Freshwater marshes are found throughout California in many different settings, environments, and elevations, typically occurring in soils that hold rainwater or are fed by springs or seeps. They are characterized by emergent hydrophytes (perennial wetland plants that emerge from rhizomes after dormancy), including cattails, rushes, sedges, and grasses. Also found in these habitats are annuals such as forbs and grasses, and woody perennials like willows. Some freshwater marshes are vernal, filling with available rainwater before drying seasonally, and some are perennially wet. These marshes reduce flooding, decrease water pollution through biofiltration, support a vast array of resident and migratory species, and are beautiful to look at. Despite these benefits, over 90% of the freshwater marshes in California have been destroyed due to filling, draining, development, agriculture, and weed invasions. Freshwater marshes are a relatively uncommon but very important habitat on campus and in the surrounding areas.
Yerba mansa
| Anemopsis californica | Chumash - ‘onchochi |
| Sauraceae (lizard’s tail family) | Spanish - yerba mansa |
Sprawling, stoloniferous, winter-dormant perennial herb, 15-45 cm (6-18 in), with distinctive white flowers. Found in moist places around both freshwater and moderately saline places at hot springs, seeps, marshes, and other wetlands in the area, it sometimes forms large stands. It grows in both full exposure to the sun, and under the canopy of willows.
This plant is a medicinal herb with a long history of indigenous use in both Chumash and neighboring North American Indian cultures. The herb is used both internally and externally. The plant was also used to purify handlers of the powerful, supernatural substance ‘ayip, made partly from rattlesnake venom (Timbrook, 2007). Among the native plants in California, Anemopsis is both a monotypic family and genus, meaning no genera in that family, and no other species in that genus occur within the state.
Alkali bulrush
| Bolboshhoenous maritimus | Cyperaceae (sedge family) |
Rhizomatous, emergent, grass-like perennial, 0.8-1.2 m (2.5-4 ft), often forming dense stands. Scattered around freshwater and salt marshes around the coast, and occurring in the interior in similar habitats. The plant has distinctly triangular stems with flowers at the tips, which mature into a cluster of brown spikelets. Inside of these, brown, glossy seeds form that look similar to sesame seeds.
Recently split from the genus Scirpus, members of the genus Bolboschoenous form small, underground tubers on their rhizomes. The rhizomes and possibly the seeds were eaten by some Native Americans, and are also food for waterfowl such as ducks.
Western goldenrod
| Euthamia occidentalis | Asteraceae (sunflower family) |
Rhizomatous perennial, 0.6-2 m (2-6.5 ft). This plant displays winter dormancy, and reemerges each spring, briefly bearing yellow flowers for a few weeks before they mature into wind-dispersed seeds. Occurring around the Goleta slough and the banks of its tributaries, it is a valuable summertime floral resource for monarchs and many other insect species.
Solidago, another native genus of yellow-flowered aster, also goes by the common name goldenrod, and comprises about 13 species, subspecies or varieties in the state. By contrast, Euthamia occidentalis is the only species in that genus in California.
Common rush, spreading rush
| Juncus patens | Juncaceae (rush family) |
Clump forming (cespitose) perennial, 30-90 cm (11-35 in), with bluish-green to green stems. Tiny seeds form in capsules at the upper end of the stems. It can be found in moist places around vernal pools, stream banks, and marshes. A relatively xeric rush, it can be found in drier locations, such as in the partial shade of oak woodlands or in grasslands. Like many California natives, it has many forms, some of which have been made into cultivars in the horticultural trade.
For restoration use, as with all of the species we work with, CCBER uses only locally occurring, wild material from the natural areas around campus for propagation and planting.
Brown-headed rush
| Juncus phaeocephalus | Juncaceae (rush family) |
Rhizomatous perennial, 25-76 cm (10-30 in), with compressed, iris-like leaves. Juncus phaeocephalus often occurs in the bottoms and edges of our local vernal pools. The insides of these leaves are ribbed with internal horizontal walls called septa, which can be seen when held to the light, and felt by pinching a stem and running your fingers along its length.
Another locally occurring species called the iris-leaved rush, Juncus xiphioides, is also rhizomatous but tends to occur in riparian settings, such as El Capitan creek. Its leaves are wider, lighter green, and more distinctly compressed like those of an iris. Juncus is a cosmopolitan genus with over 300 species worldwide.
Basket rush
| Juncus textilis | Chumash - mekhme’y |
| Juncaceae (rush family) | Spanish - junco |
Rhizomatous perennial, 0.6-2.5 m (2-8 ft), with slightly bluish-green stems and loosely formed flowers, which form into inconspicuous capsules that bear their tiny seeds. It occurs in both wetlands and drier places, such as oak woodlands, but does best with at least some extra moisture. This is the famous plant from which many beautiful Chumash baskets have been woven over millennia, and it is the main Juncus species used for basketry by the Chumash of Goleta and Santa Barbara.
Another related rush, the spiny rush (Juncus acutus) is clump forming, acutely sharp at the leaf tips, and grows in riverbeds and salt marshes, where it tolerates saline conditions. It was used in twined basketry for water bottles and other implements.
Alkali rye grass, beardless wild rye
| Elymus triticoides | Poaceae (grass family) |
Rhizomatous perennial grass, 3-1.2 m (1-4 ft), with blue-green leaves and stems. Found in salt marsh edges, stream banks, meadows, and in grasslands. Alkali rye grass tolerates a wide variety of soils and can grow in wetlands or non-wetlands, as well as in soils with some salinity. This grass hybridizes with its larger cousin giant rye grass Elymus condensatus, to form Elymus x gouldii, the many flowered wild rye. This hybrid is rhizomatous, darker green, and is about 25% larger than E. triticoides.
It can sometimes be found locally growing on the margins of eucalyptus trees, possibly because they prevent competition from exotic annual grasses.
California bulrush
| Schoenoplectus californicus | Chumash - stapan |
| Cyperaceae (sedge family) | Spanish - tule |
Rhizomatous perennial, 2-3.5 m (6-12 ft), with a round-edged but triangular stem. Found in large colonies in fresh and brackish water marshes, the lower portions of creeks, ponds and lake margins. California bulrush has many traditional Chumash uses, including as house thatching, sleeping mats, privacy partitions, and tule balsas, a type of watercraft made by tying bundles of dried tule together that are stiffened with willow poles.
Tomols also incorporated tule, as the gaps between their planks were chinked with the pithy heart inside the stems before being waterproofed with tar. The rhizomes of these plants can be eaten, and the plant has medicinal uses as well. Chumash reported using the ash from burnt tule on the navels of newborn babies and to treat poison oak rashes (Timbrook, 2007). A similar species, hardstem bulrush (S. acutus), has bluer stems and is rare around Goleta, but has been more commonly recorded from places around Santa Barbara and the Santa Ynez Valley.
Cattail
| Typha dominguensis | Typhaceae (cattail family) |
Broadleaf cattail
| Typha latifolia | Chumash - taqsh |
| Typhaceae (cattail family) | Spanish - tule ancho |
Rhizomatous perennial, 1-2.2 m (3-7 ft), with bluish green to light green leaves and stems. This common wetland plant occurs in creeks, ponds, and other wet places all around the world, and forms the familiar cattails.
Winter-dormant, it stores starch in its rhizomes for the cold months, which can be collected in the fall and pounded in a mortar to separate the edible starch from the inedible fiber. The late, great, local primitive technologist Joe Dabill said there was more food per acre of cattails than potatoes. The yellow pollen born on the male flowers, just above the female flowers, can be collected and eaten as well. Chumash Indians traditionally mix the pollen with water to form a thin mush, in addition to using the plant for thatching (Timbrook, 2007). Narrow-leaf cattail, Typha angustifolia, is considered non-native. All three form hybrids, although only those between T. angustifolia and T. dominguensis are fertile.