If you have been by the Riverview Trailhead lately, you will have noticed a fresh new look. This trailhead has been in need of major updates for years. Following years of leasing the property, we secured full ownership last year and prioritized enhancing the trailhead as a key first step. The major goals were to improve the parking area, correct drainage issues, replace the old fencing, and consolidate all trailhead signage and the kiosk around a single, improved trailhead entrance. 

I am an Ojaian, born and raised. Summertime always makes me particularly nostalgic, since I grew up swimming in the pools of the Ventura River, driving to Bates Beach when it was too hot to do anything else, and picking fruit from friends’ trees. 

8 WEAVING FIRE INTO THE LAND 

The Ventura River and San Antonio Creek outstretch to one another at the confluence; you can see the water reach into the sky through the leaves of cottonwoods and palms of sycamore. In this canyon, the oaks and walnuts walk downstream to meet the river—hand in hand with sagescrub. Between the communion of plant associations lies Ventura River Steelhead Preserve (VRSP). The 80-acre preserve is below Santa Ana Road, and lightly slopes down to the river. Though surrounded by biodiversity, there are about 25 acres of open field filled with a tangle of invasive species, primarily yellow star thistle (Centarea solstitialis and Centarea melitensis), milk thistle (Silybum marianum), and annual grasses. These species not only prickle canvas work pants and wool socks, but they tell us that a disturbance regime was present, which is not conducive to native habitat. This regime has paused in this state. Invasive species often create conditions that inhibit succession of other habitats, unlike native vegetation communities that change and flow with natural disturbance.