A desert garden just outside the Visitor Center building provides a quick look at some of the vegetation in the 600,000-acre park, with the species identified. The desert garden includes a pupfish pond. Pupfish evolved from conditions during the Ice Age to today's precarious existence of fish in the desert. They are called Salton Sea pupfish, although none are left in the Sea. These pupfish can thrive in fresh water or water nearly as salty as the ocean, and they can survive temperatures from near freezing to as high as 108 degrees Fahrenheit. When the water gets too warm or too cold or nearly dries up, these fish burrow in the mud at the bottom of the pool. There's another pupfish pond near the picnic area beyond the Borrego Palm Canyon Campground.

There are more wonders in this desert than anyone could see in a lifetime, such as the wildflowers, which usually start blooming in force in late February or early March. Varieties of cactus bloom at all elevations but at different times, and for wildflower buffs they are the real prize. They tend to be "specimen"; blossoms in colors ranging from red to yellow, and green. Some, such as the red chuparosa and the yellow brittlebush, show themselves as a mass of tiny flowers covering the surface of a shrub, or even a field of shrubs, or, in a good year, a broad expanse of pinkish sand verbena. The park rangers say you can't predict how the desert plants will respond to the timing and amounts of rainfall and the fluctuations of temperature.

Post card notice: Visitors who want to be sure to visit Anza-Borrego at the best time for flower viewing, do what thousands of others do: address a postcard to yourself, stamp it, put in an envelope addressed to Anza-Borrego Desert State Park, 200 Palm Canyon Drive, Borrego Springs, CA 92004, and mail it. The people at Anza-Borrego will mail the card back at just the right time. Their phone number is (760) 767-5311. For a special wildflower recorded message, call (760) 767-4684.