Olneya tesota

Olneya tesota is an iconic small tree of the Sonoran Desert, occurring in the United States and Mexico. This species serves as a nurse species for other plants, protecting them from harsh desert conditions and predators. While it is wide spread in the Sonoran Desert, increasing threats from development, tourism, over harvest, and increasing fires have caused declines and continue to threaten the species. These threats cause habitat destruction and degradation, as well as direct damage or mortality to plants.

Olneya tesota occurs in the Sonoran Desert in the southwestern United States, in Arizona and California, and Mexico, from Sonora west to Baja California Sur and Baja California and south to northern edge of Sinaloa.

This species is threatened by overharvest, for firewood and for carvings (for the tourist market), in Mexico and in border regions of the United States. Development has destroyed and fragmented the species habitat, especially around rapidly expanding urban areas of Arizona. Tourism, which also increases with expanding populations, The increase in fire frequency, fueled by invasive grass, is also a threat to this species. All of these threats are magnified by the species slow pace of growth and regeneration (Hubbard 2018).