big berry manzanita (a natural list, no. 17)

You’re reading a natural list, a series in which I (an amateur naturalist) share three delightful things about an animal, plant, or fungus native to California along with an original illustration. It’s by no means an exhaustive list of delightful things, but it’s a start.

This series was inspired by the common tradition of naturalists keeping “life lists” that document the species they’ve seen throughout their lifetimes, and it’ll run as long as it takes to get through every California native species (which is to say, buckle in, because there are over 6,500 plants alone).

Since the fires in Los Angeles, I’ve been thinking a lot about manzanitas. They’re one of the many California plants that are resilient to — and even reliant on — fire across their lives. There’s a huge variety of them (I even have a manzanita-specific field guide on my shelf) across California and North America broadly. Today’s issue of a natural list covers one of my favorites that’s local to the LA area: the big berry manzanita.