I lived out in Phoenix for a few years. I was involved in scouting, running desert survival courses, winter camporees up on the rim, etc
It sounds like some of the hyperbole is getting out of hand and may lead you astray.
Dellinger's rules for desert camping...........
1. Don't camp in a wash. It may be dry where you are, but raining in the mountains. That wash will turn into a river before you will realize it.
2. Carry extra water and a small shovel.
3. I used to sleep out most of the time, without the benefit of a tent. Sleeping out under the stars is like no other experience. There's not much of a dew, so you don't get damp at night.
The other fun thing was waking up the next morning and seeing who visited you the night before. You often find cyote and other critter tracks around your bag.
4. On cool nights, snakes can find your sleeping bag nice and warm, so use a cot, or a tent with a floor and zipper. Snakes aren't going to hunt you down and bite you........but are apt to defend themselves if surprized. If you see a snake, enjoy looking but don't go poking at him, that's where people get into trouble. They will generally let you know if you intrude into their personal zone; there's no other sound like a snake rattle.
We would put on camporees, and generally the critters would clear out when the scouts started arriving, and come back when they cleared out. Those that were too slow to clear out, we would catch and put in an aquarium so the kids could see them, then release them after the weekend. The snakes are good at keeping the rat population in check; rats can carry alll kinds of nasty bugs, (plague/rabies, etc).
5. At night, don't go acting like my cousin vinne and start shooting at strange sounds in the dark--most likely it's some rancher's cows, grazing on open range.
6. Shake your shoes out in the AM before you put them on--scorpions. It's the little transparent ones that are the nastiest. The big ones just sting like a bee.
7.There are lots of tarantulas. They are harmless; well, they will sting like a bee if you really piss them off. Look and enjoy, but hands off
8. Most of the plants have stickers, so be carefull around them (it's all about their self survival)
9. Scouting has lots of info on desert camping--an example is shown below called "Surviving out in the Desert Southwest".
there are others if you do a search
http://www.usscouts.org/safety/safe_desert.html
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