Coastal Thornscrub Flora and Vegetation in the Municipality of Huatabampo, Sonora, Mexico

The Municipality of Huatabampo is located along the coast of the Gulf of California in southern Sonora, Mexico. The vegetation is coastal thornscrub, the more xeric version of tropical deciduous forest. In 1890, Edward Palmer collected plants at Agiabampo in the municipality. In the late 1980s and 1990s, Paul S. Martin and his associates extensively surveyed the Municipality as part of the 1998 Gentry’s Rio Mayo Plants book project. In the 1990s, Samuel L. Friedman studied the flora and vegetation of coastal thornscrub for his 1996 master’s degree at Arizona State University.

Thorn-scrub

Also known as Sinaloan thorn-scrub, this community covers large areas in central, southern, and eastern Sonora. From west to east Sonoran Desert gives way to thorn-scrub in the Sonoran Sky Island and Sierra Madre foothills and valleys. Sometimes Sonoran Desert in canyons and slopes gradates into thorn-scrub in structure as well as species composition. Thorn-scrub in turn gradates into its even closer relative, tropical deciduous forest, as you move southward or into sheltered canyons.

Oasis at the Desert Edge: Flora of Cañón del Nacapule, Sonora, Mexico

Cañón del Nacapule cuts into the southeastern flank of the Sierra El Aguaje, a rugged volcanic range about 20 kilometers northwest of Guaymas. Nacapule is included in the Sonoran segment of the Gulf Coast subdivision of the Sonoran Desert. The bi-seasonal (summer and winter) rainfall is highly variable. Many plants of tropical origin reach their northern limits in this region or do not extend farther north in the arid coastal desert of western Sonora.

Protecting El Pitayal

This presentation is meant to stimulate action by informing others of the nature of our goals and the urgency of the need for persons with the expertise in real estate law and land acquisition to engage our problem.

For the last 12 years, the Alamos Wildlands Alliance, a non-profit conservation group, has been operating a biological field station in the southwest corner of Sonora, a long day’s drive from Tucson. From mid-November through March, we teach and study the flora and fauna of this diverse landscape on the shores of the Agiabampo Estuary.