Nature Word Search

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glacier

A glacier's dense ice absorbs more red light than blue, giving deep cracks their vivid color without any blue dye.

canyon

The Grand Canyon is so deep it exposes rock nearly two billion years old, almost half the age of the Earth.

waterfall

Venezuela's Angel Falls is so tall, about 3,212 feet, that much of the water turns to mist before reaching the ground.

volcano

Lightning can flash inside a volcanic ash cloud, as colliding particles build electrical charges far above the crater.

prairie

Prairie roots interweave so densely that settlers cut blocks of turf to build houses, using living grassland as walls instead of timber.

plateau

Fossil palm leaves found high in Tibet show that part of today's plateau once contained a warm valley where palms could grow.

savanna

Some savanna acacias provide ants with food and hollow thorns, and the ants defend their living home from hungry animals.

wetland

Mangrove rivulus fish can spend weeks out of water inside rotting logs, hiding in insect tunnels while their habitat dries around them.

mountain

Mount Everest is the highest point on Earth, yet its rock still holds fossils of sea creatures from an ancient ocean.

forest

Many trees feed underground fungi sugar, while fungal threads help the trees collect nutrients, making root systems places of exchange.

desert

Deserts are defined by dryness, not heat, so Antarctica is the largest desert on Earth despite all its ice.

jungle

Jungle's Sanskrit ancestor described dry land with sparse trees, a surprising beginning for a word that now suggests thick, humid greenery.

valley

California's Death Valley sits below sea level and logged 134 degrees Fahrenheit in 1913, still the official world heat record.

meadow

A meadow flower called yellow rattle steals nutrients from grass roots, weakening the grass enough to give other wildflowers room to grow.

island

Scientists keep tourists off Iceland's volcanic island Surtsey so they can watch plants and animals arrive without seeds hitchhiking on visitors.

In their words