Plants Once Thought Extinct Reappear Out of the Blue
In 2005 deforestation and desertification wiped out tens of millions of acres of forests and grasslands. But the year wasn't entirely bad for plants, with several species not seen for decades—or far longer—reappearing on the scene. Among the comebacks:
The Mount Diablo buckwheat, Eriogonum truncatum, a delicate pink wildflower native to northern California, was last spotted in 1936 and believed extinct. About 20 eight-inch-tall shoots of buckwheat were discovered by Michael Park, a graduate student in biology at the University of California at Berkeley, while he was surveying the southeastern flank of Mount Diablo.
Dissanthelium californicum, an eight-inch-tall species of grass once endemic to two of Southern California's Channel Islands—San Clemente and Santa Catalina—as well as Isla Guadalupe off Baja Mexico, was last seen in 1903 and presumed to be extinct. The wispy grass was observed on March 29 in a ...
