What makes the african savanna unique

They regenerate the soil by recycling nutrients , especially those stored in dead vegetation. Most African savanna wildfires are caused by lightning strikes. Torrential wet season storms are defined by dramatic lightning. Dry season wild fires cause more damage. These can also be caused by lightning strikes. Unfortunately, people also start fires to regenerate soil.

When human communities and agricultural areas encroach on wild savannah there is a chance for fires to spread from farmland to wilderness.

People also regenerate land with fires. During the dry season these fires can grow out of control and impact the wilderness. So while wildfire is essential to regulating any savannah, too much fire is not a good thing. Savannahs can be found on every continent except for Antarctica. But the biggest and wildest are found at the heart of all evolution, in Africa. But for June to August there is less than 30 mm. The South Africa Kruger regularly goes three months without any rain, from June to August, but averages 90 mm a month from December to February.

Firstly, Africa has preserved its savannas. In America an epic grassland savannah became agricultural land in less than one century. In Australia the trees were cleared for livestock and crops. Africa is the continent where you can still find unexplored wilderness.

Local tribes and communities have lived in harmony with nature. So instead of chopping down the savannah for farmland, they have conserved a natural space. Preserve the space and you preserve a place where wildlife can thrive. Nowhere else in the world has more wildlife than the African savannah. Nowhere other than Africa has such an astonishing variety of life.

Browsers feed from high-growing vegetation, such as giraffe picking leaves from the highest branches and black rhinos hooking their upper lip into trees. This article on African animals can give you more detailed information on the different species found across the continent. You can also follow links to discover fascinating stories and facts about African wildlife. Did you know that elephants can eat over kg of food every single day? They are the archetypal savannah animal because they consume both grass and trees.

African elephants chomp through all the high grass and bash their way into trees to eat bark, twigs and foliage.

Cape buffalo and white rhinos are grazers. Giraffe are browsers. Their diets are completely different yet they can all coexist on the African savannah. These animals are usually found in and around the trees, near their food. Hippos are grazers. They rarely venture into the trees, preferring a daytime of watery wallowing and a nighttime of feeding on lush grass.

Their existence relies on space. A large African savannah wilderness can provide home to tens of thousands of elephants, hippos, giraffe and buffalo. But in some savannahs you can only encounter a handful of these giants. Some African savannahs are home to over different mammal species. Most are home to at least The cheapest private game reserves may only have 20 different species, while the Kruger or Chobe savannah is home to more than Many of the grazers travel in herds and are continually on the move to fresher pastures.

They move with the rains, with the best example of this being the great wildebeest migration. They are a quintessential African savanna resident because they can graze and browse. Many antelope choose to graze on big open spaces, far from tree cover, as usually the fringes between trees and grass are the most dangerous. Some use camouflage. For example, zebra stripes prevent lions from identifying an individual target in the dark.

Springbok are the same gold-brown colour as the dry season grass. Others rely on their speed and agility. Animals like the tiny dik-dik prefer to hide. Many savanna species work together and alert each other of danger. Almost all primates live in trees. Think of a monkey or macaque and you immediately think of a rainforest or jungle. Humans may have chopped down and destroyed most of their forest home on Earth, but humans still have special adaptations for climbing trees.

Gorillas are more terrestrial than monkeys yet they still live among the trees. The African savanna has trees and these support an incredible array of primates, from colobus monkeys to baboons. Savannas typically get very little rain — about 4 inches mm of rain — in the dry season, and they will often not get any rainfall at all for many months. However, the wet season gets lots of rain.

This allows the grasses to grow thick and lush, creating a habitat where many different animals and birds can live. Savannas are found on all continents except Antarctica. Click for more detail. If you wanted to visit a savanna, where would you go? Because of their warm climate requirements, savannas tend to be found closer to the equator, which marks the halfway point between the north and south hemispheres of the earth.

The most famous savannas are those of Africa because they are full of wildlife that people want to learn about, like lions and elephants. Nearly half of Africa is covered with savannas. But savannas can also be found in South America, Asia and even Australia. However, the diversity of plants and animals are not quite as high in other regions as in the African savannas.

In many areas, cattle are allowed to graze in the savanna. Image by Marco Schmidt. Thus, animals and plants must be able to adapt to the long dry seasons. Animals can do this by migrating, but plants must have other adaptations that allow them to survive long periods without water and the threat of fire, such as water storage organs and long roots.

Plants and animals that live in the savannas must also learn to survive living with humans. While tourism has been a big help to preserve savannas, humans have also caused a lot of harm.

As the climate gets warmer, scientists worry that savannas may get even less rain and more heat, reducing the number of plants and animals that can survive.

In addition, many farmers bring their animals, such as cows and goats, to the savannas to graze on the plants. This can lead to over-grazing. With less vegetation, savannas can easily become deserts, creating new challenges for the plants and animals living there. She is an urban ecologist, biology professor, and science writer. Melinda Weaver.

Searching the Savanna. Biome Map Worksheet. Plants may also store water, for example the baobab tree or have long roots that reach down to the water table. Animals may migrate great distances in search of food and water. The graph below shows average monthly temperatures and rainfall levels in the savanna region of Mali.

Notice how the temperature and rainfall patterns relate to each other - the hottest temperatures come just before heavy rainfall, and the coolest time of the year comes just after the rains. This pattern is typical of savanna climates.