Natural History Wanderings

Borrego Wildflowers reports on February/28/2020

Carrizo Canyon was supposed to be good, but we didn’t know any exact location.
Driving up towards Bow Willow Campground many Hesperocallis undulata | Desert lily in bloom along the road.
Next we entered the Carrizo Wash road (south), a soft sand road, not advised without a 4×4.

To see more we looped clockwise to see plants we might have missed the last time we were here.
You are kidding me blooming Nicotiana clevelandii | Cleveland’s tobacco in high number, in their favorite spot.
Great bloom with fields of Eschscholzia parishii | Parish’s poppy and Phacelia distans | Common phacelia.

Yes Antirrhinum filipes | Twining snapdragon a not very common plant.
Many Mentzelia hirsutissima | Hairy blazingstar and in the other canyon Mentzelia involucrata | Sand blazing star.
Mixed with hundreds of Mohavea confertiflora | Ghost flower.
Not to forget our favorite Diplacus bigelovii bigelovii | Bigelow’s monkey flower in nice fields.
A couple of good blooming Lycium parishii | Parish’s desert thorn another favorite of ours.

Interesting to notice the abrupt change of canyon wall the flowers prefer, always the south facing wall.
The bloom alternates from left to right to left again.
It’s so far one of the few places we found Eriophyllum lanosum | White easter bonnets mixed with Eriophyllum wallacei | Wallace’s woolly daisy (yellow).

This is a good Fagonia laevis | California fagonia year, nice finding our second completely white flowering plant.

A whole canyon wall covered with Mohavea confertiflora | Ghost flower close to the campground, but easily missed behind a mesquite barrier.
The icing on the cake, Eremalche rotundifolia | Desert five spot, not by the usual handful in bloom, but by the hundreds. Interestingly they all had their flower in various stages of opening.
Some fully open, some partially open.
Wow the best bloom this season.

See photos at: Bloom report out of the Anza-Borrego Desert