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This page is a draft for the Verdugo Mountains article. If you have arrived here from a search, be aware that this article is incomplete and not widely peer edited. (Discuss)

The Verdugo Mountains are a small mountain range located just south of the western San Gabriel Mountains in Los Angeles County, Southern California. The range is commonly known simply as the Verdugos. It is also sometimes referred to as the Verdugo Hills.

Geography
The Verdugo Mountains lie within the corporate boundaries of the cities of Glendale, Burbank, and Los Angeles. The Los Angeles neighborhoods of Tujunga, Sunland, Shadow Hills, La Tuna Canyon, and Sun Valley are all adjacent to the range on its north end.

The Verdugos are part of the Transverse Ranges. They form part of the eastern boundary of the San Fernando Valley and part of the southern boundary of the Crescenta Valley. North of the range, it is separated from the San Gabriels by an area of connected valleys containing the Sunland and Tujunga neighborhoods of Los Angeles, between the Tujunga Valley at the mouth of Big Tujunga Wash and the northern end of the Crescenta Valley. The Foothill Freeway (US 210) climbs for a few miles up and over the northern end of the Verdugos after passing through the Crescenta Valley, descending into Sunland to continue along the northeast edge of the San Fernando Valley. Near where the Foothill Freeway begins to climb the Verdugos is another pass across the north end of the range through La Tuna Canyon along La Tuna Canyon Road. On the southeast end of the range, it is separated from the San Rafael Hills to the east by the Verdugo Wash. The routing of the Glendale Freeway (CA 2) along these hills north of its junction with the Ventura Freeway (CA 134) provides a largely unimpeded view of the eastern slope of the range across the valley.

The highest peak in the Verdugos is the informally named Verdugo Peak (3,126 feet) in Glendale near the northern end of the range. Another peak to the south of Verdugo Peak near Brand Park in Glendale was recently named Tongva Peak (2,656 feet) in honor of the Tongva (Gabrielino) people, the original inhabitants of much of the Los Angeles Basin, Santa Monica Mountains, and San Gabriel Valley areas. Other named peaks are Mount La Tuna on the north end of the range and Mount Thom on the south end of the range.

The Verdugo Mountains are named after José María Verdugo and family, whose property Rancho San Rafael encompassed most of the present-day city of Glendale, the Los Angeles neighborhoods of Atwater Village, Glassell Park, Cypress Park, Eagle Rock, Mount Washington, and Highland Park (part), the entire San Rafael Hills to the Arroyo Seco, and much of the Verdugo Mountains themselves.

Geology
The Verdugo Mountains are approximately 12 miles east of the epicenter of the magnitude 6.7 earthquake that struck Northridge on January 17, 1994, and approximately 10 miles southeast of the epicenter of the magnitude 6.6 earthquake that struck Sylmar on February 9, 1971. The Verdugo Fault runs along the southwest edge of the Verdugos, through Sun Valley, Glendale and Burbank.

Exposed rocks in the Shadow Hills neighborhood at the northwestern end of the Verdugos are typically sedimentary, predominantly sandstone and shale. A half-inch-thick vein of blade-shaped evaporite crystals (gypsum or anhydrite?) can be found in the exposed shale just south of Wentworth Street, between Foothill Boulevard and the Foothill Freeway overpass.

Flora and fauna
Except for a tenuous link to the Angeles National Forest through Big Tujunga Wash to the north, the Verdugo Mountains are an urban wildlife island. Native-plant landscapes that may survive and even thrive in many places at the higher elevations include chaparral and oak woodlands. Hazards that the wise hiker will learn to avoid in these landscapes include poison oak ("leaflets three: let them be!"), black widow spiders, gopher holes (ankle sprainers), and rattlesnakes.

Protected areas

 * Verdugo Mountains State Park, California Department of Parks and Recreation
 * Verdugo Mountains Open Space Preserve, jointly operated by the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy and the City of Glendale


 * Brand Park, Glendale
 * Stough Canyon Nature Center, Burbank
 * Wildwood Canyon Park, Burbank
 * La Tuna Canyon Park, Los Angeles
 * Tujunga Ponds, Los Angeles

The Verdugo Mountains are being considered as part of the proposed Rim of the Valley Corridor National Park.

Hiking and biking
The Verdugo Mountains have many hiking trails. The trails are rather short and intermediate in difficulty.

In addition to hikers, mountain bike riders do their off-road sport on the many trails in the Verdugo Mountains. The trail that starts on La Tuna Canyon Road in the northwest end of the mountains is popular with bikers as it is one of the wider and easier trails in the mountains, with one of the easiest grades.

The entrance to the Upper Verdugo Park from the Villa Cabrinis in Burbank is a park popular with hikers who walk up the Cabrini hill.

Maps

 * Angeles Front Country Trail Map. San Rafael, California: Tom Harrison Maps, 2001. ISBN 1-877689-65-3.
 * Burbank, California, 7.5 minute topographic quadrangle map. United States Geological Survey.
 * Pasadena, California, 7.5 minute topographic quadrangle map. United States Geological Survey.
 * Mount La Tuna -
 * Verdugo Peak -
 * Tongva Peak -
 * Mount Thom -