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Biomes
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Biomes are ecosystems where several habitats intersect. The Earth itself is one large biome. Smaller biomes include [D]esert, tundra, grasslands, and rainforest. Six Virtual Biomes Ecosystems, Biomes, and Watersheds: A Definition World Biomes The Great Basin Ecosystem The High Plains: Land of Extremes Virtual Rainforest Night Creatures of The Kalahari EcoQuest: Desert Edition Shades of Green: Earth's Forests Edens The African Great Lakes Region Animal Habitats
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Biomes are the major regional groupings of plants and animals discernible at a global scale. Their distribution patterns are strongly correlated with regional climate patterns and identified according to the climax vegetation type. However, a biome is composed not only of the climax vegetation, but ... of associated successional communities, persistent subclimax communities, fauna, and soils.
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Biomes represent the most superficial classification of the ecosystems of the world and cover large geographical areas. Ecologists and naturalists have long noted that geographical regions with similar climate tend to have similar appearing plants and animals. For example regions with long, dry periods with little, or sporadic, rainfall are populated by animals adapted to these dry conditions. The plants tend to be tough, woody shrubs or succulents (such as cacti). Some plants are adapted to flower and set seed during the rare periods of rainfall in the spring. The ground is sparsely vegetated and often the plants are widely separated.
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Biomes are characterized by climate, by typical vegetation, and by the way organisms have adapted to that environment. Biomes are not permanent. Grasslands can be transformed into deserts; forests can be converted into grasslands. Climate change at the end of the last Ice Age dramatically altered the biomes of North America because of natural changes in climate and the movements of land masses. Since the Industrial Revolution, human activity has become an increasingly important factor in alteration of biomes.
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Biomes occur naturally, but people can ... create controlled biomes. For example, you can integrate several small populations in a small space and observe what happens. A famous manmade biome is Biosphere 2. Try making your own biome and observing what happens. Biomes in a Box Biosphere 2
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Biomes support the same types of organisms no matter where they are located on the planet. These organisms often have different genetic lineages and are similar only in that they have adapted to similar conditions.
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Biomes