Several kinds of bats and many small birds and insects live in this area, too.īack thousands of years before the volcanic eruption until just after the ice age ended, prehistoric humans sheltered here. Few places where we have hiked have had so much displayed information about local vegetation.Īlthough it seems impossible to people of our world today, prehistoric people were able to live here, discover which plants provided food and fiber, and hunt the small animals that have survived in their habitat here. Some gray-green four-winged salt bushes are here, along with Apache plume, little-leaf sumac and one-seed juniper. Another plant that has made it here is algerita, with its small hollylike leaves. Weathered lava particles and dust blown into the cracks in the lava have created soil where the plants' seeds can germinate. Prickly pear cacti and banana yucca are throughout the area, as are creosote, mesquite, sotol and hedgehog cactus along with walking stick cholla. In other places we saw pressure ridges - large cracks where the lava surface cooled and hardened while the hot flow continued beneath the surface, pushing against the hardened area above and making it crack.ĭetermined plants have been able to grow in this forbidding black lava. Collapsed areas of jagged pieces of lava were visible throughout and are called "a'a." Ropey-looking lava flows are called "pahoehoe." Large holes in places throughout the black crust are where gas bubbles in the hot surface burst during the cooling period. ![]() Many different kinds of lava formations are given Hawaiian names since Hawaii has many similar volcanic eruptions and lava types that have already been named. We found a sighting tube pointing to Little Black Peak miles away to the north, which was likely the last vent to open in this area and is higher than the rest of the black lava. Surprises await visitors in spring, when many desert plants bloom in a variety of colors. A brochure explains what to watch for to enhance the learning experience of identifying the plants native to the unusual landscape of the high Chihuahuan Desert. An accessible paved walkway is mostly level, and the desert plants are identified. Also here is a well-planned, informative, easy hike. The landscape in this part of New Mexico is dotted with green, healthy desert vegetation. Helens in 1980, which left no surface lava flow but is building a lava dome instead. This occurred from 2,000 to 5,000 years ago, and it remains the newest volcanic eruption in the continental United States, except for Mount St. ![]() When we reached the Carrizozo Lava Flow, we found a landscape of 44 square miles of black lava deposited from extrusions in the earth's thin crust when the hot lava pushed through these cracks and flowed over the land, then cooled and solidified. We knew that brown signs always indicate parks, museums and other points of interest, historic importance and great recreation, so that's where we went. ![]() Highway 380, but in Tularosa we saw brown signs pointing to the Valley of Fires Recreation Area. We had never heard of Carrizozo, New Mexico, a town of only 760 people on U.S. ![]() A few campsites in some of these places can be reserved, but most are on a first-come, first-served basis. Valley of Fires Recreation Area is part of the Bureau of Land Management - protected lands where ranchers are allowed to graze their animals and people are allowed to hunt, fish, camp, hike and picnic if they respect and care for the cleanliness and safety of the land, which no individual owns. On a recent RV trip across the United States, we discovered places of which we had never heard that turned out to be real finds.
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