Grasslands

=**Grasslands Homepage**=

__Climate and Location__
Grasslands occur naturally on all continents except for Antarctica. In North America, the grasslands are known as prairies. In South America they're known as pampas. In Eurasia, they're known as steppes, and in Africa, they're called savannas and veldts. There are two types of grasslands; tall grass, which are wet and humid grasslands, and short grass, which are dry with warmer summers and colder winters than the tall grass areas. In the winter, the temperatures of the grasslands can reach as low as -40°F, and as high as 70°F during the summer. Grasslands usually receive about 390 to 900 mm, or 15 to 36 inches, of rain each year. Grassland biomes are typically found near the middle latitudes toward the center of continents, as shown in the map below.

__Soil__
Most grasslands have very deep soil that are rich with many nutrients, and most of the time they will have a portion of clay that will retain most of the moisture, unlike other soils, and absorb a lot of the rain that comes in spring. Grasslands are also good at using winter snow as insulation. This is because there are so many plants in the region. Because of this, the snow gets trapped in the leaves, leaving them with a protective layer of snow that will also be useful for water when the snow melts.



__Five Kingdoms__
In the grasslands, there is a huge variety of organisms throughout all five kingdoms. In the Animal kingdom, the animals can range from the gigantic elephant, to the smallest grass-hopping mouse. Each one tries to survive in the long plains by adapting to the environment. In the Plant kingdom, there are also a variety of plants including Big Bluestem, Little Bluestem, Asters, Broom Sedge, and of course all of the grasses! These include Switchgrass, Indian Grass, and Prairie Cord Grass. Some grasses can reach very high and others are very small, even at their full size. The Kingdom Monera consists of different bacteria in the grasslands. One genus of bacteria commonly found in this biome is the Pseudomonas genus. The Protist kingdom in the grasslands can include many different things and one of these are the Paraluffisphaera Tuba. This protist is a newly discovered eukaryote. Finally, in Kingdom Fungi, Waxcaps are a very commonly found as a type of club fungi in the Grasslands Biome. The other types of fungi can include Entolomas, Clavarioids, and Earth Tongues.



Click here to go to the Factual Page. Click here to go to the Fictional Story Page. Click here to go to the Food Web Click here to go to the Bibliography.