Yes, Sky Islands definitely do exist. What are they? Some people believe them to be the magical floating mountains in the movie “Avatar”. No… but I can tell you something about those floating mountains, first.
[1] They were called The Hallelujah Mountains, on the planet of Pandora. Remember, the Na'vi had to climb these incredible floating mountains in order to choose their dragon to fly around on. That was some impressive CGI! What most people don’t know is that these creations were based very closely on something real!
[2] The vertical, nearly unbelievable mountain spires in Zhangjiajie National Forest Park in China. These mountains are one of the truly awesome sights on our planet. It turns out that James Cameron, who made the movie Avatar, saw photos of these mountains and was so awestruck, that he created a movie around them; except that his mountains disconnected from the Earth and floated around. But in a way, the real mountains are even more impressive. He saw these well before he had written Avatar. So they were his inspiration. The Chinese are well aware of this fact, and are so proud of their spires, that they actually renamed them The Hallelujah Mountains, and remind all visitors who come to see them, with a statue of a Na’vi warrior, right in the park. [3]
But, as impressive as the The Hallelujah Mountains are, on Pandora and in China… they aren’t The Sky Islands. The true Sky Islands are something far more important. Sky Islands are a geological feature, right here on Earth, that basically means a “mountain in a sea of desert”. They are very rare. You might say “But, there are desert mountains all over the place!”. Well, yes… but these are very particular types of mountains. Most desert mountains aren’t very tall, and they are just as barren as the desert around them. Sky Islands, on the other hand, are unique in that they have their base in the desert, but then they have various and distinctly different biospheres, all the way up the mountain, and different types of life that exist at each level. While at the base of the mountain you might have desert life or plants and animals representative of areas from south-western United States and Mexico… at the top, you may have representatives from a forest of fir trees in the middle of Canada. Few of them ever mix. [4]
Okay, so the climate changes as you go higher. Still doesn’t sound like anything very impressive or rare, right? Well, there are still other traits that make these types of places Sky Islands. Nearly all mountains in the world are parts of a long chain of mountains. The Appalachian Mountains, the Rocky Mountains, The Himalayan Mountains, etc. Rarely will you see a mountain by itself. And if you do, they are usually one type of environment, from base to mountain top… like a volcano, for instance. Sky islands are different in this way. And I’ll soon be getting to why this is important and unique.
So, we have a few places on Earth where this is the case. Mount Kilimanjaro is one such example… a tall mountain rising from desert grasslands, with different environments all the way up. But there is only one special place that has an archipelago of sky islands, and that is the Madrean Sky Islands. The Madrean Sky Islands are probably the most studied sky islands in the world. Found in the U.S. states of New Mexico and Arizona and the Mexican states of Chihuahua and Sonora. What makes them so unique is that they are the sky islands with the greatest disparity between top and bottom, and they are separated by land that the inhabitants of the mountains are not able to cross. Why is this so special? Because what you end up with is an entire group of isolated “Galapagos” type environments, all within sight of each other, but inaccessible to each other. Like a group of islands in the Pacific that you can’t get to, because the water in between is infested by aggressive hungry sharks. What happens is, each small mountain group develops its own species, and evolution works on each independently. It’s a remarkable opportunity to study the process of evolution. The animals can’t cross the scorching deserts in between the islands. In fact, they can’t even leave their own island, to spread to other places and inter-mingle. The Madrean Sky Islands each have their own endemic species of both plants and animals, that are found nowhere else in the world! Like a bunch of separated terrariums. And the variety of life on each island is vast, since we have so many different types of environments, as you go up the mountain.
Baboquivari Mountain is one of these sky islands. [5]
Whetstone Mountain is another. [6]
Santa Rita Mountains is yet another. [7]
There are 16–19 Sky Islands in the Madrean Sky Island archipelago, within Arizona, alone. There are between 57 and 65, within the entire archipelago, which reaches south into Mexico, and east into New Mexico. Each has its own particular mixture of species. Species Gallery - Sky Island Alliance. Santa Rita is particularly exciting to biologists and environmental scientists because it is the only place in the world where these four different species of beautiful cats are all found so close together and sharing a confined territory: Bobcat, Mountain Lion, Ocelot and Jaguar. Ocelot and Jaguar are both endangered species. [8]
Santa Rita Mtn. is in Arizona and also holds the distinction of being the territory of the only current Jaguar in the United States. El Jefe the Jaguar. [9]
This is particularly exciting to American biologists, in that the Jaguar was made extinct in the US in 1912. Ranchers killed the very last one of them, and even had cheap bounties on them. Their return to the US is thrilling. El Jefe is the 3rd or 4th Jaguar to venture into the US in the past 20 years, since the study has begun (a study that I’m proud to say I had a part in). [10]
At the moment, he is alone, but the migration of Jaguars from Mexico has been proven to be happening, and there are many efforts being made to protect this area and the travel corridors that lead to Santa Rita and all around the Sky Islands.
President Donald Trumps’s “wall” would put a definite end to this entire decades-long project and eliminate all hope of a future where this amazing animal that was eliminated from our country, could return and repopulate. There is also a constant battle between mining corporations who are intent on digging up profit in this beautiful area, and those environmental warriors that continue to fight them in court and on the ground, to keep this world-unique natural area undisturbed. Not even the fact that these Sky Islands are so special, is enough reason for corporations to have some environmental sense.
So, these are the real Sky Islands. A sky island is a mountain that is separated from other mountains by distance and by surrounding lowlands of a dramatically different environment, such that uniquely evolved and isolated species cannot travel between them. These mountains are home to many arboreal species that quite literally "ran for the hills" when the last Ice Age came to a close. As the United Nations Environment Program explained in its 2006 "Global Deserts Outlook" report:
"As they ascended into the isolated desert mountains, the communities of the desert 'sky islands' became separated from other mountains by harsh desert plains. [...] Because they have been reproducing in isolation for 15,000-20,000 years, many of their populations have developed unique genetic traits and have evolved into new species. Thus, in a similar fashion to evolution in remote oceanic islands, the biota of the desert sky islands is composed by a large number of endemic species and has immense value for biological conservation."
The Madrean Sky Island archipelago is beautiful and quite unique. It’s not quite Pandora… but it’s so much more important!
Some bits of the above text come from the website of the Sky Island Alliance, which I was a member of for several years. They are dedicated to preserving the beauty and uniqueness of the Madrean Sky Islands. Check out the website here: Home - Sky Island Alliance . They do tons of volunteer field work, legislative work, and really make a difference. Feel free to support them or help out, for some valuable eco-adventures. You can make a difference, as well!
EDIT: Here’s an interesting article about another set of Sky Islands in Montana, that Keith McKinnon brought to my attention.
IMAGE CITATIONS:
[1] Nayda Venizelos R3dFox Studio 3D Printing
[3] Lintao Zhang/Getty Images
[4] Wendy Moore 2013 Rain Gods in a Desert Sea: New Book Celebrates Southern Arizona's Mountains
[5] Wild Sonora Baboquivari Mountains
[6] Wild Sonora The Madrean Sky Islands
[7] Arizona Department of Water Resources ADWR, Santa Cruz AMA
[8] Tammie Graves 2016 Arizona Daily Star
[9] Photo database Federal Wildlife Agency Gives Approval to Harm America’s Only Known Jaguar
[10] Stefan Pociask 2006
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