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FEDERATION OF WESTERN OUTDOOR CLUBS







No. 35

BLACK CANYON WILDERNESS PROPOSAL
            




The Black Canyon Wilderness study area (WSA) of the Bureau of Land Management, Idaho Falls District, possesses a splendid combination of scenery, isolation, wildlife, and archaeology.  The landscape of this WSA, which is located at the boundary of the upper Snake River plain and Idaho's Lemhi Range, was created by enormous thrust faults and subsequent erosion of the near-vertical limestone strata.  Five major canyons, thousand of jagged spires, and hundreds of small caves are found within the 5400 acres.  As well as providing dens for mammalian predators, these outcroppings and solution cavities support an unusually high density of raptors including eagles, falcons, kestrels, hawks, and owls.


The greatest contribution of Black Canyon to the national wilderness system would be archaeological.  For at least 12,000 years, tribal groups have periodically dwelled in the caves and hunted the diverse game species that thrived on the adjacent lakes.  These prehistoric inhabitants left behind hundreds of pictographs -- symbolic paintings -- as evidence of their continued presence at this juncture of two major valleys and three rivers.  The tremendous density of occupation sites indicates that a permanent cultural center may have been formed here by tribes thought to be purely nomadic.  Although the BLM has withdrawn this WSA from mineral entry, confirmation of the archaeological significance is being compromised by pictograph desecration and large scale looting of artifacts by the public in violation of the 1972 Antiquities Act.
              

The cultural resource, educational, and wildlife values of Black Canyon are clearly deserving of preservation.  Be it resolved that the Federation of Western Outdoor Clubs endorse Black Canyon for a wilderness recommendation by the Bureau of Land Management.


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