Small pale flowers appear on the tree in April and dark green fruits appear on September.
With such a harsh environment its hard to believe that there are inhabitants of animals, well
I tell you that there are many animals that live in this desert. First off, we have the Jerboa. It is a
small rodent that have features that are relatively the same as a kangaroo, with strong hind legs
and a long tail to keep balance of walking, the only difference would be the huge ears and having
no pouch. With such powerful hind legs the jerboa is allowed to leap up to 10 feet far and jump
6 to 7 feet high. The food that the jerboa eats doesn’t make the rodent thirst, it might not need
to drink water throughout its entire life, this is a stunning fact. The jerboa has a predator, called
the golden eagle, the Mongolians have trained these eagles to prey on the jerboas in hopes of
protecting livestock, then return to their owner.
The gobi bear (also known as the Mazaalai) is also a pretty big topic of the Gobi as it is one of
the most endangered species in the world. It is similar to most bears in the world, has fur, small
ears, paws… Pretty much could pass as a brown bear. The government of Mongolia has been
trying to protect this bear as there are only 23 left in the wild 8 female and 14 male by 2013.
Have you ever played an iPhone game called the ‘Death Worm’? Well, I think they based it
off something real. In the southern parts of the gobi, there have been reports on the sight of these
two meter long creatures. The Mongol Prime Minster in 1922 described the worm: “It is shaped
like a sausage about two feet long, has no head nor legs and it is so poisonous that merely to
touch it means instant death. It lives in the most desolate parts of the Gobi Desert…” This creature
hibernates throughout most of the year but awakes in between June and July. It has two ways of
killing its enemy, either electrically discharging them or spewing out venom from a distance. I
could say it is a combination of an eel and a snake. Some scientists deny its existence.
The first few dinosaur eggs have been found in the Gobi. These eggs have been dug up from
the flaming cliffs, not only have eggs been found but other dinosaur fossils have been found as
well, for example the Velociraptors, Protoceratops, Therizinosaurus. This has been an attraction
for me since I am really into dinosaurs. Archaeologists have proven that there has been major
terrain and climate change since the Cretaceous period, this is because archaeologists have
unearthed large vegetarian dinosaurs that would have taken a huge supply of vegetation to
sustain. Most of the fossils were buried under the sand, making it another piece of evidence of the
terrain change as the sand in the Gobi takes shape.
Besides being all bright, the desert has a dark side, the desertification. This is a huge problem
as it not only affects China through sand storms, but it affects neighboring countries such as
Japan, North and South Korea. The Chinese government had been blamed because of the high
carbon emission everyday and ended up with such a result. The Chinese have launched a project
for the problem, spending billions each year, China’s government plant saplings to grow trees in
the north, the plan was successful and each year took back land mass larger than Switzerland.
This was known as the green wall of China. The logic behind this is that the tree grown griped
the sand together making it harder to spread around with the wind blowing.
So to round up facts about the Gobi, is that the Gobi has many different species of plants, and
that there were once more of it but because of the desertification the number of plants dwindled.
The first few dinosaur fossils were found in the flaming cliffs and that also proves the fact about
having a vast variety of plants at the Cretaceous period. The Gobi Desert wasn’t a desert before
and in fact would have flourished with life. There are people who live in the desert, relying on
livestock and plants for survival, most of the desert is populated with Mongols. The people there
