A Desert Dowry : As Joshua Trees Vanish, Lancaster Struggles to Establish a Preserve

In a boom town still trying to find its way after a storm of development, Lancaster is attempting to save its most abundant Joshua tree site from illegal dumpers, off-road vehicle enthusiasts and the bulldozers of builders.

With the recent purchase of five acres of land, the city is halfway toward reaching its goal of creating a 95-acre woodland preserve, a high desert oasis in the middle of expanding suburbia.

“As the (San Fernando) Valley is encroaching on the desert, we’re looking more like a city,” said Lyle W. Norton, director of parks, recreation and arts. “We just have to try to coexist as best we can.”

Development in the Antelope Valley during the 1980s destroyed about 200,000 Joshua trees, one of the Mojave desert’s unique plants, inspiring land use reform in Lancaster and Palmdale. Where once the Lancaster desert was dotted with the contorted arms of these oddly beautiful yuccas, there is now a continuum of housing tracts and shopping centers.

At first glance, it would be easy to mistake the woodland site--an irregular, 45-acre lot just south of K-4 Street--for nothing more than another illegal desert dumping ground. Near magnificently thick stands of Joshua trees lie the dilapidated hulk of an abandoned swamp cooler and an assortment of shredded couches.

But the broken glass, mud-stiff rags and rusting cans that litter the ground belie the abundant flora and wildlife to be found there. This is the richest concentration of Joshua trees in Lancaster. And one enormous creosote bush, 10 feet high and 20 feet in diameter, has been estimated by biologists to be nearly 800 years old, Norton said.

Despite the fact that the woodlands are surrounded by homes and that shouts can be heard from children playing at the nearby school, there is still a wide-open feel to the area.

In many places, the rooftops of neighboring developments are obscured by vegetation. The view of the Tehachapi Mountains to the northwest and the San Gabriel foothills to the south lends the impression of isolation in a pristine desert setting.

“You don’t even feel like you’re in the city,” said Pilar Alcivar, superintendent of parks, recreation and arts.

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But that feeling lasts only as long as you don’t look to the ground, where reminders of humanity abound.

“One of the things we can’t control right now is garbage dumping,” said Norton, standing over a moldering roll of yellow-orange shag carpet. “It’s secluded, so people are doing things that aren’t very nice.”

Even a squatter who uses the woodlands as a temporary residence has complaints about the junk.

“I’d like to put up a sign that says, ‘If you happen to be the person who put this garbage here, I am totally contemptuous of your lack of regard for the environment,’ ” said Cameron MacLauchlin, who sells some of the refuse he finds, including skis, golf bags and aluminum cans.

Operating with a $2.4-million budget--money from grants and voter-approved taxes for park improvements--Norton plans to buy 40 more acres, fence the woodlands in, and build an information center and trail system for visitors. The city has already acquired 50 acres.

Installing a fence around the area is crucial, he said, pointing out that off-road vehicles and dumpers have easy access. Near the planned entrance to the park, someone has cut through a strip of steel fence with a blowtorch, a sign that some locals value their shortcuts more than Joshua trees.

Norton said he will probably need $500,000 more to complete the project, which will include cleaning out both trash and non-native plant species, like the Russian thistle commonly seen as tumbleweeds rolling through the streets.

Acquisition of property has been complicated by the numerous landowners on the site. City planner Brian Ludicke said decades of rampant land speculation have created a crazy quilt of small subdivided lots, many owned by people who live out of state or in foreign countries.