Biomes – Geography Test Questions – Flashcards

Charles Darwin

plants/animals adapt to changes in the enviroment (will die if they don't)

"Biomes are classified by predominant vegetation which is characterized by adaptations of organisms to the particulat enviorment." [Campbell]

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biomes have changed/moved many times

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• formed 10,000 years ago
• northern fringes of Canada/Russia/Finland; southern Greenland; 55 degrees N to 70 degrees N
• -70 degrees F (-56 degrees C)
• 48 species of land mammals --> shrews, rodents, hares, foxes, wolves, deer, bears
• adaptation: thick fur

• Canada/Russia (below tundra)
• half of the year = below freezing; range = -65 to 30 degrees F (-54 to -1 degrees C); long winters, short summers
• Plants: coniferous (keep leaves year round?) trees with needle-like leaves
• Animals: many predators --> lynx, wolverines, bobcats, red deer
• Adaption: hibernation, fly south

• Eastern North America, Mid Europe, Eastern Asia (China)
• 30 - 60 in./year
• 50 degrees F (avg.); has 4 seasons
• Adaptatation: hibernate in winter (shorter); camaflouge; eat fruits, fish, and roots; trees have big wide leaves to get rid of water because there is so much
• There are more HUMANS (predators)

• Covers 6% of land (was once 20%); 50% of plants and animals; 40% of oxygen of world
• Mid South America, Mid Africa, Indonesia/Indo Pacific, equator?
• 50 - 260 in./year
• year-round warmth
• tall trees, rough underbrush; colorful birds, butterflies, plants; many monkeys (species unique to each rainforest)

• Africa, north Australia, India, EQUATOR
• can get as high as 50 degrees (F or C?)
• grasses/trees --> more variety than in a dry savanna
• LARGEST = Australian Tropical Savanna
  • seperated from rest of world for 35 million years
  • contains endemic species --> only place with marsupials
  • saltwater dominator = crocodiles

• Covers 20% of land surface
• formed because of not much precipitation (because of ocean currents and winds)

HOT DESERTS

• Located between Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn
• 43 - 49 degrees C
• nocturnal carnivores (it's cool at night); borrowers, mourning wheatears, horned vipers
• Camaflouge

COLD DESERTS

• Located in the Arctic and Antarctic
• antelope, ground squirrels, kangaroo rats (?), rabbits
• (Camaflouge)

• 1% of water is fresh
• Variety of fish, plankton; species can't live in high salt concentrations; has fish that require less oxygen; fish can live in rivers/streams
• Fertilizer and industrial waste kill plants/animals and people will eat the organisms that DON'T die

• 75% of surface covered with oceans, coral reefs, estuaries
• many invertibrates, fishes, worms, clams, predatory crestaceans, crabs, shore birds
  • Estuaries --> diverse fauna (?), variety of worms

UV hits earth directly:

• causes algae (protective shield of coral reefs) to die
  • UV will bleach corals
• Skin cancer

the one and only crop that is grown in a field; also, monoculture is the practice of growing only one crop in a field

1. light,
2. temperature,
3. precipitation,
4. and wind.

1. altitude
2. aspect
3. slope angle

1. effects of plants (for example, the measures a plant takes because of competition or parasitism)
2. effects of animals (the balance between different consumers)
3. effects of fire (forest fires)