0 a large area of land with grass but no trees, especially in eastern Europe, Russia, and Central Asia:
Therefore, studying the intake and diet composition of animals grazing in the typical steppe is of essential ecological and economical importance.
In most of the open steppe belt the soil is fertile black earth.
The lines also served as a basis for further expansion into the steppes.
The coastal plain is mainly coastal thicket; a small area in the south-eastern coastal plain is tropical steppe.
Villages tended to be larger on the south-eastern steppes than in the forested regions partly because there were fewer sources of water to settle by.
The open steppe regions, moreover, lost much of what little woodland they had.
The original flora and fauna were similar to those of the grasslands in the forested steppe.
The most favourable habitat appears to be the moist forested steppe, and transmission gradually decreases in dry steppe, semi-desert and desert areas.