Читать книгу 101 Hikes in Southern California. Exploring Mountains, Seashore, and Desert онлайн

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Botanically, parts of the San Gabriel Mountains are extremely attractive, especially in zones above 4,000 feet that receive enough precipitation. There the coniferous forest, which has two phases in Southern California, thrives. The yellow pine phase includes conifers such as bigcone Douglas-fir, ponderosa pine, Jeffrey pine, sugar pine, incense-cedar, and white fir, and forms tall, open forest. These species are often intermixed with live oaks, California bay (bay laurel), and scattered chaparral shrubs such as manzanita and mountain mahogany. Higher than about 8,000 feet, in the lodgepole pine phase, lodgepole pine, white fir, and limber pine are the prevailing trees. These trees, somewhat shorter and more weather-beaten than those below, exist in small, sometimes dense stands, interspersed with such shrubs as chinquapin, snowbrush, and manzanita.

Excluding relatively small parcels of private land, the bulk of the higher San Gabriel Mountains lies within Angeles National Forest. Hundreds of square miles of wilderness or near wilderness in the San Gabriels are available within easy reach of millions of L.A. residents.