Angelina National Forest

About Angelina National Forest

Welcome to Angelina National Forest, the largest national forest in the USA, located on the western edge of Los Angeles County, California. The forest is near the Sam Rayburn Dam, which was built in the early 1960s and is located north of San Bernardino National Park.

Angelina National Forest is located on the top level of the Gulf Coast and the terrain is slightly hilly and borders the Pacific Ocean to the east and west, the San Gabriel Mountains to the north and south. Long and left fir are the dominant cover species, while deciduous and short-leaved pine are the predominant species in the rest of this forest.

Summer in Angelina National Forest is hot and humid, with an average annual rainfall of 46 inches. Winter is generally short and mild, but temperatures rarely rise above 110 degrees or fall below 10 degrees in the forest. The average temperature in this forest is 52 degrees in winter and there is rarely an increase in the temperature of the forest. Temperatures rarely drop to -10 degrees in the woods and rarely above -40 degrees.

There are hundreds of species in Angelina National Forest, and wildlife management is focused on keeping animal populations in balance with available food and shelter.

Created for the habitat of fish and waterfowl, Sam Rayburn Reservoir provides 114,500 hectares of water to support, breed and feed migratory birds that rest and feed on their way south to the Gulf Coast. Athletes can hunt and fish under state wildlife law, but the main forest is hive and the inhabited duck population stays in the forest all year round.

North of Sam Rayburn Lake is the Angelina National Forest Wildlife Management Area, which is part of the National Wildlife Refuge System. The aim of this area is to focus on wildlife management and to create better hunting opportunities. This includes improvements to the wildlife and management of the area, as well as the development of new ways of hunting and fishing.

Angelina National Forest and its surroundings, such as Sam Rayburn Lake, provide a winter habitat for the endangered bald eagle. In the winter months, visitors to the forest can see bald eagles floating in the water, perched on trees, grasses and other plants, as well as in lakes and streams.

The red cockatoo woodpecker, an endangered species, can be found throughout the forest. The small black and white woodpeckers find their home in large, living pines with large cavity and pick cavities in them. They protect the birds from predatory snakes, generate dung flow and give pictures of opening candlesticks for nests in the cavity of the tree.

The red cockatoo woodpecker has been listed as an endangered species since 1973 and the Angelina National Forest in the state is protected. Wherever the birds are found, management will focus on providing them with the special habitat they need.

Humans arrived in the area, now called Angelina National Forest, about 8,000 years ago, and archaeological sites are located throughout the forest, with resources found and excavated ranging from the early stages of human settlement to the present day. These pages document the history of the human presence in this area as well as the current state of conservation.

Burbury is a small cemetery overlooking the creek, located in the southwestern part of the forest and named after one of the original settlers of Angelina County. Each tombstone still bears the name and date of birth, as well as the name of the family and the place of burial.

The old Aldridge sawmill is located at the end of the Sawmill Way along the River Neches. The concrete structure of hand-cast concrete has fallen into disrepair and remains a relic of the former industrial sites of Angelina National Forest, considered a historic landmark.

In 1934, the Texas legislature passed a resolution calling for the purchase of federal land to create a national forest in Texas. In 1935, U.S. Sen. Sam Brownback (R-TX) and Texas Gov. George H.W. Bush (D) began construction of Angelina National Forest on the former site of the Aldridge Sawmill.

Much of the country was sown in the late 1930s, starting with the construction of a 2.3-kilometer (2.2-mile) hiking trail. Early management efforts focused on the protection and management of wildlife such as deer, elk and coyotes, as well as the planting of trees and shrubs. A year earlier, construction of a 1,500 hectare forest management area began.

Part of the route follows an old tram, which was used in the 1920s to transport logs to the sawmill and back. The middle path leads to the abandoned Aldridge sawmill site, and at various points along the way, parts of old bridges and sawmill ruins can be seen. A hiking map can be found on the Angelina National Forest website and on its Facebook page.