Climate and Terrestrial

Biodiversity
Connections Between Wind, Climate,
and Biomes
•Why are some areas of earth’s land surface
covered by desert, another by grassland,
and another by forest?
Climate- long-term differences in
average temperature and precipitation
caused by global air circulation.

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 WIND AND ITS EFFECT
 Indirect form of solar energy
 Circulatory system for heat, moisture, plant nutrients, soil
particles, and long-lived air pollutants.
 Wind transport nutrients by carrying dust rich in Phosphate
and Irons across the Atlantic Ocean from the Sahara Dessert
 Build agricultural soils in Bahamas and Rainforests in Brazil
 Wind deposits iron into the Pacific between Hawaii and Alaska.
 Stimulates the growth of phytoplankton—supports ocean food webs.

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 Downside of wind
 Transport harmful pollutants
Some types of Fungi in dust may degrade
coral in Florida keys and Caribbean
 Particles of Iron-rich dust enhances
productivity of toxic algal blooms– called red
tide.
 From rapidly industrializing China and Central
Asia degrades air quality
 Asian pollution makes up as much as 10%
of West Coast smog—a problem that is
expected to get worse as China continues to
industrialize
 This may intensify storms over north Pacific
ocean and increased warming in the polar
region
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The Ecological Lesson:
Everything we do affects some other part of the
biosphere because everything is interconnected.

ADD A FOOTER 5
 The Earth has many different Climates
 Weather
 is a local area’s short-term temperature, precipitation, humidity, wind
speed, cloud cover, and other physical conditions of the lower
atmosphere as measured over hours or days.
Climate
 is an area’s general pattern of atmospheric or weather
conditions measured over long periods of time ranging from
decades to thousands of years.
 varies in different parts of the earth mostly because patterns of global
air circulation and ocean currents distribute heat and precipitation
unevenly.
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“Climate is what we expect, weather
is what we get.”

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 Three major factors determine how air
circulates in the lower atmosphere:
 Uneven heating of Earth’s surface by the sun
 Rotation of the earth on its axis (figure7.3)
 Coriolis Effect
 Cells
 Prevailing winds- major surface winds that blow continuously and help
distribute air, heat, and dust over the earth’s surface.
 Properties of air, water, and land (figure 7.4)
 Convection’
 Heat from sun creates giant cyclical convection cells
 Circulates air, heat, and moisture
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Figure 7-2. Natural Capital: Generalized map of the earth’s current climate zones, showing the major contributing
ocean currents and drifts and upwelling areas (where currents bring nutrients from the ocean bottom to the surface).
Winds play an important role in distributing heat and moisture in the atmosphere, which leads to such climate zones.
Winds also cause currents that help distribute heat throughout the world’s oceans.
Figure 7-3.Global air circulation. The largest input of solar energy occurs at the equator. As this air is
heated it rises and moves toward the poles. However, the earth’s rotation deflects the movement of
the air over different parts of the earth. This creates global patterns of prevailing winds that help
distribute heat and moisture in the atmosphere.
Figure 7.4. Energy transfer by convection in the
atmosphere. Convection occurs when hot and wet warm
air rises, cools, and releases heat and moisture as
precipitation (right side). Then the denser cool, dry air
sinks, gets warmer, and picks up moisture as it flows
across the earth’s surface to begin the cycle again.

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Prevailing winds and the drive the Earth’s rotation
drives earth major ocean currents.
 Current redistribute heat from the sun
 Influences climate and vegetation especially near coastal areas.
 Heat absorbed by oceans in tropical areas
 Prevailing winds and irregularly shaped continents
 Currents flowing in roughly circular patterns
 Clockwise in northern hemisphere
 Counterclockwise in southern
 More on heat transfer
 Vertical mixing in deep and shallow ocean currents
 Creates a loop of deep and shallow water currents
 Like a giant conveyor belt
 Moves heat to and from deep sea
 Transfer warm and cold water between tropics and poles (Fig. 7.5)
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 Figure 7-5. Connected deep and
shallow ocean currents. A
connected loop of shallow and deep
ocean currents transports warm
and cool water to various parts of
the earth.
This loop, which rises in some areas
and falls in others, results when
ocean water in the North Atlantic
near Iceland is dense enough
(because of its salt content and cold
temperature) to sink to the ocean
bottom, flow southward, and then
move eastward to well up in the
warmer Pacific. A shallower return
current aided by winds then brings
warmer, less salty— and thus less
dense—water to the Atlantic. This
water can cool and sink to begin this
extremely slow cycle again.
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The ocean and the atmosphere are
strongly linked in two ways
Ocean currents are affected by winds
Heat from the oceans affects the atmosphere
 Example: the El Nino-Southern Oscillation
Occurs every few years when prevailing winds in the tropical
Pacific Ocean weaken and change direction
o Above average warming of Pacific waters affect populations of
marine species by the changes in distribution of nutrients
o Alters weather patterns of at least 2/3 of the earth for one to
two years
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Figure 7-6 Global air circulation, ocean currents, and biomes. Heat
and moisture are distributed over the earth’s surface via six giant
convection cells (like the one in Figure 7-4) at different latitudes.
The resulting uneven distribution of heat and moisture over the
planet’s surface leads to the forests, grasslands, and deserts that
make up the earth’s terrestrial biomes

Global Circulation patterns, prevailing winds,

and configuration of continents and oceans.
Six giant convection cells
3 cells north of equator
3 cells south of equator
Irregular distribution of climates and
deserts, grasslands, and forest.

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Greenhouse Gases Warm the
Lower Atmosphere
 Greenhouse gases play a role in determining the earth’s average
temperatures.
 Water vapor, carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide, in the
atmosphere play a role in determining the earth’s average temperatures
and its climate.
 These greenhouse gases allow most visible light and some
infrared radiation from the sun to pass through the atmosphere.
 The earth’s surface absorbs much of this solar energy and transform it
in longer-wavelength infrared radiation (heat), which then rises into the
lower atmosphere.
 Some of this heat escapes into space, but some is absorbed by
molecules of greenhouse gases and emitted into the lower atmosphere
as even longer-wavelength infrared radiation.
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 What would probably happen
if greenhouse effect does
not occur?

 Without the warming caused

by these greenhouse gases,
the earth would be a cold
and mostly lifeless planet.

This natural warming effect of the troposphere

is called the greenhouse effect
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Human-enhanced global warming
 Climate models: 90-99% probability that human
activities are increasing GHE
 Burning fossil fuels, clearing forest, and growing
crops
 Changes in climate that could last 100s
to 1000s of years
As warming intensifies climate scientist expect it to:
 Alters precipitation
 Shifts areas where crops can grow
 Raises sea levels
 Shifts habitats for some types of plants and
animals.
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The Earth’s Surface Features Affect Local
Climates
 Heat is absorbed and released more slowly by water than by land
 Creates land and seas breezes
 Moderate climate in coastal and lakeshore areas
 Topography of earth’s surfaces
 Creates local and regional weather and climates that differ the
general climate from the region. Example: mountains, surface winds
and rain shadow effect.
 Cities create distinct microclimates
 Bricks, concrete, and asphalt absorb heat
 Buildings block wind
 Motor vehicles and air conditioning units.
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How does Climate affect the nature
and locations of Biome?
Differences in average annual precipitation and temperature lead to the
formation of tropical, temperate, and cold deserts, grasslands, and forests,
and largely determine their locations.

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Climate affects Where Organisms can live
 Biomes- large terrestrial regions characterized by similar climate,
soil, plants and animals, regardless of where they are found in
the world.
 The worlds major biomes vary with climate.
 Biomes are not uniform but consist of a mosaic of patches
each with somewhat different biological communities but with
similarities of the typical biome.
 Resources are not evenly distributed
 Human activities removed and alter the natural vegetation in many areas.

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Figure 7-8 Natural capital: the earth’s major biomes—the main types of natural vegetation in various undisturbed land
areas—result primarily from differences in climate. Each biome contains many ecosystems whose communities have
adapted to differences in climate, soil, and other environmental factors?

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Climate and vegetation vary with latitude
and elevation
Differences in climate, mostly from
average annual precipitation and
temperature, lead to the formation of
tropical (hot), temperate (moderate), and
polar (cold) deserts, grasslands, and
forests (Figure 7-10)—another important
component of the earth’s natural capital

Figure 7-9 Generalized effects of elevation (left) and latitude (right)

on climate and biomes. Parallel changes in vegetation type occur
when we travel from the equator to the poles or from lowlands to
mountaintops.
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Figure 7.10 Natural Capital: Average precipitation and average temperature, acting together as limiting factors
over a long time, help to determine the type of dessert, grassland, or forest biome in a particular area. Although
each actual situation is much more complex, this simplified diagram explains how climate helps to determine the
types and amounts of natural vegetation found in an area left undisturbed by human activities.
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 There are Three Major Types of Desert
 Desert are characterized with an annual precipitation of low
and scattered unevenly throughout the year.
 Desert soils have little vegetation and moisture to help store the
heat, and the skies above dessert are clear.
 A combination of low rainfall and different average temperatures creates
 Tropical deserts- hot and dry most of the year (Sahara, Namib)
 Temperate deserts- daytime temperatures are high in summer and low in winter
and more precipitation than in topical desert (Mojave)
 Cold deserts-vegetation is sparse, winters are cold and summers are warm or
hot, precipitation is low. Desert plants and animals have adaptations that help
them to stay cool to get enough water to survive (Gobi in Mongolia)

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 Three Major Types of Grassland
 Occurs mostly in the interiors of continents and persist because of seasonal
drought, grazing by large herbivores, and occasional fires-all of which keep large
numbers of shrubs and trees from growing.
 Tropical, Temperate, and Cold (arctic tundra)-—result from combinations of low
average precipitation and various average temperatures
 Tropical Grassland
 Savanna-contains widely scattered clumps of trees such as acacia which are
covered with thorns that help to keep herbivores away. This biome usually has
warm temperatures year-round and alternating dry and wet seasons.
 Grazing animals (grass- and herb-eating)
 Browsing animals (twig-and- leaf nibbling)
 Herds of these grazing and browsing animals migrate to find water and food in
response to seasonal and year-to-year variations in rainfall and food availability.
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 Three Major Types of Grassland
Temperate Grassland
 winters are bitterly cold, summers are hot and dry, and
annual precipitation is sparse and falls unevenly through the
year.
 Deep fertile soils
 Two types of temperate grassland
 Tall-grass prairies – 88 cm of rain per year, grasses have deep roots.
 Short-grass prairies- typically get 25 cm of rain a year, grasses have short roots.
 Many of the world’s natural temperate grasslands have
disappeared because their fertile soils are useful for growing crops
and grazing cattle.
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 Three Major Types of Grassland
 Cold Grassland, or arctic tundra
 lie south of the arctic polar ice cap
 most of the year, these treeless plains are bitterly cold (Figure 7-12, bottom
graph), swept by frigid winds, and covered by ice and snow. Winters are long and
dark, and scant precipitation falls mostly as snow.
 Under the snow, this biome is carpeted with a thick, spongy mat of low-growing
plants, primarily grasses, mosses, lichens, and dwarf shrubs (Figure 7-12,
bottom photo
 One outcome of the extreme cold is the formation of permafrost.
 Animals survive through adaptation
 Global warming causes some of the permafrost to melt.
 It is a fragile biome because of the short growing season, tundra soil and vegetation
recover very slowly from damage or disturbance
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TEMPERATE Shrubland: Nice climate,
risky place to live
 Temperate shrubland, chaparral
 Located in coastal regions that border on deserts.
 Southern CA, USA; the Mediterranean; central Chile; southern Australia,;
and southwestern south Africa
 Closeness to sea provides slightly longer winter rainy season; and fogs during spring and
fall reduce evaporation.
 Vegetation: Chaparral consists mostly of dense growths of low growing evergreen shrubs
and occasional small trees with leathery leaves that reduce evaporation.
 Animals: mule deer, chipmunks, jackrabbits, lizards, and variety of birds.
 People like living in this biome because of its moderate, sunny climate with mild, wet
winters and warm, dry summers.
 Prone to fires in the dry season followed by mudslide on rainy season.
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 Forest systems are lands dominated by trees. The three main types of forest—
tropical, temperate, and cold (northern coniferous and boreal)—result from
combinations of the precipitation level and various average temperatures.
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Three Major types of Forest
 Tropical Rain forest
 Are found near the equator where hot, moisture-laden air rises and dumps its moisture.
 Year-round uniformly warm temperatures, high humidity, and heavy rainfall almost daily.
 Dominated by broadleaf evergreen plants
 Stratification of specialized plant and animal niches
 Light level canopy to ground
 High species diversity (2% of earth’s surface at least half the terrestrial species
 Because of the dense vegetation, there is little wind in these forests to spread
seeds and pollen. Consequently, most rain forest plant species depend on bats,
butterflies, birds, bees, and other species to pollinate their flowers and to spread
seeds in their droppings.
 Rapid recycling of scare soil nutrients
 Impact of human activities: At least half destroyed by humans.

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Figure 7-17 Stratification of specialized plant and animal niches in a tropical rain forest. Filling such specialized
niches enables species to avoid or minimize competition for resources and results in the coexistence of a
great variety of species.

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Three Major types of Forest
 Temperate Deciduous forest
 Moderate average temperatures that change significantly with season.
 Long, warm summers; cold but not severe winters, and abundant precipitation, often spread evenly
throughout the year.
 Dominated by few species of broad-leaf deciduous tree such as oak, hickory, maple,
poplar and beech.
 Survive cold winter by dropping leaves
 Spring, grow leaves whose colors change in the fall.
 Slow decomposition rate because of accumulation of leaf litter, a storehouse of
nutrients.
 On global basis, most human disturbed terrestrial biome
 Fauna: once home to large predators such as bears, wolves, foxes and mountain lions.
 Today most predators have been killed; dominant mammals now: white-tailed deer, squirrels, rabbits,
opossums, raccoons and mice.
 Migratory birds decline due to habitat destruction and fragmentation.

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Three Major types of Forest
 Evergreen Coniferous forest, or boreal forest, or Taiga
 Located just south of arctic tundra in northern regions across North America, Asia,
and Europe and above certain altitudes in High Sierra and Rocky Mountains of the
United States.
 Subarctic Climate
 Winters are long, dry, and extremely cold.; sunlight only 608 hours per day
 Summers, short cool to warm and sun shines up to 19 hours per day.
 Dominated by coniferous evergreen trees (spruce, fir, cedar, hemlock, and pine)
 Plant adaptations to climate
 Fauna:
 Bears, wolves, moose, lynx, and burrowing rodents
 Caribou spend winter
 Migratory birds such as warblers breed here.

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Three Major types of Forest

 Coastal coniferous forest or temperate

rainforest
 Scattered in coastal temperate areas with
ample rainfall or moisture from dense fogs
 Dense stands of spruce, Douglas fir, and
redwoods once dominated undisturbed areas
along coast of North America

ADD A FOOTER 35
Mountains Play Important Ecological Roles
 Highlands's cover ¼ of the earth’s land surface
 Dramatic shifts in altitude, slope, climate and vegetation take place over short distances
 1.2 billion people live in mountain ranges
 Major storehouses of water
 Role in hydrologic cycle
 4 billion depend on them for water
 Steep slope means soil is easily eroded when vegetation holding them in place is
removed by natural disturbances such as landslides and avalanches, or human
activities, such as timber cutting and agriculture.
 Many freestanding mountains are islands of biodiversity surrounded by a sea of
lower- elevation landscapes transformed by human activities.

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Mountains Play Important Ecological Roles
 Mountains play important ecological roles. They contain majority of the world’s forests,
which are habitats for much of the planet’s terrestrial biodiversity.
 provide habitats for endemic species found nowhere else on earth. They also serve as
sanctuaries for animal species driven to migrate from lowland areas to higher altitudes.
 Mountains also help to regulate the earth’s climate.
 Mountains covered with ice and snow reflect solar radiation back into space. This
helps cool the earth and offset global warming. However, many of the world’s
mountain glaciers are affecting mostly because of global warming.
 Mountains can affect sea levels by storing and releasing water in glacial ice. As the earth
gets warmer, mountaintop glaciers and other land-based glaciers can melt, adding water to
the oceans and helping to raise sea levels.

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How have we affected the World’s
terrestrial ecosystem?

In many areas, human activities are impairing ecological and

economic services provided by the earth’s deserts, grasslands,
forests, and mountains

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Humans have Disturbed Most of the Earth’s
Lands
 According to the 2005 Millennium Ecosystem Assessment, 62% of
the world’s major terrestrial ecosystem are being degraded or
used unsustainably.
 A major question of interest: how long can we keep eating away at
these terrestrial forms of natural capital without threatening our
economies and long-term survival of our own species?
 Protection of remaining wild areas
 Restoration of degraded and destroyed natural areas
 The balance between exploitation and conservation is highly controversial.

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THANK YOU!