The Carson Desert is a desert

Desert

A desert is a landscape or region that receives an extremely low amount of precipitation, less than enough to support growth of most plants. Most deserts have an average annual precipitation of less than...

 in the Lahontan Basin and the desert valley of the Churchill County desert region

Churchill County, Nevada

Churchill County is a county located in the western U.S. state of Nevada. As of the 2000 census, the population was 23,982. As of July 1, 2007, the population of Churchill County was estimated at 27,190. The county, named after Mexican-American War hero brevet Brigadier General Sylvester Churchill,...

 which receives an average 5 inches (127 mm) annual precipitation. The desert is the low valley area (including the Carson Sink

Carson Sink

Carson Sink is a playa in the northeastern portion of the Carson Desert that was formerly the terminus of the Carson River. The sink is currently fed by drainage canals of the Truckee-Carson Irrigation District...

 in the north of the valley) between the adjacent mountain ranges, while the larger watershed includes the interior slopes of the demarcating ranges. The desert was inundated by Lake Lahontan

Lake Lahontan

Lake Lahontan was a large endorheic Pleistocene lake of modern northwestern Nevada that extended into northeastern California and southern Oregon...

 during the Pleistocene

Pleistocene

The Pleistocene is the epoch from 2,588,000 to 11,700 years BP that spans the world's recent period of repeated glaciations. The name pleistocene is derived from the Greek and ....

, and the watershed became part of Nevada's Conservation Security Program

Conservation security program

The Conservation Security Program is a voluntary conservation program in the United States that supports ongoing stewardship of private agricultural lands by providing payments and technical assistance for maintaining and enhancing natural resources...

in 2005.