Although most other blackberries have both pollen and fruit produced by every flower, plants of the California blackberry are either functionally male or functionally female. This may help explain why, even though plants are abundant, the tasty fruit are a seldom-found treat. I notice the California buckeye starting to leaf out, earlier than the seedlings I planted in my back yard last year. The poison-oak is also leafing out, leaves glistening with their malevolent oil. A few butterflies drift by, a couple of monarchs and a swallowtail.
Bumblebees bumble around, and a big black beetle stumbles across the ground.
I find a small feather, perhaps that of an owl, perhaps of a hawk. As always seems to happen, I spend more time on the hill than intended. I pull some scattered French broom while the ground is still moist, but mostly it is the Oxalis pes-caprae that catches my attention at this time of year. I am dismayed to see how much oxalis has spread on Albany Hill since I first began walking on the hill over a decade ago. In addition to solid patches, such a large one on the crest of the hill, I keep finding small patches, even individual plants, popping up almost everywhere I wander.