HISTORY

Elephant Hill sits on native Tongva land. In the early 1900’s, a dairy operated nearby. Residential development in the El Sereno community and neighboring South Pasadena continued apace, but by the 1980’s developers were eyeing the precious, open hillsides.

A long legal battle waged by community activists saved it from dense development, but actually turning the sprawling slopes into parkland with well-marked trails is slow going. The Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority (MRCA) now oversees multiple parcels of Elephant Hill and is working toward a preservation plan. But visitors still use the hills for illegal off-road partying and trash dumping. Community activists who previously organized to preserve the land as park space have had to organize to haul garbage and prevent off-roaders from destroying fragile habitat. It’s now a group effort: Heroes of Elephant Hill coordinates trash cleanups and remediation projects. Save Elephant Hill advocates and educates stakeholders to advance a long-term conservation vision for a 110-acre parkland. Another partner, Coyotl + Macehaulli is dedicated to protecting open space in Northeast LA and the Southern Californian Black Walnut.

El Sereno community members reached out to start a Test Plot on the eastside of Elephant Hill to further enhance the existing native plant communities, and to collaborate on land stewardship, which many of them had already undertaken. Together, Elephant Hill Test Plot is a public-private partnership between these resident groups, MRCA, California Native Plant Society, USC, Test Plot, Northeast Trees, and TreePeople. 

THE TEST 

We try to build each project around two tests (one people-centered, one plant-centered). The community "test" will be to experiment with a stewardship model that works with the neighbors of El Sereno. How do we effectively reach a broad base of community members, what structure works for them, and how can we introduce programs around native plants, habitat, art, community science, meditation that brings people into the project? The planting "test" will be whether solarization helps to suppress the mustard seed bank? Water is scarce, so we tried a method of using plastic sheeting and the solar radiation to raise the soil temperature up to 140 degrees F. This method, according to UCIPM, is more effective against annual grasses than perennial weeds present in CA. We will see. Centuries of different land uses has resulted in the current ecological state of Elephant Hill. Our site is a topographic bowl, facing south / southeast accessed off of Lathrop St. The north-facing slopes are home to thickets of California black walnut, coffeeberry, poison oak and monkey flower –  indicators of a natural underground seep. Meanwhile, the bowl and south-facing slopes are covered in black mustard, castor bean and tree of heaven. Given the intense takeover of these aggressive weeds, we also aspire to a multi-year "successional" planting strategy: start with  easy, fast adapters like CA Buckwheat, CA sagebrush, Black and White Sage and Coyote Brush. Then next year, start adding in annual wildflowers and grass like Purple Needlegrass, and finally target species like coffeeberry, CA lilac, manzanita, laurel sumac, lemonade berry and sugarbush.

‘OLDER BROTHER’ COLLAB

Given the unprecedented life-giving rains over the Winter and Spring of 2022-2023, the mustard bloomed back in profusion. We collaborated with the natural dye clothing company Older Brother and Erin Berkowitz of Berbo Studio to harvest this mustard and upcycle into a dye product for the Spring Summer 2023 line "Pervasive Bloom."  

PRESS

—El Sereno’s Guerrilla Gardeners Sow Native Plants To Resist Gentrification In Developer-Contested Land, LA TACO, July 2023

—California artists, chefs find creative ways to confront destructive ‘superbloom’ of wild mustard, AP, June 2023

—Invasive mustard is here to stay: You can use it to dye clothes, Greater LA, KCRW May 2023

—Short Video about the project, edited by Faye Zhang

—Elephant Hill Test Plot Wins PANDO DAYS '22 Award! (PANDO DAYS '22 USC Premiere Presentation)

—Elephant Hill has become a 'secret' off-road area in El Sereno, LA TACO, June 2022