SNAKES. The Kalahari is home to 12 species of venomous snakes, such as the black mamba, spitting cobra, and puff adder. See how the team handles a visit from this deadly puff adder.
BACTERIA. The smallest life forms, bacteria, are abundant everywhere, even in savanna soils. Here we sample for bacteria so that we can investigate how they influence how carbon is stored belowground.
VULTURES. It's a feeding frenzy as these starving scavengers consume the corpse of a horse in the Kalahari Desert.
WATER. Water is scarce for all life forms (including humans) in the arid savanna. Join Heather Riffel in the town of Bokspits, Botswana, where the local police station provides water to the thirsty research team.
Activity 1: Species diversity
Activity 2: Using a microscope.
ONLINE RESOURCES
Extreme microbes - find out about the hellish places where bacteria can survive (National Science Foundation)