BLM CALIFORNIA WILDERNESS
When you think of California, your first image may be high-rise buildings, busy cities, elevated freeways, stretches of suburban houses. In reality, there are large swaths of areas that are still primitive, natural and roadless. The Bureau of Land Management in California administers 87 of these wild areas, 3, 845,316 acres, designated by Congress as Wilderness.
California’s wilderness “niche” is in desert habitats with landscapes on both the Sonoran and Mojave Deserts. Though often looking lifeless, these desert environments are alive with life, including the endangered Desert tortoise, the Fringe-toed lizards, and the majestic Joshua Trees.
BLM-California wilderness areas vary in elevation from sea level to over 11,000 feet. Marine life abounds at sea level in the rocks and islands that team with tide pools to support a variety of sea birds, marine animals, and a diverse intertidal life. The highest peaks in California’s wilderness provide a different prospective with grand vistas and high country vegetation where gazing desert bighorn sheep traverse steep rocky slopes.
Wilderness areas are places of solitude where people can experience freedom from our fast-paced industrialized society. They are places where people can renew the human spirit through association with the natural world. For all its uses, values, and scenic wonders, wilderness is a land heritage that is uniquely American.
Featured Wilderness Area: Cadiz Dunes Wilderness
BLM California Wilderness
A complete list of BLM California wilderness is below:
- Aqua Tibia
- Argus Range
- Beauty Mountain
- Big Maria Mountains
- Bigelow Cholla Garden
- Bighorn Mountain
- Black Mountain
- Bright Star
- Bristol Mountains
- Cache Creek
- Cadiz Dunes
- Carrizo Gorge
- Cedar Roughs
- Chemehuevi Mountains
- Chimney Peak
- Chuckwalla Mountains
- Cleghorn Lakes
- Clipper Mountain
- Coso Range
- Coyote Mountains
- Darwin Falls
- Dead Mountains
- Domeland
- El Paso Mountains
- Elkhorn Ridge
- Fish Creek Mountains
- Funeral Mountains
- Golden Valley
- Granite Mountain
- Grass Valley
- Hollow Hills
- Ibex
- Indian Pass
- Inyo Mountains
- Ishi
- Jacumba Mountains
- Kelso Dunes
- Kiavah
- King Range
- Kingston Range
- Little Chuckwalla Mountains
- Little Picacho Peak
- Machesna Mountain
- Malpais Mesa
- Manly Peak
- Mecca Hills
- Mesquite
- Newberry Mountains
- Nopah Range
- North Algodones Dunes
- North Mesquite Mountains
- Old Woman Mountains
- Orocopia Mountains
- Otay Mountain
- Owens Peak
- Pahrump Valley
- Palen/McCoy
- Palo Verde Mountains
- Picacho Peak
- Pinto Mountains
- Piper Mountain
- Piute Mountains
- Resting Spring Range
- Rice Valley
- Riverside Mountains
- Rocks and Islands
- Rodman Mountains
- Sacatar Trail
- Saddle Peak Hills
- San Gorgonio
- Santa Lucia
- Santa Rosa
- Sawtooth Mountains
- Sheephole Valley
- South Fork Eel River
- South Nopah Range
- Stateline
- Stepladder Mountains
- Surprise Canyon
- Sylvania Mountains
- Trilobite
- Turtle Mountains
- Ventana
- Whipple Mountains
- White Mountains
- Yolla Bolly-Middle Eel
- Yuki