YosemiteNational

Park

Location

• Yosemite National Park lies in the central Sierra Nevada Mountains.

• It is about 150 miles east of San Francisco.

Location

Visiting Yosemite National Park

• Over 3.5 million people visit Yosemite National Park each year.

• There is $20 per car fee to enter the park.• This fee is good for unlimited entry for 7 days.

Geological Formation• Yosemite Valley was formed when the Sierra Nevada

Mountains were thrust from the ocean’s floor about 500 million years ago.

• The Merced River has cut canyons as it has flowed west through the Yosemite region.

• Glaciers cut even deeper and also widened the canyons. • When the glaciers thawed, parts of the canyons broke off,

leaving sheered cliffs. Creeks and rivers flow over these sheers, making beautiful waterfalls like Yosemite Falls.

• Sediment from tributary rivers and creeks eventually filled in Yosemite Lake, producing Yosemite Valley.

The Merced River begins in Yosemite National Park and flows west across central California.

The Tuolumne River begins north of the Merced River, flows west across Yosemite, and through the San Joaquin Valley.

Merced River Tuolumne River

Human InhabitantsThe First Inhabitants:The Awaneechee Indians

Gold Miners take over in 1851

Types of Environments in Yosemite

• The park has an elevation range from 2,000 to 13,123 feet and contains five major vegetation zones: chaparral/oak woodland, lower montane, upper montane, subalpine and alpine.

Unique Soil Types Yield Rare Plant Species

• Three-bract Onion• Species Threatened by vehicles• Chaparral or lower montane habitat Allium tribracteatum

• Slender stemmed monkeyflower• Lower montane coniferous forest • often in burned or disturbed areas • Slender stemmed monkeyflower• Threatened by logging and invasive species

Mimulus gracilipes

The Beginning of Yosemite National Park

In 1864, Abraham Lincoln signed the Yosemite Grant to set aside Yosemite Valley and the Mariposa Grove of Redwoods as a state of California supervised public reserve.

1n 1890, John Muir and Robert Underwood Johnson, editor of Century magazine, persuaded Congress into preserving the highlands of Yosemite as a national park. They wanted to protect the highlands from grazing and timber harvesting.

John Muir and a park ranger at Yosemite.

John Muir and Teddy Roosevelt in 1903 at Glacier Point in Yosemite National Park. Both men were

instrumental in the establishment of the National Parks System to which Yosemite belongs.

Yosemite NationalPark occupies roughly761,260 acres.

Fire Management in Yosemite• Fires were suppressed for

many years.• A “let burn” policy and

prescribed burning are used these days.

• Forest fires help clear dead vegetation, expose mineral soil, open up canopy for sunlight to reach ground, recycle nutrients, and help control disease.

• Evidence of a fire started by lightning in 1990 is still visible.

Animal Management in Yosemite• There are 300 species of

vertebrates in the borders of Yosemite National Park.

• 85 are native species.

• Black bears have required the most management.

• Incidents involving bears and humans have decreased 90% in recent years.

Other Animals• 9 of 17 species of bats

native to Yosemite are on the Federal or California Species of Concern List.

• Great gray owls live in an isolated population in Yosemite. The next nearest population is hundreds of miles away.

Other Rare Animals in Yosemite

• Willow flycatcher wolverine

• Sierra Nevada red fox

Features of Yosemite

Yosemite Falls Merced River falls over a sheer; then it flows across the Yosemite Valley.

Yosemite Valley

The destination of most visitors

Half Dome

Mariposa Groove of Giant Redwoods

Get soaked by the mist as you walk along Mist Trail toward Vernal Fall of the Merced River.