Tiger bush

Tiger bush, or brousse tigrée in the French language, is a patterned vegetation community and ground consisting of alternating bands of trees, shrubs, or grass separated by bare ground or low herb cover, that run roughly parallel to contour lines of equal elevation.

The patterns occur on low slopes in arid and semi-arid regions,[1] such as in Australia, Sahelian West Africa, and North America.

[2][3] Due to the natural water harvesting capacity, many species in tiger bush usually occur only under a higher rainfall regime.

In the regions where tiger bush is present, plant growth is water-limited - the shortage of rainfall prevents vegetation from covering the entire landscape.

Sheet flow distributes water more evenly across a hillslope, allowing a continuous vegetation band to form.

Aerial view of a tiger bush plateau in Niger . Vegetation appears in dark while lighter pixels represent bare soil. The distance between successive vegetated bands varies between 60 and 120 meters.
Aerial oblique view of a gapped bush plateau in W National Park , Niger . The mean distance between two consecutive gaps is 50 meters
Aerial view of a tiger bush area in Niger with its typical vegetation pattern. There is a sharp boundary between the tiger bush area and the distant Sahelian plain where the vegetation is much sparser.
Panoramic view taken from the middle of a bare band in a tiger bush plateau near Batama-Béri, Niger . Altitude decrease from left to right (slope is about one percent).
Vegetation band in a tiger bush near Zamarkoye, Burkina Faso.