Near Kayseri, Turkey Photograph by A. I. Solyom   Western Asia: Central Turkey Temperate Grasslands, Savannas, and Shrublands   9,600 square miles (24,900 square kilometers) -- about the size of Maryland Vulnerable

· A "Steppe" Up
· Special Features
· Did You Know?
· Wild Side
· Cause for Concern
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A "Steppe" Up

In central Turkey, patches of grasslands make up the Central Anatolian Steppe ecoregion. On a high plateau surrounded by rugged mountains, the landscape here is dotted with low plants, stunted bushes, and short grasses such as bunchgrass and other tuft-forming grasses. The landscape surrounding this plateau is open and park-like, with grasslands interspersed with scattered trees of juniper, carob, oak, and thorn. The Central Anatolian Steppe encompasses Turkey’s largest lake (Tuz Gölü) and its surrounding salt pans, salt lakes, and other wetlands. Along the water, a profusion of colors from flowering plants emerges every spring. Birds such as avocets and white-fronted geese that migrate across Turkey find a welcome stopover in the Central Anatolian Steppe.

Special Features

The mountainous terrain of this ecoregion has high plateaus and deep valleys, with many rivers draining to the Black Sea. The area has historically been an important corridor for animals moving between Europe and Asia. Birdlife International classifies this ecoregion as an "Important Bird Area" because it provides critical habitat for many threatened species. Unlike other areas of Anatolia, much of the vegetation in the central and southern portion of this ecoregion is halophytic, or salt-tolerant.

	Tuz Gölü is the second largest lake in Turkey, after Lake Van.

Wild Side

In the salt pans surrounding Tuz Gölü, thousands of pairs of greater flamingos breed on small islands. In and around the waters, food is abundant for birds such as the kestrel, avocet, greater sand plover, and white-fronted goose. And just south of the lake, large expanses of marsh and rush pasture are teeming with species of storks, plovers, cranes, and grebes. Short-eared owls scan the grassy steppe habitat for gray hamsters and harvest mice. At night, long-fingered bats take to the skies in search of insects. Persian squirrels scamper through the open forests and grasslands.

Cause for Concern

This ecoregion contains two of the most endangered habitat types in the world: grasslands and wetlands. At one time, grasslands covered nearly half of the land area of the terrestrial world. But when people began to cultivate grasses as grain crops and started to domesticate grazing animals for meat and milk, our world’s grasslands disappeared rapidly. The Central Anatolian Steppe ecoregion is no exception to this trend. As in many grasslands of the world, both agriculture and cattle ranching are widespread here. Many endangered carnivores that once roamed this region, including the Asiatic wild dog, Anatolian leopard, and European marbled polecat, have not been seen here in many years. In and around the region’s wetlands, pristine mountain lakes and marshes are being destroyed by pollution and untreated sewage runoff from surrounding towns. Fertilizers and pesticides from surrounding farms and toxic chemicals from copper plants and bottling plants also make their way to the wetlands and cause harm to the native wildlife. Logging and road construction have destroyed valuable habitat in the mountains, and damming and irrigation practices threaten many of the valleys.

For more information on this ecoregion, go to the World Wildlife Fund Scientific Report.