Mainland Collections

Although I already finished my collection of pine cones on the island I still have to finish collecting seeds from the mainland population.  This morning I located a pine grove near Lompoc California and started my collection but i have to make one more trip back to get a few more pine cones.  It was a beautiful are in the hills above Lompoc but I missed the secluded nature of the island.  While there i noticed that there were much fewer dying trees and the majority of the trees in this population were taller than those of the Santa Rosa Island population.  There were also  far fewer saplings in the mainland grove.  The most notable difference I saw between the two populations was the size of the pine cones.  The many of cones of the mainland population were far larger and much longer spines than those on the island leading me to believe that the climate on the coast is more suitable to the Bishop pines than the climate on Santa Rosa Island.