Wandering Wednesday - Quail Hollow Ranch

I made it up to the top of Quail Hollow Ranch on Sunday, this is news because it's been years and years. We're trying our best to hike every weekend so that I can keep up with my sister-in-law's family on our monthly hike. And I guess it's working, I go very slowly hiking uphill but I keep going because I can. 
On this one hike we went through so many different plant communities: Central Oak Woodland, Mixed Evergreen Forest, Chaparral, Coast Redwood Forest. Very fun to see all the variation.

I noticed this one looping design on a leaf of a manzanita. There was a slight bump when I ran my finger over it but the leaf surface was intact. Later at home, using a great app, Seek I figured out that the design t is a trail left behind in the upper layers of the leaf by the larvae of the Madrone Leaf Miner, which eventually turns into a beautifully striped moth.

Seek easily hooks up to iNaturalist which I already use. It's cool that these two apps are a joint project of the California Academy of Sciences and National Geographic.

We were a little red and sweaty by the time we reached the top, but happy as you can see by the cheesy grins.

Above us in the oak tree were a bunch of God's Eyes hanging off the branches. I used to make these all the time as a kid so it was cool to see them out in the wild. Someone had fun climbing that tree!