Natural History Wanderings

Santa Monica Mts. National Recreation Area reports

Reports are that this is the best flower season the Santa Monica’s have seen in years.

Malibu Creek State Park – Backbone Trail from Piuma Rd. to Saddle Peak 5/10/17

Hiked the Backbone Trail eastbound from Piuma Road to Saddle Peak. There is a large variety of flowers blooming on this trail. There is a lot of Golden Yarrow, Elegant Clarkia , Orange Monkey Flower, and Purple Sage blooming on this trail. Other flowers seen; Yellow Monkey Flower, Deerweed, Chemise, Indian Pink, California Everlast, Tarweed, Mariposa Lily, White Pincushion , Wooly Bluecurl, California Fuchsia, Buckwheat , Popcorn Flower, Canyon Sunflower, Purple Nightshade, Black Sage, Purple Sage Turkish Rugging Goldenstar, Fern Phacelia, Tarweed, Large Flowered Phacelia, Caterpillar Phacelia Cliff Aster.

See older reports and photos at What’s Blooming

Santa Monica Mt. Quick Links:
Wildflowers of the Santa Monica Mountains – Photos of 1000 SMM plants.
Archive – Previous “What’s Blooming” reports.
Outdoors – The Calendar of Events for the Santa Monica Mountains NRA.
SMM WildFlowers – The Park’s popular wildflower app for the iPhone.
New! SMM WildFlowers – The Park’s popular wildflower app for Android smartphones (Pre-Release Beta Version)