A rare chance to visit a unique California habitat

STEVE MCCABE DROPPED TO HIS knees in the sand next to a small, scraggly Ben Lomond wallflower, squinting at it through a magnifying glass. The UC Santa Cruz botanist was kneeling on a sandy knoll in the heart of one of California's rarest and most fascinating natural habitats, the "sand islands" of the Santa Cruz Mountains. This vestpocket habitat nurtures plants and animals that interact in a Darwinian marvel of adaptation and survival.

These unique landlocked dunes -- created tens of thousands of years ago when coastal dunes were uplifted away from the ocean as the Santa Cruz Mountains were formed -- gradually became biological "islands" surrounded by mixed evergreen and redwood forests. The rounded, almost bald-looking domes, which scientists call sand parklands, are home to about 90 species of plants; two of them are listed as endangered by the federal government.

Many of the species are distinctive either as relics from another age or because they have adapted uniquely to the isolated environment. McCabe pointed to a variety of ponderosa pine that grows only on the sand parklands; it's different enough from its Sierra Nevada cousins that some botanists consider it a separate species. McCabe believes it is a remnant of coastal ponderosa pine forests that disappeared thousands of years ago as the local climate and geography changed.

Other plant and animal species have adapted more dramatically. McCabe's favorite adaptive example is the caterpillar of the rare Smith's blue butterfly, which feeds on a rare naked-stem buckwheat found in this area. Several sand-parkland inhabitants, including silverleaf manzanita, the Mount Hermon June beetle, and the wallflower McCabe pointed out, are found nowhere else in the world.

Years of sand mining in the mountains have reduced undisturbed sand-parkland habitat from some 500 acres to about 50, most of which are on a 35-acre knoll called South Ridge. County officials and local environmental groups have agreed to purchase the property for $3.2 million; they have until July 1, 1998, to raise the money.

RARE TOUR OF A SAND PARKLAND

Sand parklands, inherently fragile, are not generally open to the public. But this spring, visitors can take a specially guided 2-hour hike into the protected sand-parkland habitat at Quail Hollow Ranch County Park near Felton, 7 miles north of Santa Cruz.

The 1 1/2-mile walk climbs through oak woodlands to the heart of a sandy ridge that, by April, should be yellow with poppies and wallflowers and speckled with blooms of lupine and coyote mint. Docents will explain local plant relationships and ongoing sand-parkland research. From the top of the ridge, you'll get a sweeping cross-valley view that includes the scarred, working sandpits of Kaiser and Lone Star quarries and the balding dome of South Ridge. The free hikes are scheduled for I P.M. March 30, April 13 and 27, and May 4; for reservations or more park information, call (408) 462- 8324 during business hours Mondays or Fridays. Quail Hollow is open from 10 to 4 on weekends. Besides the protected habitat, the park has 4 miles of public trails, a historic ranch house visitor center, and picnic areas.

By Jeff Phillips

p. 36L S U N S E T      March 1996

Photos omitted: caption Walkers on these former coastal dunes encounter rare and variant plant species (at left, a uniquely adapted California poppy).