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Santa Cruz Mountains
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Santa Cruz Mountains, California, 95033, United States (37.21174 -122.05826)
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Santa Cruz Mountains
The Santa Cruz Mountains are a region of great biological diversity, encompassing cool, moist coastal ecosystems as well as warm, dry chaparral. Much of the area in the Santa Cruz mountains is considered temperate rainforest. In valleys and moist ocean-facing slopes some of the southernmost coast redwoods grow, along with coast Douglas-fir. Coast live oak, Pacific madrone, Pacific wax myrtle, big leaf maple, California bay laurel, and California black oak also occur in the Santa Cruz Mountains. There do exist several small and isolated stands of old-growth forest, most notably at Henry Cowell Redwoods and Portola Redwoods State Parks and one sizeable old-growth redwood forest at Big Basin. At higher elevations and on sunny south slopes a more drought-resistant chaparral vegetation dominates: manzanita, California scrub oak, chamise, and chaparral pea. Spring wildflowers are also widespread throughout the range.