Wildflowers on Columbine to Coyote Song Trail

I'm very fortunate to live in a community that has access to many trails. Some are public and some are private for the use of residents only. I've blogged about the Cathy Johnson trail before--click here to read that post--which is a public trail very close to our community. In fact, while I was walking on the Cathy Johnson trail recently, I took this photo looking back towards the beginning of the trail, and you can see a portion of our neighborhood to the left. Please click on the photo to enlarge it to get a better view. It gives you an idea of how we live at over 6,000 feet elevation, but we are in a valley between the Dakota Hogback and Colorado Front Range foothills.  I love to take hikes like this in late spring and early summer, when many wildflowers are in bloom. This time my husband and I decided to take an off shoot of the Cathy Johnson Trail, called the Columbine Trail, that crosses over a smaller Lyons Hogback to the west.

Most of Colorado has been arid this summer, and at times we've had above normal temperatures, yet hardy wildflowers continued to share their beauty. As soon as I began hiking the trail these flowers were the  first ones that I saw.

I also saw prairie dogs on the north of the Cathy Johnson trail, They face a hard time in many areas of the front range and plains as development grows.  This quote from this article in the Denver Post states: 

"A Century ago, black tailed prairie dogs numbered in the hundreds of millions and were possibly the most abundant mammal in North America. Colorado officials reckon prairie dogs inhabited 7 million acres in the state--an area 14 times larger than prairie dogs inhabit today. But plague, urban development, poisoning. roads and hunting, here and around the Great Plains, reduced prairie dogs by 95% Federal biologists estimate 10 to 20 million have survived."

We arrived at the turn off that leads to the Columbine Trail....

...where we happily saw many bees and insects at work!

The Columbine Trail climbs in elevation about 500 feet and crosses over the Lyons Hogback

There were many wildflowers on this trail!

There were also a large amount of scrub oak trees.

 As you can see from this photo the trail cuts in and out of these groves of scrub oaks.  Unless one is in one of the many pine forests at higher elevations, most Colorado foothill trails are fairly tree less......

....so even this small amount of shade was nice.

We saw many pretty delicate wildflowers in this area of the trail.

As we reached the crest of the Columbine Trail to cross over the Lyons Back, we could see a Lockhead Marten Space Systems Company in the distance, and a portion of South Valley Park ahead.

There were cactus flowers and other beautiful and colorful wildflowers at this point.

Now the trail began to descend....

...with rock steps to aide in the footing.

Looking back you can see the Lyons Hogback and signs that show that now this portion of the trail connects with Coyote Song Trail in South Valley Park.  I've blogged about the entire Coyote Song Trail on this post.

There are many stunning red rock formations on South Valley Park.  It is interesting to see how this land that was hundreds of millions of years ago the shoreline of a sea, and was uplifted by geological forces that lasted for 150 million years. Archaeological evidence in this area also points to hunter gatherer people occupying the South Valley 7,500 years before the pyramids of Egypt were built! These red rock formations also provided shelter for early Native Americans.

As we approach the end of Coyote Song Trail and South Valley Park, houses in my community can be seen over the ridge.

We hiked back past the Lyons hogback...

...and turned back towards home in front of the Dakota Hogback.

It was a pleasant hike so close to home and filled with beautiful views and exquisite wildflowers. How fortunate I feel to be able to experience all this beauty, almost in my own backyard!

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