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Show Dixie National Forest is Utah's Largest Playground Area The Dixie National Forest with almost two million acres is the largest National Forest in Utah. The area includes high plateaus and deep canyons of outstanding scenic beauty. The Forest straddles the divide between the Great Basin and the Colorado River. Elevations vary from 2800 feet near St. George, Utah's Dixie, to 11,314 feet at Brian Head, a rise of over 8,500 feet in 57 airline miles; the southern rim of the Great Basin provides spectacular scenery. Colorado , River canyons break away in a thousand miles of colored cliffs and steep walled gorges. High-altitude Forests and bently rolling hills characterize the Markagunt, Paunsaugunt, and Aquarius Plateaus; Boulder Mountain, one of the highest plateaus in the United States is dotted with hundreds of small lakes, ten to eleven thousand feet above sea level. The several mountain ranges, broad plateaus, and timbered slopes provide exciting opportunities op-portunities for families to picnic, camp, hunt, fish, ride, hike, and in other ways enjoy the out of doors. Camp and picnic sites are developed for public use and enjoyment. These are designed to maintain a natural atmosphere, and the facilities provided are limited to those needed for safety and sanitation. Drinking water is generally available, but where it is not, you should provide your water from a source known to be safe. There are 24 campgrounds on the Dixie Forest. A $2.00 per day user fee is charged at each site to help pay the cost of operation and maintenence. Privately owned resorts on National Forest land at Panguitch Lake and Navajo Lake rent boats and cabins, provide meals and sell gasoline and groceries. Wildlife residing on the Dixie National Forest include mule deer, bear, cougar, badger, bobcat, coyote, fox, porcupine, . mink, ruffed and blue grouse, chukar partridge, quail, wild trukey, and numerous birds. The Utah Division of Wildlife resources establishes bag limits and hunting seasons. The Forest Service has responsibility respon-sibility for wildlife habitat on the National Forest and for coordinating wildlife needs with the use of other resources. Management plans provide for big game range improvement im-provement and the protection and improvement of the habitat of other wild animals where necessary or desorable. The most important product of the Western National Forests'is water. In arid Utah where every city and town, every ranch or farm, and every industry in-dustry is dependent upon water x originating on the mountains, this is particularly true. The mountains of the Dixie National Forest receive an annual precipitation of from 10 inches in the lower foothills to about 35 inches on the mountain tops. Most of the precipitation falls as snow, forming a vast frozen blanket. In spring and early summer, the resulting water percolates into the earth and emerges gradually in springs and seeps. These collect into cold, clear, . mountain streams to slack the valley's thirst during hot, dry, summers. sum-mers. About nineteen million board feet of timber is harvested on the Dixie National Forest each year. The Forest Ranger designates the trees to be cut using proven management practices which assure con- linous and manimum growth of the remaining trees. He provides for new trees either by planting new trees or providing lor adequate growth of exisiting young trees in the area. The Ranger is able to request help from soil scientists, hydrologisls, landscape ar- . chitects, archeulogists, silviculturists, and engineers to properly lay out and sell the timber. The forage crop on the Dixie National Forest is harvested by about 25,000 cattle and 30,000 sheep. These animals belong to approximately 400 farm and ranch families that depend upon summer grazing to round out their livestock operations. These grazing areas are continually con-tinually studied by range experts ex-perts who prepare management plans tainsure proper use of the forage resources and to correlate grazing with other Forest resources and values. Practically all of the Dixie National Forest is open . to mineral prospecting and oil and gas exploration. Coal located on or adjacent to the Dixie National Forest has received renewed interest with the current search for new energy . sources. A large part of the Forest is presently under lease for gas and oil exploration. Forest visitors with specific questions regarding campgrounds, cam-pgrounds, trails, roads and other points of interest may want to contact the local Rangers office. District Rangers are located in St., St. George, Cedar City, Panguitch, Kscalante, and Teasdale. |