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IN THE FIELD: Corte Madera Mountain

By Tom Oberbauer

Back in January of 1978, I hiked up onto Corte Madera Mountain with a friend, Tom Scott (now with UC Berkeley and UC Riverside), who had been studying Golden Eagles in San Diego County. Bald Eagles were wintering at Corte Madera Lake. After postponing the hike due to rain, that was a good rain season, we drove out to Corte Madera Lake, which was accessible because Tom Scott had a key, and we hiked up the north side of Corte Madera Mountain on a little used trail. The trail climbed through a woodland of mostly coast live oak (Quercus agrifolia), but also Coulter pine (Pinus coulteri), as well as Jeffrey pine (Pinus jeffreyi). It was foggy going up and the view was obscured.

IN THE FIELD: Corte Madera Mountain
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In The Field: The New Santa Fe Valley Trail

By Jürgen Schrenk

Recently, the new Santa Fe Valley Trail, connecting the San Dieguito River Park’s Del Dios Gorge Trail with the Lusardi Creek Preserve, was opened to the public. The beginning of the trail took us through fields of Menzies’ Goldenbush (Isocoma menziesii var. menziesii).

In The Field: The New Santa Fe Valley Trail
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The Desert a Month after Monsoonal Rains

By Jürgen Schrenk

After yet another week of waiting for the temps to go down watching our Monarch production and limiting our walks to local parks, I was worried that I might completely miss the monsoonal “spring” in the desert. So, I went on a quick drive along S-2

The Desert a Month after Monsoonal Rains
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CNPS-SD Helps With Rare Plant Surveys

By Justin Daniel, Vice President, Rare Plants Co-chair

With vaccinations allowing more contact outdoors and a workload a year behind, it's been a busy time a few of us to help some of our fantastic environmental conservancy organizations around San Diego County by assisting them in their rare plant surveys. The following are glimpses into some of the recent surveys. Come along for the ride and reach out to support our partners, too!

CNPS-SD Helps With Rare Plant Surveys
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The Mount Laguna Surprise

By Tom Oberbauer

…The next week, I drove up and hiked to the location I visited in December and sure enough, the display of Platystemon californica (above) was pretty amazing. Sheets of color extended across the slopes leading into the center of the meadow. I spent some time attempting to photograph and create video of the breeze gently shaking the small flowers. From this location, the view of the meadow ranges across its full length, extending more than three miles in the distance to the south. Laguna Lake also contained a good level of water reflecting the blue sky, apparently left over from the previous two good rainfall seasons. I attempted to capture the view of the flowers with the lake and end of the meadow in the distance. The breeze and the movement of the flowers in this manner always reminds me of when I was a child and my family visited Estes Park in Colorado and we observed alpine wildflowers…

The Mount Laguna Surprise

calochortus weedii

Jamul Mountains-June 2015

Jamul Mountains-June 2015

By Tom Oberbauer, Vice President CNPS-San Diego

The Jamul Mountains are not as well recognized as some of their nearby neighbors. They are over-shadowed by Otay Mountain at 3,500 feet and San Miguel Mountain at 2,567 feet since they top out at 2,059 feet at the highest point. The Jamul Mountain stand between SR-94 as it passes through the southern part of Jamul, and Proctor Valley.  Proctor Valley is notorious for the strange events that are purported to have occurred there: Proctor Valley monster and two headed cows; remnants of rumors from my youth growing up in the vicinity. Like San Miguel and Otay Mountains, the Jamul Mountains are composed of metavolcanic rock. This is volcanic rock that was deposited as part of a group of very tall mountains like the Andes, but in an island arc off the west coast of North America 106-108 million years ago (Kimbrough, 2014). Since I last climbed the Jamul Mountains in the late 1970’s, many things have changed including the fact that a large part of the surrounding land has been preserved, a steel barrier has been constructed to prevent OHV and trucks from driving cross-country over the slopes, and major fires have occurred. 

I set out on an overcast morning, overcast where I live, but clear and sunny by the time I reached Proctor Valley.  The temperature of the day was predicted to be in the mid 90’s. I drove down Proctor Valley Road and could see that some things have not changed, especially the washboard surface and the debris from target shooting along the side of the road. I parked my vehicle near a lone Eucalyptus tree and set off toward the peak.