San Benito Mountain Research Natural Area

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In 1999 the BLM designated the San Benito Mountain Natural Area as a Research Natural Area (RNA) to encourage scienfitic research and provide protection for the unique conifer forest and vegetation communities on and around San Benito Mountain.

The San Benito Mountain Forest is the only forest in the world that supports Jeffrey, Coulter, and Foothill pine (a.k.a. gray or digger pines), incense cedar, and Jeffrey-Coulter hybrids.  The federally endangered and listed San Benito evening-primrose (Camissonia benitensis) also occurs here.

The relatively intact soils toxic to most plant species, the isolated high-elevation ecological processes, and the unusual plant and animal species composition qualify the area as having outstanding and unusual ecological, geological and hydrologic features.

San Benito Mountain RNA was designated an Instant Wilderness Study Area in 1980.

Plants of the Highest Santa Lucia and Diablo Range Peaks, California - James R. Griffin - USDA Forest Research Paper PSW-110 (1975)

The Breeding Avifauna of San Benito Mountain, California: Evidence for Change Over One-Half Century - Ned K. Johnson and Carla Cicero - Western Birds, Volume 16 Number 1 (1985)

Rick Cooper, Field Manager
Bureau of Land Management
Hollister Field Office
20 Hamilton Court
Hollister, CA 95023
Phone: (831) 630-5000
Fax: (831) 630-5055
Office Hours: 7:30 a.m. - 4:00 p.m., M-F
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