They have popular names such as Dome Rock, Yosemite, Rocky Mountain and Joshua Tree, and they share one problem that seasoned rock climbers call a “ticking time bomb” – aging climbing anchors.

The anchors, drilled and pounded into the sides of mountains, are rusting and starting to fail, and some climbers and parks are trying to replace them. Funds, however, are sparse.

Some of the anchors are made of iron and were installed in the 1960s. Others hide dangerous secrets – they are bolted in rocks that have loosened because of freezing and thawing. Some bolts are so bad climbers can pull them out with their fingers.

Experienced climbers often keep logs of dangerous or failing equipment and share them with other climbers, but the information is often not available to other climbers.

Bernadette Regan, a seasoned climbing ranger at Joshua Tree National Park, about 140 miles east of Los Angeles, fell last year when a bolt broke off while she was rappelling down a popular route called “Solid Gold.” Her life was saved because she didn’t trust the bolt and had a backup rope that kept her from plunging 150 feet to the ground.

“I was testing it and jumped on a bolt and it broke,” she said. The bolt was replaced a week later.

Park officials held a “bolting blitz” recently that brought in master bolters from around the U.S. to do some concentrated rebolting on ancient anchors. They replaced 62 bolts, some of them more than 30 years old.

Regan said experienced climbers are worried because the sport has drawn more interest in recent years. She said interest soared this year after Kevin Jorgeson and Estes Park resident Tommy Caldwell spent 19 days scaling the 3,000-foot sheer granite face of El Capitan’s Dawn Wall in Yosemite National Park, long considered one of the world’s more difficult climbs.

Chris Weidner, who is on the board of the Boulder Climbing Community in Colorado, said experienced climbers don’t rely on old equipment to keep them safe. But thousands of climbing routes nationwide need to be fixed for new enthusiasts, he said. “It’s scary when you look at bolts that are corroded,” he said.

Weidner said one of his favorite routes in Rocky Mountain National Park, called “the Diamond” because of its massive diamond shape, requires enthusiasts to climb nearly 1,000 feet vertically on ropes. He said the mountain is dotted with rotting equipment left behind by other climbers.

Weidner said it will take a concerted effort to make the sport safer, and the group is asking for donations to buy the equipment.

“So far, deaths are few and far between,” said Brady Robinson, who leads a campaign called the Access Fund dedicated to replacing the equipment.

He said every climber, no matter how experienced, falls once in a while and people are putting their lives on the line when they hook their ropes to the equipment.

Winter Ranger Brent Connell leads a New Year’s Day hike Tuesday, January 1, 2013 in Cheyenne Mountain State Park. Photo by Mark Reis, The Gazette

MARK REIS