The San Lucan xeric scrub occupies the southernmost tip of Mexico's Baja California peninsula, falling within Baja California Sur state around the resort cities of Cabo San Lucas, San Jose del Cabo, and La Paz, and it began as a Miocene "island" of land and vegetation before joining the peninsula. Its arid shrublands are dominated by cacti and drought-adapted small trees, including the elephant tree (Bursera microphylla), Lysiloma, organ pipe cactus (Stenocereus thurberi), barrel cactus (Ferocactus), and yuccas, while desert oases such as San Jose support stands of the fan palm Washingtonia robusta. The climate is tropical desert (Koppen BWh), with roughly 400 mm of rain a year concentrated from about August through October. The ecoregion is notably rich in endemics, harboring numerous endemic plant genera as well as wildlife such as Xantus's hummingbird, with long-nosed and long-tongued bats serving as important pollinators of its desert plants. For gardeners in hot, dry climates, several of its natives are familiar ornamentals, including barrel cactus, organ pipe cactus, yuccas, and the stately Washingtonia robusta palm.
Marker placed inside the RESOLVE 2017 polygon at 23.5°N, 110.2°W.
Climate snapshot for this ecoregion
°C
°F
Current zone range (2011–2040)
12b-13b
Plotwright
CHELSA-derived typical winter month at this ecoregion's bbox grid.
Projected (2041–2070)
13a-13b
Plotwright
Where the CHELSA models say the typical winter month is heading.
Average warming this ecoregion is on track for: +2.7°F by mid-century. SSP3-7.0 (current trajectory) · CHELSA v2.1 bio06 sampled across 6 of 10 points within this ecoregion's bounding box.
At a glance
Dominant biome
Deserts & Xeric Shrublands
Realm
Neotropic
Approximate area
1,496 sq mi
Conservation tier
Nature Could Recover (Dinerstein NNH 3)
About the deserts & xeric shrublands biome
Arid and semi-arid lands where low, erratic rainfall and high evaporation limit vegetation to drought-adapted shrubs, succulents, and sparse grasses. Day-to-night temperature swings are large, and life is finely tuned to water scarcity.
Catalog plants suited to this ecoregion
Computed from each plant's stated USDA zone range against this ecoregion's CHELSA-derived current zone range, with the CHELSA mid-century warming delta applied for the projection. Plants whose stated range falls outside both the current and projected zone end up dropped; the rest land in one of the three buckets below.
Currently suited · 4
These plants fit the ecoregion as it is today, but the mid-century projection moves them outside their stated zone range — plan for them to struggle by 2070.
No curated collection's plants all fit this ecoregion's zone range. We surface a collection only when every member would grow here — partial fits get filtered out rather than mislead. As the catalog and the curated set both grow, this section will fill in.
Related ecoregions
Other deserts & xeric shrublands ecoregions to explore: