The Desert Environment

We learn from this lesson the following :

*The Definition of desert biome or invironment.

*Adaptation of some plants and animals in desert invironment.

The desert is a flat surface of sand containing sand dunes. This is the case as in the western and eastern desetrs and the sinai desert in Egypt, and the desert of Saudi Arabia. All these deserts are similar in one common factor, water is rare in these areas and this causes water shortage, therefor, all the plants of the desert are dry environment plants. In the desert, some animals and plants live and they all are adapted to the disert condtions such as rereness of water, strong wind, and high temperature.

Desert Plants:

Try to refer to your library to prepare a report on the plants of sand desert and discover new kinds of these plants.

Woody plants:

They are short spiny shrubs that are protected from grass eaters by its spines and it include:

Cactus:

1- Cactus is fleshy with spiny leaves and grows from the stem at the soil surface.

2- Cactus is a fleshy stem with large fleshy leaves covered with spines which are modified leaves. The cactus has yellow flowers and its fruits are edible. The roots extend in the soil near the soil surface as shown in the figure.

Calamagrostis:

Calamagrostis is a plant which grows on the sand dunes with a maximum height of 50 cm(see the figure below).

Animals of the desert:

There are different groups of animals that live in the desert such as rodents, reptiles, deer, and camels. We will study the Camel as an example of the animals of the sand desert.

The Camel:

The camel is really the desert ship. He can walk for long distances without drinking or eating. The Camel eats whatever he finds from the grasses and herbs. He stores the surplus food after he digests it as fats in his humb. The camel can live on this fat for several days. The Camel drinks large quantities of water. He stores the water in one of his three stomachs. With this stored water, he can live for a month without the need to drink any more water.

The camel's ability to store food and water makes him a suitable animal for long distances travel in deserts where water is rare. Also, the Camel is provided with a padded flat foot ending with a thick hoof to protect him from hot sands and to enable him to walk on the sands with little effort.

How did these living organisms adapt to live in the hot desert?

The living organisms of the hot desert were adapted to overcome the shortage of water, strong wind and high temprature. This can be shown by the following:

1-about the plants, the roots of the plants extend to deep areas in the soil to absorb large amount of water as in sand cane. In other plants roots extend horisontally under the soil surface for long distances to absorb large amounts of rain water when it falls as in cactus plants.

2-about the animals like the camel stores large amounts of water enough for a month. In the early morning, some animals like the beetles and gerboa soak the dew drops on the leaves of desert plants. Some animals feed on succulent plants which store large amounts of juices to obtain water. Some animals absorb their prey's blood as a source of water.Desert animals can reduce the water in their excretions and sweat by staying in the burrows and the shaded areas.