List of North American Deserts - Full Listing

Full Listing

(Listed from north to south)

• Western Canada
  • Carcross Desert, small "desert" in the Yukon, only 2.6 kilometers across. It has cold winters and very hot summers. Too humid to be a true desert.
  • Fraser Canyon - the landscape of the Fraser Canyon is severely arid from just south of Lytton upstream as far as the city of Williams Lake.
  • Thompson Country - the southern Thompson Country, comprising the immediate banks of the Thompson River between the city of Kamloops and the village of Lytton, has a range of desert-like terrain and climates.
  • Nk'mip Desert, small arid area in British Columbia, Canada. Claimed to be Canada's only "true" hot desert, but actually shrub steppe and, like other "deserts" in BC, is a northward extension of the Columbia Plateau (ecoregion).

• Washington - Idaho - Wyoming - Oregon
  • Much of the Columbia Plateau (ecoregion) is desert, such as the
    • Channeled Scablands, a desert in the Columbia Basin of eastern Washington
  • Most of the Snake River Plain (ecoregion) is sagebrush steppe, but barren lava fields form small deserts, such as
    • Craters of the Moon National Monument in Idaho
  • The Wyoming Basin (ecoregion) is dominated by arid grasslands and shrub steppe, but also contains the
    • Red Desert (Wyoming)
  • Owyhee Desert, in southwestern Idaho, northern Nevada, and southeastern Oregon.
    • Yp Desert, a portion of the Owyhee Desert in Idaho
  • Alvord Desert, a dry lake in eastern Oregon
  • Oregon High Desert, aka "Great Sandy Desert", eastern Oregon

• Great Basin Desert - Nevada, dominated by sagebrush steppe
  • Black Rock Desert, a dry lake bed in northwestern Nevada
  • Forty Mile Desert, Nevada
  • Smoke Creek Desert, Nevada (980 sq mi)

• Utah
  • Great Salt Lake Desert, Utah
  • San Rafael Desert, the drier portions of the San Rafael Swell
  • Sevier Desert surrounds the intermittent, salty Sevier Lake

• The Colorado Plateau is dominated by pinyon-juniper woodlands, but contains desert areas:
  • Escalante Desert, Utah (3,270 sq mi)
  • Bisti Badlands Desert, New Mexico
  • Painted Desert, Arizona

• Mojave Desert - California (the High Desert); and parts of western Arizona and southern Nevada.
  • Death Valley, California
  • Amargosa Desert, Nevada

• Sonoran Desert
  • Colorado Desert, Southern California (the Low Desert)
    • Yuha Desert, Imperial Valley, California
  • Yuma Desert, southwest Arizona
  • Lechuguilla Desert, southwest Arizona
  • Tule Desert (Arizona) and Sonora, Mexico
  • Gran Desierto de Altar, Sonora, Mexico
  • Baja California Desert, State of Baja California, Mexico
    • Vizcaíno Desert, central State of Baja California, Mexico

• Chihuahuan Desert
  • Trans-Pecos Desert, west Texas
  • White Sands, unusual gypsum dune field in New Mexico