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16 unusual facts about Channel Islands of California


Abronia maritima

This is a beach-adapted perennial plant native to the coastlines of southern California, including the Channel Islands, and northern Baja California.

Carlos Antonio Carrillo

Governor Manuel Micheltorena gave a Mexican land grant of the Island of Santa Rosa, in the Channel Islands of California, to Carlos and his brother José Antonio Carrillo in 1843.

Catalina eddy

The eddy gets its name from Santa Catalina Island, the Channel Island closest to the Los Angeles-Long Beach area; the center of an eddy is often located above or near the island.

Channel Islands of California

In 1972, the Brown Berets, a group of Chicano activists, seized and claimed the islands for Mexico, citing the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, a treaty between Mexico and the USA by which Mexico lost more than half of its territory, and arguing that the treaty does not specifically mention the Channel Islands nor the Farallon Islands.

Coso Range

The prehistoric Coso inhabitants exported volcanic glass (Coso obsidian) and this highly valued toolstone has been found as far distant as the Channel Islands of California.

Don Meadows

Meadows taught high school biology, and worked as a field supervisor for a biological survey of the Channel Islands (1936–1941), and Park Naturalist at the Big Basin Redwoods State Park and Calaveras Big Trees State Park (1946–1952).

Francis Raymond Fosberg

Fosberg worked as a plant researcher at the Los Angeles County Museum, specializing in plants from islands on the coast of California and of the desert Southwest.

Galvezia

Gambelia speciosa (Nutt.), commonly known as Showy Island Snapdragon and native to the Channel Islands of California in California and Guadalupe Island, Mexico.

Greta Andersen

She was the first person to swim the Santa Catalina Channel both ways.

José Antonio Carrillo

José Antonio Carillo was the Mexican land grant grantee of Rancho Las Posas in 1834, in present day Ventura County, California, and the Island of Santa Rosa of the Channel Islands.

Lasthenia

Lasthenia gracilis – Common Goldfields (found in California, Arizona, the Channel Islands of California, and northern Mexico)

Logfia gallica

It is widely introduced species, that has naturalized in western North America — from southwestern Oregon, throughout California including the Channel Islands, to northwestern Baja California, Mexico.

Lycium brevipes

It is native to northwestern Mexico and it occurs in California as far as the Sonoran Desert as well as some of the Channel Islands.

Naval Base Ventura County

The base has been home to many ordnance testing programs, and the test range extends offshore to the Navy-owned San Nicolas Island in the Channel Islands.

Painted Cave, California

Painted Cave is the highest and largest of the inholdings within the Santa Ynez Mountains, and commands an impressive view- on clear days, all seven of the Channel Islands can often be seen.

Trifolium gracilentum

palmeri, is a rare plant limited to the Channel Islands of California; it is sometimes treated as a species in its own right, Trifolium palmeri.


Aboriginal title in California

In United States ex rel. Chunie v. Ringrose (1986), the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit considered the trespass and conversion claims of Chumash tribe (joined by the federal government) over the ownership of the Channel Islands of California (and the channel beds surrounding the Santa Cruz and Santa Rosa islands) in California.

David A. Score

Score also served in a variety of management and operational roles at Channel Islands, Gray's Reef National Marine Sanctuary, and Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary.

Leptasterias hexactis

Leptasterias hexactis occurs in the intertidal zone of the north east Pacific Ocean with a range extending from the San Juan Islands in Washington to the Channel Islands of California.

Malacothrix squalida

It is endemic to Santa Cruz and Anacapa Islands, two of the eight Channel Islands of California, where it grows on rocky seaside bluffs and cliffs.

Ralph Hoffmann

On July 21, 1932 Hoffmann joined a group of scientists on an expedition to California's Channel Islands to explore San Miguel Island for fossil remains of the prehistoric Pygmy Mammoth.