“This book is a remembrance of what was lost, an appreciation of what is left, and a celebration of what could be. Forests are not eternal. For all their solemn stillness, they constantly change, evolve, die, and regrow. But they are persistent, and they always...

“On mesa and valley floor and treeless loma, the mantle of vivid green is overlaid riotously with color — the orange of California poppies; the blue and lavender of sturdy lupines and lolling wild heliotrope; the mauve of owl’s clover; the pale gold of sun-cups...