Old Woman Mountains
Map SatelliteOne of the high ranges on the Mojave block, this is an area of spectacular granitic formations. The rocks include Pre-Cambrian granitics and gneisses as well as other igneous and metamorphics, with an intrusion of pre-Cenozoic granitics in the middle portion of the range.
Several plant communities are found in the mountains, including the creosote bush scrub in which blackbush, Coleogyne ramosissima, and Mexican tea, Ephedra sp., are common. Higher up the slopes, above 1,200 meters (4,000 feet), there is a rather sparse pinyon-juniper woodland with pinyon, Pinus monophylla, and Utah juniper, Juniperus osteosperma. The woodland has a relatively high concentration of shrubs. Here, the pinyon woodland begins at an elevation several hundred meters lower than it does in the mountains 200 kilometers (125 miles) further north.
A number of desert and desert-mountain animal species are present, including the Mojave rattlesnake, Crotalus scutulatus, desert tortoise, Gopherus agassizi, chuckwalla, Sauromalus obesus, bighorn, Ovis canadensis, and mountain lion, Felis concolor.
Immediately to the north of the mountains the wash contains Miocene mammalian fossils. There are sites of archaeological interest in the area.
Integrity: Numerous mines, some jeep trails and a few buildings are scattered through the mountains; otherwise the area is virtually undisturbed.
Use: Research, educational, observational, Some private.
December 1976
Inventory of California Natural Areas
Revision © 2009 Steven Louis Hartman