Welcome! Theodore Payne Foundation’s Wildflower Hotline is made possible by donations and memberships. Please support the Hotline today! All locations are on easily accessible public lands and range from urban to wild, distant to right here in L.A. 


Paramount Ranch in the Santa Monica Mountains near Agora Hills is the site of an elaborate movie set used for filming westerns.  The set and surrounding chaparral habitat was destroyed in the Woolsey Fire of 2018. The western movie location is now being reconstructed and the natural chaparral landscape has made a strong resurgence as well. Construction fencing and abundant non-native weedy plants greet you as you approach the beginning of the trail from the parking lot—not a promising sight. Continue further, however, and the “behind the scenes” trail opens up to a lovely walk with valley views and a refreshed natural habitat chock full of blooming natives. The creek that parallels this pathway is banked with yellow creek monkey flowers that like the moist soils there. Then you start seeing purple nightshade, Western vervain, California everlasting, elderberry, morning glory, elegant clarkia and owl’s clover blooming alongside the trail. In the distance there are great swaths of golden yarrow and scattered clumps of blue foothill penstemon forming a stunning tapestry of gold and blue. Rose colored Nuttall’s snapdragon and blush pink Catalina mariposa lilies are tucked into the hillside grasses. Scattered on the adjacent and distant slopes, are the tall spires of blooming chaparral yucca. This is an easy and pleasant loop trail, and right now there’s a diversity of showy flowering natives.

Spring came very late to Placerita Canyon Nature Center this year. Wildflowers were hesitant to expose themselves to the chilly temperatures that hung around for so long this spring. Recent sunny and warm days have coaxed out the shy wildflowers just in time to delight visitors this holiday weekend. The surrounding landscape is in beautiful, fragrant bloom now and two favorite hikes at the Nature Center — the Walker Cabin Trail and the Ecology Trail, showcase this magnificent chaparral bloom.  Elderberry and chamise have large sprays of creamy white flowers and serve as a handsome backdrop to colorful perennials including black sage, California buckwheat, yerba santa, deerweed, woolly blue curls and orange and red bush monkeyflower. Annuals lining the trails and filling in the spaces between the perennials include purple pagodas, yellow pincushions, sun cups, cobweb thistle, winecup clarkia, golden yarrow, California everlasting, bright pink elegant clarkia and many more. Placerita would be a great family outing for the holiday weekend.

The Ramona Trail off Hwy 74 near Mt. Center in the San Jacinto Mtns is in full “fire-follower” bloom. The display of flowers usually popping up on recent burn sites as first colonizers, is better than expected hikers noted, and way better than it appears from the bottom of the trail. The flower display in the burn area is a clear botanical highlight and “ablaze”, if you will, with lovely colors.  Short lobed phacelia and common cryptantha are the most abundant plants by far, in uncountable numbers. Dotted amongst the white cloud of phacelia and cryptantha flowers are the vivid blue and purples of Canterbury bells, school bells, globe gilia and larkspur, mixed with patches of coral-colored desert mallow. golden yarrow, and annual monkeyflowers— the wide-throated monkeyflower and the bright pink Fremont’s monkeyflower. Oh, and the views of mountain slopes and valeys are spectacular from this trail.  


That’s it for this week. Visit the Wildflower Hotline website to see photos of, and links to these and more wildflower sites. The next report will be available on Friday, May 31st.