Handbook 139
Craters of the Moon
A Guide to Craters of the Moon
National Monument
Idaho
Produced by the
Division of Publications
National Park Service
U.S. Department of the Interior
Washington, D.C. 1991
[Illustration: {uncaptioned}]
_Using This Handbook_
Craters of the Moon National Monument protects volcanic features of the
Craters of the Moon lava field. Part 1 of this handbook introduces the
park and recounts its early exploration. Part 2 explores how life has
adapted to the park’s volcanic landscape—and how people have perceived
it. Part 3 presents concise travel guide and reference materials for
touring the park and for camping.
National Park Handbooks are published to support the National Park
Service’s management programs and to promote understanding and enjoyment
of the more than 350 National Park System sites, which represent
important examples of our country’s natural and cultural inheritance.
Each handbook is intended to be informative reading and a useful guide
before, during, and after a park visit. More than 100 titles are in
print. They are sold at parks and can be purchased by mail from the
Superintendent of Documents, U.S. Government Printing Office,
Washington, DC 20402. This is handbook number 139.
_Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data_
Craters of the Moon: A Guide to Craters of the Moon National Monument,
Idaho/produced by the Division of Publications, National Park Service.
p. cm.—(Official national park handbook; 139)
1. Craters of the Moon National Monument (Idaho)—Guidebooks.
2. Geology—Idaho—Craters of the Moon National Monument—Guidebooks.
I. United States National Park Service. Division of Publications.
II. Series: Handbook (United States. National Park Service. Division
of Publications); 139.
F752.C7C73 1991 917.96'59—dc20 89-13670CIP
ISBN 0-912627-44-1
Part 1 Welcome to Craters of the Moon 4
Rift Volcanism on the Snake River Plain 7
Part 2 From Moonscape to Landscape 20
Geology of the Craters of the Moon 23
Life Adapts to a Volcanic Landscape 35
Indians, Early Explorers, and Practicing Astronauts 47
Part 3 Guide and Adviser 52
Approaching Craters of the Moon 54
Visitor Center and Programs 56
Map 58
Take the Driving Tour 59
Camping and Backcountry Use 60
Winter Recreation 61
Regulations and Safety 62
Nearby Attractions 63
Armchair Explorations 64
Part 1
Welcome to Craters of the Moon
[Illustration: {uncaptioned}]
[Illustration: _Rock or rope? Folds of lava rock look like coils of
irregular rope. Lava flows of this type are known as pahoehoe, a
Hawaiian word pronounced_ pah-hoy-hoy _and meaning ropey_.]
Rift Volcanism on the Snake River Plain
Light playing on cobalt blue lavas of the Blue Dragon Flows caught the
inner eye of explorer Robert Limbert: “It is the play of light at sunset
across this lava that charms the spectator. It becomes a twisted, wavy
sea. In the moonlight its glazed surface has a silvery sheen. With
changing conditions of light and air, it varies also, even while one
stands and watches. It is a place of color and silence....”
Limbert explored the Craters of the Moon lava field in Idaho in the
1920s and wrote those words for a 1924 issue of _National Geographic
Magazine_. “For several years I had listened to stories told by fur
trappers of the strange things they had seen while ranging in this
region,” wrote Limbert, a sometime taxidermist, tanner, and furrier from
Boise, Idaho. “Some of these accounts seemed beyond belief.” To Limbert
it seemed extraordinary “That a region of such size and scenic
peculiarity, in the heart of the great Northwest, could have remained
practically unknown and unexplored....” On his third and most ambitious
trek, in 1924, Limbert and W. C. Cole were at times left speechless by
the lava landscape they explored. Limbert recounted his impressions in
magazine and newspaper articles whose publication was influential in the
area’s being protected under federal ownership. In 1924, part of the
lava field was proclaimed as Craters of the Moon National Monument,
protected under the Antiquities Act. It was created “to preserve the
unusual and weird volcanic formations.” The boundary has been adjusted
and the park enlarged since then. In 1970, a large part of the national
monument was designated by Congress as the Craters of the Moon
Wilderness. It is further protected under the National Wilderness
Preservation System.
Until 1986, little was known about Limbert except for those facts
recounted above. That year, however, a researcher compiling a history of
the national monument located Limbert’s daughter in Boise. The daughter
still possessed hundreds of items, including early glass plate
negatives, photographs, and manuscripts of her father and that shed more
light on his life, the early days of Idaho, and Craters of the Moon.
Some of these photographs served as blueprints for the National Park
Service in the rehabilitation of fragile spatter cone formations that
have deteriorated over the years of heavy human traffic. The Limbert
collection has been fully cataloged by Boise State University curators
and has already proven to be a valuable resource to historians
interested in Limbert and this fascinating part of Idaho. Preservation
of the area owes much to Limbert’s imaginative advocacy in the true
spirit of the West in its earlier days.
Local legends, beginning in the late 1800s, held that this area
resembled the surface of the moon, on which—it must now be remembered—no
one had then walked! Geologist Harold T. Stearns first used the name
Craters of the Moon when he suggested to the National Park Service, in
1923, that a national monument be established here. Stearns found “the
dark craters and the cold lava, nearly destitute of vegetation” similar
to “the surface of the moon as seen through a telescope.” The name
Craters of the Moon would stick after Limbert adopted it in _National
Geographic Magazine_ in 1924. Later that year the name became official
when the area was set aside by President Calvin Coolidge as a national
monument under the Antiquities Act.
Like some other areas in the National Park System, Craters of the Moon
has lived to see the name that its early explorers affixed to it proved
somewhat erroneous by subsequent events or findings. When Stearns and
Limbert called this lava field Craters of the Moon, probably few persons
other than science fiction buffs actually thought that human beings
might one day walk on the moon and see firsthand what its surface is
like. People have now walked on the moon, however, and we know that its
surface does not, in fact, closely resemble this part of Idaho. Although
there are some volcanic features on the surface of the moon, most of its
craters were formed by the impact of meteorites colliding with the moon.
Moonscape or not, early fur trappers avoided the lava flows along the
base of the Pioneer Mountains at the north of today’s park. In doing so,
they followed Indian trails such as one found by Limbert that “resembled
a light streak winding through the lava. When the sun was directly
overhead it could be seen to advantage, but at times was difficult to
follow. Think of the years of travel,” Limbert marveled, “necessary to
make that mark on rock!” At least one Indian trail was destined to
become part of Goodale’s Cutoff, an alternative route on the Oregon
Trail that pioneers in wagon trains used in the 1850s and 1860s. Many
adjectives early used for this scene—weird, barren, exciting,
awe-inspiring, monotonous, astonishing, curious, bleak, mysterious—still
apply. It is not difficult today to see why pioneering folk intent on
wresting a living from the land did not tackle this volcanic terrain.
Geologists possessed the proper motivation to tackle it, however.
Curiosity aroused by this lava field has led several generations of
geologists, beginning with Israel C. Russell in 1901 and Harold T.
Stearns in the 1920s, into a deeper understanding of its volcanic
origins. With ever increasing penetration of its geological history, the
apparent otherworldliness of Craters of the Moon has retreated—but not
entirely. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA)
brought the second set of astronauts who would walk on the moon to this
alien corner of the galaxy before their moonshot. Here they studied the
volcanic rock and explored an unusual, harsh, and unforgiving
environment before embarking on their own otherworldly adventure.
Most types of volcanic features in the park can be seen quite readily by
first stopping at the visitor center and then driving the Loop Road. Far
more features can be seen if you also walk the interpretive trails at
the stops along the Loop Road. Still more await those who invest the
time required to come to feel the mysterious timelessness and raw
natural force implicit in this expansive lava field. Many travelers are
en route to Yellowstone National Park and spend only a couple of hours
visiting Craters of the Moon. This is ironic because here you are on the
geological track of Yellowstone. In fact, Craters of the Moon represents
what Yellowstone’s landscape will resemble in the future, and both areas
can supplement your insight into what happens when the Earth’s
unimaginable inner forces erupt to its surface.
[Illustration: _Silvery leaves of the buckwheat dot a cinder garden
with such regular spacing they almost look planted. Such spacing
results from the shortage of available surface water: Each plant
controls with its roots the space surrounding it, discouraging
competing plants. Rainwater and snowmelt penetrate volcanic cinders
so readily that their moisture quickly drops beyond reach of most
plants’ root systems. For a close-up view of a buckwheat, see page
36._]
Although Idaho is famous for forests, rivers, and scenic mountain
wilderness, its Snake River Plain region boasts little of these
attributes. This plain arcs across southern Idaho from the Oregon border
to the Yellowstone area at the Montana-Wyoming border. It marks the
trail of the passage of the Earth’s crust over an unusual geologic heat
source that now brings the Earth’s incendiary inner workings so close to
its surface near Yellowstone. This heat source fuels Yellowstone’s
bubbling, spewing, spouting geothermal wonders. Craters of the Moon
therefore stands as a geologic prelude to Yellowstone, as its precursor
and the ancestral stuff of its fiery secrets.
When did all this volcanism at Craters of the Moon happen? Will it
happen again? According to Mel Kuntz and other U.S. Geological Survey
geologists who have conducted extensive field research at Craters of the
Moon, the volcanic activity forming the Craters of the Moon lava field
probably started _only_ 15,000 years ago. The last eruption in the
volcanic cycle ended 2,000 years ago, about the time that Julius Caesar
ruled the Roman Empire.
Craters of the Moon is a dormant, but not extinct, volcanic area. Its
sleeping volcanoes could become active again in the near future. The
largest earthquake of the last quarter century in the contiguous United
States shook Idaho’s tallest mountain, Borah Peak, just north of here in
1983. When it did, some geologists wondered if it might initiate
volcanic activity at Craters of the Moon. It did not. According to
Kuntz, however, this is no reason not to expect another volcanic
eruption here _soon_—probably “within the next 1,000 years.” Part Two of
this handbook explores the still young and rapidly evolving
understanding of the fascinating geologic story of Craters of the Moon.
Today’s Craters of the Moon National Monument encompasses 83 square
miles of the much larger Craters of the Moon lava field. Reaching
southeastward from the Pioneer Mountains, the park boundary encloses a
series of fissure vents, volcanic cones, and lava flows known as the
Great Rift volcanic zone. This volcanic rift zone is a line of weakness
in the Earth’s crust that can be traced for some 60 miles across the
Snake River Plain. Recent volcanism marks much of its length. You can
explore the Great Rift and some of its volcanic features via the park’s
7-mile Loop Drive, as described in Part Three of this handbook. In the
park’s northern part you will find spatter cones, cinder cones, lava
flows, lava caves, and an unexpected variety of wildflowers, shrubs,
trees, and wild animals. The much larger southern part of the park,
designated by Congress in 1970 as the Craters of the Moon Wilderness
Area, is a vast and largely untraveled region of stark volcanic features
flanking the Great Rift. It offers a challenge to serious hikers and
explorers—latter day Robert Limberts—who are prepared for rugged
wilderness travel.
Despite its seeming barrenness, Craters of the Moon is indeed home to a
surprising diversity of plant and animal life. As Limbert noted in 1924:
“In the West the term ‘Lava Beds of Idaho’ has always signified a region
to be shunned by even the most venturesome travelers—a land supposedly
barren of vegetation, destitute of water, devoid of animal life, and
lacking in scenic interest.
“In reality the region has slight resemblance to its imagined aspect.
Its vegetation is mostly hidden in pockets, but when found consists of
pines, cedars, junipers, and sagebrush: its water is hidden deep in
tanks or holes at the bottom of large ‘blow-outs’ and is found only by
following old Indian or mountain sheep trails or by watching the flight
of birds as they drop into these places to quench their thirst. The
animal life consists principally of migrant birds, rock rabbits,
woodchucks, black and grizzly bears: its scenery is impressive in its
grandeur.”
Years of patient record-keeping by scientists have fit numbers to
Limbert’s perceptive observations. The number of species identified
includes more than 300 plants, 2,000 insects, 8 reptiles, 140 birds, 30
mammals—and one amphibian, the western toad. We now call Limbert’s “rock
rabbit” the pika. The grizzly is long gone here. With few exceptions,
the park’s denizens live mostly under conditions of great environmental
stress.
Near constant winds, breeze-to-gale in strength, sweep across the park
to rob moisture from all living things. Scant soils, low levels of
precipitation, the inability of cinder cones to hold rainwater near the
surface, and the heat of the summer sun—intensified by heat-absorbing
black lavas—only aggravate such moisture theft. Cinder surfaces register
summer soil temperatures of over 150°F and show a lack of plant cover.
Plants cover generally less than 5 percent of the total surface of the
cinder cones. A recent study found that when the area is looked at on a
parkwide basis, most of the land is very sparsely vegetated (less than
15 percent vegetative cover). On a scale of sand trap to putting green,
this would approach the sand trap end of the scale.
[Illustration: _Winter snow transforms these landscapes, smoothing
out both contours and the jagged edges of lavas. Less lunar in
appearance now, the park nonetheless maintains an otherworldly
aura._]
[Illustration: _The park was named in 1924, 45 years before humans
walked on the Moon. Although we now know more about the Moon’s
actual surface, the park’s name still rings true. Only a few trees
immediately suggest that the large photo was taken on Earth. In the
inset photo, astronaut Edwin E. “Buzz” Aldrin walks on the Moon near
the lunar module._]
Into this difficult environment wildlife researcher Brad Griffith
ventured to count, mark, and scrutinize the mule deer of Craters of the
Moon in May 1980. Griffith, of the University of Idaho, conducted a
three-year study of the park’s mule deer population because the National
Park Service was concerned that this protected and productive herd might
multiply so much that it would eventually damage its habitat. Among
other things, he would find that the herd has developed a drought
evasion strategy that makes it behave unlike any mule deer population
known anywhere else.
“By late summer,” Griffith explains, “plants have matured and dried so
that they no longer provide adequate moisture to sustain the deer in
this landscape that offers them no free water. Following about 12 days
of warm nights and hot days in late July, the deer migrate from 5 to 10
miles north to the Pioneer Mountains. There they find free-flowing
creeks and the cool, moist shade of aspen and Douglas-fir groves and
wait out summer’s worst heat and dryness. Early fall rains trigger the
deer’s return to the park’s wilderness from this oasis in late September
to feed on the nutritious bitterbrush until November snowfalls usher
them back to their winter range.”
The pristine and high-quality forage of the Craters of the Moon
Wilderness Area, historically nearly untouched by domestic livestock
grazing, has inspired this migratory strategy for evading drought. In
effect, the mule deer make use of a dual summer range, a behavioral
modification unknown elsewhere for their species.
“Their late summer and fall adaptations simply complete the mule deer’s
yearlong strategy for coping with the limits that this volcanic
landscape imposes on them,” Griffith explains.
Taking a walk in the park on a mid-summer afternoon gives you a good
opportunity to experience the influence of wind, heat, and lack of
moisture. The park’s winds are particularly striking. The lava that has
flowed out of the Great Rift has built up and raised the land surface in
the park to a higher elevation than its surroundings so that it
intercepts the prevailing southwesterly winds. Afternoon winds usually
die down in the evening. As part of the dynamics of temperature and
moisture that determine mule deer behavior, this daily wind cycle helps
explain why they are more active at night than are mule deer elsewhere.
These deer do not move around as much as mule deer in less ecologically
trying areas. They have adapted behaviors to conserve energy and
moisture in this environmentally stressful landscape.
Early mornings may find park rangers climbing up a cinder cone to count
the deer, continuing the collection of data that Brad Griffith set in
motion with his three-year study. The rangers still conduct spring and
late summer censuses: over a recent three-year period the deer
populations averaged about 420 animals. Another several years of
collecting will give the National Park Service a body of data on the
mule deer that is available nowhere else.
The uniqueness of this data about the park’s mule deer population would
surely please the booster aspect of Robert Limbert’s personality.
Likewise, the research challenges involved in obtaining it would appeal
to his explorer self. History has justified Limbert on both counts.
Publicity arising from his explorations led to creation of the national
monument. Furthermore, that publicity put forth a rather heady claim
that history has also unequivocally borne out: “Although almost totally
unknown at present,” Limbert prophesied in 1924, “this section is
destined some day to attract tourists from all America....”
Every year tens of thousands of travelers fulfill Robert Limbert’s
prophecy of more than a half-century ago.