Grasslands are biomes dominated by grasses rather than trees. They are found across North America, Eurasia, South America, South Africa, and Australia. Grasslands develop in areas with moderate rainfall between 250-800 mm and periodic droughts that prevent the growth of forests but support grasses. Grazing animals and fires help maintain grasslands by preventing the growth of shrubs and trees. Human impacts like plowing for crops, overgrazing, and replacing native plants with domesticated species have degraded many original grasslands.

2. • A biome where grasses
form the predominant
vegetation, usually mixed
with herbs and sometimes
with shrubs, but usually
without trees. Grasslands
dotted with trees are called
savanna.

3. Where are Grasslands found?

4. Types of Grasslands
I. Domestic Grasslands
II. North American Grasslands
III. Eurasian Streppes
IV. South American Pampas
V. South African Veld
VI. Australian Grasslands

5. o Generally, all grasslands have in common a climate
characterized by rainfall between 250 and 800 mm
(too light to support a heavy forest and too great to result in a desert)
o Have a high rate of evaporation and periodic severe droughts
o Grazing and burrowing are the dominant animals
o Usually require fires for maintenance, renewal and
elimination of woody growth

6.  adapted to periods of drought and survive under low rainfall
but grasses grow best under optimal moisture and temperature.
 Poorest: where precipitation is the lowest and high
temperature
 Best: where the mean annual precipitation is greater than
800 mm and mean annual temperature is above 15 °C,
 The greater the mean annual precipitation, the greater the
aboveground production

7. Vegetation
 Most visible feature is the tall, green, ephemeral
herbaceous growth that develops in spring and dies
back during autumn.
 Herbaceous Layer
1. First layer - consist of low growing and ground-hugging plants
2. Middle layer - consist of shorter grasses and forbs
3. Upper layer – consist of leaves and flowering stems of tall grasses,
leafy stalks and flowers of forbs

8. Animal life
o Life in herbaceous layer varies as the strata become
more pronounced from spring to fall.
o Invertebrate life is most abundant and varied.
o Large grazing ungulates and burrowing mammals are
the most conspicuous vertebrates

9. Human Impact
 Most grasslands are plowed under for cropland
 Degraded by overgrazing
 Replaced native plants species with highly forage
plants
 Removed great herds of
wild ungulates and replaced
with domestic stock
DUST BOWL