The Tushar Mountains are the third-highest

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 ...

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 its ...

after the

Uinta Mountains The Uinta Mountains ( ) are an east-west trending chain of mountains in northeastern Utah extending slightly into southern Wyoming in the United States. As a subrange of the Rocky Mountains, they are unusual for being the highest range in the ...

and the La Sal Range. Located in the Fishlake National Forest, Delano Peak, 12,174 ft (3,711 m) NAVD 88, is the highest point in both

Beaver Beavers are large, semiaquatic rodents in the genus ''Castor'' native to the temperate Northern Hemisphere. There are two extant species: the North American beaver (''Castor canadensis'') and the Eurasian beaver (''C. fiber''). Beavers a ...

and Piute counties and has a prominence of 4,689 ft (1,429 m). Delano Peak is named for Columbus Delano (1809–1896), Secretary of the Interior, during the Grant administration. The Tushars receive an ample amount of snow annually even though they are situated within the rainshadow of the

Sierra Nevada The Sierra Nevada () is a mountain range in the Western United States, between the Central Valley of California and the Great Basin. The vast majority of the range lies in the state of California, although the Carson Range spur lies primar ...

range in

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the m ...

and the

Snake Range The Snake Range is a mountain range in White Pine County, Nevada, United States. The south-central portion of the range is included within Great Basin National Park, with most of the remainder included within the Humboldt-Toiyabe National Fores ...

located in

Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, Western region of the United States. It is bordered by Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. N ...

. The main part of the range is in

, Piute and Sevier counties. The northwestern corner extends into the southeastern corner of Millard County, and the southern end extends into the corners of

Garfield ''Garfield'' is an American comic strip created by Jim Davis. Originally published locally as ''Jon'' in 1976, then in nationwide syndication from 1978 as ''Garfield'', it chronicles the life of the title character Garfield the cat, his hum ...

and

Iron Iron () is a chemical element with symbol Fe (from la, ferrum) and atomic number 26. It is a metal that belongs to the first transition series and group 8 of the periodic table. It is, by mass, the most common element on Earth, right in ...

counties.Utah Dept. of Transportation, 2011, ''Utah Official Highway Map''
/ref> The Tushars are bounded roughly by

I-15 I15 may refer to: * Interstate 15, a north–south Interstate Highway in the United States of America * Polikarpov I-15, a Soviet fighter aircraft * I15 (band) "Soulja Girl" is the second single from American rapper Soulja Boy's studio album '' ...

to the west, I-70 to the north, US–89 to the east and U–20 to the south. U–153 crosses the southern part of the range between

and

Junction Junction may refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''Junction'' (film), a 2012 American film * Jjunction, a 2002 Indian film * Junction (album), a 1976 album by Andrew Cyrille * Junction (EP), by Basement Jaxx, 2002 * Junction (manga), or ''Hot ...

Prominent peaks

* Mount Belknap * Mount Baldy * Mount Brigham * Edna Peak * Copper Belt Peak * Circleville Mountain Mount Belknap, Utah

Geology and landforms

The peaks of the Tushars were formed between 22 and 32 million years ago by volcanic activity that included a calamitous explosion that blew off the top of a massive peak. At the cusp of the Great Basin, the range also shares characteristics of the

Colorado Plateau The Colorado Plateau, also known as the Colorado Plateau Province, is a physiographic and desert region of the Intermontane Plateaus, roughly centered on the Four Corners region of the southwestern United States. This province covers an area o ...

Province to the east. Geologically complex, this area dominated by past volcanism, is composed of

lava flows Lava is molten or partially molten rock (magma) that has been expelled from the interior of a terrestrial planet (such as Earth) or a moon onto its surface. Lava may be erupted at a volcano or through a fracture in the crust, on land or und ...

ash Ash or ashes are the solid remnants of fires. Specifically, ''ash'' refers to all non-aqueous, non-gaseous residues that remain after something burns. In analytical chemistry, to analyse the mineral and metal content of chemical samples, ash ...

flow

tuff Tuff is a type of rock made of volcanic ash ejected from a vent during a volcanic eruption. Following ejection and deposition, the ash is lithified into a solid rock. Rock that contains greater than 75% ash is considered tuff, while rock ...

s from

caldera A caldera ( ) is a large cauldron-like hollow that forms shortly after the emptying of a magma chamber in a volcano eruption. When large volumes of magma are erupted over a short time, structural support for the rock above the magma chamber is ...

s, volcanic domes,

cinder cone A cinder cone (or scoria cone) is a steep conical hill of loose pyroclastic fragments, such as volcanic clinkers, volcanic ash, or scoria that has been built around a volcanic vent. The pyroclastic fragments are formed by explosive eruption ...

rhyolite Rhyolite ( ) is the most silica-rich of volcanic rocks. It is generally glassy or fine-grained (aphanitic) in texture, but may be porphyritic, containing larger mineral crystals ( phenocrysts) in an otherwise fine-grained groundmass. The miner ...

basalt Basalt (; ) is an aphanitic (fine-grained) extrusive igneous rock formed from the rapid cooling of low-viscosity lava rich in magnesium and iron (mafic lava) exposed at or very near the surface of a rocky planet or moon. More than 90 ...

-like rocks,

conglomerate Conglomerate or conglomeration may refer to: * Conglomerate (company) * Conglomerate (geology) * Conglomerate (mathematics) In popular culture: * The Conglomerate (American group), a production crew and musical group founded by Busta Rhymes ** ...

, and metals such as

gold Gold is a chemical element with the symbol Au (from la, aurum) and atomic number 79. This makes it one of the higher atomic number elements that occur naturally. It is a bright, slightly orange-yellow, dense, soft, malleable, and ductile ...

molybdenum Molybdenum is a chemical element with the symbol Mo and atomic number 42 which is located in period 5 and group 6. The name is from Neo-Latin ''molybdaenum'', which is based on Ancient Greek ', meaning lead, since its ores were confused with lead ...

and

uranium Uranium is a chemical element with the symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Uranium is weak ...

. The area contains developed and undeveloped geothermal activity,

fluorite Fluorite (also called fluorspar) is the mineral form of calcium fluoride, CaF2. It belongs to the halide minerals. It crystallizes in isometric cubic habit, although octahedral and more complex isometric forms are not uncommon. The Mohs sca ...

, and the

hydrothermal Hydrothermal circulation in its most general sense is the circulation of hot water (Ancient Greek ὕδωρ, ''water'',Liddell, H.G. & Scott, R. (1940). ''A Greek-English Lexicon. revised and augmented throughout by Sir Henry Stuart Jones. with th ...

ly-altered rocks of ''Big Rock Candy Mountain''. The Tushars have at least seven high alpine glaciated canyons, Cottonwood Canyon, North Fork of Cottonwood Canyon, South Fork Basin, The Pocket Basin, Bullion Basin, Beaver Basin and City Creek Basin. All were heavily glaciated during the last ice age.

Watershed

The Tushars contain a variety of intermittent and perennial streams that receive their flow from the annual snowpack. The entire watershed region is divided into two main watershed locations: Beaver River originates in the Tushar Mountains east of

at the confluence of the South Fork and several other creeks and springs. It drains west past Beaver and Milford and the southern end of the Mineral Range then turns north and disappears into the ground at the Beaver Bottoms near Red Rock Knoll and Black Rock in Millard County. In earlier days it was known for its large number of beaver colonies. Jedediah Smith called it "The Lost River" and Dominguez and Escalante called it "El Rio de Tejedor" (The Beaver River). The Sevier River, extending 383 miles (616 km), is the longest Utah river entirely in the state and drains an extended chain of mountain farming valleys to the intermittent

Sevier Lake Sevier Lake is an intermittent and endorheic lake which lies in the lowest part of the Sevier Desert, Millard County, Utah. Like Great Salt Lake and Utah Lake, it is a remnant of Pleistocene Lake Bonneville. Sevier Lake is fed primarily by t ...

. The Upper Sevier is used extensively for irrigation; consequently, Sevier Lake is now essentially dry. Sevier Lake is a remnant of

Lake Bonneville Lake Bonneville was the largest Late Pleistocene paleolake in the Great Basin of western North America. It was a pluvial lake that formed in response to an increase in precipitation and a decrease in evaporation as a result of cooler temperature ...

, a freshwater lake covering much of Utah's western and northwestern portions. Some of the more prominent creeks and streams are: Clear Creek, Pine Creek, Beaver Creek, Cottonwood Creek, and other small streams drain into the Sevier River. All the watershed from the Tushars has a final terminus in Sevier Lake, located in western Utah, and is part of the

Great Basin The Great Basin is the largest area of contiguous endorheic watersheds, those with no outlets, in North America. It spans nearly all of Nevada, much of Utah, and portions of California, Idaho, Oregon, Wyoming, and Baja California. It is noted fo ...

. No water reaches any ocean from the Tushars.

Ecology

The Tushar Mountain range is part of a temperate coniferous forest ecoregion. Common trees include ponderosa pine, Rocky Mountain Douglas-fir, subalpine fir, Engelmann spruce, trembling aspen, and Gambel oak. The Tushars contains several

old growth An old-growth forestalso termed primary forest, virgin forest, late seral forest, primeval forest, or first-growth forestis a forest that has attained great age without significant disturbance, and thereby exhibits unique ecological featur ...

stands of pine, some of which are the oldest in the state of Utah.

Plant Communities

Diverse due to elevation change, the Tushars support alpine and sub-alpine vegetation, mountain meadows, dense

aspen Aspen is a common name for certain tree species; some, but not all, are classified by botanists in the section ''Populus'', of the '' Populus'' genus. Species These species are called aspens: *'' Populus adenopoda'' – Chinese aspen (C ...

, sub-alpine fir,

Engelmann spruce ''Picea engelmannii'', with the common names Engelmann spruce, white spruce, mountain spruce, and silver spruce, is a species of spruce native to western North America. It is mostly a high-altitude mountain tree but also appears in watered canyon ...

, five-needle

pine A pine is any conifer tree or shrub in the genus ''Pinus'' () of the family (biology), family Pinaceae. ''Pinus'' is the sole genus in the subfamily Pinoideae. The World Flora Online created by the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew and Missouri Botanic ...

, and some

Douglas fir The Douglas fir (''Pseudotsuga menziesii'') is an evergreen conifer species in the pine family, Pinaceae. It is native to western North America and is also known as Douglas-fir, Douglas spruce, Oregon pine, and Columbian pine. There are three v ...

, mountain brush, sagebrush steppe, pinion-juniper woodlands, oak, mountain mahogany, and upland mountain grasslands. The area contains endemic species such as the Tushar paintbrush and rare and sensitive plants. Recent fires in the area, both natural and prescribed, have greatly benefited vegetation, causing the regeneration of Aspen and other species.

Recreation

Eagle Point ski resort is located on the western slopes and accessed from

. The Tushar range is home to a host of other outdoor pursuits as well. Hundreds of miles of mountain biking and hiking trails wind through the canyons and alpine valleys of the Tushar Range, offering back-country access. The Tushars are also hosting a vast portion of the Paiute ATV Trail system, one of the longest ATV trails of its type in the United States.

Naturalness and other unique features

The area possesses a high degree of naturalness, palpable solitude, and infinite opportunities for primitive and unconfined recreation. The area contains several unique and special features. The Big Rock Candy Mountain Altered Zone is a site that is of truly national significance and is either unique to or distinctive of the

. The Altered Zone is unexcelled in the Colorado Plateau for showing the effects of hot water or hydrothermal alteration of igneous rocks and the development of clays in the weathering process associated with the late phases of igneous activity. The highly altered, brightly colored rocks associated with various igneous intrusions and extrusions make the area distinct and virtually unique in the Colorado Plateau. Also found are outcrops of strongly jointed volcanic glass in Clear Creek Canyon along the I-70 corridor called the Skinner Canyon Ignimbrites, a spectacular development and exposures of columnar joints in the rewelded ash flow tuffs here are almost unique in the Colorado Plateau because of the limited exposures of these types of volcanic rocks. The Tushars can be easily accessed from several locations: U.S. 89 through Marysvale, Junction and Circleville; I-15 through Beaver, Utah, and from I-70 in Clear Creek Canyon.

References

External links

{{Authority control Mountain ranges of Utah Mountain ranges of Beaver County, Utah Mountain ranges of Piute County, Utah Mountain ranges of Sevier County, Utah Fishlake National Forest