The Simpson Desert ecoregion sweeps across the dry heart of Australia, spanning parts of the Northern Territory, Queensland, and South Australia within the Deserts and Xeric Shrublands biome. Its red parallel dunes are bound by sandhill canegrass (Zygochloa paradoxa), with hummocks of Triodia spinifex on the slopes and gidgee or coolibah (Eucalyptus coolabah) woodlands threading the watercourses and floodplains. The climate is intensely arid, with rainfall averaging only around 150 millimetres a year and summer temperatures that can climb past 40 degrees Celsius, yet rare floods periodically transform the landscape, filling Lake Eyre and other semi-saline wetlands and drawing thousands of breeding waterbirds. Despite the harshness, the region supports notable arid-zone wildlife, including the endemic kowari, a small marsupial predator, and the grey grasswren that One Earth names its flagship species. For gardeners, the spinifex-dominated dunefields underscore how drought-hardy native grasses and hardy eucalypts such as coolibah anchor planting in extreme dry-summer climates.
Marker placed inside the RESOLVE 2017 polygon at 26.3°S, 139.4°E.
Climate snapshot for this ecoregion
°C
°F
Current zone range (2011–2040)
11a-12a
Plotwright
CHELSA-derived typical winter month at this ecoregion's bbox grid.
Projected (2041–2070)
11a-12b
Plotwright
Where the CHELSA models say the typical winter month is heading.
Average warming this ecoregion is on track for: +3.4°F by mid-century. SSP3-7.0 (current trajectory) · CHELSA v2.1 bio06 sampled across 10 of 10 points within this ecoregion's bounding box.
At a glance
Dominant biome
Deserts & Xeric Shrublands
Realm
Australasia
Approximate area
225,991 sq mi
Conservation tier
Nature Could Reach Half Protected (Dinerstein NNH 2)
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.
Climate-resilient picks · 52
These plants fit this ecoregion today AND remain in range under the mid-century SSP3-7.0 projection. Lead with these for a planting that holds up as the climate shifts.
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: