Wildflowers at Bridgeport

Spring Flowering Plants at Bridgeport
South Yuba River State Park
(Updated October 2, 2016)

The SYRPA (Park Association) Wildflower Committee has been photographing and cataloging wildflowers in the park since SYRPA's inception. In the final years of the 20th century metal placards were fabricated to post photographs of each wildflower species at locations along the trails (mainly the Buttermilk Bend Trail) where they are growing. These are a great aid to flower identification by park visitors and became a noted feature of Springtime at Bridgeport. In 2002, photographs of 86 of the more noteworthy wildflowers were organized into a 16-page booklet to be made available at the Visitor Center. Final Committee review of this wildflower guide for accuracy was completed in Spring 2003, but government publication never came to pass. In Spring 2004 the Committee decided that SYRPA should print the booklet on its own, and the wildflower guide has been a popular item at the Visitor Center sales counter ever since. All profits are used to support park activities.

To provide the public with some form of the wildflower guide during the 2003 hiatus, a personal computer printable version was posted here on the Internet. This version also makes the wildflower guide more widely available, so it remains on this website. The resolution is not as high as in the printed version because the images are designed for computer display as well as printing. Also, the expense of personal printing is comparable to the cost of the booklet at the Visitor Center, so the Internet version is best viewed as an instant source of electronic information. It was updated in 2004 to include the many superior photographs taken since its inception in 2002. The more flexible Internet format allowed an additional 10 flowers to be included, giving a total of 96.

This Web version is designed such that each Web page will produce an 8.5 x 11 inch printed page. There are 8 pages with 12 plants and their names on each page, plus a cover page that explains how the plant photos are organized.

If you decide to print these pages, make sure you set the left and right page margins to 0.8 inches or less, and adjust the top and bottom margins so the flower tables print but not the link list at the bottom of each Web page. (Use Page Setup in the File menu of your browser -- I've found that setting all margins to 0.5 inch gives the desired results. Also, remove any settings you've made for headers or footers -- see first Reader Feedback below.) Also, when printing each page select "Print range Pages from 1 to 1," to avoid an unwanted additional page that simply has the link list. The pixel size of each flower picture is smaller and hence the printed resolution lower than in the printed booklet prepared for the Visitor Center, in order to minimize Web space and download times. Still, the pictures are reasonably satisfactory.

Most of you know how to get to the South Yuba River State Park, but for visitors and newcomers to the area the map below shows its location relative to Nevada City, Grass Valley, and Lake Wildwood. The park is indicated by the red square labeled SYRSP.