Relative Location

Coming home yesterday during a break in the storm, I got a chance to take some pictures of the landscape that surrounds much of our land. It's treeless and stark, slightly undulating. When we get good rain there are small pools(vernal pools?) dotting the landscape and running along the road. But during the drought of summer it's a harsh and barren landscape. I don't know how the birds survive out there. It looks like a degraded grassland/desert, as though goats have been on it for decades and eaten everything. Who knows maybe this happened. In the spring they do run cattle on this fragile land for a few months. But in the winter it turns green and the big skies are breathtaking. I drive this road at least once a week.




I don't know if this landscape ever had trees on it or not. From early European settler's writing they refer to this part of Tehama County as the "badlands." I think this area might also be dominated by hard pan. This would explain the pooling water that stays and the lack of trees or even shrubs. There is a small bird that lives out here, even in the summer. But as I drive it flies so fast that I have never been able to catch a good enough glimpse to id it.

Since I drive through this area quite a lot I think about what I would do if I were homesteading out here. First problem would be the wind. Shelter and shade would be paramount. Utilizing the mounds that already exist to catch debris and plant trees might work. I find it troubling that not even star thistle infiltrates this area. Maybe they spray it. But the grass and wildflowers that grow are about two inches tall and quickly die back. Nothing else grows. No weeds, no shrubs, nothing for hundreds of acres, thousands? The topsoil is thin to non-existent. Did man do this or is this the natural state of this landscape?

Our land is about eight miles from this. And as I have mentioned it is Oak Woodland Savannah, or was. Many of the oaks have been cut. Valley Oaks used to come all the way to our land from Thomes Creek but none have been seen for a while. The land is getting more and more dry as the trees are cut down.