The badlands of Ruhama, which lie to the west of Kibbutz Ruhama (founded 1911) and south of Highway 334, are a popular tourist attraction.
Kibbutz Ruhama is considered the first modern Jewish settlement in the Negev.
According to the KKL-JNF site:
The Nahal Shikma (“Sycamore River”) gully is the backbone of the area between Kibbutz Ruhama, Kibbutz Bror Hayil and the town of Sderot. This region attracts large numbers of visitors, especially in winter – the rainy season – when it is particularly beautiful: fields of wheat paint the landscape green, while uncultivated areas are red with anemones. A little later in the season poppies and crucifers (Brassicaceae) such as mustard stripe the fields with red and yellow. The area has its attractions in other seasons, too: on summer afternoons the stubble in the fields glows bright yellow, and in the autumn the glittering land is a rich dark brown – “Ruhama brown,” as it is called.