The Animas Mountains are a small mountain range in Hidalgo County, within the " Boot-Heel" region of far southwestern

New Mexico New Mexico is a state in the Southwestern United States, Southwestern region of the United States. It is one of the Mountain States of the southern Rocky Mountains, sharing the Four Corners region with Utah, Colorado, and Arizona. It also ...

, in the

United States The United States of America (USA), also known as the United States (U.S.) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It is a federal republic of 50 U.S. state, states and a federal capital district, Washington, D.C. The 48 ...

Location

They extend north–south for about 30 miles (50 km) along the

Continental Divide A continental divide is a drainage divide on a continent such that the drainage basin on one side of the divide feeds into one ocean or sea, and the basin on the other side either feeds into a different ocean or sea, or else is endorheic, not ...

,Since both of the neighboring valleys are closed drainage basins, the designation of the Continental Divide in this region is somewhat arbitrary. from near the town of Animas to a few miles north of the border with

Mexico Mexico, officially the United Mexican States, is a country in North America. It is the northernmost country in Latin America, and borders the United States to the north, and Guatemala and Belize to the southeast; while having maritime boundar ...

. The range is about 12 miles (20 km) wide at its widest. The highest point of the range is the southern summit of the mile-long Animas Peak massif, . (Animas Peak itself is the slightly lower north summit, 8,531 ft/2,600 m.) The Animas Mountains lie between the Animas Valley on the west and the Playas Valley on the east. Nearby ranges include the

Peloncillo Mountains (Hidalgo County) The Peloncillo Mountains of Hidalgo County, (Spanish language ''pelo'', hair, ''pelón'', hairless, bald; ''peloncillo'', Little Baldy), is a major long mountain range southwest of New Mexico's Hidalgo County, and also part of the New Mexico Bo ...

, across the Animas Valley, and the Big Hatchet and Little Hatchet Mountains, across the Playas Valley. Butterfield, Mike, and Greene, Peter, ''Mike Butterfield's Guide to the Mountains of New Mexico'', New Mexico Magazine Press, 2006,

Geography

Physiographically, the range divides into two parts. The compact southern part, which includes Animas Peak, is higher and wider, rising up to above the nearby valleys. It has a sky island character, with dense

conifer Conifers () are a group of conifer cone, cone-bearing Spermatophyte, seed plants, a subset of gymnosperms. Scientifically, they make up the phylum, division Pinophyta (), also known as Coniferophyta () or Coniferae. The division contains a sin ...

ous forests at the higher elevations.Animas Mountains at the New Mexico Audubon Society
The longer, narrow northern portion is lower, reaching only at Gillespie Peak, and is characterized by grassland and piñon-

juniper Junipers are coniferous trees and shrubs in the genus ''Juniperus'' ( ) of the cypress family Cupressaceae. Depending on the taxonomy, between 50 and 67 species of junipers are widely distributed throughout the Northern Hemisphere as far south ...

woods and shrubs. The Animas Mountains lie near the Chihuahuan Desert, the

Sonoran Desert The Sonoran Desert () is a hot desert and ecoregion in North America that covers the northwestern Mexican states of Sonora, Baja California, and Baja California Sur, as well as part of the Southwestern United States (in Arizona and California). It ...

, the

Sierra Madre Occidental The Sierra Madre Occidental is a major mountain range system of the North American Cordillera, that runs northwest–southeast through northwestern and western Mexico, and along the Gulf of California. The Sierra Madre is part of the American C ...

of Mexico, and the mountains surrounding the headwaters of the

Gila River The Gila River (; O'odham ima Keli Akimel or simply Akimel, Quechan: Haa Siʼil, Maricopa language: Xiil) is a tributary of the Colorado River flowing through New Mexico and Arizona in the United States. The river drains an arid watershed of ...

. Biotic influences from these regions, as well as the more distant

Rocky Mountains The Rocky Mountains, also known as the Rockies, are a major mountain range and the largest mountain system in North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch in great-circle distance, straight-line distance from the northernmost part of Western Can ...

, give the southern portion of the range a great diversity of species, including "approximately 130 species of birds, 60 species of mammals, and 40 species of reptiles."

History and current management

Most of the range is encompassed in the ''Diamond A Ranch'' (formerly the ''Gray Ranch''), which is owned and managed by the Animas Foundation. The 321,000 acre (1,299 km²) ranch (more than one third the size of the state of

Rhode Island Rhode Island ( ) is a state in the New England region of the Northeastern United States. It borders Connecticut to its west; Massachusetts to its north and east; and the Atlantic Ocean to its south via Rhode Island Sound and Block Is ...

- 3140 km2) was bought in 1990 by

The Nature Conservancy The Nature Conservancy (TNC) is a global environmental organization headquartered in Arlington, Virginia, United States. it works via affiliates or branches in 79 countries and territories, as well as across every state in the US. Founded in ...

, which took the unusual step of selling it in the mid-1990s to the Animas Foundation, a private organization founded by poet and rancher Drummond Hadley and funded in part by the

Anheuser-Busch Anheuser-Busch Companies, LLC ( ) is an American brewing company headquartered in St. Louis, Missouri. Since 2008, it has been wholly owned by Anheuser-Busch InBev SA/NV (AB InBev), now the world's largest brewing company, which owns multiple ...

family. The Foundation is intended to practice "sustainable agriculture in harmony with the environment." The Animas Foundation is one cooperating landowner within the

Malpai Borderlands Group Malpai Borderlands is a land area along the U.S.-Mexico border. It encompasses the southeast corner of Arizona and the southwest corner of New Mexico. It is sometimes defined as including areas in the Mexican states of Chihuahua (state), Ch ...

, a collaborative group in the region involving local landowners, local, state and federal agencies, universities, and environmental organizations. "The Animas Foundation is particularly important to the group in that they own more than a third of the planning area." Access to the ranch, and hence to portions of the Animas Mountains, is tightly controlled, with little or no public recreational use opportunities. As a result, the Continental Divide Trail had to be rerouted from the true Continental Divide near Antelope Wells, New Mexico to the current, official beginning of the CDT at Crazy Cook in the Big Hatchet Mountains.

References

External links

Peloncillo Mountains & Animas Mtns
east of San Bernardino Valley (Arizona)
(Article)
{{Mountains of New Mexico Great Divide of North America New Mexico Bootheel Madrean Sky Islands mountain ranges Mountain ranges of New Mexico Mountain ranges of Hidalgo County, New Mexico