Hall Ranch
 Hall
Ranch has been heralded as a crucial wildlife habitat. It is home to the
tiny ruby-crowned kinglet, golden eagle, great horned owl, Cooper's
hawk, night hawk, mountain lion, elk, bighorn sheep, white-tailed deer,
black-tailed prairie dog, coyote, fox, badger and bobcat. The prairie
rattlesnake is also commonly seen from March through October at Hall Ranch.
Hall Ranch has multiuse trails and picnic
shelters
available for visitors and is
located
near the town of Lyons.
History
Hall Ranch is located at the interface between the mountains and the
plains. The western portion of the ranch is made up of igneous rock formed
more than a billion years ago. The eastern side is composed of more
recent, red sedimentary Fountain and Lyons Formations which has been
extensively quarried. Many of the buildings on the University of
Colorado's Boulder campus were built using stone from these quarries.
The property was the home of the Arapaho and Cheyenne Indian tribes
before the more than 20 different Anglo families lived and operated
businesses at Hall Ranch. These families prospected, farmed and quarried
sandstone.
If you travel on the Nelson Loop Trail, you will be in the historic
Antelope Parks area which was originally homesteaded by Rich Clark in
1890. In 1922, the homestead was purchased by the Nelson Family. In the
mid-1940s, Hallyn and June Hall bought the property and for more than 50
years, it was a working ranch. Boulder County Parks and Open Space bought
the property in 1993 shortly after the passage of the 0.25% open space
sales tax.
Hall Ranch consists of 3,206 acres of backcountry. Because of its
importance as a wildlife habitat, we strive to balance the protection of
wildlife and recreation. Therefore, dogs are not allowed on this
open space property.
 Hall Ranch provides over 12 miles of multiuse trails. Bitterbrush Trail
(3.7 miles) and Nelson Loop (2.2 miles) are both multiuse trails open to
hikers, mountain bikers and
equestrians.
The Nighthawk Trail
(4.7 miles) is open to hikers and equestrians and Button Rock Trail (2 miles) is open only to hikers.
A group shelter, which can
accommodate up to 50 people, is available for use on a first-come,
first-serve basis. The trailhead also has picnic tables, grills and restrooms.
 The entrance to Hall Ranch is found on Highway 7, one mile west of
Lyons.
Weekend use is high at Hall Ranch and parking is limited. The eastern
portion of the property can be extremely hot midday during July and
August. We recommend early morning or evening use during these months.
Hall Ranch Map: Because all of our open space properties are environmentally sensitive,
it is important for users to know the rules
and regulations pertaining to
our open space.
Once
the map is displayed, you can use the adobe toolbar to fit the map to your
window, pan, zoom in or out, search or print the map on your own printer.
The size of the original map and screen reduction are shown on the lower
left hand status bar.
The Hall Ranch map is a 780 KB file and will
require Adobe Acrobat Reader, which is available free from Adobe. Map may
not appear properly in your web browser, for best results, save map file to a
directory on your computer (right click and choose "Save Target
as" in Internet explorer or "Save Link as" in Netscape) and
open using Adobe Reader.
|
