Download - catie shaw and simon murphy
![Page 1: catie shaw and simon murphy](https://reader036.vdocuments.site/reader036/viewer/2022062400/568c3bd31a28ab0235ab966d/html5/thumbnails/1.jpg)
Desert Biomes
By:Catie Shaw
&Simon Murphy
![Page 2: catie shaw and simon murphy](https://reader036.vdocuments.site/reader036/viewer/2022062400/568c3bd31a28ab0235ab966d/html5/thumbnails/2.jpg)
The Desert biomes receive less than 25 centimeters of precipitation annually, and are always characterized by a very dry, or
arid climate.The four types of deserts:
• Hot
• Semiarid
• Coastal
• Cold
![Page 3: catie shaw and simon murphy](https://reader036.vdocuments.site/reader036/viewer/2022062400/568c3bd31a28ab0235ab966d/html5/thumbnails/3.jpg)
Food Web
![Page 4: catie shaw and simon murphy](https://reader036.vdocuments.site/reader036/viewer/2022062400/568c3bd31a28ab0235ab966d/html5/thumbnails/4.jpg)
Poisonous Desert Animals
The Gila Monster is one of the only poisonous lizards in the world.
The Western Diamondback rattlesnake is a viper. Vipers have a pair of long hollow fangs in the upper jaw. Their poison is
sent out through the two teeth.
The most venomous desert scorpion is the bark scorpion
which is about two inches long and a translucent, light brown
color.
![Page 5: catie shaw and simon murphy](https://reader036.vdocuments.site/reader036/viewer/2022062400/568c3bd31a28ab0235ab966d/html5/thumbnails/5.jpg)
Biodiversity of a Desert
Long-eared Hedgehog,
China
Coyote, US and Mexico
Armadillo, South America and Argentina
Llama, Peru Chile Penguin, Antarctica
![Page 6: catie shaw and simon murphy](https://reader036.vdocuments.site/reader036/viewer/2022062400/568c3bd31a28ab0235ab966d/html5/thumbnails/6.jpg)
Human Activities Harm Deserts• Mining - not only do the mining operations themselves disturb the desert habitat and
plants and animals that live there, the roads built to get needed equipment into the mines also destroy the desert. Uranium mining creates a host of radioactive hazards.
• Tourism - as the people who love this wonderful planet we live on, sometimes in our stampede to experience all the wonders of nature, we can "love it to death".
• Farming - as the population on our planet continues to increase at an alarming rate (estimated at 6 billion by October 1999), the demand for more agricultural products, needed to feed these billions of people, will also increase. With modern technology, it is becoming increasingly easier to turn dry, arid desert habitat into productive farmland. Unfortunately, these lands are over cultivated and soon fall victim to desertification.
• Ranching - overgrazing is one of the major threats to the desert habitat. Mismanagement and overuse of land is putting severe pressure on desert habitat areas.
• Drilling operations - oil drilling operations in desert habitat areas alter the ecology of the desert. The high level of oil product usage in the world is destroying desert habitat. Pollution, produced by car exhaust, increases global warming, which, in turn, changes weather patterns. These changes result in climatic alterations that can shift the fragile balance needed to maintain the dry, arid conditions of the desert.
![Page 7: catie shaw and simon murphy](https://reader036.vdocuments.site/reader036/viewer/2022062400/568c3bd31a28ab0235ab966d/html5/thumbnails/7.jpg)
Places with Desert Biomes•Australia
•Northern Africa (Egypt, Niger, Libya, Sudan, Tunisia, etc)
•Chile
•The Middle East (especially Saudi Arabia, Yemen, Iraq, Kuwait and UAE)
•Mexico
•South Africa
•Namibia
•Somalia
•Central Asia (Afghanistan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, etc)
![Page 8: catie shaw and simon murphy](https://reader036.vdocuments.site/reader036/viewer/2022062400/568c3bd31a28ab0235ab966d/html5/thumbnails/8.jpg)
Types of Pollution• Deserts are being used as dump sites for nuclear
waste and as nuclear testing grounds. Recently, a site was opened in the desert of New Mexico to be used for the storage of nuclear waste. On July 6, 1962 a 100-kiloton nuclear bomb was exploded in the Nevada desert displacing about 12 million tons of earth. The crater is 320 feet deep and 1,200 feet across. The site in the Great Victoria Desert of Australia where nuclear tests were done in the 1950’s and 1960’s is still heavily contaminated with radioactivity. Deserts are remote, which is why many have been used for nuclear weapons research.
![Page 9: catie shaw and simon murphy](https://reader036.vdocuments.site/reader036/viewer/2022062400/568c3bd31a28ab0235ab966d/html5/thumbnails/9.jpg)
Natural Disasters in the Desert
Rain does fall occasionally in deserts, and desert storms are often violent. A record 44 millimeters (1.7 in) of rain once fell
within 3 hours in the Sahara. Large Saharan storms may deliver up to 1 millimeter per minute. Normally dry
stream channels, called arroyos or wadis, can quickly fill after heavy rains, and flash
floods make these channels dangerous.
![Page 10: catie shaw and simon murphy](https://reader036.vdocuments.site/reader036/viewer/2022062400/568c3bd31a28ab0235ab966d/html5/thumbnails/10.jpg)
Endangered Desert Species
Gila Monster
Ocelot
Kangaroo RatDesert Tortoise
![Page 11: catie shaw and simon murphy](https://reader036.vdocuments.site/reader036/viewer/2022062400/568c3bd31a28ab0235ab966d/html5/thumbnails/11.jpg)
Climate
• Average Annual Temperature- 64 degrees F• Average precipitation- 1 inch• Five seasons- Fall, Winter, Spring,
Foresummer, Summer Monsoon
![Page 12: catie shaw and simon murphy](https://reader036.vdocuments.site/reader036/viewer/2022062400/568c3bd31a28ab0235ab966d/html5/thumbnails/12.jpg)
Seasons• Fall- September to November, plants start to
dry and die.• Winter- December to January, mild
temperatures.• Spring- February to April, wildflowers start
to appear.• Foresummer- May to June, hottest, driest
part of the year.• Summer Monsoon- July to August, windy,
some precipitation.
![Page 13: catie shaw and simon murphy](https://reader036.vdocuments.site/reader036/viewer/2022062400/568c3bd31a28ab0235ab966d/html5/thumbnails/13.jpg)
Climate
• Average Annual Temperature- 64 degrees F• Average precipitation- 1 inch• Five seasons- Fall, Winter, Spring,
Foresummer, Summer Monsoon• Mostly located around places that spend
most of the year in the sun.
![Page 14: catie shaw and simon murphy](https://reader036.vdocuments.site/reader036/viewer/2022062400/568c3bd31a28ab0235ab966d/html5/thumbnails/14.jpg)
Climate (cont.)
• Droughts are major problems due to low precipitation
• Large amounts of wind during Summer Monsoons in late summer.
![Page 15: catie shaw and simon murphy](https://reader036.vdocuments.site/reader036/viewer/2022062400/568c3bd31a28ab0235ab966d/html5/thumbnails/15.jpg)
Geology
• Alluvial fans, when sediment spills into a fan shaped pile, are unique characteristics of deserts.
• Blowouts are common in deserts, where the wind will blow a depression into the ground.
• Strange rock columns, also know as hoodoo, are common sights in the desert.
• The border of the Mojave Desert is defined by the San Andreas Fault Line.
![Page 16: catie shaw and simon murphy](https://reader036.vdocuments.site/reader036/viewer/2022062400/568c3bd31a28ab0235ab966d/html5/thumbnails/16.jpg)
Sources• http://library.thinkquest.org/5788/• http://rmhs.dist214.k12.il.us/classes/
lepbilscience/biome.html• http://www.worldbiomes.com/• http://www.enchantedlearning.com/biomes/ • http://inchinapinch.com/hab_pgs/terres/
desert/desert.htm
![Page 17: catie shaw and simon murphy](https://reader036.vdocuments.site/reader036/viewer/2022062400/568c3bd31a28ab0235ab966d/html5/thumbnails/17.jpg)
Sources (cont.)
• http://www.blueplanetbiomes.org/desert_climate_page.htm
• http://www.scenicdrive.org/pp0202seasons.htm
• http://www.desertusa.com/mag99/sep/papr/desfeatures.html