Plant and Animal Life
Because of its location as a mountainous island in a sea of arid grassland, the Chiricahua Range affords a haven for a multitude of plants and animals of many varieties. Winter snows and summer rains result in springs and small streams. Dense vegetation covers the shaded canyon bottoms and the cool north slopes of the higher elevations. In contrast, south exposures feel the full heat of the summer sun and have plants characteristic of the desert. Red-stemmed manzanitas and bark-shedding madrones rub branches with the chalky-white limbs of the sycamore and the feathery gray foliage of the Arizona cypress. Green slopes, covered by chaparral of scrub oak and manzanita, face open hillsides dotted with a desert vegetation of yuccas, century plants, and cactuses. Seasonal changes bring with them many varieties of wildflowers.
Arizona whitetail deer are numerous in the Chiricahuas, and in the monument, where they are protected, they become accustomed to man and are frequently seen. Coatimundi and peccary are increasing in numbers. Rodents are common, as are birds of many species. Each vegetative belt and plant association has its own distinctive animal population, some of which are unique because of the relative and long-established isolation of the Chiricahua Range.