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THE CALIFORNIA ACORN REPORT

Vol. 6                          The Official Newsletter of the California Acorn Survey©                  25 Sept. 2002

Walt Koenig and Jean Knops, co-directors

Editor: Walt Koenig

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ACORNS: THE FINAL FRONTIER

You'll be relieved to learn that it is indeed time to switch off your computers and go count some acorns! Contrary to popular opinion, it's a great family activity. Just ask my daughter Phoebe, who got the nod this year to accompany me to the Twin Cities for the Minnesota Division of the California Acorn Survey©. She loved every minute of it, particularly since she, like Dale last year, was kidnapped by her Aunt Laurie the moment we got out of the airport and avoided any pretense of academic endeavor until we met on Monday to examine in sickening detail the infinite variety of deep-fried, artery-clogging food-like substances the Minnesota State Fair has to offer.

Until then, Laurie introduced Phoebe to the wonders of the Mall of America while Jean and I went out for dinner at a reasonable seafood restaurant in St. Paul and then headed north to Cedar Creek. This is year 8 for the acorn count there, which we currently pursue largely out of inertia. Actually, Jean puts up with it because he still does much of his research at Cedar Creek, while I like it because I get to visit old friends and spend half a day at the Fair. Beyond these essentials, we spend a full day counting some 213 trees of four species of oaks (primarily bur and pin, with a few white and red oaks thrown in for variety) spread out over seven plots differing in the frequency with which they are burned. The obvious rationale for the study would appear to be whether burning, or different burn regimes, affect the acorn crop. Unfortunately, the answer is pretty clearly no. Having resolved this fairly lame issue, we apparently continue the study largely because neither one of us has felt like writing up the Central Minnesotan Naturalist paper that all those years of counting are destined to produce. Maybe after next year.

But I digress. Worse yet, I verge on being downbeat about the start of the most exhilarating event of the year: acorns! Just the thought is enough to inspire poetry of a sort that is generally suppressed by prevailing social mores, if not congressional decree:

            They're bitter as all heck

            And fall all over your deck

            Acorns! Acorns! Acorns!

            This year they're everywhere

            While last saw none to spare

            Acorns! Acorns! Acorns!

            We count them in the trees

            We balance them on our knees

            Acorns! Acorns! Acorns!

            They feeds the tiny mice

            Birds too find them quite nice

            Acorns! Acorns! Acorns!

            A miracle is each one

            Once the leaching is done

            Acorns! Acorns! Acorns!

Can you believe I just made that up? I thought you could. In the unlikely event that you're inspired, I'd be happy to consider submissions of acorn poetry for future volumes of The California Acorn Report.

Poetic or not, we counted all the Minnesota acorns there were to count on Sunday 25 August. As usual, some trees had acorns and others didn't; Jean keeps the data and having counted over 1,000 trees since then I can't remember much more than that. I do remember that while the Cedar Creek landscape was charming, the mosquitoes were small, abundant, and nasty. It made us wish for face flies, a desire that was soon to be granted once the California Acorn Survey© returned to its native soil.

As for food, lunch at Cedar Creek is basically limited to The Creamery in bustling downtown Isanti, about 5 miles north. Having blissfully lost my notes on the inimitable “Meatballs with [instant] mashed potatoes and [canned] mixed vegetables” special that I was talked into getting, I'll spare you a review, and instead spotlight the town.

Live long and prosper! Yours truly gives his intergalactically-renowned greeting from the hub of Isanti while waiting for a table at The Creamery, on the corner at the right.

Isanti is a classic Midwestern city that apparently used to be someplace but isn't anymore. Currently you can get a good view of almost everything in town by standing, sitting, or even lying down in the middle of Main Street. This is, admittedly, true in Carmel Valley as well. The difference is that there isn't a lot of competition for your spot in downtown Isanti and you can pretty much lie there for as long as you want without getting in anyone's way. It's a great candidate for a pedestrian mall, except for the fact that there aren't really any pedestrians either, much less any functional stores.

Lunch in Isanti is only one of the many traditions that drip from every cap of the California Acorn Survey©. Two other traditions of the Minnesota Division include “Dinner at Bob's” on Sunday night and “Morning at the Fair” on Monday. Bob Zink, an old grad school friend, is still seriously into taking out his constitutional right to bear arms on the local wildlife. This year, he fried up a truly outstanding set of bacon-wrapped avian tidbits, including snow goose, which I highly recommend, and woodcock. As usual, Bob's stories of hunting excess make for a hilarious evening; just don't drive up wearing your deer suit unless you're prepared to dodge a couple of arrows aimed directly at your heart.

And then there's the Fair! (Better run; I feel another poem coming on….) Jean's teaching schedule may require that we move the Minnesota Division up a week next year, in which case this could be the last time the State Fair will be part of the package. If so, Jean promises that it will still be possible to find minidonuts, but what about deep-fried candybars? Or chocolate-covered waffles on a stick? Certainly nothing can replace the Epiphany Country Diner, and where else in Minnesota will we find Australian Battered Potatoes? And, most importantly, where will we heed nature's call if not at the Charmin restrooms?

Phoebe, the 2002 Minidonut Queen, checks out the Tom Thumb stand at the Minnesota State Fair. Minidonuts are one of the Midwest's most lucrative exports, with over 6 million cubic yards shipped to 34 countries on 6 continents in an industry predicted to surpass $1.2 billion this year.

These philosophical issues aside, the Fair was great as always. With Phoebe to help set the agenda, we spent more time than usual checking out the rides on the Midway, at least after she gave the “Moo-letteWheel” a spin over in the Dairy Barn and went to pet the newborn piglets in the “Miracle of Life” exhibit. Why she preferred these attractions to “Monty's Traveling Reptile Show” is anyone's guess, but it was fun nonetheless and will be hard to replace.

THE PIMPMOBILE COMETH

We barely had time to celebrate Dale's birthday before Jean showed up on 4 September to kick off the Western Division of the California Acorn Survey©. And, unlike the last couple of years, Jean showed up in style: a brand-new, white, Lincoln Town Car. How can this be, you ask?

 

Who needs a climate-changing SUV when you can cruise the state counting acorns in style with a late-model Lincoln Town Car? Here it is with Jean in command at Hopland on Day 2.

It's a long story, but hey, that's what the California Acorn Report is for, so here goes. Last winter I went to a workshop run by the “Oak Woodland Conservation Group.” I always attend these things because a related organization (the Integrated Hardwoods Range Management Program) gave us money once upon a time and I figure there's always the chance they might slip up and do it again. That didn't happen, but almost as good was the attendance of Sam Blankenship, who is a Wildlife Biologist with Cal Fish and Game and has taken over the vast responsibilities of California's acorns from our previous contact, Barry Garrison. Sam immediately saw the national security implications of the California Acorn Survey© and was able to drum up support from their monitoring and assessment program, with the proviso being that we report all suspicious people seen during the survey to Sacramento. We took this latter responsibility seriously, eventually generating a 237 page report. To see if you or someone you love succeeded in making the list, check out our provisional report at www.CalAcornSurvey.com/weirdoswesawwhilecountingacorns.

With Sam's support, we left the classic, but embarrassingly unfashionable, 1989 Camry wagon home and had Jean rent a car in San Jose instead. Jean likes room to move around, so he reserved a “full-size” vehicle which was nowhere to be found once he finally showed up at the airport after a couple of delayed flights. Instead, they gave him the “luxury” model for the price of the piece of junk he'd reserved, which was pretty darn cheap since he'd done the whole thing through Hotwire. Hence the Pimpmobile arrived, only to instantly become an indelible part of the California Acorn Survey© legend.

And I must say, it was awfully comfortable. The mileage wasn't bad either given that the car is the size of several eastern states. It even made it on the various dirt roads we navigate in the course of the survey, although in order to do so one has to slow to a crawl from the normal cruising speed of around Warp 7. It's quiet enough to sleep in, an activity facilitated by the ability of the back seat to accommodate a king-size canopy bed. The only problem is that the trunk is so big we kept losing entire suitcases full of food, nothing that a few hours and a small crane couldn't resolve. In any case, we highly recommend it for all your acorn counting needs. And we mean that, at least insofar as our coveted endorsement might convince the Ford Motor Company to sign up as a corporate sponsor for next year.

Before we move on, however, we wish to give our heartfelt thanks by reinstating CF&G as The Official Fish & Game Department of the California Acorn Survey©, joining previous winners including California (the official state) and oaks (the official tree). Good job, Sam!

COUNTING THE HOMELAND

With Jean in California, it was time to get serious. First off, we finally got off our duffs and went up to Chews Ridge a few miles from Hastings to add a tanoak site to the survey. Tanoaks are of particular interest these days because they're especially susceptible to the dreaded Sudden Oak Death that has killed so many trees in nearby Big Sur and Santa Cruz. We noted no comparable mortality on Chews Ridge, but figured we should get some data on acorn production before the species disappears from under our noses.

They're kind of funny looking, but they're still acorns. A juicy tanoak acorn along upper Tassajara Road just down from Chews Ridge.

With 20 individuals now marked and counted, we can officially embrace this new genus (Lithocarpus) to the California Acorn Survey©. Lithocarpus is an interesting taxon, by the way, with some 100 species confined (with the exception of our L. densiflora) to southeastern Asia from southern Japan and southern China through the Malay Peninsula and the Indian Archipelago. In other words, along with the three species of redwoods, similarly distributed in California and China, tanoaks provide convincing evidence for either continental drift or an ancient race of international arboriculturists who devoted an inordinate amount of time cultivating trees on both sides of the Pacific rim. Tanoak, along with black, canyon live, and interior live oaks, requires two years to mature acorns. Whether or not the genus, like Quercus, is variable in this respect and contains both “1-year” as well as “2-year” species is a good question, but one that will have to wait to be answered until a subsequent volume of The California Acorn Report, if then.

Upper Carmel Valley and the Sierra de Salinas from just below Chews Ridge. Hasting Reservation, one of our two international headquarters, aka “the Homeland,” is near the center of the photo.

We reserved Friday and Saturday for the main count, for which 2002 represented year 23. Yes it's true: only 5 more years and I'll have been counting acorns for half my life. I'm also looking forward to the day when we drag one of my field assistants out who was born after the California Acorn Survey was initiated in 1980, but this year wasn't quite it: Patricia Hartman, my woodpecker assistant who helped set up the tanoak site and accompanied with us on Friday, was close but just a tad too senior for this distinction. Next year, perhaps.

Jean, Patricia, and I counted the Arnold and both hills (Haystack and School) on Friday, ending traditionally at Red House where Bill Carmen was once again not around to deliver his trademark gin and tonics. This oversight was corrected on Saturday, when Bill showed up with his virtually grown-up offspring to both finish off the count and mix up the drinks afterwards.

As you may recall, our version of acorn counting (patent pending) involves having two observers count as many acorns as they can in each tree for 15 seconds (30 seconds total). Observers are trained and certified professionals; please do not try this at home. How many acorns did we count, you ask? The answer is 7,511. A more difficult question: how many acorns have we counted at Hastings over the lifetime of the survey? Let's make this the subject of the annual (usually unannounced) contest of the 2002 California Acorn Report. To be precise: how many acorns has the California Acorn Survey© team counted at Hastings Reservation in the 23 years of its existence between 1980 and 2002, inclusive? Submit your guess via courier to either of our international offices no later than midnight, 31 August 2003. The contest is absolutely free, but please be sure to include a nominal $100 processing fee (cashier's check or money order only). Contestants need not be subscribers to The California Acorn Report, and the winner will receive a prize, the nature of which remains to be determined. Please do not forget the completely nominal processing fee. Decisions of the judges are final. Did I forget to remind all of you to include the (totally nominal) processing fee?

FASHION TIPS: EYEBROWS

Part of the role of The California Acorn Report is to expand international appreciation of the rigors of counting acorns. For example, few recognize the detail and planning that goes into getting our eyebrows just right for the occasion. One apparently benign eyebrow hair out of place and Pow! The whole survey has to be redone.

It's more than worth the effort required to get those eyebrows color-coordinated and perfectly aligned. From the top: Jean, Bill, and yours truly show off what months of plucking and countless hours at beauty salons can do.

Notice, for example, the European flair with which Jean's set off his beguiling Dutch complexion, while Bill sports the bold, dark look expected of a Marin County professional. Meanwhile, mine perfectly complement the hairdo produced by hours under the terror of The Mildew Hat™. Getting those eyebrows just right for you may seem overwhelming; fortunately, there are now many resources and clinics that can help. For more information, see www.CalAcornSurvey.com/FashionTips/eyebrows.html.

IT'S A PARTY!

There were two reasons why we felt obliged to complete the Hastings count on Saturday instead of mid-day Sunday, as is traditional. The first was because Jean and I had decided that in order to avoid spending the better part of Monday morning stuck in the inevitable traffic crunch on 101 at Morgan Hill on our way to Jasper Ridge we should instead drive up to the Bay Area on Sunday night. The second, more cogent reason was that Sunday was Phoebe's birthday, and her party was being held at the Monterey Sports Center. In any case, finishing up early meant that Bill could hang out with his kids on Sunday, while we could all celebrate Saturday night with a game of Taboo, a charades-type game where you try to get your partners to correctly guess a word or phrase as quickly as possible without using certain key words. For example, the word might be “acorn” but you can't use “acorn,” “tree,” “fruit,” “oak,” or “seed.” Try it; it's fun. (“They grow on tall plants in the fall and are counted annually by strange guys wearing mildewy hats.”) OK, so that one's easy. But you get the picture. With Jean, Phoebe, Natalie, and Sophia on one team and Bill, Janis, and yours truly on the other, it was no contest: we got creamed. They must have cheated; I still can't believe I was supposed to be able to get people to guess “Kolmogorov-Smirnov 1-sample test” without being able to use “statistics,” “non-parametric,” “Sokal and Rohlf,” or “vodka.”

THE PIMPMOBILE TOURS CALIFORNIA

Sunday after the party we met up at El Migeleño, one of our favorite local El Savadoran restaurants. Afterwards Jean and I immediately headed up to Los Altos for the night. Despite fearing that we might end up getting stuck in traffic, the trip was uneventful and allowed us not only to enjoy the evening with my old college friends Robert and Tania but have a wonderful breakfast (Tania's plum coffee cake puts pretty much everything else we eat the rest of the year to shame) and still make it over to Jasper Ridge rested and alert the next morning.

I fear this means that once again we conducted the statewide division in the clockwise direction. As always, this was the subject of considerable controversy within, and a great deal of litigation against, the Executive Committee of the California Acorn Survey©. We would like to thank all the lawyers who helped on both sides, particularly the Clovis, California firm of Jones, Smith, and Withershins who provided a particularly impassioned pro bono brief supporting the public benefits of performing the survey counterclockwise. In the end, however, it was the pure joy of knowing that once again we could avoid paying the $3 toll on the Golden Gate Bridge that convinced me to stick with tradition. My only worry is that there might be a special transit police force whose job it is to track down people who only drive across Bay Area toll bridges in the free direction, and that we're going to be nailed one of these years and hit with a huge fine for flaunting something along the lines of “San Francisco City Ordinance 15436.2: no person or persons shall conspire to avoid paying charges on any toll bridge or roadway by always traveling in a clockwise direction.”

Maybe next year we'll finally break down and see what the state looks like going the other way. This may depend on how many of you enter the contest to guess the number acorns we've counted over the years; please don't forget to include at least one, and preferably several, (absolutely nominal) $100 processing fees with your entry. Speaking of which, it's time to celebrate the winner of last year's unannounced contest to guess the exact time that we would first reach the Golden Gate Bridge on the 2002 survey. Our winner, picked from the many responses we had to the 2001 California Acorn Report, was long-time subscriber Ms. Wanda Hinckelmeyer of Woonsocket, South Dakota, whose entry, dated 4 December 2001, 9:20 am (“Please take me off your mailing list immediately or I will have no choice but to refer the matter to my attorneys”) came closest to 9 September 2002, 1:52 pm, the moment we breezed onto the Golden Gate Bridge heading north (thus avoiding the toll) on 101. Wanda wins a bag of frozen acorns that's been in one of the DNA lab freezers since 1987, while both she and her lawyer get lifetime subscriptions to The California Acorn Report. Thanks, Wanda, and keep up the good work!

With that, let's move on to what has become one of the most revered, not to mention bizarrely out of context, sections of The California Acorn Report©.

THE ANNUAL RESTAURANT REVIEW

This year found us at several new restaurants as well as a couple of old favorites. The old ones (Clearwater Seafoods in Pasadena and McPhee's in Templeton) which we've reviewed in prior issues, were both revisited because they're so good that they keep us going regardless of the other dives we end up in. We were also able to partake of a wonderful dinner in Three Rivers provided by Eric Knapp, one of Kevin Rice's former post-docs who's now working for Jon Keeley in Sequoia National Park. Regrettably, we again failed to make it to Davis for a repeat of our legendary 2000 dinner at Chez Brad et Louise. I'm also sorry to report that the latter's expansion (which they had planned to fund with what turned out to be thousands of worthless UC Davis stock options) has fallen through. This means that the alligator wrestling pit is on hold. The good news is that the dining room reportedly remains as charming and intimate as ever.

Speaking of reviews, many of you have written to inquire about the objectivity of our restaurant reviewing methodology. Unlike many lesser reviewers who try to keep their identities secret, we make a point of bringing in notebooks, writing copiously whenever the waitperson is in the vicinity, and asking pointed questions about a restaurant's sanitation habits whenever we review for The California Acorn Report. Unfortunately, this technique has yet to pay off in terms of having waiters frantically running around speaking in hushed tones as they serve us gourmet dishes on the house that we haven't ordered. We'll keep trying, but in the meantime, this is what allows us to provide you, our subscribers, with the kind of in-depth reviews you have come to expect from The California Acorn Report. This year we review five.

Café Bakery and Restaurant, 1345-65 Noriega St., San Francisco.

Long-time subscribers have acclimated to the fact that we eat the first lunch of the statewide survey in San Francisco somewhere off 19^th Ave. on the way to Hopland. Over the years we've ended up in some pretty funky places, but Café Bakery and Restaurant outdoes them all. We chose it because it was bustling with Asian types sitting at long tables eating what we thought was Vietnamese food. Instead, the menu turned out to include an almost uncategorizable mix of practically anything and everything. The day's specials, for example, included rib-eye steak and chicken spaghetti (with “XO” sauce, whoever he was), while the regular fare included lasagna, schnitzel, and borscht. Borscht? We began to suspect that this might not be traditional Vietnamese cuisine after all.

Jean ordered curry brisket as a main course with escargot as an hors d'oeuvres, while I went for the chicken teryaki. Both came with soup of the day (cabbage/carrot/tomato), a choice of carbohydrate (white rice or spaghetti), mixed vegetables (canned; apparently they were leftovers from The Creamery in Isanti) and, incredibly enough, a desert consisting of a canned fruit entombed in a small bowl of red jello. Now that I've taken your breath away, allow me to admit that the chicken was fine and that Jean's escargot, baked in a pastry shell, was really quite good. Nonetheless, we left vowing that next year we would pick out a nice place in San Francisco beforehand.

We also went next door to the bakery itself, which was brimming with pastries filled with miscellaneous food-like substances. Jean, who is remarkably game for this kind of stuff, bought several, and even ate a couple along the road the next day before heaving the rest out for the bears. Rating: 1 acorn.

Raging Fork Riverfront Grille, On the Sacramento River, Red Bluff.

While heading south on I-5 after counting at Whiskeytown we attempted to follow the signs for “historic Red Bluff” only to find ourselves in the middle of a rather decrepit city that may have been nice about 75 years ago. We eventually gave up looking for the charming historic district and turned toward the river, at which point we stumbled upon Raging Fork. I admit that we were pretty desperate, but it looked reasonable despite the “Cowboy hats welcome” sign over the front door. Things started to look up when I noticed “steamer clams” on the menu. “Where do they come from?” I asked. “The kitchen,” our waitress replied. We should have bolted then, but no, we stuck it out. And yes, as we suspected, the steamer clams were not the large eastern “steamers” Janis, Dale, and I stuffed ourselves with in Maine this summer; they were but humble, misnamed cherrystones. The good news is that they were cooked in a nice lemon butter sauce and served in a decorative bread bowl, but still, it was a letdown from which it was hard to recover.

And we didn't. My New York Steak was fine, but the garlic mashed potatoes were bizarre (albeit reputedly made from real potatoes) while the mixed grilled vegetables (mostly squash) were in part raw and otherwise viciously overcooked. Jean, meanwhile, had duck l'orange chipotle, which sounded promising but had hardly any zip to it, which, given how hot chipotles are, must have been a goal the chef worked hard to achieve. Now the good news: the deck was quite nice, offering a peaceful view of the river that was marred only slightly by traffic on the nearby bridge. Rating: 1.5 acorns.

Oakdale Brewing Company, 160 N. Third Ave., Oakdale.

Despite my beer allergy, The California Acorn Survey© has a weakness for microbreweries, which led us to the Oakdale Brewing Company on Wednesday evening on our way down from Sierra Foothills. Immediately disturbing was the lack of a useable bathroom (due to “a major incident” according to our waiter; we didn't ask for details). Fortunately, they let me wash my hands in the sink at the bar. As for other necessities, the place wasn't particularly full and best I could tell everyone was taking advantage of one of the more deserted corners of the main dining room. After quickly assessing the situation, we sat outside.

Things improved temporarily with a lovely glass of ice tea and Jean's beer, which was appropriately intoxicating. From there it was all downhill. Iceberg lettuce. Bland soup. Overcooked steak. Soggy garlic French fries. Dead broccoli. “Cajun calamari” that had no seasoning whatsoever. All garnished with millions of face flies. We recommend sticking to the drinks and sitting inside, although you might want to avoid the left back corner. Rating: 1 acorn.

Pala Casino, Pala Road, San Diego County.

Next to microbreweries, The California Acorn Survey© also has a thing for casinos, which were sparse the first couple of years but since the passing of the Casino Gambling Initiative of 1998 and the California Indian Casino Law of 2000 they've sprung up fast. Consider the Pauma Valley in San Diego County, which used to be home to several sleepy (and admittedly quite depressed) Indian Reservations, Mission San Antonio de Pala (a substation of Mission San Luis Rey and the only one of the original Spanish missions still catering to Native Americans rather than to tourists) and family ventures along the lines of “Cupid's Garden Bed and Breakfast” and the ever-mysterious “Wilderness Gardens Preserve.” This has all changed; in fact, the guy at the motel in Fallbrook made a point of giving us a “gaming tour” map providing directions to four major casinos already in the area. The one we checked out was the Pala Casino, primarily because it's on the way to our site up on Mount Palomar, Jean was desperate for a good cup of coffee, and we had the entire $3 we saved from going over the Golden Gate Bridge in the free direction burning holes in our pockets.

And it's quite a place. Uniformed guards greeted us cheerfully at the entrance with only the briefest of glances at the Mildew Hat™. The coffee was good and the bearclaws were just the ticket for breakfast. For lunch on the way back down we were a bit less fortunate; both Jean's foot-long hot dog and my Philly cheesesteak were serviceable but not much more. On the other hand, we sat outside on a lovely deck overlooking the river (which they must have dammed; the place is dry as a bone that time of year), and there appeared to be several other potential lunch opportunities (including the enticingly-named “Oak Room”) that may turn out to be better.

Of course, the food was not the primary attraction. Rather, it was the opportunity to invest some money on the off chance that we might win enough to support a future edition of The California Acorn Survey©. Surprisingly, this was not destined to be the case. My $1.50 disappeared disturbingly quickly in the “Multi Poker” machines, while Jean, after losing 75¢ of his own, staged a comeback and won $1.25 on his next round, eventually walking out of the place exactly even. Needless to say, our rating of this place depends largely on our luck at the slots, which this year could have been worse. Rating: 1.5 acorns.

The Hitching Post, 406 E. Hwy 246, Buellton.

When we arrived at this popular steak joint it was packed with old guys wearing flowery Hawaiian shirts, making us suspect we'd stumbled into the middle of the banquet for a Danish-Hawaiian polka festival taking place in nearby Solvang. Despite the clientele, the quality of which admittedly did not improve with our arrival, the place was pretty good. In particular, the relish tray was reminiscent of the ones Will's Fargo gives you in Carmel Valley. Since Will, who has since moved on to that great oak woodland in the sky, married Janis and me, I have a soft spot for anyplace that reminds me of his old restaurant. Beyond that, there's not a whole lot to report. Meals come with a refreshing shrimp cocktail, the salad does not consist of iceberg lettuce, and the steaks (I had a “flat iron,” while Jean had a top sirloin) were excellent. Perhaps next year we'll check out ostrich (“the meat of the future”) steaks, or maybe not. In any case, if you want steak and don't mind jostling with the Hawaiian shirt crowd, this is the place for you. Rating: 3 acorns.

MEANWHILE WE COUNTED. AND COUNTED

Along with tanoaks, we simply had to add an Oregon oak (Q. garryana) site in order to complete our sampling of all the major acorn producing trees in California. Unfortunately, adding sites is rarely easy. We called several people prior to departure but had little success in finding the perfect location. Meanwhile, the Oaks of California book that served us so well in the past offers nothing definitive in the way of a site for Oregon oaks that wasn't way out of our way. In the end, despite vows to the contrary, we again went north on 101 after Hopland rather than cut across to I-5, a route that is attractive but way longer. After several aborted attempts and a lot of arguing over what was and wasn't an Oregon oak, we finally settled on 2 sites in Trinity County off of Hwy 299 on our way back toward Tower House near Whiskeytown. With this addition, The California Division of the California Acorn Count© now officially encompasses all 9 major tree species of acorn-producing trees found in California. And it's about time, if I do say so myself.

We now count valley and blue oak at 10 sites each (235 valley oaks; 256 blue oaks), canyon live oak at 7 sites (130 individuals), coast live and black oak at 6 sites each (177 and 126 individuals, respectively), interior live oak at 5 sites (57 individuals), with Engelmann oak, Oregon oak, and tanoak filling in with 1 site and about 20 individuals each. The survey extends over some 18 sites from Trinity and Shasta Counties in the north to San Diego County in the south and includes a grand total of 1,040 trees, thereby surpassing even the decadent acorn counting orgies of the ancient Roman Empire.

This year we drove 2,261 miles and counted a grand total (excluding Hastings and Chews Ridge) of 18,706 acorns, or 8.27 acorns per mile. This was a significant improvement over the 5.93 acorns per mile we achieved in 2001, but far below the excellent Y2K count of 10.99 acorns per mile. In contrast to 2001, when I came from behind to beat Jean with 6,618 acorns to his 6,370, Jean won the count this year with 9,547 acorns to my 9,159.

Normally I would demand a recount, but I admit that we were ready to call it quits by the time we rolled back into Hastings after a solid week on the road. The first night, up in Los Altos, was great. Night 2 found Hopland packed with what must have been 500 students from a UC Davis archaeology field class, forcing us to stay in Ukiah. We camped on nights 3 and 4, first at Dye Creek and then at Crane Flat in Yosemite. We were pretty grungy by that point, but Eric Knapp graciously put us up at his house in Three Rivers on night 5. Night 6 was at the motel in Fallbrook, while the last was spent thrashing around at Sedgwick. By the way, our special apologies go to manager Peter Hujik (in photo) at Dye Creek and the guy trying to sleep at Sedgwick, both of whom we intruded upon while figuring out where we were supposed to be. Both places were great, so we promise to resolve this issue by next year.

SPOTLIGHT ON: POZO

In 1989, when we finally decided to branch out from Hastings and add some geographic diversity to The California Acorn Survey©, Jasper Ridge was the obvious site to add north of Hastings. South was a different matter, and eventually Pam Muick suggested that we try Pozo, down in San Luis Obispo County.

So, on 11 October 1989, Mark Stanback and I drove down there and took a look. At Santa Margarita, just north of the Cuesta Grade and San Luis Obispo, you get off 101 and head east. After going through town you turn south on Pozo Road and drive some 10 or 15 miles through a lot of lovely oak woodland until you get to Pozo itself, a two-company town dominated by the Pozo Saloon (on the left) and the Pozo Ranger Station. The Saloon alone was enough to sell us on the place, but it gets even better as one continues east until you get to a gate that's normally locked but left open during hunting season. We mention this because, although it's always worked out so far, getting the key to the gate in years when we've counted in late September has sometimes proved problematical. Fortunately, the contacts we made at the Ranger Station have been accommodating and we've generally been able to borrow a key there. One year, however, we made the mistake of calling the main Ranger Station in Santa Maria where some bozo (from Pozo?) told us we'd better go down and get a key from him. We proceeded to drive way out of the way only to be told (correctly) that the gate was unlocked. Then there was the year we made it to the gate without a key only to discover that it was locked.

In any case, another 5 miles beyond the gate, abutting the Machesna Mountain Wilderness, is the American Canyon where there's an old Forest Service campground. Starting there, we marked 75 trees including 25 valley, blue, and coast live oaks. Except for the campground the area appears to be mostly private land (“No Trespassing” signs keep cropping up on some of our trees and there are cattle everywhere) but we haven't run into anyone disturbed by us yet and the only downside is that the hunters like to use our tags for target practice.

Oaks along Pozo Road. Nice place, and although it seems a bit isolated, it's actually right on the way to the Carrizo Plains and McKittrick!

The first time Mark and I went to Pozo it was a great crop and we even ran across a fall acorn woodpecker nest. It was not nearly so good at Hastings that year and as a result we were misled into thinking that the geographic scale on which the acorn crop varies was much smaller than the 168 kms between Hastings and Pozo. Hence in 1990 we initiated the ill-fated Carmel to Paso Robles Transect in which we performed lightning-fast surveys of unmarked trees at 34 sites 5-10 kms apart. We continued the transect until 1993 when we finally realized that 1989 had been a fluke and that the acorn crops of Jasper Ridge, Hastings, and Pozo were all nicely synchronous. Hence the start, in 1994, of the Statewide Division of the California Acorn Survey©.

 The relationship between mean number of blue oak acorns counted at Jasper Ridge, Hastings, and Pozo. The three sites, separated by 295 kms, correlate quite well, with the main exceptions being 1989, the first year we did all 3 sites, and this year, when it was unaccountably terrible at Jasper Ridge.

Although we usually get to Pozo from Santa Margarita, there's a shortcut from the south whereby you turn at Arroyo Grande toward Lopez Canyon Dam, eventually ending up on a dirt road that goes over the Garcia Mountains and down to the Saloon. We took this route in 1999 and barely survived; the road is terrible and some of the potholes left over from the 1998 El Niño were nearly the size of our (small) car. If we ever succeed in getting that Hummer we'll try again. With anything less, take Pozo Road.

THERE MUST BE MORE

Well yes, there is. But most will have to wait, since I've already squandered the majority of space on pathetic drivel like eyebrows and acorn poetry. In order to forestall a lot of angry mail, however, here are the mean number of acorns counted in 30 seconds this year by species:

	Valley	Blue	Canyon live	Coast live	Black	Engel-mann	Interior live
2000	38.3	43.8	26.8	28.3	11.9	1.8	55.7
2001	13.6	7.2	6.8	9.9	46.2	8.0	11.9
2002	30.1	27.7	20.7	15.4	40.3	0.3	33.0
Ave.	20.9	22.8	18.8	18.0	20.4	9.4	29.4

Bottom line: it was generally an intermediate year, which tends to translate into 'some sites were good, others weren't.' Nearly all species were near their long-term average except for black oak, which did much better than average, and Engelmann oaks at the Santa Rosa Plateau, which generally looked terrible and barely had any leaves, much less acorns.

Besides acorns, we saw several other nice things on the trip. My favorite (this is for you, Brad) was the flock of 10 Lewis' woodpeckers that flew over at Dye Creek. We also saw 2 coyotes, a gray fox in the San Gabriels scavenging acorns cracked by vehicles in the parking lot, and one long-dead bear while searching for Oregon oak sites along Hwy 299. We also had a nice chat with Laurie Flowers, a former UC Davis grad student who's doing common garden studies on native grasses in Yosemite, and a farewell visit with Dick Sage at Sedgwick. Dick, after several years of great work on the fitness consequences of valley oak acorn size, is relocating this fall to Argentina. We wish him the best of luck!

Dick Sage (leaning on the Pimpmobile). After years of making fun of his field vehicle (on the left), there was more than a tad of irony in finding ourselves driving a newer version of the same model.

SCIENCE IN ACTION

The California Acorn Survey© published 2 papers this year. The first, in the recent hardwoods symposium, summarizes our extensive, but ultimately unsatisfying, work on insect parasitism of acorns (Koenig et al., 2002. Arboreal seed removal and insect damage in three California oaks. Pp. 193-204 in Proc. 5^th Symp. on Oak Woodlands: Oaks in California's Changing Landscape) while the second is a general review of seed production by oaks (Koenig and Knops, 2002. The behavioral ecology of masting in oaks. Pp. 129-148 in Oak Forest Ecosystems, W. J. McShea and W. M. Healy, eds. Johns Hopkins Univ. Press). Otherwise, I'm still chasing after acorn woodpeckers while Jean pursues the mysteries of biodiversity and keeps an eye out for any missing tetrakilos of global carbon that happen to be lying around.

AND NOW IT'S TIME…

It would appear to be a wrap for the California Acorn Report. Additional copies, prior issues, endorsements by notorious axe murderers, condemnations of the Mildew Hat™, and pictures of our summer vacation on Cape Breton Island are, as usual, graciously provided by our manager Mark Stromberg on the Hastings web site at http://www.hastingsreserve.org/OakStory/OakIntro.html. Yes, that's a real URL for a change.

FINANCIAL DISCLOSURE

The California Acorn Report is owned and operated by the California Acorn Survey© Corporation. Our goal is to monopolize the acorn counting market. Nonetheless, we deny all responsibility for the 2000 California acorn crisis. Send comments to either of our offices, including as many nominal  $100 processing fees as you wish. Our international headquarters remain:

Hastings Reservation, 38601 E. Carmel Valley Rd.

Carmel Valley, CA 93924 (831-659-5981)

wicker@uclink4.berkeley.edu

and

School of Biol. Sciences, Univ. of Nebraska, 348 Manter Hall, Lincoln, NE 68588-0118 (402-472-6449)

jknops@unl.edu

Have a great year and keep those acorns counted!