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WONDERS OF NATURE
Desert of White Sands. Nature miracle
In the very south of the United States, near the border with Mexico, between the mountains of Sacramento and the Rio Grande, there is the most unusual desert in the world. It could even be called twice unusual, since both its color and the material from which it was created are unique. It is for the color that the desert got its name - White Sands Desert ("White Sands Desert"). On the pages of this book, we have already met with the red Namib desert, with the yellow Sahara, with the brown Gobi and the green Kalahari. But for the first time we will encounter a completely white desert.
Nowhere on Earth, except, perhaps, the snowy expanses of Antarctica, it is impossible to find such a vast area (700 square kilometers), occupied by dunes and ridges of such a strange appearance. At first glance, it seems that they are indeed swept by a recent blizzard, especially since the white sand grains sparkle under the sun, like snow crystals. And only the scorching heat reminds you that the area that opened up to the eye is not beyond the South Pole Steep, but in the state of New Mexico. How could this unusual landscape have been formed? The fact is that the sand of the albino desert does not consist of grains of quartz, as in other sandy deserts: the Namibe, the Great Western Erg in the Sahara or the Australian Simpson Desert. The white cover of White Sands is made up of gypsum crystals, more precisely, its variety, bearing the poetic name of selenite. This soft white mineral is similar to chalk, but dissolves much more easily in water, so it is rarely found on the earth's surface. In places where layers of gypsum and selenite lie, caves are often formed, washed into them by river and rain waters. Such, for example, is the famous Kungur cave in the Urals. The emergence of gypsum deposits, our planet is obliged to the sea and the sun. By their joint efforts, all the largest deposits of calcium sulfate were born (namely, this is the chemical composition of gypsum). Here and on the territory of the present American state of New Mexico in the Cretaceous period (about 100 million years ago) there was a shallow sea. Retreating, it left coastal lagoons, which then turned into salt lakes. The sun's rays evaporated the brine, and table salt and gypsum (selenite) precipitated. Another 40 million years passed, and in the Paleogene period, mountain building processes began on the site of the dried seabed. This is how the Sacramento and San Andreas ranges arose, the upper parts of which were composed of layers of selenite crumpled into folds. Rains and mountain streams gradually dissolved the calcium sulfate and carried it down to the salt lake Lucero. In this drainless pond, under the hot desert sun, the water gradually evaporates, and the lake, as it were, "shrinks", leaving a white crust of selenite crystals along the shores. And then the wind takes over. Rolling down from the Mexican highlands, air currents break open the crust, pick up selenite grains of sand and carry them to the foot of the Sacramento Range. The wind puts them into gentle dunes, reaching 18 meters in height, which slowly move to the northwest. Sometimes they climb on top of each other, forming unusual "two-story dunes". The belt of moving dunes is eight kilometers wide and stretches for forty kilometers. Due to the fact that the sand is in constant motion, it is not easy for plants to take root in this region, although the rains here are not so little for the desert - almost 200 millimeters per year. Only the unpretentious poplar and the yucca, which looks like a disheveled broom, have adapted to life in such conditions. Yucca is a close relative of magnolia. It is an unfolded bunch of hard glossy leaves, above which an elegant inflorescence rises on a long thin stem. The root system of a yucca develops throughout its life, and plucked from its place, it easily puts new roots where the wind and sand take it. And the poplar is rescued by the extraordinary length of the roots (up to 30 meters), which go through the loose thickness of the dune deep into the underlying soil. On the outskirts of the desert, where it is not so hot and there is more moisture, pink centaury flowers and purple abronias appear in spring. Next to them, echinocactus glows with scarlet inflorescences, at the base of which the desert melon calabazilla is often attached. Animals also prefer to stay on the edges of the desert. In the depths of the White Sands, you can find only lizards, which are distinguished by an unusual grayish-white skin color, and rare rodents - pouched rats, also very pale in color. This disguise helps them to hide from birds of prey in the white sandy sea. And at the foot of the mountains, where cacti and yucca form something like a rare, but continuous growth, similar to a thin bush, the fauna is much more diverse. Here come across prairie wolves-coyotes and small but invulnerable skunks, businesslike laborers-porcupines and cheerful earth squirrels, always ready to frolic, and even fight with each other. Tiny shrew burrows can be seen next to the large desert badger burrow. All of them take refuge from the heat during the day: some in cool holes, and some in thorny thickets. Only with the onset of twilight does active life begin in the white sands. Nature has endowed many local animals with such an unusual appearance that even their scientific names cannot be read without a smile: grasshopper mouse, antelope hare, big-eared fox, kangaroo rat, hook-billed thrush, zebra-tailed lizard, leaf-toed gecko and even leopard lizard. And the only poisonous lizard living here in the world was given a short but expressive name - gila-tooth. By the way, her poisonous teeth are located for some reason not in the upper jaw, like in snakes, but from below. There are almost no dangerous snakes here, except perhaps a black rattlesnake. This slow-moving rattlesnake emits a dry crackle with a rattle at the end of its tail when threatened. Animals in the White Sands Desert adapt to life in waterless sand dunes in different ways. So, the kangaroo rat learned to do without water at all. She never drinks and gets all the moisture she needs from the seeds of plants - her main food. And the collared peccary (the only wild pig that has mastered the desert) easily eats juicy echinocactus cakes, not paying attention to its thorns. There are many on the outskirts of White Sands and a variety of birds, from a huge turkey vulture to tiny hummingbirds. Some of the birds make their homes in the hollows of cacti (hummingbird, woodpecker, cactus owl), others, like the earthen cuckoo, switched to an underground lifestyle, like rodents. Earth owls also like to occupy hare and badger burrows. And the smallest of the owls, the elf owl, prefers to settle in the vacant hollows of woodpeckers. White Sands lies on the northern border of Mexico's largest desert, Chihuahua, but bears little resemblance to its rocky neighbour. In the deserts of Mexico, there are almost no sandy areas and, moreover, moving dunes. And the White Sands desert in this sense is a unique exception. And if we add to this the unusual material of its white hills, then it is understandable why this corner of America amazed not only the local Apache Indians, but also European settlers, who aptly dubbed White Sands the "porcelain desert". Now, at the foot of the Sacramento Ridge, there is a National Park, and a rare natural monument in the state of New Mexico attracts many tourists who want to see such an unusual "country of snowy sands" for our planet. Author: B.Wagner
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