Providence Mountains State Recreation Area
The Providence Mountains State Recreation Area is located in the Providence Mountains, within the Mojave National Preserve in San Bernardino County, California. It is also home to the Mitchell Caverns Natural Preserve.
Geography
The Recreation Area is located on the east side of the Providence Mountain range and has dramatic views of the surrounding Mojave Desert.On approaching the Providence Mountains State Recreation Area one can see layers of tilted grey rock that are ancient limestone formed during the Paleozoic Era. The base elevation of the park is 4,300 feet with the Providence Mountains reaching 7,162 feet on Edgar Peak.
Flora
Vegetation on the lower parts of the mountains is xeric shrublands scrub habitat, composed of creosote bush, California barrel cactus, and Mojave yucca.The habitat dramatically shifts with elevations above 4000 feet to a sky island where numerous animals and plants flourish in the added moisture caught by the mountains. The plant habitat includes forests of single-leaf pinyon and California juniper, and remnant chaparral and woodlands with oaks and manzanita in these higher parts of the mountains.
Mitchell Caverns is home to two endemic species of insects found nowhere else.