Right on the heels of California Wine Month and the beginning of grape harvest, comes Ken Burns latest documentary: Prohibition. The six hour series, which airs on PBS stations October 2nd, takes us back to an infamous thirteen year time period in our nation’s history when the commercial production and sale of alcohol was banned. For those not glued to the prohibition era TV series Boardwalk Empire, the 18th Amendment was passed in 1920 at the urging of the temperance movement.

Prohibition agents. Photo: Library of Congress

California’s wine industry, which had recently rebounded from a major pest infestation and was poised for great things, was devastated by Prohibition. Vineyards were ripped up and a majority of the more than six hundred wineries were shuttered. The few that remained open did so by producing wine for religious purposes. Beaulieu Vineyard was one of them. Founder Georges de Latour was a Catholic and a friend of the archbishop of San Francisco. Latour cut a deal to sell wine to all the priests in the diocese.

Prohibition was supposed to curb alcohol consumption, but instead the party went underground, giving rise to a thriving criminal economy run by bootleggers and gangsters. Port cities, like San Francisco, managed to stay pretty wet during those dry years, thanks to illegal liquor brought ashore in the dead of night, carried on ships from Canada. The roaring twenties saw the rise of a new breed of young women, known as "flappers," while beer, wine and spirits—some bootlegged, some made in basement stills flowed in hundreds of backroom speakeasies.

Flappers in the prohibition era. Photo: ©Scherl / Sueddeutsche Zeitung Photo / The Image Works

After years of lawlessness, the 18th Amendment was eventually repealed. You can still visit remnants of the prohibition era throughout the Bay Area. Some former San Francisco speakeasies still remain and dozens of wineries survived Prohibition.

Called “Ghost Wineries” some have become homes, others used as barns or shopping complexes in Yountville and St. Helena. A handful of wineries have been restored and now have a second life including Freemark Abbey, Far Niente, Hall Wines and Storybook Mountain Vineyards in Calistoga.

Freemark Abbey 1898. Photo courtesy of Freemark Abbey

We’ve come along way since the dry days of Prohibition, in just seventy five years the state’s award winning wine industry has built itself up to be a world leader with more than 3,300 bonded wineries. But a new threat looms — this one from mother nature. Research shows that California's prime wine producing areas could shrink dramatically over the next three decades from climate change.

Find out much more about the past and future of California wines at California Academy of Sciences Prohibition NightLife this Thursday evening. You can purchase tickets online for the event or buy them at the door. QUEST will be screening the segment on wine and climate change featured below and serving up wines for warmer temps. Also, Cal Academy will be leading mixology classes and screening a sneak peak of Ken Burns and Lynn Novick’s new documentary on Prohibition. Can you think of a better way to commemorate the end of the 18th Amendment than with a cocktail party and wine tasting?

This post was originally published on KQED's Bay Area Bites.

"Napa Wineries Face Global Warming"

California Academy of Sciences
Address: Map
55 Music Concourse Drive
Golden Gate Park
San Francisco, CA 94118
(415) 379-8000
Twitter: @calacademy
Facebook: California Academy of Sciences
This post was originally published on KQED's Bay Area Bites.

 Jim Wolpert’s Alternative Varietals - References ( pdf ) Jim Wolpert’s Alternative Varietals - References

The world's largest butterfly species, the Queen Alexandra’s birdwing on display in the Cal Academy's collection

The California Academy of Sciences has the largest collection of biological reference materials west of the Mississippi.  The collection provides a treasure trove of biological information for scientists and researchers studying the natural world.  Of the 20 million specimens housed at the Cal Academy, 17 million are insects within the Entomology Department. Collections Manager Norman Penny gives Science on the SPOT a small peek at The Academy’s vast butterfly collection.  “Butterflies hold a special interest for people,” says Penny, “They’re easily preserved, they’re numerous, they’re brightly colored and they show a lot of biological principles.”

The Academy has a long history studying bugs.  The Entomology Department officially dates back to 1862 but the first insects and arachnids for The Academy's collection were actually received eight years prior in 1854. By 1900, the collection had grown to about 50,000 specimens. Unfortunately, most of The Academy’s collection was lost in the great fire which followed the 1906 earthquake.  However, The Academy had sponsored an expedition to the Galapagos Islands in early 1905, and when the earthquake struck, the entomology team had not yet returned to San Francisco. Thus, the specimens saved from the fire and the new insects collected by the Galapagos expedition members served as a starter of The Academy's new collection. Today, The California Academy of Sciences boasts one of the largest entomology collections in the world.

Penny opened the lids of the cases and showed us a variety of beautiful butterflies from around the world.  Bright blue iridescent morpho butterflies from South America glisten as he tilts the case.  We see monarchs and owl butterflies from North America and marvel at the huge Queen Alexandra’s birdwing butterflies from Papua New Guinea.  My personal favorite was seeing the California state insect, the Dogface Butterfly.  Once known as “flying pansies,” Dogface butterfly males have bright yellow wings with dark markings that profile a poodle’s head.

But not all of the Cal Academy’s butterfly specimens are pinned in trays.  Some are very much alive!  Each day within the warm mist of the Academy’s expansive living Rainforest exhibit, colorful butterflies flit freely from blossom to branch.  Each week the Academy receives a new batch of living butterfly specimens from the Central American rainforest.  Cooperative butterfly farmers in Costa Rica have obtained special permits to allow them to rear native butterflies and send them north.

This program is actually beneficial to the butterflies and their native ecosystems as it encourages farmers to protect pollinators and the critical host plants in the surrounding rainforest.  Farmers plant host plants on their land to feed caterpillars.  Once the caterpillars transform to pupae some are collected and sent to the Academy.

(click here to see a behind-the-scenes video of the Rainforest biologists in action)

When they arrive, the pupae are carefully unpacked and placed in temperature / humidity controlled chambers where they finish their gradual metamorphosis into colorful butterflies.   Each morning, as new adult butterflies emerge, biologists release them into the Rainforest exhibit.  Their new home is quite suited for them.  Native flowering Costa Rican plants and feeding stations, provide the butterflies here with plenty of nectar and pollen sources to eat.  But biologists also need to make sure the butterflies aren’t too happy. The insects are not allowed to reproduce within the Rainforest Dome.  Hungry caterpillars would make short work of the contained bio-dome plants.

That isn’t the case above on the Academy’s Living Roof.  Here, native plants have been brought in specifically to encourage the whole cycle of life for local butterfly populations. Nine species of native annuals and perennials have been planted, many with specific species of butterflies in mind. Miniature lupine (Lupinus bicolor), California poppies (Eschscholzia californica) and Sea pink (Armeria maritime) that produce pom-pom-like flowers, attract a number of native butterflies. California plantain (Plantago erecta) also hosts a variety of butterfly larvae, including the endangered Bay checkerspot butterfly.  And Stonecrop (Sedum spathulifolium) produces nectar for the Hairstreak butterfly and the threatened San Bruno elfin butterfly.  Although the famed Living Roof has only been in existence since 2008, a study by San Francisco State University showed that Bay Area native insects are already more prevalent on the Academy’s  roof than other areas in Golden Gate Park.

The butterfly collection at the Cal Academy, old and new, pinned in trays or flying free help us better understand and appreciate the world around us.  As Norm Penny said, “A lot of the biological principles we study are based on the bright color patterns you see.  Scientific study is very vividly displayed on the wings of butterflies.”

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The scientists on the Farallones live in the old lighthouse keepers’ houses, built in the late 1800’s.

The chill of the fog and wind cut through you, the kelp flies swarm, the overpoweringly acrid smell of years-worth of bird guano wafts through the air and loud, incessant cackle of hundreds, even thousands of sea gulls, could drive even the hardiest of souls away from this desolate outcropping of granite in the middle of the Pacific Ocean.  The animals wouldn’t want it any other way.  And neither would the researchers and biologists stationed at the Farallones.

While only 27 miles off the coast of San Francisco, for the human inhabitants, life can also seem isolated and lonely.  They have a very small neighborhood.  Only two houses still stand on Southeast Farallon.  Today the old lighthouse keepers’ houses, originally built in the late 1800’s, house the small team of researchers from PRBO Conservation Science.  A bit of Victorian civilization in an otherwise completely wild world.

It is a rare privilege to be able to set foot on the Farallon Islands.  As rugged as this place may seem, it is a fragile and extremely sensitive environment.  As a National Wildlife Refuge, the area is strictly off limits to the public.  Each year only a few dozen people are allowed to be hoisted onto South Farallon Island, and most, if not all, are there specifically to conduct scientific research.  The humans there now tread lightly.  QUEST was invited out to the islands to get an inside look at this living laboratory and meet some of the people doing important scientific research on such wide ranging topics as global climate change to highly specific studies on sea bird breeding rates.

Each day on the Farallones might bring new surprises.  To get an idea what they witnessed on the islands this week, researchers sent back a number of reports.

“October 12th was a fantastic day for whales around the islands – biologists noted the 3 resident Gray Whales, an incredible 15 endangered Blue Whales and 93 Humpback Whales! Even more amazing were the 265 Risso’s Dolphins, 20 Pacific White-sided Dolphins, 12 Northern Right Whale Dolphins, and 5 Dall’s Porpoises –All these marine mammals are attracted to the Gulf of the Farallones to feed on its bountiful food sources, particularly this year’s abundant supply of krill.”

“October 5th – PRBO conducted a weekly island survey of the six species of pinniped on the Farallones. This entailed counting all the seals and sea lions from the lighthouse and walking around to the coves to find elephant seals and other species. This survey yielded 1,939 California Sea Lions, 40 Steller’s Sea Lions, 30 Harbor Seals, 81 Northern Fur Seals, and 116 Northern Elephant Seals. On 1-Oct, we conducted our first survey of at Indian Head Beach and counted 115 fur seal pups and over 160 adults and immature – this is a true success story for conservation on the Farallones!”

“October 3rd – Landbird migration day!  Dropping from the sky, an Evening Grosbeak flew down into the Lavaterra bushes.  Although this species is not super-rare on the coast, here on the Farallones, this was the first Evening Grosbeak seen on the island since 1979!  While observing the grosbeak, the biologists began spotting other birds such as a female Canada Warbler and an Ovenbird from the previous few days.”

To learn more about what it is like to live and work on the Farallones, check out our QUEST Science on the SPOT story, “Life on the Farallones.”  I also encourage you to explore the islands further via QUEST, where we have stories on the seals, birds and sharks – on, above and around the islands, as well as educational materials, an audio slide show, an interactive multimedia map, and historic timeline. Also, you can get more info from KQED's Jean-Michel Cousteau's Ocean Adventures website.

Visit the Science on the SPOT: Life on the Farallones page or watch the video below:

QUEST on KQED Public Media.

In addition, this week a new film about the Farallon Islands opens at California Academy of Sciences in Golden Gate Park.  SANCTUARY IN THE SEA: A GULF OF THE FARALLONES EXPERIENCE debuts Saturday, October 16.  Discover the beauty, diversity and history of the Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary, through the eyes of Ron Elliot, a former urchin diver turned wildlife videographer who has spent years in the underwater gardens  beneath the waves around the Farallones.

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A view of the “Devil’s Teeth.” The rocky Farallon Islands from the New Superfish, out on a shark diving expedition.

In San Francisco the chilly summer fog is being replaced by the warm sunshine of the autumn season.  And seemingly with the return of the sun, come a group of wayward San Francisco natives from their annual vacation in the great Pacific.  The Gulf of the Farallones National Marine Sanctuary is a gathering spot for whales, sea birds, seals, sea lions, and other marine life. 

Located just 27 miles off the coast, The Farallon Islands are also the wildest part of the City of San Francisco. The most famous residents of this area are the magnificent great white sharks. And each fall they return from their wanderings to these islands so rich with life.

On Saturday, September 18th 2010, the California Academy of Sciences in Golden Gate Park will debut a new Farallones display within the Altered State: Climate Change in California exhibit.  The new exhibit will feature specimens, audio stations, and a live webcam from the Farallon Islands, providing an intimate look at this wildlife sanctuary beyond the Golden Gate.

So to celebrate the return of the great white sharks and the opening of the new Farallones exhibit at Cal Academy, QUEST presents “The Great White Shark Song: Live at the Farallones!” by Andy Brandy Casagrande IV.

We were fortunate to meet Andy on our last trip out to the islands and he was kind enough to share his song.  Andy is a wildlife cameraman for National Geographic TV and has a lot of experience with great white sharks.  His original music video for this song has gained a certain amount of notoriety as he jumped into the water with his guitar and serenaded a group of inquisitive white sharks off the coast of South Africa.  I forgot to mention, he was not in a shark cage.  As you can see, Andy is a special kind of crazy.

His “Live at the Farallones!” version is a salute to the great white sharks in the green waters around the Farallon Islands, and features underwater shark footage taken (with permit) by white shark expert Scot Anderson and the Tagging Pacific Predators Program.

Over the years QUEST has been fortunate to produce many unique stories on Farallon Islands from land, sea and air.  Our comprehensive coverage includes an educator guide and multiple stories on television, radio, and interactive.

As you can probably tell, we think the Farallones rock!

QUEST on KQED Public Media.

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Monterey Bay Aquarium's giant octopus

Okay, I’m biased. I definitely have my favorite animal in the Steinhart Aquarium and I visit him often. The first time I saw him come out and swim around was magical. It was just before we opened to the public and it had been a long day. I was taking a break in the Aquarium and after strolling for a spell; I sat down by his tank. He was hiding just out of sight in the bottom of the tank squeezed between the glass and the rocky outcroppings. I saw a tentacle, red and furtive and then another one. His face poked up and then dipped down quickly. His tentacles stilled roamed, creating a beautiful line against the glass. He got braver and would peek at me for longer and then dip down yet again. Of course I would be biased –- considering I was able to play peek-a-boo with a red octopus!

That was almost a year ago and I still visit regularly. I can count on two hands the amount of time that I’ve visited his tank to find him out and exploring. Most often he is hiding within one of the corners of the tank. But I catch him out — hunting a crab or opening a jar the biologist gave him to play with. His elusive nature makes the times I get a glimpse that much more special. He has grown quite a bit over the course of the year and now when he comes, he spreads out and takes up much of the span of the tank. His red coloring, mottled skin and white suckers make him look like a dancing underwater firework.

I am in great awe of his shape and the intelligence he shows in manipulating his form. On the Red Octopus, the only hard substance on its entire body is its beak. These species are invertebrate cephalopods; most species lack either an internal or external structure. Most often them can squeeze into spaces no bigger around then their beak. Which explains why he can fit into such a small corner despite his large size.

Astro-turf is also carpeting the rim of his tank. It is a deterrent against him crawling out of his tank into another tank to feed. A previous octopus on display in the old Steinhart Aquarium did just that, much to the chagrin of the biologists caring for the tanks. There is also a weight on top of the octopus tanks at the tidepool. This is to insure they do not get out and eat the residents of the tidepool. The weight is a couple of pounds, and without it the small octopus could easily open its jewel tank.

Octopus species are considered the most intelligent invertebrates in the ocean. In captivity, they have shown play, problem solving and short and long term memory. In the wild, their intelligence, flexibility, camouflage, and problem solving makes them a formidable predator. They have even been known to prey on sharks! The best time to see an octopus “on the hunt” is at night. They are nocturnal and the octopus at the Academy is no different. The majority of the time I have seen him out is after 5pm. So if you visit during the extended hours in August, stop by the Octopus tank. The glimpse of red and dance of tentacles is well worth the visit.

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Volunteers have a whale of a time working to save our seas. Join the fun this weekend!

Friday may be National Doughnut Day, but the real party this weekend is on June 8th in celebration of World Ocean Day. WOD, the brainchild of our Canadian brethren, is a worldwide effort to raise awareness and promote personal connection with the oceans that sustain life on this planet. Because we are lucky to have the ocean as our neighbor here in the Bay Area, there are a number of incredible events surrounding the celebration:

Ocean Beach Cleanup
When: Sunday, June 7th, 10 AM -12 noon
Where: Ocean Beach at the Judah Street Entrance, San Francisco
OceanHealth.Org teams up with the San Francisco Chapter of Surfrider for our annual World Ocean Day beach cleanup in San Francisco at Ocean Beach. There will be gloves and bags. Just bring yourself and dress for variable weather. The event is co-sponsored by the California Academy of Sciences & the Aquarium of the Bay.

I have quite the personal connection to SF’s Ocean Beach. For the past 2.5 years, I have led the Ocean Beach Foundation, working to preserve the beach with the fire pit installations as well as organizing weekly cleanups. It’s quite amazing what you can find out on the beach during cleanups…I’ve found everything from a huge Barbie dollhouse to an old school Radio Flyer (the toy of my youth!). I hope you’ll take part in the Ocean Beach cleanup.

World Oceans Day Film Festival
When: Wednesday, June 10th, 7-10 PM
Where: Victoria Theater, San Francisco
OceanHealth.org is celebrating World Ocean’s Day by screening a few short ocean films. We hope that you'll join us in this great location to share our love of the oceans and to view a variety of films showing perspectives on the ocean.

Purchase advance tickets at http://www.victoriatheatre.org or purchase tickets at the box office on the day of the film. Cost $10.

Some of the great films you'll see:
A Sea Change, End of the Line, Silent Snow, Keeping Coast, Favela Surf Dreams, Papa Tortuga, Revolution of the Crabs

Sustainable Seafood at Cal Academy’s Nightlife
When: Thursday, June 11th, 6-10 PM
Where: California Academy of Sciences, San Francisco
The Academy and its partners in the San Francisco Seafood Watch Alliance are pulling out all the stops to encourage visitors to make sustainable seafood choices.

Local celebrity chefs will whip up tasty treats during sustainable seafood cooking demonstrations: Eric Magnani from Global Gourmet Catering, Kin Lui and Casson Trenor from Tataki Sushi & Sake Bar, Craig Stoll from Delfina, and Loretta Keller from COCO5OO and The Moss Room. Also, we’ll host a screening of “The End of the Line,” a new film about overfishing that received rave reviews at Sundance.

Nightlife often sells out, it is suggested to buy your tickets ahead of time.

For even more events, check out OceanHealth.org

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The California Academy of Sciences' homepage

For the last forty-five minutes, I have been perusing the California Academy of Sciences website, trying to think of a topic for this blog piece. It is 10 PM on the day before my entry is due, and I am doing what I have been doing since college – procrastinating! But now the Internet makes that so much more time consuming. Going through the pages and sifting ideas to see what might work, I am drawn into how technology and the Internet are making so much available to the public, and how information interacts at so many intersections. You just need to look at the Academy's website for examples.

There is a page on the Academy website dedicated to blogs. It follows researchers in the field, or discusses nuances of climate change; one blog category is dedicated to being a fly on the wall. One of these "fly on the wall" blog entries notes that Claude (the albino alligator) is doing well after being pulled off the floor for an injury.  Because these blogs feature a way to leave comments, we can streamline them to answer specific inquiries, and also bring light to the concerns of the public.  People can watch specific animals online through streaming video, such as the Penguin Cams.  The videos and images are not wholly staff generated either; YouTube video and flickr photo uploads are linked in, as well as social commentary from Facebook and Twitter. There is even a  survey (on the bottom right of the homepage) that lets you test your science knowledge against a recent study.  I got all six of them correct, compared to an average of 4.1 right answers, a fact I found out immediately after taking the quiz.

Last week, Google unveiled it's new Google Ocean feature (for its Google Earth software) at a press conference in our building. A great deal of technical set-up went into the day to have the press conference virtual. A link to the story about the process of creating it is referenced on the homepage. You can also take a quiz to test your Google Earth acumen, again directly from our homepage.

None of this surfing and procrastinating led me to a finite topic, but it did give me a "huh" moment. I remember when the Internet was just disparate websites. Information that before would take me hours to find, if I could at all, I can now access from a home base on one website. Websites and information are integrated, and help form communities along with advanced interactivity. There are now Social Networking Coordinators at various institutions — including the Academy — who work to maintain and enrich this virtual and ever-growing community.

In just getting lost on the Academy site, I was emmeshed in a rich diversity of content and feedback. Evolution has put down strong roots online.

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The film follows Kavanaugh and his collaborator, University of California-Berkeley doctoral candidate Sean Schoville, as they search for the beetle, then put possible candidates to the test by dissecting them under the microscope and doing genetic testing on them.

It's rare for a biologist to predict the discovery of a new species – even for someone like Kavanaugh, who has discovered 73 new species. For his prediction, he drew inspiration from Charles Darwin's own prediction, which the English naturalist and founder of modern evolutionary biology made in 1862.

When Darwin saw an orchid from Madagascar with a foot-long nectare, he predicted that a pollinator would be found with a tongue (called a proboscis) long enough to reach the nectar inside the orchid's very thin, elongated nectar "pouch." Darwin's prediction was based on his finding that all living beings are related to each other and that some of them evolve closely together. His prediction came true in 1903, when a moth was discovered in Madagascar with a long, thin proboscis, which it uncurls to reach the nectar in the orchid's nectare. In the process of feeding from the orchid, the moth serves as its pollinator. The moth was given the scientific name Xanthopan morganii praedicta, in honor of Darwin’s prediction.

"Chasing Beetles, Finding Darwin" is QUEST TV's contribution to the celebration of Darwin's 200th birthday and the 150th anniversary of the publication of his book "On the Origin of Species."

Watch Chasing Beetles, Finding Darwin online. You can also see additional photos for this story.

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Photo credit: California Academy of Sciences Library

The Foucault Pendulum first demonstrated in February 1851 that the Earth rotates by turning on its axis when French Philosopher Leon Foucault unveiled it in the Meridian Room of the Paris Observatory. His most famous pendulum was exhibited beneath the 279-foot dome of the Pantheon in Paris, hanging from a 219-foot wire. A replica of this famous pendulum swings in the East Pavilion of the Academy, though from only a 30 foot cable. A weight known as a "bob" on the end of a wire swings in a straight arc in relation to the laws of inertia and gravity. Below the constant back and forth arc of the bob a circle of pins set 6 degrees apart rotates. As the Earth rotates the pins come into contact with the constant arc of the bob and are knocked over.

At the Academy located in San Francisco (latitude 37.7°N), the pins will be knocked down every 39 to 40 minutes over a 24 hour period. In twenty-four hours, the pendulum will only knock over 220 degrees worth of pins. Knocking over 360 degrees worth of pins in San Francisco would take 39 hours, where at the North Pole (90° N) it would only take 24 hours.

Why is there a difference? This is because at the North & South Poles, Earth's rotation is enough to explain the change in the pendulum's apparent direction of swing. But as soon as you leave the poles and change latitude, something called the Coriolis Effect comes into play. The Coriolis Effect is an apparent deflection of moving objects when they are viewed from a rotating frame of reference, and its strength varies with latitude. Freely moving objects on the surface of the Earth experience a Coriolis force, and appear to veer to the right in the northern hemisphere, and to the left in the southern. Over time, this continual veering-off-course causes the swing of the pendulum bob to gradually precess, or rotate. This precessing is tracked as the pendulum knocks down pegs set up in a circle beneath it. The farther a pendulum is located from the pole, it will take gradually longer and longer for the pendulum's swing to precess a complete 360°. At the equator, the Coriolis effect is so weak that the pendulum is unaffected – the swing would never precess and therefore the pendulum would never knock over any pegs.

Intestingly, the Coriolis Effect also explains the spiral shapes of hurricanes, cyclonic weather systems, and oceanic gyres and which way they spiral in the northern or southern hemispheres, so the physics works for various natural phenomena, not just for pendulums.

Over two hundred Foucault Pendulums around the world were made in-house at the California Academy of Sciences. In 1958, Academy staff built a Foucault Pendulum for the Smithsonian. In 1960, Foucault Pendulums began to be produced en masses for clients around the globe. Four to five a year were produced in the instrument shop and are still being created today by a retired staff member – Cary Ponchione under "Academy Pendulum Sales". So the Foucault Pendulum on display at the Academy today is just one of many that demonstrate the axis rotation of the Earth and the specific laws of physics that affects arc, tilt and rotation.

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A Baobab Tree

Baobab is the common name of the genus Adansonia. The genus contains eight species of tree – six are native to Madagascar, while one species occurs in Mainland Africa and one in Australia. The Baobab tree is the national tree of Madagascar and is also known as the boaboa, bottle tree, the monkey bread tree, or the upside down tree: It looks as if someone took a tree out by the roots and turned it upside down. Throughout most of the year, its branches are bare, making them resemble a network of roots. All Baobab tree species occur in naturally dry areas and shed their leaves in the dry season to survive harsh drought conditions. Baobab trees can reach a height of 80 feet and a trunk diameter of 23- 36 feet. The trees store water inside the trunk during the dry season. During the rainy season, the trunk will increase or decrease in girth depending on rainfall amounts. It is difficult to determine how long these trees live, as their wood does not create growth rings, but current evidence points to a lifespan of up to 400 years.

The Adansonia grandidieri is the largest and grandest of the Baobab family. It has a massive cylindrical trunk covered with smooth, reddish-grey bark. When in bloom, the flat crowns of the trees bear bluish-green palm-like leaves and dark brown floral buds or spectacular flowers with white petals. It produces leaves from October to May and flowers from May to August. The flowers open around dusk and they all pollinate on the same night they flower. Nocturnal animals pollinate the trees by licking the nectar from the flowers and repeating this process from tree to tree. Scientists believe only lemurs are now capable of pollinating these trees. Before the colonization of Madagascar, other nocturnal animals and the elephant bird also were seed dispersers, but these species have long gone extinct.

Humans have not only affected the number of animals that can pollinate the tree, they have changed the tree's environment and exploited its various parts. These trees historically prospered in dry, deciduous forest, especially near seasonal river or lakes. Today, they are mainly found in open, agricultural land because of the increased demand for farming. Many trees are scarred from pegs hammered into the bark by humans, who use them to climb up the trunk to collect seeds. The bark is stripped to make rope and the wood is carted away to use for thatch. Because of the changes made to their environment and the exploitation of their resources, there are few young baobab trees, which could seriously hinder species survival. Numerous organizations and researchers, like those at the Academy, along with the Malagasy government, have realized the importance of conserving the unique biodiversity of Madagascar and are working to protect this hotspot. One measure, which will help the Grandidier's baobab, is the 2003 pledge from the President of Madagascar to triple the number of protected areas in the region. This will not only help restore an incredible area of biodiversity but also help the Malagasy people. Their livelihoods depend on the continued preservation of their watersheds and forests.

Cat Aboudara is the Special Projects Manager at California Academy of Sciences and works in the public programs division. The Academy is a wonderful fit for her because of her curiosity about the natural world and her experience in working with native California wildlife.

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