The Red Cliffs National Conservation Area is a

National Conservation Area National Conservation Area is a designation for certain protected areas in the United States. They are nature conservation areas managed by the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) under the National Landscape Conservation System. Restrictions vary b ...

located in southwest

Utah Utah ( , ) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. Utah is a landlocked U.S. state bordered to its east by Colorado, to its northeast by Wyoming, to its north by Idaho, to its south by Arizona, and to it ...

, north of St. George at the northeasternmost edge of the

Mojave Desert The Mojave Desert ( ; mov, Hayikwiir Mat'aar; es, Desierto de Mojave) is a desert in the rain shadow of the Sierra Nevada mountains in the Southwestern United States. It is named for the indigenous Mojave people. It is located primarily ...

. It is managed by the Bureau of Land Management as part of the

National Landscape Conservation System National Conservation Lands, formally known as the National Landscape Conservation System, is a collection of lands in 873 federally recognized areas considered to be the crown jewels of the American West.Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009 The Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009 (, ) is a land management law passed in the 111th United States Congress and signed into law by President Barack Obama on March 30, 2009. The bill designates millions of acres in the US as protected a ...

. The Red Cliffs National Conservation Area (NCA) is part of the larger multi-jurisdictional Red Cliffs Desert Reserve, which was created in 1996 to protect the habitat and populations of the

desert tortoise The desert tortoise (''Gopherus agassizii''), is a species of tortoise in the Family (biology), family Testudinidae. The species is native to the Mojave Desert, Mojave and Sonoran Deserts of the southwestern United States and northwestern Mexic ...

and other species. Part of the NCA was designated in 2009 as the Cottonwood Canyon and Red Mountain wilderness areas, which are part of the National Wilderness Preservation System. The Pine Valley Mountains and

Dixie National Forest Dixie National Forest is a United States National Forest in Utah with headquarters in Cedar City. It occupies almost two million acres (8,000 km²) and stretches for about across southern Utah. The largest national forest in Utah, it st ...

are north of the NCA. The NCA is located within the watershed of the

Virgin River The Virgin River is a tributary of the Colorado River in the U.S. states of Utah, Nevada, and Arizona. The river is about long.Calculated with Google Maps and Google Earth It was designated Utah's first wild and scenic river in 2009, during the ...

, a tributary of the

Colorado River The Colorado River ( es, Río Colorado) is one of the principal rivers (along with the Rio Grande) in the Southwestern United States and northern Mexico. The river drains an expansive, arid watershed that encompasses parts of seven U.S. s ...

. There are over of non-motorized trails in the NCA.

Gallery

File:Red Cliffs Desert Reserve.JPG, alt=A photo of Cottonwood Canyon, Cottonwood Canyon File:Dtn st george.jpg, alt=St. George with the Red Cliffs and Pine Valley Mountains in the background, St. George and the Red Cliffs File:Yant Flat Top (49128303261).jpg, Top of Yant Flat trail: spectacular

cross-bedding In geology, cross-bedding, also known as cross-stratification, is layering within a stratum and at an angle to the main bedding plane. The sedimentary structures which result are roughly horizontal units composed of inclined layers. The origina ...

in fossil sand dunes in the Navajo sandstone File:Day 2 Yant Flat (40897323043).jpg, More geology & scenery along the Yant Flat trail, Red Cliffs NCA

References

External links

Red Cliffs National Conservation Area
- BLM page National Conservation Areas of the United States Bureau of Land Management areas in Utah Protected areas of Washington County, Utah Protected areas established in 2009 Units of the National Landscape Conservation System {{Utah-geo-stub