Redwood National and State Parks
The Redwood National and State Parks are a complex of several state and national parks located in the United States, along the coast of northern California. Comprising Redwood National Park and California's Del Norte Coast, Jedediah Smith, Prairie Creek Redwoods State Parks, the combined RNSP contain 139,000 acres, feature old-growth temperate rainforests. Located within Del Norte and Humboldt Counties, the four parks, protect 45% of all remaining coast redwood old-growth forests, totaling at least 38,982 acres; these trees are one of the most massive tree species on Earth. In addition to the redwood forests, the parks preserve other indigenous flora, grassland prairie, cultural resources, portions of rivers and other streams, 37 miles of pristine coastline. In 1850, old-growth redwood forest covered more than 2,000,000 acres of the California coast; the northern portion of that area inhabited by Native Americans, attracted many lumbermen and others turned gold miners when a minor gold rush brought them to the region.
Failing in efforts to strike it rich in gold, these men turned toward harvesting the giant trees for booming development in San Francisco and other places on the West Coast. After many decades of unrestricted clear-cut logging, serious efforts toward conservation began. By the 1920s the work of the Save the Redwoods League, founded in 1918 to preserve remaining old-growth redwoods, resulted in the establishment of Prairie Creek, Del Norte Coast, Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Parks among others. Redwood National Park was created in 1968, by which time nearly 90% of the original redwood trees had been logged; the National Park Service and the California Department of Parks and Recreation administratively combined Redwood National Park with the three abutting Redwood State Parks in 1994 for the purpose of cooperative forest management and stabilization of forests and watersheds as a single unit. The ecosystem of the RNSP preserves a number of threatened animal species such as the tidewater goby, Chinook salmon, northern spotted owl, Steller's sea lion.
In recognition of the rare ecosystem and cultural history found in the parks, the United Nations designated them a World Heritage Site on September 5, 1980 and part of the California Coast Ranges International Biosphere Reserve on June 30, 1983. Modern day native groups such as the Yurok, Karok and Wiyot all have historical ties to the region, some Native American groups still live in the park area today. Archaeological study shows. An 1852 census determined that the Yurok were the most numerous, with 55 villages and an estimated population of 2,500, they used the abundant redwood, which with its linear grain was split into planks, as a building material for boats and small villages. For buildings, the planks would be erected side by side in a narrow trench, with the upper portions bound with leather strapping and held by notches cut into the supporting roof beams. Redwood boards were used to form a shallow sloping roof. Previous to Jedediah Smith in 1828, no other explorer of European descent is known to have investigated the inland region away from the immediate coast.
The discovery of gold along the Trinity River in 1850 led to a minor secondary rush in California. This brought miners into the area and many stayed on at the coast after failing to strike it rich; this led to conflicts wherein native peoples were placed under great strain, if not forcibly removed or massacred. By 1895, only one third of the Yurok in one group of villages remained; the miners logged redwoods for building. Over 2,000,000 acres of the California and southwestern coast of Oregon were old-growth redwood forest, but by 1910, extensive logging led conservationists and concerned citizens to begin seeking ways to preserve the remaining trees, which they saw being logged at an alarming rate. In 1911, U. S. Representative John E. Raker, of California, became the first politician to introduce legislation for the creation of a redwood national park. However, no further action was taken by Congress at that time. Preservation of the redwood stands in California is considered one of the most substantial conservation contributions of the Boone and Crockett Club.
The Save the Redwoods League was founded in 1918 by Boone and Crockett Club members Madison Grant, John C. Merriam, Henry Fairfield Osborn, future member, Frederick Russell Burnham; the initial purchases of land were made by club member Stephen William Kent. In 1921, Boone and Crockett Club member John C. Phillips donated $32,000 to purchase land and create the Raynal Bolling Memorial Grove in the Humboldt Redwoods State Park; this was timely as U. S. Route 101, which would soon provide nearly unfettered access to the trees, was under construction. Using matching funds provided by the County of Humboldt and by the State of California, the Save the Redwoods League] managed to protect areas of concentrated or multiple redwood groves and a few entire forests in the 1920s; as California created a state park system, beginning in 1927, three of the preserved redwood areas became Prairie Creek Redwoods, Del Norte Coast Redwoods, Jedediah Smith Redwoods State Parks. A fourth became Humboldt Redwoods State Park, by far the largest of the individual Redwood State Parks, but not in the Redwood National and State Park system.
Because of the
Tijuana
Tijuana is the largest city of both Baja California State and the Baja Peninsula. It is part of the San Diego–Tijuana transborder urban agglomeration and the larger Southern California megalopolis; as the 6th-largest city in Mexico and center of the 6th-largest metro area in Mexico, Tijuana exerts a strong influence in education and politics – across Mexico, in transportation and art – across both Californias, in manufacturing and as a migration hub – across the North American continent. One of the fastest-growing metropolitan areas in Mexico, Tijuana maintains global city status; as of 2015, the city of Tijuana had a population of 1,641,570. Tijuana is located on the Gold Coast of Baja California, is the municipal seat and the cultural and commercial center of Tijuana Municipality. Tijuana covers 70 % of 80 % of its population. A dominant manufacturing center of the North American continent, the city maintains facilities of many multinational conglomerate companies. In the early 21st century, Tijuana became the medical-device manufacturing capital of North America.
Tijuana is a growing cultural center and has been recognized as an important new cultural mecca. The city is the most visited border city in the globe. More than fifty million people cross the border between these two cities every year; this metropolitan crossing makes the San Ysidro Port of Entry the busiest land-border crossing in the world. It is estimated that the two border crossing stations between the cities proper of San Diego and Tijuana account for 300,000 daily border crossings alone. Tijuana is the westernmost city in Mexico. According to the 2015 census, the Tijuana metropolitan area was the fifth-largest in Mexico, with a population of 1,840,710, but rankings vary, the city itself was 6th largest and the municipality 3rd largest nationally; the international metropolitan region was estimated at about 5,158,459 in 2016, making it the third-largest metropolitan area in the former Californias region, 19th largest metropolitan area in the Americas, the largest bi-national conurbation, shared between US and Mexico.
Tijuana is becoming more suburbanized like San Diego. Tijuana traces its modern history to the arrival of Spanish explorers in the 16th century who were mapping the coast of the Californias; as the American conquest of northern Mexico ended with the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, Tijuana's new international position on the border gave rise to a new economic and political structure. The city was founded on July 1889 as urban development began. Known by its supposed initials, T. J. and nicknamed Gateway to Mexico, the city has served as a tourist center dating back to the 1880s. The city’s name comes from the rancho that Santiago Argüello Moraga established in 1829 on his Mexican land grant, naming it Rancho Tía Juana; the first Spanish mission call the settlement variously as'La Tía Juana','Tiguana','Tiuana','Tiwana','Tijuan','Ticuan', as well as'Tijuana'. While the Mexican city standardized to "Tijuana", the American term for both the river and a U. S. settlement, now part of San Ysidro remained "Tia Juana" until the mid-20th century.
The accepted theory among historians is that Tía Juana, as Argüello named his rancho, is derived from the word "Tiwan" in the language of the Kumeyaay – the original aboriginal inhabitants of the San Diego-Tijuana region. Urban legend, states that Tía Juana, which means Aunt Jane in Spanish, was a real person whose inn provided food and lodging to travelers. There is however no record of such an inn. In Spanish, the name is pronounced "Tee-HWAH-nah" /tiˈxwana/ – with three syllables, the "j" in Mexican Spanish pronounced as a guttural "h" sound. In English, the name is pronounced "Tee-HWAH-nuh" /tiːˈhwɑːnə/ but the incorrect pronunciation "Tee-uh-WAH-nuh" /tiːəˈwɑːnə/, based on the obsolete "Tía Juana", persists outside the San Diego area. In Southern California, Tijuana is referred to as "TJ" or T. J. Baja Californians have adopted this pronunciation as Tiyei. In Spanish the demonym for someone from Tijuana is Tijuanense, while in English the demonym is Tijuanan. A common slang term used for a person from Tijuana is Tijuanero.
The nickname Tijuas is popular among residents and visitors alike. Due to a recent increase in violence in the city, a new term is developing; the phrase Yo Tijuaneo, ¿y tú? translates to I Tijuanate, you?. This term comes from a new popular local verb Tijuanear meaning to Tijuana, describing the cosmopolitan aspects of living in the city and crossing the border; the land was inhabited by the Kumeyaay, a tribe of Yuman-speaking hunter-gatherers. Europeans arrived in 1542, when the explorer Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo toured the coastline of the area, which Sebastián Vizcaíno mapped in 1602. In 1769, Juan Crespí documented more details about the area, called the Valley of Tijuana. Junípero Serra founded the first mission of Alta California in nearby San Diego. Further settlement took place near the end of the mission era when José María de Echeandía, governor of the Baja California and Alta California, awarded a large land grant to Santiago Argüello in 1829; this large cattle ranch, Rancho Tía Juana, covered 100 km2.
Although "Tia Juana" means "Aunt Jane" in Spanish, the name was an adaptation of
Black-necked stilt
The black-necked stilt is a locally abundant shorebird of American wetlands and coastlines. It is found from the coastal areas of California through much of the interior western United States and along the Gulf of Mexico as far east as Florida south through Central America and the Caribbean to Ecuador and the Galápagos Islands; the northernmost populations those from inland, are migratory, wintering from the extreme south of the United States to southern Mexico as far south as Costa Rica. It is treated as a subspecies of the common or black-winged stilt, using the trinomial name Himantopus himantopus mexicanus. However, the AOS has always considered it a species in its own right, the scientific name Himantopus mexicanus is seen. Matters are more complicated though, but the white-backed stilt from southern South America and intergrading to some extent with its northern relative where their ranges meet, would warrant inclusion with the Black-necked stilt when this is separated becoming Himantopus mexicanus melanurus.
The Hawaiian stilt, H. m. knudseni, is to belong to the American species when this is considered separate. Adults have a long thin black bill, they have black wings and backs. The tail is white with some grey banding. A continuous area of black extends from the back along the hindneck to the head. There, it forms a cap covering the entire head from the top to just below eye-level, with the exception of the areas surrounding the bill and a small white spot above the eye. Males have a greenish gloss to the back and wings in the breeding season; this is less absent in females, which have a brown tinge to these areas instead. Otherwise, the sexes look alike. Downy young are light olive brown with lengthwise rows of black speckles on the upperparts – where adults are black – and dull white elsewhere, with some dark barring on the flanks. Where their ranges meet in central Brazil, the black-necked and white-backed stilts intergrade; such individuals have some white or grey on top of the head and a white or grey collar separating the black of the hindneck from that of the upper back.
The black-necked stilt is distinguished from non-breeding vagrants of the Old World black-winged stilt by the white spot above the eye. Vagrants of the northern American form in turn are hard to tell apart from the resident Hawaiian stilt, in which only the eye-spot is markedly smaller, but though many stilt populations are long-distance migrants and during their movements can be found hundreds of miles offshore, actual trans-oceanic vagrants are nonetheless a rare occurrence. The black-necked stilt is found in estuarine, salt pond and emergent wetland habitats, it is found in seasonally flooded wetlands. Use of salt evaporation ponds has increased since 1960 in the USA, they may now be the primary wintering habitat. At the Salton Sea, the black-necked stilt is resident year-round; this bird is locally abundant in the San Joaquin Valley, where it winters. It is common to locally abundant in appropriate habitat in southern California from April to September, it breeds along lake shores in northeastern California and southeastern Oregon as well as along the Colorado River.
In North America outside California, the black-necked stilt breeds inland, but it is known as a breeding bird in riparian locales in Arizona and elsewhere in the southern USA. In Arizona, black-necked stilts may be seen along artificially created lakes and drainage basins in the Phoenix metropolitan area, in remnant riparian habitat. In the San Francisco Bay Area, specific locations where one would expect to see this bird are Richardson Bay, mudflats of Belmont Slough, mudflats of Seal Slough in San Mateo, salt ponds in Hayward, exposed bay muds on the Burlingame estuarine shore, Heron's Head Park at India Basin. For flocks that summer in the northern Central Valley of California, a migration occurs to the San Joaquin Valley to consolidate with flocks that were summering there. In coastal areas flocks both summer and winter in these estuarine settings. Fall migration of the northernly birds takes place from July to September, they return to the breeding grounds between March and May; the entire population breeding at any one site arrives, incubates eggs for about a month, protects and broods the young until they are capable of sustained flight and leaves again migrating in flocks of about 15 individuals sometimes juveniles congregating in small groups and other times siblings with family groups.
There is some seasonal movement of the tropical populations, but this is not long-range and poorly understood. The parasitic cyclocoeline flatworm Neoallopyge americanensis was described from the air sacs of a black-necked stilt from Texas, its genus is presently monotypic and seems to be related to the similar genus Allopyge, found in Old World cranes. The black-necked stilt forages by probing and gleaning in mudflats and lakeshores, but in shallow waters near shores.
Pelican
Pelicans are a genus of large water birds that make up the family Pelecanidae. They are characterised by a long beak and a large throat pouch used for catching prey and draining water from the scooped-up contents before swallowing, they have predominantly pale plumage, the exceptions being the Peruvian pelicans. The bills and bare facial skin of all species become brightly coloured before the breeding season; the eight living pelican species have a patchy global distribution, ranging latitudinally from the tropics to the temperate zone, though they are absent from interior South America and from polar regions and the open ocean. Long thought to be related to frigatebirds, cormorants and gannets and boobies, pelicans instead are now known to be most related to the shoebill and hamerkop, are placed in the order Pelecaniformes. Ibises, spoonbills and bitterns have been classified in the same order. Fossil evidence of pelicans dates back at least 30 million years to the remains of a beak similar to that of modern species recovered from Oligocene strata in France.
They are thought to have spread into the Americas. Pelicans frequent inland and coastal waters, where they feed principally on fish, catching them at or near the water surface, they are gregarious birds, travelling in flocks, hunting cooperatively, breeding colonially. Four white-plumaged species tend to nest on the ground, four brown or grey-plumaged species nest in trees; the relationship between pelicans and people has been contentious. The birds have been persecuted because of their perceived competition with commercial and recreational fishing, their populations have fallen through habitat destruction and environmental pollution, three species are of conservation concern. They have a long history of cultural significance in mythology, in Christian and heraldic iconography; the genus Pelecanus was first formally described by Linnaeus in 1758 in the tenth edition of his Systema Naturae'. He described the distinguishing characteristics as a straight bill hooked at the tip, linear nostrils, a bare face, webbed feet.
This early definition included frigatebirds and sulids, as well as pelicans. The name comes from the Ancient Greek word pelekan, itself derived from the word pelekys meaning "axe". In classical times, the word was applied to the woodpecker; the family Pelecanidae was introduced by the French polymath Constantine Samuel Rafinesque in 1815. Pelicans give their name to an order which has a varied taxonomic history. Tropicbirds, cormorants, gannets and frigatebirds, all traditional members of the order, have since been reclassified: tropicbirds into their own order and the remainder into the Suliformes. In their place, ibises, the hamerkop, the shoebill have now been transferred into the Pelecaniformes. Molecular evidence suggests that the shoebill and the hamerkop form a sister group to the pelicans, though some doubt exists as to the exact relationships among the three lineages; the eight living pelican species were traditionally divided into two groups, one containing four ground-nesters with white adult plumage, one containing four grey- or brown-plumaged species which nest preferentially either in trees, or on sea rocks.
The marine brown and Peruvian pelicans considered conspecific, are sometimes separated from the others by placement in the subgenus Leptopelicanus but in fact species with both sorts of appearance and nesting behavior are found in either. DNA sequencing of both mitochondrial and nuclear genes yielded quite different relationships; the Dalmatian, pink-backed, spot-billed were all related to one another, while the Australian white pelican was their next-closest relative. The great white pelican belonged to this lineage, but was the first to diverge from the common ancestor of the other four species; this finding suggests that pelicans evolved in the Old World and spread into the Americas, that preference for tree- or ground-nesting is more related to size than genetics. The fossil record shows, its beak is complete and is morphologically identical to that of present-day pelicans, showing that this advanced feeding apparatus was in existence at the time. An Early Miocene fossil has been named Miopelecanus gracilis on the basis of certain features considered unique, but thought to lie within the range of interspecific variation in Pelecanus.
The Late Eocene Protopelicanus may be a pelecaniform or suliform – or a similar aquatic bird such as a pseudotooth. The supposed Miocene pelican Liptornis from Patagonia is a nomen dubium, being based on fragments providing insufficient evidence to support a valid description. Fossil finds from North America have been meagre compared with Europe, which has a richer fossil record. Several Pelecanus species have been described from fossil material, including: Pelecanus cadimurka, Rich & van Tets, 1981 (Late Pliocene, South Austra
Wader
Waders are birds found along shorelines and mudflats that wade in order to forage for food in the mud or sand. They are called shorebirds in North America, where the term "wader" is used to refer to long-legged wading birds such as storks and herons. Waders are members of the order Charadriiformes, which includes gulls and their allies. There are about 210 species of wader, most of which live in coastal environments. Many species of Arctic and temperate regions are migratory, but tropical birds are resident, or move only in response to rainfall patterns; some of the Arctic species, such as the little stint, are amongst the longest distance migrants, spending the non-breeding season in the southern hemisphere. Many of the smaller species found in coastal habitats but not the calidrids, are named as "sandpipers", but this term does not have a strict meaning, since the upland sandpiper is a grassland species; the smallest member of this group is the least sandpiper, small adults of which can weigh as little as 15.5 grams and measure just over 13 cm.
The largest species is believed to be the Far Eastern curlew, at about 63 cm and 860 grams, although the beach thick-knee is the heaviest at about 1 kg. In the Sibley-Ahlquist taxonomy and many other groups are subsumed into a enlarged Ciconiiformes order. However, the classification of the Charadriiformes is one of the weakest points of the Sibley-Ahlquist taxonomy, as DNA–DNA hybridization has turned out to be incapable of properly resolving the interrelationships of the group; the waders were united in a single suborder Charadrii, but this has turned out to be a "wastebasket taxon", uniting no less than four charadriiform lineages in a paraphyletic assemblage. However, it indicated that the plains wanderer belonged into one of them. Following recent studies, the waders may be more subdivided as follows: Suborder Scolopaci Family Scolopacidae: snipe, sandpipers and allies Suborder Thinocori Family Rostratulidae: painted snipe Family Jacanidae: jacanas Family Thinocoridae: seedsnipe Family Pedionomidae: plains wanderer Suborder Chionidi Family Burhinidae: thick-knees Family Chionididae: sheathbills Family Pluvianellidae: Magellanic plover Suborder Charadrii Family Ibidorhynchidae: ibisbill Family Recurvirostridae: avocets and stilts Family Haematopodidae: oystercatchers Family Charadriidae: plovers and lapwingsIn keeping more in line with the traditional grouping, the Thinocori could be included in the Scolopaci, the Chionidi in the Charadrii.
However, the increasing knowledge about the early evolutionary history of modern birds suggests that the assumption of Paton et al. and Thomas et al. of 4 distinct "wader" lineages being present around the Cretaceous–Paleogene boundary is correct. Shorebirds is a blanket term used to refer to multiple species of birds that live in wet, coastal environments; because most these species spend much of their time near bodies of water, many have long legs suitable for wading. Some species prefer locations with rocks or mud. Many shorebirds display migratory patterns and migrate before breeding season; these behaviors explain the long wing lengths observed in species, can account for the efficient metabolisms that give the birds energy during long migrations. The majority of species eat. Different lengths of bills enable different species to feed in the same habitat on the coast, without direct competition for food. Many waders have sensitive nerve endings at the end of their bills which enable them to detect prey items hidden in mud or soft soil.
Some larger species those adapted to drier habitats will take larger prey including insects and small reptiles. Shorebirds, like many other animals, exhibit phenotypic differences between males and females known as sexual dimorphism. In shorebirds, various sexual dimorphisms are seen, but not limited to, size and agility. In polygynous species, where one male individual mates with multiple female partners over his lifetime, dimorphisms tend to be more diverse. In monogamous species, where male individuals mate with a single female partner, males do not have distinctive dimorphic characteristics such as colored feathers, but they still tend to be larger in size compared to females; the suborder of Charadrii displays the widest range of sexual dimorphisms seen in the Charadriiformes order. However, cases of sexual monomorphism, where there are no distinguishing physical features besides external genitalia, are seen in this order. One of the biggest factors that leads to the development of sexual dimorphism in shorebirds is sexual selection.
Males with ideal characteristics favored by females are more to reproduce and pass on their genetic information to their offspring better than the males who lack such characteristics. Mentioned earlier, male shorebirds are larger in size compared to their female counterparts. Competition between males tends to lead to sexual selection toward larger males and as a result, an increase in dimorphism. Bigger males tend to have greater access to female mates because their larger size aids them in defeating other competitors. If the species exhibits gender role reversal males will select female mates based on traits that are the most appealing. In the Jacana species, fe
Cabrillo National Monument
Cabrillo National Monument is at the southern tip of the Point Loma Peninsula in San Diego, United States. It commemorates the landing of Juan Rodríguez Cabrillo at San Diego Bay on September 28, 1542; this event marked the first time a European expedition had set foot on what became the West Coast of the United States. The site was designated as California Historical Landmark #56 in 1932; as with all historical units of the National Park Service, Cabrillo was listed on the National Register of Historic Places on October 15, 1966. The annual Cabrillo Festival Open House is held on a Sunday each October, it commemorates Cabrillo with a reenactment of his landing at Ballast Point, in San Diego Bay. Other events are held above at the National Monument and include Kumeyaay and Mexican singing and dancing, booths with period and regional food, a historical reenactment of a 16th-century encampment, children's activities; the park offers a view of San Diego's harbor and skyline, as well as Coronado and Naval Air Station North Island.
On clear days, a wide expanse of the Pacific Ocean and Mexico's Coronado Islands are visible. A visitor center has exhibits about the expedition; the Old Point Loma Lighthouse is the highest point in the park and has been a San Diego icon since 1855. The lighthouse was closed in 1891, a new one opened at a lower elevation, because fog and low clouds obscured the light at its location 129 meters above sea level; the old lighthouse is now a museum, visitors may enter it and view some of the living areas. The area encompassed by the national monument includes various former military installations, such as coastal artillery batteries, built to protect the harbor of San Diego from enemy warships. Many of these installations can be seen while walking around the area. A former army building hosts an exhibit; the area near the national monument entrance was used for gliding activities in 1929-1935. Several soaring endurance records were established here by William Hawley Bowlus and others including the first 1-hour flight in a sailplane, a 15-hour flight in 1930 which surpassed the world record for soaring endurance.
Charles Lindbergh soared in a Bowlus sailplane along the cliffs of Point Loma in 1930. Markers for these accomplishments can be found near the entrance, the site is recognized as a National Soaring Landmark by the National Soaring Museum. On October 14, 1913, by presidential proclamation, Woodrow Wilson reserved 0.5 acres of Fort Rosecrans for "The Order of Panama... to construct a heroic statue of Juan Rodriguez Cabrillo." By 1926 no statue had been placed and the Order of Panama was defunct, so Calvin Coolidge authorized the Native Sons of the Golden West to erect a suitable monument, but they were unable to carry out the commission. A major renovation of the half-acre monument was undertaken in 1935. In 1939 the Portuguese government commissioned a heroic statue of Cabrillo and donated it to the United States; the sandstone statue, executed by sculptor Alvaro de Bree, weighs 14,000 pounds. The statue was intended for the Golden Gate International Exposition in San Francisco but arrived too late and was stored in an Oakland, California garage.
Then-State Senator Ed Fletcher managed to obtain the statue in 1940 over the objections of Bay Area officials and shipped it to San Diego. It was stored for several years on the grounds of the Naval Training Center San Diego, out of public view, was installed at Cabrillo Monument in 1949; the sandstone statue suffered severe weathering because of its exposed position and was replaced in 1988 by a replica made of limestone. Cabrillo Monument was off-limits to the public during World War II because the entire south end of the Point Loma Peninsula was reserved for military purposes. Following the war the area of the national monument was enlarged by Presidents Eisenhower and Ford, it includes more than 140 acres. Despite factors such as the toxicity of the San Diego Harbor, over-harvesting of native species, large-scale developments for the 3.1 million residents of the San Diego-Carlsbad Metropolitan Area, the introduction of exotic and harmful species to the area, there is still a vast array of flora and fauna that inhabit the Monument area.
One of the most thriving and diverse animal communities of Cabrillo National Monument is located in the intertidal zone and tide pools. The species that live in the tide pools include coralline algae, true limpets, acorn barnacles, goose neck barnacles, rock louse, sea lettuce, kelp fly, pink thatched barnacles, encrusting algae, mussels, dead man's fingers, sea bubbles, unicorn snail, Tegula top snails, aggregating anemone, sandcastle worms, hermit crabs, wavy turban snails, keyhole limpet, brittle star, surfgrass limpet, kelp crab, sea hare, bat star, knobby blue star, sea urchin, sargassum weed, feather boa kelp, chestnut cowry, sea palm, ruddy turnstone, lined shore crab; the Monument advises that the best time to see the tide pools is in the late fall or winter, when tides are rated at negative one or lower during daylight hours. In the winter (December
Pinnacles National Park
Pinnacles National Park is an American national park protecting a mountainous area located east of the Salinas Valley in Central California, about five miles east of Soledad and 80 miles southeast of San Jose. The park's namesakes are the eroded leftovers of the western half of an extinct volcano that has moved 200 miles from its original location on the San Andreas Fault, embedded in a portion of the California Pacific Coast Ranges. Pinnacles is managed by the National Park Service and the majority of the park is protected as wilderness; the national park is divided by the rock formations into East and West Divisions, connected by foot trails. The east side has shade and water, the west has high walls; the rock formations provide for spectacular pinnacles. The park features unusual talus caves. Pinnacles is most visited in spring or fall because of the intense heat during the summer. Park lands are prime habitat for prairie falcons, are a release site for California condors that have been hatched in captivity.
Pinnacles was established as a national monument in 1908 by President Theodore Roosevelt, was redesignated as a national park by Congressional legislation in 2012, signed into law by President Barack Obama on January 10, 2013. Native Americans in the Pinnacles region comprised the Chalon and Mutsun groups of the Ohlone people, who left stone artifacts in the park; these native people declined with the arrival of the Spanish in the 18th century, who brought novel diseases and changes to the natives' way of life. The establishment of a Spanish mission at Soledad hastened the area's native depopulation through disease and dispersion. Archaeological surveys have found 13 sites inhabited by Native Americans, 12 of which antedate the establishment of the missions. One site is believed to be about 2000 years old; the last Chalon had died or departed from the area by 1810. From 1810 to 1865, when the first Anglo-American settlers arrived, the Pinnacles region was a wilderness without human use or habitation.
By the 1880s the Pinnacles known as the Palisades, were visited by picnickers from the surrounding communities who would explore the caves and camp. The first account of the Pinnacles region appeared in print in 1881. Between 1889 and 1891, newspaper articles shifted from describing excursions to the "Palisades" to calling them the "Pinnacles". Interest in the area rose to the point that the Hollister Free Lance sent a reporter to the Pinnacles, followed two months by a party of local officials. Investors came from San Francisco to consider placing a resort hotel there, but the speculation came to nothing. In 1894, a post office was established in Bear Valley. Schuyler Hain was the postmaster. Since at least one other Bear Valley was in California, the post office was named "Cook" after Mrs. Hain's maiden name. In 1924, the post office was renamed "Pinnacles". Schuyler Hain was a homesteader who arrived in the Pinnacles area in 1891 from Michigan, following his parents and eight siblings to Bear Valley.
His cousin, A. W. White, was a student at Stanford University, White brought G. K. Gilbert, one of his professors, to see the Pinnacles in 1893. Dr. Gilbert was impressed by the scenery, his comments inspired Hain to publicize the region. Hain led tours through the caves, advocating the preservation of the Pinnacles. Hain's efforts resulted in a 1904 visit by Stanford president David Starr Jordan, who contacted Fresno Congressman James C. Needham. Jordan and Needham, in turn, influenced Gifford Pinchot to advocate the establishment of the Pinnacles Forest Reserve to President Theodore Roosevelt, who proclaimed the establishment on July 8, 1906. Pinchot, interested in the management of forests for productive use rather than for preservation, advocated the use of the passed Antiquities Act to designate the scenic core of the area as Pinnacles National Monument, done by Roosevelt on January 16, 1908; this designation nominally passed control of the Pinnacles from the Department of Agriculture to the Department of the Interior, but the U.
S. Forest Service retained effective control of the area until circa 1911. In his efforts to promote the Pinnacles, Hain became convinced that the Pinnacles were an "extraordinary mountain" described by Captain George Vancouver and pictured by John Sykes in his book Voyage of Discovery, which documented the Vancouver Expedition. Hain began to refer to the mountain as "Vancouver's Pinnacles", a term, picked up by Sunset in a 1903 article. References to "Vancouver's Pinnacles" persisted until 1955, when analysis of the Sykes picture indicated that the mountain described by Vancouver was located near Fort Ord, within easy reach of the day trip described by Vancouver. First set aside as part of the Pinnacles Forest Reserve in 1906, Pinnacles has had several different federal management agencies, ranging from the U. S. Forest Service to the General Land Office and to the National Park Service. In 1908 President Theodore Roosevelt created Pinnacles National Monument with the power given him in the Antiquities Act of 1906.
The initial area designated under the Antiquities Act was 2,080 acres. The Forest Service relinquished control of the monument circa 1911, but no operating agency yet existed to receive it. No drivable roads existed into the park from communities like Hollister. Hollister boosters campaigned for federal funds for road-building. Congressman Everis A. Hayes made a trip into the Pinnacles in 1913 as part of the campaign for road funds. By 1914, primitive roads extended to Bear Valley; the National Park Service was fina
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