They include mule deer, elk, pronghorn, black bears, coyotes, bobcats, foxes, cougars, and bighorn sheep.

Activities include hiking, camping, fishing, mountain biking, downhill and cross-country skiing, wildlife viewing, scenic touring, off-highway vehicle riding, and rock climbing.

A portion of the 56-mile High Road to Taos, another state designated scenic byway, goes through the forest's Camino Real Ranger District.

Four winter and summer resort developments where activities ranging from skiing to mountain biking have special use permits to operate on national forest land: The forest was once inhabited by the Ancestral Pueblo people, who left ruins of adobe dwellings and other artifacts at an archaeological site now called Pot Creek Cultural Site.

In the early 20th century, Taos Pueblo petitioned the federal government to regain Blue Lake, but their requests were denied.

The Department of Agriculture therefore denied requests to set aside land at Blue Lake for the Taos Pueblo to perform ceremonies, claiming that it was "foreign to the policies of the Department of Agriculture, when once some land has been set aside as a National Forest, to allow it to be withdrawn completely and donated to a private purpose."

The ICC then concluded that Taos Pueblo's land had been illegally obtained and no proper amends had been made to rectify it, suggesting a monetary award as compensation.

Taos Pueblo refused a monetary settlement, leading to a deliberation in Congress to return Blue Lake back to the tribe.

[11] In October 1966, the Alianza Federal de Mercedes, an organization dedicated to the restoration of certain land grants entrenched in the 1848 Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo to descendants of then-Mexican citizens, occupied the Carson Forest's Echo Amphitheater in an attempt to create a land grant community.

In 1982, the forest grew by 405 square kilometers (100,000 acres) when the Pennzoil corporation donated the Valle Vidal Unit to the American people.