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Desert plants have evolved ways of conserving and efficiently using the wateravailable to them. Some flowering desert plants are ephemeral; they live for a fewdays at most. Their seeds lie dormant in the soil, sometimes for years, until asoaking rain enables them to germinate and quickly bloom. Woody desert plantseither have long root systems that reach deep water sources or have spreadingshallow roots that are able to take up surface moisture quickly from heavy dewsand occasional rains. Desert plants usually have small leaves. This conserves waterby reducing surface area from which transpiration can take place. Other plants droptheir leaves during the dry period. The process of photosynthesis—by whichsunlight is converted to energy and usually conducted primarily in leaves—is takenover in the desert by the stems. A number of desert plants are succulents, storingwater in leaves, stems, and roots. Thorns, which are modified leaves, serve toguard the water from animal invaders. These plants may take in and store carbondioxide only at night; during the day their stomata, or pores, are closed to preventevaporation. Desert plants growing on saline soils may concentrate salt in their sap
If these trade winds meet an island or mainland coast, moist air ispushed up into cooler elevations, and heavy rainfall might occur. Day-by-dayvariations in a given area constitute the weather, whereas climate is the long-termsynthesis of such variations. Only in highly stressful habitats, such as in some swampareas, will one or a few species dominate. Ferns canalso be members of the epiphyte community. The vast majority of species are woody (see Xylem). n secrete the salt through their leaves. To understand them, the circulation of the upperatmosphere, or stratosphere, must be considered, as well as that of the loweratmosphere, or troposphere, where weather takes place. Steady northeast trade winds blow in the northern hemisphere, andsoutheast trade winds in the southern hemisphere. Itplays statistically significant roles in many physiological processes, from conceptionand growth to health and disease. II CLIMATIC ZONES Climates are described by agreed-upon codes or by descriptive terms that aresomewhat loosely defined but nevertheless useful. Roughly between 80 and 200woody species can be found in 1 hectare (about 2. The largest tropical rain forests are located in the Amazon Basin in SouthAmerica; in southern Asia, including the large archipelagoes; and in the Congo Basinin Africa. Tropical rain forests contain most of the planet’s biodiversity, and there areprobably still millions of insect species, as well as many plant species, that have notbeen described scientifically.
Common topics in this essay:
Xylem Roughly,
Rain Forest,
ZONES Climates,
,
North South,
Africa Tropical,
rain forests,
desert plants,
South America,
tropical rain,
tropical rain forests,
rain forest,
upper canopy,
winds tend,
trade winds,
moist air,
northern hemisphere,
climate long-term,
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Acceptance Essays
