Early History
Native Americans have lived in Ash Meadows for thousands of years settling around spring pools
and meadows. Families owned and managed mesquite groves to enhance the size and taste of
the nutritious seed pods. For hundreds of years, Native Americans cultivated corn, beans,
squash, and sunflowers in small fields irrigated with spring water. From their Ash Meadows
homes they traveled to the mountains to gather
pinyon pine
nuts, hunt
bighorn sheep,
and exchange news with friends and relatives.
Many decendants of the prehistoric Ash Meadows Native Americans live today amoung the nearby
Pahrump Southern Paiute and
Timbisha Shoshone
of
Death Valley.
The old archeological sites, historic home locations,
mesquite
groves, and crystal pure water of Ash Meadows remain
important elements of modern Shoshone and Paiute culture.
Later History
The Amargosa Valley is also rich in pioneer history. Many settlers were interested in the
prospects of mining or farming. Ash Meadows was intensively farmed prior to its establishment
as a National Wildlife Refuge. During the 1960's and early 1970's in particular, irrigated
row crops, grazing, and development took a heavy toll on the area's natural resources. Plants,
fish, and wildlife declined as pumping and diversion of spring channels, development of roads,
large scale earth moving, and introduction of over 100 non-native plants and animals occurred
in a "blink" of evolutionary time. The Carson Slough, an area in the northwestern portion of
the refuge which was historically the largest wetland in southern Nevada, was drained and
mined for its peat in the 1960's.