Unit 5B Land and Water Use

Question 1

What is clearcutting?

Answer 1

Practice in which most or all trees in an area are uniformly cut down.

Question 1

2) What are four environmental problems associated with clearcutting?

Answer 1

• Soil Erosion: caused by loss of stability in root structure (removes nutrients from forests)
• Increased soil and stream temp: loss of tree shade warms the area
• Flooding & Landslides: logging machinery compacts soil
• Lowers biodiversity: same tree species are repeatedly grown

Question 2

3) What are some of the ecosystem services that forest provide?

Answer 2

1. Filtration of air pollution: stomata removes pollutants (VOCs, NO2, PM) from air and stores them in tree or soil
2. Removal and storage of CO2 from atm: Trees take in CO2, store carbon as sugar, wood, other tissue and release O2
3. Habitat for organisms: many org. live in forests

Question 3

5) Why is meat production inefficient?

Answer 3

It requires masses of grain, water and land

Question 4

6) Who eats more meat, developed or developing countries? Why?

Answer 4

Developed countries eat more meat because meat is more expensive to produce.

Question 5

7) Compare overgrazing to free grazing meat production methods. How can overgrazing lead to desertification?

Answer 5

Overgrazing occurs when farmers allow livestock to graze to the point where they damage the vegetation.

Free grazing is allowing cows to graze freely in the fields close to farms and dairies.

They remove or damage the vegetation that is protecting the land and keeping it moist and fertile.

Question 6

8) What are the negative effects of CAFOs?

Answer 6

• Given antibiotics & growth hormones to prevent disease outbreak & speed meat production
• Animals produce large volume of waste which can contaminate nearby surface or groundwater
• Produces large amounts of CO2, CH4 (methane), and N2O (greenhouse gasses → climate change)

Question 7

Positive benefits of CAFOs?

Answer 7

+ Minimizes cost of meat for consumers

+ Maximizes land use and profit (most meat production per/unit of area)

Question 8

Bottom Trawling

Answer 8

is a technique typically used to harvest scallops, crabs, and shrimp from the sea floor by using a net to drag them.

Question 9

9) What happened in the fishing industry between 1975 and 1985? What were the consequences?

Answer 9

Overfishing in period of 1975 - 1985 leads to sharp loss of profits from 1985 - 2018

Question 10

10) What is bycatch

Answer 10

Bycatch is anything that is caught that is not the intended catch.

Question 11

What are ghost nets?

Answer 11

Ghost nets are nets left behind by fishermen that cause entanglement

Question 12

11) What is urban sprawl?

Answer 12

The uncontrolled expansion of urban areas into surrounding suburbs

Question 13

12) What are three environmental negative effects of urban sprawl?

Answer 13

Increased water pollution

Increased air pollution due to increased traffic

Loss of agricultural capacity due to development

Question 14

13) What are the environmental advantages to urbanization?

Answer 14

Increase in jobs, entertainment and cultural attractions

Minimize driving and land use

Question 15

14) Why do citizens leave rural areas to live in urban areas?

Answer 15

Rural areas lack academic and economic opportunity compared to metropolises.

Question 16

15) What is salt water intrusion?

Answer 16

Population growth in coastal cities leads to salt water intrusion - as sea levels rise along the coasts due to warming of the ocean, saltwater can move onto the land and as excessive groundwater withdrawal near the coast, saltwater seeps into the ocean

Sea level rise due to warming of ocean and melting of ice caps can contaminate fresh groundwater with salt. Excessive groundwater withdrawal near coast lowering water table pressure, allowing saltwater to seep into groundwater

Question 17

16) What is Smart Growth?

Answer 17

an approach to achieving communities that are socially, economically, and environmentally sustainable

covers a range of development and conservation strategies that help protect our health and natural environment and make our communities more attractive, economically stronger, and more socially diverse.

Question 18

CAFOs

Answer 18

Also called feedlots - densely crowded method where animals are fed grain (corn) to raise them to as quickly as possible

Question 19

Manure Lagoons

Answer 19

Large, open storage pits for animal waste (manure)

Question 20

• manure lagoons

Answer 20

-Heavy rain can flood lagoons & contaminate nearby surface and ground water with runoff
-e. Coli → toxic to humans
-Ammonia (N) → eutrophication
-Antibiotics & growth hormones → alter endocrine (hormonal system) of humans

Question 20

Free Range Grazing

Answer 20

Animals (usually cows) graze on grass & grow at a natural rate without growth hormones

Question 21

• free range grazing

Answer 21

• Requires more total land use/pound of meat produced
• More expensive to consumer

Question 22

+ free range grazing

Answer 22

+ No need for antibiotics with dispersed pop.
+ Doesn’t require production of corn to feed animals
+ Waste is dispersed over land naturally, acting as fertilizer instead of building up in lagoons
+ Animals can graze on land too dry for most crop growth

Question 23

Depletion of smaller fish pop. ____ fishery recovery and ___ food supply of marine mammals & seabirds

Answer 23

Limits
decreases

Question 24

Propose a solution to address the issue of fishery depletion.

Answer 24

Limit fish catching to allow fish population to remain abundant and overfished populations to recover

Question 25

Explain an environmental benefit of eating a plant-based diet, rather than a meat-based diet, using the data below.

Answer 25

Smaller carbon footprint because carbon is emitted a lot when needing to make fertilizers, clear lands, transport animals, feed animals, and housing the animals

Question 26

Describe TWO ecosystem services provided for humans by forests.

Answer 26

provides oxygen for humans to live
provide food products for human consumption

Question 27

Explain how clear-cutting would affect each ecosystem service you describe.

Answer 27

loss of oxygen
loss of habitat for animals

Question 28

urban sprawl causes

Answer 28

Cheaper property in suburbs than in cities (larger home for same price)
Cars make it easy to still get from the suburbs into the city for work, entertainment, cultural attractions
Domino effect (neighbors leave, so you leave)
Fewer residents in cities leads to decline in tax revenue for city (decrease in city services)
Residents leave, so businesses follow
Abandoned homes + businesses create blight (unsightly, rundown infrastructure) so more people leave

Question 29

Describe a possible solution to the issue of urban sprawl.

Answer 29

Mixed land use: residential, business, and entertainment buildings all located in the same area of a city
Enables walkability & sense of place

Question 30

Identify one possible economic consequence of this urban sprawl solution

Answer 30

Increasing local tax revenue