San Luis Obispo development - includes monarch sanctuary?

[Sandwhy]

Wondering if anyone else heard this story on NPR - or know more about this. If so, I'd be curious to hear their take on it:

"All Things Considered, October 27, 2006 · The owner of one of the last large open spaces in San Luis Obispo, Calif., is seeking to develop old farm land into a modern shopping mall. But after local voters soundly rejected the plan, Ernie Dalidio has made his proposal "greener." The planned mall in the coastal town would now incorporate an organic garden, a traditional farmers' market and a monarch butterfly sanctuary."

If the link below doesn't work, go to npr.org and search for "butterfly"... the story turned up first in the search results.

Sandy


To hear this story: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/stor ... Id=6394192

[Paul Cherubini]

[quote="Sandwhy"]Wondering if anyone else heard this story on NPR - or know more about this. If so, I'd be curious to hear their take on it:
The planned mall in the coastal town would now incorporate an organic garden, a traditional farmers' market and a monarch butterfly sanctuary."

Depends on what they mean by a "sanctuary". Maybe they mean a breeding sanctuary where they'd plant alot of milkweed to keep monarchs around the whole year (San Luis Obispo is warm enough to permit breeding year round). Or maybe they mean creation of an autumnal monarch cluster site or creation of an overwintering site. It's possible to create a large monarch overwintering site in as little as 8-9 years by planting a clump of Australian blue gum eucalytus trees on 2-3 acres of land. These trees grow very fast (6 feet per year) so in 8-9 years you can have a stand of trees that is 50 feet tall.

[Mona Miller]

Please take this warning into consideration before you plant blue gum eucalytus trees in CA:
California Invasive Plant Council
http://www.cal-ipc.org/landscaping/dpp/ ... type=Trees
blue gum eucalyptus
Eucalyptus globulus
Found along the coast from Humboldt to San Diego and in the Central Valley. Most invasive in coastal locations. Easily invades native plant communities, causing declines in native plant and animal populations. Fire departments throughout Southern California recommend against using eucalyptus trees for landscaping because they are extremely flammable.

[Paul Cherubini]

Please take this warning into consideration before you plant blue gum eucalytus trees in CA: California Invasive Plant Council
http://www.cal-ipc.org/landscaping/dpp/ ... type=Trees blue gum eucalyptus Eucalyptus globulus
Found along the coast from Humboldt to San Diego and in the Central Valley. Most invasive in coastal locations. Easily invades native plant communities, causing declines in native plant and animal populations. Fire departments throughout Southern California recommend against using eucalyptus trees for landscaping because they are extremely flammable.

Although blue gum eucalytus is fairly highly flammable (from what I have witnessesed) so are the native trees and vegetation in coastal California. In 2004 there was a horrific coastal fire called the "Gaviota Fire" near Santa Barbara. As you can see from these photos, the native plants are trees were burn't to a crisp: http://www.lifesci.ucsb.edu/~lowry/gavi ... /index.htm

The blue gum eucalyptus trees surrounding the Arguello Oil and Gas refinery also burned in the 2004 Gaviota Fire, but the blue gum is so fire hardy and resistant, the trees were not killed and most have already recovered http://i85.photobucket.com/albums/k75/4af/chevron.jpg

Oil refinery companies continue to use blue gum eucalyptus as a landscape ornamental because they (and the insurance companies who insure them) don't consider it a serious fire hazard and they know practically all the native coastal trees (e.g. oaks, sycamores) will burn too.