USFS National Forest System Trails · Dakota Prairie Grasslands · North Dakota · Updated June 2026
Blacktail (USFS trail 6001) is a 6.9 mi trail in Dakota Prairie Grasslands, North Dakota. Mountain bikes are designated as allowed year-round, with no Class 1 e-bike designation on record.
Can I bike Blacktail?
| Use | Status | Season on record |
|---|---|---|
| Mountain bike | Allowed | year-round |
| Class 1 e-bike (pedal-assist, 20 mph) | Restricted | — |
| Class 2 e-bike (throttle, 20 mph) | Restricted | — |
| Class 3 e-bike (pedal-assist, 28 mph) | Restricted | — |
Zooming out: across Dakota Prairie Grasslands, 100% of rideable trail miles are open to mountain bikes — a Bike Access Grade of B.
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About this trail
Blacktail (USFS trail 6001) is a 6.9 mi trail in Dakota Prairie Grasslands, North Dakota. Everything below comes straight from the US Forest Service National Forest System Trails dataset — length, surface, slope-derived difficulty, and the specific bike and e-bike designations on record — so you can check legality before you load up. USFS records list its surface as imported compacted material. Based on slope, this is a Easy trail (grade band 5-8%); that reflects gentle gradient and is not the same as a technical MTB difficulty rating. Bike use is designated as allowed year-round. The agency lists no Class 1, 2 or 3 e-bike designation here; absent a local order to the contrary, that means e-bikes are not an allowed use on this trail. The route is mapped as USFS Trail Class 4 on the agency's 1-to-5 development scale, where 1 is the most primitive, minimally maintained tread and 5 is the most developed. For day-of certainty on closures or seasonal orders, check directly with the ranger district, since this reflects the USFS data as of the latest refresh.
Frequently asked questions
- Can you mountain bike on Blacktail?
- Yes. Mountain bikes are designated as allowed on Blacktail in Dakota Prairie Grasslands, year-round, per USFS data.
- Are e-bikes allowed on Blacktail?
- No e-bike class (1, 2 or 3) is designated on Blacktail in the USFS data.
- How long is Blacktail?
- Blacktail measures about 6.9 mi in total, summed across its mapped National Forest System segments.
- What is the surface of Blacktail?
- USFS data records the tread surface of Blacktail as imported compacted material.
- How difficult is Blacktail?
- Its grade-based difficulty is Easy (grade band 5-8%), derived from USFS slope data. This reflects steepness, not technical mountain-bike difficulty.
How we read this data
Grade-based difficulty above is the USFS grade (route steepness), not a technical mountain-bike rating — a gentle-grade trail can still be rocky or technical, and vice versa. Bike and e-bike status come verbatim from the USFS managed-use fields for this trail; we never infer access we can't cite. See our methodology for how the dataset is built and what each field means.
Where it is
Approximate location of Dakota Prairie Grasslands (USFS trail geometry isn't mapped).
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