Establishment of the Gold Butte National Monument

Proclamation 9559 of December 28, 2016

Establishment of the Gold Butte National Monument

By the President of the United States of America

A Proclamation

In southeast Nevada lies a landscape of contrast and
transition, where dramatically chiseled red sandstone,
twisting canyons, and tree-clad mountains punctuate
flat stretches of the Mojave Desert. This remote and
rugged desert landscape is known as Gold Butte.

The Gold Butte area contains an extraordinary variety
of diverse and irreplaceable scientific, historic, and
prehistoric resources, including vital plant and
wildlife habitat, significant geological formations,
rare fossils, important sites from the history of
Native Americans, and remnants of our Western mining
and ranching heritage. The landscape reveals a story of
thousands of years of human interaction with this harsh
environment and provides a rare glimpse into the lives
of Nevada's first inhabitants, the rich and varied
indigenous cultures that followed, and the eventual
arrival of Euro-American settlers. Canyons and
intricate rock formations are a stunning backdrop to
the area's famously beautiful rock art, and the desert
provides critical habitat for the threatened Mojave
desert tortoise.

Gold Butte's dynamic environment has provided food and
shelter to humans for at least 12,000 years. Remnants
of massive agave roasting pits, charred remains of
goosefoot and pinyon pine nuts, bone fragments, and
projectile points used to hunt big horn sheep and
smaller game serve as evidence of the remarkable
abilities of indigenous communities to eke out
sustenance from this unforgiving landscape. Visitors to
Gold Butte can still see ancient rock shelters and
hearth remnants concealed in the area's dramatic Aztec
Sandstone formations. This brightly hued sandstone is
the canvas for the area's spectacular array of rock
art, depicting human figures, animals, and swirling
abstract designs at locations like the famed Falling
Man petroglyph site and Kohta Circus. Pottery sherds
and other archaeological artifacts scattered throughout
the landscape reveal the area's role as a corridor for
the interregional trade of pottery, salt, and rare
minerals. These world-renowned archaeological sites and
objects are helping scientists to better understand
interactions between ancient cultural groups.

By the time Spanish explorers arrived in the region in
the late eighteenth century, the Gold Butte area was
home to the Southern Paiute people, who to this day,
retain a spiritual and cultural connection with the
land and use it for traditional purposes such as
ceremonies and plant harvesting. Hunters and settlers
of European descent followed the explorers, and, by
1865, Mormon pioneers had built settlements in the
region.

These newcomers grazed livestock and explored Gold
Butte's unique geology in pursuit of mining riches.
Their activities left behind historic sites and objects
that tell the story of the American West, including the
Gold Butte townsite, a mining boomtown established in
the early 1900s, but mostly abandoned by 1910. Several
building foundations and arrastas--large flat rocks
used for crushing ore--remain at the townsite today.
Settlers built corrals out of wood or stone, some of
which are still standing in the Gold Butte area,
including one near the Gold Butte townsite and one at
Horse Springs, along the Gold Butte Scenic Byway. In
the 1930s, the Civilian Conservation Corps was put to
work in the area, leaving behind a variety

of historic features including a dam and remnants of a
camp in the Whitney Pockets area, in the northeastern
region of Gold Butte.

The Gold Butte landscape that visitors experience today
is the product of millions of years of heat and
pressure as well as the eroding forces of water and
wind that molded this vast and surreal desert terrain.
Rising up from the Virgin River to an elevation of
almost 8,000 feet, the Virgin Mountains delineate the
area's northeast corner and provide a stunning backdrop
for the rugged gray and red desert of the lower
elevations. Faulted carbonate and silicate rock form
the ridges and peaks of this range, which are regularly
snow-covered in winter and spring, while the southern
region of Gold Butte is laced with a series of wide
granitic ridges and narrow canyons. These broad
landscape features are dotted with fantastical geologic
formations, including vividly hued Aztec Sandstone
twisted into otherworldly shapes by wind and water, as
well as pale, desolate granitic domes. An actively-
expanding 1,200 square-meter sinkhole known as the
Devil's Throat has been the subject of multiple
scientific studies that have enhanced our understanding
of sinkhole formation.

The Gold Butte landscape is a mosaic of braided and
shallow washes that flow into the Virgin River to the
north and directly into Lake Mead on the south and
west. Several natural springs provide important water
sources for the plants and animals living here. The
arid eastern Mojave Desert landscape that dominates the
area is characterized by the creosote bush and white
bursage vegetative community that covers large, open
expanses scattered with low shrubs. Blackbrush scrub, a
slow-growing species that can live up to 400 years, is
abundant in middle elevations. Both creosote-bursage
and blackbrush scrub vegetation communities can take
decades or even centuries to recover from disturbances
due to the long-lived nature of the plant species in
these vegetative communities and the area's low
rainfall. These vegetation communities are impacted by
human uses, invasive species, wildfires, and changing
climates. Gypsum deposits are a distinctive aspect of
the Mojave Desert ecosystem and result in soil that
contains physical and chemical properties that stress
many plants, but also support endemic and rare species.
For example, the sticky ringstem, Las Vegas buckwheat,
and Las Vegas bearpoppy are unique plants that rely on
gypsum soil; the populations in Gold Butte are some of
only a handful of isolated populations of these species
left in the world. Other rare plants in Gold Butte
include the threecorner milkvetch and sticky wild
buckwheat, which are sand-dependent species, as well as
the Rosy two-tone beardtongue and the Mokiak milkvetch.
Scattered stands of Joshua trees, an emblem of the
Mojave Desert, dot the landscape along with Mojave
yucca, cacti species, and chaparral species, among
others.

The often snowcapped peaks of the Virgin Mountains in
the northeastern corner of Gold Butte stand in stark
contrast to the desolate desert landscapes found
elsewhere in the area. Due to their elevation of almost
8,000 feet, these mountains exhibit a transition
between ecosystems in the southwest. At the highest
points of the Virgin Mountains, visitors can hike
through Ponderosa pine and white fir forests, and visit
the southernmost stand of Douglas fir in Nevada. In
this area, visitors are also treated to a rare sight:
the Silver State's only stand of the Arizona cypress.
The lower to middle elevations of the area are home to
stands of pinyon pine, Utah juniper, sagebrush, and
acacia woodlands, along with occasional mesquite
stands. By adding structural complexity to a shrub-
dominated landscape, these woodlands provide important
breeding, foraging, and resting places for a variety of
creatures, including birds and insects, and support a
number of plant species.

Gold Butte also provides habitat for a number of
wildlife species. It has been designated as critical
habitat for the Mojave desert tortoise, which is listed
as threatened under the Endangered Species Act. These
slow-footed symbols of the American Southwest rely on
the creosote-bursage ecosystem that is widespread here.
A generally reclusive reptile, the Mojave desert

tortoise uses the protective cover of underground
burrows to escape extreme desert conditions and as
shelter from predators.

Other amphibians and reptiles also make their homes in
Gold Butte. For example, once considered extinct and
now a candidate species for listing under the
Endangered Species Act, the relict leopard frog has
been released into spring sites in the area in a
collaborative effort by local, State, and Federal
entities to help revive this still very small
population. The banded Gila monster, the only venomous
lizard in the United States, has also been recorded in
Gold Butte. Many other reptile species--including the
banded gecko, California kingsnake, desert iguana,
desert night lizard, glossy snake, Great Basin collared
lizard, Mojave green rattlesnake, sidewinder, Sonoran
lyre snake, southern desert horned lizard, speckled
rattlesnake, western leaf-nosed snake, western long-
nosed snake, and western red-tailed skink--also have
populations or potential habitats in the area.

The Gold Butte area serves as an effective corridor
between Lake Mead and the Virgin Mountains for large
mammals, including desert bighorn sheep and mountain
lions. Smaller mammals in Gold Butte include white-
tailed antelope squirrel, desert kangaroo rat, and the
desert pocket mouse. Several species of bat, including
the Pallid bat, Allen's big-eared bat, western
pipistrelle bat, and the Brazilian free-tailed bat, are
also found here, as well as the northern Mojave blue
butterfly.

Bald and golden eagles, red-tailed and Cooper's hawks,
peregrine falcons, and white-throated swifts soar above
Gold Butte. Closer to the ground, one can spot a
variety of birds, including the western burrowing owl,
common poorwill, Costa's hummingbird, pinyon jay,
Bendire's thrasher, Virginia's warbler, Lucy's warbler,
black-chinned sparrow, and gray vireo. Migratory birds,
including the Calliope hummingbird, gray flycatcher,
sage sparrow, lesser nighthawk, ash-throated
flycatcher, and the Brewer's sparrow, also make stop-
overs in the area. These birds, and a variety of other
avian species, use the diversity of habitats in the
area to meet many of their seasonal, migratory, or
year-round life cycle needs.

In addition to providing homes to modern species of
plants and wildlife, the area shows great potential for
continued paleontological research, with resources such
as recently discovered dinosaur tracks dating back to
the Jurassic Period. These fossil trackways were found
in Gold Butte's distinctive Aztec Sandstone and also
include prints from squirrel-sized reptilian ancestors
of mammals.

The protection of the Gold Butte area will preserve its
cultural, prehistoric, and historic legacy and maintain
its diverse array of natural and scientific resources,
ensuring that the historic and scientific values of
this area, and its many objects of historic and of
scientific interest, remain for the benefit of all
Americans.

WHEREAS, section 320301 of title 54, United States Code
(known as the ``Antiquities Act''), authorizes the
President, in his discretion, to declare by public
proclamation historic landmarks, historic and
prehistoric structures, and other objects of historic
or scientific interest that are situated upon the lands
owned or controlled by the Federal Government to be
national monuments, and to reserve as a part thereof
parcels of land, the limits of which in all cases shall
be confined to the smallest area compatible with the
proper care and management of the objects to be
protected;

WHEREAS, it is in the public interest to preserve the
objects of scientific and historic interest on the Gold
Butte lands;

NOW, THEREFORE, I, BARACK OBAMA, President of the
United States of America, by the authority vested in me
by section 320301 of title 54, United States Code,
hereby proclaim the objects identified above that are
situated upon lands and interests in lands owned or
controlled by the Federal Government to be the Gold
Butte National Monument (monument) and, for the purpose
of protecting those objects, reserve as part thereof

all lands and interests in lands owned or controlled by
the Federal Government within the boundaries described
on the accompanying map, which is attached to and forms
a part of this proclamation. These reserved Federal
lands and interests in lands encompass approximately
296,937 acres. The boundaries described on the
accompanying map are confined to the smallest area
compatible with the proper care and management of the
objects to be protected.

All Federal lands and interests in lands within the
boundaries of the monument are hereby appropriated and
withdrawn from all forms of entry, location, selection,
sale, or other disposition under the public land laws,
from location, entry, and patent under the mining laws,
and from disposition under all laws relating to mineral
and geothermal leasing.

The establishment of the monument is subject to valid
existing rights, including valid existing water rights.
If the Federal Government subsequently acquires any
lands or interests in lands not owned or controlled by
the Federal Government within the boundaries described
on the accompanying map, such lands and interests in
lands shall be reserved as a part of the monument, and
objects identified above that are situated upon those
lands and interests in lands shall be part of the
monument, upon acquisition of ownership or control by
the Federal Government.

The Secretary of the Interior (Secretary) shall manage
the monument pursuant to applicable legal authorities,
which may include the provisions of section 603 of the
Federal Land Policy and Management Act (43 U.S.C. 1782)
governing the management of wilderness study areas, to
protect the objects identified above. Of the
approximately 296,937 acres of Federal lands and
interests in lands reserved by this proclamation,
approximately 285,158 acres are currently managed by
the Secretary through the Bureau of Land Management
(BLM) and approximately 11,779 are currently managed by
the Secretary through the Bureau of Reclamation (BOR).
After issuance of this proclamation, the Secretary
shall, consistent with applicable legal authorities,
transfer administrative jurisdiction of the BOR lands
within the boundaries of the monument to the BLM. The
Secretary, through the BLM, shall manage lands within
the monument that are subject to the administrative
jurisdiction of the BLM as a unit of the National
Landscape Conservation System.

For purposes of protecting and restoring the objects
identified above, the Secretary, through the BLM, shall
prepare and maintain a management plan for the monument
and shall provide for maximum public involvement in the
development of that plan including, but not limited to,
consultation with State, tribal, and local governments.

The Secretary shall establish an advisory committee
under the Federal Advisory Committee Act, 5 U.S.C.
App., to provide information and advice regarding
development of the land use plan and management of the
monument.

Except for emergency or authorized administrative
purposes, motorized vehicle use in the monument shall
be permitted only on roads designated as open to such
use as of the date of this proclamation, unless the
Secretary decides to reroute roads for public safety
purposes or to enhance protection of the objects
identified above. Non-motorized mechanized vehicle use
shall be permitted only on roads and trails, consistent
with the care and management of the objects identified
above.

Consistent with the care and management of the objects
identified above, nothing in this proclamation shall be
construed to preclude the renewal or assignment of, or
interfere with the operation, maintenance, replacement,
modification, or upgrade within the physical
authorization boundary of existing flood control,
pipeline, and telecommunications facilities, or other
water infrastructure, including wildlife water
catchments or water district facilities, that are
located within the monument. Except as necessary for
the care and management of the objects identified
above, no new rights-of-way shall be authorized within
the monument.

Nothing in this proclamation shall be deemed to enlarge
or diminish the rights or jurisdiction of any Indian
tribe. The Secretary shall, to the maximum extent
permitted by law and in consultation with Indian
tribes, ensure the protection of Indian sacred sites
and traditional cultural properties in the monument and
provide for access by members of Indian tribes for
traditional cultural and customary uses, consistent
with the American Indian Religious Freedom Act (42
U.S.C. 1996) and Executive Order 13007 of May 24, 1996
(Indian Sacred Sites).

Livestock grazing has not been permitted in the
monument area since 1998 and the Secretary shall not
issue any new grazing permits or leases on lands within
the monument.

Nothing in this proclamation shall be deemed to enlarge
or diminish the jurisdiction of the State of Nevada,
including its jurisdiction and authority with respect
to fish and wildlife management, including hunting and
fishing.

Nothing in this proclamation shall be construed to
preclude the traditional tribal collection of seeds,
natural materials, salt, or materials for stone tools
in the monument for personal noncommercial use
consistent with the care and management of the objects
identified above.

Nothing in this proclamation shall preclude low-level
overflights of military aircraft, the designation of
new units of special use airspace, or the use or
establishment of military flight training routes over
the lands reserved by this proclamation consistent with
the care and management of the objects identified
above. Nothing in this proclamation shall preclude air
or ground access to existing or new electronic tracking
communications sites associated with the special use
airspace and military training routes, consistent with
the care and management of such objects.

Nothing in this proclamation shall be deemed to revoke
any existing withdrawal, reservation, or appropriation;
however, the monument shall be the dominant
reservation.

Warning is hereby given to all unauthorized persons not
to appropriate, injure, destroy, or remove any feature
of the monument and not to locate or settle upon any of
the lands thereof.

IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this
twenty-eighth day of December, in the year of our Lord
two thousand sixteen, and of the Independence of the
United States of America the two hundred and forty-
first.

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