Owyhee River Wilderness | |
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Location | Owyhee County, Idaho, United States |
Nearest city | Boise, Idaho |
Coordinates | 42°16′N116°46′W / 42.26°N 116.77°W |
Area | 267,328 acres (108,184 ha) |
Established | 2009 |
Governing body | Bureau of Land Management |
The Owyhee River Wilderness is located on the high basalt plateaus of Owyhee County in southwestern Idaho in the western United States. The wilderness area is named after and protects the upper Owyhee River, its tributaries, and the surrounding desert canyon landscape. [1] Whitewater rafting is a popular recreational activity in this wilderness area. Managed by the Bureau of Land Management, it is the second-largest U.S. Wilderness Area that is not located within a National Forest, National Park, or National Wildlife Refuge. The BLM's Black Rock Desert Wilderness, located within Black Rock Desert – High Rock Canyon Emigrant Trails National Conservation Area, is larger. About 67.3 miles (108.3 km) of the Owyhee River is classified as a wild river. [2]
The Owyhee River Wilderness is irregularly shaped, generally following the course of the Owyhee River, South Fork Owyhee River, Little Owyhee River, Deep Creek, and Battle Creek, as well as including some plateau lands. The wilderness area stretches from the Oregon-Idaho border in the west to the Duck Valley Indian Reservation in the east to the Nevada-Idaho border in the south. The rivers and creeks are deeply eroded into the Owyhee Plateau, resulting in deep canyons. [3] The only roads are rough and there are few trails. There are challenging whitewater rivers.[ citation needed ]
The Owyhee River Wilderness was created by the Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009 and signed into law by President Barack Obama on March 30, 2009. Also created in the Omnibus Land Act were five additional southwestern Idaho wilderness areas in Owyhee County, collectively known as the Owyhee Canyonlands Wilderness Areas: [4] [5]
The Act of 2009 added 517,025 acres (209,233 ha) of wilderness within the state of Idaho. The Owyhee River Wilderness accounts for 51.7% of that area. [4] [5]
Wilderness areas do not allow motorized or mechanical equipment including bicycles. Although camping and fishing are allowed with proper permit, no roads or buildings are constructed and there is also no logging or mining, in compliance with the 1964 Wilderness Act. Wilderness areas within National Forests and Bureau of Land Management areas also allow hunting in season. [6] [7]
The Owyhee River Wilderness lies within the Owyhee Desert, part of the northern Basin and Range ecoregion, although hydrologically the wilderness area is within the Snake River – Columbia River drainage. [8] [9] The region is home to a varying amount of animal and plant life. Animals such as bighorn sheep, cougars, prairie falcons, bobcats, and pronghorn live through the region. A variety of plant life such as lupine, Eriogonum salicornioides, Phacelia lutea var., and bitterroot can also be found in the area. [1] [10]
The Bruneau River is a 153-mile-long (246 km) tributary of the Snake River, in the U.S. states of Idaho and Nevada. It runs through a narrow canyon cut into ancient lava flows in southwestern Idaho. The Bruneau Canyon, which is up to 1,200 feet (370 m) deep and 40 miles (64 km) long, features rapids and hot springs, making it a popular whitewater trip.
The Owyhee River is a tributary of the Snake River located in northern Nevada, southwestern Idaho and southeastern Oregon in the United States. It is 280 miles (450 km) long. The river's drainage basin is 11,049 square miles (28,620 km2) in area, one of the largest subbasins of the Columbia Basin. The mean annual discharge is 995 cubic feet per second (28.2 m3/s), with a maximum of 50,000 cu ft/s (1,400 m3/s) recorded in 1993 and a minimum of 42 cu ft/s (1.2 m3/s) in 1954.
The Owyhee Desert ecoregion, within the deserts and xeric shrublands biome, is in the Northwestern United States. The Owyhee Uplands Byway passes through the desert.
The Jarbidge River is a 51.8-mile-long (83.4 km), high elevation river in Elko County, Nevada, and Owyhee County, Idaho, in the United States. The Jarbidge originates as two main forks in the Jarbidge Mountains of northeastern Nevada and then flows through basalt and rhyolite canyons on the high plateau of the Owyhee Desert before joining the Bruneau River.
The Darwin Falls Wilderness is a protected area in the northern Mojave Desert adjacent to Death Valley National Park. The 8,189-acre (3,314 ha) wilderness area was created by the California Desert Protection Act of 1994 and is managed by the Bureau of Land Management as part of the National Wilderness Preservation System.
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 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 and establishes a National Landscape Conservation System. It includes funding for programs, studies and other activities by the Department of the Interior and the Department of Agriculture, and in some cases bars further geothermal leasing, oil and gas leasing, and new mining patents on certain stretches of protected land.
The Bruneau – Jarbidge Rivers Wilderness is located on the high basalt plateaus of Owyhee County in southwestern Idaho in the western United States. The wilderness area is named after and protects much of the Bruneau and Jarbidge Rivers and their canyons. Whitewater rafting is a popular recreational activity in this wilderness area, which has rivers up to Class V. About 40 miles (64 km) of the Bruneau River and about 28.8 miles (46.3 km) of the Jarbidge River are classified as a wild river.
The Santa Rosa Wilderness is a 72,259-acre (292.42 km2) wilderness area in Southern California, in the Santa Rosa Mountains of Riverside and San Diego counties, California. It is in the Colorado Desert section of the Sonoran Desert, above the Coachella Valley and Lower Colorado River Valley regions in a Peninsular Range, between La Quinta to the north and Anza Borrego Desert State Park to the south. The United States Congress established the wilderness in 1984 with the passage of the California Wilderness Act, managed by both the US Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management. In 2009, the Omnibus Public Land Management Act was signed into law which added more than 2,000 acres (8.1 km2). Most of the Santa Rosa Wilderness is within the Santa Rosa and San Jacinto Mountains National Monument.
Cottonwood Canyon Wilderness is a 11,712-acre (47.4 km2) wilderness area in the US state of Utah. It was designated March 30, 2009, as part of the Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009. Located adjacent to the southern edge of the Dixie National Forest, it encompasses and protects a transition zone between the Colorado Plateau to the east and the Mojave Desert to the west. It is bordered by the Cottonwood Forest Wilderness to the northeast and is itself a part of the Red Cliffs National Conservation Area.
Dickshooter is the name of a trailmarker and also of at least three features in Owyhee County, Idaho: a ridge, a reservoir, and a creek. These are in close proximity to each other in the southwestern corner of the state, in a wilderness area approximately 24 miles (39 km) northwest of Riddle.
The Pole Creek Wilderness is located on the high rhyolite and basalt plateaus of Owyhee County in southwestern Idaho in the western United States. Its whitewater rapids are a popular attraction.
The North Fork Owyhee Wilderness is on the high basalt plateaus of Owyhee County in southwestern Idaho in the western United States. The rivers within it offer whitewater rapids up to Class IV. The upper 20.8 miles (33.5 km) of the North Fork Owyhee River, from the Idaho–Oregon border to the upstream boundary of the wilderness, are part of the National Wild and Scenic Rivers System. Of this total, 15.1 miles (24.3 km) are classified as wild and the remaining 5.7 miles (9.2 km) are classified "recreational".
The Big Jacks Creek Wilderness is located on the high basalt plateaus of Owyhee County in southwestern Idaho in the western United States. Little Jacks Creek Wilderness is on its northwest border. About 35 miles (56 km) of Big Jacks Creek is classified as a wild river.
The Little Jacks Creek Wilderness is located on the high basalt plateaus of Owyhee County in southwestern Idaho in the western United States. Big Jacks Creek Wilderness is on its southeast border. About 12.4 miles (20.0 km) of Little Jacks Creek is classified as a wild river.
Battle Creek is a 67-mile (110 km) long tributary of the Owyhee River. Beginning at an elevation of 6,704 feet (2,043 m) in central Owyhee County, Idaho, it flows generally south through the Owyhee Desert to its mouth west of Riddle, at an elevation of 4,636 feet (1,413 m). In 2009, 23.4 miles (37.7 km) of the creek were designated as wild by the Omnibus Public Land Management Act, which also created the Owyhee River Wilderness.
Sheep Creek is a 63-mile (101 km) long tributary of the Bruneau River. Beginning at an elevation of 6,126 feet (1,867 m) east of Owyhee in northern Elko County, Nevada, it flows generally north into Owyhee County, Idaho and the Owyhee Desert, where it is roughly paralleled by Idaho State Highway 51. It then flows to its mouth in the Bruneau – Jarbidge Rivers Wilderness, at an elevation of 3,415 feet (1,041 m). In 2009, 25.6 miles (41.2 km) of the creek were designated as wild by the Omnibus Public Land Management Act, which also created the Bruneau – Jarbidge Rivers Wilderness.
The Wildlands Conservancy is a nonprofit organization with a mission to preserve land for public recreation. It manages 25 preserves, detailed in the list of its preserves, covering over 200,000 acres (81,000 ha) across the western United States. The preserve system encompasses diverse landscapes including mountains, valleys, deserts, rivers, and oceanfront lands. The Wildlands Conservancy buys and restores land, builds public visitor facilities, and provides outdoor education programs for children. All usage is free of charge, attracting over 1.5 million visitors annually.
The North Fork Owyhee River is a tributary, about 30 miles (48 km) long, of the Owyhee River in Malheur County, Oregon, and Owyhee County, Idaho, in the United States. It begins on the east flank of the Owyhee Mountains in Idaho and flows generally southwest to meet the main stem at Three Forks, Oregon, 161 miles (259 km) above the confluence of the larger river with the Snake River.
Sand to Snow National Monument is a U.S. National Monument located in San Bernardino County and northern Riverside County, Southern California.