Category Archive

Barrel cactus, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, California.

I have had a few inquires on the wildflower conditions here – I noticed it has been a couple of weeks since my last update, and with the weekend approaching, now seems like a perfect time.

I personally tend to group the wildflowers by where they grow, either in rocky terrain, or in the sandy areas.  I imagine the wildflower experts would roll their eyes to such a simple classification, but it makes it easier for me.  🙂

That said, this has been a good year for the wildflowers that grow in the rockier  regions – things like brittle bush and chuparosa are looking good.  This has been where I have been spending much of my time – pretty much along the base of the mountains, and in the canyons leading into the mountains all have a nice variety of color, including some a few early bloom cactus.

Probably the best area in the park still has to be Borrego Palm Canyon.  Thanks to recent rains, the stream now flows all the way down to the campground, and there is a wide variety of wildflowers.  Plus, the sheep have been seen in there regularly – yesterday I saw about a dozen including the same band of newborn ewes that I spotted a couple of weeks ago!

Now the sandy ares are a different story, and have only improved a little from two weeks ago.  The local newspaper quoted local park official who claimed this has been one of the “weirdest” years they have ever seen – I think that is true for much of the nation.  In January they had temperatures pushing 90, but then had a cold spell where it dropped to 24.  Local “experts” were partly blaming the freeze on the poor showing.  I was skeptical at first, but after doing a bit of hiking, I would now tend to agree.  I have found numerous dried up “dead” wildflowers like verbena that do appear to have been killed by something, possibly freezing.  And clearly the widespread sahara mustard isn’t helping any.

Two weeks ago, I couldn’t find any verbena or desert gold, but now, there does seem to be a second round of flowers – possibly ones that hadn’t sprouted before the freeze.  On my daily exercise run – usually in Coyote Canyon, I’m now seeing numerous patches of verbena, dune primrose and desert gold in places that didn’t have any two weeks ago.  Now these are very small patches unusable as a foreground in a landscape image, but adequate if you wanted to do wildflower closeups with a macro lens.

According to the local newspaper – Anza-Borrego naturalists did think this would be a very good year for cactus wildflowers and I would agree – I’m seeing lot of cactus loaded with buds just waiting to bloom.  The cactus tend to bloom later and should be a lot better in a couple of weeks.  As far as the wildflowers go, I would say this is about peak – some areas of Borrgo Palm Canyon area already declining.  So if you are thinking of a visit, I would say come this weekend, or wait for the cactus bloom.

Janine in a mud cave, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, California.

Yesterday we went exploring some mud caves.  It is believed that Anza-Borrego may have the largest mud caves in the world.  According to the book Anza-Borrego Desert Region
,  (a great resource by the way), there are at least 22 known caves.  The largest caves are over 1,000 feet long with rooms up to 80 feet high and 30 feet wide.  Some of the caves like this one have dry waterfalls.  Researcher Dwight Carey notes that subterranean streams are buried at depths of up to 180 feet.  Since the erosion rate is low, these caves may be thousands of years old!

It is crazy to think there are subterranean streams in such a dry location!

We explored a couple of caves.  The first one just kept going and going, turn after turn – we finally chickened out before ever reaching the end – it is spooky in there!

The one in the photo was my favorite, not only because of the huge chamber created by the dry waterfall, but because it had a sky light making it a bit easier to photograph.

Indian Head, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, California.

Much like Mt Alice back in Seward, Indian Head seems to find its way into many of my compositions here in Anza-Borrego, and this morning wasn’t any exception.

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Cholla and Ocotillo, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, California.

There is a place called the Cholla Garden in Joshua Tree National Park, I think this location is even better – almost as many cholla, but it is also full of blooming Ocotillo right now!

I photographed this last week as I was scouting for the past weekend’s workshop.  I forgot to take a photo of the workshop participants, but we had a great time!  It stopped raining right before the workshop began, and we had a nice variety of clouds and weather the rest of the day, followed with nice weather on Sunday.  One of the unexpected benefits of leading tours and workshops is the opportunity to meet really nice, very interesting people, and last weekend was no exception!

Yellow-Throat-Monkeyflower, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, California.

I have found a beautiful, thick patch of this colorful wildflower recently.  Here I decided to focus on an individual plant – in the future, I think I will try to include the entire patch.

Swainson's Hawk, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, California.

For many people, Anza-Borrego is famous for its desert wildflower bloom which in wet years can be amazing.  But, when a birder thinks of Anza-Borrego, they probably think of the Swainson’s Hawk migration that takes place this time each year.  On a record day, more then 1,000 hawks stopped in the valley where the town of Borrego Springs is located to roost for the night.  I personally have seen groups as large as a 100, with dozens roosting in the trees near our camp.  The stay the night, and then move on the next morning.  Last year over 3,000 hawks migrated through this area.

Beginning on February 15, volunteers begin a local hawk watch where they count the migrating hawks – the peak of the migration is in March.  You can see the hawk watchers with their spotting scopes on top of a large mound of dirt along De Giorgio Road north of Big Horn Road, very near to where this photo was taken.

Chuparosa, Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, California.

This was at sunrise less then an hour ago.  I was hoping for a bit more on an interesting sky, so I likely will return to this location again. Sounds like we might have some clouds and interesting weather coming this weekend.

Speaking of this weekend – I do have a couple spots left for my Anza-Borrego workshop.  The second weekend is sold out, but with lots of wildflowers and interesting weather on the way – this could be a good one!