Organ Needle is the highest point of the
Organ Mountains
The Organ Mountains (also known as La Sierra de los Órganos) are a rugged mountain range in southern New Mexico in the Southwestern United States. Organ Mountains–Desert Peaks National Monument was declared a national monument on May 21, 2 ...
in the south-central part of the
U.S. state
In the United States, a state is a constituent political entity, of which there are 50. Bound together in a political union, each state holds governmental jurisdiction over a separate and defined geographic territory where it shares its sove ...
of
New Mexico
)
, population_demonym = New Mexican ( es, Neomexicano, Neomejicano, Nuevo Mexicano)
, seat = Santa Fe
, LargestCity = Albuquerque
, LargestMetro = Tiguex
, OfficialLang = None
, Languages = English, Spanish ( New Mexican), Navajo, Ke ...
. It lies in
Doña Ana County
Don (; ; pt, Dom, links=no ; all from Latin ', roughly 'Lord'), abbreviated as D., is an honorific prefix primarily used in Spain and Hispanic America, and with different connotations also in Italy, Portugal and its former colonies, and Croatia ...
, east-northeast of
Las Cruces and southwest of
White Sands, headquarters of the
White Sands Missile Range
White Sands Missile Range (WSMR) is a United States Army military testing area and firing range located in the US state of New Mexico. The range was originally established as the White Sands Proving Ground on 9July 1945. White Sands National P ...
. It is at the southeast end of a narrow ridge of vertically jointed
granite
Granite () is a coarse-grained ( phaneritic) intrusive igneous rock composed mostly of quartz, alkali feldspar, and plagioclase. It forms from magma with a high content of silica and alkali metal oxides that slowly cools and solidifies under ...
(more specifically,
quartz monzonite
Quartz monzonite is an intrusive, felsic, igneous rock that has an approximately equal proportion of orthoclase and plagioclase feldspars. It is typically a light colored phaneritic (coarse-grained) to porphyritic granitic rock. The plagiocl ...
) called The Needles.
Organ Needle is one of the most dramatic peaks in the state. True to its name, it is a steep, pointed summit. Moreover, it rises above the edge of the
Tularosa Basin
The Tularosa Basin is a graben basin in the Basin and Range Province and within the Chihuahuan Desert, east of the Rio Grande in southern New Mexico and West Texas, in the Southwestern United States.
Geography
The Tularosa Basin is located prim ...
to the northeast in only , and above Las Cruces, giving it as large and as steep a degree of local relief as any peak in the state, including
Big Hatchet Peak,
Sandia Crest
Sandia Crest, also known locally as Sandia Peak or simply as the Crest, is a mountain ridge that, at , is the highpoint of the Sandia–Manzano Mountains, and is located in the Sandia Mountains of Bernalillo County, New Mexico, United States ...
, and
Shiprock
Shiprock ( nv, , "rock with wings" or "winged rock") is a monadnock rising nearly above the high-desert plain of the Navajo Nation in San Juan County, New Mexico, United States. Its peak elevation is above sea level. It is about southwest ...
.
Climbing Organ Needle involves tricky route-finding, a vertical gain of about and a difficult
scramble
Scramble, Scrambled, or Scrambling may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Games
* ''Scramble'' (video game), a 1981 arcade game
Music Albums
* ''Scramble'' (album), an album by Atlanta-based band the Coathangers
* ''Scrambles'' (album)
...
().
References
Mountains of New Mexico
Landforms of Doña Ana County, New Mexico
Organ Mountains–Desert Peaks National Monument
Mountains of Doña Ana County, New Mexico
{{NewMexico-geo-stub