[4] The smaller volcanic cone of Shastina (12,270 ft)[5] lies one mile (1.6 km) west of Mount Shasta and was formed after the ice-age glaciers melted.

It is valued for the many scenic, geologic and recreational attributes including glaciers, lava flows, hot springs, waterfalls and forests of Shasta red fir, sugar pine and other conifers.

Being a high, solitary and very large mountain with a base diameter of 17 miles (27 km),[6] Mount Shasta can create its own weather patterns which hikers must be aware of.

Although there is no designated trail to the summit, many cross-country routes ascend to the mountaintop and all require experience in traversing ice and snow.

Wildlife include the ubiquitous black bear, coyote, ground squirrel, deer, golden eagles, prairie falcons and red-tail hawks.

The Shasta owl's clover (Orthocarpus pachystachyus) of the family Scrophulariaceae is critically imperiled and was believed to be extinct.

Known only from two reports from the Shasta Valley of northern California, it could not be relocated despite repeated searches of the moist meadows and vernal pools where it was thought originally to have been found.

In May, 1996, botanist Dean Taylor of the University of California, Berkeley, rediscovered the evasive plant on the higher, drier ground of a sagebrush-covered hillside.