Only specialized plants and animals thrive there. Animal life forms include numerous species of insects, lizards, snakes, and there are many desert birds such as cactus wrens and thrashers. In spring the desert is a stopover for migrating birds.
Most reproduction occurs duing the short summer rainy season.
During the summer most animal activity is nocturnal or in early mornings. There are 75 species of mammal life in the desert, two- thirds of which are rodents. These are Sonoran specimens on the left. The Sonoran desert covers 120,00 square miles in the U.S. and Mexico. The photo on the right are specimens from the Mojave Desert .