California’s 2 new monuments

Former President Joe Biden designated two new national monuments in California in January.

The Chuckwalla National Monument is 624,270 acres in Riverside and Imperial counties. This area is part of the Colorado Desert. It’s home to many rare and endangered plants and animals. Twenty-seven rare and endangered plants are listed on California Native Plant Society’s Inventory of Rare and Endangered Plants of California. For example, the rare Mecca aster, Xylorhiza cognata, grows there. It’s a beauty with large lavender-blue flowers.

The Sáttítla Highlands National Monument consists of 224,676 acres in Modoc, Shasta-Trinity and Klamath national forests. It’s also a rich, biodiverse area. Sixteen plants are on the rare and endangered list, including whitebark pine, Pinus albicaulis. Whitebark pine is slow-growing, with a lifespan between 500 and 1,000 years.

— katie martin, UC Marin Master Gardeners