Mediterranean environments - Fundamentals of the Physical Environment - page 644

Plate 25.4 Overexploitation over millennia can result in degraded Mediterranean heath (garrigue) as in northern Cyrenaica,
Libya. Current impacts are overgrazing and collection of plants for fuelwood.
Photo: Ken Atkinson

Plate 25.5 Goats in Jordan: curse of overgrazing, or sustainable survival in a marginal environment?
Photo: Ken Atkinson

leaves to give a photosynthesizing stem; sticky, waxy or
hairy leaf cuticles or surfaces; leaf stomata sunk into
surface depressions; loss of transpiring leaves in summer
(drought-deciduousness); pale leaves and stems to
increase reflectivity of radiation by higher albedo. A high

dilute the salt within the plant. Phreatophytes are plants
with deep tap roots allowing them to reach ground water
at depth, e.g. carob trees and bunch grasses.
A range of structural modifications in plants favour
drought tolerance : needle-leaf form; the elimination of all