Do you remember the wonderful mission bells or chocolate bells? Frittilaria biflora.
Anyway, the ONE meadow they grow in had become absolutely over run with campers, and more came every weekend. Well, look what the PV Station of the USFS DID!
They fenced it off! Yeah, yeah! Thank you E17!
I don’t know, wish they’d done it differently. Hired a patrol of Girl/Boy Scouts. Littering fines posted. Limit the number of campers. Clean up crew. Seems a bit heavy handed on the scold/deny/screw the public side. Now nobody has access to the chocolate lilies, including me and you.
Thank you for the lovely photo of the chocolate mission bell…
I hear Holycowgirl too…it is a dilemma. Like the old song “we take paradise and put a parking lot..” putting up fences and signs is hard to see too.
I am a several generation northern Californian who, due to a job, has had a ringside seat the last seven years on the central coast…and I remain shocked at the numbers of people who trample what they come to see.
We have so many laws that intend to protect wildlife and the enviiron and yet between innocent & willful ignorance of nature’s needs, lack of respect for others, youthful drive to power and sheer exuberance, scoff-law and internal lawlessness …well the good and the fragile take a mighty hit.
We carved a wooden sign for a vista lookout that says “enjoy the view…thank you for not littering.” Yes..well…so we pick up a lot of litter.
Maybe the sign by the lilies should say why there is no camping there…those lilies could win over a heart or two. Every appreciative heart on earth helps a bit, yes?
Thanks for yours…
Thank you E17! I’d like to be more forgiving of people but as a property owner with similar issues of having to clean up after the masses and worry about fires…it’s enough for me to know the ‘bells’ can once again thrive….
Hey, what a great idea! Take a photo of the chocolate Lilly, laminate it, put it up next to the no camping sigh.
bigsurkate on iPhone
Barbara, if you had watched this field for 20 years, as I have, go from no intruders, until 2 years ago when camping in thus field first started, to wall-to-wall, bush to bush tents, chairs, tables, toilet paper, etc. you might feel differently. If the USFS hadn’t done this, there would not be ANY chocolate Lillie’s for anyone to see. I choose to see them thru a fence than watch them disappear all together. I wish people were conscience and caring but alas, I do not often see that in the campers that come here.
bigsurkate on iPhone
The chocolate lily can be the south coast’s symbol for the renewal/continuance of the delicate balance of nature in the over run camping/hiking spots!
I feel the summer masses increasing up here on the north coast and it’s worrisome. Just watched a bunch of kids pulling off sea stars at a minus tide and playing with them. No thought of the injury they’re doing. I wouldn’t mind the tourists so much if they were just a bit more civilized.
When I read the heading, I thought maybe she died.
So, that’s a relief.
Sounds so bad, I would not argue with you; and I know we live in exceptionally irresponsible times. And of course it breaks my heart to read your description of beloved land you treasure. I understand your joy at seeing it finally protected.
I had a less terrible (but still shocking) experience when tucked way in the woods on a mountain in the Blue Ridge, discovering the Apalachian Trail ran 15 feet from my back door and the reprobates who hiked it.
My reaction about fencing your much beloved field and flowers stems from a perception that land is increasingly closed off to the public~ bad along with good. And that we, as a population, are being ushered toward a look-but-don’t-touch notion of landscapes, fenced away a distance like zoo animals. I fear all of us suffer from policies that are fast made, broad in scope, and antithetical to freedom.
If the universal starting premise is to eliminate human presence, which it seems to be, then that is the ALWAYS solution.
If the starting premise is,
(1) The State of California, in keeping with the freedoms inherent in America, will under no circumstance ever deny human access and participation in nature on our public oceanfronts, waterways, lakes, or land. Therefore, (2) How do we make this work, because all of the above are being seriously abused.
Which seems to me the kind of starting point that, by its generous nature, calls for ingenuity and genius and good will, which, even with deficit budgets, California has plenty of. This land is your land this land is my land from California to the New York Island to the redwood forests to the big sea waters this land is meant for you and me.
We could demonstratably lead the way.
Well, I am a fan of education and one comment led me to the idea of printing up a photo of the Lillie’s, and posting that to the sign, although some angry camper already tore the no camping sign down!
Lack of respect for the land, for others, for the very specialness of this place, has grown exponentially during the 20 years I’ve lived on this mountain. It’s enough to turn me into a hermit!
bigsurkate, on a mountain top in Big Sur
Modern Humans tend to destroy what pleases them by not allowing it thrive because of their ‘need’ to be right on top of it in an effort to connect. IMO. Freedom goes many directions. It also means respecting the natural world’s need to BE. I hear you, BSK. “WE” only think we humans have the right to everything. That’s all too often just our ratinalization for behaving like the disjointed, disconnected, unbalanced fools many of us have become.
If people want more ‘natural’ land then get it–protect it–make it-defend it- perserve it–from development and restore it as best you can. Earth day IS every day. Earth First — if you want to live with it then do the work to let it do more then ‘survive’ our presence. If your only desire is to suit yourself and demand only for yourself then well, we all know about what that road is paved with…
Long may the Lilies THRIVE! If that means they must be free of you and me–so be it. I don’t need to plant myself on top of them just to prove something to other humans.
The Campers need to get a clue. How?
To holycowgirl, with due respect for your viewpoint, I reply, “this land” is no one’s land. “IT” belongs only to itsefl-not to any human being no matter what they claim. We have no innnate rights to do with any part of it just what we please. We only “think” we do because of laws we’ve constructed to suite US.
The song expresses a persepctive I can appreciate–but no more than that. Freedom involves much more than doing just as you please because you want to do it and the Earth appears unable to prevent you in the short term.
I also aknowledge the fact that clearly, just from the comments here by BSK and others–some people understand mutual benefit, balance, connection and ‘threats’ to life better than others.
Thank you for all you do to perseve that incredibly lovely delicate coastal region.