E-mail A Friend Tell a friend about the information found on this page by sending them an e-mail.   Your Name: Your E-mail:   Type an e-mail address, then click add: Add a Personal Message: (Optional)

Snapshots	Past stories Avalon Peninsula Cape Breton Islands Cypress Hills Northern Ontario Okanagan Valley

Regional Map

Contents: Location Geology First Nations European Contact Flora and Fauna Agriculture Tourism and Leisure Cities Contacts

The Okanagan boasts an extremely diverse terrain. You can scan a panorama that melts from dry desert to lush basins, or graduates from low grasslands to upper forest hills to less majestic mountains that accentuate their ice-capped elders far in the distance.

Although in a dry belt, the Okanagan's natural vegetation is divided into two general categories. North Okanagan is dominated by a "dry/rainshadow forest" characterized by sage bush, antelope bush (also called greasewood), bunchgrass and scattered ponderosa pines. It is a green and fertile region with a much wetter climate than the rest of the valley.

Southern Okanagan has near desert-like conditions which produce a more arid but unique vegetation, unlike any other in Canada. Here, the deep valley becomes grassland - too dry for tree growth without irrigation. Sagebrush shrubs, cheatgrass, poison ivy and sumac are scattered with beautifully coloured prickly pear cactus, Okanagan sunflower and bitter root.

The region's wildlife is also unique. In the winter, hoofed animals such as mule deer and bighorn sheep migrate down from the mountains into the warmer valleys. White-tailed deer, cottontails, jackrabbits, badgers and muskrats are seen throughout the seasons. The valley is a birder's paradise, hosting mallards and canvasbacks in the cooler north, along with canyon wrens, white-throated swifts, woodpeckers and calliope hummingbirds in the warmer south. Alligator lizards, painted turtles, and several snakes (western blue racer, rubber boa, gopher/bull, and Pacific rattle) frequent the area, as does the odd scorpion.

Conservation concerns have arisen in the valley's southerly reaches due to extraordinarily unique wildlife coupled with a booming population.