By Julie Yoshioka
Daily Bruin Contributor

Surrounded by small dirt turn-offs and abundant
vegetation, the access road to the UCLA Stunt
Ranch Santa Monica Mountains Reserve contrasts
vibrant foliage with blackened oak trees shielding the
road.

It eventually delves deeper into the site, revealing
rock formations on nearby mountains and the trickle
of Cold Creek. Only an occasional car passes by the
home of a variety of wildlife including rattlesnakes,
woodpeckers and deer.

"It's a great place to show what the natural
ecosystems of the Santa Monica Mountains look
like," said Peter Nonacs, assistant professor of
behavioral ecology.

The Stunt Ranch is a natural reserve used by
researchers, professors and students to conduct field
studies in a relatively secluded habitat.

Despite the ranch's name, no stunts are performed on
the grounds. It takes its name from the family who
owned the land.

One of the Natural Reserve System's 33 sites, the
ranch sits between Malibu and Calabasas in the Santa
Monica Mountains.

Professors as well as several graduate students use
the site mainly to conduct field research as well as to
bring classes on site for field trips.

The ranch is open by appointment only and classes
from UCLA, along with other nearby campuses and
schools, have visited for field studies on herpetology -
the study of reptiles and amphibians - astronomy and
archaeology.

Professor Kenneth Nagy's herpetology class, for
example, came to the ranch to look for amphibians
and reptiles.

Nagy said students were able to look at frogs, newts
and lizards close up, providing hands-on experience
as he was able to point out certain characteristics and
facts about the animals.

The Stunt Ranch is likewise an important
archaeological site providing research on the
Chumash and Gabrielino native tribes that once
settled in the area.

"We think they just used the Stunt Ranch area as a
summer site, not a full time site," Felixson said.

Artifacts such as bowl fragments and arrowheads
have been found at the site. Large plant communities
of chaparral, oak woodland and grassland also grow
in the reserve.

"The whole idea of field studies is to come out onto
the sites and study the plants where they're growing,"
said Carol Felixson, director of education and
community outreach for the Stunt Ranch.

Graduate student Aviva Liebert has been using the
Stunt Ranch for the past two years to conduct her
field research on behavioral patterns of paper wasps.

The wasps, named after the way in which they chew
on wood and stems to make a "paper" substance then
used to make a nest, are located all over the world,
but Liebert said they are often hard to study in the
wild because they tend to nest deep in the vegetation.

By setting up a temporary enclosure on site, Liebert
was able to release a few wasps inside so she could
observe their behavior.

"I wanted to have someplace close by to study the
wasps I'm looking at," Liebert said.

Although the ranch is now primarily used for research
purposes, the Stunt family originally homesteaded it in
1885 with the intent to build a nursery and grow fruit
trees.

The three Stunt brothers, Harry, Walter and Ernest,
came to the Cold Creek watershed area from
Kensington, England, and built what is thought to be
the first structure in the vicinity.

They lived and worked in Hollywood during the
week and would come up to the ranch on the
weekends, although it is not known why the Stunt
family originally decided on settling in the Santa
Monica Mountains.

The brothers' initial plan of growing fruit trees never
fully developed, but the lemon and olive trees still
growing on the site signify their attempt.

In 1937, their sister Ethel Stunt came to live at the
ranch with the only surviving brother at the time,
Harry.

Sources say the Stunts were hospitable to neighbors
and were often visited by the local Boy Scouts.

Harry would teach Boy Scouts to burn their names
on a shingle and then put it on the front porch,
Felixson said.

After Harry died in 1953, Ethel built a new house on
the ranch where she lived until she passed away in
1971.

Before her death, however, Ethel Stunt allowed
Occidental College to use the ranch for field studies
before the State of California bought it in 1978.

Docents from the nearby Cold Creek Canyon
Reserve also started using the ranch as part of a local
program on environmental interpretation activities.
They still run an educational program with local
elementary schools to study archaeological artifacts,
Native American culture and chaparral ecology.

In 1984, the University of California traded 400 acres
of land in the Santa Monica Mountains for the Stunt
Ranch before the ranch joined the Natural Reserve
System in 1995. Upon the ranch's induction, UCLA
was granted administration of the reserve.

The Malibu/Topanga fire of 1993 devastated the area
as most of the vegetation was burned along with
structures within the ranch's 67 acres - including the
Stunts' former houses.

On top of that, severe winter storms in 1994 and
1995 caused flooding and erosion of the grounds.
The access road was closed for four months after a
major landslide occurred near its entrance.

Still, these natural disasters also provided an
opportunity for research in the area.

Following the fire, researchers were able to conduct
studies on vegetation re-growth and fire recovery in
the area.

Currently, authorities plan to build a nature center and
classroom on the site.

"We want this to be a site for photographers to come
out ... for artists to come out," Felixson said. "This is
such a rich site for so many courses of study."

There are also hopes to create a natural outdoor
amphitheater for chamber music or poetry reading, as
well as a weather station with updated Web
information.

Administrators also aim to conduct an oral history
program answering questions about the ranch's
history, augmenting it with interviews of neighbors as
well as former Boy Scouts from the area to learn
more about the Stunt family and the ranch itself.

For the time being, though, the Stunt Ranch will
continue to be an educational site for researchers,
professors and students.

Felixson said she hopes the ranch can maintain "the
delicate balance between the needs of the human
population ... and keeping the environment as pristine
as possible."