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The Peninsular Ranges are a group of mountain ranges which stretch 900 miles from southern California to the southern tip of Baja California, part of the North American Coast Ranges that run along the Pacific coast from Alaska to Mexico. The Peninsular ranges run predominantly north-south, unlike the Transverse Ranges to their north, which mostly run east-west.The Peninsular Ranges include the Santa Ana Mountains, San Jacinto Mountains and Laguna Mountains of southern California with the Sierra Juarez, San Pedro Martir, and La Giganta mountains of Baja California. Mount Palomar , home to Palomar Observatory, is in the Peninsular Ranges in San Diego County.
Several terrestrial ecoregions cover portions of the Peninsular Ranges. Most of the ranges are in the Nearctic ecozoneEcozone is a classification system of the world first proposed by Miklos Udvardy under the name biogeographical realms for conservation purposes. It defines 8 biogeographical realms with unifying features of geography, fauna and flora. Nearctic 22. kmē (i. On the coast side of the ranges, the California chaparral and woodlandsThe California chaparral and woodlands is a terrestrial ecoregion of central and southern California ( United States) and northwestern Baja California ( Mexico), located on the west coast of North America. It is a Mediterranean forests, woodlands, and shr ecoregion covers the northern portion of the range, in southern California and northern Baja California. The Baja California desert ecoregion runs along the coast side of the southern portion of the Peninsular Ranges. On the eastern side of the ranges, the Sonoran DesertThe Sonoran Desert is a desert situated in Arizona, California and Mexico. It is one of the largest and hottest deserts in North America, with an area of 120,000 square miles (311,000 square kilometres). The desert covers much of the Mexican state of Sono ecoregion covers southeastern California and northeastern Baja California as far south as the town of Loreto, Mexico. Anza-Borrego Desert State ParkAnza-Borrego Desert State Park in southern California is the largest state park in the contiguous United States. The park is located on the eastern side of San Diego County, with portions extending east into Imperial County and north into Riverside County, on the eastern side of the Peninsular Ranges in San Diego County, is famous for its springtime profusion of Sonoran Desert wildflowers. The Gulf of California xeric scrub ecoregion covering the southeastern portion of the peninsula and the islands of the Gulf of CaliforniaThe Gulf of California (also known as the Sea of Cortez or Sea of Cortes locally known in the Spanish language as Mar de Cortes or, much less frequently, Golfo de California is a body of water that separates the Baja California Peninsula from the Mexican.
The higher portions of the Peninsular Ranges, especially the west-facing slopes, are home to coniferous and mixed forests. Cleveland National Forest covers much of the southern California Peninsular Ranges, and includes oakThis article is about oak trees and shrubs. OAK is also the three-letter IATA airport code for Oakland International Airport in Oakland, California USA. See also Oak, Nebraska, USA. See List of Quercus species The term oak can be used as part of the commo woodlands and forests of Jeffrey Pine (Pinus jeffreyi) and Coulter pine (P. coulteri). The Sierra Juarez and San Pedro Martir pine-oak forests cover the upper slopes of the Sierra Juarez and San Pedro Martir ranges. These isolated forests, predominantly pinesThis article deals with the tree; for the e-mail client see Pine email client About 115. Pines are coniferous trees of the genus Pinus in the family Pinaceae. There are about 115 species of pine, although different authors accept anything from 105 to 125, white fir, juniper, and oaks, harbor many rare and endemic species.
The southern end of the Baja Peninsula, including the Sierra de la Laguna, was formerly an island, and evolved in relative isolation from the northern part of the peninsula. The flora and fauna share many affinities with Central America, and are considered part of the Neotropic ecozone. It includes three distinct ecoregions, the Sierra de la Laguna dry forests , Sierra de la Laguna pine-oak forests , and San Lucan xeric scrub .
California geography
