Tule Elk
Once reduced to a single tiny herd, tule elk now occupy protected pockets across California grasslands, marsh edges, and oak country.
California, United States: places and wildlife — page 2
Browse the published Explore collection for California, United States. Open a discovery for its field guide, practical details, and background.
Delta Smelt
This slender, nearly translucent fish lives only in the upper San Francisco Estuary, where its seasonal movements track fresh water, tides, and salinity.
Giant Sequoia
Giant sequoias grow naturally only in scattered Sierra Nevada groves, building extraordinary volume through thick fire-resistant bark and immense longevity.
Coast Redwood
Coast redwoods occupy a narrow Pacific fog belt, where immense height, canopy moisture, and vigorous resprouting build forests found nowhere else.
American Black Bear
America’s most widespread bear is often easier to recognize by tracks, clawed logs, and overturned stones than by a direct sighting.
Gray Wolf
Long legs, a broad muzzle, and purposeful travel distinguish a wolf whose family life shapes northern forests and human debate.
Pronghorn
Neither deer nor antelope, the pronghorn pairs extraordinary eyesight and speed with horns that shed their outer sheath.
Common Bottlenose Dolphin
A curved dorsal fin, robust gray body, and short bottle-shaped beak mark a dolphin that finds prey through both vision and echolocation.
Humpback Whale
Knobbed head, extraordinarily long flippers, and deeply notched tail flukes identify a whale that migrates between feeding and breeding seas.
Orca
Black-and-white pattern, tall dorsal fin, and a family-specific acoustic world make the orca much more than a generic “killer whale.”
Harbor Seal
Round head, spotted coat, and V-shaped nostrils distinguish the true seal most regularly seen around Rhode Island.
Common Raven
Heavy bill, shaggy throat, and wedge-shaped tail separate the raven from crows as it works cliffs, tundra, forests, and towns.
Hermit Thrush
Spotted breast, plain face, and a reddish tail contrasting with a browner back identify the thrush behind one of Vermont’s clearest woodland songs.
California Quail
The forward-drooping topknot, scaled belly, and quick ground-running coveys belong to California’s adaptable native quail.
Osprey
Dark eye stripe, kinked long wings, and reversible outer toes identify the fish specialist nesting beside Oregon waters.
Anna’s Hummingbird
The male’s iridescent crown and throat can flash rose-magenta or vanish to black as light and angle change.
Largemouth Bass
A jaw extending behind the eye, deep body, and dark side stripe separate largemouth bass from their smaller-mouthed relatives.
Bluegill
A deep compressed body, dark ear flap, and blue-green cheek identify a widespread sunfish that rewards close looking.
Chinook Salmon
Black gums, spotted tail lobes, and immense migrations identify a salmon whose life carries marine nutrients far inland.
Pacific Halibut
Both eyes migrate to the dark right side as this broad predator changes from an upright larva into a seafloor hunter.
Monarch Butterfly
Orange wings with heavy black veins identify a migrant whose caterpillars can eat only milkweeds and whose journey outlasts any one summer adult.
Common Green Darner
Large size, bright green thorax, and a dark bull’s-eye on the forehead help identify a darner capable of continental movement.
Black Swallowtail
Paired rows of yellow spots and an orange-centered hindwing eye distinguish a butterfly whose striped caterpillar feeds on carrots’ wild relatives.
California Poppy
Silky orange cups, four petals, and finely divided blue-green leaves make California’s state flower recognizable well beyond mass-bloom photographs.
Big Sagebrush
Three-toothed wedge leaves, silvery foliage, and a resinous scent identify a shrub that shelters far more life than its muted color suggests.
Douglas-fir
Three-pointed bracts protruding from each cone scale make Douglas-fir recognizable even when its immense crown is far overhead.
Sitka Spruce
Sharp four-sided needles, thin scaly bark, and enormous coastal stature identify the spruce that thrives where ocean moisture meets mountains.
Getty Center
European paintings, drawings, photographs, decorative arts, conservation studios, Richard Meier architecture, and Robert Irwin’s Central Garden turn the Getty into a study of how collections are framed.
Getty Villa
Greek, Roman, and Etruscan objects sit within courtyards, gardens, pools, mosaics, and rooms modeled on the Villa dei Papiri.
Los Angeles County Museum of Art
LACMA ranges from ancient American and Asian art to modern design, film, photography, and Southern California art.
The Broad
The Broad’s collection moves from Pop and Conceptual art to large-scale installations, with the building’s veil wrapping public galleries around visible storage.
California Academy of Sciences
Steinhart Aquarium, Morrison Planetarium, a four-story rainforest, natural-history halls, and active laboratories make the Academy a scientific campus rather than a single museum.
Exploratorium
The Exploratorium treats visitors as investigators: light, sound, motion, human behavior, weather, and estuary systems become manipulable exhibits.
San Francisco Museum of Modern Art
SFMOMA combines painting, sculpture, photography, architecture, media art, and a major living wall inside an expanded downtown building.
de Young Museum
The de Young is strongest where American painting, California art, Indigenous arts, African art, Oceanic collections, and textiles challenge a single national story.
Asian Art Museum
Masterworks from across South, Southeast, Central, East, and West Asia share space with contemporary commissions and changing interpretation.
Oakland Museum of California
OMCA combines three disciplines around terraced gardens, with community voices and contemporary issues placed beside artifacts, ecosystems, and art.
Bowers Museum
The Bowers holds California art, Native Californian material, Pacific collections, and rotating international exhibitions.
Norton Simon Museum
European paintings and sculpture, South and Southeast Asian art, modern works, and a sculpture garden fit within a museum whose scale encourages return viewing.
Petersen Automotive Museum
The Petersen ranges from experimental engineering and custom culture to Hollywood vehicles, motorcycles, racing, and Southern California car identity.
Griffith Observatory
Historic telescopes, planetarium programs, physics exhibits, and sweeping views make the observatory both laboratory and civic monument.
La Brea Tar Pits and Museum
Excavation pits, bubbling seeps, a working fossil lab, and mounted megafauna connect fieldwork to museum reconstruction.
Natural History Museum of Los Angeles County
The museum joins deep time to an urban nature lab, California history, mineral science, and a research collection far larger than what is displayed.
USS Midway Museum
The preserved USS Midway combines restored aircraft with bridge, flight deck, engine-room interpretation, and oral histories from sailors.
Fleet Science Center
Interactive galleries explore energy, engineering, perception, health, and technology, while the dome theater changes the pace from manipulation to immersion.
Crocker Art Museum
The Crocker combines a nineteenth-century residence with a contemporary expansion, linking California painting, European works, ceramics, Asian art, and works on paper.
Computer History Museum
Revolution follows computing from calculating machines through code, personal devices, the internet, and artificial intelligence.
Alcatraz Island
Cell blocks and escape stories draw attention, but Alcatraz also preserves military confinement, prison labor, gardens, bird habitat, and the 1969–71 Indians of All Tribes occupation.