Boerne Chapter

The Native-Plant Guru of the Trans-Pecos Collected in Kendall County

Author: Bill Ward

Two or three weeks ago my wife Kathy brought home a collection of pressed native plants for me to see. She suspected I’d be interested in these herbarium specimens because of their high quality, and she was right! This turns out to be a historic collection!

Scanned image of flowers
Ox-eye collected November 4, 1983. If this identification is correct, it is a rare plant for the Edwards Plateau. (photo by Bill Ward)

Kathy had been asked if she could use any of the plant specimens for the Cibolo Nature Center “Nature Boxes” that she and other volunteers are taking to Boerne elementary schools. No, the pressed plants are not appropriate for the Nature Boxes, but she borrowed them to bring home. As soon as we opened the folders, we saw that the collection must have been made by Barton Warnock!

Dr. Barton Warnock was the Sul Ross State University botany professor so famous for his work on plants of Trans-Pecos Texas. None of my professional botanist friends knew Warnock ever collected in Kendall County. In fact, it is often told that he refused to botanize out of the Trans-Pecos during his later years.

Part of this herbarium collection was given to Mary Gomillion for safe keeping at the Cibolo Nature Center by Norm Foster just after he retired from Boerne High School. He saved another part of the collection at his home. Foster “inherited” the collection from Buddy Dechert, former Ag teacher at BHS. Dechert and Foster had used a few of the specimens in their classes, but neither one knows how or when the collection went to BHS.

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Red cedar (juniper) collected November 4, 1983. (photo by Bill Ward)

The specimen labels intrigued me. All labels say “Pamela Bevier Las Encinas Ranch, Kendall County” and “Barton H. Warnock.” Each label also has the family and species name, a brief description, a collection date and number. Collection dates were during the fall of 1983 and spring of 1984. If the elevation is given, it is always 1425 feet.

Google tells me that Pamela Bevier, a resident of San Antonio and New York City, owned and operated Las Encinas Ranch from 1979 to 1995. Dr. Bevier also recently owned Park Central Corporate Center in San Antonio. She has been a university professor of French and a public health researcher, both in New York City and at the UT Science Center in San Antonio.

With some pointing in the right direction from some friends who live in Kendall County and with top-notch sleuthing by my good friend Rebecca Rogers, we can confirm that Las Encinas Ranch was north of the Guadalupe River on FM 474. The ranch now has another name.

The years of collection, 1983 and 1984, were shortly after Dr. Warnock retired as head of botany at Sul Ross State University. According to a 1998 memorial written by Dr. Billie Turner, the “guru of Trans-Pecos botany” spent many of his post-retirement years collecting plants for small “ranch herbaria.”

Scanned image of leaves
Rough-leaf dogwood collected May 4, 1984. (photo by Bill Ward)

Warnock set up herbaria on many large Trans-Pecos ranches so that the ranch owners, their children, and the ranch managers might know and appreciate what their land grew and where. Apparently Barton Warnock also made a ranch herbarium for Las Encinas Ranch.

I became a true believer in “this is a small world” when I showed an early draft of this column to TPWD botanist Jason Singhurst, and he promptly informed me that Dr. Bevier is his wife’s aunt! Jason told me that when Pamela Bevier and her mother once lived in Alpine, they were good friends with the Warnocks. Apparently Dr. Bevier was a good enough friend to persuaded Barton Warnock to collect on her Las Encinas Ranch, way east of the Trans-Pecos.

This historic Kendall County herbarium contains 24 species of trees, shrubs, and woody vines; 43 species of grasses; and 63 species of forbs (wildflowers).

I checked the data base of the largest herbarium in Texas, the one at the University of Texas at Austin, and there is no record of Warnock collections from Kendall County, nor from the nearby counties of Bexar, Kerr, Medina, Bandera, Hayes, Uvalde, or Real. He did collect a few specimens in Comal and Blanco Counties during 1946, about the time he was finishing his PhD work at UT.

Several species included in the Las Encinas Ranch herbarium are not listed among the Kendall County specimens in the UT herbarium. Not yet, anyway. Permission has been given by Norm Foster and Mary Gomillion to present the entire Kendall County ranch herbarium to the Plant Resources Center, The University of Texas at Austin, where the specimens will be suitably preserved and available for botanical research.

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About the Region

New Braunfels, the location of our Fall 2024 Symposium, straddles both the Edwards Plateau Ecoregion and the Blackland Prairie ecoregion. Interstate 35 divides the city of New Braunfels; its path through the city closely parallels the boundary of these two ecoregions, with the Edwards Plateau on the west side and the Blackland Prairies region to the east. The Edwards Plateau area is also called the Hill Country; however, this general term covers a much larger area extending farther north. Spring-fed creeks are found throughout the region; deep limestone canyons, rivers, and lakes (reservoirs) are common. Ashe juniper is perhaps the most common woody species found throughout the region. Additional woody species include various species of oak, with live oak (Quercus fusiformis) being the most common. Sycamores (Platanus occidentalis) and bald cypress (Taxodium distichum) border waterways. This area is well known for its spring wildflower displays, though they may be viewed in spring, late summer, and fall, as well. According to Texas Parks and Wildlife, average annual rainfall in the Edwards Plateau ranges from 15 to 34 inches.

The Blackland Prairie extends from the Red River south to San Antonio, bordered on the west by the Edwards Plateau and the Cross Timbers, and on the east by the Post Oak Savannah. Annual rainfall averages 30 to 40 inches, with higher averages to the east. This region is dominated by prairie species. The most common grass species include little bluestem (Schizachyrium scoparium) and Indian grass (Sorghastrum nutans) in the uplands and switchgrass (Panicum virgatum) in the riparian areas and drainages. Common herbaceous flowering plants include salvias, penstemons, and silphiums. This area has suffered greatly from overgrazing and agricultural use. Few intact areas remain, though many of the plants can be found along county roadsides throughout the region.

Our four host chapters (New Braunfels, Lindheimer, Guadalupe, and the Hill Country chapters) are located in one or both of the ecoregions above. However, the eastern portion of Guadalupe County also falls within the Post Oak Savanna ecoregion. Annual rainfall averages 35 to 45 inches, with higher averages to the east. A wide variety of hardwood trees are found, including several species of oaks, elms, and in the Bastrop area, loblolly pine (Pinus taeda). Grasses and forbs dominate in the open savannas, with most common grass being little bluestem. Ranching, agriculture, and fire suppression have allowed woody species to encroach on the once-open savannas.

Source: Wildflowers of Texas by Michael Eason