The rim of the Canyon at Grand Canyon Village is 7000' (2134 m) and at Pipe Creek Beach at the bottom of Bright Angel Trail, the river is 2000' (610 m). Over its 277 miles, there are innumerable habitats and micro-habitats with a variety of conditions to which organisms are adapted and adapting.
| Spruce-Fir Forest (Kaibab Plateau above 8,200') | Dominant plants: Engelmann spruce, subalpine fir. Important associates: White fir, blue spruce, quaking aspen. |
| White Fir Forest (Kaibab Plateau: warmer sites above 8,250') | Dominant plant: White fir. Important associates: Ponderosa pine, douglas-fir, quaking aspen, greenleaf manzanita, New Mexican locust, Arizona rose, gambel oak, creeping mahonia. |
| Mountain Grassland (Kaibab Plateau: shallow basins above 8,400') | Dominant plant: various perennial bunchgrasses. Common wildflowers: Mountain dandelions, fleabanes, owl-clovers, pygmy lewisia, yarrow, and others. |
| Ponderosa Pine Forest (North Rim: 7200-8250'; South Rim: above 7000') | Dominant plant: Ponderosa pine. Important associates: Gambel oak, New Mexican locust, cliff rose, Apache plume, mountain mahogany, greenleaf manzanita, big sagebrush, fernbush, rabbitbrush, understory grasses. |
| Pinyon-Juniper Woodland (4000-7300') | Dominant plant: Pinyon, Utah juniper. Important associates: Rabbitbrush, big sagebrush, fernbush, broom snakeweed, gambel oak, banana yucca, cliff rose, Apache plume, serviceberry. |
| Blackbrush Scrub (3500-4500') | Dominant plant: Blackbrush. Important associates: Mormon tea, desert thorn, bursage, Utah agave, narrowleaf yucca, various cacti. |
| Mohave Desert Scrub (Inner Gorge below 4000') | Dominant plant: Four-winged saltbush, creosote bush. Important associates: Utah agave, yuccas, Mormon tea, mesquite, ratany, catclaw, various cacti. |
| Riparian Woodland (Banks of colorado River and tributary streams) | Dominant plants: Tamarisk (river); Fremont cottonwood (tributaries). Important associates: Seep-willow, desert-willow, true willows, redbud, netleaf hackberry, Arizona walnut (Havasu Canyon). |
Whitney, Stephen. 1982. A Field Guide to the Grand Canyon. William Morrow and Company, Inc., New York.