Question

How many biomes are there?

Answer 1

Hint: Biomes are large communities of plants and animals that share some common features to adapt to the environment they exist in. In a biome, all inhabitants have to adapt to the same type of conditions for their survival.

Complete answer: Biome is a large community of wildlife and vegetation all adapted to a special climate. All share some common characteristics for the environment they live in. Biomes are found over a range of continents. These are distinct biological communities that have formed in response to a shared climate. It is a broader term than habitat. There can be a variety of habitats in a biome.
A biome is named for the dominant type of vegetation. On this basis, there can be broadly five types of biomes. These are aquatic, grassland, forest, desert and tundra. These can be further divided into marine, freshwater, savanna, tropical rainforest, temperate rainforest, taiga etc.

A forest is a biome dominated by trees. It covers about one third of the Earth and contains much of the world’s terrestrial biodiversity, including insects, birds and mammals. It is further divided into three major biomes. These include tropical forests, temperate forest and the taiga. These are divided on the basis of their latitudes and therefore experience different types of climate. The tropical forests are near equator in torrid zones and are dense, hot and humid. The temperate forests are on higher latitude in temperate zones and experience all four seasons. The taiga, also known as boreal forest, are found at even higher latitude and are coldest and driest. The precipitation most of the time occurs in the form of snow.
Grasslands are open regions dominated by grass. They have warm and dry climates. They are further divided into temperate and tropical grasslands. Tropical grasslands, also known as savannas, are found close to the equator. They have few scattered trees. Temperate grasslands are found further away from the equator and do not have any trees or shrubs. Unlike the savanna, they receive less precipitation. For example prairies and Steppes.
Dessert are dry places where trees are absent. They received very little rainfall, less than 50cm per year. Deserts are extremely hot during the day and extremely cold during night. There is not much biodiversity in deserts due to extreme conditions. Wildlife and vegetation existing there have special characteristics to adapt to the dry and harsh atmosphere of deserta.
Aquatic biomes are both freshwater and marine biomes. Freshwater biomes are inland water bodies i.e, surrounded by land. These include ponds, rivers, lakes etc. Whereas marine water includes ocean, coral reefs and estuaries.
A tundra is measured with the lowest temperature of all five biomes. The conditions are extreme and inhospitable. The precipitation is very low with poor quality soil nutrients and short summers. It is further divided into arctic tundra and alpine tundra. The arctic tundra is above taiga and the alpine tundra is on mountains where the altitude is too high for trees to survive. There is not much biodiversity and vegetation in the tundra region due to frozen layers under the soil surface, known as permafrost. Only simple vegetations like shrubs, grasses, mosses and lichens are found there.
Thus, a biome is a major life zone.

Note: The biomes can also be further divided depending on their different characteristics. For example, the temperate forest which falls under forest biome can also be further divided into temperate evergreen forests and temperate deciduous forest. Temperate evergreen forests remain green throughout the year because all the trees do not shed their leaves at the same time. Whereas, in temperate deciduous forests, trees shed their leaves at the same time..