I went out today to see a landscape before it’s completely altered. My camera is on its last legs after only 6 years, but I squeezed a few more washed-out shots from its unwilling frame.

It was in the Chuckwalla Valley, site of the Desert Sunlight Solar “Farm” being built now by First Solar. My little walk was right around where the rectangle on the map above says “access” in Section 4. I may have been on the footprint of the site or just outside of it: I don’t know. I didn’t hike much. I walked out a mile or so from the Colorado Aqueduct Road, looked at a few things, spooked a few jackrabbits, and found a shady spot under an acacia to sit in for a while. I closed my eyes and listened to the desert.

The terrain was mixed: about a third of it some of the best desert pavement I’ve ever seen, intact despite obvious vehicular traffic from the aqueduct guys, local hunters, and perhaps General Patton. A sample of that is in the foreground here:

Much of the rest was inactive wash, sandy soil amenable to inhabitation by all kinds of burrowing animals:

And running throughout were little pockets of leguminous riparian forest, palo verdes and acacias and an ironwood here and there, with creosote especially verdant at the washes’ margins.

The palo verdes were full of seed, which would help explain the fat, sleek jackrabbits and their bean-powered flight as I approached.

Tromping along in one of the washes I looked down at an opportune moment.

The clamshell had likely been unoccupied by any clam for at least 12,000 years, perhaps much longer. It lay there 100 miles from the nearest water. It was already broken from the force of flash flood in wash. I picked it up and put it in my pocket.

There were construction crews on site, and along the aqueduct road where I parked the biological consultants, Ironwood, had massed and were pointing at maps as I drove by.

Within a few months this vista will be permanently altered.

1. 
   Laura Cunningham 2011 09 12 at 9:02:41 am

   Very sad. But glad you documented more of the beauty before it’s gone.

2. 
   Brian L. Horejsi 2011 09 12 at 9:20:46 am

   Sad days indeed. When I wonder what America has become and will become, and I do that when I see something like these photos and comments, and all I see is a very dark tunnel.

3. 
   Donna Charpied 2011 09 12 at 9:41:37 am

   Thanks for taking time to enjoy the area again.

   We will deeply miss it.

4. 
   Kevin Emmerich 2011 09 12 at 9:53:03 am

   I am still in disbelief over this. The Interior Department approved this on the 75th birthday of Joshua Tree National Park. They have obviously decided conservation is not a priority.

   This is a beautiful place. PV panels can go on rooftops. What a display of greed and stupidity…

5. 
   ChasCPeterson 2011 09 12 at 5:17:34 pm

   My very first experience of the desert was there. Friends of mine studied lizards just northwest of Desert Center. I’ve still never seen so many Dipsosaurus anywhere else. Almost stepped on a diamondback as thick as my arm. Ironwoods, coachwhips. Living desert.

   damn it

6. 
   morongobill 2011 09 12 at 5:31:54 pm

   The new paradigm, we have to destroy the wilderness on the planet to save it.

7. 
   Ariful H Bhuiyan 2011 09 17 at 8:44:35 am

   The Landscapes are too awesome :O

8. 
   Helen 2011 09 19 at 6:14:22 pm

   Surely there are enough swathes of periurban wasteland in California - old industrial estates and other brownfield sites - which could house these things?

   Stand by for this to happen in Australia.

9. 
   David Williams 2011 09 20 at 3:01:50 pm

   I just found out about this project.  Is it still possible to fight to save this land from development?