fea I >. • - Desert Magazine of the Southwest

THE LIVING DESERT
by Susan Durr Nix
DUNESDAY
Join us in meeting the
animals who inhabit the
"barren" dunes.
I
n the dunes in August, the indications
of life are bleak:
dessicated creosote and yellowed
tufts of grass, insect carcasses and
purple shotgun shells. Derelict cement
bags congregate with brittle tumbleweeds
in the branches of a mesquite.
Mummified golf balls loiter next to
abandoned burrows, a parody of their
counterparts on the links nearby. A lone
cicada, three ants and a lizard are the
only animals I can spot under the litter.
To be sure, an August noon is probably
the worst time to visit the dunes.
Midday casts no softening shadows on
the chalky skull of a jackrabbit, nor on
the vulgar scars of dirt bikes and dune
buggies. Moreover, the sand is so hot it
burns through the soles of your shoes
and you cook, like a Thanksgiving
turkey, basting in your own sweat. Only
the holes that riddle the sand, the scat of
coyotes, lizards and rabbits and the
thoroughfares and intersections of
animal traffic confirm the fact that the
sand is home to an enormous variety of
animals.
It's a peculiar and demanding home.
A sand dune, whether fixed by deeprooted
plants or reshaped by every passing
breeze, is a hot, arid, windy, open,
gritty, crumbly, dangerous world. Survivors
here must be suited to its exacting
requirements. Walking on a dune is
like slogging through a torrid snowdrift,
so many dune animals "wear snowshoes"
or have other adaptations for getting
around comfortably and efficiently.
Insects, rodents and hares race or hop
over the ground on long strong legs.
The sidewinder's unique looping locomotion
not only keeps most of his body
off the surface of the sand at all times, it
gives him enough traction to move
rapidly, even up a slippery incline.
10 November, 1981
Completely at home on the hot, sandy dunes is the kit fox.
Lizards, whose legs keep their bodies
elevated, have a built-in advantage over
their low-lying relatives. Many double
the advantage by running from bush to
bush on two legs, holding their tails
high or flexing their toes for added
height. Others climb vegetation to
escape the burning sands.
Snowshoes are an extreme answer to
the loose, hot sand problem. Among the
mammals, kangaroo rats and kit foxes
are so equipped: Thick tufts of hair on
the soles of their feet provide traction
and insulation. Roadrunners frequent
the sandy haunts of favored reptile
foods: glossy snakes, desert iguanas and
zebra-tailed lizards. These birds not
only have very long toes, but sensibly
designed feet, with two toes pointing
forward and two backward in an X
shape.
The fringes on the toes of fringe-toed
lizards and on the legs of camel crickets
are among the most exaggerated
adaptations to dune life. Long, pointed
scales on the lizard's hind toes increase
the surface of the feet as do the combs of
long hairs on the cricket's legs. Both of
these animals "swim" through the sand
with their fringes, as we swim through
water with fins. The lizard has a bevy of
adaptations to make this possible,