During dry periods grasses can become dormant, leaving only dry stems and seed heads standing above the roots. When rain falls, new shoots come up from the roots again. Another adaptive characteristic of grasses is that they grow up from where the stems join the roots. Other plants grow from the tips of shoots, twigs, and branches, but grasses grows from the bottom up. This allows animals to eat grass without slowing its growth, and people to mow lawns without killing the grass.
Grasses are wind pollinated flowering plants.
The tiny flowers form at the top of the stalks where the wind can pick up and deliver the pollen. Later the seed heads form at the top of the stalks. Grasses are monocotyledons, so that when the seeds germinate each one sends up a single leaf. There are grasslands in many places in the world. The huge grasslands of this biome are found in the interior of continents, on land that is gently rolling or nearly flat.