"clean-coast economy"

An apt phrase, but new to me.  I'm just taking note of it here since it seems to capture a lot of ideas in a simple phrase.

As seen in the LA Times in this opinion piece by Steve Lopez.

“I think California’s clean-coast economy is hanging on by a thread right now,” said Ocean Foundation senior fellow Richard Charter, who has worked for decades to protect coastal waters from offshore oil and gas drilling.

Google's Ngram viewer doesn't have enough results to graph "clean-coast economy" or its variants, suggesting that it's a newer term of art and a few directed searches for the phrase "clean-coast economy" suggest that it's a newer term.

Never underestimate the power of a well-made turn of phrase to capture the zeitgeist of the moment.

Surge tanks vs. rain barrels II

In this post I'm trying to estimate the usefulness of a rain barrel operated as surge tank. 

The valve is open all the time when a rain barrel is used as a surge tank.

This is a bit stream-of-consciousness, and engineering-estimate-like so just skip it if that bothers you.  It could very well be wrong too.  I'm not paid in anything other than pride for this writing gig, so fact cross-checking sometimes gets short shrift.  A little Googling provided the information used herein, and I'm sure you can find similar numbers for your area if you care to.

The first question I asked was how big must a surge tank be to capture rainfall effectively in a downpour?

Surge tanks vs. rain barrels I

 I received a few electronic solicitations to get a free rain barrel from my local water district which I promptly ignored.  As I've noted before, they aren't a particularly good investment for southern California.

However, there are a couple specific exceptions to normal situations in which a rain barrel might be a good use of resources in our climate.  One of those is when it's used as a surge tank.  Surge tanks might sound complicated, but the concept of operations for a rain barrel used as a surge tank is not that different than a rain barrel used as a reservoir.

LAX dune cleanup

We spent the morning working this beautiful area with degraded habitat near Los Angeles International Airport. I found some cool Great Horned Lizards - three or four depending upon whether I was double counting one of them or not.

Waterman Peak hike

My buddy Dan, his brother, and I took a hybrid trail + cross country route to Waterman Peak a few months ago. It's great to relive that hike today when the weather is much colder. I held on to this posting for a while in draft status because I thought I'd identify some plants, but I'm setting it free now without doing that homework.

Alaska trip - Tongass National forest

From the not in California files.














- Posted from my iPhone

Alaskan trip

Vicinity of Anchorage. Doesn't look much like home.








- Posted from my iPhone

Bugs

There were plenty of mosquitos in the Sierra. I had countermeasures.


Fortunately, mosquitoes weren't omnipresent.  More pleasant critters abounded:

Kings Canyon

I take a lot of photos when I backpack but then the question is what to do with them. I guess I'll share a few.

This looks like Paradise Valley. We backpacked up it on the outbound leg. At the point I took this photo, we were on the return leg and I finally got to see the valley from a distance.


- Posted from my iPhone

Mesembryanthemum crystallinum (common iceplant, crystalline ice plant) at Portuguese Bend

Mesembryanthemum crystallinum (common iceplant, crystalline ice plant) found adjacent to the road in at Portuguese Bend.  I had thought since I first observed it that this was a native, due to the tenacious way that it clung to seaside crevices and novel appearance of dew drops on its leaves.  I was wrong.  It's actually an invasive plant.  Wikipedia has useful information.

The plant usually uses C3 carbon fixation, but when it becomes water- or salt-stressed, it is able to switch to Crassulacean acid metabolism. Like many salt-tolerant plants, M. crystallinum accumulates salt throughout its life, in a gradient from the roots to the shoots, with the highest concentration stored in epidermal bladder cells. The salt is released by leaching once the plant dies. This results in a detrimental osmotic environment preventing the growth of other, non-salt-tolerant species while allowing M. crystallinum seeds to germinate.

Rainfall 0.30"; season total 1.85"

We had a nice rain last Thursday with 0.28" in my back yard.  It got clear for Friday when I was out backpacking with the Scouts.  It stayed clear for us, though cold - nights were near freezing.  Back at home, I'm told that there was a little rain and that's consistent with the damp yard and ponding that I came home to.  My rain gauge isn't accurate for low rainfall and I was a day or two late to measure, so I'm guessing 0.02" for a total this season of 1.85".  If I lived in Los Angeles and this were the season-end total, we would be in the lowest 1-2% of historical rainfall totals.  But I'm not and it isn't. 

More after the break.

Sunset with Lemonade Berry

This was actually how it looked - I emailed this straight from my phone last Tuesday. Amazing. It was getting dark, but I think that was a Lemonade Berry (Rhus integrifolia) in the foreground.

Self portrait in George Eff Canyon

- Posted from my iPhone

Kings Canyon 6-29-13

Kings Canyon 6-28-13

Kings Canyon 6-27-13

Kings Canyon 6-26-13

Kings Canyon 6-25-13

Kings Canyon 6-24-13

We hit the trail early the next day. The young men I traveled with were 15, 16, and 15 years old (left to right below).  This was their first long term backpack trip.

Most of the shots I will post here will not be people pictures.  Click on to the rest of the blog post to see the interesting wildlife and plants that I saw.  I may or may not get around to ID'ing the plants in this blog post.