Spirit Mountain Wilderness

Spirit Mountain Wilderness contains 33,518 acres in the southern area of the Lake Mead National Recreation Area with a small spillover onto BLM land west of the National Park Service boundary. Bridge Canyon Wilderness is to the southwest and Nellis Wash Wilderness to the north. Spirit Mountain (5,639') is of high religious and cultural importance to the Native Americans of this area. As part of that cultural and religious heritage, there are numerous archaeological resources in the wilderness. Legends and artifacts say this area has been in use for centuries by members of the ancient Amacava (ancestors of the Mojave tribes), then more recently by the Southern Paiute and Yuman tribes.

Spirit Mountain Wilderness is characterized by steep canyons and rugged granite boulders. You can see from the photos on this page that the vegetation is primarily blackbrush, creosote bush, yucca and desert willow. There is also some smoke tree here, at the far northern end of smoke tree habitat. In the higher elevations you might come across a few pinon pines and maybe some juniper. As for beasties, well, there's bobcat, bighorn sheep, coyote, Gila monster and several species of rattlesnake. There are several springs and seeps among all this rock that help to keep the area from being completely barren.