Exploring Arizona: A Desert Adventure with Green Schools Engagement Officer Jonah

Green Schools Engagement Officer Jonah ventured out into the foggy and wet wilderness of Spryfield this morning to see if he could spot any signs of spring popping up. Sadly… there wasn’t much to report back. So instead of looking to the future (spring is coming!.. just not yet) we’re going to throw it back to a few weeks ago when Jonah was in Arizona over March Break!

By far one of the most striking things about the Arizona landscape is just how different it is from what we normally see in Nova Scotia. The area in Arizona where Jonah visited is part of the Sonoran Desert, home of the Saguaro cactus, probably one of the most iconic cactus in the world. Picture the kind of cactus you would expect to see in a Looney Tunes cartoon. That’s the saguaro (pronounced: suh-WAH-ro).

These things can grow up to 12 meters tall, live for up to 150 years, and are all over the place in the Sonoran desert. They act as habitats for the creatures that live in the desert as we can see from the “Saguaro Hotel” image below.

There were also all sorts of other cacti Jonah saw in Arizona, each one just as unique and distinct as the saguaro. So even when everything in Nova Scotia is covered in snow or rain, just remember that there are places in the world that have totally different climates to us, and that makes for totally different vegetation and wildlife. What an amazing and diverse world we live it!