Trillium Valley Trail

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White trillium (Trillium grandiflorum). Photo by Dranrebedrali.

Installation of new sign at California Woods. Photo by Cincinnati Park Board.

Installation of new sign at California Woods. Photo by Cincinnati Park Board.

California Wood (OH). Photo by Patricia Hutchinson.

white trout lilies. Photo by Jonathan Duerbeck.

winter trees. Photo by Jonathan Duerbeck.

northern red oak. Photo by Jonathan Duerbeck.

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In California Woods Nature Preserve, is managed by Cincinnati Parks. Open dawn to dusk. It is the second trailhead on your left as you enter the park road. The trailhead is several yards from another NRT trail, California Junction Trail. The trail loops back to the park road a short distance away and also connects to other trails in the preserve. The nearest parking lot is between the two trailheads. Additional parking is by the nature center. This is a natural-surface trail with many steps.

Abundant native spring wildflowers and native understory herbs cover the forest floor here in spring and early summer, including many Trillium flexipes (drooping trillium). (The photo on the webpage is Trillium grandiflorum, which is not present along this trail). The trilliums were even more abundant in the past before the local deer population increased and many trilliums were killed or stunted by repeated browsing. Most of the trail passes through old-growth forest, and much of this forest is on deep glacial outwash soil in steep-walled valleys, a combination that supports unusually tall trees. Trillium Valley's forest hosts at least 10 trees over 140 feet tall and at least two trees over 150 feet tall. Visible from the trail are: the tallest known black walnut, the tallest known common hackberry, the tallest known chinkapin oak, the tallest known bur oak in Ohio, the tallest known shagbark hickory in Ohio, and the tallest known red hickory in Ohio. We had the tallest bitternut hickory in Ohio but it fell. We had the tallest black cherry in Ohio until someone found a taller one.

The trail is maintained by the Cincinnati Parks trail crew. California Woods phone number is 513-231-8678

Allowed Uses:

• Certified as an NRT
  Nov 18, 1981