--- title: The savanna: grass, trees and the great herds — a lesson of Mova's school · trees and pragmatics description: «The savanna: grass, trees and the great herds», a lesson of the biology course of Mova's primary school, sentence by sentence with dependency trees and pragmatics. It begins: A savanna is a warm grassland with trees scattered here and there, like the plains of the Serengeti in Africa, with a long d --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/4-the-savanna/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [Biology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/) / The savanna: grass, trees and the grea… # The savanna: grass, trees and the great herds Lesson 4 of the biology course of Mova's primary school: 18 sentences, each with its syntax tree and pragmatics. The lessons are written for Mova, and their agreed trees are part of Mova corpus 0.4 (CC BY-SA 4.0). How Mova does on its tests: [the lesson at school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/school-run/biology/4-the-savanna/). - [0](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/4-the-savanna/0/) — A savanna is a warm grassland with trees scattered here and there, like the plains of the Serengeti in Africa, with a long dry season and a rainy season when the grass bursts back to life. - [1](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/4-the-savanna/1/) — Grass is the savanna's bread: zebras, wildebeest and gazelles graze it, and lions, cheetahs and hyenas hunt the grazers, so when the rain moves, the whole crowd moves after it. - [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/4-the-savanna/2/) — Every animal has its own floor in the savanna kitchen: the giraffe browses at treetop height, the elephant lower down, the zebra on the grass and the meerkat digs for beetles underneath. - [3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/4-the-savanna/3/) — The Lion King opens with every animal bowing on Pride Rock; real herds keep well away from lions, Rafiki's mandrill-like face belongs to a rainforest monkey, and spotted hyenas are not silly scavengers but clever hunters led by females. - [4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/4-the-savanna/4/) — On a hot afternoon at a safari park the lions lie flat in the shade like big sleepy cats: they hunt mostly at dusk, at night and at dawn, and resting in the heat saves their energy and water. - [5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/4-the-savanna/5/) — Lions rest for up to about 20 hours a day, hunt mostly from dusk to dawn and live mainly on African grassland and savanna, not in jungles; a small group of Asiatic lions lives in India's Gir Forest. - [6](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/4-the-savanna/6/) — Giraffes are the tallest animals, up to about 5.5 metres, with a tongue about 45 cm long and just 7 neck bones, the same number as us, each over 25 cm long. - [7](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/4-the-savanna/7/) — Each year more than a million wildebeest, with zebras and gazelles, follow the rain and fresh grass in a loop round the Serengeti and the Masai Mara, even across crocodile rivers. - [8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/4-the-savanna/8/) — Every zebra's stripes are different, the skin under the hair is dark, and strong evidence shows the stripes put off biting flies. - [9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/4-the-savanna/9/) — The cheetah is the fastest land animal, reaching about 100 km per hour in short bursts, but it tires after a few hundred metres and often loses its catch to lions or hyenas. - [10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/4-the-savanna/10/) — African elephants are the largest land animals, weighing about 6 tonnes or more; they spray dust and mud to protect their skin and flap their big ears to cool their blood. - [11](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/4-the-savanna/11/) — Termite mounds are built from soil, saliva and droppings, with tunnels that move air through them, and some are over a hundred years old. - [12](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/4-the-savanna/12/) — Spotted hyenas live in clans led by females, catch most of their own food and use whoops and giggles to talk; lions often steal from hyenas as well as the other way round. - [13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/4-the-savanna/13/) — Whistling-thorn acacias give ants homes in swollen thorns and sweet nectar, and the ants attack animals that nibble the tree, so both win; when a giraffe keeps browsing, acacia leaves also soon turn bitter. - [14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/4-the-savanna/14/) — A meerkat sentry stands guard while the group digs for beetles, scorpions and grubs, and it gives different alarm calls for an eagle in the air and a jackal on the ground. - [15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/4-the-savanna/15/) — The ostrich is the largest living bird; it cannot fly but runs at about 70 km per hour on long legs with only two toes on each foot. - [16](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/4-the-savanna/16/) — Ostriches do not bury their heads in the sand; they lay their heads flat on the ground to hide and turn their eggs in a nest scraped in the soil. - [18](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/4-the-savanna/18/) — Mandrills, the monkeys with red and blue faces, live in the rainforests of central Africa, not on the open savanna. - ← previous: [The rainforest from below: understorey and forest floor](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/3-the-rainforest-from-below/) - next →: [The desert: living with little water](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/5-the-desert/) - ↑ back to [Biology](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/biology/)