The Ashdown Gorge Wilderness is located in southwestern Utah

Utah

Utah is a state in the Western United States. It was the 45th state to join the Union, on January 4, 1896. Approximately 80% of Utah's 2,763,885 people live along the Wasatch Front, centering on Salt Lake City. This leaves vast expanses of the state nearly uninhabited, making the population the...

, USA

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

, within the arid Colorado Plateau

Colorado Plateau

The Colorado Plateau, also called the Colorado Plateau Province, is a physiographic region of the Intermontane Plateaus, roughly centered on the Four Corners region of the southwestern United States. The province covers an area of 337,000 km2 within western Colorado, northwestern New Mexico,...

 region. The wilderness is within the Dixie National Forest

Dixie National Forest

Dixie National Forest is a United States National Forest in Utah with headquarters in Cedar City. It occupies almost two million acres and stretches for about 170 miles across southern Utah. The largest national forest in Utah, it straddles the divide between the Great Basin and the Colorado River...

 adjacent to Cedar Breaks National Monument

Cedar Breaks National Monument

Cedar Breaks National Monument is a U.S. National Monument located in the U.S. state of Utah near Cedar City. Cedar Breaks is a natural amphitheater canyon, stretching across , with a depth of over . The elevation of the rim of the canyon is over above sea level.The eroded rock of the canyon is...

 and characterized by extremely steep-walled canyon

Canyon

A canyon or gorge is a deep ravine between cliffs often carved from the landscape by a river. Rivers have a natural tendency to reach a baseline elevation, which is the same elevation as the body of water it will eventually drain into. This forms a canyon. Most canyons were formed by a process of...

s cut through the west rim of the Markagunt Plateau

Markagunt Plateau

The Markagunt Plateau is an plateau located in southwestern Utah between Interstate 15 and U.S. Route 89. It is one of the plateaus that make up the High Plateaus Section of the Colorado Plateau. The plateau encompasses Cedar Breaks National Monument and is part of Cedar Mountain District of...

. Elevations in the wilderness range from 10500 foot to 7500 foot. Rattlesnake Creek and Ashdown Creek flow through the wilderness. The 7043 acres (28.5 km²) wilderness area was designated by the U.S. Congress in 1984 and is administered is by the United States Forest Service

United States Forest Service

The United States Forest Service is an agency of the United States Department of Agriculture that administers the nation's 155 national forests and 20 national grasslands, which encompass...

.

Like the more famous Cedar Breaks National Monument

Cedar Breaks National Monument

Cedar Breaks National Monument is a U.S. National Monument located in the U.S. state of Utah near Cedar City. Cedar Breaks is a natural amphitheater canyon, stretching across , with a depth of over . The elevation of the rim of the canyon is over above sea level.The eroded rock of the canyon is...

, Ashdown Gorge is known for its multicolored rock formations and plateau-top stands of 1,000 year old bristlecone pine

Bristlecone pine

The bristlecone pines are a small group of pine trees that are thought to reach an age far greater than that of any other single living organism known, up to nearly 5,000 years....

s. The Gorge is named after the family of George Ashdown who set up a sawmill there in 1898. Today there are 320 acres (1.3 km²) of private land inholding

Inholding

An inholding is privately owned land inside the boundary of a national park, national forest, state park, or similar publicly owned, protected area...

s mostly surrounded by the wilderness.

In 2006, Iron County

Iron County, Utah

As of the census of 2000, there were 33,779 people, 10,627 households, and 8,076 families residing in the county. The population density was 10 people per square mile . There were 13,618 housing units at an average density of 4 per square mile...

 officials were considering a proposal to expand Cedar Breaks National Monument to include the Ashdown Gorge Wilderness, the private inholdings and nearby Flanigan Arch. With congressional approval the area would be renamed Cedar Breaks National Park.

See also

• Dixie National Forest
  Dixie National Forest
  Dixie National Forest is a United States National Forest in Utah with headquarters in Cedar City. It occupies almost two million acres and stretches for about 170 miles across southern Utah. The largest national forest in Utah, it straddles the divide between the Great Basin and the Colorado River...
  
  
• Wilderness
  Wilderness
  Wilderness or wildland is a natural environment on Earth that has not been significantly modified by human activity. It may also be defined as: "The most intact, undisturbed wild natural areas left on our planet—those last truly wild places that humans do not control and have not developed with...
  
  
• National Wilderness Preservation System
  National Wilderness Preservation System
  The National Wilderness Preservation System of the United States protects federally managed land areas designated for preservation in their natural condition. It was established by the Wilderness Act upon the signature of President Lyndon B. Johnson on September 3, 1964...
  
  
• List of U.S. Wilderness Areas
• Wilderness Act
  Wilderness Act
  The Wilderness Act of 1964 was written by Howard Zahniser of The Wilderness Society. It created the legal definition of wilderness in the United States, and protected some 9 million acres of federal land. The result of a long effort to protect federal wilderness, the Wilderness Act was signed...