tundra

TUN-druh

A treeless landscape of the high Arctic and high alpine — underlain by permafrost, dominated by mosses, lichens, sedges, and dwarf shrubs. Tundra looks barren from a distance. At ground level it is dense with life, compressed into a frantic growing season of weeks.

Etymology

From Sámi (Kildin Sámi) tūndâr, via Russian тундра. The Sámi word means a treeless, marshy plain — the people who named it live there.

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