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Join Mike and Carisa Riedmiller who lead one of the Fastest Growing and Largest Teams in TriVita Nopalea. Take the Nopalea Wellness Challenge for ...
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Join Mike and Carisa Riedmiller who lead one of the Fastest Growing and Largest Teams in TriVita Nopalea. Take the Nopalea Wellness Challenge for yourself in which it can help to reduce inflammation and chronic pain. Call us for your FREE bottle of Sonoran Bloom Nopalea. Check out these recent photos during a TriVita Leadership Conference at the Ritz Carlton Resert in the Sonoran Desert. The Sonoran Desert is a North American desert which straddles part of the United States-Mexico border and covers large parts of the U.S. states of Arizona and California and the northwest Mexican states of Sonora, Baja California, and Baja California Sur. It is one of the largest and hottest deserts in North America, with an area of 311,000 square kilometres (120,000 sq mi). The desert contains a variety of unique plants and animals, such as the saguaro cactus. (The northern part is sometimes called the Gila Desert[citation needed] after the Gila River or the Low Desert in opposition to the higher Mojave Desert). The Sonoran Desert wraps around the northern end of the Gulf of California, from Baja California Sur-(El Vizcaíno Biosphere Reserve in central and Pacific west coast, Central Gulf Coast subregion on east to southern tip), north through much of Baja California, excluding the central northwest mountains and Pacific west coast, through southeastern California and southwestern and southern Arizona to western and central parts of Sonora. It is bounded on the west by the Peninsular Ranges, which separate it from the California chaparral and woodlands-(northwest), and Baja California desert-(Vizcaino subregion, central and southeast), ecoregions of the Pacific slope. To the north in California and northwest Arizona, the Sonoran Desert transitions to the colder-winter, slightly higher elevation Mojave, Great Basin, and Colorado Plateau deserts. To the east and southeast, the deserts transition to the coniferous Arizona Mountains forests and Sierra Madre Occidental forests at higher elevations. The Sonoran-Sinaloan transition subtropical dry forest marks the transition from the Sonoran Desert to the tropical dry forests of Sinaloa to the south.
The desert's sub-regions include the Colorado Desert of southeastern California and the Yuma Desert east of the north-south Colorado River. In the 1957 publication, Vegetation of the Sonoran Desert, Forrest Shreve divided the Sonoran Desert into seven regions according to characteristic vegetation: Lower Colorado Valley, Arizona Upland, Plains of Sonora, Foothills of Sonora, Central Gulf Coast, Vizcaíno Region, and Magdalena Region. (see An Overview of the Sonoran Desert, external link below). Many ecologists now consider Shreve's Vizcaíno and Magdalena regions, which lie on the western side of the Baja California Peninsula, to be a separate ecoregion, the Baja California desert.
Within the Sonora desert is found the Pinacate National Park, extending 2,000 sq. kilometers of desert and mountainous regions.[1] The Pinacate National Park is home to some of North America's only sand dunes. The nearest city to the Pinacate National Park is Puerto Penasco (also known as Rocky Point).
Sonoran Desert near Maricopa, Arizona
[edit] Ecology
The Sonoran Desert includes 60 mammal species, 350 bird species, 20 amphibian species, 100+ reptile species, 30 native fish species, over 1000 native bee species, and more than 2000 native plant species. The Sonoran Desert area southwest of Tucson and near the Mexican border is vital habitat for the only population of Jaguars living within the United States.
[edit] Flora
Many plants not only survive the harsh conditions of the Sonoran Desert, but they actually thrive. Many have evolved to have specialized adaptations to the desert climate. The Sonoran Desert's biseasonal rainfall pattern results in more plant species than in the other North America deserts. The Sonoran Desert includes such plants from the agave family, palm family, cactus family, legume family, and many
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