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Temperate Grassland
Temperate grasslands are typically classified as areas without trees and with precipitation totals ranging between 20 and 35 inches per year. Typically, winters are cold, and summers are hot. Temperate grasslands exist in the central United States and Canada, central Asia and western South America. Do not confuse grasslands with savannahs. Savannahs, such as those that exist in central Africa, are similar to grasslands, but they have isolated trees, a feature that does not exist in a true grassland.
Grassland Life
The most common grassland life form is grass, of course, but in reality, life in a grassland is extremely diverse. Some common North American grasses in grasslands include Indian grass, butterflyweed and coneflowers. Other flowering plants, such as various species of milkweeds, ironweed and dogbane, regularly grow in grasslands. However, they do not form the dominant plant life. In addition, a number of large and small animal species call grasslands their home. Common grassland dwellers include the red milkweed beetle, bison and Przewalski's horse, a wild horse most often seen on the steppes of Asia.
Grassland Conversion
One of the most prevalent threats to grassland is land conversion. To date, much of the world's grasslands has been destroyed by land conversion. Most often, grasslands are converted to farms or grazing land and urban areas. Grasslands are favorable for agriculture and grazing because they are flat, generally featureless, and have rich soil already covered with grass. If grasslands are inappropriately converted, desertification can occur. Luckily, techniques such as crop rotation, a method which lets fields rest after harvest, have been developed and utilized and have greatly reduced desertification rates.
Global Warming
Like grassland conversion, the second threat to grasslands, global warming, is an anthropogenic threat. Scientists who believe in the threat of global warming insist that rising temperatures will lead to increased global evaporation rates. The drastic increases in evaporation rates will lead to local drought and desertification. Also, with larger concentrations of water in the atmosphere, large downpours are possible across the world. Natural disasters such as large-scale soil erosion and flooding will occur with these downpours and have the potential to destroy large plots of grasslands.