Joshua Tree
A US National Park protecting two desert ecosystems.
Last updated
via Wikipedia: Joshua Tree National Park · see source
Where it is
Coordinates: 34°06′00″N 116°16′12″W (34.1000, -116.2700) · Open in OpenStreetMap
Coordinates and connected clubs: the infobox of Wikipedia: Joshua Tree National Park (CC BY-SA 4.0). Map: drawn by Codexery from OpenStreetMap tiles.
It is named for the endemic Joshua tree (Yucca brevifolia) and lies about 130 miles east of Los Angeles.[1] The park encompasses 795,156 acres, including 429,690 acres of designated wilderness.[2]
Last updated 2026-10-01 from the source article.
Geography and history
The park straddles two deserts: the higher Mojave Desert and the lower Colorado Desert.[3] The earliest known inhabitants were the Pinto Culture people, who lived there between 8000 and 4000 BCE.[4] President Franklin D. Roosevelt established Joshua Tree National Monument on August 10, 1936, protecting about 825,000 acres.[5] The park's oldest rocks, including Pinto Gneiss, are 1.7 billion years old.[6]
The park's southwest border is defined by the Little San Bernardino Mountains.[3] The Serrano, Cahuilla, and Chemehuevi peoples were later inhabitants who established small villages near water sources, including the Oasis of Mara.[4][7] The California Desert Protection Act, passed by the U.S. Congress in 1994, changed the monument's status to a national park on October 31 of that year.[1][5] The mountain ranges in the park were created by compression and uplift of crustal material from tectonic forces along the San Andreas Fault system.[6]
What the cited sources add
Under the highest emissions scenario, the park's average annual temperature could increase by 8 °F by 2099.[8] The Lost Horse Mine produced more than 10,000 ounces of gold and 16,000 ounces of silver between 1894 and 1931.[9] Data from the NPS climate change page indicates that between 1895 and 2016, the park experienced a 39 percent decrease in annual precipitation and a 3 °F rise in average temperature.[8]
References
- Wikipedia, "Joshua Tree National Park" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "Proclamation 2193: Joshua Tree National Monument, California, lands set apart.", 1936-08-10 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Joshua Tree National Park" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Land Resources Division, "National Park Service Listing of Acreage (summary)", National Park Service, December 31, 2016 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Joshua Tree National Park" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "A Desert Park", National Park Service (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Joshua Tree National Park" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: "Pinto Culture", National Park Service, February 28, 2015; "Pinto Culture", National Park Service, February 28, 2015 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Joshua Tree National Park" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Netburn, "How a South Pasadena matron used her wits and wealth to create Joshua Tree National Park", Los Angeles Times, February 14, 2019; Zarki 2015, p. 75–76; Zarki 2015, p. 75–76; "Park History", Joshua Tree National Park, NPS; Emerson, "Joshua Tree to expand and 716,000 acres gain protection as Trump signs lands package", The San Bernardino Sun, March 12, 2019; Rogers, "Trump signs largest wilderness protection bill in a decade", The Mercury News, March 12, 2019 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Joshua Tree National Park" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Dilsaver 2015, p. 28–29 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Wikipedia, "Joshua Tree National Park" (CC BY-SA 4.0), which cites: Hunter, "American Indians", National Park Service, March 22, 2016 (original not read by us) en.wikipedia.org
- Palms, "Climate Change - Joshua Tree National Park (U.S. National Park Service)", www.nps.gov. facts only, no text reused. nps.gov
- Spoo, "Lost Horse Mine", National Park Service, February 28, 2015. facts only, no text reused. nps.gov
Each numbered sentence above was checked against the source it cites before publication. Sentences citing Wikipedia adapt text from the English Wikipedia article Joshua Tree National Park (contributors), used under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is available under the same licence. Other sources were used for facts only; no text or images are copied from them.
More in US National Parks
Sources
Compiled from Wikipedia and the sources listed below. Text from Wikipedia is available under CC BY-SA 4.0; this entry is adapted from it.
- Wikipedia: Joshua Tree National Park (CC BY-SA 4.0).
- Word definitions: the Codexery glossary, each quoted from its Wikipedia article.
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