Owyhee desert

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Owyhee [ ɒˈwaɪˌhiː / ɒˈwaɪˌiː ] is an arid desert covering an area of ​​36,000 km² in northern Nevada , southwestern Idaho and southeastern Oregon . It is located at the southern end of the Columbia Plateau - southwest Idaho's capital Boise - and extends east of the Santa Rosa Range and west of the Independence Mountains (which reach 3,000 feet in the Matterhorn). In the south the desert borders the Great Basin . The area is located at an average altitude of 1600 m above sea level. The desert is drained by the Owyhee River , a tributary of the Snake River . Most of the area is owned by the federal government and administered by the Bureau of Land Management .

Flora and fauna

The largely untouched landscape, which is cut through by canyons, is characterized by vast dry grass landscapes that are used as ranch land. The most important representatives of the fauna are coyotes and hares , gray squirrels and smaller rodents as well as lizards and rattlesnakes .

Residents

On both sides of the border between Nevada and Idaho, on the Owyhee River, there is the Duck Valley Indian reservation (approx. 1200 km²), where Schosonen settle and Owyhee , Nevada (1150 inhabitants), the largest town in the Owyhee Desert, is located. Only a 300 km long paved road leads through the area, which connects Boise with Elk on the Humboldt River and runs through the village of Owyhee. Politically, the desert in Nevada belongs to Elko County , in Idaho to Owyhee County and in Oregon to Malheur County .

The name of the desert is an older form of the name of the island of Hawaii , as the first trappers to explore the area were Hawaiians in 1819 . Around four fifths of the population are white, one fifth are Hispanics, and the Indian population is now only a tiny minority.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Owyhee Desert in the Geographic Names Information System of the United States Geological Survey
  2. ↑ cf. Jared Sparks: Life of the Famous American Traveler John Ledyard . Leipzig, 1829, p. 124

Coordinates: 41 ° 47 ′ 30.6 "  N , 116 ° 57 ′ 56.4"  W.