Plant Checklist for Cahuilla Mountain Area, Riverside County
Introduction
Labeled View of Mountains Seen from Cahuilla Peak
Taxa Rejected from the Checklist
Checklist
Introduction This checklist was compiled from:
- five all-day field surveys done by various subsets of the authors of this page. Two were done at a non-optimal time of the year, on 12 October 2009 and 22 September 2016. One survey was done at prime time on 27 May 2017, with a follow-up survey on 13 June 2017 primarily targeting the Delphinium species. One survey was done very early in spring, on 9 April 2009, when only about 15 species were in bloom.
- a search of the Consortium of California Herbaria on 11 October 2009. The vouchers came from a search for Cahuilla Mountain and a geographic search for vouchers between 33.621 and 33.54° latitude, and -116.841 to -116.735° longitude, which includes Reed Valley, Cahuilla Mtn, Little Cahuilla Mtn, Tripp Flats, and Cottonwood Canyon.
- some additional species from a plant checklist done in 1986 by Todd Keeler-Wolf for the Cahuilla Mountain Research Natural Area, henceforth referred to as the CMRNA Checklist.
Our work in 2017 was stimulated entirely by the possibility that Delphinium hesperium ssp. cuyamacae might be present here; see Taxa Rejected from the Checklist. Tom took extensive diagnostic photographs of the plants present along the main trail to the Peak, and the Delphinium expert Jason Koontz determined them as D. parryi and D. patens.
The Delphinium plants here are essentially identical to the ones at San Jacinto Mountain; see Delphinium parryi, blue larkspur, and D. patens, spreading larkspur for photographs of the two species and how to distinguish them.
Labeled View of Mountains Seen from Cahuilla Peak Table 1. Distances and Azimuth Angles of Mountain Ranges Seen From Cahuilla Mountain
Feature Distance (miles) Azimuth (deg) Martinez Mtn. 25.5 93.78 Toro Peak 21.4 100.99 Rabbit Peak 33.3 107.90 Villager Peak 35.5 112.06 Peak above lowermost White Wash 16.1 115.10 unnamed feature between Dry Wash and Coyote Canyon 20.6 116.30 Coyote Mtn. 31.1 121.86 Combs Peak 16.0 140.38 Hot Springs Mtn. 21.3 146.58 Iron Springs Peak 9.6 149.25 Granite Mountain 40.0 153.95 Monument Peak 51.5 155.81 Garnet Peak 48.5 157.22 Garnet Mtn. 47.4 158.60 Beauty Peak 9.9 159.85 Volcan Mountain 31.2 160.22 North peak 40.7 163.70 Middle Peak 42.2 165.47 Cuyamaca Peak 44.4 166.65
Taxa Rejected from the Checklist Of the taxa given in the CMRNA Checklist, 21 appear to be misdeterminations. Those that appear to be clear misdeterminations are noted in Table 2, and do not appear in the checklist below for Cahuilla Mountain. In Table 2, we give the 2012 Jepson Manual Second Edition name if it is different from the name used by the CMRNA Checklist. Some taxa have notes giving the characteristics of the observed species that distinguish them from the species given in the CMRNA Checklist. We haven't had time to add notes for all species; just the ones we could quickly add to this table.
We considered a clear misdetermination to be one in which there are no observations or vouchers of a taxon in the CMRNA Checklist, but there is an observation or voucher of a similar species at Cahuilla Mountain that was not present in the CMRNA Checklist.
Taxa which have had taxonomic changes since 1986 do not appear in Table 2, since they were correct determinations made at the time. Examples are Quercus dumosa, which was split into a number of different scrub oaks in the 1993 Jepson Manual First Edition, and Claytonia perfoliata, some of whose varieties were placed in a different species, C. parvifolia.
Table 2. Probable Misdeterminations in the CMRNA Checklist
CMRNA Checklist taxon (JM2 name) Probable actual taxon Notes Agoseris grandiflora Agoseris retrorsa Calystegia macrostegia Calystegia occidentalis ssp. fulcrata The corolla is yellowish, not white; and the bracts are remote from the calyx, not appressed to the calyx Ceanothus integerrimus Ceanothus palmeri These two species are very close; the plants here have the green twigs of C. palmeri. Collinsia heterophylla Collinsia concolor The filaments are unspurred; the calyx lobe tips are widely acute and ciliate; and the corolla pouch is twice as long as wide. Collinsia parviflora Collinsia childii The calyx lobes tips are not sharp or long-tapered Cryptantha maritima Cryptantha muricata var. jonesii C. maritima is a lower desert species with a different gestalt than the plants here, which fit perfectly the gestalt of C. muricata jonesii Cryptantha micrantha var. micrantha Cryptantha micrantha var. lepida The corollas are large, the size of var. lepida, not the small corollas of var. micrantha. Variety micrantha is also a lower desert species. Delphinium hesperium ssp. cuyamacae Delphinium patens ssp. montanum Plants determined by the Delphinium expert Jason Koontz. Eriastrum filifolium Eriastrum sapphirinum ssp. sapphirinum The corolla lobes are 5 mm, not less than 4 mm, and the stamens reach to the tips of the corolla lobes, not shorter than the tips of the corolla lobes. Ericameria teretifolia Ericameria parishii? The plants of E. parishii here reach ten feet tall, far taller than any known E. teretifolia; the leaves have the odor of E. parishii, and Cahuilla Mountain is 20 miles from the nearest known location of E. teretifolia on the desert north slope of the Santa Rosa Mountains. Juncus textilis Juncus effusus ssp. austrocalifornicus The plants in the CMRNA Checklist were said to occur only at the spring, where the plants are clearly a clumped perennial, not a rhizomed perennial, with a height that of typical Juncus effusus ssp. austrocalifornicus, shorter than typical J. textilis. Lithophragma affine Lithophragma bolanderi Lonicera interrupta Lonicera subspicata var. denudata Tom looked at literally dozens of plants in full bloom on 6/13/17 spaced all along the main trail, and they all had terminal leaves that were separate, not fused around the stem. Nemophila pedunculata Nemophila menziesii var. integrifolia Orobanche parishii Orobanche californica ssp. feudgei Plantago ovata Plantago patagonica The single plant seen here had bracts longer than the calyces. Ribes malvaceum Ribes indecorum flowers are all white Selaginella asprella a moss? Silene lemmonii Silene verecunda The petals are clearly 2-lobed, not 4-lobed, and the flowers are not nodding. Trichostema lanatum Trichostema parishii The corolla tube is 6 mm, fitting only the 4-7 mm range for T. parishii, not the 9-14 mm range for T. lanatum. T. lanatum is a more coastal species found at lower elevation. Viola pinetorum Viola purpurea ssp. quercetorum The cauline leaf blades are less than twice as long as wide. In addition, the Research Natural Area document mentions Delphinium parishii, but that was probably a typo for D. parryi, since D. parishii does not appear in the CMRNA Checklist, whereas D. parryi does.
Checklist Basic information about the checklist presentation and links:
- Notes on the Scientific Names Used At This Site and
- Explanation of Checklist Order and Information about the links from the Scientific Name and Common Name.
A few species have qualifiers given in front of the scientific name, indicating that the species determination is not 100%.
An asterisk before the Common Name indicates a non-native taxon.
The column with header #V gives the number of vouchers. If there are no vouchers, but the taxon appears in Keeler-Wolf's checklist, the column contains KW. Of the taxa given on the Keeler-Wolf checklist, 21 appear to be misdeterminations, and are not given in this checklist; see Table 2 above.
Some taxa on the list are only from the CMRNA Checklist and need verification.
The column with header #Pls gives the number of plants observed on or in the vicinity of the trail to the peak of Cahuilla Mountain. An x in the column means we observed the taxon, but didn't estimate an abundance. One species, Calochortus splendens, was observed only on the road we drove to the trailhead, and has an R in front of its abundance.
Version for printing, without lines and other text on this page: html (8 pages) or pdf Clickbook booklet (2 double-sided pages). (See printing instructions for an explanation of these options)
Data provided by the participants of the Consortium of California Herbaria (ucjeps.berkeley.edu/consortium/).
We thank Melody Lardner for the information about the Delphinium hesperium ssp. cuyamacae and Monardella macrantha ssp. hallii at Cahuilla Mountain, which stimulated the two 2017 field trips here.
Melody also provided the correct determination of the Monardella macrantha ssp. hallii plants we saw on the trail on 12 October 2009 that were not in bloom, and Ken Weaver provided us with pictures that confirmed the determination.
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Copyright © 2009-2018 by Tom Chester, James Dillane, William Schlegel, Keir Morse, Don Rideout, Ted Caragozian, Mike Crouse, and Sharon Gott
Permission is freely granted to reproduce any or all of this page as long as credit is given to me at this source:
http://tchester.org/plants/floras/pr/cahuilla_mtn.html
Comments and feedback: Tom Chester
Last update: 13 April 2018 (typo corrected 21 May 2020)