Santa Clarita is hot and dry this time of year, existing at the veritable doorstep of the Mojave desert. It is furthermore northwest of Los Angeles, west of the San Gabriel mountain range, and overlooking the San Fernando valley just to the south. At first glace, the vegetative type appears to be a transition between high desert varieties and interior sage scrub, with a ribbon of riparian habitat supported by the presence of the Santa Clara river. It is sunny and clear, with no readily apparent cloud cover. The temperature at the time of this writing is 84 degrees Fahrenheit. It is conspicuously silent outside, as if this place, and the world at large, is spellbound by its own beauty in the finer details. Fall is drawing especially near. While there is yet to be any hint of a crisp quality to the air as the evening dawns, the sun slants lower on the horizon at a lesser time than the day before, and the one prior to that. In this most southern of latitudes, Autumn does not announce itself as a brazen statement. Rather, one must view the natural world with a trained eye to notice the leaves changing on a Cottonwood tree off of a creek side trail, the insects more modest in their appearances, and the mountains and deserts becoming more accessible to wander about under a tempered solar assault. And that is what makes this time of year in southern California remarkable.
The impetus for this journaling arose from personal recommendation of the book Keeping a Nature Journal: Deepen Your Connection with the Natural World All Around You by Clare Walker Leslie. After reading an excerpt, I must say that I highly recommend this book to anyone curious about the topic of nature journaling specifically, or observing nature in general.
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