Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve is a state-protected reserve of
California, United States, harboring the most consistent blooms of
California poppies, the state flower. The reserve is located in the rural west side of
Antelope Valley in northern
Los Angeles County
Los Angeles County, officially the County of Los Angeles, and sometimes abbreviated as L.A. County, is the most populous county in the United States and in the U.S. state of California, with 9,861,224 residents estimated as of 2022. It is the ...
, west of
Lancaster. To the north is
Kern County. The reserve is at an elevation ranging from above
sea level, in the
Mojave Desert climate zone. The reserve is administered by the
California Department of Parks and Recreation
The California Department of Parks and Recreation, more commonly known as California State Parks, manages the California state parks system. The system administers 279 separate park units on 1.4 million acres (570,000 hectares), with over 280 ...
. Other
wildflowers within the reserve include the
Owl's Clover,
Lupin
''Lupinus'', commonly known as lupin, lupine, or regionally bluebonnet etc., is a genus of plants in the legume family Fabaceae. The genus includes over 199 species, with centers of diversity in North and South America. Smaller centers occur ...
e,
Goldfields,
Cream Cups
''Platystemon'' is a monotypic taxon, monotypic genus of flowering plants in the Papaveraceae, poppy family containing the single species ''Platystemon californicus'', which is known by the common name creamcups. It is native to Oregon, Californi ...
and
Coreopsis.
The Reserve
The intense blooming season for the California Poppy usually falls within late winter to early spring, during the months of mid-February through mid-May. Blooming seasons are dependent on the amount of rainfall during the winter to early spring seasons. Within the reserve, there are of trails, including a paved section for
wheelchair access, which traverse the poppy fields.
In order to keep the fields in a strictly natural state, California State Parks does not water or stimulate the flowers. The park service also excludes
sheep and
cattle from grazing the hillsides. Until the early 1970s, sheep once grazed the buttes in the western Antelope Valley.
Pronghorn grazed long before then, until the railroad arrived in 1876. With the exception of
service dogs, pets are prohibited from the reserve. Under California state law, visitors are also prohibited from taking flowers from the reserve.
Since 1994, controlled fires have been used to regulate dead brush, exotic species and litter within the reserve.
The reserve is located east of
Arthur B. Ripley Desert Woodland State Park.
See also
*
List of California Native Plants
*
List of California State Parks
*
Natural History of the Mojave Desert
Nature, in the broadest sense, is the physical world or universe. "Nature" can refer to the phenomena of the physical world, and also to life in general. The study of nature is a large, if not the only, part of science. Although humans are p ...
References
External links
*
California State Parks: Official Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve Website
California State Reserves
Antelope Valley
Protected areas of the Mojave Desert
Protected areas of Los Angeles County, California
IUCN protected area omissions
Protected areas established in 1976
1976 establishments in California
{{California-protected-area-stub