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Home | Plant Communities | Southern Oak Woodland

The Southern Oak Woodland habitat is located in the foothills below 4,000 feet from the Pasadena region to San Dimas and south to eastern San Diego County. It gets 15 - 25 inches of rain annually, and temperatures are mild to warm. The growing season is 7 - 10 months. Luiseños Native Americans made their lives here, hunting deer and making stone and bone tools. Today, raccoons and coyotes hunt on the ground while Turkey Vultures and Red-Shouldered Hawks patrol above.

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California Black Walnut

Juglans californica; Walnut Family

• small to medium-sized deciduous tree up to 40 feet tall, with several trunks
• shiny green leaves, alternate, compound, 6” to 9” long with 11 - 15 leaflets
• small, greenish male and female flowers in early spring
• 1” diameter walnuts
• Cahuilla Native Americans used the hulls of the black walnut to make a dye for their baskets

Poison Oak

Toxicodendron diversilobum; Sumac Family

• "Leaves of three, Let it be!" The resin of this plant causes a painful rash for most people
• tall, stiff, bushy plant, with three leaves, arranged alternately
• flowers April - May
• Native Americans used poison oak for fire-making drills

Englemann Oak

Quercus engelmannii; Oak Family

• medium-sized evergreen tree; reaches 20 to 60 feet; spreading branches form a broad, irregular crown
• bark is thin with grey scales
• oblong leaves 1" - 3" long, blue-green, thick and leathery, often toothed
• acorns are 1" long with half the nut enclosed by a deep, scaly cap
• acorns were the staple diet of many Native Americans

Lemonadeberry

Rhus integrifolia; Sumac Family

• evergreen, aromatic, rounded, thicket-forming shrub up to 20 feet high
• elliptical leaves are stiff and leathery, 1" - 2" long and mostly without teeth. Leaves are shiny dark green above and pale with raised veins underneath
• 1/4" flowers with 5 pinkish-white petals are clustered at the end of the twig
• 1/2" fruit is elliptical, berry-like, dark red, hairy and covered with a white, resinous, sour secretion
• Native Americans dried, soaked, and heated the berries, producing a drink that tastes like pink lemonade
• The Cahuilla Native Americans used a tea made out of the leaves for coughs and colds
• leaves were often smoked
• stems used in basketry