[2] Following the uplift, large volumes of sediments, rich in early Tertiary fossils, were deposited in the adjoining basins.

Brief gold rushes of placer deposits occurred at Bald Mountain City and Porcupine Creek, and in Big Goose Canyon.

The lack of precious metals helped stave off development and settlement in the mountains, in contrast to the Colorado Rockies.

[4] The Natural Trap Cave on the west slope of the Bighorns contains numerous remains of prehistoric mammals.

One area, north of U.S. Route 14A and containing the headwaters of the Little Bighorn River, is 155,000 acres of National Forest land.

[5] In this part of the range, semidesert prairie is cut by steep canyons leading to Yellowtail Reservoir, and high, Douglas-fir cloaked ridges top out at over 9,000'.

Rocky Mountain juniper and limber pine are scattered on lower elevations, and wildlife includes pronghorn, rattlesnake, golden eagle, ferruginous hawk, and mule deer.

The high elevation of the Bighorns results in condensation of air and significant yearly snowfall, creating a highland oasis of moisture towering over the otherwise arid plains that surround the range in all directions.

The Wyoming Geological Survey studied the area and determined that "The Crack" may be the result of an "apparent active landslide" in the southern end of the Big Horn Mountains.

[7] The Bighorns provided important resources for ancestral indigenous people, including plants, migratory big game, rock shelters, tepee poles, and stone for tools.

The southern Bighorns, particularly in the Middle Fork of the Powder River, contained an important American Indian trail adjacent to a bison migration corridor.

The Wilson Price Hunt expedition of Astorians noted in 1811 that the bison dung was so dense in this area that it resembled a "continuous barnyard" for several miles.

[8] The Medicine Wheel on the northern end of the Bighorns is an important sacred site built by ancestral tribes that is still used in present-day American Indian ceremonies.

Ancestors of the Shoshone Tribe likely had the longest continuous association with the Bighorns, potentially dating back 1,000 years or more.

The Apsalooke or Crow tribe located in this region about 300–400 years ago after discovering the sacred tobacco plant growing in the Bighorn Mountains below Cloud Peak.

This ended a multi-generational sojourn that began near Devils Lake, North Dakota, where a leader named No Vitals received a vision to seek the tobacco.

[10] Cheyenne, Arapaho, and Lakota use of the Bighorns region mostly dates to the period after 1800, when they made incursions into traditional Shoshone and Crow territory.

By the 1860s and 1870s, the Lakota showed a knowledge of the ancestral trail systems in the Bighorn Mountains, particularly in incidents like the Sibley Fight.

[15] The Lakota word for the Bighorns is Ȟeyúškiška meaning "Rugged mountain ridge" or "rough animal horns.

Permitted livestock grazing on the Bighorn National Forest is known to degrade water quality with microbes like e coli and giardiasis.

Wilderness users must register at trailheads, but no permit is required, though there are regulations about group size, prohibiting fires at high elevation, and camping away from water sources.

The noise impacts from ATV use outside of the Cloud Peak Wilderness contrast from the former marketing motto that invited people to "Visit the Bighorns if you can stand the quiet."

The former Spear O Wigwam guest ranch hosted Ernest Hemingway in 1928, where he wrote part of "A Farewell to Arms."