DesertUSA - Wildflower Reports For Joshua Tree NP 2009

Send your pictures to DesertUSA!

2009 Reports

May 1, 2009 Kim reports: Taken Apr 30 at Joshua Tree National Park. There's still some flowers, mostly at upper elevations, along Park Blvd between West and East entrances. However, they are drying out fast.

Apr. 20, 2009 Lori reports: Photos taken on 4/19/09 at the park.

Apr. 20, 2009 Mesk reports: Some photo from the cactus garden.

Apr. 15, 2009 Carol reports: Rangers say it has been a disappointing flower year but we still found many flowers blooming in the washes and along the roadsides at the south end of the park. Our campsite at Cottonwood Springs had 10 different species blooming. Cholla garden had not only blooming cholla but a few hedgehog cactus, and there were some lovely Ocotillo. We were told that the Joshua trees were late blooming this year but there was a plant at Sheep Pass with 5 blooms.

Apr. 8, 2009 Jeff reports: These pictures were taken just a few steps off the Hidden Valley trail on April 5th.

Mar. 28, 2009 DUSA reports: There are lots of wildflowers from southern entrance to the higher elevations of the park. Some are past their peak while other are peaking. The cactus are are also blooming, may last a another week or two.

Mar. 20, 2009 Kahlee reports: Joshua Tree National Park - Cottonwood Canyon – Southern Entrance. This area is easily accessible on paved roads off of Interstate 10. As of Sunday, March 15th, I would rate this area past peak and it appears there was minimal blooming here to begin with. Along with a smattering of most of the species on the primary list given above, you’ll find Arroyo Lupine (Lupinus succulentus) and Bladderpod (Isomeris arborea). From here, the road south to Mecca through Box Canyon is not worth taking in terms of flowers.

Mar. 20, 2009 MS reports: Hello, on March 19th my dad an I went to Joshua Tree NP via Berdoo Canyon. While there was not carpets of flowers, there were many flowers to be seen. The lower portion of Berdoo Canyon (4X4 road only) had the most while portions of Geology Tour road had some also. (Best around Tour Stop #9 and #10) Some flowers had not fully bloomed yet, so maybe in a week or so it will be in full bloom.

Mar. 13, 2009 Jimbo reports: I saw a post on this website saying that there wasn't much going-on at the Desert Lily Santuary northeast of Desert Center. In order to see the desert lilies you have to walk southeast from the parking lot and head into the sand dunes for about a half-mile or so. There are literally thousands of them out there. They are just starting to bloom. I've enclosed a couple of pictures to prove it! That being said, we were a bit dissapointed with our trip out this way. It does not match-up favorably with the bloom at Anza-Borrego.

Mar. 13, 2009 Jared reports: WOW JIM!! What a trip I just got back from!!PEAK BLOOMS spotted in the Southeast Joshua Tree Park border, Desert Center, Corn Springs, and the Chuckwalla Mountains!! I used the NOAA map that John (below) provided showing desert rainfall totals, printed it out, and with my GPS spent three days in the areas on the map that had received between 110% and 150% of Normal Rainfall to see what was around, puzzled that John hadn’t included any pictures.
Well, he was right on in his posting! Everything he listed is amazing!! As you can see from the map, most of Joshua Tree National Park was spared the higher rainfall totals, as described in the previous postings.

You must head farther east, starting at about Red Cloud Rd. This is ALL off highway travel mind you, but is 95% Two Wheel Drive accessible. The Southeastern end of the Joshua Tree Park boundary have amazing displays of Brittle Brush, Golden Desert Poppies, Dandelions, Arizona Lupines, Monkey Flower, and Blue and Purple Phacelia. The aroma was intense! I also trekked down through Augustine Pass (4X4), via the Bradshaw Trail, then down Chuckwalla Springs Rd, to Chuckwalla Valley Rd, then back up into the mountains via DuPont Rd, to the Bradshaw Trail and then out to the Salton Sea. Golf course green in Corn Springs, and purples, yellows and whites splashing accents on what are normally dry, desolate and inhospitable Chuckwalla Mountains. Great displays of Desert Chicory, Gravel Ghost, Desert Pincushion, Blazing Star and many others between the Choya and Ocotillo’s all throughout the alluvial fans, below the mountains! Good displays of Arizona Lupines on your way out to the Salton Sea as well. It truly should be experienced!! BUT!!! You must hurry! I predict that this won’t be as amazing as it was this week for much longer. Long range forecasts show 90 degree weather next week. ENJOY!

Mar. 11, 2009 Jerry & Bessie reports: There is not much of a show yet at Joshua Tree National Park. We started at the south entrance and spent the day throughout the park. In fact the color is sparse. If you look carefully you can find a flower here and there. We did have a successful day shooting macro of individual flowers, but the carpet of color and the mass of color is yet to come. The rangers tell me the weather has been a little cold for the spring flowers to burst forth. Hopefully the future has color to show us. On another note the Joshua Trees themselves show little evidence of bloom. One of the rangers said that they do not really bloom in mass each year and that this appears to be a lean year.

Mar. 7, 2009 Kathy reports: I hiked from Cottonwood Springs to Lost Palms Oasis and then down to Victory Palms today and I saw very few flowers. On the way out I did the loop over to Mastadon Peak and there wasn't much of a show there either. I drove in from Interstate 10 and there were hardly any flowers along the road between I-10 and Cottonwood, but there were some flowers along I-10 between Indio and the Exit for Joshua Tree National Park. I had expected to see more flowers, but they just weren't there.

Mar. 6, 2009 John reports: A look at rainfall data from the past six months (see http://www.wrcc.dri.edu/cgi-bin/anomimage.pl?cal6mPpct.gif) shows an anomaly of high rainfall near Desert Center, so on Wednesday I went off to explore this zone.

Sure enough, as you drive east on IH-10 from the south (Cottonwood) entrance of Joshua Tree, the bloom begins to look progressively more healthy, really taking off near the Eagle Mountain Road exit, with brittlebush and globemallow catching the eye.

My first stop was Corn Springs in the Chuckwalla Mountains south of the interstate (exit about 8 miles east of Desert Center -- you'll drive through some fields of desert dandelion along the way). The road to Corn Springs is a dirt road, but easily passable in any vehicle. The road takes you up a dissected alluvial fan where you can find a wide variety of flowers in the various soil conditions -- washes, slopes, even desert pavement. Look carefully and you can find alkali phacelia, depressed fiddleleaf, and Parry's marina, along with more obvious flowers like desert poppies and pebble pincushion that blanket slopes in some places. You'll also see some of the happiest-looking sun cups ever, deep blue common phacelia, desert chicory, trailing four o'clock, and much more.

Near the Corn Springs Campground (and palm oasis) you can find desert starvine, box thorn, yellowhead, rock daisy, and two species of Fagonia, among others. Some slopes above the wash to the north are densely covered in notch-leaf phacelia, and slopes adjacent to the local washes are sometimes littered with sand blazing star. If you're really lucky, you'll find the Bigelow monkeyflower slope!

Desert lilies are starting to bloom at the Desert Lily Sanctuary northeast of Desert Center, off CA Hwy. 177 (Rice Road). Plenty of other wildflowers can be found in this location, including spectacle pod, sand verbena, and dune evening primrose.

Just north of the Sanctuary, where the highway skirts the southern end of the Coxcomb Mountains, is a good place to find more annuals in bloom. As evening falls, look for Jones linanthus in the washes here. This peach-colored relative of evening snow opens at night and has a wonderful scent akin to butterscotch. Nearby are desert threadplant, dalea, desert star, purple mat, desert gold, gravel ghost, desert five-spot, and others. In all, I highly recommend a visit to this remote corner of California, especially if your first impressions of Joshua Tree's south entrance leave you disappointed. Head east and enjoy!

Mar. 1, 2009 Jorden reports: These photos are from the southern boundary of Joshua Tree near Chiriaco Summit on 28 Feb. The bloom is much more sparse than it was in 2008, but all of the usual plants appear to be flowering here now. I counted about 65 different species currently in bloom.