Spring Preview : Record Rains Give Nature a Jump-Start

The extraordinary rains of winter decidedly washed away the drought. And this spring, it’s going to pour even more: grasshoppers, deer, fleas, poppies, pollen, rats, mosquitoes and maybe even rattlesnakes.

Within the natural and human web from Pasadena to Pomona and beyond, the drought-quenching rains are triggering untold reactions, some to be seen next year as well.

Without a doubt, entomologists and exterminators say, San Gabriel Valley gardeners and the back yard barbecue crowd will encounter more bugs in the next few months.

To the delight of hikers and the dismay of allergy sufferers, vegetation will be lush from the mountaintops to the valley below, including a plethora of wildflowers the likes of which have been unseen for perhaps a decade.

At the same time, the danger of wildfires will increase in the hills and canyons around suburban housing tracts in places such as Diamond Bar and Hacienda Heights, where the rains have fueled a thick growth of grasses that can rapidly convert a spark into a torrent of fire.

Yet the rains have dramatically lessened the risk of brush fire in much of the water-saturated San Gabriel Mountains, said Rich Hawkins, a fire officer with the U.S. Forest Service. The precipitation level at Mt. Wilson has reached almost 60 inches, nearly three times the norm for this time of year.

Monrovia, with rainfall comparable to many surrounding cities’, has logged more than 36 inches, twice the amount that normally would have fallen by now.

All the rain has created “conditions favorable to every kind of wildlife out there, both avian and mammal,” said U.S. Forest Service biologist Bill Brown of Angeles National Forest.

Birds and animals, he said, will flourish because their habitat has increased and so has their food supply. “When you provide more in terms of living space and food, they do quite well. It’s just like humans,” he said.

“We’re not going to see droves and droves of snakes or other species coming down into the foothills being a menace to people, though you will see some of that,” he said.

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Having more food and water and a better place to live will also mean an increase in breeding and reproduction.

For example, a water-deprived doe in the past might have rejected a buck’s advances with signals that are akin to saying, in effect, “Not tonight, dear, I’m too thirsty.”

Now, there will be no excuses. Naturalists predict that deer will reproduce next fall and winter in record numbers.

A reproductive boom may show up as early as this weekend, when state and federal biologists undertake their annual count of Nelson bighorn sheep in Angeles National Forest, where about 650 live. Brown said he expects that many more lambs have been born this spring compared with the drought years.

One irony in the abundance of wildlife, said Mickey Long, director of the Eaton Canyon Park and Nature Center in Pasadena, is that the lushness of the vegetation may make it harder to see some animals.

And animals forced during the drought to frequent streams such as the one in Eaton Canyon now have a vastly wider choice of locations to get their water, including places less accessible to humans.

So, Long said, “with all the rain, you may in a sense see less wildlife.”

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One insect, however, has already become quite visible: the mosquito, which has few enemies outside of the slap of an irritated human hand.

Culex tarsalis, a variety of mosquito that normally does not show up in abundance until late spring, already is out in full force, said Sue Zuhlke, manager of the San Gabriel Valley Mosquito Abatement District based in Irwindale.

This year without question will be worse than last year, she said. And mosquito breeding “is not going to slow down. There’s no way.”

One sure deterrent, however, is the mosquito fish, a minnow-sized fish that thrives on mosquito eggs and larvae. Mosquito districts are distributing the fish to people who have ornamental ponds.

Like mosquitoes, many other insects “react very rapidly to an increase in moisture,” said Altadena entomologist Robert H. Crandall.

“Aphids can take advantage of the water and multiply like nobody’s business,” he said. “They can be born pregnant. If you’re born pregnant, you kind of got a real jump on things.”

The bounty of aphids is likely to fuel an increase in their enemy, the ladybug, he said.

Grasshoppers too will profit from the prolific plant life. By next year, he said, there probably will be even more grasshoppers and the emergence of some rare species of blister beetles. “Many, many insects will be collected that hadn’t been collected for years,” he said.

Ants have already been marching in droves to get out of the rain, said Jesse Andrade, a pest service manager for Great Western Termite and Pest Control Inc. of El Monte.

“We’re seeing a big increase in business because of all the rains,” he said, explaining that ants retreated to the dryness of houses.

And rats are on the rise, Andrade said. When exterminators responded to complaints during the drought, “we’d only find two or three rats” in a house. But now, he said, “we’re pulling out 10, 12, 14 rats.”

Flea season has arrived a month or two early, he said. “All they needed was a little bit of warm weather, and away they went.”

And dry-wood and subterranean termites, which need moisture to survive, are thriving, he said.

The drought was hard on the pest control business, he said, but now “we’re looking at some good years ahead.”

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For allergy sufferers, there is bad news.

The wet winter and potentially sunny spring is “a perfect combination” to create a nightmare for people beset with asthma and allergy problems, said Dr. Jonathan Corren, director of UCLA’s allergy clinic. “We anticipate (the pollen count) is going to be pretty heavy.”

People who usually get sick in late March started feeling ill in February, he said. Generally, if the pollen and hay fever season starts earlier, it lasts longer, not finishing perhaps until October.

For those who can roam the outdoors with impunity, “it’s a sensational wildflower year,” said Kevin Connelly, volunteer coordinator at the Earthside Nature Center, as he admired the blooms already perking up the two-acre wooded lot in eastern Pasadena.

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The spacing of the rains since October has been excellent for stimulating wildflower growth, he said. Many flowers at Earthside are likely to be in full bloom when the center has its annual wildflower walk March 27 to 29.

As bumblebees and honey bees went about their business, he bent down to admire the hearty blooms and buds everywhere.

“They are much bigger and stouter than last year,” he said, holding the stems of arroyo lupine and then the buttery golden blooms of California poppies.

In a few cases, the rain has even caused mildew on the plants. “The wildflowers are adapted to take advantage of rain,” he said, “but for some, it’s even been too much rain.”