Understory
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Your place in the living year

Martinez

Contra Costa County · California · 94553 37.9558, -122.0987

Solar peak 7:27 am 12:52 pm 5:48 pm

Twilight ends 6:46 pm dark 7:47 pm the skyline

Waxing Gibbous 96% lit

Rises 5:21 pm Peak 12:04 am Sets 6:47 am

This place is beginning to tell its story

The first signals will settle here as they arrive.

Listening for today’s signals The picture of this place will take shape as they arrive.

The standing record

What this place is made of

How this place came to be →

Growing zone

9b

Zone 9b here corresponds to average annual extreme winter lows of 25–30°F.

Soil

Cut and fill land-Diablo complex, 9 to 30 percent slopes

Cut and fill land (fill part) is about 75% of this mapped soil unit · very slow infiltration and high runoff potential

Mapped geology

Mesozoic sedimentary rocks

Mesozoic · siltstone,sandstone,shale

Mapped by the Geological Survey of Canada, via Macrostrat

Climate and landscape

Mediterranean California

About 18.1 inches of precipitation per year

winter 59° / 42° spring 72° / 49° summer 86° / 58° autumn 76° / 52°
Typical high / low · 1991–2020 NOAA normals · EPA Level II ecoregion

Lie of the land

A gentle slope facing southwest

200 feet above sea level · the ground falls about 4°

Where the moon's path runs over the coming month, from its highest to its lowest The moon's range this month The sun's path on June 21 The sun's path on December 21 The sun's path today The moon's path tonight The sun's path on June 21 The sun's path on December 21 The sun's path today The moon's path tonight Sun, June 21 Sun, Dec 21 Sun today Moon tonight 7:27 5:48 4:52 5:37 5:49 8:19 7:35 4:15 7:24 6:20 4:49 5:49 5:45 8:34 7:20 4:52 The moon now N E S W N

Over open ground the sun would shine 18 min longer on June 21, and 52 min longer on December 21: the hills take that much.

  • Winter solstice: 8 h 40 min of direct sun over the terrain, of 9 h 32 min with a flat horizon · clears the skyline 7:35 am, behind it 4:15 pm
  • Summer solstice: 14 h 30 min of direct sun over the terrain, of 14 h 48 min with a flat horizon · clears the skyline 5:49 am, behind it 8:19 pm
USGS 3DEP elevation at 30 metres, for this pin · bare earth: trees and buildings are not in it

Habitat today

Mostly roads and buildings

  • Within half a mile: 39% roads · 38% buildings and pavement · 18% street trees and planted ground · 4% introduced grasses and weeds
  • Largest unbuilt ground: California Ruderal Grassland and Meadow (4%)
  • Nearest mapped water and wetlands: stream or river, 0.4 miles southwest
LANDFIRE 2024 existing vegetation · USFWS National Wetlands Inventory

Before settlement

California Central Valley and Southern Coastal Grassland

LANDFIRE's model of what this ground most likely supported before European settlement, from its soils, climate and historical fire. In that regime, fire returned about every 4 years.

  • 77% California Central Valley and Southern Coastal Grassland
  • 10% California Central Valley Mixed Oak Savanna
  • 5% California Coastal Live Oak Woodland and Savanna
  • 5% California Montane Riparian Systems
LANDFIRE Biophysical Settings, 2016 remap

Watershed

Walnut Creek-Frontal Suisin Bay Estuaries

Subwatershed 180500010204 · Suisun Bay subbasin · California Region

USGS Watershed Boundary Dataset · NHDPlus, traced by USGS NLDI

Scars and events

On record nearby: 14 landslides · a record flood

  • 14 older landslides mapped within half a mile from the shape of the ground, undated
  • Highest flow in 25 years of peaks at Walnut Creek at Concord, 2.8 miles east: 5 January 1982, 13,300 cubic feet per second
USGS U.S. Landslide Inventory · USGS peak streamflow