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xi “Go as far as you dare”: Austin, Land of Little Rain, in Stories from the Country of Lost Borders, p. 13.
xii “Death and life usually appear”: Abbey, Cactus Country, p. 23.
xv “The best way of inducing these novices”: Cowles, Desert Journal, p. 76.
xviii “The more I looked”: Shrub genus names: ephedra is Ephedra; blackbush is Coleogyne; bitterbrush (also called antelope brush) is Purshia; indigo bush is Psorothamnus; honey mesquite is Prosopis; catclaw acacia is Acacia; cheesebush is Hymenoclea; desert fir is Peucephyllum; felt thorn is Tetradymia; brittlebush is Encelia; desert holly, saltbush, and shadscale are Atriplex; blue sage and Mojave sage are Salvia; paper-bag bush is Salazaria; banana yucca and Mojave yucca are Yucca.
xxi “Surely this is North America’s most barren desert”: Abbey, Journey Home, p. 74.
2 “the fertilizing waters of the rivers”: Muir, Mountains of California, p. 246.
2 “The mountains, the sea”: Chase, California Desert Trails, p. 358.
2 “fixed in eternal reverie”: Ibid., p. 1.
2 “According to mythologist Joseph Campbell”: Campbell, Masks of God, p. 91.
7 “The age of the artifacts”
7 “began with the assumption”: Heizer, Handbook of North American Indians, vol. 8, p. 27.
7 “According to George Laird of the Chemehuevi tribe”: Laird, Chemehuevis, p. 149.
7 “According to anthropologists”: Heizer, Handbook of North American Indians, p. 658.
7 “According to Francisco Patencio”: Patencio, Stories and Legends of the Palm Springs Indians, p. 19.
8 “Desert is the name it wears”: Austin, Land of Little Rain, in Stories from the Country of Lost Borders, p. 9.
8 “According to Laird, their word for desert”: Laird, Chemehuevis, p. 87.
9 “To a white man, the desert is a wasteland”: Ibid, pp. 4–5.
9 “there was ‘no help’”: Austin, Land of Little Rain, in Stories from the Country of Lost Borders, p. 12.
9 “dark and terrifying place”: Laird, Chemehuevis, p. 5.
9 “all pervasive and intense feeling”: Heizer, Handbook of North American Indians, vol. 8, p. 582.
10 “which had the appearance”: Manly, Death Valley in ’49, p. 85.
11 “It was decided”: Font, Anza Expedition of 1775–1776, p. 117.
12 “Father Garces is so well fitted”: Lee, Great California Deserts, p. 50.
12 “Since the land is so elongated”: Barco, Historia Natural y Cronica de la Antigua California, p. 3.
12 “In the great arroyos”: Ibid., p. 70.
13 “Even though this tree is permeated”: Ibid., p. 84.
14 “The author of nature”: Ibid., p. 87.
15 “For the rest ... the Indians can make”: Ibid., p. 216.
16 “a west course fifteen days”: Morgan, Jedediah Smith, pp. 200, 242.
17 “We traveled ‘til long after dark”: Fremont and Emory, Notes of Travel in California, p. 50.
17 “In no part of this vast tract”: Ibid., p. 55.
17 “Crossing a low Sierra”: Fremont, Report of the Exploring Expedition to the Rocky Mountains, p. 256.
18 “The whole idea”: Ibid., p. 277.
18 “Travelers through countries”: Ibid., p. 266.
18 “Many of these Indians”: Ibid., p. 267.
18 “The country had now assumed”: Ibid., p. 262.
18 “twenty miles to the southward”: Ibid., p. 257.
19 “As I reached the lower part”: Manly, Death Valley in ’49, p. 86.
19 “One fellow said”: Ibid., p. 87.
20 “If the waves of the sea could flow”: Ibid., p. 163.
20 “There before us was a beautiful meadow”: Ibid., p. 108.
22 “I am tired of repeating”: Darwin, Voyage of the Beagle, p. 335.
22 “While traveling through these deserts”: Ibid., p. 333.
22 “utterly irreclaimable and desert”: Ibid., p. 319.
22 “It has been inferred”: Ibid., p. 44.
23 “In the spring”: Ibid., p. 333.
23 “We must admit”: Ibid., p. 375.
23 “To be sure, competition”: Darwin, Origin of Species, p. 61.
24 “struggle for life”: Ibid., p. 56.
24 “Two canine animals”: Ibid., p. 52.
24 “In regard to birds”: Darwin, Descent of Man, p. 809.
26 “Nothing could be less inviting”: Darwin, Voyage of the Beagle, p. 359.
28 “the peculiar elements”: Gray, “Characteristics of the North American Flora,” p. 340.
28 “competition from the Mexican Plateau vegetation”: Ibid., p. 326.
28 “He bases his theory”: Henslow, Origin of Plant Structures, p. 8.
29 “We thus begin to suspect”: Ibid., p. 34.
29 “As one anti-Darwinian”: Cope, On the Method of the Creation of Organic Types.
30 “Darwinism’s leading American foe”: Lurie, Louis Agassiz, p. 376.
31 “Owing to the continued exploration”: Gilmore, Fossil Lizards of North America, p. 3.
32 “It was very hot”: Osborn, Cope: Master Naturalist, p. 262.
32 “As Professor Marsh does not give us any clue”: Cope, “Reptiles of the American Eocene,” p. 981.
32 “All of the fossil lizard remains”: Gilmore, Fossil Lizards of North America, p. 2.
35 “level floor, as white as marble”: King, Mountaineering in the Sierra Nevada, p. 23.
35 “Sheets of lava”: Ibid., p. 34.
35 “Spread out below us”: Ibid., p. 41.
35 “The California deserts”: Brewer, Up and Down California, p. 535.
36 “I found the so-called desert”: Muir, Mountains of California, p. 73.
36 “It is here that the desert”: Coville, Botany of the Death Valley Expedition, p. 8. 36 “It is in the shrubby vegetation”: Ibid., p. 43.
36 “the excessive dryness”: Ibid., p. 5.
37 “The vegetation has the characteristic”: Jepson, Manual of the Flowering Plants of California, p. 4.
37 “their relationships and origins”: Ibid., p. 10. 37 “irresistible fascination”: Beidleman, “Willis Lynn Jepson,” p. 285.
37 “furnish the breeding spot”: Beidleman, “Rowboat Botanizing with Willis Linn Jepson on the Colorado River, 1912,” p. 5.
38 “The scantiness of the desert vegetation”: Coville, Botany of the Death Valley Expedition, p. 43.
38 “the report compiled by the expedition’s leading zoologist”: C. H. Merriam et al., Death Valley Expedition, p. 171.
38 “the ferocity and greed”: Ibid., p. 167.
39 “Bythinella protea”: Ibid., p. 278.
39 “supersaturated with the bitter chemicals”: Ibid., p. 180.
41 “a palpable sense of mystery”: Austin, Land of Little Rain, in Stories from the Country of Lost Borders, p. 16.
41 “If the desert were a woman”: Austin, Lost Borders, in ibid., p. 160.
41 “It is recorded in the report”: Austin, Land of Little Rain, in ibid., p. 11.
41 “There is neither poverty of soil”: Ibid., p. 13.
42 “So wide is the range”: Ibid., p. 38.
42 “Watch a coyote,” Ibid., p. 23.
42 “If one is inclined to wonder”: Ibid., p. 15.
42 “It is the opinion of many”: Ibid., p. 22.
42 “There are myriads of lizards”: Ibid., p. 89.
43 “herb-eating, bony-cased old tortoise”: Ibid., p. 65.
43 “Van Dyke’s firsthand knowledge”: Wild, “Sentimentalism in the American Southwest,” p. 133.
43 “The afternoon sun”: J. C. Van Dyke, Desert, p. 229.
44 “It is a gaunt land”: Ibid., p. 26.
44 “Everywhere you meet with the dry lake-bed”: Ibid., p. 35.
44 “Nature goes calmly on”: Ibid., p. 62.
44 “tender snow-flowers”: Muir, Mountains of California, pp. 22–23.
45 “I need not now argue beauty”: J. C. Van Dyke, Desert, pp. 191–192.
45 “And always here in the desert”: Ibid., p. 130.
45 “The life of the desert”: Ibid., pp. 150, 171.
45 “The deserts should never be reclaimed”: Ibid., p. 59
45 “But, with his lung problems”: Ibid., p. xlv.
46 “wrangled incessantly”: D. Van Dyke, Daggett, p. 135.
46 “Muir retreated ‘in great disgust’”: Ibid., p. 106.
46 “The desert animals”: J. C. Van Dyke, Desert, p. 151.
46 “It would seem as though Nature”: Ibid., p. 167.
47 “It is as if you were bemused”: Chase, California Desert Trails, p. 2.
47 “One feature of loveliness”: Ibid., p. 4.
47 “I do not see how Sahara”: Ibid., p. 275.
48 “With ingenious pains”: Ibid., p. 53.
48 “With all my weariness”: Ibid., p. 280.
48 “bony little goblins”: Ibid., p. 89.
48 “To the astonishment of everybody”: Lee, Great California Deserts, p. 223.
48 “There are, it is true”: Chase, California Desert Trails, p. 4.
49 “It has been swept by seas”: J. C. Van Dyke, Desert, p. 229.
49 “What a book a Devil’s chaplain”: Darwin, Correspondence of Charles Darwin, vol. 6, p. 178.
51 “Desert conditions”: MacDougal, “Influence of Aridity upon the Evolutionary Development of Plants,” p. 231.
51 “The view that such forms”: Ibid., p. 227.
51 “Adaptation, therefore, furnishes”: MacDougal, “Origin of Desert Floras,” p. 118.
52 “Gradual modifications”: MacDougal, Botanical Features of North American Deserts, p. 106.
52 “It is true, of course, that desert conditions”: MacDougal, “Influence of Aridity upon the Evolutionary Development of Plants,” p. 227.
53 “With the exception of the John Day region”: J. C. Merriam, “Extinct Faunas of the Mohave Desert,” p. 245.
53 “In a few strata abundant remains”: Ibid., p. 251.
53 “As nearly as the writer can judge”: Ibid.
55 “One of the most commonly held ideas”: Shreve, Cactus and Its Home, p. 29.
56 “There are strong reasons”: Sumner, “Some Biological Problems of Our Southwestern Deserts,” p. 370.
56 “Great stress”: Ibid., p. 357.
56 “Despite arguments”: Ibid., p. 370.
57 “The question before us”: C. H. Merriam, “Is Mutation a Factor in the Evolution of Higher Vertebrates?” p. 243.
57 “What does this mean?”: Ibid., p. 246.
57 “He interpreted creosote bush”: Clements, “Origin of the Desert Climax and Climate,” p. 122.
58 “There is evidence”: Shreve and Wiggins, Vegetation of the Sonoran Desert, vol. 1, p. vi.
58 “His field work in Chile”: Howard, “Ivan Murray Johnston, 1898–1960,” p. 2.
59 “clearly a South American type”: Johnston, “Floristic Significance of Shrubs Common to the North and South American Deserts,” p. 357.
59 “When it is realized”: Ibid., p. 360.
60 “Since most biologists”: Ibid., p. 361.
60 “Johnston cited examples”: Ibid., p. 362.
61 “A 1944 textbook”: Cain, Foundations of Plant Geography, p. 121.
62 “In my junior year”: Axelrod, “Response of Daniel I. Axelrod for the Award of the Paleontological Society Medal,” p. 522.
62 “Fossil evidence bearing directly”: Cain, Foundations of Plant Geography, p. 119.
63 “The occurrence of a desert element”: Axelrod, “Pliocene Flora from the Eden Beds,” p. 4.
64 “True desert conditions”: Axelrod, “Pliocene Flora from the Mount Eden Beds, Southern California,” p. 139.
64 “A site from the Eocene”: Axelrod, “Miocene Flora from the Western Border of the Mohave Desert,” p. 61.
65 “A wide diversity of opinion”: Axelrod, “Evolution of Desert Vegetation in Western North America,” p. 217.
65 “Unconcerned with ideas of plant succession”: Barbour, “Ecological Fragmentation in the Fifties,” p. 239.
66 “Clements’s postulate”: Axelrod, “Evolution of Desert Vegetation in Western North America,” p. 219.
66 “There appears to be no support”: Ibid., pp. 289, 292.
66 “Such migrations account for”: Ibid., p. 298.
66 “Increasing topographic and climatic diversity”: Ibid., p. 293.
67 “The task of determining the origins”: Ibid., p. 288.
67 “The Larrea-Franseria desert”: Cain, Foundations of Plant Geography, p. 121.
68 “I thought by all means”: Mead, “Life and Work of G. Ledyard Stebbins,” p. 48.
71 “Rapid evolution requires”: Stebbins, “Evidence of Rates of Evolution from the Distribution of Existing and Fossil Plant Species,” p. 156.
72 “The book, which synthesized perspectives”: Crawford and Smocovitis, Scientific Papers of G. Ledyard Stebbins, pp. 7, 21.
72 “The new combined attack”: Stebbins, “Aridity as a Stimulus to Plant Evolution,” p. 33.
73 “In the first place, where moisture”: Ibid., p. 35.
76 “One night we had a fair camp”: Manly, Death Valley in ’49, p. 82.
78 “When a biologist stands”: Deevey, “Biogeography of the Pleistocene,” p. 1397.
78 “Just as biological processes”: Soltz and Naiman, Natural History of Native Fishes in the Death Valley System, p. 9.
82 “From an evolutionary standpoint”: Axelrod, “Evolution of the Madro-Tertiary Geoflora,” p. 458.
83 “Late Pliocene and Quaternary elevation”: Ibid., p. 503.
84 “On the contrary, the phytogeographic data”: Rzedowski, “Algunas Consideraciones Acerca del Elemento Endemico en la Flora de Mexico,” p. 61.
85 “The floras of the middle and latter part”: Stebbins, Variation and Evolution in Plants, p. 521.
85 “Of the genera studied”: Rzedowski, “Algunas Consideraciones Acerca del Elemento Endemico en la Flora de Mexico,” p. 62.
86 “The abundance of the endemic element”: Ibid., p. 6.
88 “Finally, there belongs”: Barco, Natural History of Baja California, p. 176.
89 “They are made of nothing else”: Ibid., p. 177.
90 “Stebbins moved there”: Crawford and Smocovitis, Scientific Papers of G. Ledyard Stebbins, p. 22.
90 “I have discussed”: Mead, “Life and Work of G. Ledyard Stebbins,” p. 48.
90 “So, my book”: Ibid., p. 139.
90 “one in the Siskiyou-Trinity”: Stebbins and Major, “Endemism and Speciation in the California Flora,” p. 10.
91 “In the first place”: Ibid., p. 13.
92 “Stebbins and Major thought it ‘highly unlikely’”: Ibid., p. 14.
92 “During the early part of the Tertiary”: Ibid., p. 15.
95 “The distribution of forests”: Axelrod, “Fossil Floras Suggest Stable, Not Drifting Continents,” p. 3257.
96 “The recent discovery”: Axelrod, “Ocean Floor Spreading in Relation to Ecosystematic Problems,” p. 15.
96 “Evolution of angiosperms”: Axelrod, “Drought, Diastrophism, and Quantum Evolution,” p. 202.
97 “Stebbins (1952) has shown”: Axelrod, “Edaphic Aridity as a Factor in Angiosperm Evolution,” p. 311.
97 “The domelands of the southern Sierra”: Ibid., p. 315.
98 “Although he was not always right”: Lipps, “Daniel Isaac Axelrod (1910–1998).”
98 “He would often pull me aside”: Anonymous, “Distinguished Botanist, Daniel Axelrod, Dies at 87.”
98 “Except for a few species”: A. W. Johnson, “Evolution of Desert Vegetation in North America,” p. 135.
98 “Many of these taxa”: Ibid.
99 “In general, one may conclude”: Ibid., p. 129.
101 “One of the noisier recent struggles”: “Judgment Day: Intelligent Design on Trial,” Nova, PBS, November 13, 2007.
101 “Our beautiful deserts”: Jaeger, California Deserts, p. 189.
102 “It has become a habit”: Ibid., p. 184.
102 “The chuckwalla is a thoroughgoing vegetarian”: Ibid., p. 76.
103 “It is indeed possible”: Ibid., p. 125.
103 “In masses of conglomerate”: Ibid., p. 30.
103 “Desert plants commonly exhibit”: Ibid., p. 126.
104 “With every passing year”: Krutch, Voice of the Desert, p. 148.
104 “How does it happen that this striking creature”: Krutch, Forgotten Peninsula, p. 212.
104 “One must imagine”: Ibid., p. 214.
104 “Just how long have our deserts been deserts?”: Ibid., p. 52.
105 “He quoted the same passage”: Ibid., p. 53.
105 “Though very little plant fossil material”: Ibid., p. 50.
105 “The cactus originated”: Krutch, Voice of the Desert, p. 63.
106 “He seemed unaware”: Krutch, Baja California and the Geography of Hope, p. 122.
106 “If it is really a prickly pear”: Krutch, Voice of the Desert, p. 58.
106 “Contemplating ocotillo’s giant relative”: Krutch, Forgotten Peninsula, p. 91.
106 “something like what it now is”: Krutch, Voice of the Desert, p.55.
107 “Most unfortunate it is”: Jaeger, California Deserts, p. 189.
107 “Baja California is a wonderful example”: Krutch, Baja California and the Geography of Hope, p. 10.
107 “such creatures as the scorpions”: Krutch, Desert Year, p. 42.
107 “As for the animals”: Ibid., p. 63.
107 “To those who do listen”: Krutch, Voice of the Desert, p. 220.
110 “So we turned up a cañon”: Manly, Death Valley in ’49, p. 77.
111 “One historian thought”: Chalfant, Death Valley, p. 78.
111 “Later observers were convinced”: Manly, Death Valley in ’49, p. 343 n. 20.
112 “As they sat and commiserated”: Betancourt, Van Devender, and Martin, Packrat Middens, p. 3. 112
112 “The limited foraging range”: Wells and Jorgensen, “Pleistocene Wood Rat Middens and Climatic Change in Mohave Desert,” p. 1172.
112 “Seventeen ancient wood rat middens”: Wells and Berger, “Late Pleistocene History of Coniferous Woodland in the Mohave Desert,” p. 1646.
113 “Prevalence of woodland vegetation”: Ibid., p. 1641.
113 “That regional climate”: Axelrod, Quaternary Extinctions of Large Mammals, p. 13.
113 “a modest radiation in the late Miocene”: Betancourt, Van Devender, and Martin, Packrat Middens, p. 15.
114 “long distance migration”: A. W. Johnson, “Evolution of Desert Vegetation in Western North America,” p. 298.
115 “The striking cytogeographic differentiation”: Wells and Hunziker. “Origin of the Creosote Bush (Larrea) Deserts of Southwestern North America,” p. 853.
115 “Outlying pockets of Larrea”: Barbour, “Patterns of Genetic Similarity Between Larrea tridentata in North and South America,” p. 66.
116 “The meager fossil record”: Raven and Axelrod, “Angiosperm Biogeography and Past Continental Movements,” p. 630.
117 “The oldest continental Cenozoic”: McKenna, “Continental Paleocene Fauna from California,” p. 1.
118 “extensive prospecting efforts”: Ibid., p. 3
118 “from the water well behind the cabin”: McKenna, “Paleocene Mammals, Goler Formation, Mojave Desert, California,” p. 512.
118 “The Mohave [now Goler] formation”: Axelrod, “Eocene and Oligocene Formations of the Western Great Basin,” p. 1935.
118 “Prospecting has been intermittently continued”: McKenna, “Continental Paleocene Fauna from California,” p. 4.
119 “of some reptile adapted to powerful digging”: Ibid., p. 6.
120 “an abundance of petrified wood”: Morris, “Baja California: Late Cretaceous Dinosaurs,” p. 1539.
120 “The lithology of the El Gallo Formation”: Ibid., p. 1540.
120 “could be compared favorably”: Novacek, Time Traveler, p. 180.
121 “The only plant fossils cited”: Novacek et al., “Wasatchian (Early Eocene) Mammals and Other Vertebrates from Baja California, Mexico,” p. 9.
121 “When petrified wood from the Miocene”: McKeown, Luz, and Jones, “Fossil Wood from the Miocene Comondu Formation,” p. 7.
122 “to present the evidence”: G. Ledyard Stebbins, letter of May 10, 1983.
123 “originated from a group”: Sherwin Carlquist, letter of June 1, 1983.
123 “I do not wish to get involved”: Daniel Axelrod, letter of May 25, 1983.
123 “sometimes gruff, blunt demeanor”: Anonymous, “Distinguished Botanist, Daniel Axelrod, Dies at 87.”
124 “Axelrod’s model”: Sarmiento, “Arid Vegetation in Tropical America,” p. 95.
124 “Desert adaptation”: Blair, Hulse, and Mares, “Origins and Affinities of the Vertebrates of the North American Sonoran Desert and the Monte Desert of Northwestern Argentina,” p. 1.
124 “Several observations suggest”: Otte, “Species Richness Patterns of New World Desert Grasshoppers in Relation to Plant Diversity,” p. 208.
125 “It seems then that selection”: Blair, “Adaptations of Anurans to Equivalent Desert Scrub in North and South America,” p. 202.
126 “After his retirement”: Lipps, “Daniel I. Axelrod (1910–1998).”
126 “The tadpoles transform”: Axelrod, “Evolution and Biogeography of Madrean-Tethyan Sclerophyll Vegetation,” p. 314. 126 “sufficiently abundant in the late middle Eocene”: Ibid., p. 313.
126 “Is zonal desert vegetation ancient”: Axelrod, “Desert Vegetation,” p. 1.
127 “Since the lowlands”: Axelrod, “Age and Origin of Sonoran Desert Vegetation,” p. 52.
128 “As an alternative, it seems more probable”: Ibid., p. 55.
128 “The Monte has the greatest taxonomic diversity”: Blair, “Adaptations of Anurans to Equivalent Desert Scrub in North and South America, p. 216.
128 “The greater taxonomic diversity”: Ibid., p. 208.
128 “Paleobotanical evidence suggests”: Ibid., p. 216.
130 “occupying habitats associated with exposures”: Marlow, Brody, and Wake, “New Salamander, Genus Batrachoseps, from the Inyo Mountains of California,” p. 16.
132 “almost defy the laws of physics”: Greene, Snakes, p. 36.
132 “the farm fence lizards”: Ballou, “Serpentlike Sea Saurians,” p. 223.
133 “I spent a number of days”: Cowles, Desert Journal, p. 91.
133 “You are old”: Carroll, “Father William,” in Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, p. 51.
134 “an occasional and very brief 113 degrees F”: Cowles, Desert Journal, p. 84.
135 “But he had described showy orange”: Keynes, Charles Darwin’s Zoology Notes and Specimen Lists from H.M.S. Beagle, p. 295.
135 “The lizards are many”: Van Dyke, Desert, p. 170.
135 “having traced with surprise”: Ibid., p. 173.
138 “Besides the advances and retreats”: Krutch, Desert Year, p. 45.
138 “Ears comprise the reception system”: Pianka and Vitt, Lizards, p. 93.
138 “showed an enormous capacity”: Rowntree, Hardy Californians, p. 15.
139 “The performance went on”: Krutch, Desert Year, p. 45.
142 “More recently, a landfill”: Kelley et al., “Preliminary Report of a Paleontological Investigation of the Lower and Middle Members, Sespe Formation, Simi Valley Landfill, Ventura County, California.”
142 “And renewed digging”: Lofgren et al., “Paleocene Primates from the Goler Formation of the Mojave Desert in California,” p. 11.
142 “Every quarter mile”: Chase, California Desert Trails, p. 276.
143 “During the Pliocene”: Jefferson and Lindsay, Fossil Treasures of the AnzaBorrego Desert, p. 84.
143 “The Anza Borrego lizard assemblage”: Norell, “Late Cenozoic Lizards of the Anza Borrego Desert, California,” p. 28.
144 “It was shown that the composition”: Holman, Pleistocene Amphibians and Reptiles in North America, p. 198.
145 “The analysis of these specimens”: Norell, “Late Cenozoic Lizards of the Anza Borrego Desert, California,” p. 28.
147 “perhaps the most remarkable of all desert birds”: Krutch, Voice of the Desert, pp. 33, 36–37.
148 “Formerly the range of the road runner”: Jaeger, Desert Wildlife, p. 189.
149 “A unique type of vegetation”: Stebbins and Taylor, Survey of the Natural History of the South Pacific Border Region, p. 153.
149 “A significant, readily recognizable warming trend”: Axelrod, “Pleistocene Soboba Flora of Southern California,” p. 42.
150 “Coville (1893) noted the occurrence”: Ibid, p. 46.
153 “In the first place, the body”: Schmidt and Inger, Living Reptiles of the World, p. 116.
153 “The specializations that allow Uma”: Pough, Morafka, and Hillman, “Ecology and Burrowing Behavior of the Chihuahuan Fringe-Footed Lizard, Uma exsul,” p. 85.
153 “The Chihuahuan Desert cradles”: Morafka, “Biogeographical Analysis of the Chihuahuan Desert through Its Herpetofauna,” pp. 174, 175.
154 “The eastern or Chihuahuan desert”: Morafka and Reyes, “Biogeography of Chihuahuan Desert Herpetofauna,” p. 85.
154 “Vegetation in the [Mapimian] region”: Morafka, “Biogeographical Analysis of the Chihuahuan Desert through Its Herpetofauna,” p. 174.
155 “The underlying cause”: Morafka and Reyes, “Biogeography of Chihuahuan Desert Herpetofauna,” p. 85.
156 “A number of genera”: Raven and Axelrod, Origin and Relationships of the California Flora, p. 45.
156 “Madro-Tertiary vegetation”: Ibid., pp. 21, 46.
157 “the first person who matched”: Barbour, “Dan Axelrod: Paleoecologist for the Ages,” p. 29.
157 “The present California desert flora”: Thorne, “Historical Sketch of the Vegetation of the Mojave and Colorado Deserts of the American Southwest,” pp. 647, 648.
158 “If our present California deserts”: Ibid., p. 645.
158 “Those of us without much geological training”: Ibid., p. 642.
158 “The erosion that stripped”: Norris and Webb, Geology of California, p. 86.
159 “After the batholith”: McPhee, Assembling California, p. 31.
159 “This brief summary”: Axelrod, “Paleobotanical History of the Western Deserts,” p. 129.
160 “nearly all existed”: Stebbins, “Aridity as a Stimulus to Plant Evolution,” p. 33.
161 “two of the principal groups”: Stebbins, Flowering Plants, p. 251.
162 “radiating complexes”: Ibid., p. 164.
162 “Some scientists have tried”: Schaffer, “California’s Geological History and Changing Landscapes,” p. 49.
163 “Daniel Axelrod in 1957”: Schaffer, Geomorphic Evolution of the Yosemite Valley and Sierra Nevada Landscapes, p. 303.
163 “Desert landscapes are the most ancient”: Sokolov, Haffter, and Ortega, Vertebrate Ecology in Arid Zones of Mexico and Asia, p. 12.
163 “little hope that such fossils have been preserved”: Rzedowski, “Diversidad y Origines de la Flora Fanerogamica de Mexico,” p. 19.
164 “This phenomenon is particularly spectacular”: Ibid., p. 14.
165 “Under the palms”: King, Mountaineering in the Sierra Nevada, p. 37.
167 “partly hidden among dunes”: Chase, California Desert Trails, p. 93.
168 “Here, on November 29”: Jaeger, California Deserts, p. 180.
168 “These are the so-called oases”: J. C. Van Dyke, Desert, p. 35.
169 “Some of the groups occur”: Chase, California Desert Trails, p. 16.
169 “definitely known to be a native”: Jaeger, Desert Wild Flowers, p. 6.
169 “closely similar fossils”: Axelrod, “Evolution of Desert Vegetation in Western North America,” p. 271.
169 “It is less obvious”: Cornett, “Factors Determining the Occurrence of the Desert Fan Palm, Washingtonia filifera,” p. 37.
169 “three a-priori predictions”: McClenaghan and Beauchamp, “Low Genic Differentiation among Isolated Populations of California Fan Palm (Wash-ingtonia filifera),” p. 316.
170 “A more plausible scenario”: Ibid., p. 322.
170 “There does not, in fact, appear to be any fossil evidence”: Cornett, “Desert Fan Palm,” p. 56.
171 “These four lines of evidence”: Ibid., p. 57.
171 “the desert fan palm”: Cornett, “Population Dynamics of the Palm, Wash-ingtonia filifera, and Global Warming,” p. 47.
173 “It is likely that contemporary”: Janzen, “Chihuahuan Desert Nopaleras,” p. 625.
174 “There are many books”: Ibid., p. 597.
174 “There were four genera”: Ibid., p. 611.
174 “In the absence of contemporary”: Ibid., p. 616.
175“Acacia farnesiana clearly”: Daniel Janzen, e-mail of February 16, 2008.
176 “Then why the bright colors”: Janzen, “Chihuahuan Desert Nopaleras,” p. 613.
176 “He cited the presence”: Ibid., p. 611.
176 “Jumping cholla may well be the nastiest”: Ibid., p. 625.
176 “During recent fieldwork”: Janzen, “Depression of Reptile Biomass by Large Herbivores,” p. 381.
177 “The ease with which leaf eating”: Ibid., p. 389.
177 “a study in the Kalahari”: Ibid., p. 390.
177 “Cacti are widely believed”: Janzen, “Chihuahuan Desert Nopaleras,” p. 599.
178 “The plant-megafaunal interactions”: Ibid., p. 623.
178 “Ocotillo and cacti”: Daniel Janzen, e-mail of February 15, 2008.
181 “How doth the little crocodile”: Carroll, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, p. 26.
182 “During an era”: Barbour, “Dan Axelrod: Paleoecologist for the Ages,” p. 29.
183 “The Sierra may have maintained”: Wernicke et al., “Origin of the High Mountains in the Continents,” p. 192.
183 “A year earlier”: Dokka and Ross, “Collapse of Southwestern North America and the Evolution of Early Miocene Detachment Faults, Metamorphic Core Complexes, the Sierra Nevada Orocline, and the San Andreas Fault System.”
183 “Terrestrial plants are generally regarded”: Wolfe et al., “Paleobotanical Evidence for High Altitudes in Nevada During the Miocene,” p. 1672.
184 “Paleobotanical evidence supports”: Ibid., p. 1674.
184 “Howard Schorn, a very meticulous paleobotanist”: Schaffer, Geomorphic Evolution of the Yosemite Valley and Sierra Nevada Landscapes: Solving the Riddles of the Rocks, p. 303.
184 “We conclude that the Sierra”: House, Wernicke, and Farley, ““Dating Topography of the Sierra Nevada, California, Using Apatite (U-Th)/He Ages,” p. 68.
185 “Because he believed”: Schaffer, “Letters to the Editor,” p. 31.
185 “Volcanic ashes currently exposed”: Poage and Chamberlain, “Stable Isotopic Evidence for a Pre-Middle-Miocene Rain Shadow in the Western Basin and Range,” p. 1.
186 “The paper compared 30-million-year-old”: Retallack, Wynn, and Fremd, “Glacial-Interglacial-Scale Paleoclimatic Change without Large Ice Sheets in the Oligocene of Central Oregon,” p. 298.
186 “The data, compared with modern isotopic”: Mulch, Graham, and Chamberlain, “Hydrogen Isotopes in Eocene River Gravels and Paleoelevation of the Sierra Nevada,” p. 87.
186 “Another Science article”: Schuster et al., “Age of the Sahara Desert,” p. 821.
187 “Recent geologic data”: Stock, Anderson, and Finkel, “Pace of Landscape Evolution of the Sierra Nevada, California, Revealed by Cosmogenic Dating of Cave Sediments,” p. 193.
188 “in a pattern that steepened”: Ibid., p. 196.
188 “Low temperature geochronology studies”: Ibid., p. 193.
189 “Prior to the rise”: Pavlik, California Deserts, p. 130.
190 “This may represent the first documented fossil”: Jefferson and Lindsay, Fossil Treasures of the Anza-Borrego Desert, p. 84.
192 “In this region the ground”: Xenophon, Anabasis, p. 91.
193 “exactly what drove this”: Pianka and Vitt, Lizards, p. 60.
198 “He rode slowly home”: Steinbeck, To a God Unknown, in Novels and Stories, pp. 325, 344.
198 “In the early spring”: Chalfant, Death Valley, p. 6.
199 “There is something uneasy”: Didion, We Tell Ourselves Stories in Order to Live, pp. 162, 224.
199 “Our regional deserts”: Axelrod, “Paleobotanical History of the Western Deserts,” p. 129.
200 “My sensibility was transfixed”: Banham, Scenes In America Deserta, p. 11.
200 “The cliché ‘man-made desert’”: Ibid., p. 204.
200 “Ultimately deserts are man-made”: Ibid., p. 205.
201 “to hear with any inner understanding” : Ibid., p. 164.
202 “In calling up images”: Darwin, Voyage of the Beagle, p. 484.
205 “The small Ricardo flora”: Axelrod, “Paleobotanical History of the Western Deserts,” p. 122.
207 “Things had a way of happening”: Austin, Earth Horizon, p. 258.
207 “The palpable sense of mystery”: Austin, Land of Little Rain, in Stories from the Country of Lost Borders, p. 16.
208 “Environmentalists say desert is so hostile”: Darlington, Mojave, p. 163.
208 “Antienvironmentalists say desert is so hostile”: Fife and Dickey, “Fragile Soils of the California Desert.”
208 “Joseph Chase was already complaining”: Chase, California Desert Trails, p. 37.
208 “ORVs scraped twelve thousand tons”: Darlington, Mojave, p. 254.
209 “What monstrous folly”: J. C. Van Dyke, Desert, p. xvii.
209 “Current attempts and plans”: Axelrod, “Desert Vegetation,” p. 57.
210 “They say the Lion”: Jamshyd was a ruler of the mythical first Persian dynasty, the Pishdadians. The ruins of Persepolis, the fourth century B.C. Achaemenid Dynasty’s capital, are known as Jamshyd’s Throne. Bahram V, famed for hunting and amorous exploits, was a ruler of Persia’s A.D. fifth century Sasanian Empire. He was nicknamed Bahram Gor—Bahram the Wild Ass.