We found this one just outside the cave opening. Vegetational gradients Plants generally live best in one kind of environment. For instance, junipers are found most often at mid elevations just above the grasslands and just below pine forests. Early Holocene 11-8 Climate warms, leading to demise of woodlands. Mid, late Holocene 8 - present Rapid widespread, synchronous origin of deserts.
Woodlands retreat upslope and northward.
From here we see the area known as Sandia Park spreading eastward. This area receives precipitation during the summer monsoons. The monsoons originate in the Gulf of Mexico when high pressure systems in Bermuda push warm wet air northward. We see the elevational gradient from lowland grasslands to woodlands and forests at higher elevations. This area burned around the Fourth of July 1991.