Rancho San Antonio

Unique Redwood Trees in Purisima Creek Redwoods Preserve

Last Saturday I joined the Unique Redwood Trees hike led by David Milburn, a docent for the Open Space District. We hiked in a rarely visited Bald Knob area of the Purisima Creek Redwoods Preserve, looked at the trees, and listened to David's comments. The unique trees were the old growth trees that survived the logging times becasue of their nonstandard trunks.
For me, the most remarkable was the note on the redwood bark, which is rough and fractured on younger trees and gets smoothed on the old trees. This is how one can recognize the age of the redwood, since the height and diameter may depend not only on the age but also on the environmental conditions.
Photographing these trees was very difficult, the forest was dark and the occasional sun spots created a lot of contrasts. I selected my three best photographs.

Reiteration Tree is old and bulky. It has a secondary trunk starting high above the ground. Our leader David Milburn is standing next to the tree.

The bark of the Reiteration Tree tree is smooth and veined, like an old human skin. Looking at the bark, one can have a sense of the old age, and we are talking 1000 years here.

The Chimney Tree has a long open cavity all along its trunk. Many old redwoods have open cavities at its base, which are made by a repetitive action of the fire burning and rotting caused by fungus. This tree's cavity is much larger, and somehow did not casue the tree to fall.

Sunday Morning in Rancho San Antonio

Last Sunday morning I went to the Rhus Ridge trail head for a quick hike up the Black Mountain, but the parking lot was already full at 9AM. To not loose time, I drove to a nearby access road that is not marked on the Rancho San Antonio map and hiked to the Chamise Trail. From there I walked down to the Rancho. That morning the valley was covered with fog and I expected the same in the hills, but the air cleared out quickly. It was one of these bright and sunny mornings, with birds singing in still air.

A view toward San Jose and Mt. Hamilton from the trail to Rancho San Antonio. The white layer above the valley is from the fog rather than from the usual smog. The view looked very Japanese to me.


Buckeye trees look cool in the fall.


In several places I have seen clouds of little flies dancing in the air above the chaparral.