Grasslands

Grasslands, there a variety of different grasslands all throughout the world. Grasslands consist of what one would expect, grass, but there all different kinds of grass that make up a grassland. These fields of grass range around almost every environment that spans around the world, except places much too cold, such as Antarctica. These areas gained dominance over the forest biome, because of the mountains rising in height in North America, creating an continental climate that leaned toward the growth of grasslands. This occurred during the Miocene and Pliocene Epochs, supposedly dating back to twenty-five million years ago. The Pleistocene Ice Age passed and grasslands began to adapt to and spread to hotter an drier climates. Slowly, forests began to be less and less, while the grassland biome began to become more and more.

Many different forms of grasslands inhabit the planet, the usual being Temperate Grasslands, which contain no woody plants, the soil is much to thin to even support trees or shrubs, unlike the savannas, which have many, this is for another topic though. Temperate Grasslands is usually in a warm climate and gets maybe ten to thirty -five inches in rain a year. The amount of rain a temperate grassland gets determines how tall the grass will be, which consists of simply tall or short. Droughts also have a big part in keeping the trees from growing, because unlike the trees, grasses don't require as much water, so this results in the grass maintaining dominance. Much of grasslands goal, is to keep trees and shrubs from growing, because if they flourish, it would become more of a forest like place and the grasses would die, so fire also prevents trees from growing by burning them all down, usually caused by a strike of lightning that spreads a wildfire. Many animals live in the grasslands, but because there are not too many places to hide in the grasslands, most animals stay in large herds. Because of the drought, most of these animals aren't around during this time, instead they come out during the time of rain. Some of the animals that are included in the grasslands are, Giraffes, Black Rhinoceros, Ostriches, Lions, Bison, Prairie Dog, Warthog, Black Hyena and many more. All of these animals are in different regions of the world, all of which cannot be bought in any store I'm sorry to say.

Like there are animals there also many different kinds of grasses and plants that grow in the grasslands. Woody-plants are not present which would include, trees, shrubs, or llianas. If there are, they are very scarce. Sometimes people will go ahead and try to physically keep the grasses short, so that they may be easier to pass through or for whatever reasoning there may be for them to do that. This is much like what the people do with their lawns. Then there is the grass that keeps itself under control with fires and grazing like the Temperate grasses. The savanna grasslands which is more like Africa and such. These places have woody plants in them more regularly than the temperate grasslands, they have the

Elephants, the Lions, Hyenas and even the meerkats. This kind of place gets more rain than a temperate grassland to support the trees and shrubs along with all the other woody plants. Most woody plants are perennial and last out more than one season.

A few of the animals found in the forest, the grasslands are usually on the forest floor while some of the animals live on the floor and feed on the floor dwellers., Eastern Cottontail, Red Fox Coyote, Voles, Meadow Jumping Mouse, Red-Tailed Hawk, American Kestral Short-Eared Owl, Barn Owl, Rabbits, Eastern Fox Snakes and even the Red Locust. These animals can all be found in more of an area where the grass is below the trees and sometimes in open fields.

Talking about the animals that live in grasslands, some information should be given about them, the Barn Owl also known as Tyto alba pratincola.

As it can be seen, much of the world has grasslands around on almost every regions and it houses a numerous amount of animals. There are two main grasslands, temperate and savanna grasslands, each having their own individual characteristics. Grasslands has been around since the beginning of time, and it's only growing in numbers.