Joshua Tree National Park

East of San Bernardino and Los Angeles and north of Palm Springs is the Joshua Tree National Park, a U.S. national park. Joshua trees (Yucca brevifolia), indigenous to the Mojave Desert, are the derivation of the name. When the California Desert Protection and Conservation Act was passed by the US Congress in 1994, Joshua Tree, which was initially designated a national monument in 1936, was redefined as a national park.   consisting of 795,156 acres in total (1,242.4 sq mi; 3,217.9 km2)   marginally bigger than the state of Rhode Island.The designated wilderness area in the park covers 429,690 acres (671.4 sq mi; 1,738.9 km2). The Mojave Desert, which is higher, and the Colorado Desert, which is lower, are two desert ecosystems whose traits are mostly determined by elevation. The park spans San Bernardino and Riverside Counties and contains portions of both deserts. The southwest corner of the park is bordered by the Little San Bernardino Mountains.

Early History

The Pinto Culture people, who lived and hunted in this area between 8000 and 4000 BCE, are the earliest known occupants of the territory in and surrounding what is now Joshua Tree National Park. They are thought to have hunted wildlife and picked seasonal plants based on the stone tools and spear points that have been found in the Pinto Basin in the 1930s. Nevertheless, nothing else is known about them. The Serrano, Cahuilla, and Chemehuevi peoples finally settled there. The Oasis of Mara in what non-aboriginals eventually called Twentynine Palms was one of the little communities where all three occasionally resided. They used other plants for creating medicines, bows, arrows, baskets, and other items, of daily life in addition to small game, amphibians, and reptiles, to supplement their predominantly tree diet. [..]Source https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joshua_Tree_National_Park#History

Links

• Post-1870
• Protection
• Geography
• Recreation
• Astronomy
• Wildlife
• Further Reading

Snipped

Joshua Tree at night -Sunchaser-Flickr

References

• Page reference: Joshua Tree National Park. (2023, March 5). In Wikipedia. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joshua_Tree_National_Park
• Image Joshua Tree at night:www.google.com. (n.d.). joshua tree at night – Google Search. [online] Available at: https://www.google.com/search?q=joshua+tree+at+night&tbm=isch&hl=en&chips=q:joshua+tree+night [Accessed 6 Mar. 2023].
• Image Joshua Tree at Night Sunchaser Pictures (2014). jtreeruins4. [online] Flickr. Available at: https://www.flickr.com/photos/50014474@N05/12277822316/ [Accessed 6 Mar. 2023].