What is a Coastal Desert?

• A desert with hospitable temperatures.
• The desert is very dry, and some get very rare rainfall.
• Crescent shaped dunes are likely to be found on a coastal desert.

Geographic Location

• Coastal deserts are normally located on the west coasts of continents.
• You can find coastal deserts in North America, South America, Africa, and Asia.
• These deserts also have beaches because they are near large bodies of water.

Climate

• These deserts have cool winters and long, warm summers. A good example of this is Chile.
• Summer temperatures range from 13-24 degrees celsius (55-75 degrees fahrenheit), and winter temperatures are 5 degrees celsius and below (41 degrees fahrenheit).

Primary Vegetation Type

• The primary producers in the food web are mostly plants.
• Things like cacti, bushes, and flowers are eaten by insects and small animals.

Characteristic Food Web

• The primary producers are eaten by insects and rodents.
• After this, bigger animals eat the smaller one including snakes, lizards and big spiders.
• At the top of the food web are the hawks and the foxes.

Human Related Threats

• Some of the big human-related threats to the coastal deserts are military activities and off-road vehicles. This causes damage to the desert cover.
• Mining is also a threat although it does not focus on that much area, it hurts a lot of the desert surrounding it.
• These activities cause damage to the desert cover.