EARLY SHOW EMBLAZONS HILLSIDES WILDFLOWERS ALREADY SURROUNDING VALLEY.

Byline: Charles F. Bostwick Staff Writer

LANCASTER - As California poppies begin to blossom on Antelope Valley hillsides, state parks officials are hoping for a good wildflower season.

But it's still too early to tell how good, they say. The best wildflower years have been ones with cool and cloudy springs and plentiful March rain.

``It's looking real good,'' senior park aide Judy Elgin said Wednesday. ``There are poppies already out. There's lupine, filaree and fiddleneck.''

The Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve's visitor center is scheduled to open for the wildflower season on March 15, a week earlier than previously planned, because blossoms are beginning to show.

Whatever happens, there already are more wild blooms than there were last year - judged as possibly the worst showing in more than a century since an 1890s drought. From only 3.08 inches of rain, the 1,560-acre reserve's color scheme was more basic brown than glowing orange last March.

The 10.43 inches of rain so far this year - including 0.04 inch Tuesday - is the most in five years, records show. On Wednesday, the reserve's hills were covered with green grass dotted with a few poppies and other wildflowers.

State parks officials note that the best wildflower seasons are not always the ones with the most rain. In some years, autumn rain stimulates grasses that crowd out wildflowers.

The best year in recent memory was 1991, when less than 10 inches of rain fell but 4 1/2 inches of that came in March. Other good wildflower years were 1995, when rainfall topped 20 inches, and 1998, when more than 25 inches fell.

Starting March 15, the visitor center will be open from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays and 10 a.m. to 4 p.m. weekdays on the reserve 15 miles west of Lancaster, off Avenue I.

Visitors will be able to walk on seven miles of trails through the reserve, and docent-led tours are available on the weekends. Volunteers staff the center to answer questions and hand out trail maps showing the best flower locations.

Admission is $4 a vehicle.

For a weekly updated report on the poppy bloom at the reserve, call the hotline at [phone].

Lancaster has scheduled its 12th annual California Poppy Festival for April 26 and 27 at Lancaster City Park. Latin jazz percussionist Poncho Sanchez, jazz group Spyro Gyra, Celtic-rock band The Prodigals and country groups New West and Pinmonkey are the headline entertainers.

The festival also will include sales of arts and crafts, carnival rides, and farmers and flower markets.

CAPTION(S):

2 photos, map

Photo:

(1 -- 2 -- color in AV edition only) Anneliese Clay and Sol Shankman look at nature's show starting in the Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve.

Jeff Goldwater/Staff Photographer

Map:

Antelope Valley California Poppy Reserve