What's Out There?
History
The cultural history of the Boundary Peak Wilderness within the White Mountains is steeped in antiquity. The rare high-altitude indigenous presence is as storied as its’ bristlecone pines. Well-built dwellings dot the uppermost ridgeline and peaks of the White Mountains accompanied by extensive chipped, or knapped and ground stone artifacts. Remnants of a rare ancient culture of hunters and gatherers who called these mountains home for countless centuries. These settlements were seasonally inhabited. Hunters pursued bighorn sheep and gatherers collected medicinal, and edible plants. These settlements are exceptionally rare and fit outside the assumptions made for many decades by anthropologists who had previously relied upon predictable adaptive responses of aboriginal Great Basin peoples, assuming they were incapable of inhabiting such high altitudes. Scientific discovery of these settlements demonstrated that their assumptions are invalid. In later years when Euro-American explorers and prospectors filtered into the area (as described by Frederick Hodge, 1907-1910) the Tohaktivi, a Paviotso (Northern Paiute) tribe, inhabited the White Mountains from the southernmost portions near the head of the Owens River (Cal. Powell, 1881) as far north as Boundary Peak.
Natural History
Wildlife: Blue Grouse, Wolverine (possibly locally extirpated), Western Pipistrelle, Mountain Bluebird, Western Spotted Skunk, Coyote, Desert Horned Lizard, Cassin
At the lower elevations of Boundary Peak Wilderness, you might be lucky to witness the echoing calls of the Pinion Jay. The boisterous cacophony of calls from flocks of these birds drift on the wind from distant canyons announcing the care they have for their young. When these large flocks are spotted, they are almost all young birds which are accompanied by a few adult babysitters. They constantly call to inform their foraging parents of their location and well-being. This species of jay fly in large flocks adding a splash of blue to the green pinyon juniper forest above other species that depend on this ecological zone. One such species is the pinyon mouse (Peromyscus truei) which make fast work of short days during the fleeting summer season foraging for berries, pine nuts, grass seeds, insects, and small spiders and caring for their offspring.
As you travel into higher elevations of this wilderness, you might encounter the robust, aggressive Accipiter, the Northern Goshawk. Like a silent, gunmetal blue-grey ghost they stalk through canyons low to the ground in search of birds, reptiles, and small mammals. Golden Eagles ride thermals, below and above, they hang silently on forceful, perpetual winds washing over the rocky craig bastion homes of regal bighorn sheep rams and sculpting the wilderness’s oldest citizens, the bristlecone pines.
Trees
The Boundary Peak Wilderness’ ancient bristlecone pine forests are one of the most remarkable and worthwhile natural wonders Nevada has to offer. These trees are the oldest known living things on Earth and have witnessed between 105,000 and 175,000 generations of indigenous peoples living and worshiping in the area, their transition from the atlatl to the bow and arrow, the coming and going of the first European settlers and prospectors, and eventually their own congressional protection within the boundary of this wilderness. These ancient trees begin their lives densely clad with glistening needle-covered branches that sway like foxtail grass florescence in the wind. The sapling trees’ youthful bristled cones drip fresh pitch onto their shale surroundings during the fleeting warm sunny days of late summer. Through the ensuing centuries, the wind and winter conditions contort and sculpt these trees into naturally crafted gargoyles standing silent vigil over both their coveted wilderness and time itself. As many centuries come and go these ancient trees are reduced to a thin ribbon of living bark. After another few centuries they are brought to a tragic, though natural end. Their sculpted wooden trunks remain as elegant ghosts, wind-blown and resolute for a few more centuries until time and exposure erode them back into the dry, shale-clad earth from which they sprouted 5,000 years prior.