The Bloom Is Off the Poppy This Year

In the high desert of Southern California, it’s either too hot or too cold. In between, the wind blows. With Los Angeles County almost completely built up, Antelope Valley was one of the last areas to be developed, and during the past few years, housing tracts and shopping centers have sprung up along California 14 much the way Joshua trees used to.

Besides being a burgeoning suburb and the home of the aerospace industry and Edwards Air Force Base, there are some noteworthy attractions in the Antelope Valley area worth checking out. In Rosamond, there’s the Exotic Cats Breeding Compound, not too far from Willow Springs Raceway. And running through it all is the California Aqueduct. Also, there’s the subject of this piece, the Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve, home to more than 1,740 acres of flowers, the majority of which consists of our state flower, eschscholzia californica. At least that is the way it is supposed to be.

The poppies are allegedly hanging on some rolling hills called the Antelope Buttes, 15 miles west of Lancaster. Some of their colorful botanical buddies include owl clover, coreopsis, tidy tips, lupine, gold field, pincushion, fiddleneck and others. At least that’s what the brochure says.

But unlike fairly predictable occurrences such as sunrise and contact with the Internal Revenue Service in April, nature is not always so reliable. The poppy extravaganza has a very limited run, usually from the middle of March through the middle of May. Although 1988, 1991 and 1995 were great poppy years, 1996, alas, is not. The telephone message at the reserve says this year’s bloom is poor.

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How poor is poor? Well, you may see as many poppies in the Antelope Valley as you see antelopes. Mom was right, again. Call first.

“It’s not good,” said Mary Shawler, a volunteer at the poppy reserve who was reached by phone. “We don’t have any, not one poppy. Well, maybe we have one, one flower maybe, that’s it. We don’t want people to expect anything good this year. I’ve been here 22 years and I’ve never seen anything like this. Last year was gorgeous, but I’m told that sometimes we have blank years. Poppies need certain things at certain times and they didn’t get it this season. We’ve had a very warm winter with 70 degree days since November.”

On an early April afternoon at the poppy reserve, the wind was blowing so hard that the few visible poppies were hanging on for dear life, trying desperately not to go flying in the sky like some airborne salad.

The huge cement structure built into the hillside and visible from the road is none other than the Jane S. Pinheiro Interpretive Center. Built in 1981, the center looks a lot like a bunker built at the height of Cold War paranoia and appears perfectly capable of surviving nuclear war, locusts or the worst hair day. The center is open only from mid-March through mid-May.

Pinheiro, a lifelong Antelope Valley resident, was instrumental in the creation of the reserve. Inside the center are many of her paintings, plus a gift shop. There’s also an ongoing wildflower film written by someone who knows lots of adjectives. It describes things such as “. . . a vast fragrant flower garden of enchanting beauty” and “jungles in miniature with secrets reserved for those who bend down and look.”

The center is also in the clothing business, offering a variety of poppy T-shirts, even some spiffy $21 models. The shirt is, clearly, as close as you’re going to get to a poppy around these parts this year.

Outside the center, the wind continued to howl across the miles of trails that meander through the nearby hills. At this point, it was strong enough to send a small animal into orbit and move everything lighter than a Dodge truck. A farce to be reckoned with, a trip to Lancaster this year is a lot like whale watching in the aqueduct or grunion hunting in Death Valley. At least there is no need to worry about the $500 fine for picking wildflowers.

Eschscholzia californica has been the state flower since 1903. The Indians called the plant the Fire Flower and believed the Great Spirit sent it to drive away evil spirits and fill the land with warmth and plenty. The Spanish called the plant copa de oro, or cup of gold. To the forty-niners, the plant was the symbol of gold, and some actually believed that gold formed where the petals fell to the ground.

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There are garden varieties of eschscholzia available in seed form that are much different than the basic yellow to orange variety. Ballerina and Mission Bells come in shades of white, rose and scarlet. California poppies are easy to grow from seed, but difficult to transplant. They are a short-lived bloom, and the petals close during wind and rain. Plant in fall in full sun before the rains, and watch for their bloom in spring, in case the poppy reserve has another downer year.

Speaking of downers, imagine being a tour guide at this year’s California Poppy Festival held last weekend in Lancaster. Imagine the busloads of tourists coming from Lancaster to the reserve. Did the docents take to the hills and hide or just lock the doors and pretend the place was deserted?

“I’m just glad I was off that weekend,” said Shawler.

DETAILS

* WHAT: Antelope Valley Poppy Reserve.

* WHERE: 15101 Lancaster Road, Lancaster.

* WHEN: Daily, 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.

* HOW MUCH: $5 or free.

* CALL: 805-724-1180.