Tahquitz Canyon (, sometimes ) is located in Palm Springs, California on a section of the Agua Caliente Indian Reservation. The canyon descends from the

Riverside County Riverside County is a county located in the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 2,418,185, making it the fourth-most populous county in California and the 10th-most populous in the Uni ...

San Jacinto Mountains The San Jacinto Mountains (''Avii Hanupach''Munro, P., et al. ''A Mojave Dictionary''. Los Angeles: UCLA. 1992. in Mojave) are a mountain range in Riverside County, located east of Los Angeles in southern California in the United States. The mo ...

. It was continually inhabited for at least 5,000 years by the Native American

Cahuilla The Cahuilla , also known as ʔívil̃uqaletem or Ivilyuqaletem, are a Native American people of the various tribes of the Cahuilla Nation, living in the inland areas of southern California. Today it is a nature preserve open to the public that is overseen by the

Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians The Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians of the Agua Caliente Indian Reservation is a federally recognized tribe of the Cahuilla, located in Riverside County, California, United States.Santa Rosa Mountains, and is located at the geographic coordinates .

Legend of Tahquitz

Tahquitz Canyon is an important location in the creation myths of the Agua Caliente band. Although the legend comes in many versions, most regard Tahquitz as a powerful ''nukatam,'' roughly "Shaman," who was created directly by the creator of the world, Mukat. He became obsessed with a young woman whom he kidnapped and took to Tahquitz canyon, where they lived for several years. Due to her continued unhappiness, Tahquitz allowed her to leave on the condition that she not tell her people what had transpired. She disregarded this warning and was consequently struck dead by Tahquitz's power. The legend states that Tahquitz himself is immortal, that he still imparts power to worthy ''nukatam'', and that he steals the souls of those who venture too far into his canyon at night. He is said to be the cause of the earthquakes in the area, and to reveal himself as a bright ball of green light or a meteor. Other versions of the legend report that Tahquitz was a normal man who gained his powers when he fled his people, as opposed to being directly created by Mukat.

History of human habitation

In the late Quaternary period, the Colorado river had at times discharged its waters into the Salton Basin, rather than the

Gulf of California The Gulf of California ( es, Golfo de California), also known as the Sea of Cortés (''Mar de Cortés'') or Sea of Cortez, or less commonly as the Vermilion Sea (''Mar Bermejo''), is a marginal sea of the Pacific Ocean that separates the Baja C ...

as it does today. This resulted in the formation of a large lake named

Lake Cahuilla Lake Cahuilla ( ; also known as Lake LeConte and Blake Sea) was a prehistoric lake in California and northern Mexico. Located in the Coachella and Imperial valleys, it covered surface areas of to a height of above sea level during the Holoce ...

. The lake was a major food source for the indigenous people of the area, supporting large populations of fish and migratory birds. The

Salton Sea The Salton Sea is a shallow, landlocked, highly saline body of water in Riverside and Imperial counties at the southern end of the U.S. state of California. It lies on the San Andreas Fault within the Salton Trough that stretches to the Gulf ...

currently occupies the lowest level of the former Lake Cahuilla. At some point, in the past few thousand years, the Colorado River stopped replenishing Lake Cahuilla, and the lake slowly dissipated. Easy access to fresh water, fish, and fowl went away with the lake. This forced the Cahuilla Indians in the area to relocate to new sources of water. Along with Andreas Canyon, Palm Canyon, and Murray Canyon, Tahquitz Canyon was one such location. Indians living in the canyon created various

petroglyphs A petroglyph is an image created by removing part of a rock surface by incising, picking, carving, or abrading, as a form of rock art. Outside North America, scholars often use terms such as "carving", "engraving", or other descriptions ...

, most of which are lost today. Stone artifacts were discovered in the canyon including arrow shaft straighteners made from

soapstone Soapstone (also known as steatite or soaprock) is a talc-schist, which is a type of metamorphic rock. It is composed largely of the magnesium rich mineral talc. It is produced by dynamothermal metamorphism and metasomatism, which occur in the ...

s (steatites) and heated to steam and shape arrows. Fragments of broken ceramic

olla An olla is a ceramic jar, often unglazed, used for cooking stews or soups, for the storage of water or dry foods, or for other purposes like the irrigation of olive trees. ''Ollas'' have short wide necks and wider bellies, resembling beanpots or ...

s were also found in the canyon, used to store water, seeds and to bury the cremated remains of the dead. Irrigation ditches in the canyon were used by the Agua Caliente people to carry water to crops before the arrival of outsiders.

Visitor's Center and hiking trail

The Agua Caliente Band maintains a visitor's center and hiking trail for the canyon. The trail is a two-mile loop which leads to Tahquitz Falls and back.

Archaeological project

Between 1988 and 1994 an extensive program conducted excavations and retrieval of artifacts and archaeological data in the Canyon. The project produced the largest collection of artifacts and features of any site in the southern California desert and constitutes the most extensive research on the history of the inhabitants of Tahuqitz Canyon, the ''Kauisiktum'' clan of the Agua Caliente. The project was conducted prior to the Tahquitz Creek Flood Control Program.

Wildlife

Bighorn Sheep in Tahquitz Canyon, Palm Springs, CA

In 2010, researchers from the

San Diego Zoo The San Diego Zoo is a zoo in Balboa Park, San Diego, California, housing 4000 animals of more than 650 species and subspecies on of Balboa Park leased from the City of San Diego. Its parent organization, San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance, is a p ...

U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service The United States Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS or FWS) is an agency within the United States Department of the Interior dedicated to the management of fish, wildlife, and natural habitats. The mission of the agency is "working with othe ...

, and

California Department of Fish and Game The California Department of Fish and Wildlife (CDFW), formerly known as the California Department of Fish and Game (CDFG), is a state agency under the California Natural Resources Agency. The Department of Fish and Wildlife manages and protec ...

reintroduced the endangered Mountain yellow-legged frog into Tahquitz Creek after it had been rediscovered in 2009.

Flood control

Flood control channels were laid in order to manage the threat of devastating flooding occurring during years of heavy rain and snow fall in the mountains of the Tahquitz Canyon. As a consequence of the project, the Tahquitz creek was channeled with the least impact to the resources of the canyon. An excavation project preceded the flood control project.

Desert Plays

From 1921 through 1930 the canyon was used for outdoor plays. The series of three Desert Plays featured ''Fire'' and ''The Arrow Maker'' by

Mary Hunter Austin Mary Hunter Austin (September 9, 1868 – August 13, 1934) was an American writer. One of the early nature writers of the American Southwest, her classic ''The Land of Little Rain'' (1903) describes the fauna, flora, and people – as well as ev ...

and one based on the legend of Tahquitz, written by Garnet Holme.

In film

The Tahquitz Falls were used as a scene in Frank Capra's 1937 film, ''Lost Horizon''.

References

{{reflist Cahuilla Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians Canyons and gorges of California Landforms of Riverside County, California Palm Springs, California Archaeological sites on the National Register of Historic Places in California National Register of Historic Places in Riverside County, California San Jacinto Mountains