Research Report On Terrestrial And Aquatic Biomes

A biome is a large area or habitat that occupies the earth. Animals, plants along with flora and fauna occupy biome habitats. They cleverly adapt to their environment and geographical location. The area that I have chosen to research are the Flinders Ranges. The Flinders Rangers are in South Australia, covering 37,000 square kilometres. The biome expands from Crystal Brook in the south to Mount Hopeless in the north. There are several main general features associated with this semi-arid biome. It has landforms that are above sea level. The biome has high mountain ranges with summits reaching 900 metres. The area has steep gorges, cliffs, ridges and plateaus. The biome edges have grasslands and foothills which contain creeks, gorges, valleys,

The alpine biome is a biome high in the mountains with trees, rivers, lakes and etc. This the biome where the Himalayas, the Rockies, the Andes, and even Mount Everest! But now because of human actions, some animals are now endangered. You will learn a lot about the alpine when you finish reading this.

Depending on the biome, climate change can have very severe damage to an organism and the world around it. A biome is a large community of plants and animals that live in a specific type of region. Examples of biomes temperate grasslands, tundras, chaparral, and lakes. Climate change can take a big toll on a biome. Examples of climate change could be rise in sea levels or changes in temperature.

An impermeable surface cannot be penetrated by any element. Such a surface will not allow rain to percolate into the desert soil leaving no plants with root systems able to survive unless specifically adapted to the climate.

Weather and climate are the two major abiotic (nonliving) factors responsible for determining the major geographic ecosystems called biomes.

There are quite a few interesting facts I learned about grassland biomes. One would be that they are located

Now, humans have a steady food supply so they do not have to move about. Therefore, people use fences to keep their animals in one place, which causes overgrazing. Today we see many subjects being affected by desertification. Ute Schaeffer reports the affects of desertification in, Down to Earth: News & Views on Desertification,“(doc.3) It has presented a challenge for governments and aid agencies in over 110 countries for some time, and is a contributing factor in poverty and regional conflicts, for example in Sudan. It has also been a major issue in Egypt, where 90% of the country’s land mass is desert. Faced with a rising population, the government has had to undertake a number of settlement and irrigation projects to create additional living and working space.” Necessary changes were made in order to adapt to the conditions of the desert and the obstacles that have to be faced. It is always presumed that there are only negative aspects to deserts but this isn’t always the case. There is a side to the Sahara desert that acts as a home to several living organisms. The Sahara has vegetation and access to water, which allows life to exist in this region. The Nile Valley, for example, is an area that is still quite full of foliage, trees and other growing things. This area is an exception, because of the way it is fed by the Nile River. Another area of the Sahara that has some vegetation to it is in the North, along the Mediterranean where olive trees grow

larger vegetation zones to the way we should understand the ecology of the land scape.

In this investigation I will be using two different climates, The Desert and The Arctic

There is no consensus on what all the biomes are, so here is a just a few!

The defining character of a desert is usually low levels of rainfall with under 25 cm per year. Additional to that, the relationship between rainfall and the evaporated and transpired water must be taken into consideration. “A desert is a biological community in which most of the indigenous plants and animals are adapted to chronic aridity and periodic, extreme droughts, and in which these conditions are necessary to maintain the community’s structure” (Phillips, Comus, 2000, p. 10). This means that it is the environmental and climatic conditions that have created an evolutionary pressure for the flora to develop.

These include the Hot Desert, Semi-arid, Coastal and Cold Desert. For the purpose of this essay I will discuss the Hot Desert biome. Throughout this essay I will include examples from the Hot Deserts of the USA - the Sonora, the Chihuahua and the Mojave desert. Deserts cover approximately one-fifth of the earth's surface (Park, 2001).

A biome, also known as life zones, consists of all plants, animals, and other organisms, as well the physical environment in a particular area. A biome is characterized by its’ plant life, climate, and location. The climate and physical features determine the boundaries of a biome. A biome is made up of many different ecosystems. The ecosystems tend to have the same pants and animals as neighboring biomes around the boundaries. The major biomes are the tundra, taiga, tropical rain forest, temperate forests, desert, grassland, savanna, chaparral, and marine. Each biome has it’s own characteristics such as the tundra.

Biomes are all over the world, that’s why they are considered the “world’s major communities.” Biomes are large areas scattered around the earth, filled with animals and plants acclimating to their environments. You can classify biomes in many different ways, by their climate, their biodiversity, human activity, their animals and plants, and their habitats. There are only five conspicuous types of biomes, Grassland, Tundra, Desert, Aquatic, and forest. Without biomes, the earth would be unbalanced. Throughout the years, we have cause a lot of damage towards our earth, such as causing pollution, and abolishing natural habitats. If we continue living like this, there might be more serious or severe implications on the biomes. Knowing that we share the world with so many other species of plants and animals, we should consider the consequences of our actions.

Desertification is defined by Scott E Spoolman and G. Miller in their book Living in the Environment as “the conversion of rangeland, rain-fed cropland, or irrigated cropland to desert-like land with a drop of agricultural activity of 10% or more”. To put this as simple as possible desertification is turning usable soil into desert. Dissertation is hard to observe but over time