5 Amazing Ways That Nature Equips Plants and Animals to Survive in the Namib Desert

A recent post described the Desert Rhubarb, which uses large leaves, that lie flat on the ground to funnel whatever rain falls to its roots effectively increasing the rainfall. There are many other adaptions in deserts - this post looks at five, found in the Namib desert.

Flying Water to the Nest

The Namaqua Sandgrouse (Pterocles namaqua) needs to spend much of its life in a highly organised quest for water and food. This can involve a daily round trip of more than 80 kilometres (50 miles). The daily activity starts just after sunrise when small flocks of Namaqua Sandgrouse from different areas congregate at favoured waterholes.

The Sandgrouse lays two to three eggs in a nest that is a mere scrape in the ground between tufts of grass. To get water to their newly hatched young, the male dips his breast feathers under the surface of the waterhole and allows them to absorb water like a sponge, absorbing up to 8 times their weight in water. With his cargo complete, he flies back to the chicks, and they drink the water directly from his breast feathers.

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Collecting the Mist

Several beetles are able to collect moisture from the infrequent morning mists in desert areas close to the sea.

Onymacris unguicularis creeps to the crest of a dune, drops its head, extends its hind legs and leans forward letting its body serves as a condensation surface for the mist. Droplets of water form and slide down towards its mouth. It is able to collect up to 40% of its original weight in water, to tide it over to the next misty day.

The Namibian desert beetle, (Stenocara gracilipes),  has an armour-like shell which is covered with bumps. The peak of each bump is smooth and attracts water, while the slopes and troughs are covered with wax, which repels water. Mist condenses on the peaks of Stenocara’s bumps, eventually forming droplets that roll over the waxy parts to the beetles mouth.

Inspired by the beetle, scientists at MIT have developed a nano technology based material, that has the same interspersed hydrophilic and hydrophobic sites which has resulted in a film with potential in anti fogging and mist harvesting.

Keeping Cool and Using an Internal Water Reservoir

The Shovel-snouted Lizard (Meroles anchietae) is quite well known for its “thermal dance”, where it jumps from foot to foot to keep its feet cool. The video below from the BBC shows this behavior in amazing detail.

But is also unique in that it can store water practically free from body salts in a section of its intestine for several weeks and as the video shows it can quickly burrow underground to escape both the heat and predators.

Absorbing Dew Through Micro Pores & Unique Carbon Fixation

Welwitschia (Welwitschia mirabilis) is the only genus of the family Welwitschia, is considered a living fossil because of its appearance in the fossil record and is found only in the Namib desert in Namibia and Angola.

The plant absorbs water through peculiar structures on its leaves, that allow it to harvest the dew that forms on plants during the night. As a further adaptation to the arid conditions and hot daytime temperatures in its environment, it is the only gymnosperm species known to use the crassulacean acid metabolism (CAM) pathway for carbon fixation in photosynthesis.

Welwitschia is so symbolic of the Namib, that it is included below the shield, in the Namibian coat of arms as a symbol of survival and national fortitude.

Eating Moist Plants and Controlling Sweating

Gemsbok (Oryx gazella) are predominantly grazers, but will revert to browsing during droughts or whenever grasses are not available. They are able to dig up to a meter to find tubers and roots which, with wild tsama melons and cucumbers, provide all the water needed to sustain them. The Gemsbok also pass a minimal amount of moisture when they urinate and defecate.

More interestingly they are able to stop losing moisture through sweating, by allowing their temperature to rise from around 39ºC to as high as 45ºC. This is possible as its circulatory system has a mechanism to cool hot blood from the heart  on its way to the brain with cooler blood from its nasal cavity.

Lots of Other Tricks such as

• a spider which has developed a technique for moving fast down the smooth unobstructed surface of the dune - it bends its legs to form itself into a wheel and rolls down the dune.
• a mole that spends its life swimming through the sand rather than burrowing and therefore no longer has eyes.
• A reed-like grass that spreads its roots wide to collect drops of dew dropping from leaf ends.
• Plants that die off in drought periods, that are able to regenerate from dormant seeds decades later.

Multimedia Credits

Namaqua Grouse by  Chris Eason on Wikipedia under a Creative Commons license.

Namibia Beetle by Hans Hillewaert on Wikipedia under a Creative Commons license.

Shovel-nosed Lizard by BBC on YouTube.

Welwitschia - by Thomas Schoch on Wikipedia under a Creative Commons license.

Gemsbok - by Jeppestown on Flickr under a Creative Commons license.

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