SONORAN DESERT

SONORAN DESERT

The Sonoran Desert is a North American desert covering the southwestern United States, Arizona and California and northwestern Mexico, Sonora, Baja Sur, 100,000 square miles of 'hot' sand. It holds a variety of unique and endemic plants and animals, like the saguaro, aka, Carenegiea gigantea and organ pipe cactus, aka, Stenocereus thurberi. The desert wraps around the northern end of the Gulf of Mexico from Baja

California Sur, north through Baja California. It is bounded west by the

Peninsular Range, on the east and southeast, Sierra Madre, and south, Mexico's state of Sinaloa.

This desert is home to 60 mammal species, 350 bird species, 20

amphibian species, over 100 reptile species, 30 native fish species, over

1000 bee species and 2000 native plant species. In the southwest at the

Mexican border is home to the only jaguars in the United States.

This desert holds plant species,, agave, palm, cactus , legumes and

others. The saguarto cactus grows wild, and hedgehog, fishhook, prickly pear, and pipe organ cacti are found.

The creosote bush and bur sage fill the valley bottoms. Indigo and

Mormon Tea shrub may be found.

Seventeen Native American tribes have settlements here. Phoenix

Arizona is the largest city and sits on the Salt River. Tucson also fits

in with maybe a million people. Ciudad Obregon, Sinora, Mexico has

a population of 375,000 .

Coachella Valley supports desert resorts, like Palm Springs and

Palm Desert and with its warm year around climate mangoes, figs and

dates are grown here.

Source: Wikipedia. For www.iinni.blogspot.com