The Great Plains are a flat, expansive area of North America that lies between the Mississippi River and Rocky Mountains. The Plains have deep, fertile soils deposited by water, ice, and wind that make them well-suited for agriculture. Vast grasslands cover much of the Plains, supporting immense populations of wildlife and livestock. At the heart of the Plains ecosystem is grass, which is able to survive a wide range of harsh climates through being almost indestructible. The climate of the Great Plains is characterized by very cold winters and hot summers, with high winds and occasional dust storms.

1. GREAT PLAINS

2. WHAT IS A PLAIN?
In geography, a plain is a flat area. Plains occur as lowlands and at the
bottoms of valleys but also on plateaus or uplands at high elevations.
Plains may have been formed from flowing lava, deposited by water,
ice, wind, or formed by erosion by these agents from hills and
mountains.

4. IMPORTANCE
Plains in many areas are important for agriculture because where the
soils were deposited as sediments they may be deep and fertile, and
the flatness facilitates mechanization of crop production; or because
they support grasslands which provide good grazing for livestock.

6. OPEN SPACES
The great plains are the vast open spaces of our planet. These
immense wilderness areas are seemingly empty. The plains of our
planet support the greatest gatherings of wildlife on earth: two million
gazelles on the Mongolian steppes, three million caribou in North
America and one and a half million wildebeest in East Africa. Close on
their heels come an array of plains predators including eagles, wolves
and lions.

8. GRASS
At the heart of all that happens here is a single living thing - grass.
Flooded, burnt, baked and frozen - grass is almost indestructible, able
to survive from the baking savannahs of Africa to the frozen tundra of
the Arctic, from the floodplains of India to the high altitude steppes of
the Tibetan plateau. Together, these hugely productive grassland plains
encompass a quarter of the land on earth.

10. THE GREAT PLAINS IN NORTH AMERICA
The Great Plains in North America is the flat land covered in prairie,
steppe and grassland, that lies west of the Mississippi River tallgrass
prairie states and east of the Rocky Mountains in the United States and
Canada.

12. CLIMATE
In general, the Great Plains have a wide variety of weather through the
year, with very cold and harsh winters and very hot and humid
summers. Wind speeds are often very high, especially in winter.
Grasslands are among the least protected biomes. Humans have
converted much of the prairies for agricultural purposes or to create
pastures. The Great Plains have dust storms mostly every year or so.