Elmer’s Bottle Tree Ranch – A Father and Son Story

Out in the Mojave Desert of San Bernardino County lies Oro Grande, a small unincorporated community which is home to less than 1,000 residents. One of those residents is Elliot Long, son of Elmer Long, founder of the Bottle Tree Ranch which lies on a rural stretch of Route 66.

Elmer Long was no stranger to desert life. Back in the 1950’s Elmer and his father (Long, Sr.) regularly camped out in this barren wilderness where they marveled the landscape and collected oddities or what some might consider to be trash left behind by fellow campers and travelers. This led to a large collection of glass bottles that Elmer Long inherited after his father’s death. 

While some might simply throw out a collection such as this, Elmer Long saw beauty in these bottles, and perhaps felt a certain connection to his father through these glass containers. He decided to tether a handful of the bottles to a wooden post to form a tree. As the desert sun showed through the colorful glass “branches” of his new creation, something clicked inside Elmer Long. He soon began making more bottle trees on his 2 acre ranch, thus giving birth to Elmer’s Bottle Tree Ranch. 

Elmer Long managed and added to the ranch from its conception in 2000 until 2019 when he passed away. Elmer’s son Elliot then took over the property where he continues to run it today. The ranch is open to the public from sunrise to sunset and is free of charge to explore. You can expect to see an entire forest of bottle trees at this 66 stop. Bottles of different shapes, sizes, colors, and brands are utilized in the creation of limbs jutting out from metal trunks. 

Most of the trees also have a tree topper of sorts – some are adorned with old wagon wheels, pick axes, or even a reimagined machine gun. Other oddities on the ranch include a boat (which is filled with bottles of course), old farm equipment, typewriters, rotary phones, and other pieces from a desert past. Signs covered in stickers from around the world hang on the fence that surrounds the property.  

Elliot Long has started an interesting youtube channel (xxx) that shows the status of the property and the upkeep that he is single handedly executing. What is most apparent from his videos, though, is Elliot’s love for his father. Elliot uses voice over to speak about his father’s breadth of knowledge, his physical skill, and his one-of-a-kind outlook on life. At times Elliot is almost self-deprecating about his own attempts to keep Elmer’s Bottle Tree Ranch running and well maintained. It’s obvious that Elliot holds himself to a high standard and wants to preserve his father’s legacy.  Elmer’s Bottle Tree Ranch, like an oasis, is a beautiful art installation in the harsh Mojave Desert. It’s not only externally striking but also powerful because it represents the closeness and love between a father and son. The preservation of sites like this one along Route 66 represents the preservation of unique legacies that would otherwise be forgotten to desert winds.