Winding Paths of Palos Verdes

Today I had the pleasure of meeting with a staff member of the Palos Verdes Land Conservancy and we went on a hike around Abalone Cove. How many times have you walked an area and realized you know really not much about it?

I started to learn about birds and vegetation as well as vandalism and hazards. There are so many types of vegetation some of which are native to the area and many that are not. For example, all the pretty yellow flowers in the spring and early summer are not indigenous to the area and have now turned to dry brown brush. There's a bird called the cowbird that basically is a nest parasite and kicks the eggs out of the nest from other birds, lays their own and leave their eggs to be raised by birds. Or the lemonade plant that supposedly tastes like lemonade if you lick the berry - however, I was cautioned not to actually eat the berry itself.

There are plans to label the trails with markers which would be great since the maps we had did not seem to fit the terrain and wow...there are a lot of trails and up and down and over rocks and after 3 hours - I was only too happy to see a lifeguard who was happy to give us a ride back to our cars. His name was Jim (I think) and he could not have been nicer and was so interesting as he shared a lot of PV history.

To learn more http://www.pvplc.org