Friday, December 5, 2014

By Claudine Hodges


For the botanist, a lawn is a plant formation consisting of herbaceous species of low height (barely exceeding 20-30 cm in height), mainly grasses, such as grasslands. Leaving the ground bare in places, it can sprinkled with rare small shrubs. They host a rich biodiversity and are home to many different plants, sometimes endemic or rare (lawn service Florida Keys).

Lawns from an extensive pastoralism (meadows) are threatened mainly because of agricultural abandonment. They are part of "dry" lawns or "xeric" (the soil is very draining). They are self-sustained by the low capacity of soil to retain water from rainfall thus helping to maintain farmed and wild herbivores. This type of grass is extremely flowery and some plants in tourist areas are specifically protected.

Grasses (Poaceae) are a family of herbaceous plants, or very rarely woody variants, belonging to order Poales of monocots. With more than 820 genera and about 12,100 species described, grasses are the fourth family with highest species richness after composite, orchids and legumes; but it is definitely the first in economic importance global.

Most of these lawns exist naturally in presence of large wild herbivores. The aerohalines lawns are in immediate vicinity of sea, under the influence of wind and spray, even at high summer drought just above the rocks of foreshore or cliffs. Oligotrophic lawns located between 2,500 meters and about 3000 meters altitude in mountains. They tend to rise in sea level with global warming, as well as the forest floor above which they flourish.

This unmatched adaptability is supported by a huge morphological, physiological and reproductive diversity and several mutualistic partnerships with other agencies, converting grass into a fascinating family, not only for its economic importance, but also for its biological relevance.

Limbo (or sheet) is simple, usually linear, with parallel venation. Can flattened or sometimes rolled into a tube, may be continuous with the sheath or possess petiole. In addition to this description, it is necessary to address the variability that can found for each of these bodies: Profilo: the first sheet of each innovation is generally reduced to a membranous sheath, with two conspicuous fairings, without ligule or film which protects innovation. Pod: pod born into a knot and surrounds the rod and can shorter or longer than the internode. Often the sheath is split to base, although their edges overlap wrapping around the rod.

Their role was crucial to human activity as they allowed to feed livestock, especially sheep and goats. Other lawns of this type are born from the recent abandonment of vineyards. In this case, if man is not involved in their management, these environments naturally evolve into a forest stage through ecological succession. Many lawns have disappeared (overgrown, woody) abandoned for lack of profitability in early twentieth century. Since that time, 50 to 75% dry grasslands were perdues

Lawns are habitats in some areas have declined greatly. Many of these grasslands have been destroyed or fragmented eutrophic, by urbanization, overgrazing, intensive agriculture (large scale cultivation of legumes, cereals, leys, herbicides), agricultural abandonment when the zone and lack of shepherds, all-terrain vehicles (motorcycles, quads), tourist and leisure activities, military exercises, etc. For example, for Western Europe, "about 80 to 90% of dry grasslands still present at the end of nineteenth century have disappeared from, while - as of other oligotrophic also declining areas (ponds, bogs acids, acid moorland ...) they hosted a substantial part of biodiversity (still as an example, "the 40 species of Orthoptera present in Nord-Pas-region -Calais, 15 may be considered subservient to dry grassland. "




About the Author:



0 Comments:

Post a Comment