prairie

Examples of prairie in the following topics:

• Temperate Grasslands

  • Temperate grasslands are found throughout central North America, where they are also known as prairies, and within Eurasia, where they are known as steppes .
  • The dominant vegetation tends to consist of grasses; some prairies sustain populations of grazing animals .
  • The American bison (Bison bison), more commonly called the buffalo, is a grazing mammal that once populated American prairies in huge numbers.

• Types of Biodiversity

  • An example of a largely-extinct ecosystem in North America is the prairie ecosystem.
  • Prairies once spanned central North America from the boreal forest in northern Canada down into Mexico.
  • The variety of ecosystems on earth, from (a) coral reef to (b) prairie, enables a great diversity of species to exist.

• Dust Bowl Migrants

  • The Dust Bowl was a period of severe dust storms causing major ecological and agricultural damage to American prairie lands in the 1930s.
  • The Dust Bowl, also known as the Dirty Thirties, was a period of severe dust storms causing major ecological and agricultural damage to American prairie lands in the 1930s, particularly in 1934 and 1936.

• Simple Learned Behaviors

  • Prairie dogs typically sound an alarm call when threatened by a predator, but they become habituated to the sound of human footsteps when no harm is associated with this sound; therefore, they no longer respond to them with an alarm call.

• Mill Towns and Company Towns

  • "In the nineteenth century, saws and axes made in New England cleared the forests of Ohio; New England ploughs broke the prairie sod, New England scales weighed wheat and meat in Texas; New England serge clothed businessmen in San Francisco; New England cutlery skinned hides to be tanned in Milwaukee and sliced apples to be dried in Missouri; New England whale oil lit lamps across the continent; New England blankets warmed children by night and New England textbooks preached at them by day; New England guns armed the troops; and New England dies, lathes, looms, forges, presses and screwdrivers outfitted factories far and wide. " - Jane Jacobs, The Economy of Cities, 1969

• The Fossil Record and the Evolution of the Modern Horse

  • The series of fossils tracks the change in anatomy resulting from a gradual drying trend that changed the landscape from a forested habitat to a prairie habitat.
  • One of the trends, depicted here, is the evolutionary tracking of a drying climate and increase in prairie versus forest habitat reflected in forms that are more adapted to grazing and predator escape through running.

• The End of the Open Range

  • The prairie and desert lands of what is today Mexico and the western United States, were well-suited to "open range" grazing.
  • Unlike the eastern United States, the western prairies of the 19th century were vast, undeveloped, and uncultivated, with scarce, widely separated sources of water.

• Literature and the Depression

  • and As I Lay Dying, Margaret Mitchell's Gone with the Wind, Daphne du Maurier's Jamaica Inn, the first issue of Life magazine, Laura Ingalls Wilder's Little House on the Prairie, F.

• The Migratory Stream

  • After the Civil War, many people from the East Coast and Europe were lured west by reports from relatives and by extensive advertising campaigns promising "the Best Prairie Lands," "Low Prices," "Large Discounts For Cash," and "Better Terms Than Ever!

• Chicago School of Architecture

  • Frank Lloyd Wright started in the firm of Adler and Sullivan but created his own Prairie Style of architecture.