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fewscatteredcedarsofsmallgrowth."He isdescribing the landscape northwest of Kendrick, San Francisco, Sitgreaves and Bill Williams Mountain and south or slightly southwest of Red Butte.
Continuing northwest, he notes:
"Cedar wood was also abundant for camp purposes on the side of the hills.... On the plain there is but very little growth of wood ofanykind;onceinamileorsooneseesa small cedar."
Somewhere near the east side of Cataract Canyon where it begins to drop more rapidly into the Grand Canyon, Beale notes:
" A heavy growth of pine and cedars covered the hills in every direction, around the great canon Ihavementioned,andextendedasfaraswe could see from the high hill we ascended."
Finally, heading southward in search of water, and camping on the north face of Mount Floyd, probably at the head of Partridge Creek, Beale notes:
"The cedar growth here is quite heavy and abundant; I measured one tree today sixteen f e e t i n c i r c u m f e r e n c e , a n d it w a s b y n o m e a n s the largest I saw...."
Ives (1861), in April, 1858 (fig. 16), remarked on a dense juniper stand between the general vicinity of Frazier's Well and upper Partridge Creek: "...A thick growth of cedars and pines offered occasional obstruc tions to the pack animals, who would get their loads tangled among the low branches."
Furtheralong,stillapparentlynorthwestofMount Floyd, Ives noted:
"...The face of the country continued much the same. The trees generally intercepted the v i e w .... A t t h e e n d o f t e n m i l e s o f w e a r y t r a v e l , a steep ascent brought us to the summit of a table that overlooked the country towards the south for a hundred miles. The picture was grand, but the cedars and pines kept itshut out during most of the time."
T h i s is i n t h e v i c i n i t y o f t h e A u b r e y C l i f f s , b e f o r e d r o p ping into the flatter terrain around Rose Well. At this point,theywouldbelookingsouthandsouthwesttoward MountFloyd.Thepicturethatevolvesisofcountryside withdenseclustersofjuniper,someextensiveinarea, with relatively open country in between.
On April 25, 1858, catching up on his diary, he wrote:
"Camp 80.... Partridge ravine widened as it was descended, til it became a beautiful
valley,coveredwithgrassyslopesandclumpsof cedars.Itcontainedneitherspringsorarunning stream, but among the rocks along the base of the bluffs many pools were discovered. The pasturage was excellent. The place is a great resort at this season of grizzly bear, antelope [pronghom] ,deer [mule] ,and wild turkeys ,large numbers of whose tracks were seen leading to and from water holes."
Writing this, Ives had the benefit of having traversed this area twice, once in the winter and then three years later in the spring.
Mollhausen, riding with Ives, noted the poor condi tion of the junipers. O n April 19, 1858, in the vicinity of the lagoons on the present Hualapai Reservation, he wrote:
"The soildespiteofthenew snowfallswas dry and barren, small cedar forests decorated the s i d e s o f t h e h i l l s ,b u t o n t h e p l a i n s o n l y i n d i v i d u a l shrubs were standing and changed their shape in the distance in mirages or, dead and devoid of their green ornamentation, stuck up like the antlers of prehistoric elks."
OnApril21.headedsouthwestwardfromthelagoons, he notes:
"The character of the environment would have alsoremindedme oftheproximityofthetrail, which in 1854 I passed in the expedition of Captain Whipple, because everywhere I saw the already known change between lime- and sandstone as well as the black lava fields,which were crossed in all directions by deep gorges. The almost sole tree vegetation was formed by crippled cedars, which in places crowded into black, but thin forests or covered wide areas with their dried up, skeleton-like remains."
Finally, on April 22, entering Partridge Creek, he writes:
"Again,we spottedthesceneofacedarforest, thetreesofwhich allhaddiedatthesame time, namelyasIassumeasaresultofanextended fire, which had not affected the wood, but yet r e m o v e d t h e b a r k a n d n e e d l e s . "
Theyearsof1856to57weretwoofthedriestonrecord forthesouthwest(Swetnam 1999,personalcommunica tion). Mollhausen has mentioned dead junipers over a three-day period, suggesting extensive fires, which he assumes to have happened. His use of the word "as sume"rendershisstatementalittlepuzzling.Hedoes not claim to have seen obvious evidence of fire, but rather dead trees over a large area. Another possibility would be drought kill.
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USDAForestServiceRMRS-GTR-177. 2006