chapter 3 heritage themes and related resources

DEVELOPMENT OF THE events, notes about the current HERITAGE THEMES diversity of cultures found in the watershed, and lists of activities related The seven heritage themes in this to outdoor recreation or local festivals. chapter emerged directly from public Continuing in their small groups, input. During Meeting Two of the participants reviewed all of the items series of four Working Group meetings placed on the maps and devised described in Chapter 1, participants between four and six themes that were divided into small groups and would capture all of the items. Each given large maps of the Little Colorado small group then reported its themes to watershed. They were then asked a the whole group. The whole group then series of four questions designed to worked all of themes suggested by each elicit responses that would describe the smaller group into one set of between heritage of the region. four and six themes. This process took place at five meetings in five different Š If you had a two-week dream locations across the watershed and vacation in the Little Colorado resulted in a total of 25 heritage themes River watershed, where would you being suggested. Many of the themes go? from a Working Group in one meeting Š If you had to describe this area to location were virtually the same as someone who had never been here, themes suggested by one or more what would you say? Working Groups in other meeting Š When friends or family come to locations, thus giving evidence that visit, where do you take them? particular themes indeed identified Š If “something” were to leave this prevalent, consistent, and over-arching area forever, what would you miss characteristics of the region. The most? Heritage Programs Coordinator reviewed all 25 suggestions and found Participants drew or wrote their seven common themes that united the responses on the maps. In most cases, most frequently suggested themes by the maps were completely covered the Working Groups. Those seven with sites, references to historical unifying themes became the seven

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heritage themes described in this were written on large pieces of paper chapter: and participants wrote down the name of the resource (a site, event, Š Sacred and Enchanted Landscapes organization, business, etc.) and its Š Trails, Roads, and Rails of the West general location on the paper of the Š Native Nations particular theme the resource fit. Š Living from the Land Participants were asked to identify Š Archaeology resources that related to tourism as Š Expressions of Art and Life well as those that served local Š Outdoor Recreation communities, although often a single resource fulfilled both functions. After establishing the seven heritage Often, too, a single resource reflected themes, the next round of Working more than one theme. The related Group meetings focused on identifying resources sections that appear in each resources within the watershed that heritage theme chapter are a direct reflected, interpreted, or embodied one result of data generated during these or more themes. The seven themes Working Group meetings.

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Theme 1 Sacred and Enchanted Landscapes

“The valley is vast. When you look out over it, it does not occur to you that there is an end to it. You see the monoliths that stand away in space, and you imagine that you have come upon eternity. They do not appear to exist in time. You think: I see that time comes to an end on this side of the rock, and on the other side there is nothing forever.” —The Names, N. Scott Momaday

SUMMARY OF THEME or carefully marked by shrines, prayer feathers, petroglyphs, corn pollen, and The Little Colorado River Valley is a story. A Hopi farmer looks toward a landscape of mesmerizing colors, particular mesa on the horizon and astounding views, deceiving distances, tracks the sun’s position through the immense quiet, and ancient, year; a Zuni man follows an old trail to remembered places. For a very long a revered place beside the river; time, people’s lives have been Apache school children take a field trip intricately linked to this land, with into the mountains and learn plants meaning attached to nearly everything along the way; a Navajo grandmother gathers fragrant sprigs of a shrub she’ll use for medicine.

The 26,000-square-mile watershed of the Little Colorado extends from the Continental Divide in New Mexico, south to the Mogollon Rim and White Mountains of Arizona, west to the San Francisco Peaks, and north to Black Mesa on the Navajo and Hopi reservations. It’s big country, 16.5 million acres, with unending vistas across empty grasslands, broken badlands, undulating volcanic fields, and hidden canyons.

The Little Colorado River begins its winding journey to the north- Travelers speeding by on the west after starting as a mountain spring high in the White Moun- interstate might not notice tains. The higher land on the left side of the picture is the result of lava that bubbled up from a shield volcano and spread across the much of interest. The land slowly. (Photo credit: Adriel Heisey) enchantment comes with a detour off the main road, in it and everything it produces— permitting more time for a closer look sacred mountains, springs, streams, at the subtleties. It grows with a walk rocks, plants, animals—each honored down into painted hills littered with

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gleaming chips of petrified wood, on a to the Equator then, and the hike up a trail into the mountain environment was humid to subtropical. headwaters of the Little Colorado, or at a roadside pullout where a flashflood The defining formation of the Little steamrolls down a normally dry wash. Colorado Basin, known best in the Then that sense of endless time and Painted Desert and Petrified Forest silence seeps in, working magic and National Park, is the Chinle. The instilling appreciation of why this Chinle’s multicolored pastel layers— landscape is viewed as enchanted and red, purple, blue, green, gray, white— sacred. consist of clays, mudstones, and sandstones deposited by streams that flowed slowly across a low basin about DESCRIPTION OF THEME 225 million years ago, in late Triassic times. The Chinle also contains Geology significant amounts of ash blown in from surrounding volcanoes. The ash The Little Colorado Basin occupies the weathered to bentonite clay that swells southeast section of the Colorado and shrinks with wetting and drying, Plateau, a major physiographic giving the formation the common name province and geologist’s paradise. Like “badlands.” The Chinle reaches the larger plateau of which it is part, greatest expression near the border of the predominant rocks of the Little Arizona and New Mexico, where it is Colorado Basin are sedimentary and nearly 2,000 feet thick. The soft clays volcanic in origin, recording more than erode rapidly, at the rate of one to two 200 million years of geologic time. feet a century. The weathering and Underlaying most of the basin are the erosion reveal animal and plant fossils same sedimentary layers as those that that have made the Chinle famous occur in the upper portion of Grand among paleontologists for well over a Canyon. Two of those layers, the century. Kaibab Limestone and Coconino Sandstone, crop out in a few places. About 200 million years ago, at the end of the Triassic and beginning of the Mostly exposed on the surface are Jurassic, uplifted land held sand progressively younger, mostly waiting to be picked up and carried by horizontal, sedimentary layers that the wind to accumulate as the Wingate make up the Plateau’s classic Mesozoic Sandstone. To the south, the Wingate sequence: the Moenkopi, Chinle, grades into the Moenave Formation, Wingate and Moenave, Kayenta, laid down partly as windborne dunes, Navajo and Gallup sandstones, and but also in ephemeral lakes and local Dakota and Mesa Verde Formations. rivers. Atop these rest the Kayenta Formation, river-laid silts and The brick-red Moenkopi Formation is sandstones interspersed with purplish composed largely of siltstones and fine- beds of shale. The Navajo Sandstone, grained sandstones veined with one of the plateau’s outstanding rock gypsum. The sediments were deposited layers, started as dunes in a paleo- by a northwest-heading river flowing desert as large as today’s Sahara. The across a coastal plain 250 to 228 million nearly pure quartz sand grains were years ago, the early Triassic Period of compressed into rock that forms steep, the Mesozoic. This part of the sculpted cliffs and rounded domes. American Southwest was much closer Moving eastward into New Mexico, the

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Zuni and Gallup Sandstones form movement along faults, and formation similar cliffs, overlain by Cretaceous- of large-scale folds such as the East Period Dakota and Mesa Verde Kaibab Monocline, shape the modern Formations. course of the Little Colorado River. Thus the fundamental geologic In the ensuing Cenozoic Era (65 million processes of deposition, uplift, and years ago-present), riotous volcanic erosion have occurred, and are still activity spewed voluminous quantities occurring, throughout the Little of lava, cinders, and ash across the Colorado Basin. Erosion is an land. Thick caps of resistant basalt especially visible, and exceedingly cover many mesas; hundreds of cinder rapid, process in rocks such as the cones and associated lava flows Chinle Formation, and accounts for the punctuate the landscape. Three huge sediment loads the river carries. volcanic regions, among the largest in the country, occur in the basin—the San Minerals occur in minable amounts in Francisco and Hopi Butte fields in some of the rocks, especially uranium Arizona, and the Springerville field deposits in the Chinle and coal in the near the White Mountains which Mesa Verde Formation. extends into the Datil area in New Mexico. The youngest cinder cone in Meteor Crater, a national landmark, is the basin is Sunset Crater just east of a large indentation in the grassy plain the San Francisco Peaks. It erupted south of Interstate 40 and west of sometime between A.D. 1050 and 1100 Winslow, Arizona. Early establishment for up to several years, and left behind geologists thought the pit resulted from a cone rimmed with reddish-yellow a volcanic explosion. But mining cinders, hence the name and protection engineer Daniel Barringer believed the as a national monument. crater—500 feet deep and 4,000 feet across—was left behind after a The San Francisco Peaks, a meteorite crashed into Earth. He stratovolcano, mark the western edge intended to mine the iron-rich deposits of the basin. At 12,633 feet elevation, left behind by the meteorite. Barringer, the Peaks are the highest point in it turns out, was correct. Meteor Crater Arizona. They are sacred to more than now is understood to have been the a dozen Native groups. To the Navajo result of such an impact, and it is now they are the Dook’o’osliid, the “abalone a world-renowned feature among shell mountains,” one of the four planetary geologists and nonscientists sacred peaks that mark the boundaries alike. of their land. The Hopi call them Nuvatekiaqui, home of the kachina, While dramatic events like meteorites, spiritual beings that live half the year and the sometimes less spectacular on the Peaks and half the year on the work of water, have shaped the Hopi Mesas. To the Zuni they are landscape, wind is a force to reckon Sunha K’hybachu Yalanne, to the with here. Geologists set up weather Apache Dzil Tso. stations on cliffs in the Painted Desert as part of the Desert Winds Project. But About 20 million years ago, the the wind blew so hard, and carried so landscape began to assume its present much sand, the equipment soon configuration with uplift of the became jammed. Remote monitoring Colorado Plateau as a single, largely systems replaced it, and geologic and undeformed, crustal block. Renewed meterologic data have been collected

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for many years. The information is remarkably full reconstruction of the useful in studies of climate change and late Triassic has come from the rich desertification in the region. Sand in fossil record of the Little Colorado the basin tells another interesting story. River Basin, particularly from the Westerly winds blow sand up off the Chinle Formation in and around bed of the Little Colorado, ramps of Petrified Forest and the Painted Desert. dunes climb the cliff faces to the east, then some of the sand is brought back The first fossil plants and vertebrates down the washes to the river, the were collected in the Chinle by process continually repeating in a giant exploring parties in the mid 19th recycling system. century. Scientists combed the area through the 20th century. Research and excavations into the first decade of the Paleontology 21st century are still posting many “firsts” in paleontology, with new and The late, famed paleontologist Edwin exciting finds at Petrified Forest in Colbert wrote that the Petrified Forest particular. The discovery of several “is in many ways unique . . .[and] is. . . well-preserved skeletons of an animal an outstanding segment of a world- named Revueltosaurus. Determined to wide record of the earth as it existed be a relative of crocodiles rather than more than 200 million years ago.” dinosaurs, this discovery has led to a wholesale reexamination of The Petrified Forest—and a major evolutionary lines in the late Triassic. portion of the Little Colorado River Other crocodile relatives—the Basin—preserves that significant, aetosaurs—have been found. New unique record of life on earth. Here, the phytosaur skeletons, including door opens into the Mesozoic Era, the complete skulls, have also been Age of Reptiles, especially those great uncovered. reptiles known as dinosaurs. With major rock layers dating to the late A pair of quarries in the Chinle near Triassic of the Mesozoic, they hold the Saint Johns, Arizona, along the Little key to a time of transition in life forms. Colorado River, have also been It was the time when the earliest motherlodes for paleontologists. The dinosaurs and modern predecessors of Placerias and Downs quarries have other animals, and plants, stood poised yielded more bone than almost any on the threshold; during the same other Triassic site in the hemisphere. period, doors were being closed on Among the most common fossils are some of nature’s failed experiments. the namesake Placerias. This mammal- like reptile was shaped like a barrel, During the late Triassic, a diverse with some specimens weighing two group of animals populated what tons and sprawling to nine feet in would become the American length. Also, lizard-like reptiles, Southwest. Small and large, predator aetosaurs, and big amphibians known and prey, meat-eaters, plant-eaters, as metoposaurs have been recovered at dwellers both on land and in water, these locations. they added up to an incredibly diverse lot. There were giant amphibians, An array of plant fossils has added to crocodile relatives, freshwater sharks, the reconstruction of the Triassic bony fish, clams, insects, and those environment. Some 200 species have earliest dinosaurs. Much of the been identified from Petrified Forest

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alone—fossilized leaves, stems, cones, bowl rimmed on all sides by higher pollen, even charcoal. Cycads, country. All runoff drains into the horsetails, and ferns indicate an Little Colorado River, the seam that environment that was then much stitches the watershed together. Along wetter, some say tropical. Of course, its 350-mile course, the Little Colorado the area’s best known fossil is petrified can be divided into three distinct wood, from large conifers that were sections. The river begins life as springs washed downstream, buried in ash and that rise on 11,400-foot Mount Baldy, a mud, and the wood literally turned to wilderness area in the White stone over time. (Arizona’s state fossil, Mountains of eastern Arizona. These Araucarioxylon arizonicum, is the source headwaters are sacred to the White tree that has produced most of the Mountain Apache, home of their petrified wood.) benevolent gaan spirits. The East, West, and South Forks join to form a single Other rock layers in the basin have also stream, a cool brook narrow enough to yielded fossils, ones that indicate a step across in the upper reaches. change to a drier environment and that show dinosaurs assuming their full This character persists as the river reign. Though a few plant fossils have flows north past Greer, through Round been found in the Moenave Formation, Valley and beside the town of mostly it is known for trackways of Springerville to Saint Johns. Zunis animals. The three-toed tracks of large make pilgrimages to the river near carnivorous dinosaurs are notable, Saint Johns, at a sacred place they call along with those of archosaurs, Kolhuwaa la:wa, or Zuni Heaven. therapsids, and possibly small mammals. On Navajo land near Here the Little Colorado veers Cameron and Tuba City, Arizona, northwestward, winding across the dinosaur track sites have been known Painted Desert past Holbrook and for more than a century. One of the Winslow to Cameron. It transforms to a most extensive ones in the West is in “flashy” desert river, crisscrossing a the Ward Terrace area. Barnum Brown, wide, flat floodplain, flowing curator of vertebrate paleontology at intermittently with winter snowmelt the American Museum of Natural and summer monsoon rains. Its History in New York, learned of it from average flow is about 250 cubic feet a local residents. He visited the site in second, 18,000 cfs is considered high 1929, and Museum of Northern flow, and historic extreme flows of Arizona paleontologists rediscovered 50,000 cfs have been recorded. But the and studied it in the 1980s and 1990s. word “average” has little meaning for this mercurial river. The water can rise Still more tracks and fossils—of by feet in a matter of hours, then recede dinosaurs, frogs, turtles, lizards, to a trickle by the next day. Early pterosaurs, and more—have been Mormon colonists learned this when found in the Kayenta Formation and they arrived in the valley in the spring layers above it. of 1876 to settle homes and farms. They remarked that the river looked “like a running stream of mud of reddish Hydrology color.” But by July, it was reported dry. The Mormons tried repeatedly to The 26,000-square-mile basin, about the construct brush and rock dams to size of the state of West Virginia, is a divert irrigation water, but a

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rampaging Little Colorado swept away it to go around and back down into its the dams as fast as they could be built. old channel. At nearly 190 feet high, Grand Falls is higher than Niagara Ideas of where the Little Colorado Falls. originally flowed engender lively discussions among geologists. The river continues on through the Depending on how far back one goes in Painted Desert to Cameron, Arizona. geologic time, the river’s course From this point, it enters the final 50- probably was not what it is now. One mile reach, dropping precipitously over prevailing theory proposes that an 2,000 feet in that short distance, down ancestral river flowed out of the north through a sheer-walled gorge to its and turned toward the southeast, confluence with the mainstem opposite the Little Colorado’s modern Colorado in Grand Canyon. In flood, direction. An uplift blocked the the Little Colorado enters the main southeast flow, caused formation of a Colorado as a frothy silt-rich chocolate large lake, and sent the Little Colorado brew. At such volumes, the water in a reverse direction. It was then carries enormous loads of sediment—in “captured” by another major drainage January 1993 the Little Colorado system and pulled into what became shuttled an estimated 10 million tons of the through-flowing main Colorado sediment into the Colorado. River. A look at a map today shows the Little Colorado entering the mainstem Perennial base flow in this lower reach, Colorado just as the Colorado makes a however, is supplied by Blue Springs, 90-degree turn into the heart of the emerging from limestone layers several Grand Canyon. This critical positioning miles above the confluence. The high thus ties any theory into the evolution carbonate load precipitates out to form of the Grand Canyon and Colorado travertine terraces in the river, and River, and uplift of the Colorado turquoise waters swirl into the Plateau. It’s a very complex story, Colorado. Near the confluence is the destined to keep geologists busy for sipapu, which the Hopi identify as the many years to come. place where they entered this, the Fourth World. Studies of the Little Colorado in the 20th century, at least, show the river The Little Colorado’s own major constantly adjusting to climatic, land tributaries enter from the east. The use, and other factors. From 1900 to Zuni River meets it near Saint Johns, around 1940, large floods eroded and while the Puerco River, rising at the widened the river channel. With a Continental Divide in New Mexico, decrease in rainfall in the 1940s-1950s comes in near Holbrook. From north floods were less frequent, and flow was and east ephemeral washes—Oraibi, about half the preceding period. The Dinnebito, and Moenkopi among main channel narrowed. Wetter years from ones—drain Hopi and Navajo lands. 1952 to 1978 again built up the From south and west Silver Creek, East floodplain. Clear Creek, Chevelon Creek, and Deadman Wash enter. Grand Falls is a notable landmark in the middle stretch of the river. This The basin also holds important stairstep waterfall formed where the groundwater sources, including the C- Little Colorado encountered a basalt and N- aquifers. Where groundwater flow that dammed the river and forced encounters an impermeable rock layer,

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springs and seeps come to the surface. the geographic area, there are amazing Notable ones include those at the base surprises. A small but significant piece of Black Mesa, which provide crucial of alpine tundra exists on the San water for Hopi agriculture. Heavy Francisco Peaks. Below that is a forest drawdown of the aquifers for of mixed conifers (Englemann and blue industrial, municipal, and power spruce, subalpine fir, Douglas fir) and generation uses are raising concerns quaking aspen in the mountains of about the long-term sustainability of New Mexico, the headwaters of the groundwater resources and springs. Little Colorado in Arizona’s White Native people of the region, with Mountains, and on the San Francisco others, are working to protect and Peaks. Damp meadows and small lakes restore the valuable springs and in the White Mountains host cattails, wetlands. sedges, reeds, and rare bog orchids. Once the heart of grizzly bear country, these mountains are still home to black Biology bear, elk, wild turkey, deer, and the endangered Mexican wolf. The The Little Colorado River Basin is a Mexican spotted owl seeks the dark land of extremes. That’s a fairly forests, while bald eagles and ospreys obvious statement, but numbers rule the sky. reinforce it. Precipitation varies from about 8 to 30 Around 7,000 feet in elevation, inches, both as snow in ponderosa pine becomes dominant, the higher elevations part of the largest continuous and as summer rains. ponderosa forest on the continent. This Elevational extremes, pine has been the focus of intensive from 2,500 feet studies of forest fire and restoration above sea level ecology. Gambel oak is the main to over 12,000 understory tree. Hundreds of feet, along with thousands of acres of pinyon and Top: A small herd of prong- complex juniper woodlands grow across mesas, horn thunder across open land in Navajo County. Right: geology, hills, and ridges at 6,000 to 5,000 feet. Arizona and New Mexico are topography, and Though they grow slowly and do not famous for their deserts, but microclimates attain great heights, some specimens snow is a frequent winter visi- tor in the higher elevations of combine to are a thousand years old or more. the Little Colorado River wa- produce high Pinyon pines at Sunset Crater and tershed. biological Wupatki National Monuments in the diversity. It was western part of the basin are being these extremes that brought biologist C. studied to assess different climate Hart Merriam to the region in the late change scenarios. Pinyons on cinder 19th century, and from his work here he soils of Sunset Crater (“high-stress” formulated the pioneering concept of sites drier and lower in nutrients) grow “life zones.” more slowly, produce fewer cones, and are more susceptible to insects than The region resides in the rainshadow of those on the lower-stress, sandy-loam the higher Mogollon Rim to the south sites in Wupatki. and the San Francisco Peaks on the west, accounting for the region’s Around 5,000 feet elevation, high- general arid and semiarid climate. But desert shrubs such as four-wing with so many life zones present within saltbush, shadscale, sagebrush, and

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rabbitbrush begin to appear, the hunt. Coyote, the Trickster, figures representing a southern extension of in many Navajo stories. Ma’ii is the high, cold Great Basin Desert. In magical, and though often guilty of addition, Great Basin grasslands greed is a wise messenger of morality. (gramas, sacaton, ricegrass) merge with It was Coyote who threw the North the farthest west extension of Plains Star and the Milky Way into the sky. shortgrass prairie. Often muted and gray-green in appearance, the grass The “breaks” of Chinle Formation, and shrubs morph into vivid green interspersed with the grass and with only a few days of good summer shrublands, are nearly barren of plants. rains. After a wet winter, an The few species that can survive on the unexpectedly colorful wildflower poor soils often are specialists that can display adds interest. tolerate soils high in salts and gypsum for example. The grasslands of the Little Colorado Basin are ideal habitat for pronghorn, The Little Colorado and tributaries— and the region’s herds are important to along with hundreds of isolated the animals’ populations. Optimum springs, seeps, and shaded pools—are food for these ungulates is a mix of riparian areas that add immensely to forbs and grasses. The fastest land the basin’s biodiversity. The river’s old mammals on the continent, they can channel is marked by Fremont sprint up to 60 miles an hour and flee cottonwoods that tree-ring studies any predator. Fawns, however, are show sprouted between 1800 and 1905. more subject to predation and need Those cottonwoods, and native grass high enough to stay hidden willows, have mostly been during their first weeks of life. outcompeted by aggressive exotics, Pronghorn also have adapted both to especially tamarisk and camelthorn. survive days of freezing temperatures, Tamarisk was first noted near Winslow and extreme heat and drought. Other in 1909, but by the mid 20th century it animals of the grassland live below had spread along the riverbed. ground. Burrowing owls, badgers, prairie dogs, and ground squirrels These rare wet areas are the only places assume tenancy of empty burrows, and where amphibians (true toads, occasionally these different species will spadefoot toads, tiger salamanders, share a burrow. and leopard frogs) can survive. These species exhibit fascinating adaptations The Navajo have a number of stories to the extreme fluctuations in and uses for these grassland mammals. temperature, moisture, and salinity The prairie dog, “dloo,” is lured from presented by intermittent water its burrow with a shiny object, then sources. Among invertebrates in the killed with a special, single-barbed basin, unique species include the arrow. Though the Navajo consider California floater (a freshwater mussel), ground squirrels thieves, a squirrel tail the White Mountain water penny hung on a cradleboard makes the child beetle, and long dash butterfly, found agile. Black-tailed jackrabbits, in Arizona only along East Clear Creek, commonly seen in the grass and a tributary of the Little Colorado. shrublands, in the past sustained the people through periods of starvation. One aquatic species, the introduced They say that killing one before going crayfish, has become a problem. deer hunting will bring good luck in Especially common in the upper

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reaches of the Little Colorado, crayfish wealth. The land is inseparable from have altered plant and invertebrate the indigenous people who have lived communities in streams wherever they here for generations, inseparable from live. Likewise, introduced fish compete their language, imagery, traditions, and with unique native fish such as Apache religions. For these reasons, this trout, a minnow called the Little watershed qualifies as a distinct part of Colorado spinedace, the Zuni bluehead the country, worthy of national sucker, and the humpback chub. The heritage designation. Apache trout and Little Colorado spinedace are both targets of intensive recovery programs in the region’s DISTINCTIVENESS OF THEME streams. For the endangered humpback chub, the remaining breeding grounds The landscape of the proposed Little are the warmer backwaters at the Colorado River National Heritage Area mouth of the Little Colorado. is one that has been familiar to people Protection of the chubs’ critical habitat who have both lived in and traveled has led to changes in the operation of through the region. For Native Glen Canyon Dam upstream of Grand Americans, it encompasses the San Canyon. Francisco Peaks, arguably the singlemost important sacred mountain, For birds, particularly migrating birds, the central landmark, in the religions of the green ribbon of riparian habitat every group. Both nationally and serves as an essential corridor. The internationally, the region is known endangered Southwest willow among geologists and paleontologists flycatcher, when present in the for the extraordinary exposures of watershed, is completely dependent on Mesozoic-aged rock and the fossil this zone. wealth sequestered in that rock. The geologic resources of the region have Like the larger Colorado Plateau of yielded fossil remains that have which it is part, the Little Colorado allowed a detailed reconstruction of a watershed contains a high number of key time in earth’s evolutionary endemic creatures, known only from history, the late Triassic. Further, the the basin, along with ones identified as presence of extensive volcanic fields, species of special concern. Botanical and the impact feature Meteor Crater, examples include Peebles Navajo brought attention to the region in the cactus, gladiator milk vetch, Arizona mid 20th century. Astrogeologists willow, White Mountain paintbrush, determined this landscape to be the Sunset Crater penstemon, and San closest analog to the terrain of the Francisco Peaks groundsel. Among Moon, and so it served as an important mammals are endemic subspecies of “real-life” training ground for the chipmunk, spotted ground squirrel, Apollo astronauts. In addition, the Botta’s pocket gopher, silky pocket extreme ranges of natural mouse, Ord’s kangaroo rat, and environments and climates led to Stephen’s woodrat. formulation of the seminal biological concept of life zones. Though later The Little Colorado River watershed is modified by ecologists, the concept still a region unto itself. It possesses offers a way to explain the internationally known geologic and interrelationships of climate and paleontologic features, and numerous assemblages of plants and animals. In unique species and significant biologic summary, all of these unique attributes

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add up to a sound rationale for the Conservancy’s Hart Prairie Preserve worthiness of this region as a national sits at the foot of the San Francisco heritage area. Peaks, and The Arboretum at Flagstaff features native plants. Each Native American tribe generally has RELATED RESOURCES departments of fish and wildlife, natural resources, parks, or outdoor Visitors and residents of the Little recreation that are good sources of Colorado Valley have many information. Check Web sites of possibilities to experience and learn specific tribal governments: Hopi Tribe about the region’s natural history. (www.hopi.nsn.us), Navajo Nation Three national forests—Apache- (www.navajo.org), White Mountain Sitgreaves, Coconino, and Cibola— Apache (www.wmat.nsn.us), and Zuni offer several million acres of public (www.ashiwi.org). Maps and land and hundreds of miles of publications are available at visitor backcountry roads. Forest district centers in parks and towns, local offices have good maps and libraries, museum bookstores, trading knowledgeable people. National parks posts, and outdoor shops. and monuments display and interpret the wealth of geology, paleontology, and biology resources. Among them RELATED RESOURCES LIST are Petrified Forest National Park, and Sunset Crater, Wupatki, Walnut Š 1,000-yr. old junipers, New Mexico: Canyon, and El Morro National Some species of juniper can live to be Monuments, with scenic drives, trails, more than 1,000 years old. Western ranger programs, and exhibits. State New Mexico has numerous such parks in Arizona, Homolovi Ruins, awe-inspiring specimens in their Fool Holow, and Lyman Lake, and Red forests. Rock State Park in New Mexico, offer hiking, camping, and interpretive Š The Arboretum at Flagstaff, opportunities. The Little Colorado Flagstaff: Previously a working cattle River Gorge Navajo Tribal Park, ranch, the Arboretum’s 200 acres operated by the Navajo Nation, offers now showcases plants native to the overlooks of the dramatic gorge region and conducts ongoing leading to the confluence of the Little research and education programs and main Colorado Rivers and, for the related to the natural flora and flora brave, spectacular hiking. Arizona of the area. One research project in Game & Fish Department manages particular focuses on the Little several wildlife areas, including Becker Colorado spinedace fish. Lake, Chevelon Canyon, Sipe, Wenima, and White Mountain Grasslands. The Š Arizona Ethnobotanical Research Little Painted Desert County Park near Association, Flagstaff: Founded in Winslow contains bright exposures of 1983, the Association promotes the the Chinle Formation. Meteor Crater study, documentation, and use of National Natural Landmark has an traditional plants from the American interesting visitor center and rimside Southwest. It also promotes the walk for a full view into the crater. The development of bilingual and Museum of Northern Arizona in multicultural educational programs Flagstaff offers exhibits and trips into about plants, sustainable cultivation, parts of the basin. The Nature the protection of natural habitats, the

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development of a seed bank, and the Š Biennial Colorado Plateau creation of a medicinal plant Conference, Flagstaff: This herbarium. conference brings together land

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managers, biologists, and other the region through a variety of professionals to share information media. and develop better strategies to manage the natural resources of the Š Grand Falls on the Little Colorado, Colorado Plateau. Leupp Chapter: A 190 ft. waterfall, dramatic for its height, the two Š Buffalo Park, Flagstaff: This city distinct kinds of rock that converge at park in Flagstaff offers uninterrupted the site, the 90-degree turn of the and spectacular views of Mt. Elden Little Colorado River after the Falls, and the San Francisco Peaks. Deer views of the San Francisco Peaks, the and other wildlife sightings are not depth of scale of the gorge after the uncommon. falls, and the chocolate milk color of the sediment-laden water which Š Dinosaur footprints and fossils: gives the Falls one of its nicknames, Found in several locations Chocolate Falls. throughout the watershed (Petrified Forest National Park and Cameron Š Hart Prairie (Nature Conservancy and Tuba City Chapters are two well- interpretive hikes): Free, guided known places), well-preserved nature walks and hikes aid in footprints and bones have added peoples’ understanding and significantly to scientists’ appreciation of the geological and understanding of the world during ecological features of the San the dinosaurs’ time. Francisco Peaks.

Š El Morro National Monument, New Š Little Colorado River Gorge, Mexico: A striking, 200 ft. sandstone Cameron Chapter: The Little bluff in western New Mexico with an Colorado descends 2,000 ft. in just 30 important, ancient pool at its base. miles as it approaches the mainstem The Mesa Top Trail leads visitors to Colorado. The massive sandstone see the nearly-eroded rock layers at walls that form the steep gorge are the top, to take in an incredible view topped with limestone and reach of the surrounding landscape, to see 1,000 ft. tall in places. The gorge is the beautiful box canyon in the center the site of many ancient trails and is of the bluff, and past the ruins of a currently a Navajo Tribal Park and sizeable pueblo. open to visitors.

Š Flagstaff Chapter of the Arizona Š Los Gigantes, Ramah: Rock Plant Society, Flagstaff: The Arizona formations near Ramah, New Mexico Native Plant Society promotes that look like giant male and female knowledge, appreciation, figures. These “figures” are conservation, and restoration of considered sacred by the Ramah Arizona’s native plants and their Navajos and Zunis. habitats. The Flagstaff Chapter hosts a series of lectures and plant walks in Š Lowell Observatory and dark skies: the general area for the enjoyment Visitors to rural Arizona and New and education of participants. Mexico marvel at the night sky. Many long-time residents still do, Š Gallup Public Library Fine Art too. With no major urban areas and Collection, Gallup: Contains artwork few cities greater than 10,000 people, that reveals the dynamic landscape of the night skies are both infinitely

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dark and infinitely filled with stars. Apache, as well as the source of the The experience of the night sky is as headwaters of the Little Colorado much a part of the landscape of the River. Little Colorado region as are its mountains and canyons. Pluto was Š National Forest and National Park discovered from Lowell Observatory Service interpretive programs and in Flagstaff and the research hikes: Ranger-led hikes or institution holds regular public interpretive trails on both National viewings through its historic Forest and Park Service lands help telescope. Flagstaff is also has the local residents and visitors both to distinction of being the first better understand the treasures they International Dark Sky City. Quality contain. stargazing for the average viewer and amateur astronomy enthusiast Š Native Plant and Seed: A retail alike only increases in the more rural nursery that specializes in native areas. varieties of plants. Also provides full- scale, native plant restoration Š Meteor Crater, eastern Coconino services. County: Meteor Crater was the first meteor impact site in the world Š Painted Desert and Little Painted identified as such my modern Desert County Park, Navajo County: science. A young Eugene Shoemaker The current name is derived from the reached this conclusion in 1960 after label Spanish explorers gave to the building on the work of the Crater’s region, el desierto pintado, because of early owner, Daniel Barringer. It has the brilliant colors of its rock continued to contribute significantly formations. It is a geologic formation to the study of meteor impacts and to the north side of the Little was also used by Apollo astronauts Colorado River that extends in a to train for their landing on the gentle curve from the western Navajo Moon. Reservation through the Petrified Forest National Park. The desert is Š Mogollon Rim: A 200-mile mostly comprised of the Chinle escarpment that runs basically east- Formation, formed up to 225 million west across eastern Arizona to the years ago mostly through river New Mexico border. It defines the deposits. When the sun is low in the southern boundary of the Little sky, as at sunrise or sunset, the Colorado River watershed and the stripes of gray, purple, blue, green, southern boundary of the larger red, pink, white, orange, and Colorado Plateau. The elevation combinations of any of these, are at difference between land above and their most dramatic. The interaction below the Rim is as much as 3,000 ft. of rising and falling watertables, The central section of the Rim is various minerals, and layers of characterized by dramatic sandstone volcanic ash created the colorful cliffs. The Rim is a major geologic canvas that is still in an active and feature and a major divide for plant dynamic state of erosion, exposing and animal communities. more dinosaur fossils and petrified wood on a regular basis. Little Š Mt. Baldy, Apache-Sitgreaves Painted Desert County Park in National Forest: Mt. Baldy is a Navajo County is an excellent sacred site to the White Mountain viewing area.

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Š Petrified Forest: Trees buried under protecting the San Francisco Peaks sediment more than 200 million years which are held sacred by the Navajo, ago are now re-emerging as sparkling Hopi, Zuni, and 10 other tribes. rainbows of rock. Quartz replaced the wood, minerals added color, and Š Scenic Skyride at the Arizona now erosion is wearing off sediment Snowbowl, Flagstaff: In the summer that buried the trees in prehistoric months, the Arizona Snowbowl ski times, exposing thousands of resort, located on the southwest side petrified logs and other fossils. of the San Francisco Peaks, still Petrified Forest National Park operates its lifts for panoramic preserves many logs in their natural viewing of the Northern Arizona state, but the actual extent of the landscape. Views extend for 70 miles range of the ancient forest extends and include the Grand Canyon. well beyond Park boundaries into Coconino National Forest state, private, and tribal lands. interpretive rangers meet riders at the top and discuss the biology and Š Rock Art Ranch, Winslow: Chevelon geology of the region. Creek/Canyon passes through the ranch, containing a rich riparian Š Sunset Crater Volcano National habitat, numerous petroglyphs, and a Monument: Sunset Crater is the chance for visitors to experience the youngest and least-eroded cinder delights of one of the region’s many cone volcano in the San Francisco smaller, but still spectacular canyons. Volcanic Field, making it and the surrounding landscape an ideal Š San Francisco Peaks: A former setting for the study of soil strato-volcano, the Peaks dominate formation, plant succession, and the skyline for as much as 100 miles other ecological processes following and the tallest of the peaks, Mt. an eruption. The Monument consists Humphries, is the highest point in of 3,040 acres of cinder cones, lava Arizona. The Peaks are sacred to the fields, lava tubes, and an ice cave. Navajo, Hopi, Zuni, and 10 other tribes. Traditional Navajo land, or Š Walnut Canyon National Dinetah, is bound by four mountains Monument: Walnut Canyon is 20 in the four cardinal directions that miles long (the Monument contains 6 represent the four pillars of a worldly of these miles), 400 ft. deep, and ¼ hogan, the traditional dwelling of mile wide. Its extremes of Navajos. The Peaks are the western topography, along with seasonal mountain, known as Dook’o’sliid or water, result in a place of the Abalone Shell Mountain. To the concentrated biological diversity. Hot Hopi, the Peaks are known as desert climates and shady forest Nuvatekiaqui and the home of rain- climates occur nearly side by side making kachina spirits. To the Zuni, when in most places they would be they are known as Sunha K’hybachu separated by hundreds of miles or Yalanne and are also extremely thousands of feet in elevation. Cliff sacred. dwellings more than 700 years old line one side of the canyon. Š Save the Peaks Coalition, Flagstaff: An organization dedicated to Š Willow Bend Environmental Center, addressing cultural and Flagstaff: A non-profit environmental rights, in particular environmental education center

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sponsored by the Coconino Natural The site contains five gardens with Resource Conservation District slightly different microclimates to dedicated to nurturing a sense of display the variety of plants, insects, place through hands-on and animals found in the diverse environmental education programs. Northern Arizona ecosystem.

PRIMARY REFERENCES

Arizona Heritage Program n.d. Arizona Game & Fish Department. .

Brown, David E. (editor) 1982 Biotic Communities of the American Southwest-United States and Mexico. Special Publication of Desert Plants, Vol. 4(1-4). University of Arizona Press, Tucson.

Center for Sustainable Environments. n.d. Safeguarding the Uniqueness of the Colorado Plateau. With Grand Canyon Wildlands Council and Terralingua. Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff.

Houk, Rose 1990 The Painted Desert: Land of Light and Shadow. Petrified Forest Museum Association, Petrified Forest National Park, Arizona.

Nabhan, Gary P., Marcelle Coder, and Susan J. Smith 2004 Woodlands in Crisis. Occasional Papers No. 2. Bilby Research Center, Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff.

Natural Heritage New Mexico n.d. .

Sadler, Christa, William Parker, Sidney Ash n.d. Dawn of the Dinosaurs. Petrified Forest Museum Association, Arizona.

Thybony, Scott 2006 The Painted Desert: Land of Wind and Stone. University of Arizona Press, Tucson.

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