Soils and Civilizations exam 3

UTK ESS 120

Be able to explain how raiding and trading could be related with regards to the Vikings

Trading paved the way for raiding, the root word for Viking means raider

Be able to draw a simple map of Viking routes

see images on slides

Describe the soils and ecology of Iceland before the Vikings

lowlands covered in birch and willow forest (25% of island in forest), fertile soils up to 50 ft deep, mild climate (enough for barley), lakes and rivers and seas teemed with fish, animals like: seals, seabirds, walruses, and ducks

Explain the factors that lead to Iceland being the most heavily ecologically damaged country in Europe. 

ash layer from volcanic eruptions, removed vegetation exposes ash which results in erosion, heavy rains (wind erosion too), slow plant growth, positive feedback cycle to erosion 

Describe the colonization process the Vikings used and its impact on the environment for future generations.

from 870 AD to 930 AD, all suitable land claimed, herding economy because farming failed, survived on sheep, wild animals, and fish, walrus exterminated, wood wasted or burned, highland soils carried off to sea, sheep overgrazing

Describe the factors affecting the environmental fate of Iceland

no prior inhabitants, closer to Scandinavia than Greenland, second most unfavorable potential for food production, environmental fragility

Explain possible reasons why maps would be drawn that have a northern exaggeration to them

Eurocentric mapping: Europeans were Northern, so they wanted to make themselves look important, trying to project a round world on a flat map

Explain the role of pollen, oxygen isotopes, and calcium and sodium in determining the past weather/climatic conditions

Pollen: take mud cores to find out what was growing near the lakes. Ice: use oxygen isotopes to determine how warm the climate was. Ca and Na: in snow means storms and blew sea spray up to the ice caps

When was the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age and how did this impact the Vikings?

Warm Period: 800 and 1300 AD and it was warm enough to grow hay and pasture animals; 1420 AD was the start of the Little Ice Age and ship movement ended because of drift ice

Explain how the Inuit adapted to “Climate Change in the Little Ice Age”

hunted seals, smaller houses covered in skins/blubber for heat, whale hunting expertise, birds shot with darts

Be able to explain why there was a shift away from pigs and cows to sheep

cows needed barns and lots of hay and pigs tore the place up, but sheep could forage under the snow and only had to be inside for 3 months

What observations suggest that the Norse were desperate in terms of food supply

all bones were split to the marrow, cows lived in a starvation diet

Explain how the ecological and environmental shifts are documented with sediment data

After Vikings arrived, started to find charcoal, tree pollen decreased, imported plants came in, magnetic susceptibility means erosion occurred, sand followed after complete denuding of land

How does the fate of the Siberian family following their “discovery” confirm Diamond’s hypothesis regarding the impact of visitors on native cultures

brought disease and killed everybody, confirms that germ warfare was the most effective means of conquering

Why is a pole star important to navigation?

it’s above the pole, a few lengths above the end of the big dipper and last star in the little dipper handle

What is the southern cross? Is it a polar star?

Called Mirrabooka by aborigines, four eyes to see all the directions of the Earth, also called “Crux”, not a polar star

Why were the maps distorted by the direction of travel?

Distorted perception, no indication of East-West, currents made it hard to calculate speed, and you need a good clock.

How accurate were the maps?

considerably off in the 15th century, good Polaris sighting was +-55 miles, one degree latitude and longitude was 60 miles apart each

Why did China stop exploring?

Palace burned to the ground, believed gods must be angry, led to a change of policy in which there was no more exploring outside of China, all maps destroyed

Compare and contrast Europe to China in the 1400s

China had an army of 1 million, China would feed thousands on fine porcelain, Chinese were the first to put watertight compartments on ships; Europe would feed a few hundred in barbaric conditions, Columbus’s ships were shorter than the Chinese were wide, copied the watertight compartments from the Chinese

What is the population of China and how does it compare to the U.S

China has 1.3 billion to the United States’ 0.3 billion

What was the name of the recent large dam project

Three Gorges Dam- Yangtze River

Be able to explain the impact on people living where the Three Gorges Dam was built.

more than 1 million people displaced, 244 square miles of land flooded, more than 1000 villages and towns flooded, architectural and cultural sites of the Ba people disappeared, Si:N ratios dropped which impacted fisheries, Dam increased trade on river

Explain the effect of the timber harvest ban on African timber harvest

15-20% of commercial timber for the urban markets of China pulled from supply chain, import substitution encouraged, development of fast-growing and high-yield plantation forests

Explain the impediments to mechanization

expensive, lots of labor, topography, each family has a little piece of land/very diverse

Know the centers of domestication/origin for crops

Mesoamerica- maize, beans, sweet potato

Andes and Amazonia- potato, tomato, cotton, peanut, rubber, cocoa, tobacco

West Africa and Sahel- durum, wheat, oats, peas, clovers, elax, rape, lettuce, hop, spelt

Fertile Crescent- wheat, lentil, alfalfa, fig, apple, vetch, barley

Ethiopia- Hard wheat, teff, millet, flax, sesame, coffee, okra

China- radish, peach, walnut, soybean, onion, cucumber, apricot, cherry

New Guinea- Banana, coconut, sugarcane, breadfruit

Be able to give examples of civilizations that failed due to environmental issues

Easter Island, Pitcairn Island, Henderson Island, The Anasazi, The Maya, Greenland

Know which type of island different approaches worked best

“bottom-up” approach- smaller islands, shared interests, people work for common goal

“top-down” approach- centralized government

Be able to describe PNG at discovery

Humans for 46,000 years, few inputs from outside world, near equator, ridges and valleys, no European explorers until 1930s, rugged terrain confined explorers to the coast 

Be able to briefly describe PNG agriculture

7000 years of agriculture; crops: taro, banana, yams, sugarcane, sweet potato; animals: pigs, chickens; tools: primitive, stone axes, wooden spears, bamboo knives

Be able to describe how indigenous knowledge was important to their agricultural success 

knowledge passed down through generations, soil fertility management, wood supply management

How did silviculture assist their likelihood of civilization survival

selection and cultivation of fast-growing hard wood species, allows for wood dependent society survival

Be able to explain the role of “big men”

not control, lived in the same huts as everyone else, village meetings and lots of talking, frustrating process that worked

Be able to explain the approach of the Tokugawa Era

series of Tokugawa Shoguns, population and economy grow rapidly, agricultural production increases, rapid population growth (especially in the cities), strong centralized government, almost no trade with the rest of the world, self-sufficient, system collapsed in 1868

How did the top-down measures impact the outcome

solved imbalance between forest consumption and production

How is land use evolving in Vietnam due to population pressure 

they are farming more land to produce more food, they're farming on steep hills

Understand the difficulties in using marginal lands

erosion, machines cant make it up hill, difficult to walk on, cant use concrete cause it wont fix everything

Understand that this famine resulted from the quick adoption of New World crops

potato famine was a genocide

When was the Irish potato famine

1845-1852

Why did they grow potatoes

productive crop, grew max yield

How many people did the Blight impact

1 million starved and 1 million emigrated from Ireland

What unique group of people sent aid to the Irish 

Choctaws 

How did the battle of Culloden “pave the way” to the Highland Clearances

land holdings per farmer decreased in size, middlemen had more tenants, expansion of human numbers without expansion of economic capacity

Explain how religion played a role in the Clearances

part of a systematic transformation to become more like the civilized south, 80% of the tenants were Catholic and Catholics were prevented from owning land, voting, holding public office, etc.

How did the lowly sheep impact the need for the Clearances

400% increase in wool prices, justification for increased rents, tenants evicted for sheep farming

Why did the Clearances happen

caused partly by the disruption where highland people left the established church and joined the “free church”

Describe some of the acts that supported the clearances

Battle of Culloden- losers sent as slaves to Caribbean

Proscription- highland owners either accept all English rule or forfeit their lands

Passenger Act- prohibits emigration, decline in labor force, kept many in poverty

Describe the ways and means that people were moved to North America

1801- The Sarah en route to Pictou, Nova Scotia

1807- The Rambler from Thurso

1826- The James to Halifax

Who interceded for the Wataugans

The Cherokee 

Explain why European countries expanded to Africa

Factories in Europe required raw materials, sought this source of raw materials in Africa

Be able to give examples where country/tribal borders caused problems decades after lines were arbitrarily drawn on the map

Scramble for Africa- resulted in the colonization of Africa in 25 years

Colonialism brings new boarders for Africa- loss of African history

Be able to give both historical and current day examples of land dispossession and its effects on civilization

Tanganyika Scheme, Rwandan Genocide, Darfur Genocide

What factors played into the decision to grow groundnuts in Africa

Britian had to balance its debt payments, had a shortage of vegetable oils and fats

What soil properties played into the failure of the scheme

poor, sandy soils, erratic rainfall

What importance were trees to the local peoples

baobab trees were the local tribal jail, site of ancestor worship, and many had bees’ nests in their hollow trunks

Explain the impacts of the scheme’s failure to the local economy

temporary influx of money and wages, labor competition, cancellation led to market collapse, many companies did not invest in Tanzania

Who settled Rwanda? Know the two tribes and their origins

Hutu-from south and west, crop farmers

Tutsi- from north and east, livestock farmers

How did the drought and environmental problem exacerbate the racial tensions

1989- deforestation, soil erosion, and soil fertility losses, set the stage for the buildup to the genocide (to wipe out the Tutsi because of their oppression of the Hutu)

So is hate speech acceptable as free speech as shown on the Rock

No

Explain how land tenure impacted this genocide

densely populated before the European arrival, land prices went up, food insecurity cause panic

Rwanda is the only country in the world to ban this common item

plastic bags 

Why do soybeans struggle to grow in Rwanda

on the equator, days of length need to change, photoperiod plant

Why is lime added to soil

to get the soil’s pH towards neutrality

What is unique about this outhouse

pee and poop are separated to be used for other stuff

Explain how federal acts encouraged the dust bowl

After the Civil War, settlement to the West was encouraged with:
-4 federal homestead acts, gave ownership of 160-640 acres of land to each applicants at little or no cost
-straight row cultivation
-lack of awareness concerning clean row cultivation
-severe climate conditions

Explain how the price of wheat contributed to the dust bowl

high price of wheat caused people to buy more farmland, more land brought more tractors and more plowing

Did the homestead act provide enough land for an economical ranch unit? why

no, it takes more land to support a cow, can’t make enough money of 16 cows

Describe “Black Sunday”

worst “black blizzard” of the dust bowl, soil erosion declared a national menace, 850 million tons of topsoil blown off southern plains

Describe the conversation practices that resulted from the dust bowl

establishment of the soil conservation service, birth of conservation districts, public programs started, inventory of soil resources

If wind break trees are 60 feet high and 40% porous, how far apart should they be placed

0.5 mile apart

Understand the significance of wind breaks to alleviating wind erosion

slows wind erosion, cheaper than fixing erosion

Be able to draw a simple map of the area of the US that was the epicenter for wind erosion losses