Koip Peak is a 12,968-foot-elevation (3,953 meter) summit in

Mono County, California Mono County ( ) is a county located in the east central portion of the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 13,195, making it the fourth-least populous county in California. The county seat is Bridgeport. The coun ...

, in the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. It is located in the

Ansel Adams Wilderness The Ansel Adams Wilderness is a wilderness area in the Sierra Nevada of California, United States. The wilderness spans ; 33.9% of the territory lies in the Inyo National Forest, 65.8% is in the Sierra National Forest, and the remaining 0.3% cover ...

, on land managed by

Inyo National Forest Inyo National Forest is a United States National Forest covering parts of the eastern Sierra Nevada of California and the White Mountains of California and Nevada. The forest hosts several superlatives, including Mount Whitney, the highest poi ...

. It is approximately outside of

Yosemite National Park Yosemite National Park ( ) is an American national park in California, surrounded on the southeast by Sierra National Forest and on the northwest by Stanislaus National Forest. The park is managed by the National Park Service and covers an ar ...

's eastern boundary, and west of

Parker Peak Parker Peak () is a peak of the Walker Mountains rising at the base of Evans Peninsula on Thurston Island. It was delineated from air photos taken by U.S. Navy Squadron VX-6 in January 1960. It was named by the Advisory Committee on Antarct ...

. Koip is derived from a

Western Numic Numic is a branch of the Uto-Aztecan language family. It includes seven languages spoken by Native American peoples traditionally living in the Great Basin, Colorado River basin, Snake River basin, and southern Great Plains. The word Numic com ...

name meaning "mountain sheep".

Bighorn sheep The bighorn sheep (''Ovis canadensis'') is a species of sheep native to North America. It is named for its large horns. A pair of horns might weigh up to ; the sheep typically weigh up to . Recent genetic testing indicates three distinct subspec ...

roam in the area.

Climate

According to the

Köppen climate classification The Köppen climate classification is one of the most widely used climate classification systems. It was first published by German-Russian climatologist Wladimir Köppen (1846–1940) in 1884, with several later modifications by Köppen, notabl ...

system, Koip Peak is located in an

alpine climate Alpine climate is the typical weather (climate) for elevations above the tree line, where trees fail to grow due to cold. This climate is also referred to as a mountain climate or highland climate. Definition There are multiple definitions of ...

zone. Most

weather front A weather front is a boundary separating air masses for which several characteristics differ, such as air density, wind, temperature, and humidity. Disturbed and unstable weather due to these differences often arises along the boundary. For in ...

s originate in the

Pacific Ocean The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the continen ...

, and travel east toward the Sierra Nevada mountains. As fronts approach, they are forced upward by the peaks (

orographic lift Orographic lift occurs when an air mass is forced from a low elevation to a higher elevation as it moves over rising terrain. As the air mass gains altitude it quickly cools down adiabatically, which can raise the relative humidity to 100% and cr ...

), causing them to drop their moisture in the form of rain or snowfall onto the range.

Gallery

File:Alger Lakes Panorama.jpg, Koip Peak to the right of center File:Stitched shot of the road leading to June Lake.jpg, Snow-covered Koip Peak centered in back, flanked by

(left) and Mount Lewis (right) File:Alger basin from Koip peak.jpg, View from Koip Peak: Alger Lakes, Blacktop Peak, and distant Ritter Range File:View South from Mt Gibbs Summit.jpg, North aspects of

(left), Koip Peak (right of center), and

Kuna Peak Kuna Peak is a summit on the boundary between Mono and Tuolumne counties, in the United States, is the highest point on Kuna Crest. With an elevation of , Kuna Peak is the 146th-highest summit in the state of California, and is the third-high ...

(right) as seen from Mount Gibbs.

References

External links

* Mountains of Mono County, California Mountains of the Ansel Adams Wilderness North American 3000 m summits Mountains of Northern California Sierra Nevada (United States) Inyo National Forest {{MonoCountyCA-geo-stub