Why California Spent $205,000 To Move $15 Shrubbery

MA Driver · Apr 16, 2012

As with everything else, a truck had to move it

California is broke. The national debt continues to spiral out of control. So, it's perhaps a little bit of a surprise that the California Department of Transportation, along with some help from the federal government, spent $205,000 in 2010 to move a shrub that's available at nurseries for about $15. Even the Knights who say Ni would find that too expensive.

There's a good chance that the sole remaining in-the-wild Arctostaphylos franciscana would have escaped notice altogether, but for the keen eye of a botanist driving by a soon-to-be-removed median strip near the Golden Gate Bridge.

A low, leafy shrub which occasionally sprouts unexciting little flowers, the Franciscan manzanita is that kind of squat ground-cover found all over California. Like other types of chaparral, it's not the sort of thing that draws close attention, but is part of the quilt of dark green sharing the light browns of the state's many hillsides.

The Franciscan manzanita didn't excite anyone until the last wild one was found. As it turned out, state and federal funds some of it stimulus money paid for the pricey shrub "translocation" project. Moving the plant and the weighty chunk of soil supporting its life cost $100,000, with $79,470 going to "fund the establishment, nurturing and monitoring of the Mother Plant" for a decade, as well as $25,605 to cover what federalese linguists call "reporting requirements." All that added to a road widening project budgeted at more than $1 billion.

The saga

began in 2009, when Caltrans had begun clearing brush from the median in preparation for a road improvement project along Doyle Drive, the road leading up to the iconic span. Dr. Daniel Gluesenkamp, a botanist and erstwhile director of habitat protection and restoration for Audubon Canyon Ranch, spotted the squat bush, igniting excitement amongst ecologists who thought the plant had been extinct in the wild, anyway since the last one was destroyed in 1942.

Botanists say that Franciscan manzanitas once spread from the San Francisco Bay's coastal area down to California's Central Coast, but by World War II, there was only one plant known to be left in the wild, and that situated in a not very wild place: A cemetery. When the cemetery was bulldozed to make way for tennis courts, that was that, or so the handful of people who actually cared thought.

Not long after Gluesenkamp's discovery, the Presidio Trust, Caltrans, the National Park Service, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the California Department of Fish and Game all got involved in trying to figure out what to do with the forgotten plant. Then the Wild Equity Institute, the Center for Biological Diversity and the California Native Plant Society added their two cents, pushing for an Endangered Species Act listing, and the subsequent requirement that the shrub be moved someplace other than a nursery, where it would lose its "in the wild" status.

According to reports, the manzanita is thriving in its new location. You may be asking yourself why the whole thing was necessary. Botanists suggest that putting it in a nursery with a bunch of farm-raised manzanitas would have altered it for the worse.

Apparently, San Francisco is a wild place. Who knew?

Taxpayers chipped in a lot of money for the security of knowing that the last wild example of the once prolific Franciscan manzanita will survive in its wild new San Franciscan home. Joy.
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http://m.jalopnik.com/5902371/why-california-spent-205000-to-move-a-15-shrubbery

Emulsified · Apr 16, 2012

I can sleep easier tonight knowing that poor plant won't have to take it's place next to a 'farm raised' sibling!

windsmith · Apr 16, 2012

extinction: elimination of a species as part of a natural process. The opposite of speciation.

Treefork · Apr 16, 2012

Someone will end up finding a whole field of these somewhere now.

Emulsified · Apr 16, 2012

Treefork said: ↑

Someone will end up finding a whole field of these somewhere now.
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Nesting habitat for the spotted owl

CondoCruiser · Apr 16, 2012

Give me $100 and a chainsaw!

Perfect example of wasteful spending. For $79K the plant should be able to say, "I'll be back"!

RAGE 18 · Apr 16, 2012

Road to nowhere in Alaska was much worse. Thanks politicians u guys always try to outdo the next guy or (gal).

fisher guy · Jan 11, 2013

i know im late to the party but i'll bring the round up lets kill this friggen thing c'mon people its a weed

truckermario · Jan 11, 2013

Hey Califussedup. You forgot your shipment of herring.

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