Fish in the Desert

Desert living is challenging for any creature, but what if your home was just one small pool of water? That’s the predicament of a fish—yes, a fish—that lives in the Mojave Desert.

- Merry Dankanich

Home, Sweet Home

One of America’s four major deserts, the Mojave is located in the southern parts of Nevada and California. It is home to the famous Death Valley. (Perhaps you’ve heard of it— dry, with wickedly hot summers. Not a great place for a backyard barbeque.)

Just to the east of Death Valley is the Mojave Desert’s largest oasis, Ash Meadows National Wildlife Refuge. Keep heading east, and at the edge of the oasis you’ll come across an ordinary-looking rock formation surrounded by a fence. You can go through the fence onto a platform.

Now look down.

Below you is an opening in the side of the rock formation. The opening is the entrance to a deep cave filled with clear water. This is Devils Hole, part of Death Valley National Park and the home of the Devils Hole pupfish.

You may not be able to see it from the platform, but life in Devils Hole is always in motion, especially in the spring and summer.

Closest to you, a shelf of rock is just barely submerged in water. Blue and olive green pupfish dart back and forth over the shelf, nibbling on bits of swaying green algae. Only 1 inch (2.5 cm) long, the pupfish are the largest residents of Devils Hole—and possibly the rarest fish in the world.

Miniature spring snails slowly make their way around on the rocks, while water beetles swim about as they please. Owls and bees sometimes nest in an alcove above the water. Stay here long enough and you’ll notice the water is always in motion too. It rises and falls with the tides, like the ocean.

If you’re really lucky, you might even see the water slosh about. This likely means that an earthquake has happened, as far as 2,000 miles (3,219 km) away. (Seriously!)