notable raptor is the California condor, a critically endangered species. As in many California mountains, larger fauna includes: mule deer, mountain lion, coyote, fox, black bear, feral pig, bobcat and raccoon. The Tehachapi Mountains are also the only known breeding site prior to 1860 of the jaguar in the United States. The big cats were found there as recently as the late 1800s. Climate The range includes and is the boundary between the xeric Mojave Desert and Mediterranean climate zones, and includes the subalpine zone. The majority of the range is in the Mediterranean climate zone, receiving precipitation in the winter similar to the neighboring Transverse Ranges in the Los Padres and Angeles National Forests to the west and southwest. They create a rain shadow for the eastern foothills ecotone into the Mojave climate zone that typically receives only a few inches of precipitation a year, usually in winter. Summer monsoon season can bring localized rains to the higher subalpine parts of the range. The wettest slopes receive about 20–25 inches of precipitation a year, some in the form of snow. The prevailing wind is northwesterly, funneling up the east–west canyons from the San Joaquin Valley into the valleys, upper canyons, and passes of the Tehachapi range with regularity. The Tehachapi Wind Resource Area exists due to this. To the northwest lies the San Joaquin Valley with its grasslands and oak savanna climbing the broad western slopes of the range. Like sand dunes piling up where winds converge, the Tehachapis collect marine and valley moisture, which piles up into fog that blankets the windward sides of the range many weeks of the year. The higher north-facing slopes are mixed evergreen forest, while the south-facing are chaparral and woodlands, typical of the relationship between the cooler moisture-retaining northern slopes and the exposed warmer and drier southern slopes. Canyons, even on southern slopes, can have year-round surface water flow, from springs and where orographic enhancement brings extra precipitation and snow from passing storms. History The origin of the name Tehachapi may come from the Kawaiisu language, derived from the word "tihachipia" translated as "hard climb". The historic Indigenous peoples of California with homelands in the Tehachapi Mountains were the: Kitanemuk Kawaiisu Serrano people The historic Mexican land grants in the Tehachapis are: Rancho El Tejon (1843) Rancho Castac (1843) Rancho La Liebre (1846) Rancho Los Alamos y Agua Caliente (1846) All four