We examined how a recent, extreme climatic event affected ecotones between grassland and shrub-dominated states in the Jornada Basin LTER. Transitions to shrub-dominated states, initially catalyzed by historical periods of intense grazing, drought, and shrub spread, have been heterogeneous over time due to subtle edaphic variations and the contagious nature of desertification. While drought has been considered an important trigger of degradation, there are few data to indicate the role of extremely high rainfall years for restoration. We examined plant responses to climate on local gradients of increasing shrub cover across ecotones (3 sites/ecotone) and a landscape-level gradient in shrub and grass cover across all 5 local ecotones (15 sites). We examined changes in plant cover from an intense drought year and over a period of very high rainfall (2003-2009), with unprecedented summer rainfall in 2006. We examined net primary production (NPP) during the peak years of 2006 and 2007. Perennial grass cover increased dramatically at all sites, even in sites with initially low grass cover and high shrub cover that were thought to be past degradation thresholds. Shrub cover did not change appreciably. Total NPP did not vary across the shrub cover gradient, and there was a 30% increase from 2006 to 2007 in response to the high rainfall. Of particular interest, the NPP of perennial grasses (and black grama in particular) was not related to shrub cover during these peak years, suggesting that high rainfall effectively erased the impact of shrub competition (or other negative interactions) during this period. The results indicate that while grass-soil degradation feedbacks may be important processes constraining perennial grass during most years, extremely high rainfall can overcome them at least temporarily.