Sagebrush scrub is a vegetation type (biome) of mid-to-high elevation Western United States deserts characterized by low-growing drought-resistant shrubs including the sagebrush (Artemisia tridentata) and its associates.
[1][2] It is the dominant vegetation type of the Great Basin Desert (Great Basin shrub steppe),[2] occurs along the margins of the Mojave Desert, including in the southern slopes of the Sierra Nevada and the Transverse Ranges, in California,[2] and occurs in the Colorado Plateau and in the Canyonlands, where it may be referred to as cool desert shrub.
[3] It often occurs adjacent to piñon-juniper woodland communities, between 4,000 and 7,000 feet elevation, where annual precipitation is 8"-15", much of it snow.
[2] In the Mojave Desert, sagebrush associates include saltbrush (Atriplex spp.
[4] In the Sierra Nevada range, in California, sagebrush associates include bitterbrush (Purshia tridentata), curl-leaf mountain-mahogany (Cercocarpus ledifolius), and rabbitbrushes (Chrysothamnus spp., Ericameria spp.).