Nature In Your Nurture

Books

🌿🌻Way Out in the Desert by TJ Marsh & Jennifer Ward (illustrated by Kenneth J. Spengler)
This reimagining of “Over in the Meadow” is specific to the American deserts. This is a counting book, and there is a number hidden on each page (though “1” still eludes).

🌿🌻Whose Hiding in the Desert? by Katharine McEwen
This cute board book gives two dozen lift-the-flap facts about animals from deserts around the world! Learn about coyotes, tortoises, desert iguanas, & roadrunners from North American deserts as well as guanacos in South America, bilbies in Australia, camels in Africa, and ibex in the Middle East.

🌿🌻V is for Vulture by DK Publishing (illustrated by Kate Slater)
This illustrated Animal Alphabet board book features alliterative facts about vultures from around the world, including black vultures, king vultures, and Andean condors.

🌿🌻Little Naturalists: Georgia O’Keefe Loved the Desert by Kate Coombs (illustrated by Seth Lucas)
This board book introduces children to the story of Georgia O’Keefe, a famous artist who loved to paint the landscapes, rocks, plants, and even sun-bleached bones of the New Mexico desert where she lived.

🌿🌻Welcome to the Cactus Hotel by Brenda Z. Guiberson (illustrated by Megan Lloyd)
From the creators of the picture book Cactus Hotel, this board book introduces younger readers to the animals who live in and around a cactus.

🌻Our World: Mexico by Cynthia Harmony (illustrated by Claudia Navarro)
This bright illustrated board book explores a day in the life of a child in Mexico, where the Sonoran and Chihuahuan deserts are found. Learn a little bit about Mexican cuisine, games, traditions, and language. A glossary of Spanish words provides translations and explanations.

🌿Over on a Desert by Marianne Berkes (illustrated by Jill Dubin)
Like other books in her series, this one is a reimagining of “Over in the Meadow.” This book is not specific to the deserts of North America and each page shows what continent that animal is from. Additional information about each animal is provided at the end of the book.

🌿Over and Under the Canyon by Kate Messner (illustrated by Christopher Silas Neal)
In this illustrated story, a mother and child climb down into a desert canyon, observing the animals who live at the ground level of the canyon, fly above it, or make their homes along the canyon’s walls and ledges.

🌿The Tinaja Tonight by Aimee Bissonette (illustrated by Syd Weiler)
This illustrated book describes the animals of the desert who emerge after dark to gather at a natural temporary pool in the desert called a tinaja. The primary text reads smoothly and is supplemented by small-print notes about different animals, plants, and geographic features. This book highlights the biodiversity and how the desert ecosystem is served by small pools of water.

🌿The Night Flower by Lisa Hawthorne
This illustrated nonfiction book is rife with beautiful illustrations of the lifeforms supported by desert plants. As the sun sets, the saguaro cactus flower begins to bloom, drawing pollinating bats as the desert comes alive with nocturnal animals. At the end of the book is additional information about the life cycle of saguaro cactuses and about some of the desert animals shown featured in the book.

🌿Dig, Wait, Listen: A Desert Toad’s Tale by April Pulley-Sayre
This illustrated story details the cycle of a desert spadefoot “toad” estivating in the dry desert ground until the sound of rain draws her out along with other spadefoots to breed in the rainy season. While the book consistently calls the spadefoot a toad (and it is part of their common name), they are not actually toads at all– they just resemble them.

🌿Tumble by Adriana Hernandez-Bergstrom
A windblown tumbleweed rolls through the desert until it rests against a cactus. Falling rain causes the tumbleweed’s seeds to take root, grow, flower, dry out, and roll away to distribute seeds of their own. A key at the end of the book challenges readers to go back and spot the desert plants and animals in the pages of the book.

🌿Cactus Hotel by Brenda Z. Guiberson (illustrated by Megan Lloyd)
This illustrated book tells the story of a tiny saguaro cactus in the desert that grows tall over decades. As it gets bigger, woodpeckers carve out holes in the cactus that come to shelter other creatures throughout the life of the cactus until, after, 150 years, the cactus stands 50 feet tall and hosts a myriad of birds. When the aged cactus falls, it slowly dries out and becomes a shelter for insects and snakes.

🌿Cactus Queen: Minerva Hoyt Establishes Joshua Tree National Park by Lori Alexander (illustrated by Jenn Ely)
In the 1920s, Minerva Hoyt watches the beautiful Mojave desert start to disappear as it is picked bare, burned, dismissed, and deserted. This illustrated book follows her efforts to save the Mojave, organizing the famous “Spirit of the Desert” exhibit for the 1928 International Flower Show that revived public interest in the Mojave and invigorated a movement to save and ultimately preserve the rare landscape as a national park. This park is home to the unique Joshua Tree endemic only to the Mojave desert.

🌿Desert Song by Laaken Zea Kemp (illustrated by Beatriz Gutierrez Hernandez)
With an illustrative color palette ranging from earthy browns, sunset oranges, and twilight teals, this book shows a family harmonizing human voices and instruments with the sounds of the surrounding desert, including crickets, coyotes, birds, cicadas, owls, and rain.

Creative Art Opportunities

🦂Painting with sand mixed in
🦂Succulent-inspired collage with green, pink, and purple tissue paper
🦂Cactus-inspired sponge painting with green paint and glitter
🦂Painting with water on hot pavement
🦂Sprinkle warm sand over a wet painting
🦂Draw temporary designs in smooth sand or dirt

Hands On Experiences

⛅️Oven-warmed sand in sensory bin
⛅️Desert animals in sensory bin
⛅️Explore spineless prickly pear pads or aloe vera leaves
⛅️Build a cardboard shelter to take cover from summer heat
⛅️Blow fine sand into dunes in a bin (gently)

🌿Observe water evaporating from flat surfaces in the heat of the sun
🌿Go for a walk carrying a thin blanket to shelter you from the sun
🌿Use a sheet to turn a stroller into a portable tent
🌿Load up a stroller or wagon with water bottles to keep hydrated in the heat
🌿Help a grownup rub in your sunscreen

Songs to Learn and Sing

“American Deserts” – Kurt Kroeker (guide to remembering the four American deserts; lyrics and video hosted at link)

“Cactus Dance” – Jessie Farrell and the Gumboot Kids

“Nighttime on the Desert” – Marty Robbins

NIYN – Deserts on Spotify
All playlists are works in progress and may change over time.