Table Mountain Observatory (TMO) is part of NASA JPL’s Table Mountain Facility, located above Wrightwood in the San Gabriel Mountains. The 37-acre site is situated at an elevation of 7,300 feet and overlooks the Mojave Desert, approximately 60 miles northeast of JPL’s Pasadena campus. Its high elevation, mountain setting, and distance from Los Angeles air pollution make it a prime location for astronomical and atmospheric research.
TMO – 1998 – pilot, Willy Williams
Building on this foundation, the site’s scientific history goes back further than most people think. The Smithsonian Institution started the observatory in 1926 to study solar radiation. In the late 1950s, JPL began using it to test solar panels for space vehicles and took over the U.S. Forest Service lease in 1962. That same year, JPL built TM-1, set up a 16-inch telescope, and saw its first light on August 1, 1962.
Beyond its original astronomical purpose, TMO’s primary focus is scientific research. In addition to astronomy, the Table Mountain Facility enables solar testing, spacecraft calibration, atmospheric lidar, and ozone and water vapor measurements. JPL’s lidar group values the site’s remote location, high altitude, favorable climate, and dark skies, which support research on stratospheric ozone, temperature, aerosols, tropospheric ozone, and water vapor.
In terms of significant equipment, a key modern telescope at TMO is Pomona College’s 1-meter (40-inch) telescope, which is shared with JPL. It has CCD imaging, filter wheels, polarimetry, near-infrared tools, and advanced adaptive optics. Built from 1982 to 1985, it got new optics in the 1990s and is now used for both student and research observations.
From a broader perspective, and from the viewpoint of someone in the Mojave or Wrightwood, Table Mountain Observatory stands out as a dedicated scientific station where the San Gabriel Mountains meet the desert sky. While places like Cajon Pass, Big Pines, and Angeles Crest are known for recreation, TMO’s main purpose is to support scientific research in the area.
Table Mountain – 1998 – Ultralight pilot, George Chabot
Further reading: JPL Table Mountain Facility history, JPL Table Mountain lidar site, NDACC Table Mountain Facility station page, and Pomona College’s Table Mountain Observatory page.
The Mojave River, a hidden gem in the arid landscapes of California, serves as a vital lifeline in the Mojave Desert. This remarkable river spans approximately 110 miles and offers a diverse ecosystem, historical significance, and recreational opportunities for nature enthusiasts and history buffs.
Geography and Formation:
The Mojave River originates in the San Bernardino Mountains and meanders through the Mojave Desert, eventually dissipating into Soda Lake. Its path encompasses various landscapes, including rugged canyons, barren deserts, and lush riparian habitats. The river’s formation can be traced back thousands of years ago when geological processes and the ever-changing climate of the region shaped its course.
Ecological Importance:
Despite the harsh Mojave Desert conditions, the Mojave River sustains a surprising array of flora and fauna. The river’s riparian zones provide an ideal habitat for a variety of plant species, such as willows, cottonwoods, and mesquite trees. These lush areas attract diverse wildlife, including birds, reptiles, and mammals, seeking refuge in this desert oasis.
Historical Significance:
The Mojave River holds a significant place in the history of California. Native American tribes, such as the Mojave, Serrano, and Chemehuevi, once relied on the river’s resources for sustenance and survival. European explorers, including Spanish missionaries and fur trappers, ventured along its banks, leaving behind a legacy of cultural exchange and exploration.
Moreover, during the mid-1800s, the Mojave River played a crucial role in the development of the Old Spanish Trail and the Mojave Road. These historic trade routes linked the Spanish colonies of California with the eastern United States, facilitating trade and migration.
Recreational Opportunities:
For outdoor enthusiasts, the Mojave River offers a plethora of recreational activities. Hiking trails, such as the Mojave Riverwalk Trail, provide opportunities for exploration, allowing visitors to immerse themselves in desert scenery. Camping facilities and picnic areas along the river’s banks provide the most idyllic setting for a peaceful getaway amidst nature’s tranquility.
Conservation Efforts:
Recognizing the importance of preserving this vibrant ecosystem, numerous conservation organizations and government agencies have worked to protect and restore the Mojave River. These initiatives focus on sustaining river water quality and preserving riparian habitats.
Conclusion:
The Mojave River stands as a testament to the resilience of nature in the face of adversity. Its meandering path through the Mojave Desert provides a lifeline for both wildlife and humans, offering a sanctuary amidst the arid landscapes. Whether you are a nature lover, history enthusiast, or adventure seeker, the Mojave River is a destination that promises a unique and memorable experience. So, embark on a journey to this desert oasis, and let the Mojave River captivate you with its beauty and allure.
The arroyo toad is a small, stocky toad of sandy washes, shallow streams, and open riparian terraces. It is not a general desert toad. It depends on a very particular kind of stream: low-gradient water, sandy or fine-gravel bars, shallow pools, and nearby upland soils soft enough for burrowing. The young develop in quiet, shallow water, while adults spend much of the dry season underground.
In the Mojave region, the arroyo toad belongs to the old drainage system of the San Gabriel and San Bernardino mountains rather than the open desert floor. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service recognizes a Desert Recovery Unit in northeastern Los Angeles County and southwestern San Bernardino County.
Breeding usually occurs from winter into summer when shallow pools are available. Eggs hatch quickly, tadpoles develop in slow water, and young toads remain near drying pools before moving into nearby sandy uplands. During hot, dry months, toads estivate in burrows, emerging in response to moisture or disturbance.
The arroyo toad remains federally endangered. Its main problems are loss and fragmentation of stream habitat, dams and water diversions, altered flows, non-native predators such as bullfrogs and crayfish, drought, wildfire, and climate change.
Simple description:
The arroyo toad is a rare, federally endangered toad found along sandy, shallow streams in parts of central and southern California and northern Baja California. It needs both water and sand: quiet pools for breeding and soft upland soils for burrowing during the dry season. In the desert region, it is tied to mountain-fed washes and riparian corridors, not open dry flats.
Notes & Additional Reading
The arroyo toad, Anaxyrus californicus, was federally listed as endangered on December 16, 1994. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service describes it as a species of shallow, slow-moving stream and riparian habitat with nearby sandy or fine-gravel uplands, and lists threats including non-native predators, disease, water withdrawals, urban and agricultural development, pollution, drought, and climate change.
For desert-region wording, be careful. The species is mainly tied to coastal and mountain drainages of central and southern California and northwestern Baja California, but it also occurs in some desert-associated drainages, including the Mojave River. The San Diego Natural History Museum atlas specifically notes “more prominent desert drainages, such as the Mojave River.”
For accuracy on old desert records, use Ervin, Beaman, and Fisher. They found that four reported Sonoran Desert populations from Riverside, San Diego, and Imperial counties were erroneous, which is important when discussing the arroyo toad’s desert range.
For current conservation and population discussion, use Hitchcock et al. The 2017-2020 range-wide surveys found arroyo toads at 61 of 88 surveyed historical sites and in 20 of 25 historically occupied watersheds, but no detections occurred at nearly one-third of surveyed sites. The paper also emphasizes drought, invasive aquatic species, altered flows, and other human effects as major management concerns.
For upland habitat, stream terraces, and management, use Gallegos et al. Their radio-telemetry study found that adult toads used open, sandy flats with sparse vegetation and remained on stream terraces during and after breeding; they also warned that assuming toads are absent from floodplain habitat outside the breeding season may leave them vulnerable to disturbance.
Additional reading:
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. “Arroyo Toad (Anaxyrus californicus).” Best general source for status, description, habitat, life cycle, range, threats, and recovery context.
U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. “Arroyo Toad (Anaxyrus californicus) 5-Year Review.” Best source for the current federal review status and conservation assessment.
Hitchcock, C. J., et al. 2022. “Range-wide persistence of the endangered arroyo toad (Anaxyrus californicus) for 20+ years following a prolonged drought.” Ecology and Evolution. Best recent scientific paper for persistence, drought, and broad survey results.
Gallegos, E., L. M. Lyren, R. E. Lovich, M. J. Mitrovich, and R. N. Fisher. 2011. “Habitat use and movement of the endangered Arroyo Toad (Anaxyrus californicus) in coastal southern California.” Journal of Herpetology. Best paper for adult movement, stream terraces, upland use, and management timing.
Ervin, E. L., K. R. Beaman, and R. N. Fisher. 2013. “Correction of locality records for the endangered arroyo toad (Anaxyrus californicus) from the desert region of southern California.” Bulletin of the Southern California Academy of Sciences. Best paper for correcting desert-location errors.
California Department of Fish and Wildlife / UC Davis. California Amphibian and Reptile Species of Special Concern. Useful state-level conservation reference; the CDFW page includes the arroyo toad species account under its amphibian and reptile Species of Special Concern publication.
San Diego Natural History Museum. “Anaxyrus californicus — Arroyo Toad.” Good field-guide style source for identification, range notes, conservation status, and the Mojave River mention.
Experiencing solitude differs from just being alone. Being alone means having no one else present, while solitude is freedom from being watched, measured, interrupted, explained, or directed.
This is why it isn’t solitude if someone tells you so. When another names it, your experience transforms into performance. You’re no longer simply alone; you’re seen as alone, and that changes everything. True solitude can’t be certified; it has no witness.
Solitude arrives when the mind stops looking over its shoulder—no audience to impress, answer, or defend against. At first, it feels empty, but then honest. The usual noise from others fades, as well as the quiet inside you grows.
Because of this inward journey, solitude must be discovered, not assigned. Someone might point you to a trail, canyon, road, or quiet room, but can’t give you the experience. You must arrive inwardly and stay until silence feels present, not absent.
It is important to note that solitude is not loneliness, even though the two may seem alike at first. Loneliness longs for company; solitude accepts aloneness. Loneliness feels like exclusion; solitude feels like being reunited with yourself. Solitude is a private settlement between a person and the world.
In true solitude, the land does not explain itself. The wind does not ask to be understood. The stones, brush, sky, and distance do not perform for you. They simply exist. And if you remain still enough, you begin to exist in the same plain way. No announcement. No approval. No lesson forced upon you.
Once found, solitude is easier to visit. At first, it’s distant—a place with no road. You may mistake it for loneliness, boredom, or emptiness. But after that first encounter, you recognize the path back. You know what to set aside: noise, explaining, the need to be seen, and the habit of answering others. Then solitude is no longer a strange country; it becomes a place you can return to.
With practice, in solitude, you can sit still until the restlessness passes. At first, the mind seeks noise: a task, a voice, a screen, a reason to leave. Stay past that. Solitude works once the urge to be distracted fades.
In this space, you can walk without regarding it as exercise. Notice the ground, wind, tracks, shadows, slope, distance, heat, cold, bird calls, creosote, and how light changes on the rock. Let the place be, without turning it into a lesson.
During this attention, think honestly—not dramatically, not in circles. Ask simple questions: What burdens aren’t mine? What do I defend? What do I believe with no pressure? What matters without an audience?
Afterward, write a few plain sentences. Just field notes of the mind: I noticed. I remembered. I avoided it. I felt calmer when. No need to explain.
If writing settles your thoughts, read something steady: nature writing, scripture, philosophy, desert history, a field guide, or a map. Old books help because they don’t shout; they wait.
For example, I have read books in solitude. Land of Little Rain by Mary Hunter Austin is one. As time went on, I made photographs to illustrate her chapters. That kind of reading does not finish with the last page. It carries you back into the land itself. The words teach you how to look, and the camera becomes a quiet way of answering what the book first taught you to notice.
Study one plant, rock, wash, bird, or old road cut. Solitude pairs well with attention; the deeper you look at one thing, the less you crave many things.
Pray, meditate, or be silent. The name matters less than the act. The point is to stop performing and listen inwardly.
Above all, stop explaining yourself. That is solitude’s rarest gift: no defense, no audience, no argument. Quiet enough to be real again.
That is the value of being alone: it does not flatter or define you. It gives you space to find out.
The Mojave Desert is home to many small rodents, including squirrels, rats, and mice. At first glance, they may seem alike, but each group has its own habits and place in the desert.
Antelope Squirrel
Squirrels are often the easiest to see because many are active during the day. White-tailed antelope squirrels, California ground squirrels, and Mojave ground squirrels may be seen running across open ground, sitting upright, or watching from near a burrow. Their alert behavior helps them survive in a land of hawks, snakes, coyotes, and foxes.
Packrat – Roger Barbour photo – USFWS
Rats and mice are more often active at night. Kangaroo rats are well-adapted to desert life, with long hind legs for hopping and cheek pouches for carrying seeds. Woodrats may build large stick nests under cactus, shrubs, or rocks. Mice are usually smaller, quicker, and harder to notice. Pocket mice, deer mice, and grasshopper mice often stay hidden in burrows, brush, or rocky cover.
Pocket mouse
All of these animals are rodents. They have front teeth that keep growing, and many feed on seeds, plants, insects, or a mix of foods. Though small, they are an important part of the Mojave ecosystem. They move seeds, loosen soil, and provide food for owls, snakes, bobcats, kit foxes, and other desert predators.
Squirrels are the daytime watchers. Kangaroo rats are the night jumpers. Mice are the hidden seed gatherers. Together, they help keep the desert alive.
I like geology because it transforms how I see the desert. Geology explains why the land looks the way it does, why water follows certain paths, why mountains rise, or basins sink, and why springs appear. It shows how natural forces shape human choices: trails, roads, mines, railroads, and settlements emerge from the land’s history. Geology turns the desert from empty space into a record that can be read.
To many people, the desert looks still and silent. They see rocks, dry washes, cliffs, playas, distant mountains, and open ground. However, geology reveals that the desert is not still at all. It is the result of movement, pressure, heat, erosion, faulting, volcanism, uplift, and time. Every ridge, canyon, lava flow, terrace, wash, spring, and fault scarp has a reason for being there. While the land may not speak plainly, it leaves evidence.
Jumbo Rock – Joshua Tree National Park
That is one reason geology appeals to me. It is based on visible proof. A geologist can look at a cliff face, a broken hillside, a tilted layer of rock, a dry lakebed, or a mine dump and begin to understand what happened. The evidence may be old, weathered, scattered, or partly hidden, but it is still there. Geology rewards careful observation. It asks a person to slow down, look closely, compare patterns, and respect what the land is showing.
For about nine years, I wandered and explored the desert simply by going out there. I moved from one point of interest to another, mostly staying to myself. Instead of following a formal course or guided route, I learned by looking, walking, comparing places, and remembering what I had seen. A canyon led to a spring. A spring led to a wash. A wash led to a road. A road led to a mine, a pass, a dry lake, or a faulted hillside. Over time, the separate places began to connect, further deepening my understanding.
Amboy Crater
That kind of wandering gave the desert time to teach me. I was not trying to master it all at once. Some places made sense right away. Others stayed confusing until I saw another place that explained them. Over time, the desert became less like a collection of isolated sites and more like one connected landscape.
Lake Manly – Death Valley
In making these connections, I began to see that geology and history both seek to explain the past, but in different ways. History asks who came through a place, what they did, what they called it, and what they left behind. Geology, in contrast, asks deeper questions: Why is this pass here? Why did the river cut through at this place? Why did the lake disappear? Why was ore found in this mountain and not another? Why did a spring appear along one route and not another? Ultimately, human history depends on the shape and structure of the earth beneath it.
Blue Cut Fault – Joshua Tree National Park
This is especially true in the Mojave Desert. The Mojave is a land of corridors, barriers, basins, mountains, playas, springs, faults, and washes. People did not move across a blank map. They followed water, passes, dry lake margins, river channels, and openings between ranges. Trails, wagon roads, railroads, highways, mining camps, and towns were all influenced by geology. To understand the Mojave well, a person has to understand the ground.
Geology also explains why the desert can feel so old. Human history may reach back a few hundred or a few thousand years, but geology reaches into deep time. It deals with ancient seas, vanished lakes, old volcanoes, buried rivers, moving faults, and mountains worn down and raised again. It reminds us that the land existed long before us and will remain long after us. That perspective gives the desert dignity.
I admire geologists because they know how to read the earth without needing it to speak plainly. They can stand before a canyon wall, a fault zone, a lava field, or a dry lake and see more than scenery. They see time, force, sequence, and evidence. They understand that the land is not random. It has structure. It has a history. It has a record, even when that record is difficult to read.
I also admire the dedication and discipline geology requires. It is not casual work. It takes field study, maps, measurements, samples, notes, old reports, and comparison. A geologist must be willing to walk rough ground, endure heat and distance, and keep looking when the answer is not obvious. The earth does not reveal its story all at once. Understanding comes one observation at a time.
That kind of work requires humility. A good geologist cannot force the land to fit an easy explanation. The evidence has to lead. If the rocks say one thing and the theory says another, the theory must change. That respect for facts is one of the strongest parts of geology. It is disciplined curiosity. It combines imagination with restraint.
The Desert Studies Center at Zzyzx belongs in this story because it represents desert study put into practice. With this focus shifting from theory to place, it is a center where students, teachers, and researchers can go into the Mojave itself and learn directly from the land. Set near Soda Dry Lake, at the end of the Mojave River system, it stands in one of the best natural classrooms in the desert.
That setting matters. Around Zzyzx are dry lake beds, springs, salt flats, rocky slopes, volcanic features, desert plants, old shorelines, and evidence of water, heat, faulting, erosion, and long-term change. A person studying there is not learning geology only as an abstract subject. He is standing inside the evidence.
The Desert Studies Center also shows why geology requires discipline. Field science is not guessing from a distance. It means walking the ground, taking notes, checking maps, and comparing what is seen with what has been written. That is the kind of work I admire. It takes order and respect for facts.
In that sense, Zzyzx is more than a place on the map. It serves as a bridge between curiosity and discipline, and as a living example of how the Mojave Desert continues to be studied and interpreted. The Desert Studies Center turns admiration for geology into practical learning. Connecting students and researchers directly with the land shows that the desert itself remains the best teacher.
Geologists also help preserve meaning in places that might otherwise be overlooked. A dry wash is not just a wash. A playa is not just a flat place. A fault is not just a crack. A mine is not just a hole in the ground. Building on this, each one belongs to a larger story. Geology connects small details to big forces. It turns scattered features into a pattern.
That is why geology makes the desert understandable. Instead of seeing emptiness, geology reveals the bones and memory of the landscape. The Mojave is not barren, but layered with evidence of violence, patience, age, movement, and history. Geology’s explanation brings order and beauty to the surface, grounded in the evidence it preserves.
I like geology because it deepens every desert visit. Once you begin to see the land geologically, ordinary places become more interesting. A roadcut becomes a lesson. A wash becomes a process. A spring becomes a clue. A mountain front becomes evidence of movement. A dry lake becomes the trace of a vanished world.
Most of all, I like geology because it sharpens attention and deepens understanding. Geology rewards patience, discipline, and respect for the past. It reminds us that the earth has a story older than our own, and the Mojave Desert, far from being empty, vividly displays that story. With geology, the desert becomes readable and meaningful.
At first glance, desert ground appears bare, dry, and lifeless. A visitor notices only gravel, sand, rock, and scattered shrubs. Yet in many parts of the Mojave Desert, the soil’s surface is alive. A thin, dark, uneven layer often forms between plants and rocks. This is a biological soil crust, sometimes called cryptobiotic soil crust. It is one of the desert’s quietest, most important natural systems.
A biological soil crust is composed of tiny living organisms, such as bacteria, algae, fungi, lichens, and mosses. These organisms grow together at the soil surface, binding loose particles into a protective skin. In dry weather, the crust may look dull, gray, black, or almost invisible. After rain, it can darken and swell, showing that it is not dead ground at all, but a living cover adapted to long drought and sudden moisture.
This crust holds the desert in place. Mojave soils are loose and easily moved by wind, water, feet, tires, and hooves. When healthy, biological crust stabilizes the surface and reduces erosion. It slows soil movement during storms and protects small seeds. In some places, it captures nutrients for desert plants. Though only a fraction of an inch thick, it has a much larger influence than its size suggests.
The crust is fragile. A single footprint breaks decades of growth. Tire tracks cut through, leaving scars for years. The slow-changing desert means even small damage lasts a long time. Trails matter. Stay on marked paths—not just for neatness or regulation, but to protect the living ground most people never notice.
Lichens are part of this desert story. They grow on soil, boulders, cliffs, and rocks. A lichen is not a single plant, but a partnership, usually between a fungus and algae or cyanobacteria. This partnership lets lichens survive where others cannot. On desert rocks, lichens appear as green, orange, yellow, gray, or black patches. They grow slowly, weather rock, and add color and texture to the stone country.
In places like Joshua Tree National Park, the links between rock, lichen, soil, and people become clear. Climbers seek granite formations; hikers move across the open ground. The same rocks that invite touch may also shelter lichens developed over the years. Spaces that seem empty may contain biological crust. The desert invites exploration, but rewards care.
Erosion is natural in the Mojave Desert. Wind, water, heat, cold, and gravity shape the land. Flash floods carve washes. Wind lifts dust. Expanding and contracting rock fractures over time. But when the protective surface erodes too quickly, erosion worsens. Biological soil crusts shield the desert from loss. When crushed, the soil moves easily, and the surface loses stability.
The Bajada Nature Trail and Ripley Desert Woodland reveal hidden life. On these walks, small dark spots on the ground are often biological crust. To an untrained eye, they look like dirt or stains, but they are part of a unique ecosystem. Nearby mistletoe, juniper, and palo verde show how life adapts to dryness. Some plants shelter animals. Some provide food. Desert mistletoe lives as a parasite. These details show the desert is not empty. It is layered.
Understanding biological soil crust changes how you see the Mojave. The empty space between shrubs matters. The dark patch beside a trail and the lichen on a boulder record nature’s history. The desert floor is not just a surface to cross. It is a living boundary between earth and air.
The old habit of looking closely serves us best. Walk slowly and observe. Stay on durable surfaces—such as rock, sand, or gravel—when possible. Never cut switchbacks; always use established paths. Keep vehicles on established roads. Check the ground before stepping off the trail. These simple acts protect organisms that cannot move or recover quickly.
The Mojave Desert demands patience from those who wish to understand it. Its life is not always loud, green, or obvious. Sometimes it is a thin crust, a lichen on stone, or a dark patch alive after rain. Biological soil crust reminds us that the desert’s strength lies in small things. Even the ground itself may be alive.
BIOTIC – Mojave Desert Glossary https://mojavedesert.net/glossary/biotic.html Defines biotic as the living part of the desert environment, including plants, animals, lichens, microbes, and soil organisms.
LICHENS – Mojave Desert Glossary https://mojavedesert.net/glossary/lichens.html Explains lichens as slow-growing partnerships of organisms found on desert rocks, soil, and tufa surfaces.
Desert Magic – Cryptobiotic Soil Crust https://digital-desert.com/bajada-trail/12.html Shows cryptobiotic soil crust along the Bajada Nature Trail and explains why it should not be stepped on.
Once dusk approaches, vulture activity shifts noticeably. During the day, vultures ride thermals, travel, and search for carrion. While the sun drops lower, the warm rising air begins to weaken. The birds often stop traveling far and begin moving toward a regular night roost.
Just before sunset, vultures may circle near the roost in loose groups. This circling can look like they are gathering over something dead, but that is not always the case. In the evening, they often use the last lift of the day, sorting themselves into the roost and waiting for a safe place to settle. One bird may arrive, then several more. They may circle, drift, perch, shift position, and lift off again before finally settling.
A roost may be in tall trees, cliffs, utility towers, old buildings, or other high open places. Vultures prefer places where they can see around them. In the morning, they launch easily. Roosting together provides some protection against danger. It may also help them keep track of where other vultures go to feed.
After dark, vultures are mostly quiet and inactive. They do not hunt at night. Their eyesight is good, but they need sunlight and warm air to soar. Without thermals, they conserve energy by perching. They may shift, preen, or shuffle along a branch, but mostly they rest at night.
Animals die at night. Their carcasses, if not swallowed whole, may be hastily shredded, abandoned, and left to rot as a meal for the buzzards or other scavengers.
Near sunrise, the roost stirs. Vultures stretch, preen, and spread their wings. Sunning in the morning is among their most noticeable behaviors. A vulture standing with open wings is usually warming after the cool nighttime, drying dew, and preparing for flight.
They usually wait for the sun to warm the ground and create rising air. When thermals form, vultures leave, circling upward and spreading out. The roost empties, and the search begins again.
The Scavengers
Fifty-seven buzzards, one on each of fifty-seven fence posts at the rancho El Tejon, on a mirage-breeding September morning, sat solemnly while the white tilted travelers’ vans lumbered down the Canada de los Uvas. After three hours they had only clapped their wings, or exchanged posts. The season’s end in the vast dim valley of the San Joaquin is palpitatingly hot, and the air breathes like cotton wool. Through it all the buzzards sit on the fences and low hummocks, with wings spread fanwise for air. There is no end to them, and they smell to heaven. Their heads droop, and all their communication is a rare, horrid croak.
Interesting! Haven’t been there, but it’s been described as gold mineralization localized in one of the low-angle (thrust) fault zones that extend south from (and relieve compression from) the San Andreas Fault along the north side of the San Gabriels. That compressional environment extends from where it bends more westerly, north of the Coachella Valley, to where it resumes its more northwesterly course at the west end of the San Gabriels. Could you see any visible geological evidence of that? Envious that you got there!
Interesting! I have not been there, but I have heard it described as gold mineralization localized in one of the low-angle thrust fault zones that extend south from the San Andreas Fault along the north side of the San Gabriels. Those faults help accommodate the compression created where the San Andreas bends more westerly north of the Coachella Valley, before resuming its more northwesterly course near the west end of the San Gabriels.
Could you see any visible geologic evidence of that on the ground? Fault gouge, sheared rock, quartz veining, altered zones, breccia, or repeated/tilted beds would all be interesting. Envious that you got there!
elucidate
Here is a more elucidated version:
Interesting. I have not been there, but the description makes geological sense. The gold mineralization has been described as localized within one of the low-angle thrust or reverse-fault zones that extend southward from the San Andreas Fault along the north side of the San Gabriel Mountains.
That setting is important because this part of the San Andreas is not a simple, straight strike-slip boundary. North of the Coachella Valley, the fault bends into a more westerly trend. That bend creates transpression: strike-slip motion combined with compression. The crust has to shorten and thicken, and some of that strain is taken up by reverse and thrust faults along the northern San Gabriels. Farther west, near the west end of the range, the San Andreas resumes its more typical northwest trend.
In such a compressional fault environment, mineralization can become focused along zones of weakness. Fault planes, fractured rock, breccia zones, and sheared contacts can all act as pathways for hydrothermal fluids. If those fluids carried silica, sulfides, and metals, they could deposit quartz veins and gold where pressure, temperature, chemistry, or permeability changed.
So I would be curious whether there was visible evidence of the structure on the ground: sheared or crushed rock, fault gouge, breccia, slickensides, repeated rock units, tilted beds, iron staining, quartz veining, altered zones, or a distinct contact where one rock package has been pushed over another. Even if the gold itself was not visible, the structural setting might be.
Envious that you got there. That is exactly the kind of place where the landscape may tell a larger tectonic story if you know what to look for.
expand all
Interesting. I have not been there, but the description makes geologic sense, and it opens up a much larger story than just “gold in a fault zone.”
The gold mineralization has been described as localized within one of the low-angle thrust or reverse-fault zones that extend southward from the San Andreas Fault along the north side of the San Gabriel Mountains. That is an important detail. A low-angle fault zone is not just a crack in the rock; it is a broad zone of broken, sheared, crushed, and chemically altered rock where movement has taken place over time. In a compressional setting, one block of crust is being driven up and over another. Those zones can become major pathways for mineral-bearing fluids.
This part of the San Andreas is not a simple, straight, clean strike-slip fault. Farther south and east, the San Andreas trends northwest-southeast in the classic right-lateral fashion. But north of the Coachella Valley, the fault bends into a more westerly orientation. That bend matters enormously. When a right-lateral strike-slip fault bends the “wrong” way, the two sides do not simply slide past each other smoothly. They jam, shorten, and thicken the crust. Geologists call that transpression: a combination of lateral shear and compression.
That compressional zone extends along the northern front of the San Gabriel Mountains. The mountains themselves are partly a product of that tectonic crowding. The crust is squeezed, folded, broken, and shoved upward. Some of the strain stays on the main trace of the San Andreas, but much of it is transferred into adjacent reverse faults, thrust faults, oblique-slip faults, folds, and fractured belts. In other words, the San Andreas does not act alone. It produces a whole structural neighborhood.
The low-angle thrust zones extending south from the San Andreas are part of that neighborhood. They help accommodate shortening across the range front. In plain terms, the crust cannot slide smoothly through the bend, so it stacks, uplifts, and fractures. That creates the conditions in which fault-related mineralization can occur.
Gold mineralization in such a setting is usually not random. Hydrothermal fluids move through the most permeable pathways available. A fault zone provides exactly that: broken rock, fractures, crushed breccia, shear planes, and repeated openings caused by movement. Fluids rising through these pathways may carry silica, iron, sulfur, carbonate, and small amounts of precious metals. When conditions change–pressure drops, temperature changes, chemistry shifts, fluids mix, or the pathway narrows–minerals precipitate. Quartz veins, iron oxides, sulfides, clay alteration, and sometimes gold may form in and near the fault zone.
That is why I would be especially interested in what was visible on the ground. The gold itself might not be obvious, and in many cases it would not be visible at all. But the structural and alteration evidence might be. I would look for a zone of rock that appears more shattered, softened, stained, or disrupted than the surrounding material. Fault gouge would be one clue: clay-rich, powdery, crushed material produced by grinding along the fault. Fault breccia would be another: angular fragments of older rock cemented or packed together within the fault zone. Sheared rock, where minerals or rock fabrics are smeared out into streaks or bands, would also be significant.
Quartz veining would be especially interesting. In a mineralized fault zone, quartz may occur as thin stringers, irregular veinlets, thicker veins, or stockwork networks. The veins might be white, gray, rusty, milky, or iron-stained. Rusty red, brown, orange, or yellow staining can indicate oxidation of iron-bearing minerals such as pyrite. That does not prove gold, but it is often associated with hydrothermal alteration. Greenish, whitish, or clay-rich alteration halos around fractures could also be meaningful.
A true thrust relationship might show itself in larger structural ways. You might see one rock type lying structurally above another in a way that does not match normal stratigraphic order. There may be repeated units, abrupt contacts, crushed zones along the contact, or beds and foliations tilted at unexpected angles. In metamorphic or plutonic terrain, the evidence may be less like neat layered beds and more like zones of mylonite, cataclasite, breccia, altered granitic rock, or sheared gneiss.
Slickensides would be another prize: polished or striated fault surfaces showing the direction of movement. On a thrust or reverse fault, the lineations may suggest upward movement of one block over another, though in this region movement could be oblique because the San Andreas system combines strike-slip and compression. That obliquity is part of what makes the San Gabriel block so structurally interesting.
The broader tectonic setting is the key. From the San Gorgonio Pass / Coachella Valley region westward along the northern San Gabriels, the San Andreas enters a restraining-bend geometry. The motion between the Pacific and North American plates is still dominantly right-lateral, but the bend forces compression into the system. That compression is relieved through uplift of the San Bernardino and San Gabriel Mountains, thrusting along range-front and internal faults, folding of sedimentary basins, and distributed deformation away from the main fault.
At the west end of the San Gabriels, where the San Andreas resumes a more northwesterly course, the geometry changes again. The compressional intensity and structural style are not uniform along the entire belt. Some areas are dominated by uplift and thrusting; others by oblique-slip deformation, strike-slip transfer, folding, or basin development. That variability could help explain why mineralization is localized in one fault zone rather than spread evenly everywhere. The right combination of structure, permeability, host rock chemistry, fluid source, and timing has to occur.
So the place you mention may be interesting for two reasons at once. Locally, it may preserve a mineralized fault zone where gold-bearing fluids used a low-angle thrust structure as a conduit. Regionally, it may be a small exposure of the larger tectonic machinery that built and continues to deform the northern San Gabriel Mountains. The mine or prospect is the local expression; the restraining bend of the San Andreas is the regional engine.
What I would want to know from someone who had been there is whether the mineralization looked structurally controlled in the field. Was the quartz confined to a shear zone? Did the veins parallel the fault fabric, or cut across it? Was the country rock pervasively altered, or only fractured locally? Was there a visible low-angle contact? Did the workings follow a seam, a vein, a breccia body, or a crushed zone? Were there iron-stained ribs or resistant quartz ledges standing out from softer fault gouge? Were the dumps full of milky quartz, rusty quartz, altered granite, schist, or breccia?
Those details would help distinguish several possibilities. It could be gold in discrete quartz veins occupying fractures related to thrusting. It could be disseminated or veinlet-controlled mineralization in a broader altered shear zone. It could be mineralization along a contact between contrasting rock units. Or it could be older mineralization later caught up in San Andreas-related deformation. The field relationships would matter.
In a place like that, the visible clues are often subtle. A casual visitor might see only broken rock, brush, mine dumps, and a scar in the hillside. But a geologist would ask: why here? Why did the miners follow this exact line? Why is the rock crushed here and not there? Why does the staining follow a zone? Why do the veins have this orientation? Why does the ridge or drainage line up with the structure? Those questions are often more revealing than the mine opening itself.
That is why I said I would be envious. It sounds like the kind of locality where a small mining feature might sit directly on top of a much larger tectonic story: the San Andreas bend, compression along the northern San Gabriels, low-angle faulting, fractured rock, hydrothermal fluid movement, and localized gold deposition all intersecting in one place.
outline
I. Main point
The locality is interesting because the gold occurrence may not be isolated or random. It may be tied to a larger structural system associated with compression along the San Andreas Fault and the north side of the San Gabriel Mountains.
II. Regional tectonic setting
A. The San Andreas Fault is not straight in this region.
B. North of the Coachella Valley, the fault bends into a more westerly trend.
C. This bend creates a restraining-bend geometry.
D. In a right-lateral fault system, that geometry produces compression as well as lateral slip.
E. The resulting deformation is called transpression: strike-slip motion plus shortening.
III. Effect on the San Gabriel Mountains
A. The northern San Gabriels occupy part of this compressional zone.
B. The crust is shortened, thickened, fractured, and uplifted.
C. The mountains are partly a result of this tectonic crowding.
D. The San Andreas does not carry all the deformation by itself.
E. Strain is distributed into nearby structures, including:
Reverse faults
Thrust faults
Oblique-slip faults
Folds
Shear zones
Fractured belts
IV. Low-angle thrust faults
A. Some fault zones extend southward from the San Andreas along the north side of the San Gabriels.
B. These may be low-angle thrust or reverse-fault zones.
C. In such structures, one block of crust is pushed up and over another.
D. These faults help relieve or accommodate compression from the San Andreas restraining bend.
E. They form broad zones of crushed, sheared, fractured, and altered rock.
V. Relationship to gold mineralization
A. Gold mineralization may be localized within one of these low-angle fault zones.
B. Fault zones are natural conduits for hydrothermal fluids.
C. Mineral-bearing fluids can move through:
Fractures
Breccia zones
Shear planes
Crushed rock
Reopened fault surfaces
D. Gold and associated minerals may precipitate where conditions change, including:
Pressure drops
Temperature changes
Chemical shifts
Fluid mixing
Changes in permeability
Narrowing or sealing of fluid pathways
VI. Possible mineral indicators
A. Visible gold may not be present.
B. More likely clues would include:
Quartz veins
Quartz stringers
Stockwork veinlets
Iron staining
Rusty red, brown, orange, or yellow oxidation
Sulfide remnants or boxwork textures
Clay alteration
Silicified rock
Altered granitic, metamorphic, or sedimentary host rock
VII. Structural evidence to look for
A. Fault gouge: soft, clay-rich, crushed material along a fault.
B. Fault breccia: angular broken rock fragments in a fault zone.
C. Sheared rock: stretched, smeared, or foliated material produced by movement.
D. Slickensides: polished or striated fault surfaces showing movement direction.
E. Repeated rock units: the same unit appearing more than once because of thrusting.
F. Abrupt contacts: sudden boundaries between rock types.
G. Low-angle contacts: shallowly dipping fault surfaces.
H. Tilted or disrupted bedding or foliation.
I. Linear ridges, saddles, gullies, or drainage alignments following the fault zone.
VIII. Field questions for someone who visited
A. Was the mineralization clearly confined to a shear or fault zone?
B. Did the workings follow a vein, seam, breccia body, or crushed zone?
C. Was there a visible low-angle fault contact?
D. Were quartz veins parallel to the fault fabric, or did they cut across it?
E. Was there iron-stained quartz on the dump?
F. Was the country rock altered broadly or only along fractures?
G. Were there slickensides, gouge, breccia, or sheared rock?
H. Did the mine follow a structurally obvious line?
IX. Alternative interpretations
A. Gold may have formed directly in the thrust-related hydrothermal system.
B. Gold may occupy fractures caused by compression.
C. Gold may be related to an older mineralizing event later deformed by San Andreas-related faulting.
D. Gold may be localized along a contact between contrasting rock units.
E. Gold may occur in discrete veins rather than a broad mineralized fault zone.
X. Larger significance
A. The site may be a local mining feature.
B. It may also expose part of the broader tectonic machinery of Southern California.
C. The mineralization, faulting, uplift, and San Andreas restraining bend may all be connected.
D. The key question is whether visible field evidence supports that structural interpretation.
XI. Closing sentiment
A. The locality sounds worth seeing because it may combine mine history, structural geology, mineralization, and regional tectonics in one place.
B. The most interesting question to ask on the ground is: why did mineralization happen there, along that exact zone?
if I were to return to the site (Big Horn Mine, Angeles National Forest) what would be the top three pieces of evidence to look for?
I will ground this in the Big Horn Mine setting rather than speak only in generalities, and I will separate geologic clues from mine-safety/access issues.Thought for 15s
For Big Horn Mine specifically, I would make the top three targets these:
The Vincent Thrust contact itself
The main thing to look for is not just “a vein,” but evidence that the mine sits in the Vincent Thrust zone. The published mine description places Big Horn along the trace of the Vincent Thrust, with mineralization in a northeast-striking, low-angle zone dipping roughly 15 to 30 degrees northwest. It also describes the thrust as the contact between upper-plate San Gabriel Gneiss and lower-plate Pelona Schist. That is your number-one field question: can you see the structural contact, or at least the contrast between the rocks on either side? USGS/MRDS summaries describe the gold as occurring in a structurally favorable position along the Vincent Thrust zone.
In practical terms, look for a low-angle, laterally persistent zone rather than a steep, narrow fissure. Look for a change from more massive gneissic or amphibolitic rock to more foliated schistose rock. The Pelona Schist near the mine is described as well-foliated, medium- to dark-gray or black schist; the host interval between thrust strands is described as dominated by crushed amphibolite, an important host for the gold mineralization.
Crushed, sheared, gougy, or brecciated rock in the fault zone
The second thing to look for is mechanical damage: the ground preparation that made the rock permeable. The deposit description says favorable preparation included crushing and increased permeability within the Vincent Thrust zone, with impermeable gouge along upper and lower thrust surfaces helping confine the fluids. That is a very useful clue because it tells you the ore was not merely “near” a fault; it depended on the fault zone’s internal architecture.
On the ground, I would look for angular breccia fragments, crumbly clay-rich gouge, slick or polished shear surfaces, smeared foliations, shattered amphibolite, and zones where the rock changes from competent to rotten over a short distance. A mine dump may be as useful as an outcrop: pieces of crushed amphibolite, gneiss, schist, gouge, or veined breccia would tell you what the miners were actually following underground.
Quartz-pyrite-gold and calcite-pyrite-gold veinlets, especially where they follow fractured rock
The third thing is the mineralization style. The USGS resource study summarizes the district’s gold as being associated with small amounts of sulfides and occurring in quartz in fracture zones. The Big Horn mine description is more specific: it describes quartz-pyrite-gold and calcite-pyrite-gold veinlets formed from hydrothermal fluids.
In the field, look for white to gray quartz veinlets, calcite veinlets, rusty iron staining after pyrite, boxwork textures where sulfides weathered out, and quartz or calcite concentrated along fractures rather than randomly distributed. The key observation is orientation: do the veinlets parallel the thrust fabric, occupy sheared fractures, or occur between strands of the fault zone? If the veins and alteration are confined to the crushed thrust interval, that supports the structural-control interpretation.
My field hierarchy would be: first find the structural zone, then the damaged rock, and then check whether quartz/calcite/sulfide alteration is localized within that damaged zone. That sequence would give you the strongest evidence that the gold mineralization is tied to the Vincent Thrust rather than merely occurring somewhere near an old mine.
One caution: observe from outside. Current hiking guidance warns against entering the mine and to be careful around old boards and metal; the route is also seasonal because CA-2 can close in winter.
Beginning photographers are drawn to cemeteries because they offer strong subjects without needing access, models, money, or complicated logistics.
A cemetery gives a novice several useful things at once: quiet, stillness, interesting light, readable shapes, texture, inscriptions, age, symbolism, and emotion. The subject does not move, so the photographer can slow down and practice composition, focus, depth of field, close-ups, shadows, and framing. Headstones, fences, trees, paths, statues, flowers, flags, and weathered surfaces naturally create visual structure.
They also feel meaningful. A beginner often wants photographs to say something, not merely show something. Cemeteries come preloaded with themes: memory, loss, time, ancestry, mystery, abandonment, faith, and neglect. That can make the pictures feel more profound than the photographer’s technical skill can yet produce elsewhere.
There is also a long-standing romantic and gothic pull. Old cemeteries provide atmosphere: leaning stones, carved angels, iron gates, winter grass, late-afternoon light. They can look dramatic even when photographed simply.
But that is also the trap. Cemetery photography can become easy symbolism: a broken stone, a skull, an angel, a name, a sunset. The best work usually goes beyond mood. It notices evidence: who is buried there, how the graves are arranged, what materials were used, which names repeat, which markers are cared for, which are forgotten, and what the cemetery says about the community around it.
So beginners are drawn to cemeteries because cemeteries are accessible, patient, visually rich, emotionally charged, and historically layered. They make it easier to feel that a photograph has weight.
