Deserts

Montane deserts

These are arid places with a very high altitude, such as the Tibetan Plateau or the northeastern slopes of Mount Kilimanjaro.

saguaro

These cacti dominate the Sonoran Desert.

Arctic

This 2nd largest desert region on earth consists of a vast, ice-covered ocean, surrounded by treeless permafrost.

wadi

This Arabic term refers to a dry riverbed that contains water only during times of heavy rain.

Gibson Desert

This Australian desert covers a large dry area in the state of Western Australia and is still largely in an almost pristine state. It is the 5th largest desert in Australia.

Simpson Desert

This Australian desert is an erg which contains the world's longest parallel sand dunes. It is the fourth largest Australian desert and the world's largest sand dune desert.

Tanami Desert

This Australian desert is located in Australia's Northern Territory. It was not fully explored until well into the 20th century and is Australia's 3rd largest desert.

Great Sandy Desert

This Australian desert is located in the northwestern part of Western Australia straddling the Pibara and southern Kimberley regions. It is the 2nd largest desert in Australia.

Great Victoria Desert

This Australian desert is the largest in Australia. It consists of many small sandhills, grassland plains, and areas with closely packed surface of pebbles (also called gibber plains or desert pavement).

Sonoran

This North American desert covers large parts of the southwestern US including Arizona, California, northwest Mexico, and the Baja Peninsula.

Painted Desert

This US desert is located in the badlands in the Four Corners area from the Grand Canyon National Park to the Petrified Forest National Park. It is composed of stratified layers of easily erodible siltstone, mudstone and shale of the Triassic Chinle Formation.

Namib

This coastal desert of tall sand dunes in southern Africa means "vast place" in the Nama language. It is the oldest desert in the world. It extends along the Atlantic coasts of Angola, Namibia, and South Africa.

Mojave

This desert in California, Nevada, Uta, and Arizona is famous for its Joshua trees.

Taklamakan

This desert in northwest China is bounded by the Kunlun Mountains to the south, the desert Pamir mountains and Tian Shan to the west and north, and the Gobi Desert to the east.

Atacama

This desert is located in N. Chile west of the Andes Mountains. It is the driest hot desert in the world composed of salt lakes, sand and felsic lava.

Death Valley

This desert valley contains the lowest point in the Western Hemisphere.

Karakum

This desert's name means Black Sand in Turkic languages. It covers much of present day Turkmenistan and lies east of the Caspian Sea and south of the Aral Sea. As the Aral Sea shrinks, this desert gets larger.

erg

This is a broad, flat area of desert covered with wind-swept sand with little or no vegetative cover.

rain shadow

This is a dry area on the lee side of a mountainous area. The mountains block the passage of rain-producing weather systems and create deserts on the other side of the mountains.

Great Basin

This is the largest desert in the US. It is a cold desert bordered by the Sierra Nevadas on the West and the Rockies on the East, the Columbia Plateau to the north and the Mojave and Sonoran deserts to the south. It covers most of Nevada and about half of Utah as well as parts of California, Oregon, Idaho, and Wyoming.

Antarctic

This is the largest desert region in the world.

Thar

This large arid region in the northwestern part of the Indian subcontinent forms a natural boundary running along the border between India and Pakistan.

Rub al-Khali

Also called "the Empty Quarter" this is the largest sand desert in the world encompassing most of the southern third of the Arabian Peninsula, including Saudi Arabia, parts of Oman, the UAE and Yemen.

Mojave

In what larger desert will you find Death Valley?

Atacama

This desert is rich in copper and nitrate mines.

Negev

This desert region is located in southern Israel.

oasis

This is an isolated area of vegetation in a desert, typically surrounding a spring or similar water source.

Sahara

This is the largest desert after Antarctica and the Arctic. It covers most of North Afria and is almost as large as China or the United States. It's name comes from the plural Arabic language word for desert.

Patagonia

This is the largest desert in Argentina and the 7th largest in the world. It is located primarily in Argentina with small parts in Chile and is bounded by the Andes to the west and the Atlantic Ocean to the east.

Gobi

This large desert region in northern China and southern Mongolia is bounded by the Altai Mountains, the steppes of Mongolia, and the Tibetan Plateau.

Kalahari

This large semi arid sandy savannah in southern africa covers much of Botswana and parts of Namibia and South Africa. It supports more animals and plants than a true desert and so it is classed a semi desert.

Furnace Creek

This part of Death Valley holds the record for the highest reliably reported air temperature in the world (134 degrees F in 1913).

Australia

Where can you find the Gibson, Great Sandy, Great Victoria, Tanami and Simpson deserts?