Carol Leigh, an Oregon writer who also conducts photography workshops, is another wildflower enthusiast who shares her interest by sponsoring a Web site, the California Wildflower Hotsheet.

While hotels in remote spots like Death Valley can book up quickly during the peak of the blooming season, in Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area accommodations aren't a problem. The peacefulness of the area, which consists of 200,000 acres of the Mojave Desert, happens to be a half-hour's drive from the Las Vegas Strip.

A mid-February walk down the trail to Pine Creek Canyon, one of Red Rock's prime wildflower viewing areas, gave not a hint of what is to come. The grays and browns of the desert floor were punctuated only by the greens of cholla and prickly pear cactuses, blackbrush and some scattered clumps of grasses. Enthusiasts of desert wildflowers say that it's this contrast between the normal drabness of the desert floor and the vivid colors of the wildflowers when they bloom that provides one of their primary attractions.

Plant biologists say that desert wildflowers are uniquely adapted to the dry, hard soil. Death Valley, for instance, is one of the driest areas in the U.S. — and one of the best for wildflowers. The desert floor gives the flowers all the space they need to thrive when the rains come.

The wildflowers spend almost all their life cycle as seeds, and these seeds nourish the desert wildlife. "If you look at the animals who live there, they are all seed eaters," says Stan Smith, associate vice president of research and a specialist in desert plants at the University of Nevada in Las Vegas. "There is no vegetation to graze on that would get them through the fall." The birds, small mammals and other animals return the favor by spreading the wildflowers through their droppings.

Then there are the pollinators — the bees, flies, moths, beetles, butterflies and birds that allow the wildflowers to reproduce. That's the explanation for the dazzling colors of the wildflowers, which are designed to attract pollinators. "The pollinators have got to make their population grow, and there's a narrow window of time for these plants to flower," says Leary.

For more information on desert blooms, go to:

• calphoto.com/wflower.htm

Users post their predictions about the best places to go in California and the peak of the season.

• desertusa.com/wildflo/wildupdates.html

Jim Bremer's site covers wildflowers in five Western states.

• nps.gov/deva

Includes a link to the latest wildflower update on Death Valley National Park's home page.

• davidsenesac.com

David Senesac, a Silicon Valley engineer, photographs desert wildflowers and displays them on his Web site.