Because we like to mix it up in California, relishing our reputation for being innovative and edgy, it’s only fitting that the newest state symbol defies simple description and is honored by no other state. It’s among earth’s oldest living beings; one organism that comprises a complex ecosystem; not a species. It is alive and able to take in water, photosynthesize and reproduce. It’s gorgeous, ecologically essential, used by fauna and humans, and faces the usual human threats of habitat loss due to disease and development, careless destruction, and climate change.
Lace lichen became the California State Lichen on 1 January 2016 at the urging of the California Lichen Society (CALS). Hang on through the basic description below the green box. It will help you understand
- why lichen is a strange not-species,
- amazing abilities of lichens, and
- why California designated a state lichen.
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Tell us your lichen stories.
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what is a lichen, why isn’t it a species?
You cannot be a lichen without forming a partnership with someone from another kingdom. Part fungus part alga, lichens are a partnership formed into a single being when a certain alga lives among the filaments of a fungus (or several fungi). Lichens are not plants, are sometimes mistaken for mosses (a type of plant), and have tiny leafless branches with leaf-like flakes. Lacking roots, lichens cannot imbibe water and nutrients as do plants and fungi. The algal component takes in water, carbon dioxide, and nutrients from the air and produces its own food through photosynthesis using the sun’s energy (fungi do not photosynthesize, algae do).
Lichens are not plant nor animal, and are not one species. As a composite organism, a lichen’s scientific name is that of the fungal component. Reproduction occurs asexually through broken pieces and sexually when fungal spores are released and find a new alga in which to grow. The fungal spores released from the lichen that don't find their algal partner will die.
Lichens merge two of the five kingdoms of life: Monera (cyanobacteria, formerly called blue-green algae) or Protista (algae) merges with Fungi. The other two kingdoms are Plantae and Animalia. That’s the short version and omits important details you can find here.
why do we need a state lichen?
Designation of a State Lichen was promoted by CALS in recognition of the importance of lichens in the environment and the need for more public knowledge.
Lace lichen has three qualities that make it an ideal candidate for the state lichen of California:
- It is easy to recognize even by those not very well acquainted with lichens.
- It is common throughout much of California—growing along the coast from the northern to the southern borders and up to 130 miles inland.
- It is a strikingly beautiful lichen.
While small in stature, lichens play a big role in the ecosystem. With nearly 1,900 species of lichens in California, they contribute to our region’s rich biological diversity. [...]
CALS sees this designation as an important step in increasing public awareness of the significant roles that lichens play in our natural environment.
ROCK CRUSHING LICHENS
Lichens are tough survivors who handle important ecological functions that appear impossible for such a seemingly delicate beings. They break down rocks to form soil. Lichens can grow almost anywhere, even in harsh, extreme environments. The crusty surface of lichens helps hold together soils of sand dunes and deserts. You’ll find lichens growing where plants cannot survive: frozen arctic, atop rocks, and high altitude mountains. Lichens can even grow inside rocks between the grains.
Animals use lichens for forage, nests, and bedding. More than 50 birds use lichen in nests; reindeer, caribou and mountain goats eat lichens. Some invertebrates use lichen for camouflage and habitat. Larvae of lacewings (a delicate net-winged insect) have a coating of powdery lichen fragments on their bodies that helps them hide from predators as they hang out on lichen covered tree trunks and branches.
SOIL stabilizing LICHENS
Desert soils are nurtured and held safe by a layer of lichens and other organisms called cryptogrammic crust. The crust also can include cyanobacteria, green and brown algae, and mosses (sometimes with liverworts, fungi, and bacteria). Desert habitat quality can be evaluated by the how extensive or fragmented the crust is. Walking on it repeatedly, off-road vehicle traffic, and livestock use cause the crust to break up, exposing the soil, and reducing the benefits of the crust, although the pieces can grow and reconnect. Cryptogrammic crust stabilizes soil against erosion, helps water infiltration, fixes nitrogen, and adds nutrients to the soil.
Most lichens grow very slowly, often less than a millimeter per year, so cryptogrammic crusts can take decades to restore. Native herd animals like elk and deer keep moving, they tend to not stay in one area and browse until there’s little left to eat. Their impact on the cryptogrammic crust is more easily tolerated than the repeated pounding of cattle or sheep whose foraging and area use habits are different. They stay in one area and browse until their favored plants are gone.
TOUGH pioneers WHO MEASURE TIME AND AIR
Due to these abilities and their tolerance for repeated episodes of desiccation and rehydration, lichens are often first to colonize disturbed areas, such as exposed rock of a landslide or other barren landscapes. Lichens don’t just get dry, they can lose all their water and become so brittle pieces break off. Each piece is able to form a new lichen. When lichens go into this dormant state they can wait out extremes of temperature, radiation and drought.
Archeologists use lichens to help date the age of exposed rocks (lichenometry). Air quality can be evaluated through analyzing the chemical composition of lichens to understand pollutants because lichens take it all in from the air but, having no deciduous parts that fall off and die (such as leaves), they store the pollutants. Because lichens are long-lived, require specific habitat qualities, and occur in many different habitat types they are valuable as biomonitors. Lichens also are used in medicines (they are being studied as antibiotics) and as dyes.
lace lichen DESCRIPTION and habitat
California’s State Lichen, lace lichen (Ramalina menziesii) grows up to three meters long and has an intricate netted structure. Flat, pale yellowish-green branches hang from trees, often forming large clumps. It can be found in western North America from central Baja California to southern Alaska. In California, this epiphyte grows on shrubs, conifers, oaks and other broadleaf trees of the foothill and valley woodlands and north coast forests. In a few areas, lace lichen occurs in the Sierra foothills and Central Valley but most populations are in coastal regions. The Ramalina genus is one of the more pollution-sensitive lichen genera because its broad netted structure creates a large surface area to absorb airborne materials.
LICHEN CONSERVATION ISSUES
In California, lichens occur everywhere, but lace lichen are mostly in the coastal belt and need both fog and coast live oak (Quercus agrifolia), the tree on which it grows. The oak and coastal habitats are also dependent on the fog and clement coastal climate. Coast live oak is threatened by sudden oak death disease (SOD), a disease that thrives in coastal climates. Understanding threats to lichens’ substrates (such as oaks) is a world-wide issue in lichen conservation. Another is exploitive harvesting of lichen for medicinal uses because the price for medicinal lichen is high.
Climate change is suspected as one main driver of the reduction in coastal fog. Studies show that it has declined in the past century and in 2010 was about three hours per day (average) less than in the past century. At the same time, daytime temperatures have increased, so there is more demand on the trees to take up moisture but less moisture. The inland populations of lichen face drought, increased heat, and wildfires in addition to SOD and habitat degradation. A UK study of lichens’ responses to climate change indicates range changes for specific UK lichens and the need to ensure conservation of these areas.
Land use demands for ranches, agriculture, and residential/retail development are high in California’s coastal and foothill areas so loss of habitat is a serious threat. Ranch and land management practices can affect remaining suitable habitat. CALS worked with the California Native Plant Society (CNPS) to create the database and support needed to include lichen in the CNPS Inventory of Rare and Endangered Plants of California. The CNPS listing status for plants, and now lichens, is recognized under the California Environmental Quality Act and by agencies such as Fish and Wildlife, and BLM. This gives them impact and mitigation consideration in development and other actions that might affect the organisms. Currently there are 14 lichens either listed or undergoing evaluation to determine if they meet CNPS list criteria. One species is listed as “Rare, Threatened, or Endangered in State and Elsewhere” and known only from four populations in coastal scrub on islands off south coastal CA and Baja: island tube lichen (Hypogymnia schizidiata).
more lichen information - workshop and field trip (Santa Barbara ca)
For more information on lichens, explore the Lichens of North America website.
The upcoming CALS 2016 Annual Meeting (January 28-31) in Santa Barbara California will celebrate the State Lichen designation.
The meeting includes a Lichen Identification Workshop by Shelly Benson, Sonoma County, CA lichenologist (visit the workshop link to see a great photo of Benson wearing a lace lichen shawl!). Another activity planned is a visit to Sedgwick Reserve in the Santa Ynez Valley. Part of the UC Natural Reserve System, public access to the reserve is limited. The reserve hosts a rich lichen flora in a diversity of habitats including coastal sage scrub, chaparral, oak woodlands, gray pine forest, and riparian areas
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