Colorado's Spanish Peaks Region: An Exploration Guide to History, Natural History, Trails, and Drives

Colorado's Spanish Peaks are landmarks of unique beauty. As the region's first comprehensive guide, this book provides an indispensable introduction to the area, including numerous maps and illustrations. The guide's utility is enhanced by appendices featuring preparations for outings, notes on Colorado trespass law, tips on mountain photography, and a source list for agencies and organizations. Finally, a detailed resource list is included, plus two indices, one for general subjects, the other for common and scientific names of plants and animals.

Richard Keating retired as a biology professor from Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville, Illinois. He and his wife, Jody, have spent summers in the Cuchara Valley since 2000, and so are relative newcomers to Huerfano County. While he was raised and educated in the east, Professor Keating s long interest in western natural history began in the 1960s when he spent two summers as a ranger-naturalist in Grand Teton National Park, Wyoming.

During his professional career he conducted summer field courses in botany and ecology in Belize, Central America, Tennessee s Great Smoky Mountains National Park, South Dakota s Black Hills, and the University of Colorado s Niwot Ridge Field Station in the Front Range.

Much of his research in plant form and microscopic structure, and related topics, was accomplished at the Missouri Botanical Garden, St. Louis, where he has been a Research Associate since 1967. Fieldwork connected with his research has taken him to the American and Old World tropics as well as to the North American Arctic. As a landscape photographer, Dr. Keating makes black and white exhibition prints and has found southern Colorado particularly photogenic.