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The Tularosa Basin is a graben basin in the Basin and Range Province and within the Chihuahuan Desert, east of the Rio Grande in southern New Mexico and West Texas, in the Southwestern United States.
The Tularosa Basin is located primarily in Otero County. It covers about 6,500 sq mi (16,800 km2) (35% larger than Connecticut). It lies between the Sacramento Mountains to the east, and the San Andres and Oscura Mountains to the west. The basin stretches about 150 mi (240 km) north–south, and at its widest is about 60 mi (100 km) east-west. It is geologically considered part of the Rio Grande Rift zone, which widens there due to the slight clockwise rotation of the Colorado Plateau tectonic plate.
Notable features of the basin include White Sands National Park, Oliver Lee Memorial State Park, the Carrizozo Malpais lava flow, Holloman Air Force Base, and the White Sands Missile Range with the historic Trinity nuclear test Site. Tularosa Creek flows westward into the Tularosa Basin just north of the village of Tularosa. The distinct northwestern New Mexico Tularosa River is located in Catron County.
Hydrologically, the Tularosa Basin is an endorheic basin, as no water flows out of it. The basin is closed to the north by Chupadera Mesa and to the south by the broad flat 4000-foot-elevation plain between the Franklin and Hueco Mountains, with the conventional boundary taken to be the New Mexico–Texas border. Surface water that does not evaporate or soak into the ground eventually accumulates at playas (intermittently dry lake beds), the largest of which is Lake Lucero, at 3888 feet elevation, at the southwest end of the White Sands dunes. The White Sands are a 710-km2 (275-mi2) field of white sand dunes composed of gypsum crystals. To the north of Lake Lucero are extensive alkali flats, which produce additional gypsum for wind deposition on the dunes.
The White Sands fossil footprints in the Tularosa Basin are estimated by the National Park Service to be 21 000 to 23 000 years old and include footprints possibly showing humans stalking a giant sloth. [1] The footprints are located at the shore of an ice age era lake. As of November 2021, 61 fossil footprints have been found at the site. [2]
When the Spanish arrived in the Tularosa Basin, they found springs and small streams coming from the Sacramento Mountains that fed a relatively lush grassland on the eastern side of the basin. While the Spanish tried some sheep ranching and some mining, the area remained firmly under Apache control until the 1850s, when the United States established its military presence at Fort Stanton (in the Sacramento Mountains) (1855–1896), Torreon Fort (near Lincoln) (1850s), and Camp Comfort (1858–1859) at White Sands. Under US military protection, the first permanent settlement was established in 1862, when about 50 Hispanic farmers from the Rio Grande Valley moved to Tularosa. Efforts to control the Apache waned somewhat during the American Civil War and serious American settlement did not begin until the late 1870s, when settlers and cattle ranchers from Texas began moving into the basin. In 1969, the Gemsbok was introduced.
The native grasslands in the Tularosa Basin were able to support large herds in theWhite wet years of the 1880s. When the Americans first started running cattle, in some places, the native perennial bunchgrasses grew 'as high as a horse’s shoulder' - 1.0–2.5 m (3.3–8.2 ft) depending on species. One cowboy estimated in 1889 that 85,000 head were mustered within the basin, but said that was “far too heavy a burden for the range” - or beyond its carrying capacity. [3] Severe drought followed for years, and the grassland pastures never recovered from the overgrazing, which continued in many instances for 75 years or more and caused top-soil erosion and desertification. Even within the White Sands Missile Range, where cattle grazing was eliminated in 1945, the effects from the 1890 -1945 period of overgrazing can still be seen nearly everywhere. Many areas that were historically known to be rich perennial grasslands are now xeric desert shrublands, with creosote bush—(Larrea tridentata) predominating.
Since surface water was unable to sustain the cattle herds, ranchers turned to groundwater, and the easily reachable aquifer of 'sweet water' was pumped out and depleted from under the basin, leaving only brackish water. Applying the groundwater to the surface resulted in additional salts being dissolved and transported back down by groundwater recharge into the aquifer, increasing its salinity. By 2000, it became clear that salts in the aquifer needed to be significantly reduced if existing levels of water use were to continue. Therefore, in 2004, the Tularosa Basin National Desalination Research Facility was established in the basin at Alamogordo, as a joint project of the Federal Bureau of Reclamation and Sandia National Laboratories. It is a national center for researching procedures to reduce brackish water creation and to develop new technologies for desalination as it is increasingly found in present-day inland basin aquifers with agricultural irrigation and potable water withdrawal demands.
The Tularosa Basin is in the Chihuahuan Desert ecoregion, with the former Great Plains grassland habitat ecotones. Because of the closed nature of the basin, a number of unique ecological niches have developed. A significant number of endemic species are only found in the Tularosa Basin. These include the White Sands pupfish (Cyprinodon tularosa) and the Oscura Mountains chipmunk.
While the Tularosa Basin lies primarily in New Mexican Otero County, it also extends into Doña Ana, Sierra, Lincoln, and Socorro Counties in New Mexico, and El Paso County in southwest Texas.
Otero County is a county located in the U.S. state of New Mexico. As of the 2020 census, the population was 67,839. Its county seat is Alamogordo. Its southern boundary is the Texas state line. It is named for Miguel Antonio Otero, the territorial governor when the county was created.
White Sands is a census-designated place (CDP) in Doña Ana County, New Mexico, United States. It consists of the main residential area on the White Sands Missile Range. As of the 2010 census the population of the CDP was 1,651. It is part of the Las Cruces Metropolitan Statistical Area.
Alamogordo is the seat of Otero County, New Mexico, United States. A city in the Tularosa Basin of the Chihuahuan Desert, it is bordered on the east by the Sacramento Mountains and to the west by Holloman Air Force Base. The population was 31,384 as of the 2020 census. Alamogordo is widely known for its connection with the 1945 Trinity test, which was the first ever explosion of an atomic bomb.
Tularosa is a village in Otero County, New Mexico. It shares its name with the Tularosa Basin, in which the town is located. To the east, Tularosa is flanked by the western edge of the Sacramento Mountains. The population was 2,842 at the 2010 census. During the 1990s and early 2000s, the town, north of the much larger Alamogordo, experienced moderate growth and construction as a bedroom community, especially in the housing industry. Tularosa is noted for its abundance of cottonwood shade trees and its efforts to preserve the adobe-style architecture of its past.
White Sands Missile Range (WSMR) is a United States Army military testing area and firing range located in the US state of New Mexico. The range was originally established in 1941 as the Alamogordo Bombing and Gunnery Range, where the Trinity test site lay at the northern end of the Range, in Socorro County near the towns of Carrizozo and San Antonio. It then became the White Sands Proving Ground on 9 July 1945.
White Sands National Park is an American national park located in the state of New Mexico and completely surrounded by the White Sands Missile Range. The park covers 145,762 acres in the Tularosa Basin, including the southern 41% of a 275 sq mi (710 km2) field of white sand dunes composed of gypsum crystals. This gypsum dunefield is the largest of its kind on Earth, with a depth of about 30 feet (9.1 m), dunes as tall as 60 feet (18 m), and about 4.5 billion short tons of gypsum sand.
The Sacramento Mountains are a mountain range in the south-central part of the U.S. state of New Mexico, lying just east of Alamogordo in Otero County. From north to south, the Sacramento Mountains extend for 85 miles (137 km), and from east to west they encompass 42 miles (68 km).
The Sierra Blanca is an ultra-prominent range of volcanic mountains in Lincoln and Otero counties in the south-central part of the U.S. state of New Mexico. The range is about 40 miles (64 km) from north to south and 20 miles (32 km) wide.
Hollywood is a neighborhood of Ruidoso, in Lincoln County, New Mexico, United States and is part of the Lincoln National Forest. It is located along State Road 48 and U.S. Route 70 in the eastern end of the village, adjacent to Ruidoso Downs. The town was originally named after Hollywood, Florida, and includes a post office, homes, hotels, and retail outlets.
Cathey Peak is a peak in the Sacramento Mountains, in the south-central part of the U.S. State of New Mexico. It lies in Otero County, 10 miles (16 km) southeast of the community of Alamogordo.
Salinas Peak is the highest point in the San Andres Mountains of south-central New Mexico, in the United States. It lies near the northern end of the range, about 50 miles (80 km) northwest of Alamogordo and 50 miles (80 km) southeast of Socorro. To the east lies the Tularosa Basin, while to the west is the Jornada del Muerto.
The Carrizozo volcanic field is a monogenetic volcanic field located in New Mexico, US. The volcanic field consists of two lava flows, the Broken Back flow and the Carrizozo lava flow, the second youngest in New Mexico. Both lava flows originated from groups of cinder cones. The Broken Back flow is approximately 16 kilometres (10 mi) long and the Carrizozo, one of the largest in the world, is 68 kilometres (42 mi) long, covering 328 square kilometres (127 sq mi) with a volume of 4.2 cubic kilometres (1.0 cu mi).
Orogrande is an unincorporated community in Otero County, New Mexico, United States, located at a latitude of 32.37111 and a longitude of -106.08389 in the Jarilla Mountains of the Tularosa Basin on U.S. 54 between El Paso, Texas and Alamogordo. Originally a mining town named Jarilla Junction due to its proximity to the Jarilla Mountains, established in 1905, the town was renamed Orogrande in 1906 and is not far from similar mining towns named Brice and Ohaysi. The population soared to approximately 2000 as the result of a gold rush that occurred in 1905, but quickly collapsed almost to the point of depopulation when the gold deposits proved much less abundant than expected. There are still numerous abandoned mines in the area which fall under the jurisdiction of the Bureau of Land Management. Other land around Orogrande is part of a military reservation under the control of Fort Bliss.
The Tularosa Basin Museum of History, formerly the Tularosa Basin Historical Society Museum, is a history museum holding a collection of historical photographs, documents, and relics from Otero County, New Mexico. The museum is located in Alamogordo, New Mexico, and is owned and operated by the Tularosa Basin Historical Society.
Gerald Champion Regional Medical Center is a general hospital, owned and operated by the non-profit Otero County Hospital Association, that serves the Alamogordo, New Mexico area. It is the first military/civilian shared hospital facility in the United States.
The San Augustin Mountains are a small mountain subrange located at the southern terminus of the San Andres Mountains east of Las Cruces, New Mexico.
Victorio's War, or the Victorio Campaign, was an armed conflict between the Apache followers of Chief Victorio, the United States, and Mexico beginning in September 1879. Faced with arrest and forcible relocation from his homeland in New Mexico to San Carlos Indian Reservation in southeastern Arizona, Victorio led a guerrilla war across southern New Mexico, west Texas and northern Mexico. Victorio fought many battles and skirmishes with the United States Army and raided several settlements until the Mexican Army killed him and most of his warriors in October 1880 in the Battle of Tres Castillos. After Victorio's death, his lieutenant Nana led a raid in 1881.
Lake Lucero is a playa located within that section of the Tularosa Basin that is contained within White Sands National Park in the U.S. state of New Mexico. The playa is noted for the unusually high quantity of water-deposited and wind-deposited gypsum dissolved in its intermittent waters. Annual evaporation cycles have caused much of the gypsum to precipitate into crystals of impure, brownish selenite that line the alkaline mudflats of the lakeshore. The further process of gypsum erosion abrades the fragile selenite, and other precipitated gypsum, into the pure-white sands covering most of the national park.
White Sands Ranch is a locale of private land in Otero County, New Mexico, near federal lands of the Tularosa Basin acquired during World War II. Located on the border of the White Sands Missile Range on census block 1168 between Las Cruces and Alamogordo, the site is about 40 mi (64 km) northeast of the White Sands Census Designated Place. Part of the White Sands Ranchers of New Mexico vs. United States legal case denied additional Takings Clause remuneration, the ranch includes numerous buildings and a pond on Wsmr S Rt 250.
Oscura Mountains, originally known to the Spanish as the Sierra Oscura, are a ridge of mountains, trending north and south, east of the Jornada del Muerto and west of the Tularosa Valley. The word oscura means "dark" and refers to the dark color of the mountains due to the Pinyon-juniper vegetation at their higher elevations. The Oscuras are located in Socorro County and Lincoln County, New Mexico. Their southern end is at 33°30′30″N106°18′45″W and their northern end is at 33°49′15″N106°22′20″W near North Oscura Peak. Their highest elevation is Oscura Peak at 8,625 feet.