Tag Archives: Hiking

Figueroa Mountain Bug Bloom

Along the road to bugville in autumn.  Springtime wildflower blooms on Figueroa Mountain capture all the attention. But I’ve long marveled, too, at the winter ladybug blooms of the mountain. December 2023 I hold onto a childhood memory of ladybugs … Continue reading

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Discreet Sensitive Habitat Signage, Sespe Wilderness

A thin sign in Sespe Wilderness only but several inches wide with not another sign in sight. Once upon a time not long ago, following wildfire, thoughtful land managers in Ventura County reposted sliver-thin signs along Sespe Wilderness trail, there … Continue reading

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Spring Potrero Mutilated, San Marcos Foothills Preserve

Restoration travesty (January 2023) “Paths are human; they are the traces of our relationships.” —Robert Macfarlane  Channel Islands Restoration, her purported protector, deflowered the virgin. A screaming outrage. A grotesque violation. This was not restoration. This was mutilation. I met … Continue reading

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Big Bummer At Baron Ranch: Trashing the Place To Save It

Yikes. Alright already, sheesh. A wall of nearly impenetrable willow needs no sign. Nobody is going in there. And we destroy everything we can find And tomorrow when the human clock stops and the world stops ticking We’ll be an index fossil … Continue reading

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Renaming Los Padres: Names Of the 1930s

Detail showing Abel Mtn. on a 1938 map of Los Padres National Forest. Backstory I’ve long had an interest in place, in the particularity of natural settings and the composition of undeveloped scenes, and in the forest placenames chosen by … Continue reading

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