Wayfarers All

A vast flock of gulls take wing at Westward Beach. as summer gives way to autumn, the air is full of the rustle of wings as feathered pilgrims arrive and depart. All photos © 2015 S. Guldimann

The Water Rat was restless, and he did not exactly know why. To all appearance the summer’s pomp was still at fullest height, and although in the tilled acres green had given way to gold, though the rowens were reddening, and the woods were dashed here and there with a tawny fierceness, yet light and warmth and colour were still present in undiminished measure, clean of any chilly premonitions of the passing year. But the constant chorus of the orchards and hedges had shrunk to a casual evensong from a few yet unwearied performers; the robin was beginning to assert himself once more; and there was a feeling in the air of change and departure. 

The cuckoo, of course, had long been silent; but many another feathered friend, for months a part of the familiar landscape and its small society, was missing too, and it seemed that the ranks thinned steadily day by day. Rat, ever observant of all winged movement, saw that it was taking daily a southing tendency; and even as he lay in bed at night he thought he could make out, passing in the darkness overhead, the beat and quiver of impatient pinions, obedient to the peremptory call.

—Kenneth Graham, The Wind in the Willows, Chapter 9, Wayfarers All

Malibu is a long way from Graham's much-loved English river bank, but here, too, there is a feeling in the air of change and departure, as August gives way to autumn.  

In the garden, the first red leaves have appeared on the liquidambar tree, and the pomegranates are almost ripe, their red rinds burned brown by the hot weather.

The leaves of the liquidambar tree in the garden are already touched with autumn color. 

The parrots that nested in the eucalyptus tree have successfully raised their young and departed. I am surprised to find how much I miss their chatter. 

The family of parrots that nested in the eucalyptus tree were the Malibu Post's summer alarm clock. The young ones woke at six each morning and let the world know that they were hungry. Both chicks were successfully raised and fledged, much to everyone's relief and the nest is empty and quiet. 

I snapped this photo on fledging day, as the young ones took wing for the first time. The garden seems strangely bereft now that they've moved on. I miss their cheerful ebullience, if not their early hours.

The oak titmice are back in possession of the garden, their harsh scolding cries are the dominant sound, forming a counterpoint to the Geiger-counter-like tick-tick-tick of the dark-eyed juncos and the chirping of the ever busy bushtits. 

The small but feisty oak titmouse is the undisputed boss of the garden at the moment. You can hear its distinctive voice here.

The crows, having spent the summer paired up raising their young, have begun gathering in the eucalyptus trees to conduct their end of summer conclaves. They fill the sky with dark wings and harsh calls, while below them, the air is alive with butterflies and dragonflies.

Last September, the Malibu Post took a look at a number of fall butterfly species in the entry called Folk of the Air. This year, autumn butterfly season seems to be peaking early. Here's a look at what we've seen so far.

This is the beautiful California sister, Adelpha californica. In the garden, it's drawn to water or mud, where it can be found "puddling, or sipping at the salts and minerals. They also seem to like ripe fruit, but the caterpillars feed exclusively on live oaks. 

The anise swallowtail, Papilio zelicaon, gets its name from its primary caterpillar host plant, although caterpillars can thrive on almost any member of the parsley and carrot family and even on some types of citrus. It's easy to distinguish this butterfly from the four other local species of swallowtail because the coloring is black and yellow, instead of yellow and black. Adults can be found anywhere there is a source of nectar and are common garden visitors, although this one was spotted at Malibu Bluffs Park.

This is the Western tiger swallowtail, Papilio rutulus, named for its tiger-like stripes. There's a paler and less common version of this species that is unimaginatively but accurately named the pale tiger swallowtail. This butterfly is often seen puddling at the edge of pools or on muddy ground. Unlike the anise swallowtail, tiger caterpillars feed on willow and cottonwood leaves. Adults are attracted to garden flowers. I photographed this one in the blueberry bushes at the Thorne Family Farm in Bonsall Canyon.

The mourning cloak, Nymphalis antiopa, seems to prefer tree sap to flower nectar, but they are sometimes found sampling the flowers in the garden and they appear to love the juice of overripe fruit. Mourning cloak caterpillars feed on willow leaves.

The Gulf fritillary butterfly, Agraulis vanillae, is native to Mexico and the American South, but the popularity of passion flower vines—the caterpillar's host—as a garden plant in California and other parts of the west has extended this colorful butterfly's range. Adult butterflies are attracted to garden flowers. This one is visiting a Cedros Island verbena we planted as a nectar plant on the advice of Bob Sussman, whose Marillija Nursery specializes in native and drought tolerant plants.

The light patches on the underside of the Gulf fritillary's wings are actually a metallic silver color.

The fiery skipper, Hylephila phyleus, may not be large and colorful, but it's by far the most common garden butterfly in Malibu. Like the fritillary, this skipper was attracted to the Cedros Island verbena. Native and lawn grass are the host plants for this prolific little butterfly.

We have a bewildering number of dragonfly species in Southern California, but I think this is a female variegated meadowhawk, Sympetrum corruptum, a medium-sized dragonfly that is a common garden visitor. Males of this species are a vivid orange. 

This is a species of darning needle, or damselfly, the smaller cousin of the dragonflies. Instead of being constantly in motion, its hunting strategy seems to involve finding a good lookout post and waiting for its prey to come within striking distance. All dragonflies are exceptional hunters and many species love to feed on things that humans find annoying, like gnats and mosquitos, making them welcome garden residents.

Although the weather and the water are warm, there are signs of autumn at the beach as well. 

The terns are here, wheeling and diving and filling the air with their haunting cries. They have wide expanses of sand and sea to themselves for much of the day, now that most schools are back in session.

An elegant tern spies a fish, dives, and launches itself back into the air all in the space of seconds. You can see the water droplets in the last photo, as the bird somehow shifts from swimming to flying again. 

The end of summer signals the beginning of sunset season, as every evening the sun sets farther west.

In mid July, the sun still sets far to the northwest, behind the mountains. Having a large chunk of California in the way means that, no matter how much potential there may be for a good sunset—like this one, the mountains block the view from Malibu beaches.

By mid August, the sun is once again setting over the ocean. When conditions are right and there's just enough clouds to catch the light and not so many that they swallow the sun, spectacular sunsets are once again possible.

The sun may be setting on summer, but the best beach weather of the year and the most beautiful sunsets are still ahead.

We seem barraged this year by a rising tide of terrible news. It's easy to get distracted and discouraged, but we are blessed, too, to have beauty all around us, if we can just make—or take—the time to see it.  

September brings the best beach weather; October and November, the clearest skies; December, the most vivid sunsets. Right now the air is filled with the rustle and flutter of summer on the wing—beautiful and ephemeral. 

Suzanne Guldimann
23 August 2015

November Winds

The November new moon sets in a sky turned crimson and gold by the Santa Ana winds. 

The wind that makes music in November corn is in a hurry.  The stalks hum, the loose husks whisk skyward in half-playing swirls, and the wind hurries on. A tree tries to argue, bare limbs waving, but there is no detaining the wind.

—Aldo Leopold, Sand County Almanac

November in Malibu is a time of warm days, cold nights, wicked winds, fiery sunsets, and an ocean pressed so smooth by the Santa Anas that it looks like watered silk. By Thanksgiving, almost all of the winter birds have arrived, while the last of the fall pilgrims are sent on their way by gale-force Santa Ana winds. 

A lesser goldfinch, one of Malibu's winter residents, seeks shelter from the Santa Ana winds among the bright autumn leaves of a liquidambar tree. By the end of the windstorm, almost all the leaves were gone, but the finch is here to stay.

At Zuma, the beach once covered in brightly colored umbrellas and towels is now crowded with gulls. The blue lifeguard towers, like oversized sheep, are pastured well away from the reach of winter tides, and sand barricades are in place to protect lifeguard headquarters and the other county buildings along the beach from storms. 

Gulls gather on the wet sand at the beach to escape the scouring Santa Ana-driven sand.

There’s a distinctly autumn smell in the wind, compounded of dust and eucalyptus and sun-baked chaparral. It’s a time of waiting. Everyone holds their breath, waiting for the winds to die and the red flag fire warnings give way to winter rain.

Gale force winds whip the waves at Surfrider Beach. The Santa Anas have the power to subdue, or "blow out," the surf.

Dame Wendy Hiller, in the brilliant Pressburger and Powell film I Know Where I’m Going, is stranded by gale-force winds and prays for the wind to drop so she can cross to a small Scottish island where her fate awaits her. Anyone who has lived through a Malibu fire storm can appreciate the intensity of that prayer.

The poet Christina Rossetti famously posed the question "who has seen the wind?" The answer is NASA. The space agency released this image of the Santa Anas blowing clouds of dust far into the Pacific. You can just see Malibu, with Point Dume facing south, in the upper left corner of the image. 

The Santa Anas go by a lot of names. Some people meld the syllables together to make the name Santana, others call these fierce desert winds the red wind, the devil's breath, or the devil's wind, but the winds apparently get their name from Santa Ana Canyon, in Orange County, where the phenomenon was reportedly once thought to originate. 

It's unclear if the name was bestowed by Spanish settlers or later arrivals. However, the theories that the name derives from Satan or from an Indian word meaning evil wind seem to be entirely urban legends. It seems equally unlikely that the name comes directly from the saint, since her feast day is celebrated in July, a time of year when Santa Ana winds are least likely to occur. And the tempestuous Mexican military leader Antonio Lopez de Santa Anna, who is also sometimes credited for the name, also seems unlikely, since he never even visited California and had no part in its history.

Santa Ana, the namesake of Santa Ana Canyon, if not the actual Santa Ana winds, looks pensive and sad in this sculpture from the Cathedral Museum of  Church of  Santiago Campostella in Spain. Photo: Wikimedia Commons. 

The Chumash must have been very familiar with the winds, but their names for the phenomenon have not survived, although it's said that the name Simi derives from a Chumash term for the little white clouds that often accompany the wind. 

Robert Fovell, a professor at UCLA in the department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, has examined the Los Angeles Times archive in search of the etymology of the name, but found nothing more exotic than the place name. 

According to Fovell, the earliest reference to the Santa Anas in the Times dates to 1881, just one year after the newspaper began publication.

One of the items Fovell found in the Times archive is a letter to the editor complaining about the name and its connection to the community of Santa Ana: 

In 1893, the Times published a complaint from an Orange County resident concerning the "the misnaming of the winds which blow at times over almost all portions of Southern California, and which, unfortunately, in some sections of the southern portion of the State are erroneously called Santa Ana winds." The name, the writer insists, leads "nine out of every ten persons in the East" to conclude that the Santa Ana wind is "peculiar only to the immediate vicinity surrounding and contiguous to the city of Santa Ana." 

These winds are "an exceedingly unpleasant feature, especially in the fall before the rains have laid the dust." The writer recognizes that the winds "take the name of Santa Ana by reason of their passage through the Santa Ana mountain canyon, which is shaped very much like a large funnel" but insists it is "not a Santa Ana wind any more than it is a Los Angeles, San Bernardino, Riverside or San Diego wind."

You can read Fovell's interesting and entertaining article here but, sadly, you won't find proof of either saints or devils in it.

The wind sweeps away all traces of human activity along the shore and leaves in place of footprints calligraphic patterns in the sand.

We aren't the only ones to experience this type of wind phenomenon. In the Alps it's the Foehn; in Provence, the Mistral; in Canada, the Chinook; in Argentina, the Zonda; and in Japan, the Oroshi.  

One of the traditional Provençal santons—Nativity figures—is a shepherd holding his hat to keep it from blowing away in the Mistral, the French equivilent of California's Santa Ana winds. This was the only character I could find that is traditionally associated with this type of wind, although my dad remembered his grandmother telling him that the Foehn, the Swiss version of the Santa Ana winds, was the ghostly horsemen of the Huns, riding with the wild hunt across the rooftops at night, and Perchta, a pre-Christian goddess who still lingers on in folk tradition throughout parts of Northern Europe, is also associated with the wild hunt and with the wild winds sometimes called "snow-eaters." I find it hard to believe there isn't a Californian equivalent recorded in some long-forgotten ethnographer's notes. Our winds are so fierce and so unforgettable that it seems they must have figured in stories and legends. Photo: Marie Blanche Sorribas, Wikimedia Commons.

Most of the winds of this type begin as cold air in an area of high pressure. As the cold air travels around the high pressure system (clockwise in the Northern Hemisphere; counterclockwise in the Southern Hemisphere) it gains speed and is squeezed into the surrounding low pressure areas. The wind is heated through compression and gains speed as it pours through mountain canyons like water down a drain.

A tiny sanderling, its feathers blown every which way, ventures out to forage in the tide wrack, despite the wind. 

Winds like the Santa Anas have a special Greek name: Katabatic, which means to drain, or  flow downhill. While the Santa Ana can reach speeds in excess of 70 mph, the Alaskan Williwaw, also a katabatic wind, has been clocked at over 140 mph. 

For Santa Ana winds to occur, the air in the Great Basin east of the Sierras has to be colder than the air at the coast. This NASA graphic shows the distance the winds travel before arriving in Los Angeles.

In many parts of the world, this type of wind is thought to cause madness and illness. In Germany they even have a special word for it: Föhnkrankheit. In Southern California madness isn't nearly as much of a worry as fire. All of Malibu's major wildfires have occurred during Santa Ana windstorms.

Along with the fear of fire, the devil wind really does bring a host of lesser ills: migraines, allergies and nose bleeds, among them. Also static electricity that plagues the cats and transforms long hair into Medusa's snakes; downed trees, branches, and palm fronds; and clouds of dust that covers every surface. At the beach, wind-driven sand scours the shore. In the hills, the wind screams down the canyons, breaking branches, sucking the moisture out of the vegetation; and even tipping over the occasional cyclist or high profile vehicle.

Squid season has extended far into autumn this year. The ghostly lights used to attract market squid into the nets have been a constant presence off the coast of Malibu. The fishery only closes in the fall when it meets the 118,000 short ton limit. According to the California Department of Fish and Wildlife, as of November 26, 2014, total landings of market squid are 114,649.3 st. The squid fleet's continued presence off the coast at County Line was lucky for a group of kayakers swept out to sea by the Santa Anas. Two of the six were rescued by the fishers.

On Sunday in western Malibu, where the Santa Ana winds can rip down the canyons at more than 60 mph,  six kayakers were swept out to sea. News reports stated that the squid fishers, anchored off Leo Carrillo, were able to rescue two of the kayakers. Lifeguards and Ventura and Los Angeles County emergency crews used jet skis and air support to reach the other four. The Malibu Times reports that the rescue effort involved 28 emergency responders.

Four stand-up paddleboarders were swept away the same day, this time near Surfrider Beach, according to the same article. Fortunately, there were no serious injuries in either incident.

The Santa Ana Winds can make the sea look deceptively smooth and calm.

Frederick Hastings Rindge, who purchased the entire Malibu Rancho in 1892, expressed an oddly optimistic view of the devil winds in his poetic collection of essays Happy Days in Southern California:

"At this season begin to blow the Santa Annas [sic], the fierce autumn wind storms, — dreaded, to be sure, but zephyrs, compared with cyclones. Three days they blow, and often precede a rain. They are a blessing in disguise, for beside their sanitary, microbe-dispelling effects, they also drive the dormant seeds hither and thither, to distribute them equally on the surface of the land. This task accomplished, down pour the early rains and up come, as by magic, the living green grasses out from the browned hills and fields..."

A gaggle of cormorants are blown across the sky at sunset. These birds are powerful fliers, divers and swimmers, but they are no match for the wind.

Joan Didion, also a Malibu resident for a time, takes a more fatalistic view of the wind in Slouching to Bethlehem:

“The violence and the unpredictability of the Santa Ana affect the entire quality of life in Los Angeles, accentuate its impermanence, its unreliability. The wind shows us how close to the edge we are."

Raymond Chandler paints yet another picture of the winds in his short story Red Wind: 

“There was a desert wind blowing that night. It was one of those hot dry Santa Anas that come down through the mountain passes and curl your hair and make your nerves jump and your skin itch. On nights like that every booze party ends in a fight. Meek little wives feel the edge of the carving knife and study their husbands' necks. Anything can happen. You can even get a full glass of beer at a cocktail lounge.”

It isn’t all bad. When the winds drop we are left with the illusion of summer: bright sun and vivid blue sky and sea. Unexpected vistas are revealed: the Los Angeles skyline emerges from the haze and smog; the Channel Islands appear like the lost lands of legend out to sea. At night, the Point Fermin lighthouse flashes in the darkness, while Orion, his faithful hound at his heels, strides across a brilliant field of stars, once the red glow of sunset has faded. 

Santa Monica, with Los Angeles beyond, appears like a mirage beyond the sand berm at the Malibu Lagoon. The water impounded in the lagoon is relatively calm, but the ocean in the bay is being whipped into wild whitecaps by the gale-force winds.

The current round of Santa Anas is expected to die down just in time for Thanksgiving Day, leaving warm weather and calm skies. My mom remembers spending one of her first California Thanksgivings at the beach in Malibu on just such a day. For my parents, who both grew up in places with snow and ice from November until March, it seemed like a miracle. More than 50 years later, it still does.

The Channel Islands are revealed by the wind, emerging dreamlike from the fog that usually shrouds them from view.

November 22 marked the first anniversary of The Malibu Post. We've had nearly 13,000 visitors in the past 12 months. I am grateful and thankful to everyone who has taken the time to read these pages, but especially to my family, friends and neighbors. Thank you. 

Wherever you are, and wherever you are going this Thanksgiving, dear reader, may the road rise up to meet you, and the wind be always at your back.

Suzanne Guldimann
26 November 2014

The Anonymous Season

A magnificent autumn sunset transforms the already striking view from Kanan Dume Road into something strange and wonderful. All photos © 2013 Suzanne Guldimann

The Beat poet Kenneth Rexroth famously wrote in 1938 that:

Autumn in California is a mild
And anonymous season, hills and valleys
Are colorless then, only the sooty green
Eucalyptus, the conifers and oaks sink deep
Into the haze; the fields are plowed, bare, waiting;
The steep pastures are tracked deep by the cattle;
There are no flowers, the herbage is brittle.
All night along the coast and the mountain crests
Birds go by, murmurous, high in the warm air.
Only in the mountain meadows the aspens
Glitter like goldfish moving up swift water;
Only in the desert villages the leaves
Of the cottonwoods descend in smoky air. 

It's a nice enough poem, but I don't agree with him.

Autumn arrived late in Malibu this year, but it's here at last, and there is nothing anonymous about it. It was 38 degrees on Point Dume last night. The ocean was warmer than the air this morning—61 v. 45 at 7 a.m. Tonight will be even colder. In the canyons, where cold air drainage lowers the temperature even on warm days, there will be frost.

Frost has already turned the canyon willows and cottonwoods to gold. 

There's a sense of anticipation for the first real chance of serious rain on Friday. All over Malibu there are signs that autumn has arrived at last.

In the garden, the liquidamber trees have turned crimson, the pomegranates are finally ripe, and the narcissus bulbs—a harbinger of Christmas here, instead of spring—are sprouting.

Autumn doesn't officially end until the Winter Solstice— December 21 at 9:11 a.m., PST, this year— but the winter birds are already here: the fierce wren tit, cheeky oak titmouse and the valiant Bewick's wren;  the sharp-shined hawk and the brilliant blue and white king fisher, shaped like a lawn dart.

Over at Bluffs Park, the white-tailed kite can be found every afternoon surveying its winter territory. It shares its treetop lookout with a pair of ravens and a sharp-shined hawk.

The crows, in vast noisy convocations, conduct corvid business, or quarrel with the red-tailed hawks and the great horned owls, who are already in the process of selecting mates and potential nesting sites in the Point Dume eucalyptus trees for winter breeding season.

Liquidamber trees bring a blaze of late autumn color even to coastal gardens. 

This is the season for dramatic sunsets and sunrises. It's also the season for star gazing. After sunset, clear skies reveal Orion and Canis Major—the winter constellations—rising earlier and earlier each evening. The clear, cold, stable sea air, without a trace of the summer marine layer, still offers a view of the Milky Way, something that's becoming rare as light pollution increases.

Shorebirds, like these sandpipers at Zuma Beach, have the coast to themselves. 

Last night, the thin new moon was in the western sky with Venus, with the last glow of sunset turning the horizon a color popular in Rexroth's time called "ashes of roses." It is so clear today that the skyscrapers in Downtown L.A. and the mountains beyond the city are visible from the beach. 

Until the rains come, it's a nervous time for everyone in wildfire country. We all fear that the winds will bring the red and black skies of fire season. Every siren, every helicopter, can stir a wave of panic. Fires are by far the least welcome aspect of the season, but no one could describe them—or the demon winds that drive them—as mild or anonymous.

Perhaps the poet measured our skies against the Indiana sunsets of his childhood and found them lacking. Or perhaps he just didn't look in the right places to find the colors of autumn in California. 

A surfer, lulled by the last evening of warm weather, dreams of of winter waves. 

Storm clouds heralding the first major Alaskan cold front gather, and night comes early. 

The Last Butterfly of Autumn

November is monarch season in Malibu, frail orange and black wings flutter everywhere, long distance travelers pausing on an impossible journey to rest in garden refuges or roost among the eucalyptus trees, looking like flame-colored autumn leaves.

We were surprised all the same to find a monarch chrysalis hidden in the garden. The enterprising caterpillar traveled more than 20 feet from its milkweed plant to spin its chrysalis in a safe place, out of sight among the African daisies that line our driveway.

A cleverly hidden monarch chrysalis, ready to hatch.

The newly hatched butterfly unfolds and dries its wings, preparing for flight.

The empty chrysalis is almost transparent, and far too small to hold a butterfly. 

The new butterfly unfolds and is ready to take flight. It's frail wings will carry it all the way to Mexico. 

Squid Fishers

The squid fleet begins to arrive at Zuma Beach. By the time the sun goes down the bay will be full of boats. 

Curious Squid, so called because, as well as being squid, they were curious. That is to say, their curiosity was the curious thing about them.

—Terry Pratchett, Jingo

  

I always watch for them, this time of year. The eerie glow of the squid fleet's light boats  is a sure sign of autumn in Malibu. Along the coast, from Westward Beach to Point Mugu, the boats give the illusion of the lights of a phantom city out to sea.

Like the Curious Squid that inhabit the Discworld’s Circle Sea, Loligo Opalescence, otherwise known as market squid, are curious. They are attracted to the powerful floodlights, and are scooped up by purse seiners.

According to NOAA Fisheries Service, market squid is “the state’s largest and most lucrative commercial fishery, valued at over $69 million last season.” Most of the local catch is frozen and shipped to Asia, some squid is sold for bait, but fresh and frozen Malibu squid will appear on menus all over the world. As of October 8, “total landings of market squid are estimated to be 107,057.1 short tons. The DFW sets a limit of 118,000 “short tons” per season.

Market squid live for less than a year—usually just six to eight months. Commercial fishing is not permitted on weekends to “give the squid a break.” Although the state of California has regulated the market squid fishery since 2005, many aspects of the life history of market squid reportedly remain unknown.

The commercial squid boat crews aren’t the only ones depending on squid for a living, these small cephalopods are an essential food source for marine mammals and birds like the California brown pelicans. 

I was told once by a squid fisher that “It’s really weird to be surrounded not by water but by a sea of millions of squid. They watch you with those eyes. They also squeak. If you don’t take adequate precautions they’ll clog your engine, all your pumps. It’s like something from a science fiction movie.” 

For Malibu residents, the appearance of the squid fleet at dusk, without even a glimpse of their curious quarry, often seems like an alien invasion. The boats follow to squid, using sonar to track them. Like the squid themselves, their presence off the coast is short-lived.

By nightfall, squid light boats illuminate the bay. Their arrival is a sure sign of autumn in Malibu.