The Mojave Desert is a desert found within the rain shadow of the southern Sierra Nevada mountains and Transverse Ranges in the Southwestern United States. This desert is located primarily in southeastern California and southwestern Nevada, with small portions extending eastward into Arizona and Utah.

The Mojave desert, together with the Chihuhuan, Great Basin and Sonoran deserts, forms what is known as the North American Desert. Of these four deserts, the Mojave is the smallest and the driest.

There is a large diversity of fauna, which include 230 bird species and about 100 mammal species.

Due to the fact that there is very little water in this desert, the natural ground cover here is predominantly creosote bush resulting in little or no livestock grazing. However, there are various endemic plant species found within this ecoregion, notably the Joshua Tree, which has become an indicator species for the Mojave Desert. Too, there are more endemic flora in this desert than almost anywhere else in the world.

Predominant plants of the Mojave desert include: all-scale (Atriplex polycarpa), brittlebush (Encelia farinosa), creosote bush (Larrea tridentata), desert holly (Atriplex hymenelytra), Joshua tree (Yucca brevifolia), and white burrobush (Hymenoclea salsola).

Other cacti species in the Mojave Desert include: beavertail cactus (Opuntia basilaris), Mojave prickly pear (Opunita erinacea), and many-headed barrel cactus (Echinocactus polycephalus), silver cholla (Cylindropuntia echinocarpa).

Additionally, there are other dissimilar plants including: blue Palo Verde (Parkinsonia Florida), California dalea (Psorothamnus arborescens), chuparosa (Justicia californica), desert senna (Cassia armata), goldenhead (Acamptopappus shockleyi), ironwood (Olneya tesota), and spiny menodora (Menodora spinescens).

The Mojave Desert displays typical basin and range topography by having a series of parallel mountain ranges divided by interspersed valleys.

The Mojave Basin ecoregion has scattered mountains, generally lower than those of the Central Basin ecoregion to the north.

The Mojave Desert is often called the High Desert due to the fact that most of this desert is from 2,000 and 4,000 feet in elevation. However, there are areas in Death with the lowest elevation in North America.

This desert is named for the indigenous Mojave people, who are a Uto-Aztecan language people of the Cochimí family group.

Lone Tree BLM

Colorado River

Lake Mead NRA

London Bridge, Lake Havasu City