THE SAVANNA OR SUDAN CLIMATE

1. Natural vegetation

• The savanna landscape is typified by tall grass and short trees. The terms parkland or bush-veld perhaps describe the landscape better.
• The trees grow in equatorial humid latitudes or along rivers' banks but decrease in height and density away from the equator.
• The trees are delicious, shedding their leaves in the cool, dry season to prevent water loss.
• Baobabs and bottle trees are water-storing devices even though they survive droughts. Many trees are umbrellas shaped exposing the narrow edge to the strong winds.
• The grass is tall and coarse growing 6 – 12 feet high. The elephant grass may attain 15 feet in height. Tufts grass has long roots which reach down to search for water.
• The grass lies dormant throughout the long rainless period and springs up in the next rainy season. As the rainfall diminishes towards the desert the savanna merges into thorny scrub.
• In Australia, this scrubland is well represented by several species such as mallee, mulga, spiniflex grass and other bushes.

2. Animal life of the Savanna

• The savanna in Africa is the home of wild animals. It is known as a big game country because of the vast hunting of animals all over the world.
• Animals are cracked down for their skin, tusks, horns, bone or air. Some were captured alive for zoo and laboratory specimens or pets.
• The leaf and grass-eating animals include zebra, antelope, deer, giraffe, elephants, gazelle and okapi etc. are well camouflaged species.
• Lion, leopard, tiger, hyena, panther, jaguar, jackal, lynx and puma are carnivorous animals of the savanna.
• Along the rivers of the marshy lakes are numerous species of reptiles and mammals including crocodiles, alligators, monitors and giant lizards together with larger rhinoceros and hippopotamus.
• In many parts of the east and South Africa national parks have been set up. In Kenya, there are large towers and viewing points built in the heart of the savanna.

3. Human life in Savanna

• In the East African plateau, the Masai tribe lived as cattle pastoralists. They are confined to 15,000 square miles of reserve in Kenya and Tanzania.
• Their land is taken over by the immigrant white settlers for coffee, tea cotton plantation and dairy farming.
• Whenever there is drought the Masai moves towards the upward and cooler plateau for cattle grazing. They build circular huts with sticks, bushes and mud for temporary shelter. 
• In northern Nigeria, Hausa are the settled cultivators. They are almost six million and doing agriculture for hundreds of years. Kano is the ancient city of Hausa.
• They cultivated cotton and tobacco. They rotate the crops between different fields at different years. They domesticate animals for milk and meat. Animal manure is used as fertilizer in the fields.

4. Problems prospects and development of the savanna

• World population pressure and the need for greater food production will necessitate greater economic development of the savanna.
• The deserts or the freezing tundra form climatic barriers too formidable for large-scale human intervention to take place.
• But the savanna land with an annual rainfall of over 30 inches.
• Pioneer settlements in central Africa, northern Australia and eastern Brazil have immense agricultural potential for plantation agriculture of cotton, cane sugar, coffee, oil palm, groundnuts and even tropical fruits.
• Tropical Queensland, despite its scarcity of labour force has been very successful in its attempts to develop its huge empty land.
• The newly independent states of Kenya, Uganda, Tanzania and Malawi have already taken to large-scale production of cotton and sisal hemp.
• Both crops thrive well in savanna conditions. In West Africa, the commercial cultivation of groundnuts, oil palm and cocoa has been gradually extended into the savanna lands.
• New drought-resistant varieties will have to be introduced into these newly emergent countries to increase their foreign earnings in such tropical raw materials. 
• Droughts may be long and trying, as rainfall is often unreliable.
• Adequate provision for irrigation, improved crop varieties and scientific farming techniques suitable for the tropical grasslands, crop failures can be disastrous for the people.
• The Sudan Climate, with distinct wet-and-dry periods is also responsible for the rapid deterioration of soil fertility.
• Torrential downpours of heavy rain cause leaching resulting in plant nutrients such as nitrates; phosphates and potash are dissolved and washed away.
• During the dry season, intense heating and evaporation dry up most of the water.
• Many savanna areas, therefore, have poor lateritic soils which are incapable of supporting good crops.
• Unless the soil is properly conserved through regular manuring, weeding and careful maintenance, crop yields are bound to decline.
• It seems necessary to introduce temperate cattle such as the English Shorthorn, Friesian or Guernsey to cross with the tropical zebu if cattle rearing is to be successful in the savanna.
• In tropical Queensland which has become Australia’s largest cattle producing state.
• The quality of the grass needs to be improved and a better network of communications is essential.
• All cattle breeding and disease control must be carried out on a scientific basis.
• In the African savanna, the attitude of such native herdsmen as the Masai who treat cattle as prestige animals, not for slaughtering, will pose many difficulties towards the commercialization of the cattle industry. But as an agricultural region, the savanna holds great promise for the future.