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Arizona Wild Bird Photos
Is now http://birdfotos.com - desert-life.org-azwildbird-azwildbirds.com

Deserts

Map and desert areas are not to any scale, and may not be totally accurate.
The Chihuahuan Desert does extend farther down into Texas.

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Why do we call these areas DESERTS?

The people who define deserts say, they are areas that do not get much rain, and the rain is most irregular. Also these areas may have extremely high summer temperatures. There can be deserts at low and high elevations. Higher elevation deserts may get more rain, but will be much colder in the winter, possible snow also. On many of the low elevation deserts rain may only come in the winter.

When viewing the deserts you can almost tell if it gets much rain. On the deserts where there is rain you will see a greater variety of plant & tree life, and they will be growing much closer together than on a desert where is not hardly any rain at all. On the deserts where there is little on almost no rain the plant life will be sparse and growing quite a ways apart from each other. This so the roots won't have to compete for what little rain may fall.

Certain plants only grow on certain deserts.
The Joshua Tree only grows on the Mojave desert and no where else.

The Arizona Desert may get the most amount of rain in the summer. This is where you will find the giant Saguaro cactus growing. Many small trees and much other desert plant life.

On the Colorado Desert there is very little rain and the temperatures are very high, so plant life will be very scarce.

On the Chihuahuan Desert there are many small cactuses and other small plant life. Most of the rain that comes to this desert is in the form of large thunderstorms in the summer.

Blooms - en - thorns index page.