The Deserts Jacob Seeloff

People often imagine a desert as a hot, scorching place with blowing sand and no vegetation. In fact, a desert landscape can be covered by gravel, clay, coarse soil, or even ice. To be classified as a desert, a region must either receive 10 inches of rain or less in a given year or lose more moisture through evaporation than it receives through rainfall.

Scientists group deserts into three main categories: Arid, semi-arid, and extremely arid. Arid deserts receive less than 10 inches of rain annually. Semi-arid deserts receive between 10 and 20 inches of rain per year. Extremely arid deserts many not see any rain for more than a year.

Deserts are also characterized by the type of precipitation they receive. Asia’s Gobi desert is covered in snow during the winter months. The Sahara, covering 3,500,000 square miles in Northern Africa—is hot all year round.

There are ten major deserts across the world: – Sahara – Turkestan – Gobi – Australian Outback – Thar – Patagonia – Takla Makan – Arabian – North American – Kalahari