Floral Defense

Sixth Army to the rescue

The U.S. Sixth Army has a new life-and-death assignment: guarding what may be the most imperiled of the more than 2,000 American plants on the endangered species list. The last-known Arctostaphylos hookeri ravenii, commonly called the Presidio Manzanita, is located on a hillside overlooking the Pacific at the Army's Presidio base in San Francisco.

Manzanita is Spanish for "little apple"--a reference to the tiny berries nestled amid the 4-ft. shrub's shiny green leaves and pink blossoms. Indians used to boil manzanita leaves to make a medicinal tea to treat venereal disease. There are about 50 types of the plant, but the Presidio variety has been dying out as developers paved over its habitat.

The Army is keeping the exact location of its shrub secret to protect it from plantnapers. Already, people have been spotted skulking around the Presidio base in search of it. "It's quite a handsome ground cover and would make a nice addition to someone's garden," says Rare-Plant Expert Alice Howard. What will happen if the Sixth Army gets hard pressed? Threatens Howard: "We'll call out the vigilante corps of the California Native Plant Society."

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