The Riverside Mountains form a small but rugged range in the Colorado Desert of southeastern California along the lower Colorado River Valley. Part of the range is protected within the Riverside Mountains Wilderness, established in 1994 and managed by the Bureau of Land Management, where terrain ranges from sloping bajadas to steep canyons and craggy peaks. The area shelters desert species including foxtail cactus, California barrel cactus, and a small herd of Burro deer. The range is also geologically important, preserving rocks and structures that reveal major Cretaceous crustal shortening and later Miocene extension in the lower Colorado region.