Flora of Little Surprise Canyon

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Introduction
Checklist

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Introduction

This checklist is a start at a flora of Little Surprise Canyon, a very small canyon south of the Hellhole Canyon parking lot just west of Borrego Springs.

The name Surprise Canyon is ambiguous, since it is used for several locations. The main use is for a canyon in the Mountain Palm Springs drainage. It is also an alternate name for Flat Cat Canyon immediately north of Hellhole Canyon.

There is very little mention of Little Surprise Canyon online or in reference books. Although the name is mentioned on the display board in the parking lot, it is not mentioned in Schad (1998) or Lindsay and Lindsay (2002). Fortunately, the Anza-Borrego Desert Natural History Association has a nice page on it, mentioning it as a nice wildflower location.

The location of Little Surprise Canyon is shown in the following Google Map, which can interactively be zoomed or panned:

View Larger Map

In the Google map on the left, the Hellhole Canyon Parking lot is the dirt area in the upper part of the map just left of center. Little Surprise Canyon extends south from the parking lot. The west branch of Little Surprise Canyon extends south from the middle of the map. The east branch, which consists of two forks, extends from the center of the map to Highway S22 on the right of the map. Click on the plus or minus symbol at upper left to change the scale of the map.

The map on the right shows exactly where we surveyed, with the unsurveyed portion of East Canyon shown separately. Highway S22, Montezuma Valley Road, is offset slightly so that our survey route along the road can be seen.

Since the checklist was made on a single day on 16 January 2008, many of the identifications were made from baby annuals and other non-blooming plants. There are no vouchers from this canyon that we know of. Hence the checklist consists entirely of our observations, plus the addition of Carlowrightia arizonica documented here by Aaron Schusteff's photographs of the plant and flower.

Although this canyon is small, it has considerable appeal. It is a beautiful little canyon, with steep (albeit short) walls rising quickly above you which makes it very scenic. It is indeed a good wildflower location, since we saw good annual growth in this fairly-low-desert-rainfall year. I was able to take more baby pictures. The favorable environment is due to decent rainfall in this west-side desert location, good concentration of that rainfall along the bottom by the walls of the canyon without too much runoff, and an abundance of niches in which plants can grow.

We surveyed most of the west canyon, and much of the area above the canyons. We have not yet surveyed the east canyon.

See also Botanical Trip Report from 16 January 2008.

The following photograph shows the view from near the top of the west branch of Little Surprise Canyon looking north down into the west branch:

Toro Peak is the highest peak on the left in the farthest ridge, and is due north in this photograph. The intermediate ridge that is the highest-appearing feature on the left leads to Indian Head to the left of the pictured area. Borrego Palm Canyon, the Visitor Center, and the Campground are out of sight to the left in front of Indian Head. The closest prominent buildings are the Administrative Headquarters for Anza-Borrego Desert State Park.

Checklist for Little Surprise Canyon

The Checklist is sorted first by category - dicots, monocots, and ferns - and then by family and scientific name. The Family and Scientific Name are from the Jepson Manual. An asterisk before the Common Name indicates a non-native taxon.

A "~" before the taxon name indicates a determination that is likely, but is not 100%, usually because we have not yet seen flowers.

A rough estimate of the number of plants, and the number of locations for each species, is given in the last two columns. Maximum values are 99 plants, and 9 locations. The main intent of this column is to indicate the species for which we found very few plants or locations.

#	Family	Scientific Name	(*)Common Name	# Plants	# Locations
1	Acanthaceae	Carlowrightia arizonica	Arizona carlowrightia	-	-
2	Acanthaceae	Justicia californica	chuparosa	50	9
3	Asteraceae	Adenophyllum porophylloides	San Felipe dogweed	1	1
4	Asteraceae	Ambrosia dumosa	burroweed	50	9
5	Asteraceae	Bebbia juncea var. aspera	sweetbush	10	2
6	Asteraceae	~Chaenactis fremontii	~Fremont pincushion	99	9
7	Asteraceae	Encelia farinosa	brittlebush	20	9
8	Asteraceae	Hymenoclea salsola var. salsola	cheesebush	20	5
9	Asteraceae	Perityle emoryi	Emory's rock-daisy	2	1
10	Asteraceae	~Rafinesquia neomexicana	~desert chicory	10	2
11	Asteraceae	Stephanomeria pauciflora var. pauciflora	wire-lettuce	5	1
12	Asteraceae	Trixis californica var. californica	California trixis	5	1
13	Asteraceae	Viguiera parishii	Parish's viguiera	1	1
14	Boraginaceae	Amsinckia (menziesii?)	fiddleneck	99	9
15	Boraginaceae	Cryptantha sp.	Cryptantha barbigera?	99	9
16	Boraginaceae	Pectocarya sp.	comb-bur	5	1
17	Brassicaceae	Brassica tournefortii	*Asian mustard	99	9
18	Brassicaceae	~Descurainia pinnata	~western tansy-mustard	20	1
19	Brassicaceae	Lyrocarpa coulteri var. palmeri	Coulter's lyrepod	1	1
20	Cactaceae	Echinocereus engelmannii	Engelmann's hedgehog cactus	1	1
21	Cactaceae	Ferocactus cylindraceus	California barrel cactus	20	9
22	Cactaceae	Mammillaria dioica	fish-hook cactus	5	5
23	Cactaceae	Opuntia basilaris var. basilaris	beavertail cactus	5	5
24	Cactaceae	Opuntia ganderi	Gander's cholla	50	9
25	Campanulaceae	Nemacladus sp.?	nemacladus?	3	1
26	Euphorbiaceae	Chamaesyce polycarpa	small-seeded spurge	50	9
27	Euphorbiaceae	Ditaxis lanceolata	narrowleaf ditaxis	10	3
28	Fabaceae	Acacia greggii	catclaw	5	1
29	Fabaceae	Lupinus arizonicus?	Arizona lupine?	2	1
30	Fabaceae	~Lupinus concinnus	~bajada lupine	2	2
31	Fabaceae	Psorothamnus schottii	indigo bush	5	1
32	Fabaceae	Trifolium sp.	clover	30	9
33	Fouquieriaceae	Fouquieria splendens ssp. splendens	ocotillo	50	9
34	Geraniaceae	Erodium cicutarium	*redstem filaree	99	9
35	Hydrophyllaceae	~Emmenanthe penduliflora var. penduliflora	~whispering bells	5	1
36	Hydrophyllaceae	Phacelia distans	common phacelia	99	9
37	Krameriaceae	Krameria grayi	white rhatany	20	9
38	Lamiaceae	Hyptis emoryi	desert lavender	10	5
39	Malvaceae	Hibiscus denudatus	rock hibiscus	10	2
40	Nyctaginaceae	Mirabilis bigelovii	Bigelow's desert four-o'clock	1	1
41	Onagraceae	~Camissonia boothii ssp. condensata	~Booth's desert primrose	2	2
42	Onagraceae	~Camissonia californica	~California suncup	99	9
43	Onagraceae	Camissonia cardiophylla ssp. cardiophylla	heartleaf sun-cup	20	1
44	Papaveraceae	Eschscholzia minutiflora ssp. minutiflora	small-flowered poppy	20	2
45	Plantaginaceae	~Plantago ovata	~desert plantain	99	9
46	Polemoniaceae	Eriastrum eremicum ssp. eremicum	desert woolly-star	5	1
47	Polemoniaceae	~Gilia stellata	~star gilia	10	2
48	Polygonaceae	Eriogonum inflatum	desert trumpet	30	9
49	Simmondsiaceae	Simmondsia chinensis	jojoba	5	1
50	Urticaceae	Parietaria hespera var. hespera	pellitory	2	1
51	Zygophyllaceae	Fagonia laevis	California fagonia	50	9
52	Zygophyllaceae	Larrea tridentata	creosote bush	99	9
53	Liliaceae	Agave deserti	desert agave	10	2
54	Poaceae	Schismus sp.	*Mediterranean schismus	99	9
55	Poaceae	Vulpia myuros?	rattail fescue?	20	1
56	Pteridaceae	Cheilanthes parryi	woolly lipfern	10	5

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• Plants of Southern California: Regional Floras