Los Angeles & Southern California - Andrea Schulte-Peevers [39]
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GREENING UP LA
Cities in the US have lost 20% of their trees in the last decade alone. But if LA Mayor Anthony Villaraigosa has his way, that trend will soon be reversed in his city. Called the Million Trees Initiative (www.milliontreesla.org), the idea has caught on like – pardon the expression – wildfire. By enlisting the expertise and grassroots skills of groups like Tree People (www.treepeople.org) and the LA Department of Parks and Recreation (www.laparks.org), volunteers are being trained and directed in the task of planting hundreds of thousands of trees in the megalopolis over the next few years.
If people like Mayor Villaraigosa, Leonardo DiCaprio and Tree People founder Andy Lipkis have their way, the stereotypical images of Los Angeles will soon be harder to come by. Oh you’ll still have the horrifying traffic, the relentless sprawl of development, and 747s roaring in and out of LAX. But there will be two gigantic differences: the air in which they exist will be far, far better and they’ll be much harder to spot through the outreaching branches of all those new trees.
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The Torrey pine, on the other hand, is super-rare. This gnarly tree, which has adapted to sparse rainfall and sandy, stony soils, only grows at Torrey Pines State Reserve near San Diego and on Santa Rosa Island, part of Channel Islands National Park and home to dozens of endemic plant species. The same is true of Catalina Island, where you’ll find the Catalina ironwood, Catalina mahogany, Catalina Manzanita and Catalina bedstraw at the Wrigley Memorial & Botanical Gardens.
Except for the deserts and high mountain ranges, the hills of SoCal turn green in winter, not summer. As soon as the rains arrive, the dried-out brown grasses spring to life. As early as February, wildflowers pop up, most notably the bright orange California poppy, the state flower. Resist the temptation to pick one or risk facing a $500 fine. Along the coast little purple wild irises flower until June.
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A colorful survey of California’s wildflowers from desert to alpine can be found at www.calacademy.org/research/botany/wildflow.
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Nothing says desert more than a cactus. Cacti and other desert plants have adapted to the arid climate with thin, spiny leaves that resist moisture loss (and deter grazing animals), and seed and flowering mechanisms that kick into gear during brief rains. The sheer variety of cacti is astonishing. The cholla cactus, for instance, appears so furry that it’s nicknamed ‘teddy-bear cactus.’ But beware, it’s far from cuddly and instead will bury extremely sharp, barbed spines in your skin at the slightest touch. Ouch! If you’re lucky enough to visit in spring, you’ll get to see its bright-yellow flower.
Almost as widespread are prickly pears, flat cacti that produce showy flowers in shades of red, yellow and purple, and whose juice is still used medicinally in Mexico today. The smoke tree, a small, fine-leafed tree with a smoky blue color, is said to indicate the presence of underground water. Like figments from a Dr Seuss book, the whimsical Joshua trees are the largest type of yucca and are related to the lily. They were named by migrant Mormons, who saw them as Joshua welcoming them to the promised land. They grow throughout the Mojave but are, of course, most abundant in Joshua Tree National Park.
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For complete information about national parks, from activities to zoology, visit the National Park Service website at www.nps.gov.
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Then there’s the cactuslike creosote (actually a small bush with hard leaves and a distinctive smell) and the spiky ocotillo shrub, which grows up to 20ft tall and has canelike branches that produce blood-red flowers. And watch out for catclaw, nicknamed