Monte Bello Open Space Preserve

There was a large dairy near what is now the preserve's main parking area on Page Mill Road, and cattle freely grazed the slopes of Monte Bello Ridge.

George Morell, founding publisher of the Palo Alto Times and a Trustee of Stanford University, bought the Black Mountain Ranch property in 1940.

A large ranch building was used as a central dining hall, and maintained a woodworking shop, a stained-glass workshop, and a food store selling bulk items.

The preserve's grasslands include California poppy, checker mallow, purple owl's-clover, bluedicks, and blue-eyed grass.

Monte Bello hosts a wide variety of owl species, including great horned, barn, pygmy, long-eared, western screech, and northern saw-whet.

Monte Bello boasts grassland, Douglas fir, live oak, and California bay forests, an excellent riparian corridor, great views, and a backpack camp.

The Canyon Trail leads through a grove of English walnuts from the Preserve entrance on Page Mill Road, to a sag pond formed by faults and fed by a spring on Monte Bello Ridge.