THE GREAT SOUTHWEST NATURE FACTBOOK
Over 17,500 copies sold

By Susan J. Tweit

Alaska Northwest Books
paperbound
0-88240-434-2
223 pages, illustrations, index





Field guide meets engaging encyclopedia in this compact volume of short and fact-packed essays on nature in the Southwest from A to Z.

A treasure trove of facts about nature in the Southwest, from "Ants" to "Zion Canyon."
- Tucson Daily Star

Buy two copies: one for at home and another for your car. You'll be amazed at what you didn't know about our own region.
- Las Cruces (NM) Sun-News

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Animals
Ants to Yucca Moths
Including Black Widow Spiders,Coati, Darkling Beetles, Freshwater Shrimp, Gila Monsters, Horned Lizards, Hummingbirds, Jackrabbits, Kit Foxes, Magpies, Mountain Lions, Orioles, Pupfish, Quail, Roadrunners, Spadefoot Toads, Wrens, and more.

Plants
Agave to Yucca
Including Barrel Cactus, Beans, Buffalo Gourd, Chiles, Creosote Bush, Devil’s Claw, Evening Primrose, Fir, Grasslands, Ironwood, Juniper, Lichen, Mariposa and Sego Lilies, Mesquite, Palms, Saguaro, Tumbleweed, Watermelon Snow, and more.

Natural Features
Ácoma Pueblo to Zion Canyon
Including Bajada, Canyonlands, Casa Grande, Desert Varnish, Four Corners, Grand Canyon, Lightning, Malpaís, Mesa Verde, Microbiotic Crusts, Mirage, Monsoon, Natural Bridges, Petroglyphs & Pictographs, Petrified Forest, Playas, Sand Dunes, Turquoise, Uranium, and more.

 

From the book:

SPHINX MOTHS

Sphinx moths, named for a hornlike projection that makes the larva look like a sphinx, are the humming-birds of the insect world. The bright-colored, heavy-bodied adults have wingspans up to 6 inches and are active after dusk throughout North America, including in the Southwest's deserts, hovering while they sip flower nectar through their tubular tongue.

After ample winter or summer rainy seasons in the desert, sphinx moth larvae are sometimes so abundant in the resultant plant growth that the sound of their chewing is audible from many yards away.

Sphinx moths fuel their high-energy metabolisms by feeding on flowers with nectar containing about 60 percent sugar - twice that required by bees, half again that needed by butterflies.

Hovering generates intense heat, most of which is dissipated through their tissuelike wings; since their food is high in water, they use water to cool themselves evaporatively by circulating air through their respiratory system. Few other arid-environment organisms (besides humans) can afford to waste water for evaporative cooling.

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