The snowshoe hare, also called the varying hare or snowshoe rabbit, is a species of hare found in North America. It has the name "snowshoe" because of the large size of its hind feet. The animal's feet prevent it from sinking into the snow when it hops and walks. Its feet also have fur on the soles to protect it from freezing temperatures.
Lassen Volcanic National Park is a national park of the United States in northeastern California. The dominant feature of the park is Lassen Peak, the largest plug dome volcano in the world and the southernmost volcano in the Cascade Range. Lassen Volcanic National Park is one of the few areas in the world where all four types of volcanoes can be found: plug dome, shield, cinder cone, and stratovolcano.
The western tanager, is a medium-sized American songbird. Formerly placed in the tanager family (Thraupidae), it and other members of its genus are classified in the cardinal family (Cardinalidae). The species's plumage and vocalizations are similar to other members of the cardinal family.
The ecology of the Sierra Nevada, located in the U.S. states of California and Nevada, is diverse and complex. The combination of climate, topography, moisture, and soils influences the distribution of ecological communities across an elevation gradient from 500 to 14,500 feet. Biotic zones range from scrub and chaparral communities at lower elevations, to subalpine forests and alpine meadows at the higher elevations. Particular ecoregions that follow elevation contours are often described as a series of belts that follow the length of the Sierra Nevada. There are many hiking trails, paved and unpaved roads, and vast public lands in the Sierra Nevada for exploring the many different biomes and ecosystems.
Abies amabilis, commonly known as the Pacific silver fir, is a fir native to the Pacific Northwest of North America, occurring in the Pacific Coast Ranges and the Cascade Range. It is also commonly referred to in English as the white fir, red fir, lovely fir, amabilis fir, Cascades fir, or silver fir.
The Mount Washington Wilderness is a wilderness area located on and around Mount Washington in the central Cascade Range of Oregon in the United States. The wilderness was established in 1964 and comprises 54,278 acres (219.66 km2) of the Willamette National Forest and Deschutes National Forest. It is administered by the U.S. Forest Service.
Wilding conifers, also known as wilding pines, are invasive trees in the high country of New Zealand. Millions of dollars are spent on controlling their spread.
The Coast Range ecoregion is a Level III ecoregion designated by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in the U.S. states of Washington, Oregon, and California. It stretches along the Pacific Coast from the tip of the Olympic Peninsula in the north to the San Francisco Bay in the south, including Grays Harbor, Willapa Bay, and the Long Beach Peninsula in Washington, the entire length of the Oregon Coast, and the Northern California Coast. Named for the Coast Range mountains, it encompasses the lower elevations of the Olympic Mountains, the Oregon Coast Range, the Californian North Coast Ranges, and surrounding lowlands.
The Cascades ecoregion is a Level III ecoregion designated by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in the U.S. states of Washington, Oregon, and California. Somewhat smaller than the Cascade mountain range for which it is named, the ecoregion extends north to Snoqualmie Pass, near Seattle, and south to Hayden Pass, near the Oregon-California border, including the peaks and western slopes of most of the High Cascades. A discontiguous section is located on Mount Shasta in California.
The Eastern Cascades Slopes and Foothills ecoregion is a Level III ecoregion designated by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in the U.S. states of Oregon, Washington, and California. In the rain shadow of the Cascade Range, the eastern side of the mountains experiences greater temperature extremes and receives less precipitation than the west side. Open forests of ponderosa pine and some lodgepole pine distinguish this region from the Cascades ecoregion, where hemlock and fir forests are more common, and from the lower, drier ecoregions to the east, where shrubs and grasslands are predominant. The vegetation is adapted to the prevailing dry, continental climate and frequent wildfire. Volcanic cones and buttes are common in much of the region.
The Blue Mountains ecoregion is a Level III ecoregion designated by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in the Pacific Northwest, mainly in the state of Oregon, with small areas over the state border in Idaho and southeastern Washington. It is also contiguous with the World Wildlife Fund's Blue Mountain forests ecoregion.
The Klamath Mountains ecoregion of Oregon and California lies inland and north of the Coast Range ecoregion, extending from the Umpqua River in the north to the Sacramento Valley in the south. It encompasses the highly dissected ridges, foothills, and valleys of the Klamath and Siskiyou Mountains. It corresponds to the Level III ecoregion designated by the Environmental Protection Agency and to the Klamath-Siskiyou forests ecoregion designated by the World Wide Fund for Nature.
The Northern Basin and Range ecoregion is a Level III ecoregion designated by the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in the U.S. states of Oregon, Idaho, Nevada, Utah, and California. It contains dissected lava plains, rolling hills, alluvial fans, valleys, and scattered mountain ranges in the northern part of the Great Basin. Although arid, the ecoregion is higher and cooler than the Snake River Plain to the north and has more available moisture and a cooler climate than the Central Basin and Range to the south. Its southern boundary is determined by the highest shoreline of Pleistocene Lake Bonneville, which once inundated the Central Basin and Range. The western part of the region is internally drained; its eastern stream network drains to the Snake River system.
The Caribou Wilderness is a federally designated wilderness area created by the Wilderness Act of 1964 and is part of the National Wilderness Preservation System. It is located 60 miles (97 km) east of Redding in the state of California, United States. The Caribou Wilderness comprises 20,546 acres (83.15 km2) and is adjacent to the east side of Lassen Volcanic National Park. Although the park is surrounded by Lassen National Forest, it is managed separately by the National Park Service, whereas the U.S. Forest Service manages the wilderness.
The Ecology of the North Cascades is heavily influenced by the high elevation and rain shadow effects of the mountain range. The North Cascades is a section of the Cascade Range from the South Fork of the Snoqualmie River in Washington, United States, to the confluence of the Thompson and Fraser Rivers in British Columbia, Canada, where the range is officially called the Cascade Mountains but is usually referred to as the Canadian Cascades. The North Cascades Ecoregion is a Level III ecoregion in the Commission for Environmental Cooperation's classification system.
The Central Pacific coastal forests is a temperate coniferous forest ecoregion located in the Canadian province of British Columbia and the U.S. states of Oregon and Washington, as defined by the World Wildlife Fund (WWF) categorization system.
The South Fork Eel River Wilderness is a 12,868-acre (5,207 ha) wilderness area located in Mendocino County, California. The wilderness was added to the National Wilderness Preservation System when the United States Congress passed the Northern California Coastal Wild Heritage Wilderness Act in 2006. The Department of the Interior's Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is the agency in charge.
Bull Creek is the largest Eel River tributary drainage basin preserved within Humboldt Redwoods State Park. The basin contains the world's largest remaining contiguous old-growth forest of coast redwoods. Bull Creek flows in a clockwise semi-circle around 3,373-foot (1,028-meter) Grasshopper Mountain to enter the South Fork Eel River approximately 1.5 miles (2.4 km) upstream of the South Fork confluence with the Eel River.
Mixed conifer forest is a vegetation type dominated by a mixture of broadleaf trees and conifers. It is generally located in mountains, below the upper montane vegetation type.
The upper montane forest is a vegetation type generally found above the mixed coniferous forest and below the subalpine forest vegetation types. Most of what grows in upper montane forests are conifers, because of the short growing season.
