Plant Guide to Desert View Trail, San Jacinto Mountains
Introduction and Explanation of Plant Trail Guides
Introduction
Highlights of This Trail
Fieldwork Dates and Summary of List Changes With Time
Botanical Trip Reports
The Plant Guide
Comments On Specific Species
Introduction
The Desert View Trail is a loop trail off of the Long Valley Nature Trail, with 0.15 miles separating its beginning and ending intersection with the Nature Trail, as shown on the following map:
The Nature Trail is shown in green in the above map; the Desert View Trail is shown in dark blue.
This plant trail guide covers only the Desert View loop trail itself; the other portions that must be walked in order to get to and return from this loop trail are part of the Long Valley Nature Trail. No permit is required.
The total walking distance to do the Desert View Trail from the Tram Concrete sidewalk is 1.3 miles, with 200 feet of total elevation gain and loss. The portion covered by the plant trail guide below is 0.9 miles.
The loop can be done in either direction, but this guide travels the loop in a clockwise direction as seen from above, as shown by the blue arrow on the map above.
Although the map shown at the trailhead appears quite different from the above map, they are actually pretty much the same. The differences are:
- the map at the trailhead has north to the lower right, instead of having north up, probably to orient the map the way one sees the trails at that point;
- the map at the trailhead shows the old Desert View trail, which had an extra crossing of Long Valley Creek on the south of the Nature Trail; and
- the map at the trailhead distorts the Nature Trail and makes it appear wider than it is, probably to fit the name inside the trail on the map.
This trail has been covered just once for this guide, on 8/16/07 in a drought year. More species would probably be seen in a normal rainfall year, as well as more specimens of some species found in the guide.
This trail, and the connecting Nature Loop Trail, are the only trails, out of the 114 for which we have produced plant trail guides across southern California, that contain a leach field from a septic tank. This leach field produces the densest stand of wild tarragon, Artemisia dracunculus, that we have ever seen.
Highlights of This Trail
The botanical highlights of this trail are:
Number of Unique Taxa On This Trail
The following histogram gives the number of trails in our database that contain each taxon on this trail (not including the taxa seen only off-trail given at the end of the guide). We had 114 trails in our database when this histogram was made; 13 of those trails, including this one, are in this area of San Jacinto Mountain. A number of "1" means the taxon has only been found on this trail among the trails in our database; numbers of "13" or smaller may indicate taxa found only in this area of San Jacinto Mountain.
| Number of Trails Containing A Taxon | Number Of Taxa On This Trail | % of Taxa On This Trail |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 0 | 0% |
| 2 | 0 | 0% |
| 3 | 0 | 0% |
| 4 | 1 | 8% |
| 5 | 0 | 0% |
| 1-5 | 1 | 8% |
| 6-10 | 0 | 0% |
| 11-15 | 5 | 38% |
| 16-20 | 1 | 8% |
| 21-25 | 1 | 8% |
| 26-30 | 2 | 15% |
| 31-35 | 3 | 23% |
| Total Taxa | 13 | 100% |
We found 1 additional species not in the above table, since they have not been fully identified yet. The unidentified ones are marked with ? or sp in the id? column in the guide, and have no entries in the #all column.
Fieldwork Dates and Summary of List Changes With Time
The following table gives the dates the trail was walked and taxa recorded. After each visit, the table gives the total number of taxa on the list and the breakdown of the taxa without positive identification. See Explanation of Plant Trail Guides to understand the symbols below.
| Visit Date | Visit # | # taxa | # "?" | # "sp" | # "~" | # "ssp" |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 8/16/2007 | 1 | 13 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
We thank Philip Erdelsky for help with the fieldwork on 8/16/07, and for taking the picture of the trail map at the trailhead.
Botanical Trip Reports
The Plant Guide
This version has been converted to the 2012 Jepson Manual Second Edition plant species names.
See a family order version of the flora for this area, and a print version that has the tram plant trail guide, the long valley nature trail, and this desert view guide.
Version for printing, without lines and other text on this page: html (2 pages) or pdf Clickbook booklet (1 page). (See printing instructions for an explanation of these options)
The mileages in the guide come from a GPS recording of this trail on 8/16/07, measured with Topo!. They are probably accurate to 0.01-0.02 mile.
| Mile | S | # | id? | Common Name | Latin Name | #here | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0.00 | l | Begin guide at North jct. with Nature Loop, 0.14 miles south of Tram concrete sidewalk; elevation ~8360 feet (2548 m) | |||||
| 0.00 | r | 1 | Jeffrey pine | Pinus jeffreyi | 30 / 9 | ||
| 0.00 | b | (San Bernardino rubber rabbitbrush, Ericameria nauseosa var. bernardina) | |||||
| 0.00 | r | 2 | San Gabriel beardtongue | Penstemon labrosus | / | ||
| 0.01 | r | 3 | wax currant | Ribes cereum var. cereum | / | ||
| 0.02 | b | 4 | wild tarragon | Artemisia dracunculus | 99 / 9 | ||
| 0.02 | l | (white fir, Abies concolor) | |||||
| 0.02 | r | 5 | curl-leaf mountain-mahogany | Cercocarpus ledifolius | 5 / 3 | ||
| 0.02 | b | 6 | western wallflower | Erysimum capitatum var. capitatum | 5 / 1 | ||
| 0.02 | l | 7 | groundsmoke | Gayophytum diffusum ssp. parviflorum | / | ||
| 0.02 | l | 8 | Fremont's goosefoot | Chenopodium fremontii | / | ||
| 0.03 | l | (Grinnell's beardtongue, Penstemon grinnellii var. grinnellii; little-leaf mock orange, Philadelphus microphyllus; Parish's snowberry, Symphoricarpos rotundifolius var. parishii) | |||||
| 0.05 | r | 9 | white fir | Abies concolor | 30 / 9 | ||
| 0.08 | l | 10 | goldenrod | Solidago velutina ssp. californica | / | ||
| 0.08 | r | (lodgepole pine, Pinus contorta ssp. murrayana) | |||||
| 0.10 | b | Dense field of tarragon, Artemisia dracunculus, due to leach field of septic tank from Tram restrooms | |||||
| 0.10 | r | Manhole cover | |||||
| 0.12 | r | 11 | San Bernardino rubber rabbitbrush | Ericameria nauseosa var. bernardina | 20 / 9 | ||
| 0.13 | Trail curves right and begins climbing | ||||||
| 0.18 | r | 12 | woodland spurge | Euphorbia lurida | 5 / 1 | ||
| 0.23 | Y-jct: go left to first Desert Overlook | ||||||
| 0.23 | b | 13 | San Jacinto buckwheat | Eriogonum apiculatum | / | ||
| 0.25 | r | 14 | sugar pine | Pinus lambertiana | 5 / 2 | ||
| 0.25 | First Desert Overlook on saddle; canyon live oak, Quercus chrysolepis, on left; Parish's bedstraw, Galium parishii, on right. Return to main trail and continue on it | ||||||
| 0.27 | Back at main trail; go left | ||||||
| 0.33 | Trail jogs left | ||||||
| 0.34 | l | (mountain California-fuchsia, Epilobium canum ssp. latifolium; granite prickly phlox, Linanthus pungens; mountain spray, Holodiscus microphyllus var. microphyllus; in drainage above trail) | |||||
| 0.35 | (San Jacinto Mts. Keckiella, Keckiella rothrockii var. jacintensis) | ||||||
| 0.35 | l | 15 | San Jacinto lupine | Lupinus hyacinthinus | 5 / 1 | ||
| 0.35 | b | 16 | San Jacinto Mts. keckiella | Keckiella rothrockii var. jacintensis | 5 / 1 | ||
| 0.38 | l | Unusual rock formation, with balanced boulders and large depressions in rocks | |||||
| 0.38 | Y-jct: go left to second Desert Overlook | ||||||
| 0.42 | Second Desert Overlook on saddle; high point on trail, elevation 8480 feet (2585 m); great views into Palm, Long Valley and Tahquitz Canyons; return to main trail and continue on it | ||||||
| 0.45 | Back at main trail; go left | ||||||
| 0.47 | Highest point on main trail; elevation ~8470 feet (2582 m) | ||||||
| 0.56 | Y-jct: go left to minor overlook | ||||||
| 0.57 | Minor overlook; return to trail | ||||||
| 0.58 | Back at main trail; go left | ||||||
| 0.62 | l | (lodgepole pine, Pinus contorta ssp. murrayana) | |||||
| 0.66 | r | 17 | granite prickly phlox | Linanthus pungens | 1 / 1 | ||
| 0.69 | r | (bush chinquapin, Chrysolepis sempervirens) | |||||
| 0.70 | r | (rose sage, Salvia pachyphylla) | |||||
| 0.72 | l | 18 | Parish's bedstraw | Galium parishii | 2 / 1 | ||
| 0.74 | Minor overlook very close to trail | ||||||
| 0.82 | l | 19 | lodgepole pine | Pinus contorta ssp. murrayana | 1 / 1 | ||
| 0.83 | b | 20 | brown sedge | Carex subfusca | 10 / 1 | ||
| 0.83 | l | (swamp sedge, Carex senta) | |||||
| 0.88 | l | Jct. Nature Trail; lowest point on trail, elevation 8320 feet (2536 m). End guide; continue ahead to get back to the Tram directly | |||||
| 1.17 | Tram sidewalk | ||||||
Mile: 0.00 includes all mileages from 0.000 to 0.009; etc.
S: Side of trail on which the first occurrence is found: left, right, both, or center
#: On-Trail species are numbered in order of first occurrence on trail (touchable without leaving the trail). Off-trail species are in parentheses.
id?: Species without an entry in this column are positively identified. "?" means we are just guessing the identification; "sp" means the genera is probably known, but the species name is uncertain; "~" means we have 95% confidence that this is the determination, but have not yet positively identified it; "ssp" means the subspecies or variety needs to be determined.
#here gives the minimum number of on-trail plants of this species on this trail, with the number of locations on this trail following the /, using maximum values of 99/9. 1/1 means a single plant in a single location; 10/9 means 10 plants occurring in at least 9 locations, etc.