Introduction

In this chapter, “microclimate” will be used in two ways, one to designate the climatic conditions near the surface (both in the atmosphere and in the ground just below the surface) and another to designate the particular climatic conditions of microhabitats within the drylands. The latter include dunes, oases, desert depressions, riverine environments within deserts, and beneath the canopy of the savanna vegetation. This chapter begins with an examination of typical conditions of temperature, moisture, and wind near the surface of a sand or stone desert. Then the microclimates of select habitats are considered: the desert dunes, the more extreme conditions of desert depressions, and the more moderate environments of the riparian valleys, oases, desert lakes and irrigated fields, and within a vegetation layer are described.

The research that is available includes many classic studies from several desert research institutes. These include the Repetek Desert Research Center in Turkmenistan; the Desert Ecological Research Unit at Gobabeb, Namibia; the University of Arizona and the Arid Lands Office, in Tucson; the Nevada Desert Research Center; the Egyptian Meteorological Authority; the Lanzhou Institute of Desert Research in China; the Chihuahuan Desert Research Institute in Mexico; CSIRO in Alice Springs, Australia; the Arid Ecosystems Research Center at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, the Blaustein Institute for Desert Research at Ben-Gurion University in Tel Aviv, and the Institute for Arid Zone Research at the University of the Negev in Beer Sheva. Most of the discussion in this chapter will be based on a selection of available examples, many from important but little-known studies of half a century ago. Books by Dubief (1959) and Menenti (1984) also contain a wealth of information about desert microclimates.