We live in the high desert of New Mexico, at exactly 6,000 feet above sea level. I suppose that sounds very high to people who live near sea level: like getting into an elevator of a 600-story skyscraper and riding to the top. Maybe it sounds pretty low to people who live in Tibet, or others who regularly climb “fourteener” mountains in Colorado.

But it’s a great elevation for the people, animals, and plants who live here. We have air, but rarely encounter tidal waves, floods, or tsunamis. Just drought and forest fires.

I am constantly impressed by the resilience of the native life here. Trees run mostly to piñon pines and junipers, with cottonwoods down in the bosque (river valleys). Further up in the Jemez Mountains, ponderosa pines, blue spruce, aspens and other Standing People like the slightly higher altitudes and cooler temperatures.

Our piñon pines have had it rough lately: years-long droughts, and bark beetle infestations that killed huge number of these game little trees. They partner with junipers (sometimes called mountain cedar, though they are actually part of the cypress family) whenever they can, lovely little friendly pairs that show us how interspecies cooperation can work. The junipers are gnarly, twisty, and rugged, grasping their long lives with incredible tenacity. The piñons are more fragile. When we see a juniper hanging in, with a dead piñon intertwined, we feel like we’re intruding on a widow’s grief.

Then we have the cacti, prickly pears and cholla and barrel cacti and others more rare. Grasses used to be common here, though generations of sheep have left only little isolated patches and “fairy circles” of grass. Shrubs and wildflowers show up in surprising diversity, and down by the river a lot of thirsty greenery, even cattails. Then there are the invasive species like sagebrush, saltbush, salt cedar (Chinese tamarisk), Russian olive, some thistles, and even various tumbleweeds.

And birds! Stellar’s jays, red-tailed hawks, magpies, songbirds, burrowing owls, wild turkeys, hummingbirds, ravens and roadrunners…. Some live on bugs and berries, some on the ever-present rodents: field mice, kangaroo rats, gophers, chipmunks, deer mice, squirrels, meadow jumping mice, and so many more!

And we haven’t even mentioned the many other desert creatures who enrich our landscape: coyotes and mule deer, diamond back rattlesnakes and horned toads, lizards and… well, you get the idea. A little higher up in the mountains, bobcats and bears and mountain lions, and foxes and elk and raccoons, oh my.

Yes, we have tried planting non-natives, especially herbs. The rosemary loves this alkaline soil, and thrives, but everything else we’ve tried has become a salad bar for the local rabbits and burrowing rodents.

New Mexico’s high desert is home to so much life, and most of it is not human life. People have been here for ages, and the rest of the biosphere much longer. What we all have in common is tenacity… a determination to survive in a land of rough rock and red sand, arid soil and hot sun, and rare “rivers” that would be called streams anywhere else. I admire the tough little critters and plants that hang on, and inspire me to do the same.

— Amber K