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Extinct Wildflower Found In California
Del writes "A Berkeley graduate student found the pink wildflower Eriogonom truncatum, known as the Mount Diablo buckwheat. The flower hasn't been seen for 70 years and has been rediscovered on the flanks of Mount Diablo in Contra Costa County."
It's not really extinct. It can be found in California.
In a rare interview Eriogonom truncatum states "Reports of my death are greatly exaggerated."
Scared of flying, pointy things snce 1979!
You keep using that word, and I don't think it means what you think it does. This flower is self-evidently not extinct.
Clue : the phrase you're looking for is "Wildflower previously thought extinct".
Athletic Scholarships to universities make as much sense as academic scholarships to sports teams.
"When I took people out to see it, they just walked right by it," Park said. "They couldn't grok that the thing could be so small and dainty."
Oh.
xkcd.com - a webcomic of mathematics, love, and language.
Then the ivory-billed woodpecker thought to also be extinct ate it.
"Plans are for fools! Oglethorpe, the plutonian (Aqua Teen Hunger Force)
1 down, 831 to go.
Someone make this a geocache spot so we can stampede it into extinction once and for all!
Oh, I can't help quoting you because everything that you said rings true
You fool, John Titor brought them back on the soles of his shoes.
Wait, how far back did he go again?
So what, botany nerds/geeks don't count?
"He does look a bit Oompa like, even if his Loompa is a bit off-kilter."
It is now extinct again when scientists picked it and realised they couldn't keep it alive by putting into a glass of water.
How do we know that the original flower isn't still extinct? A new flower could have evolved back to look like the extinct flower. There is nothing in the article about testing it with a 70 year old sample.
I imagine plants must be incredibly difficult to "declare extinct", after all - how would you show for sure that none are present in a country the size of America? Whilst plants may seem to be local to a specific area because of their preference for a certain type of soil, pH or shade, it doesn't follow that, because the ones you know about are dead, then the plant is extinct. It's too easy to rush to judgement, especially when environmentalists have an interest in declaring loudly how many species are threatened or are already extinct. After reading "A State Of Fear" recently, and whilst I haven't fallen for all of Crichtons selective misrepresentations, I suspect their motivations a bit more than I used to.
Meine Schwester ist sehr, sehr reizvoll - Nietzsche
the Berkeley graduate student's girlfriend was flattered with the flower her boyfriend gave her.
Hey, I'm raising my kids to be geeks. Oh, they like computers, that goes without saying. But I'm teaching them to like biology too. Instead of teaching them to react with fear and revulsion when they see I spider, I have them look closely and count the number of pairs of eyes they can find. Once we found a daring jumping spider (Phidippus audax) in our garden. This spider is really cool. It's very active because it chases it's prey, leaping on it and killing it with it's chelicerae (fangs), which are a shiny metallic green. One of my entomologist geek friends (who likes other arthopods too), tells me they make good pets.
Nature is cool, and I don't want them to miss out. But I also have an ulterior motive. Informatics was a great field to work in in the late 20th century. It still is. But the most exciting field in this century is going to be biology and its applications.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
It's only been 70 years. Evolution does not work that fast.
I find it amazing that, of all the places that Mount Diablo Buckwheat should turn up, it'd be on the slopes of Mount Diablo.
It's funny nobody thought of looking there before...
Please tell us more facts about the future.
Sure, no problem. Here's a couple:
You still aren't going to be able to buy a flying car. You will, however, be able to invest in a company which intends to build one.
Some time between 2015 to 2025, expect the cadre of kids now in pre-school to adopt a musical style that current fans of rap will find incomprehensible and offsensive.
Perhaps they can be used to ensure that our kids don't have to work at all...
Well, by the standards of my grandparents and even my parents, what I do hardly counts as work, because it doesn't involve the daily risk of death and dismemberment and is not brutally punishing on my body. I expect that by my grandchildren's time, work will look like hanging around in coffee shop and chatting.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
Just because some particular life has evolved away (become extinct) doesn't mean that it can't come back given the right conditions
I have two problems with this.
1) It suggests that HUMANS arnt responsible for mass modern extinction, just 'changes in the holes'. Thats nonsense. We are destroying the natural world, in such a way that we are removing these niches that plants and animals formerly occupied.
2) once a plant is gone it doesnt 'rematerialize'. Its genetic advantages are lost forever. in the case of this flower, it didnt just 're-appear in a jiffy' to fill the old niche. it A) probably existed all along or B) formerly dormant seeds germinated and multiplied.
What didnt happen is one plant, sensing the niche vacant, didnt 'give birth' to the SAME species as had been extinct.
Its the same flower. not a newly created flower the same as the old one (?) or someshiat.
Extinction is the history of the earth. If a species is unsuitable for it's environment it dies out and is replaced by something else. Contrary to popular belief, no species has a right to exist.
It would only concern me if key species that humans depend on were dying out.
Deleted
Here's some evolution for you... blah blah
That is not evolution. That is adaptation.
I'd say thats a bigger discovery.. a fly that looks like a bee!
A bit late for that:
Bee Fly
You can tell it looks like a bee because it's fat and fuzzy, unlike the insect in the flower picture, but here's one that looks like a wasp:
Wasp Fly
Sorry, but science has already been there and done that.
KFG
Adaptation is a change in behavior.
Evolution is a chage of genetics.
With the example of your birds, think: Do baby birds get born with the advantage? If no, it's adaptation (And they are certainly not born knowing lawnmowers = food. That is learned behavior)
If you can't see the value in jet powered ants you should turn in your nerd card. - Dunbal (464142)
You must be kidding! This is California. Most likely, environmentalists would displace all residents within 100 miles of a buckwheat plant and raze their homes to make sure it isn't threatened. Next, they'll lobby for a "Mount Diablo Buckwheat Awareness Week" and "Mount Diablo Sensitivity Training" in all grade schools and corporations.
Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
Please give us an example of a past mass extinction in which the dominant species on earth continued to be so after the extinction occurred. You can define "dominant" fairly loosely and still not find such an event in world history. (If you'd like to get as far as "sharks and turtles are the dominant forms of life on earth," or "bacteria rule the earth," then I guess you'll find this looming new mass extinction reassuring...)
The completely obvious point that heads-in-the-sand "it doesn't concern me" types refuse to hear, despite every environmentalist for the last 30 years making it, is that there is a massive danger to human beings in a drastic reduction of biodiversity. It threatens us, as a species.
Earth will come through it. Earth has sustained life at much higher temperatures than at present, for example. That doesn't mean global warming wouldn't radically destabilize human civilization. It's a question of whether we would live through those changes. It's self-interest.
"Fundamentalism" isn't about divine morality. It's about human authority.
And delicious (burp).
If there are any Geeks out there intrested in all things plant like and informatics then they might be intrested in the permaculture.info project. Were hoping to build a community driven online database of plants and their relationships, together with a host of related information and features. Theres been quite a lot of interesting ideas floating around with visual representation of data, distributed events and link systems. Theres a good few chalanges ahead especially in the relms of knowledege representation. Email me or see the website for details.
There are four sorts of people in the world: fools, lunatics, idiots and morons. - Umberto Eco, Foucaut's pendulum.
Story here
Not to mention the fact that people can barely drive the cars that don't fly.
"You spoony bard!" -Tellah
Don't be so sure this is actually the once-thought-extinct flower they say it is, because fact-checking doesn't seem to be this article-writer's strong point: notice that the caption on the picture of what is clearly a bee sitting on the flower says that it is "a fly".
Of course, that may be the rare and once-thought-extinct beefly, who mimicks bees the same way a viceroy butterfly mimics monarch butterflies...
I have rediscovered the beefly! Hooray for me!
once they get to the sea, they better have good stamina because after that much longer run to the water they still have to elude marine prey.
I think you meant predators. As eluding prey would mean hiding from your food source.
Thanks to the internet, we can now all die alone together! -SomeWoman
Come on all you natural philosphers. What do you say?
The best words on this issue have already been spoken. Charles Williams Beebe says:
"The beauty and genius of a work of art may be reconceived though its first material expression be destroyed. A vanished harmony may yet again inspire the composer, but when the last individual of a race of living beings breathes no more, another heaven and earth must pass before such a one can be again."
- Hail to our fearless misleader! Fool speed ahead!
Agreed...but jumping spiders are probably a bit too agile and quick to be kept in a container even such as an aquarium. Perhaps if you were keeping them only for a few days for observation, then maybe, but for longer than that, I'd suggest any of the funnel weaving species (or the wolf spiders you mention) that you'd find in your basement first. They're already aclimatized to your indoor temperature, and they're used to living long periods without food.
Orb weavers (the spiral web weavers) are best kept outdoors, but they tend to have fairly permanent homes that you can feed and observe every day in the same spot.