California is a creative, kooky place.  The desert heat can warp minds and bend imagination. Twisted metal life forms of artist Ricardo Breceda (@ricardo.breceda_metal.artist).

Doggo surveys lanscape.
It’s a stampede!!!
Run for your life puppy!
Pre-historic doggo prevails!

Ricardo’s inspiration for his scrap-metal, sculpted, animal kingdom came from his six-year old daughter, Lianna.  She had just finished watching the movie, Jurassic Park III and asked her father if she could have her own dinosaur for Christmas.  

Breceda’s sculptures soar.

Originally from Durango, Mexico, Ricardo came to California after a construction accident caused him to leave his job and at the time of his daughter’s request he was working as a cowboy boot salesman.  He traded a pair of boots for a welding machine and a few weeks later his first sculpture was complete: a twenty-foot tall Tyrannosaurus Rex.  His new hobby quickly became his passion.  Breceda continued to work on bringing his rusted-metal sculptures to life.  Eventually, he crossed paths with a philanthropist named, Dennis Avery who dreamed of

It’s kill or be killed in the desert.

transforming his property at Galleta Meadows Estate in Borrego Springs into a free-standing art gallery.  Avery commissioned Ricardo Breceda to sculpt all of the beasts found in a book that Avery funded which depicts now-fossilized creatures in the Anza-Borrego Desert as well as mythological ones.

 

These magnificent spectacles are scattered throughout the desert and can be difficult to find, but you can pick up a detailed map to the sculptures at the Anza-Borrego Desert Natural History Association bookstore.

Sabre-Toothed Stalker.
Bucking broncos are the toughest to tame.
Big cat preys; wild horse prays.

Is this vicious predator responsible for the near extinction of the Borrego, the Bighorn Sheep which are the park’s namesake?

The nation’s second largest state park, Anza-Borrego Desert is only a couple of hours drive from the San Diego coastline.  Its 600,000 acres include one-fifth of San Diego county and extend into Imperial and Riverside counties. Located within the Colorado Desert of Southern California, Anza-Borrego is one core area within the Mojave and Colorado Deserts Biosphere Reserve (Death Valley National Park and Joshua Tree National Park are the others).  In 1984, Anza-Borrego Desert was included into the World Network of Biosphere Reserves by the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (@UNESCO).

https://en.unesco.org/

No civilization in sight. Solitude on sandy peaks.
A surfboard in the desert?! 350 million years ago it was an ocean!
Watch out for tarantulas, they’re everywhere! You might also see roadrunners, desert cottontails, black-tailed jack rabbits, Gambel’s Quail and various reptilian mongrels. What you probably won’t run into are the borrego, the park has the largest population of Peninsular Bighorn Sheep in the U.S. (nearly 200). However, in a recent three-year period, Mountain Lions were documented taking over 40 radio-collared Bighorn Sheep in Anza-Borrego.

The reserve encompasses designated wilderness, public and private lands, as well as urban centers; the core areas currently provide environmental interpretation and education, as well as research opportunities, and conservation activities.  To learn more visit, The Anza Borrego Foundation at www.theabf.org

Get lost, explore.
After sunset, nightime sounds include those made by coyote, long-eared owl, bobcat, kit fox and numerous bats and rodents…who knows, you might even hear the ROAR of the mighty T-Rex!

To learn more about Ricardo Breceda go to:

www.ricardobreceda.com

Or check out the book, “Ricardo Breceda: Accidental Artist” by Diana Lindsay.

To find out, where’d the Borrego go go to:

https://www.desertusa.com/bighorn/bighorn-sheep1.html

For park info go to:

www.parks.ca.gov/anzaborrego/

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