Mojave Desert Animals Adaptations

The kidneys of desert animals concentrate urine so that they excrete less water.

Mojave desert animals adaptations. Below is a list of animals that live in the desert with links to additional information on each animal. How do desert animals manage to survive in the harsh conditions. Some animals live throughout all the southwestern desert areas and some are merely passing through on a migratory path.

Nocturnal behavior wherein certain species of animals only leave their dwelling at night. While rereading students follow along as the teacher reads reread with a partner or reread independently. Some insects also tap fluids such as saps and nectars from various parts of the plants.

Some animals survive only in the Mojave Desert these are called endemic species. Desert plants store water mainly in their trunk stem and fleshy leaves. Some of the most peculiar animal adaptations that you get to see in Mojave Desert are enlisted below.

The Mojave fringe-toed lizard Uma Scoparia while not endemic to the dunes is rare elsewhere Schoenherr 1992. The desert tortoise has adapted for desert existence by storing up to a liter of water in its urinary bladder. Hairy paws for walking on hot sand.

Desert tortoise escape the heat and remain hydrated by burrowing into the Mojaves sun-baked surface spending up to 98 of their lives underground. Below are some examples. Despite the harsh conditions its estimated that around 2000 species of plants and over 600 species of animals inhabit the Mojave Desert.

Even when rains come to the Mojave often a great amount of water falls in a very short time onto ground so dry that the rain runs off quickly washing away skimpy desert soil in the process. Mojave rattlesnakes mostly eat small lizards and rodents which are surprisingly common in the desert. High temperatures and scarcity of water makes sustenance very difficult in the desert.