Blessed with more than 1,000 different kinds of plants and flowers, the Santa Monica Mountains provide impressive displays of flowers to those who seek them. Our Plant of the Month Page feature is designed to help learn the names of the flowers encountered while traveling along canyons, slopes, and ridges. Over the years as plants have been added to this list, we realized that our previously myopic vision towards the plants and flowers along the trails had been "corrected". This change had the added benefit of improving our enjoyment of time spent in the mountains.

Our lives do not depend on knowing which flowers are edible or which plants could make that headache go away. The native peoples knew when and where they could find the flora that would be of benefit to them because they required them to survive - there was no Costco or Home Depot nearby. We’re so used to eating domesticated, carefully bred plants, that the idea of eating wild plants seems exotic, unattractive and somewhat dangerous. We have become tourists in our local mountains. So much goes on behind the scenes that we are oblivious to the life flow of the plants, insects, and animals. James Loeb said it more succinctly "We still depend on the natural world and its resources for survival even if we are separated from that reality by many layers of plastic packaging." This came from an article in Bay Nature October-December 2017.

“I'm comforted by the act of naming. It's a kind of befriending, a recognition, however temporary, of individuality and provenance.” - Richard Mabey - The Cabaret of Plants: Botany and the Imagination

Every plant that is native to our mountains has figured out how to thrive - whether it is by staking out damp & wet places, some by adapting to fire and sparse rainfall and some by blooming when other plants are not. If you take the time to immerse yourself in the environment - you can be more than a tourist, and you will become more appreciative of the life beyond the edges of the trail.

Having knowledge of the flowers and plants may not result in you being a better athlete but it will add another dimension to your hike, amble, walk, ride or run!

The local wildflowers bloom throughout the year - whether you run, hike, bike or ride a horse - you are bound to encounter flowers of every color and stripe on every visit.


Tips for Flower Finding
  • Bring your kids! Kids are often better at finding the few different flowers in a large grouping than adults. Seeing flowers outdoors provides excellent visual stimulation and a little fresh air as well.
  • Take lots of pictures of the flowers you want to identify. Make sure you take pictures of leaves, flowers and the whole plant. This will help you or someone else to identify the flower after you get home.
  • On your next visit, try to identify these 10 wild flowers: Lupine, California Poppy, Parry’s Phacelia, Wild Sweet Pea, Canyon Sunflower, Morning Glory, Paintbrush, Wild Hyacinth, Mariposa Lily and Red Stemmed Filaree. Our web site is a good resource for identifying what you find.
  • After you master that list, start looking for some of the more uncommon flowers: Chocolate Lily, Globe Gilia, Spreading Larkspur, Humboldt Lily or any of 900+ species known to exist in our mountains.
  • Pattern recognition skills are easy to develop. Once you can identify a flower, suddenly that flower seems to be everywhere - it is like putting on glasses.
  • Where there is one there is usually more, if you see one flower start scanning the area for more specimens.
  • While enjoying the trails, it is easy to get drawn into a splash of purple running from the top to the bottom of a canyon wall. Start looking for what is different in that splash of red or purple. The diversity of Nature is incredible.
  • Move slower and focus on the tiny flowers - often they make up in mass what they lack in size. Whispering Bells and Eucrypta are two small flowers that will color the edges of a trail in white or yellow. If you see some tiny red flowers, take a closer look - they could be Red Maids.
  • Spend an extra fifteen minutes in one location and sit. If there are flowers, there are going to be butterflies, moths, bees, hummingbirds and other pollinators. They have a lot of work to do and are amazing in and of themselves.
  • Return on the same trail you went out on. It is surprising how many more flowers you will see after you have some familiarity with an area.
  • When you learn to identify a flower be sure to tell your friends and family. The more you repeat the name to someone else the better the retention.