The Sawtooth Range is a

mountain range A mountain range or hill range is a series of mountains or hills arranged in a line and connected by high ground. A mountain system or mountain belt is a group of mountain ranges with similarity in form, structure, and alignment that have ari ...

of the

Rocky Mountains The Rocky Mountains, also known as the Rockies, are a major mountain range and the largest mountain system in North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch in straight-line distance from the northernmost part of western Canada, to New Mexico ...

in central

Idaho Idaho ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. To the north, it shares a small portion of the Canada–United States border with the province of British Columbia. It borders the states of Monta ...

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 Continental United States, primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 U.S. state, states, a Washington, D.C., ...

, reaching a maximum elevation of at the summit of Thompson Peak. It encompasses an area of spanning parts of

Custer George Armstrong Custer (December 5, 1839 – June 25, 1876) was a United States Army officer and cavalry commander in the American Civil War and the American Indian Wars. Custer graduated from West Point in 1861 at the bottom of his class, b ...

Boise Boise (, , ) is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Idaho and is the county seat of Ada County. On the Boise River in southwestern Idaho, it is east of the Oregon border and north of the Nevada border. The downtown area' ...

, Blaine, and Elmore counties, and is bordered to the east by the

Sawtooth Valley The Sawtooth Valley is a valley in the Western United States, in Blaine and Custer counties of central Idaho. About long, it is in Sawtooth National Recreation Area (SNRA) in the Sawtooth National Forest. It is surrounded by the Sawtooth Moun ...

. Much of the mountain range is within the Sawtooth Wilderness, part of the

Sawtooth National Recreation Area The Sawtooth National Recreation Area (SNRA) is a national recreation area in central Idaho, United States that is managed as part of Sawtooth National Forest. The recreation area, established on August 22, 1972, is managed by the U.S. Forest Se ...

and

Sawtooth National Forest Sawtooth National Forest is a National Forest that covers 2,110,408 acres (854,052 ha) in the U.S. states of Idaho (~96 percent) and Utah (~4 percent). Managed by the U.S. Forest Service in the U.S. Department of Agriculture, it was originall ...

. The mountains were named for their jagged peaks.

Peaks

There are 57 peaks with an elevation over in the Sawtooth Range, all falling between on Thompson Peak, the highest point in the range. Another 77 peaks fall between . Climbs range in difficulty between the Observation Peak, a Class 1 hike, and King Spire, a rock route rated Class 5.10 on the Yosemite Decimal System.

Geology

The northern Sawtooth Range formed from the

Eocene The Eocene ( ) Epoch is a geological epoch that lasted from about 56 to 33.9 million years ago (mya). It is the second epoch of the Paleogene Period in the modern Cenozoic Era. The name ''Eocene'' comes from the Ancient Greek (''ēṓs'', ...

Sawtooth

batholith A batholith () is a large mass of intrusive igneous rock (also called plutonic rock), larger than in area, that forms from cooled magma deep in Earth's crust. Batholiths are almost always made mostly of felsic or intermediate rock types, s ...

, while south of Alturas Lake the mountains formed from the

Cretaceous The Cretaceous ( ) is a geological period that lasted from about 145 to 66 million years ago (Mya). It is the third and final period of the Mesozoic Era, as well as the longest. At around 79 million years, it is the longest geological period of ...

granodiorite Granodiorite () is a coarse-grained ( phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock similar to granite, but containing more plagioclase feldspar than orthoclase feldspar. The term banatite is sometimes used informally for various rocks ranging from gr ...

of the Idaho Batholith. The Sawtooth Range has a history of

alpine Alpine may refer to any mountainous region. It may also refer to: Places Europe * Alps, a European mountain range ** Alpine states, which overlap with the European range Australia * Alpine, New South Wales, a Northern Village * Alpine National P ...

glaciation A glacial period (alternatively glacial or glaciation) is an interval of time (thousands of years) within an ice age that is marked by colder temperatures and glacier advances. Interglacials, on the other hand, are periods of warmer climate bet ...

, but while no surface glaciers exist today, perennial

snow field A snow field, snowfield or neve is an accumulation of permanent snow and ice, typically found above the snow line, normally in mountainous and glacial terrain. Glaciers originate in snowfields. The lower end of a glacier is usually free fro ...

s and

rock glacier Rock glaciers are distinctive geomorphological landforms, consisting either of angular rock debris frozen in interstitial ice, former "true" glaciers overlain by a layer of talus, or something in-between. Rock glaciers are normally found at high ...

s remain, usually on north or east facing slopes. There have been 202 perennial snow fields mapped in the Sawtooth Range. The Sawtooth Range was last extensively glaciated in the

Pleistocene The Pleistocene ( , often referred to as the ''Ice age'') is the geological Epoch (geology), epoch that lasted from about 2,580,000 to 11,700 years ago, spanning the Earth's most recent period of repeated glaciations. Before a change was fina ...

, but glaciers probably existed during the

Little Ice Age The Little Ice Age (LIA) was a period of regional cooling, particularly pronounced in the North Atlantic region. It was not a true ice age of global extent. The term was introduced into scientific literature by François E. Matthes in 1939. Ma ...

, which ended around 1850 AD. Evidence of past glaciation given remnants of the glaciers such as glacial lakes,

moraines A moraine is any accumulation of unconsolidated debris ( regolith and rock), sometimes referred to as glacial till, that occurs in both currently and formerly glaciated regions, and that has been previously carried along by a glacier or ice she ...

, horns, hanging valleys, cirques, and

arête An arête ( ) is a narrow ridge of rock which separates two valleys. It is typically formed when two glaciers erode parallel U-shaped valleys. Arêtes can also form when two glacial cirques erode headwards towards one another, although frequ ...

Seismology

In 2010, scientists from

Idaho State University , mottoeng = " The truth will set you free" , established = , former_names = Academy of Idaho(1901–1915)Idaho Technical Institute(1915–1927) University of Idaho—Southern Branch(1927–1947)Idaho Sta ...

discovered the Sawtooth Fault near the base of the mountains, running for near Stanley and

Redfish Lake Redfish Lake is an alpine lake in Custer County, Idaho, just south of Stanley. It is the largest lake within the Sawtooth National Recreation Area. The U.S. Forest Service The United States Forest Service (USFS) is an agency of the U.S. D ...

. The most recent large quakes along it occurred around 4,000 and 7,000 years ago. It is estimated the fault could produce a 7.5 magnitude

earthquake An earthquake (also known as a quake, tremor or temblor) is the shaking of the surface of the Earth resulting from a sudden release of energy in the Earth's lithosphere that creates seismic waves. Earthquakes can range in intensity, fr ...

, potentially felt as far as

Waterways

The Sawtooth Range is home to hundreds of lakes created by vanished alpine glaciers, with nearly 400 lakes in the Sawtooth Wilderness. Five of the six largest lakes in the range are located outside the wilderness (

Redfish Redfish is a common name for several species of fish. It is most commonly applied to certain deep-sea rockfish in the genus ''Sebastes'', red drum from the genus '' Sciaenops'' or the reef dwelling snappers in the genus '' Lutjanus''. It is also a ...

, Alturas, Pettit, Yellow Belly, and Stanley lakes), while

Sawtooth Lake Sawtooth Lake is an alpine lake in Custer County, Idaho, United States, located high in the Sawtooth Mountains in the Sawtooth National Recreation Area. The lake is approximately southwest of Stanley. A trail from the Iron Creek trailhead an ...

is within the wilderness. Most of the east side of the Sawtooth Range is drained by the main stem of the Salmon River and the west side by the South Fork Payette River. Small portions of the northern and southern ends of the range are in the watersheds of the

Middle Fork Salmon River The Middle Fork of the Salmon River is a river in central Idaho in the northwestern United States. It is a tributary to the Salmon River, and lies in the center of the Frank Church-River of No Return Wilderness Area. The middle fork is an ex ...

and

Boise River The Boise River is a U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline data. , accessed May 3, 2011 tributary of the Snake River in the Northwestern United States. It drains a rugged portion of the Sawtooth Range in sou ...

, respectively.

Recreation

There are 40 trails totaling nearly in the Sawtooth Wilderness that can be used for day hiking, backpacking, and

horseback riding Equestrianism (from Latin , , , 'horseman', 'horse'), commonly known as horse riding (Commonwealth English) or horseback riding (American English), includes the disciplines of riding, driving, and vaulting. This broad description includes the ...

and accessed from 23 trailheads. Additional trails traverse the foothills of the mountains outside the designated wilderness. Camping is permitted anywhere in the wilderness. There are several developed campgrounds on the western side of range, outside the Sawtooth Wilderness, including at Redfish, Little Redfish, Alturas, Pettit, and Stanley lakes, as well as at Iron Creek. Restrictions on fires and animals apply in some areas.

References

External links

Sawtooth National Forest
- official website {{Authority control Ranges of the Rocky Mountains Mountain ranges of Idaho Salmon-Challis National Forest Sawtooth National Forest Sawtooth Wilderness Landforms of Custer County, Idaho Landforms of Boise County, Idaho Landforms of Elmore County, Idaho Landforms of Blaine County, Idaho