C.+Buchanan

My family is awesome! I love to play football,basketball and baseball. I have no pets at this time.I am getting dogs soon! I go to school at ridgewood middle school in the 7th grade,some classes are cool like social studies and science and sometimes math and def. gym. My favorite colors are orange and black and maze and gold. I have no idea about my favorite foods. I love to hang out with friends and family. I am best friends with Troy and Evan jones which are brothers. I hang with them alot

 >Male mountain lions can weigh anwhere from 125 to 160 and females weigh from 80 to 100 pounds.They have no specific breeding season but in the united states ,they usually breed from later fall or early winter.The mountain lion can run approximately 35 miles for hour for short distances.

**The Kingsnake**The Kingsnake gets its name from its habit of eating other snakes, and is most famous for eating rattlesnakes, copperheads and coral snakes. But it also feeds on other snakes, lizards, birds and their eggs, small mammals, turtles and frogs.

A food chain constitutes a complex network of organisms, from plants to animals, through which energy, derived from the sun, flows in the form of organic matter and dissipates in the form of waste heat.
 * [[image:http://www.desertusa.com/video_pages/v_images/foodchain2.jpg width="118" height="88" align="left" caption="The Desert Food Chain" link="http://desertusa.com/video_pages/food_movie.html"]]The Desert Food Chain**

A tall desert-dwelling creature, the camel has become an icon of the Asian and African deserts. Generally the camel is a pleasant animal. If well treated, the domestic camel is very docile and easy to manage. If ill-treated, they can become very stubborn. Camels can easily be identified by the unique one or two humps on their back and their long necks.The Camel can go weeks with out drinking and also drink alot if available.

As a domestic animal, the camel is used for milk, food and transportation. Camels can carry up to 200 lbs on their back for distances in the heat. Their dung is so dry that it can be used to fuel fires.

There are a number of different sounds that the camel can make. Grumpling, bellowing and grunting sounds are common. They also can bleat like a goat or lamb. They also make a loud roaring noise.

Physical Characteristics

 * Long eyelashes
 * Large dark eyes
 * Protruding eye ridge bone and thick eyebrows
 * Third eye lid to protect eyes from sand
 * Short rounded ears, lined with thick fur
 * Long curved neck
 * Deep, narrow chest
 * Four long legs
 * Wide feet with two toes and hoof on the front
 * One or two humps on back approx. 30" high
 * Hump is about 30 inches tall
 * Light brown or beige fur
 * Tail around 20" long
 * Height: 6' at shoulder, 7' at hump
 * Weight: 500 to 1500 lbs
 * Body length: approx. 10'

DESERT FOOD CHAIN! MOUNTAIN LION MULE DEER PLANTS

When running, a camel can reach a speed up to 40 mph in short bursts, 25 mph for longer periods of time. Camels do not have hooves. The foot of a camel is made up of a large leathery pad, with two toes at the front, the bones of which are embedded in the foot. The padding makes the gait of a camel silent, and keeps it from sinking in the sand. The camel also has pads of thick leathery skin, on its leg joints, enabling it to kneel or lay in the hot sand. Similar to giraffes, camels move both legs together on each side of their body to walk.

The habitat for this flower is Open, sandy desert washes and plains below 7,000 feet.

The description of this poisenous flower is that the member of the Sunflower Family grows 6 to 14 inches high with 3 to 5 inch leaves, which divide into thread like lobes. Fruit is seed-like and topped with soft bristles. In springs following wet winters, this bright wildflower will form broad, brilliant patches of gold across the sandy desert floor.

DESERT CLIMATE

> > > PLANTS > > >
 * These desert climates are found in low-latitude deserts approximately between 18° to 28° in both hemispheres. these latitude belts are centered on the tropics of Cancer and Capricorn, which lie just north and south of the equator.
 * They coincide with the edge of the equatorial subtropical high pressure belt and trade winds. Winds are light, which allows for the evaporation of moisture in the intense heat.
 * They generally flow downward so the area is seldom penetrated by air masses that produce rain.
 * This makes for a very dry heat. The dry arid desert is a true desert climate, and covers 12 % of the Earth's land surface.
 * The desert is the hottest biome on earth. However, the desert is also a land of extremes. It can be over 100 degrees Fahrenheit during the day but below 32 degrees at night. This change is because deserts are bare. There is little protection to keep them from heating up in the sun and cooling off when the sun disappears at night.
 * The amount of rainfall also varies. Though there is little rain in a desert, and when it does rain, it pours. Violent rainstorms can cause flash floods in the desert. After a storm, the desert may not see any rain for weeks or months.
 * One way desert plants, trees, and shrubs suck up as much water as possible is by growing very deep taproots.
 * Sometimes these roots can get to be more than 100 feet long.
 * The above ground plant parts may remain small for years simply because the plant puts most of its energy into developing its taproot system.
 * The roots can be as long as the plant is tall, and can quickly absorb water from the slightest rainfall.

**How Do Plants Survive the Desert?** -- Desert plants have adapted to the extremes of heat and aridity by using both physical and behavioral mechanisms, much like desert animals. The ingenuity and variety of these many adaptations are explored in Desert Plant Survival and the Desert Food.

ANIMALS
 * Certain species of birds, such as the Phainopepla, a slim, glossy, black bird with a slender crest, breed during the relatively cool spring, then leave the desert for cooler areas at higher elevations or along the Pacific coast.


 * The Costa's Hummingbird, a purple-crowned and purple-throated desert species, begins breeding in late winter, then leaves in late spring when temperatures become extreme.
 * Many birds are active primarily at dawn and within a few hours of sunset, retiring to a cool, shady spot for the remainder of the day. Some birds, such as the kingbird, continue activity throughout the day, but always perch in the shadows.
 * For this reason, humans seldom encounter rattlesnakes and Gila Monsters.

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 * Many animals are completely nocturnal, restricting all their activities to the cooler temperatures of the night
 * Bats, many snakes, most rodents and some larger mammals like foxes and skunks, are nocturnal, sleeping in a cool den, cave or burrow by day.Lack of water creates a survival problem for all desert organisms, animals and plants alike.

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 * But animals have an additional problem -- they are more susceptible to extremes of temperature than are plants. Animals receive heat directly by radiation from the sun, and indirectly, by conduction from the substrate (rocks and The desert can be very hot and very cold but what is amazing is the animals that live in this biome.
 * What is special about the Camel is that it can go weeks with out water but if water is available,it will drink alot. The camel survives by its humps. Because of the camels hump,it carries water.The desert dandelion's habitat is in open sandy deserts.