Principles of Environmental Science

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Active Learning Comparing Biome Climates 101 6.1 World Forests 129
Tropical seasonal forests have annual dry seasons 101 Boreal and tropical forests are most abundant 129
Tropical savannas and grasslands are dry most of the year 101 Active Learning Calculating Forest Area 130
Deserts are hot or cold, but always dry 101 Forests provide essential products 130
Temperate grasslands have rich soils 102 Tropical forests are being cleared rapidly 131
Temperate scrublands have summer drought 102 Saving forests stabilizes our climate 133
Temperate forests can be evergreen or deciduous 103 Temperate forests also are at risk 133
Boreal forests lie north of the temperate zone 103 What Do You Think? Protecting Forests to Prevent
Tundra can freeze in any month 104 Climate Change 135
5.2 Marine Environments 105 Key Concepts Save a tree, save the climate? 136
Active Learning Examining Climate Graphs 105 Exploring Science Using Technology to Protect the Forest 138
Open ocean communities vary from surface to hadal zone 106 What Can You Do? Lowering Your Forest Impacts 139
Tidal shores support rich, diverse communities 106 6.2 Grasslands 140
5.3 Freshwater Ecosystems 108 Grazing can be sustainable or damaging 141
Lakes have extensive open water 108 Overgrazing threatens many rangelands 141
Wetlands are shallow and productive 108 Ranchers are experimenting with new methods 142
Streams and rivers are open systems 109 6.3 Parks and Preserves 142
5.4 Biodiversity 110 Many countries have created nature preserves 143
Increasingly we identify species by genetic similarity 110 Not all preserves are preserved 144
Biodiversity hot spots are rich and threatened 110 Marine ecosystems need greater protection 145
5.5 Benefits of Biodiversity 110 Conservation and economic development can work together 146
Biodiversity provides food and medicines 111 Native people can play important roles in nature protection 146
Biodiversity can aid ecosystem stability 112 Exploring Science Saving the Chimps of Gombe 147
Aesthetic and existence values are important 112 What Can You Do? Being a Responsible Ecotourist 148
Species survival can depend on preserve size and shape 149
5.6 What Threatens Biodiversity? 112
HIPPO summarizes human impacts 112 Conclusion 149
Habitat destruction is usually the main threat 112 Data Analysis Detecting Edge Effects 151
Key Concepts What is biodiversity worth? 114
Invasive species are a growing threat 116
Exploring Science What’s the Harm in Setting Unused Bait Free? 117

7
What Can You Do? You Can Help Preserve Biodiversity 119
Pollution poses many types of risk 119
Population growth consumes space, resources 120
Overharvesting depletes or eliminates species 120
5.7 Biodiversity Protection 122
Hunting and fishing laws protect useful species 122 Food and Agriculture 152
The Endangered Species Act protects habitat and species 122
Recovery plans aim to rebuild populations 122 LEARNING OUTCOMES  152
Landowner collaboration is key 123
The ESA has seen successes and controversies 123 Case Study Farming the Cerrado 153
Many countries have species protection laws 124 7.1 Global Trends in Food and Hunger 154
Habitat protection may be better than species protection 124 Food security is unevenly distributed 154
Conclusion 125 Active Learning Mapping Poverty and Plenty 156
Data Analysis Confidence Limits in the Breeding Bird Survey 126 Famines have political and social roots 156
7.2 How Much Food Do We Need? 157
A healthy diet includes the right nutrients 157

6
Overeating is a growing world problem 157
More production doesn’t necessarily reduce hunger 158
Biofuels have boosted commodity prices 159
Do we have enough farmland? 159
7.3 What Do We Eat? 160
Rising meat production is a sign of wealth 160
Environmental Conservation: Seafood, both wild and farmed, depends on
Forests, Grasslands, Parks, wild-source inputs 161
Biohazards arise in industrial production 162
and Nature Preserves 127 Active Learning Where in the World Did You Eat Today? 162
LEARNING OUTCOMES  127 7.4 Living Soil Is a Precious Resource 163
What is soil? 163
Case Study Palm Oil and Endangered Species 128 Healthy soil fauna can determine soil fertility 163

CO N T EN TS  vii
 Your food comes mostly from the A horizon 164 Exposure and susceptibility determine how we respond 192
How do we use and abuse soil? 165 Bioaccumulation and biomagnification increase
Water is the leading cause of soil loss 165 chemical concentrations 193
Wind is a close second in erosion 166 Persistence makes some materials a greater threat 193
7.5 Agricultural Inputs 166 Chemical interactions can increase toxicity 195
High yields usually require irrigation 166 8.4 Mechanisms for Minimizing Toxic Effects 195
Fertilizers boost production 167 Metabolic degradation and excretion eliminate toxics 195
Modern agriculture runs on oil 167 Repair mechanisms mend damage 195
Key Concepts How can we feed the world? 168 8.5 Measuring Toxicity 195
Pesticide use continues to rise 170 We usually test toxic effects on lab animals 196
7.6 How Have We Managed to Feed Billions? 171 There is a wide range of toxicity 196
The green revolution has increased yields 171 Active Learning Assessing Toxins 197
Genetic engineering has benefits and costs 172 Acute versus chronic doses and effects 197
Most GMOs are engineered for pesticide production Detectable levels aren’t always dangerous 198
or pesticide tolerance 173 Low doses can have variable effects 198
Is genetic engineering safe? 173 Exploring Science The Epigenome 199
7.7 Sustainable Farming Strategies 174 8.6 Risk Assessment and Acceptance 200
Soil conservation is essential 174 Our perception of risks isn’t always rational 200
Groundcover, reduced tilling protect soil 175 How much risk is acceptable? 201
Low-input sustainable agriculture can benefit people Active Learning Calculating Probabilities 201
and the environment 175 8.7 Establishing Public Policy 202
What Do You Think? Shade-Grown Coffee and Cocoa 176 Conclusion 203
7.8 Consumer Action and Farming 177 Data Analysis How Do We Evaluate Risk and Fear? 204
You can be a locavore 177
You can eat low on the food chain 177

9
Conclusion 177
Data Analysis Mapping Your Food Supply 179

8 Climate
LEARNING OUTCOMES  205
205

Environmental Health Case Study Shrinking Florida 206

and Toxicology 180 9.1 What Is the Atmosphere? 207
LEARNING OUTCOMES  180 The atmosphere captures energy selectively 208
Evaporated water stores and redistributes heat 209
Ocean currents also redistribute heat 210
Case Study How Dangerous Is BPA? 181
9.2 Climate Changes over Time 210
8.1 Environmental Health 182 Ice cores tell us about climate history 211
Global disease burden is changing 182 What causes natural climatic swings? 211
Emergent and infectious diseases still kill millions El Niño/Southern Oscillation is one of many
of people 183 regional cycles 212
Conservation medicine combines ecology
9.3 How Do We Know the Climate Is Changing
and health care 185
Faster Than Usual? 213
Resistance to antibiotics and pesticides is increasing 186
Active Learning Can you explain key evidence on
What Can You Do? Tips for Staying Healthy 187
climate change? 213
8.2 Toxicology 188 Scientific consensus is clear 214
How do toxics affect us? 188 Rising heat waves, sea level, and storms are expected 214
Endocrine hormone disrupters are of special concern 189 The main greenhouse gases are CO2, CH4, and N2O 215
Key Concepts What toxins and hazards are present What consequences do we see? 217
in your home? 190 Ice loss produces positive feedbacks 217
8.3 Movement, Distribution, and Fate of Toxins 192 Controlling emissions is cheap compared to
Solubility and mobility determine when and climate change 219
where chemicals move 192 Why are there disputes over climate evidence? 219

viii CO N T E N TS
 11
Key Concepts Climate change in a nutshell:
How does it work? 220
Exploring Science How Do We Know That Climate
Change Is Human-Caused? 222
9.4 Envisioning Solutions 223
International protocols have tried to establish common rules 224
A wedge approach has multiple solutions 224 Water: Resources and Pollution 250
Wind, water, and solar could save the climate 225
What Do You Think? Unburnable carbon 226 LEARNING OUTCOMES  250
What Can You Do? Climate Action 226
Local initiatives are everywhere 226 Case Study A Water State of Emergency 251
Carbon capture saves CO2 but is expensive 227
11.1 Water Resources 252
Conclusion 227 How does the hydrologic cycle redistribute water? 252
Data Analysis Examining the IPCC Fifth Assessment Major water compartments vary in residence time 253
Report (AR5) 228 Groundwater storage is vast and cycles slowly 254
Surface water and atmospheric moisture cycle quickly 255
Active Learning Mapping the Water-Rich

10
and Water-Poor Countries 255
11.2 How Much Water do We Use? 255
“Virtual water” is exported in many ways 256
Some products are thirstier than others 256
Industrial uses include energy production 257
Domestic water supplies protect health 257
Air Pollution 229 11.3 Dealing with Water Scarcity 257
LEARNING OUTCOMES  229 Drought, climate, and water shortages 258
What Do You Think? Water and Power 259
Groundwater supplies are being depleted 260
Case Study The Great London Smog 230
Diversion projects redistribute water 260
10.1 Air Pollution and Health 231 Questions of justice often surround dam projects 261
The Clean Air Act regulates major pollutants 232 Would you fight for water? 262
Active Learning Compare Sources of Pollutants 233
11.4 Water Conservation and Management 263
Conventional pollutants are abundant and serious 233
Everyone can help conserve water 263
Hazardous air pollutants can cause cancer and
What Can You Do? Saving Water and Preventing Pollution 263
nerve damage 235
Communities are starting to recycle water 264
Mercury is a key neurotoxin 236
Indoor air can be worse than outdoor air 236 11.5 Water Pollutants 264
Pollution includes point sources and nonpoint sources 264
10.2 Air Pollution and Climate 236
Biological pollution includes pathogens and waste 265
What Do You Think? Cap and Trade for Mercury Pollution? 237
Nutrients cause eutrophication 266
Air pollutants travel the globe 237
Inorganic pollutants include metals, salts, and acids 267
CO2 and halogens are key greenhouse gases 238
Exploring Science Inexpensive Water Purification 268
The Supreme Court has charged the EPA with controlling
Organic chemicals include pesticides and
greenhouse gases 239
industrial substances 268
CFCs also destroy ozone in the stratosphere 239
Is bottled water safer? 269
CFC control has had remarkable success 240
Sediment is one of our most abundant pollutants 269
10.3 Environmental and Health Effects 240
11.6 Persistent Challenges 270
Acid deposition results from SO4 and NOx 241
Developing countries often have serious
Urban areas endure inversions and heat islands 242
water pollution 270
Smog and haze reduce visibility 243
Groundwater is especially hard to clean up 271
10.4 Air Pollution Control 243 Ocean pollution has few controls 272
The best strategy is reducing production 243
11.7 Water Treatment and Remediation 273
Clean air legislation is controversial but
Impaired water can be restored 273
extremely successful 244
Nonpoint sources require prevention 273
Trading pollution credits is one approach 245
How do we treat municipal waste? 274
10.5 The Ongoing Challenge 245 Municipal treatment has three levels of quality 274
Pollution persists in developing areas 245 Natural wastewater treatment can be an answer 274
Change is possible 245 Remediation can involve containment, extraction,
Key Concepts Can we afford clean air? 246 or biological treatment 275
Conclusion 248 Key Concepts Could natural systems treat
Data Analysis How Polluted Is Your Hometown? 249 our wastewater? 276

CO N T EN TS  ix
 13
11.8
Legal Protections for Water 278
The Clean Water Act was ambitious, popular,
and largely successful 278
The CWA helped fund infrastructure 278
The CWA established permitting systems 278
The CWA has made real but incomplete progress 279
Conclusion 279 Energy 302
Data Analysis Graphing Global Water Stress and Scarcity 280
LEARNING OUTCOMES  302

Case Study Greening Gotham: Can New York Reach

12
an 80 by 50 Goal? 303
13.1 Energy Resources 304
The future of energy is not the past 304
We measure energy in units such as J and W 305
How much energy do we use? 306

Environmental Geology 13.2 Fossil Fuels

Coal resources are greater than we can use
306
306
and Earth Resources 281 Coal use is declining in the U.S. 307
LEARNING OUTCOMES  281 When will we run out of oil? 307
Extreme oil and tar sands have extended our supplies 308
Access to markets is a key challenge 309
Case Study Mountaintop Removal Mining 282 Natural gas is growing in importance 309
12.1 Earth Processes Shape Our Resources 283 Hydraulic fracturing opens up tight gas resources 309
Earth is a dynamic planet 283 13.3 Nuclear Power and Hydropower 310
Tectonic processes reshape continents Nuclear power is important but controversial 310
and cause earthquakes 284 How do nuclear reactors work? 311
12.2 Minerals and Rocks 286 We lack safe storage for radioactive waste 311
The rock cycle creates and recycles rocks 286 What Do You Think? Twilight for Nuclear Power? 312
Weathering and sedimentation 286 Moving water is one of our oldest power sources 313
12.3 Economic Geology and Mineralogy 287 Large dams have large impacts 314
Metals are essential to our economy 287 13.4 Energy Efficiency and Conservation 314
Nonmetal mineral resources include gravel, What Can You Do? Steps to Save Energy and Money 314
clay, glass, and salts 288 Active Learning Driving Down Gas Costs 315
Exploring Science Rare Earth Metals: Costs can depend on how you calculate them 315
The New Strategic Materials 289 Tight houses save money 316
Currently, the earth provides almost all our fuel 289 Passive housing is becoming standard in some areas 316
Key Concepts Where does your cell phone come from? 290 Cogeneration makes electricity from waste heat 317
12.4 Environmental Effects of Resource Extraction 292 13.5 Wind and Solar Energy 317
Active Learning What Geologic Resources Wind could meet all our energy needs 318
Are You Using Right Now? 292 Wind power provides local control of energy 319
Mining and drilling can degrade water quality 292 Solar thermal systems collect usable heat 319
Surface mining destroys landscapes 293 CSP makes electricity from heat 319
Processing contaminates air, water, and soil 294 Key Concepts How can we transition to alternative energy? 320
12.5 Conserving Geologic Resources 294 Photovoltaic cells generate electricity directly 323
Recycling saves energy as well as materials 294 13.6 Biomass and Geothermal Energy 324
New materials can replace mined resources 295 Ethanol has been the main focus 324
12.6 Geologic Hazards 295 Cellulosic ethanol could be an alternative 325
Earthquakes are frequent and deadly hazards 295 Methane from biomass is efficient and clean 325
Volcanoes eject deadly gases and ash 296 Could algae be a hope for the future? 326
Floods are part of a river’s land-shaping processes 297 Geothermal energy provides electricity and heat 326
Flood control 298 13.7 Energy Storage and Transmission 326
Mass wasting includes slides and slumps 298 Utilities can promote renewables 327
Erosion destroys fields and undermines buildings 299 13.8 What’s Our Energy Future? 328
Conclusion 299 Conclusion 329
Data Analysis Exploring Recent Earthquakes 301 Data Analysis Personal Energy Use 330

x CO N T E N TS
 14
15.1 Cities Are Places of Crisis and Opportunity 354
Large cities are expanding rapidly 355
Immigration is driven by push and pull factors 356
Congestion, pollution, and water shortages
plague many cities 356
What Do You Think? People for Community Recovery 357
Solid and Hazardous Waste 331 Many cities lack sufficient housing 357
15.2 Urban Planning 358
LEARNING OUTCOMES  331 Transportation is crucial in city development 358
Rebuilding cities 359
Case Study A Waste-Free City 332 Key Concepts What makes a city green? 360
14.1 What Waste Do We Produce? 333 We can make our cities more livable 362
The waste stream is everything we throw away 334 New urbanism incorporates smart growth 362
14.2 Waste Disposal Methods 334 15.3 Economics and Sustainable Development 364
Open dumps release hazardous substances into Can development be sustainable? 364
the air and water 334 Our definitions of resources shape how we use them 364
Ocean dumping is mostly uncontrolled 335 Ecological economics incorporates principles
Landfills receive most of our waste 336 of ecology 365
Active Learning Life-Cycle Analysis 336 Scarcity can lead to innovation 367
We often export waste to countries ill-equipped Communal property resources are a classic problem
to handle it 336 in economics 367
Incineration produces energy from trash 337 15.4 Natural Resource Accounting 368
What Do You Think? Environmental Justice 338 Active Learning Costs and Benefits 369
14.3 Shrinking the Waste Stream 339 Internalizing external costs 369
Recycling saves money, energy, and space 340 New approaches measure real progress 370
Composting recycles organic waste 341 What Can You Do? Personally Responsible Consumerism 370
Reuse is even better than recycling 341 15.5 Trade, Development, and Jobs 371
Key Concepts Garbage: Liability or resource? 342 Microlending helps the poorest of the poor 371
Reducing waste is the cheapest option 344 Active Learning Try Your Hand at Microlending 371
What Can You Do? Reducing Waste 345 What Do You Think? Loans That Change Lives 372
14.4 Hazardous and Toxic Wastes 345 Market mechanisms can reduce pollution 373
Hazardous waste includes many dangerous substances 345 15.6 Green Business and Green Design 373
Active Learning A Personal Hazardous Waste Inventory 346 Green design is good for business and the environment 373
Federal legislation regulates hazardous waste 346 Environmental protection creates jobs 374
Superfund sites are listed for federally funded cleanup 347 Conclusion 374
Brownfields present both liability and opportunity 348 Data Analysis Plotting Trends in Urbanization
Hazardous waste must be processed or stored permanently 348 and Economic Indicators 376
Exploring Science Bioremediation 350
Conclusion 350

16
Data Analysis How Much Waste Do You Produce,
and How Much Do You Know How to Manage? 351

15 Environmental Policy
and Sustainability
LEARNING OUTCOMES
377
377
Economics and Urbanization 352
LEARNING OUTCOMES 352 Case Study 350.org: Making a Change 378
16.1 Environmental Policy and Science 379
What drives policy making? 379
Case Study Vauban: A Car-Free Suburb 353 Policy creation is ongoing and cyclic 380

CO N T EN TS  xi
 Are we better safe than sorry?
Active Learning Environment, Science, and
380
List of Case Studies
Policy in Your Community 381 Chapter 1 Understanding Our Environment
16.2 Major Environmental Laws 381 Assessing Sustainability 2
NEPA (1969) establishes public oversight 381 Chapter 2 Environmental Systems: Matter and Energy of Life
The Clean Air Act (1970) regulates air emissions 381 Working to Rescue an Ecosystem 27
The Clean Water Act (1972) protects surface water 382
The Endangered Species Act (1973) protects wildlife 382 Chapter 3 Evolution, Species Interactions, and
The Superfund Act (1980) addresses hazardous sites 382 Biological Communities
Natural Selection and the Galápagos Finches 51
16.3 How Are Policies Implemented? 383
The legislative branch establishes statutes (laws) 383 Chapter 4 Human Populations
Key Concepts How does the Clean Water Act benefit you? 384 Population Stabilization in Brazil 77
The judicial branch resolves legal disputes 386
The executive branch oversees administrative rules 387 Chapter 5 Biomes and Biodiversity
How much government do we want? 387 Forest Responses to Global Warming 97
16.4 International Policies 388 Chapter 6 Environmental Conservation: Forests,
Major international agreements 389 Grasslands, Parks, and Nature Preserves
Enforcement often relies on national pride 389 Palm Oil and Endangered Species 128
16.5 What Can Individuals Do? 390 Chapter 7 Food and Agriculture
What Can You Do? Actions to influence environmental policy 391 Farming the Cerrado 153
Environmental literacy integrates science and policy 391
Colleges and universities are powerful catalysts Chapter 8 Environmental Health and Toxicology
for change 392 How Dangerous Is BPA? 181
Exploring Science Citizen Science: The Christmas
Chapter 9 Climate
Bird Count 393
Shrinking Florida 206
Schools are embracing green building 393
Audits help reduce energy consumption 394 Chapter 10 Air Pollution
How much is enough? 395 The Great London Smog 230
16.6 The Challenges of Sustainable Development 396 Chapter 11 Water: Resources and Pollution
UN Millennium Development Goals provided A Water State of Emergency 251
benchmarks 396
Conclusion 398 Chapter 12 Environmental Geology and Earth Resources
Mountaintop Removal Mining 282
Data Analysis Campus Environmental Audit 399
Chapter 13 Energy
Greening Gotham: Can New York Reach an
APPENDIX 1 Vegetation A-2 80 by 50 Goal? 303
APPENDIX 2 World Population Density A-3 Chapter 14 Solid and Hazardous Waste
A Waste-Free City 332
APPENDIX 3 Temperature Regions and Ocean Currents A-4
Chapter 15 Economics and Urbanization
Vauban: A Car-Free Suburb 353
Glossary G-1
Credits C–1 Chapter 16 Environmental Policy and Sustainability
350.org: Making a Change 378
Index I–1
Over 200 additional Case Studies can be found online on the
instructor’s resource page at www.mcgrawhillconnect.com.

xii CO N T E N TS
Preface
UNDERSTANDING CRISIS
AND OPPORTUNITY
Environmental science often emphasizes that while we are sur-
rounded by challenges, we also have tremendous opportunities.
We face critical challenges in biodiversity loss, clean water protec-
tion, climate change, population growth, sustainable food systems,
and many other areas. But we also have tremendous opportunities
to take action to protect and improve our environment. By study-
ing environmental science, you have the opportunity to gain the
tools and the knowledge to make intelligent choices on these and
countless other questions.
Because of its emphasis on problem solving, environmental
science is often a hopeful field. Even while we face burgeoning
cities, warming climates, looming water crises, we can observe
solutions in global expansion in access to education, healthcare,
information, even political participation and human rights. Birth-
rates are falling almost everywhere, as women’s rights gradually
improve. Creative individuals are inventing new ideas for alterna-
tive energy and transportation systems that were undreamed of a
generation ago. We are rethinking our assumptions about how to
improve cities, food production, water use, and air quality. Local
action is rewriting our expectations, and even economic and politi-
cal powers feel increasingly compelled to show cooperation in
improving environmental quality
Climate change is a central theme in this book and in envi-
ronmental science generally. As in other topics, we face dire risks
but also surprising new developments and new paths toward sus-
tainability. China, the world’s largest emitter of carbon ­dioxide,
expects to begin reducing its emissions within in a decade, much
sooner than predicted. Many countries are starting to show
declining emissions, and there is clear evidence that economic
growth no longer depends on carbon fossil fuels. Greenhouse gas
emissions continue to rise, but nations are showing unexpected
willingness to cooperate in striving to reduce emissions. Much
of this cooperation is driven by growing acknowledgment of the
widespread economic and humanitarian costs of climate change.
Additional driving forces, though, are the growing list of alterna-
tives that make carbon reductions far easier to envision, or even to
achieve, than a few years ago.
Sustainability, also a central idea in this book, has grown from
a fringe notion to a widely shared framework for daily actions
(recycling, reducing consumption) and civic planning (building
­ deeply involved in sustainability, environmental science, and
energy-efficient buildings, investing in public transit and bicycle
routes). Sustainability isn’t just about the environment anymore.
Increasingly we know that sustainability is also smart economics and
that it is essential for social equity. Energy efficiency saves money.
Alternative energy can reduce our reliance on fuel sources in politi-
cally unstable regions. Healthier food options reduce medical costs.
Accounting for the public costs and burdens of pollution and waste
disposal helps us rethink the ways we dispose of our garbage and
protect public health. Growing awareness of these co-benefits helps
us understand the broad importance of sustainability.
Students are Providing Leadership
Students are leading the way in reimagining our possible futures.
Student movements have led innovation in technology and science,
in sustainability planning (chapter 1), in environmental gover-
nance (chapter 9), and in environmental justice around the world.
The organization 350.org (chapter 16) was started by a small group
of students seeking to address climate change. That movement has
energized local communities to join the public debate on how to
seek a sustainable future. Students have the vision and the motiva-
tion to create better paths toward sustainability and social justice,
at home and globally.
You may be like many students who find environmental sci-
ence an empowering field. It provides the knowledge needed to
use your efforts more effectively. Environmental science applies
to our everyday lives and the places where we live, and we can
apply ideas learned in this discipline to any place or occupation in
which we find ourselves. And environmental science can connect
to any set of interests or skills you might bring to it: Progress in the
field involves biology, chemistry, geography, and geology. Com-
municating and translating ideas to the public, who are impacted
by changes in environmental quality, requires writing, arts, media,
and other communication skills. Devising policies to protect
resources and enhance cooperation involves policy, anthropology,
culture, and history. What this means is that while there is much to
learn, this field can also connect with whatever passions you bring
to the course.
WHAT SETS THIS BOOK APART?
Solid science and an emphasis on sustainability: This book
reflects the authors’ decades of experience in the field and in
the classroom, which make it up-to-date in approach, in data,
and in applications of critical thinking. The authors have been
conservation programs at the University of Minnesota and at
­Vassar College. Their experience and courses on these topics have
strongly influenced the way ideas in this book are presented and
explained.
P REFAC E  xiii
Demystifying science: We make science accessible by showing
how and why data collection is done and by giving examples, prac-
tice, and exercises that demonstrate central principles. ­Exploring
Science readings empower students by helping them understand
how scientists do their work. These readings give examples of
technology and methods in environmental science.
Quantitative reasoning: Students need to become comfortable with
graphs, data, and comparing numbers. We provide focused discus-
sions on why scientists answer questions with numbers, the nature of
statistics, of probability, and how to interpret the message in a graph.
We give accessible details on population models, GIS (mapping and
spatial analysis), remote sensing, and other quantitative techniques.
In-text applications and online, testable Data Analysis questions give
students opportunities to practice with ideas, rather than just reading
about them.
Critical thinking: We provide a focus on critical thinking, one
of the most essential skills for citizens, as well as for students.
Starting with a focused discussion of critical thinking in chapter 1,
we offer abundant opportunities for students to weigh contrast-
ing ­evidence and evaluate assumptions and arguments, including
What Do You Think? readings.
Up-to-date concepts and data: Throughout the text we introduce
emerging ideas and issues such as ecosystem services, coopera-
tive ecological relationships, epigenetics, and the economics of air
pollution control, in addition to basic principles such as popula-
tion biology, the nature of systems, and climate processes. Current
approaches to climate change mitigation, campus sustainability,
sustainable food production, and other issues give students cur-
rent insights into major issues in environmental science and its
applications. We introduce students to current developments such
as ecosystem services, coevolution, strategic targeting of Marine
Protected Areas, impacts of urbanization, challenges of REDD
(reducing emissions through deforestation and degradation),
renewable energy development in China and Europe, fertility
declines in the developing world, and the impact of global food
trade on world hunger.
Active learning: Learning how scientists approach problems can
help students develop habits of independent, orderly, and objec-
tive thought. But it takes active involvement to master these skills.
This book integrates a range of learning aids—Active Learning
exercises, Critical Thinking and Discussion questions, and Data
Analysis exercises—that push students to think for themselves.
Data and interpretations are presented not as immutable truths but
rather as evidence to be examined and tested, as they should be
in the real world. Taking time to look closely at figures, compare
information in multiple figures, or apply ideas in text is an impor-
tant way to solidify and deepen understanding of key ideas.
Synthesis: Students come to environmental science from a multi-
tude of fields and interests. We emphasize that most of our pressing
problems, from global hunger or climate change to conservation
of biodiversity, draw on sciences and economics and policy. This
synthesis shows students that they can be engaged in environmen-
tal science, no matter what their interests or career path.
xiv P R E FAC E
A global perspective: Environmental science is a globally inter-
connected discipline. Case studies, data, and examples from
around the world give opportunities to examine international ques-
tions. Half of the 16 case studies examine international issues of
global importance, such as forest conservation in Indonesia, soy
production in Brazil, and car-free cities in Germany. Half of all
boxed readings and Key Concepts are also global in focus. In addi-
tion, Google Earth place marks take students virtually to locations
where they can see and learn the context of the issues they read.
Key concepts: In each chapter this section draws together com-
pelling illustrations and succinct text to create a summary “take-
home” message. These key concepts draw together the major
ideas, questions, and debates in the chapter but give students a
central idea on which to focus. These can also serve as starting
points for lectures, student projects, or discussions.
Positive perspective: All the ideas noted here can empower stu-
dents to do more effective work for the issues they believe in.
While we don’t shy away from the bad news, we highlight positive
ways in which groups and individuals are working to improve their
environment. What Can You Do? features in every chapter offer
practical examples of things everyone can do to make progress
toward sustainability.
Thorough coverage: No other book on in the field addresses the
multifaceted nature of environmental questions such as climate
policy, sustainability, or population change, with the thorough-
ness this book has. We cover not just climate change but also the
nature of climate and weather systems that influence our day-
to-day experience of climate conditions. We explore both food
shortages and the emerging causes of hunger—such as political
conflict, biofuels, and global commodity trading—as well as the
relationship between food insecurity and the growing pandemic of
obesity-related illness. In these and other examples, this book is a
leader in in-depth coverage of key topics.
Student empowerment: Our aim is to help students understand
that they can make a difference. From campus sustainability
assessments (chapter 1) to public activism (chapter 13) to global
environmental organizing (chapter 16) we show ways that student
actions have led to policy changes on all scales. In all chapters we
emphasize ways that students can take action to practice the ideas
they learn and to play a role in the policy issues they care about.
What can you do? boxed features give steps students can take to
make a difference.
Exceptional online support: Online resources integrated with read-
ings encourage students to pause, review, practice, and explore ideas,
as well as to practice quizzing themselves on information presented.
McGraw-Hill’s ConnectPlus (www.mcgrawhillconnect.com) is a
web-based assignment and assessment platform that gives students
the means to better connect with their coursework, with their instruc-
tors, and with the important concepts that they will need to know for
success now and in the future. Valuable assets such as LearnSmart
(an adaptive learning system), an interactive ebook, Data Analysis
exercises, the extensive case study library, and Google Earth exer-
cises are all available in Connect.
WHAT’S NEW IN THIS EDITION?
This edition has an enhanced focus on two major themes, cli-
mate and sustainability. These themes have always been central
to this book, but the current edition gives additional explanation
and examples that help students consider these dominant ideas of
our time. The climate chapter (chapter 9) provides up-to-date data
from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCCC)
as well as expanded explanations of climate dynamics, includ-
ing positive feedbacks and why greenhouse gases capture energy.
Overall, one-third of chapter-opening case studies are new, and
data and figures have been updated throughout the book. Specific
chapter changes include the following:
Chapter 1: New opening case study focuses on campus sustain-
ability and how students can contribute. There is a revised discus-
sion of methods in science and of major themes in the course, to
give students a sense of direction through the book and the course.
The Exploring Science boxed reading is updated to focus on statis-
tics for the Human Development Index.
Chapter 2: This chapter emphasizes connections between general
ideas in environmental chemistry and environmental systems, and
why they matter for understanding topics in an environmental sci-
ence class: For example why should you know about isotopes, and
how does pH or radioactivity matter in water pollution?
Chapter 3: Expanded attention to the importance of symbiotic
and coevolutionary relationships among species. Included in this
is a new boxed reading on the microbiome of organisms that live
in and on our bodies and aid our survival (p. 63). We have retained
the focus on Darwin, evolution, and principles of speciation that
are central to this chapter.
Chapter 4: Updated figures on global population growth, fertil-
ity rates, resource consumption, and hunger. Updated data regard-
ing mortality, disease risk, life expectancy, and other demographic
factors. Estimates of global population trends by 2050 are updated.
Chapter 6: New opening case study on declining forest habitat for
orangutans, associated with forest clearance for palm oil produc-
tion and other purposes. This phenomenon is spreading through-
out the tropics and represents one of the greatest recent threats to
forest conservation. The case study links to a new boxed reading
on Norwegian REDD investments in Indonesian forest conserva-
tion in the interest of slowing climate change. Updated figures on
global forest extent and changes, including evident declines in
deforestation rates in Brazil.
Chapter 7: Updated figures on food production and access, also
updated data on hunger, obesity, and food insecurity, including
the role of conflict in famines. Expanded discussion of pesticides,
including a new graph and map of glyphosate applications (fig. 7.22).
Chapter 8: New section on emergent diseases, including those asso-
ciated with bushmeat in developing areas and updated map of major
emergent disease incidents (fig. 8.5). There is a new discussion of
antibiotic resistant bacterial infections and their link to confined live-
stock production, as well as to misuse of antibiotics in healthcare.
Chapter 9: New opening case study on sea level change and its
impacts on coastal areas, such as Florida, as well as 11 new or
revised figures, including figures from recent IPCC reports. A
new Active Learning section (p. 213) asks students to explain key
evidence for climate change; a new section on positive feedbacks
explains the role of sea ice in global climate regulation (fig. 9. 18).
The chapter closes with an updated discussion of policy responses
to climate change.
Chapter 10: Updated discussion of EPA regulation of carbon as a
pollutant, and of controlling halogen emissions. New discussion of
persistent air pollution challenges in India, China, and other parts
of the industrializing world.
Chapter 11: New opening case study on water resources in
California and the impacts of drought on agriculture and cities.
Because the previous case study on Lake Mead and the Colorado
River remains newsworthy, the topic has been revised and updated
as a What do you think? boxed reading. Largely revised section on
clean water protections, and clean water in developing areas.
Chapter 12: Updated notes on fossil fuel extraction and its effects
in the continental United States, including earthquakes. The Kath-
mandu earthquake of spring 2015 is noted, with reasons for its
extreme destructiveness.
Chapter 13: The energy chapter is largely revised to reflect
recent changes in both conventional energy and sustainable energy
resources. Updates include expanded attention to the emerging
importance of alternative energy resources, as well as develop-
ments in the conventional energy resources that still dominate
supplies. A new opening case study highlights the importance of
energy policy for climate change. The chapter has 11 new figures,
including updated maps of gas, wind, and solar energy resources.
Chapter 14: Figures on waste production and management are
updated.
Chapter 16: Recasts policy to more explicitly integrate environ-
mental science with the policy options that apply environmental data
to decision making (section 16.1). The discussion of judicial impacts
on policy includes updated notes on Supreme Court’s rulings requir-
ing that the EPA regulate carbon dioxide, as well as the Court’s
impacts on campaign finance debates. The section on individual
actions is revised, as is the What can you do? box and a discussion
of the successes of the Millennium Development Goals and the chal-
lenge of the UN’s emerging Sustainable Development Goals.
P REFAC E  xv
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
We are sincerely grateful to Jodi Rhomberg and Michelle Vogler, who
oversaw the development of this edition, and to Peggy Selle, who
shepherded the project through production.
We would like to thank the following individuals who wrote and/
or reviewed learning goal-oriented content for LearnSmart.
Broward College, Nilo Marin
Broward College, David Serrano
Northern Arizona University, Sylvester Allred
Palm Beach State College, Jessica Miles
Roane State Community College, Arthur C. Lee
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Trent McDowell
University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee, Gina S. Szablewski
Input from instructors teaching this course is invaluable to the
development of each new edition. Our thanks and gratitude go out
to the following individuals who either completed detailed chapter
reviews or provided market feedback for this course.
American University, Priti P. Brahma
Antelope Valley College, Zia Nisani
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Assistant Professor Viterbo University, Christopher Iremonger
Aurora University, Carrie Milne-Zelman
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xvi P R E FAC E
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District, John G. Shiber
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Niagara University, William J. Edwards
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Sheila Miracle
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West Chester University of Pennsylvania, Robin C. Leonard
Westminster College, Christine Stracey
Worcester Polytechnic Institute, Theodore C. Crusberg
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P REFAC E  xvii
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Guided Tour
Application-based learning contributes
to engaged scientific investigation.
What is biodiversity worth ? Lakes/rivers
KEY CONCEPTS
it’s nice if you can afford it, but most
Often we consider biodiversity conservation
need to make a living. We find ourselves
against ethical or aesthetic value of
to good economic sense? This question
ecosystems and biodiversity. For example,
to the value of logs taken from the
hard. We take countless ecosystem
flooding and erosion, soil formation,
pollination, food production, and more.
sells them directly, it’s harder to name
a series of studies called The Economics of Ecosystems and
In 2009–2010,
(TEEB) compiled available research
found that the value of ecological
least $33 trillion per year.
services is more than double the
The graphs below show values for
reefs. These graphs show average
region.
Note that these graphs have different
Food
KC 5.2
Water
Waste/water purification
$U.S. PER HECTARE OF TROPICAL
Medicines
Air quality
Recreation, tourism
Raw materials
Genetic resources
Erosion prevention
Water supply regulation
Climate regulation
$0
Waste treatment KC 5.3
Ornamentals
$U.S. PER HECTARE OF CORAL REEF
Raw materials
Food
Climate regulation
Intellectual values
Aesthetic amenities
Shoreline protection
Recreation and tourism
$0
Untitled-5 114
Case Studies
All chapters open with a real-
world case study to help students
appreciate and understand how
environmental science impacts
lives and how scientists study
complex issues.
CASE STUDY
Palm Oil and Endangered Species
A re your donuts, toothpaste,
or shampoo killing criti-
cally endangered orang-
utans and tigers in Sumatra and
Borneo? How could that be possi-
ble, you may wonder. The link is in
rapidly expanding Indonesian palm
plantations, which are destroying
the habitat of rare species, such
as orangutans, tigers, rhinos, and
elephants. What were once some
of the most highly productive and
biologically diverse lowland rain-
forests in the world are rapidly
being converted into palm mono-
cultures that have no room for
endangered species.
In Indonesian Orang means Indonesia has more than quadrupled to 11 million ha (27 million acres)
person or people, and utan means and now produces about 60 percent of the world supply of this
of the forest. Orangutans are among valuable oil. This rapid growth has destroyed habitat and displaced
the closest and most charismatic many critically endangered species.
of our primate relatives, sharing at
least 97 percent of our genes. They’re also among the most criti-
cally endangered of all the great apes. It’s estimated that between
1,000 and 5,000 of these shy forest giants are killed every year by
loggers or poachers. Today only about 6,000 orangutans are left
in Sumatra and about 50,000 in Borneo. The United Nations warns
that unless current practices change, there may be no wild orang-
utans outside protected areas in a few decades.
Palm oil is the most widely used vegetable oil in the world, and
together Indonesia and Malaysia currently produce nearly 90 percent
of the global supply. You probably have eaten or used more palm oil
than you’re aware. At least half of all the packaged foods in your local
supermarket, along with a wide range of detergents, soaps, cosmet-
ics, and other products, are made with this oil. And palm oil consump-
tion is currently growing faster than that of any other food item.
In 2000, Indonesia had about 2.5 million ha (6 million acres) of
palm plantations. Over the past 15 years, that area has grown to more
than 11 million ha (27 million acres), now producing around 35 million
Rev. Confirming Pages
Rev. Confirming Pages
Tropical forests
ity?
Can we afford to restore biodiversto destroy them. But the benefits derived over
It’s harder to find money to restore ecosystems
than
Key Concepts
time greatly exceed average restoration
costs, according to TEEB calculations.
Key concepts from each
of us
Inland wetlands
a luxury:
of resources Restoration cost
weighing the pragmatic economic value Mangroves
contradictory
Benefits over 40 years
ecosystems. Is conservation necessarily ($U.S. per hectare)
can only be answered if we can calculate
how does the value of a standing
the value of
forest compare
has always been
Coastal wetlands
Coral reefs
$1,000,000 $1,200,000
chapter are presented in a
forest? Assigning value to ecosystems $600,000 $800,000
$200,000 $400,000
purification, prevention of
beautifully arranged layout to
$0
services for granted: water
KC 5.4
regulation, crop
waste disposal, nutrient cycling, climate
because nobody
We depend on these services, but
Foods and wood products These are
easy to imagine but
guide the student through the
truckload of timber.
a price for these services than for a climate controls,
Biodiversity much lower in value than erosion prevention,
and water supplies provided by forested
ecosystems. Still, we
TEEB reports
findings on valuing ecosystem services. depend on biodiversity for foods. By
one estimate, Indonesia
total world GNP, or at All but 43, including this
two sample ecosystems: tropical
forests and coral
produces 250 different edible fruits.
mangosteen, are little known outside
the region.
often complex network issues.
vary widely by
values among studies, because values KC 5.5
KC 5.6
KC 5.8
scales. KC 5.1 SOME NATURAL MEDICINE PRODUCTS
Rev. Confirming PagesUse
Product Source
Pollination Most of the world
Fungus Antibiotic Rev. Confirming Pages
is completely dependent on Penicillin
Antibiotic
wild insects to pollinate crops. Bacitracin Bacterium
Could natural systems treat our waste
Natural ecosystems support Tetracycline Bacterium Antibiotic
FOREST water?
populations year-round, so they
are available when we need them. Erythromycin Bacterium Antibiotic
KEY CONCEPTS
Conventional sewage treatment Heart stimulant
systems are designed to treat Foxglove
(Total: $6,120) and efficiently. Water treatment large volumes of effluent
Digitalis
quickly
is necessary for public health and Chincona bank Malaria treatment Natural wastewater treatment is unfamilia
expensive. Industrial-scale installations
, high energy inputs, and contain
environmental quality,
Quinine
but it is Birth-control drug We depend on ecological systems—natu
r but usually cheaper
Mexican yam ral bacteria and plants in water and
caustic chemicals are needed. HugeMore
Medicines than half of all prescriptions Diosgenin KC 11.3
for the entire treatment process? Although soil—to finish off conventional treatment.
quantities of sludge must Development Mexican yam Anti-inflammation treatment they remain unfamiliar to most cities Can we use these systems
be incinerated or trucked off-site
some natural products. The United Nations Cortisone successfully for decades—at least as and towns, wetland-based treatment
for disposal. productsal long as the lifetime of a conventional systems have operated
Programme estimates the value of pharmaceutic microbes to Cytarabine Sponge Leukemia cure there is potential for uptake of novel plant. Because they incorporate healthy
contaminants and metals as well as organic bacteria and plant communities,
animals, and
derived from developing world plants, 1 Screening
vincristine Periwinkle plant Anticancer
drugs most conventional systems do. These
systems can be half as expensive as
contaminants. These systems also remove
nutrients better than
Vinblastine,
be more than $30 billion per year.
removes large solids conventional systems because they
Hypertension drugs have
Reserpine Rauwolfia
KC 11.2 Solids and
Bee sludge are Arthritis relief • few sprayers, electrical systems, and pumps
Bee venom → cheaper installation
2 Settlement tanks Blowfly treated larva and Wound healer • gravity water movement → low energy
Allantoin
remove most of the sent to a consumption
$1,000 $2,000
Poppy landfill or Analgesic • few moving parts or chemicals → low
be the most valuable aspects of remaining solids
Morphine maintenance
Climate and water supplies These may incinerator, • biotic treatment → little or no chlorine
areas far beyond forests themselves. use
forests. Effects of these services impact and • nutrient uptake → more complete removal
sometimes of nutrients, metals, and possibly organic
3 Bacteria sold as compounds
KC 5.7in beds or tanks fertilizer
CAN YOU EXPLAIN?
or
purify the solids
1, the
Fish nurseries As discussed in chapter
An and mangroves
biodiversity of reefs aeration
is necessary
tank helps justify
(Total: $115,000) aerobic (oxygen-using
fisheries on )which
The water may be 1. Do the relative costs and benefits
a coral reef? A tropical forest?
4 Water is returned
for reproduction of the bacteria disinfected with to
restoring KC 11.4
digest of people depend. Marine the environment
hundreds of millionsorganic ultraviolet light
KC 11.1 compounds.
benefits of
fisheries, including most farmed fish,
depend 2. Identify the primary economic you Drinkable quality water is produced
Conventional treatment misses new tropical forest and reef systems. Can by a well-designed natural system. 4 DISINFECTION
pollutants. food sources.als
on wildPharmaceutic These fish are This photo shows before and after treatment.
hormones, detergents, plasticizers,entirely
insecticides, as food,
and
but they are worth The process of conventional sewage explain how each works? about the prospect of drinking treated
Most people are squeamish Ozone, chlorine, UV light, or
dealfire
a greatand treatment
released freely into surface waters,worth retardants are wastewater, so recycled water is other methods ensure that no
because
far more for their
these recreation
systems and tourism value. generally used for other purposes such harmful bacteria remain.
for those contaminants. are not designed as toilets, washing, or irrigation.
KC 5.7 Since these uses make up about 95 Water can then be reused or
percent of many municipal water released.
supplies, they can represent a significant
Constructed wetland systems can be savings.
designed with endless varieties, but 115 3 CONSTRUCTED WETLANDS
$70,000 $80,000 KC 11.6 all
$20,000 $30,000 A constructed wetland outside can filter water through a combination of Plants take up remaining
$10,000 nutrients. Remaining nitrate is
be an attractive landscaping feature beneficial microorganisms and plants.
converted to nitrogen gas.
that further purifies water. Here are common components:
• Anaerobic (oxygen-free) tanks: here
anaerobic bacteria convert nitrate
(NO3) to nitrogen gas (N ), and organic 10/08/15 02:13 PM
2
molecules to methane (CH ).
Untitled-5 115 4
10/08/15 02:13 PM In some systems, methane can be
Where space is available, a larger captured
for fuel.
constructed wetland can serve as KC 11.5
recreational space, a wildlife refuge, • Aerobic (oxygen-available) tanks:
a living ecosystem, and a recharge aerobic bacteria convert ammonium
area for groundwater or streamflow. (NH4) to nitrate (NO ); green plants
3
and algae take up nutrients.
KC 11.7 • Gravel-bedded wetland: beneficial
microorganisms and plants growing 1 ANAEROBIC TANKS
In the absence of
In this system, after passing through in a gravel bed capture nutrients and
the growing oxygen, anaerobic 2 AEROBIC TANKS
tanks, the effluent water runs over a organic material. In some systems, bacteria decompose
waterfall and the Oxygen is mixed into water,
into a small fish pond for additional wetland provides wildlife habitat and waste. supporting plants and bacteria
oxygenation
and nutrient removal. This verdant greenhouse
open to the public and adds an appealing
space in a cold, dry climate.
indoor
is
recreational space.
• Presumable disinfection: water is clean
leaving the system, but rules usually
that further break down and
decontaminate waste.
Remaining solids settle out.
require that chlorine be added to
ensure disinfection. Ozone or ultraviolet
light can also be used.
The growing tanks need to
be in a greenhouse or other CAN YOU EXPLAIN?
sunny space to provide light
for plants. 1. Based on your reading of this chapter,
what are the primary contaminants
KC 11.8
2.
3.
What is the role of bacteria in a system
What factors make conventional treatment
like this?
expensive?
for which water is treated?
KC 11.9
4. Why is conventional treatment more
widely used?
Rev. Confirming Pages 277
Untitled-6 276
10/08/15 02:14 PM
Untitled-6 277
10/08/15 02:14 PM
Google EarthTM interactive satellite imagery
of any country
and the world’s third
highest greenhouse gas emissions.
And expansion of palm oil is a driv-
ing force in both forest destruction
gives students a geographic context for
global places and topics discussed in the text.
and climate-changing gas releases.
The process usually starts with
logging to harvest the valuable
Google EarthTM icons indicate a corresponding
hardwoods. Habitat destruction
drives out wildlife, while a network exercise in Connect. In these exercises students
of logging roads makes it possible
for poachers to enter inaccessible
areas. Logging slash is burned to
will find links to locations mentioned in the text,
clear the land for planting (and in
many cases, fires cover up illegal and corresponding assessments that will help
logging), and finally, vast areas are
FIGURE 6.1 Over the past 15 years, palm plantation area
in planted in sterile monotony.
Oil palms are highly profitable.
them understand environmental topics.
A single hectare (2.47 acres) of
palms can yield 30 metric tons of
oil per year, or as much as ten
times as much as other oilseed
crops (Fig. 6.1). Palm oil is now Indonesia’s third largest import,
bringing in $18 billion annually. One of the worst kinds of forest
destruction for plantations is on deep peatlands, where water-
logged soils prevent biomass decomposition. Peat can contain
more than 28 times as much carbon as mineral soil, and draining
and burning of a hectare of peatland can release 15,000 tons of
CO2. More than 70 percent of the carbon released from Sumatran
forests is from burning peat.
At the 2014 UN Climate Summit in New York, 150 companies—
including McDonald’s, Nestlé, General Mills, Kraft, and Procter and GU ID ED TO U R  xx
Gamble—promised to stop using palm oil from recently cleared rain-
forest. Several huge logging companies—including the giant Asia
Pulp and Paper—joined in the pledge to stop draining peat lands and
to reduce deforestation by 50 percent by 2020. Unfortunately, while
the international companies and the national government seem to
want to do the right thing, it’s difficult to trace the source of all the
lumber and oil. This is especially true because it’s estimated that
 new species have had little time to develop.
Many areas in the tropics, by contrast, were never covered
by glacial ice and have abundant rainfall and warm temperatures
year-round, so that ecosystems there are highly productive. The
year-round availability of food, moisture, and warmth supports
an exuberance of life and allows a high degree of specializa-
tion in physical shape and behavior. Many niches exist in small
areas, with associated high species diversity.
tion and territoriality. For example, penguins or seabirds compete
fiercely for nesting sites in their colonies. Each nest tends to be
just out of reach of neighbors sitting on their own nests. Constant
squabbling produces a highly regular pattern (fig. 3.24b). Plants
also compete, producing a uniform pattern. Sagebrush releases
toxins from roots and fallen leaves, which inhibit the growth of

Active Learning Coral reefs are similarly stable, productive,

and conducive to proliferation of diverse and
exotic life-forms. An enormous abundance of
Students will be encouraged to practice critical
YOU DO? What Can
brightly thinking
colored and fantastically shaped fishes,
corals, sponges,
skills and apply their understanding of newly learned and arthropods live in the Final PDF to printer
reef community. Increasingly, human activi-
Working Locally for Ecological Diversity
concepts and to propose possible solutions.ties also influence biological diversity today. You might think that diversity and complexity of ecological systems are too large
The cumulative effects of our local actions can or too abstract for you to have any influence. But you can contribute to a complex,
dramatically alter biodiversity (What Can You resilient, and interesting ecosystem, whether you live in the inner city, a suburb, or
Do?, at right). We discuss this issue in chapter 5. a rural area.
• Take walks. The best way to learn about ecological systems in your area is to
take walks and practice observing your environment. Go with friends, and try
Patterns produce community
Active LEARNING structure Tropical savannas and grasslands
to identify some of the species and trophic relationships in your area.

The spatial distributionare dry most of the year

• Keep your cat indoors. Our lovable domestic cats are also very successful
of individuals, species, predators. Migratory birds, especially those nesting on the ground, have not
Comparing Biome Climates and populations can Where
influence there is
diversity, too little rainfall
pro- to support
evolved defenses forests,
againstwe find
these open
predators.
ductivity, and stability grasslands
in a community. Niche
or grasslands with
• Plantsparse tree garden.
a butterfly cover, Usewhich weplants
native call that support a diverse insect
Look back at the climate graphs for San Diego, California, an arid
diversity and species savannas
diversity can(fig.increase
5.8). Like tropical seasonal
population. forests,
Native most
trees with tropical
berries or fruit also support birds. (Be sure to avoid
region, and Belém, Brazil, in the Amazon rainforest (see fig.complexity
as the 5.6). increases at the landscape
savannas and grasslands havenon-native invasive species.) Allow structural diversity (open areas, shrubs, and
a rainy season, but generally the
How much colder is San Diego than Belém in January? scale,Infor example. Community structure is a
July? trees) to support a range of species.
Which location has the greater range of temperature general
rains are less abundant
term we use for spatial patterns. Ecolo-
through
or less dependable than in a forest. During
• Join a local environmental organization. Often, the best way to be effective is to
gists focus on several dry
the year? How much do the two locations differ in precipitation seasons,
aspects fires can sweep across
of community a grassland,
concentrate killing
your efforts closeoff young
to home. City parks and neighborhoods support
during their wettest months? treeshere.
structure, which we discuss and keeping the landscape open.communities,
ecological Savanna as anddo grassland
farming and rural areas. Join an organization
Compare the temperature and precipitation in these two plants have many adaptations to survive
working to drought,
maintain heat,
ecosystem and fires.
health; start by looking for environmental clubs
places with those in the other biomes shown in theDistribution
pages that can be Many random, ordered, or
have deep, long-lived at your
roots school,
that seekpark organizations,
groundwater anda local
that Audubon chapter, or a local Nature
patchy Even in a relatively uniform environ- Conservancy branch.
follow. How wet are the wettest biomes? Which biomes have persist when leaves and stems above the ground die back. After a
ment, individuals of a species population can
distinct dry seasons? How do rainfall and length of warm sea- fire or drought,
be distributed randomly, arranged in uniform fresh, green shoots
ecosystemgrow quickly by
complexity from the roots.
removing
What Can You Do?
• Live in town. Suburban sprawl consumes wildlife habitat and reduces
many specialized plants and animals.
sons explain vegetation conditions in these biomes?
patterns, or clustered Migratory
together. Ingrazers,
randomly such as wildebeest, antelope,
Replacing forests or bison,with
and grasslands thrive
lawns and streets is the surest way
distributed populations,onindividuals
this new live
growth.
wher- Grazing pressure Students
to simplify,from canecosystems.
domestic
or eliminate, employ
livestockthese
is practical ideas to
mm difference in precipitation in December–February. an important
ever resources are available and chance threat
eventsto both therming
Confi plants
make and athe
Pages animals of
positive tropical
difference in our environment.
July; San Diego has the greater range of temperature; there is about 250 grasslands and savannas.
ANSWERS: San Diego is about 13°C colder in January, about 6°C colder in
68 Principles of Environmental Science
Deserts are hot or cold, but always dry
You may think of deserts as barren and biologically impoverished.
Their vegetation is sparse, but it can be surprisingly diverse, and
forests, where nutrients are held within the soil and made available most desert plants and animals are highly adapted to survive long
for new plant growth. The luxuriant growth in Pho
ing, tosy
tropical rainforests Materia
nthesis,68 anddroughts, l Cycles
extreme heat, and often extreme cold. Deserts occur
EXP ING Rem ote Sens
LOR on rapid decomposition and recycling of dead organic
cun36070_ch03_050-075 08/13/15 07:38 PM

depends where precipitation is sporadic and low, usually with less than 30 cm
Science
material. Leaves and branches that fall to the forest floor decay of rain per year. Adaptations to these conditions include water- Exploring Science
and are incorporated almost immediately back into living biomass. storing
80 leaves and stems, thick epidermal layers to reduce water

When the forest is

ctivity removed
is import ant for
for logging,
under individual plants
agriculture,
standing and and loss, and salt tolerance. As in other dry environments, many
70
Current
plants environmental issues
M easuring primar y produ Green
y produ ctivity is also key to are drought-deciduous. Most desert plants also bloom and set seed
mineral extraction,
local enviro thestandi
nments. Under thinngsoil rates of primar
the cannot support continued crop- leaves exemplify the principles of
al cycling, and biological activity:
materithe
such asfrom
60
quickly when rain does fall.
ping and cannot resist erosion
sses, abundant rains. And if the
Percent reflectance

under standing global proce

y is it scientific observation and
cleared area is too extensive, itcarbon
• In global carbon cycles, how much
may not by plants, how
be repopulated
is stored byquickl
the rain- 50
Brown
e compa re in contrasting environments, such data-gathering techniques to
forest, community.
stored and how does carbon storag 40 leaves
as the Arctic and the tropics? promote scientific literacy.
global climates (see chapter 9)? 30
• How does this carbon storage affect Near-infrared
Tropical seasonal forests have annual dry seasons
• In global nutrient cycles, how much
nitrogen and phosphorus wash offsho
re,
20
and where
Many ?
tropical regions are characterized by distinct wet and drysis) at 10
scientists measu re primary production (photosynthe
seasons, although
How can enviro nmentaltemperatures remain stem,
hot
such
year-round.
as a pond, These
ecolog ists can
In a small, relatively closed ecosy 0
areasscale?
a global support tropical seasonallevelsforests: drought-tolerant
. But that forests
method is impossible for large 400 500 600 700 800 900 1,000
t and analyze samples of all trophic
collec
that look brown and dormant in the
which coverdry70season
percentbut burst into vivide. One
of the earth’s surfac
Wavelength, nm Confirming Pages
ecosystems, especially for oceans, remote sensing,
involvescalled
green
of the newesduring
t metho rainy
ds of months.
quanti fying These
biolog forests
ical are
productivity often dry d by
rs that observe the energy reflected from FIGURE 1 Energy wavelengths reflecte
tropical
or using dataforests
collected because theye senso
from satellit are dry much of the year; however, green and brown leaves.
thethere
earth’smust
surfacbe e. some periodic rain to support plant growth.s red
in green plants absorb Many and blue
Asthe have read in this chapter, chlorophyll
youtrees eye receives, or senses,
of and and
light
shrubs insagreen
reflect seasonal wavele forest
ngths.are drought-deciduous:
Your
wavelengths of s approximately
they lose their leaves and cease
these green wavelengths. A white-
sand growing
beach, on when the other waterreflect
nohand, What Do YOU THINK?
is available.
sun, so it looks white (and
equalSeasonal
amountsforests are wavele
of all light often open
ngths that reach it from
woodlands that thegrade into savannas.
reflect characteristic
way, different surfaces of the earth
similar are
In aforests
bright!) to Tropical
your eye.dry generally more attractive than wet for- with
light wavelengths; dark green forests
ynthetShad algaee-Gr
es reflect
estsngths. Snow- covere d surfac and own Coffee and mm
wavele for human habitation and have,
abundant chlorophyll-rich leaves—and
oceantherefore,
surfaces rich suffered
in photos greater icdeg- Cocoa 8C
28.6°C 386 mm
radation from settlement. Clearing a dry
wavele forest
ngths. Dry,with
brown fireforests with little active
is relatively 300
Do your purchases of coffee
plants—reflect greens and near-infrared forests
dark green help to protec
than do often (fig. 1). and choco late
easyphyll
during
reflectthemore dry redseason. infraredofenergy
and less Soils dry forests have higher t or destroy tropical forests? 100
What Do You Think?
chloro put a senso r on a sat- Cocoa pods grow directly on the
the earth’s surface, we can trunk and large
Moisture deficit

patter ns onagriculturally Coffee and to

nutrient
To detect levels and are
land cover more productive
the sensor receiv than es those
and transm of its cocoaFIGURE are two of 5.8 many prod- 40
theTropical 80 branches of cocoa trees.
that orbits the earth. As the satellite travels, ucts grown exclus ively in develo
a rainforest. Finally,
ellite having fewer insects, parasites,
hots.” One of the best-known earth-
imagin and fungal
g satellit es,dis-
tries
Lands at
but consu
7, ping
savannas and grasslandscoun- 30 60
med almost entirely in the ha of coffee and cocoa plantations
Students
earth a series
eases than are presented
of “snaps
a wet forest makes with
185a dry
km (115or mi)
seasonal
wide, and each apixel
forest represents anexperience
healthier
wealthier, develo annual drought and 20 40 in these
produces images that cover an area approx imatel y from pole to pole, ped nations. Coffee grows
rainy seasons and year-round
areas are converted to monoculture
s, an
place for humans to live. Consequently, at orbits
these forests are highly
challenging
area of just 30 environmental
× 30 m on the groun d. Lands
it captur
e, than es image s of the entire
in cool,
surfac
mount ain areas
e everywarm temperatures. of the tropics,
Thorny 10 20 incalculable number of species
will be
endangered
as the earth in many
spins below the
places. satellit
Less 1 percent of the dry while cocoa is native to the warm,
tropical lost.
so ring biolog ical activity and abundant moist
studies
16forests that
of the eroffer
satellit
Pacifice,anSeaW opportunity
iFS, was designed mainly for monito
coast of Central America
lowlands. Whatacacias sets these two apart that
grazers 0 0
The Brazilian state of Bahia demon
to Landsor at’sthe
butAtlantic coast
days. Anoth point onthrive
it revisitsboth each in this savanna. is Yellow J FMAMJ J ASOND -
(fig. 2). SeaWiFS follows a path similar come from small trees strates both the ecological import
to consider
in ocean
of South
s contradictory
America,
day and for instance,
produ ces data,
image remain
s with ainpixel
an undisturbed
resolution of state.
just over
grow
1 km.
in low areas
light, in show
the
adapte d
moisture deficit.
shady understory
to Month of these crops and how they might
ance
the earth every of wavele ngths than our eyes can, help
r range
special Becau interest
se satellitestopics, andgreate
detect a much
phyll abundance. In oceans, this cocoa
of a mature forest. Shade-grown coffee
is a useful mea- and preserve forest species. At one time,
Brazil
they are able to monitor and map chloro . By quantifying
(grown beneath an understory of taller
and mapping produced much of the world’
s cocoa,
conflicting
sure of ecosyinterpretations
stem health, as well as within
carbon dioxid e uptake
te the
trees)
role
allow
of oceanfarmers to produce a crop at the CHAPTER 5 Biomes and Biodiversity 101 but in the early 1900s, the crop
was intro-
logists are working to estima same time asofforest habitat remain
primary production in oceans, climato duced into West Africa. Now Côte
a real scenario.
ecosystems in moderating climate
change: for example, they can estima
te the extent
butterflies, and other wild species.
s for birds,
alone grows more than 40 perce
d’Ivoire
waters of the North Atlanti c (fig. 2). Ocean- nt of the world
n-rich Until a few
biomass production in the cold, oxyge the land surfacedecades ago, most of the world’s cof-
total. Rapid increases in global suppli
es have made
areas where nutrients washing offfee and cocoa were shade-grown
ographers can also detect near-shore ctivity, such as nearcrops the mouth of the FIGURE .2But SeaWiF imagees
newSvarieti showing
of bothgrowth
prices plummet, and the value of
Brazil’s harvest has
stems and stimula te high produ have been develo and plant dropp ed by 90 percent. Côte d’Ivoire is aided
fertilize marine ecosy these pattern s helps us estima te ped hyll
chlorop thatabunda
can in oceans
ncegrown in full
be sun. Growi in this com-
Amazon or Mississippi River. Monito
ring and mapping in full sun, trees can be oncrowd lized differen
ed togeth
land (norma ce vegetation index). ng petition by a labor system that
reportedly includes widespread
er more closely. With more
human impac ts on nutrient flows from land to sea. sunshine, photosynthesis and yields
increa se.
child slavery. Even adult workers
in Côte d’Ivoir e get only about
cun36070_ch05_096-126 101 $16510/08/15
(U.S.) 09:31 AM
There are costs, however. Sun-grown per year (if they get paid at all), compared
trees die earlier from stress with a mini-
and diseases common in crowd mum wage of $850 (U.S.) per
ed growing conditions. Crowding year in Brazil. As African cocoa
also requires increased use of expen production ratchets up, Brazilian
sive pesticides and fungicides. landowners are converting their
Shade-grown coffee and cocoa gener plantations to pastures or other crops.
ally require fewer pesticides
(or sometimes none) because the The area of Bahia where cocoa was
birds and insect c level which
atthe once king is part of Brazil’s
xxi GU I DE D TO U R forest canop Organ y isms
eat many the fied
can beofidenti both by the trophi s residin g in Atlantic Forest, one of the most
er of species available and as little as 10 perce the kinds pests. Ornithologists have
Herbivores foundare plant world. Only 8 percen threatened forest biomes in the
food chain depends on both the numb they feed and bynt as many of food they eat.
birds in a full-sun plantation, com- t of this forest remains undisturbed. Although
ular ecosystem. A harsh pared and omnivores eat both plant cocoa plantations don’t have the full diversity of intact
the physical characteristics of a partic to carniv
eatersa, shade oresnare
-grow flesh
planta tion. The, numbe
eaters
simpler food chain than a shade r of bird species in a forests, they do
arctic landscape generally has a much d plantation can provide an economic rationale for
and anima l matter .be twice that of a full-su n plantation. Shade- preser ving the forest. And Bahia’s
grown plantations also need less chemi cocoa plantations protect a surpris
temperate or tropical one. cal fertilizer because many
sity that once was t
ingly large sample of the biodiver-
of the plants
Pedagogical Features Facilitate Student
Understanding of Environmental Science
Confirming Pages

CHAPTER
Practice Quiz
system stability. Cellular respiration is the reverse of photosyn- as osprey, are relatively rare because large numbers of organisms

6 Environmental Conservation: Forests,

thesis: this is how organisms extract energy and nutrients from
are needed at each lower trophic level that supports them. We can
Short-answer questions allow students
organic molecules. topyramid
think about this check their
structure of trophic levels in terms of
system stability
Primary. producers
Cellular respirati
support on
smaller
is thenumbers
reverseofofconsumers
photosyn-in an
energy, biomass, or numbers of individuals. We can also under-
Grasslands, Parks, and Nature Preserves thesis:
organic
knowledge of chapter concepts.
this is how
ecosystem.
molecul
hundreds
Thus,organism
ofes.
in the Chesapeake
as osprey, are relatively rare because
Bay saltgrass
s extract energy meadows support
stand these organisms as components
and nutrients
are needed at each from
bird, fish, and insect species. Top level predators, such
largeof a system,
numbers through which
of organism s
carbon, water, lower trophic move.
and nutrients level that supports them. We can
Primary producers support smaller numbers think about this pyramid structure
of consumers in an of trophic levels in terms of
ecosystem. Thus, in the Chesapeake Bay energy, biomass, or numbers of individu
saltgrass meadows support als. We can also under-
hundreds of bird, fish, and insect species. stand these organisms as components
Top level predators, such of a system, through which
carbon, water, and nutrients move.
Practice Quiz

Prac
1. What are the two most important nutrients causing eutrophication
tice
in Quiz
the Chesapeake Bay?
8. Which wavelengths do our eyes respond to, and why? (Refer to
fig. 2.13.) About how long are short ultraviolet wavelengths
2. What are systems and how do feedback loops regulate them? compared to microwave lengths?
1. What3. are
Your thebody
two contains
most importan
vast numbers of carbon 9. Where do extremophiles live? How do they get the energy they
t nutrients causingatoms. How
eutrophic is
ation it
8. Whichneed
in the Chesapea
possible that ke Bay?
some of these carbons may have been part of the waveleng ths do our eyes respond to, and why?
for survival?
fig. 2.13.) About how long are short (Refer to
2. What are bodysystems
of a prehistoric creature? 10. Ecosystems require energy to ultraviole
function. tFrom where
and how do feedback loops regulate them? compared to microwave lengths?
waveleng thsdoes most of
3. Your 4. body contains
List six unique properties
vast numbersofofwater. Describe, briefly, how each of this energy come? Where does it go?
carbon atoms. How is it 9. Where do extremophiles live? How
possible thatproperties
these some of thesemakes water essential to life as
carbons may have been part of thewe know it. 11. How do green plants capture do
energy,
they and what do
get the energythey
theydo with it?
body need for survival?
5. ofWhat
a prehistor
is DNA, ic creature?
and why is it important? 12. Define the terms species, population, and biological community.
4. List6.sixThe
unique 10. Ecosystems require energy to function.
oceans propertie
store as vast
of water.
amount of heat,
Describe but this huge reservoir
, briefly, how each of of 13. Why are big, fierce animals rare? From where does most of
these propertie this energy come? Where does it go?
energy is s makes
of littlewater
use toessential
humans.toExplain theknow
difference
life as we it. between 11. How 14. Most ecosystems can be visualized as a pyramid with many organ-
do green plants capture energy, and
5. What ishigh-quality
DNA, and why and is
low-quality
it importanenergy. isms in the lowest trophic levels and what doathey
only few do
individuals
t? with it? at the
6. The7.oceans 12. Define the terms species, populatio
In thestore
biosphere, matter follows
a vast amount circular pathways, while
of heat, but this huge reservoir of energy top. Give an example of an n,
inverted
and numbers pyramid.
biological community.
energy flows
is of little
in a use
linear
to fashion. 13. Why are big, fierce animals rare?
humans. Explain.
Explain the difference between 15. What is the ratio of human-caused carbon releases into the atmo-
high-quality and low-quality energy. 14. Most ecosystem s can in
sphere shown befigure 2.18 compared to the
visualize d as a pyramid withamount released by
many organ-
7. In the biosphere, matter follows isms in terrestrial
the lowest trophic
respiration?
levels and only a few individuals at the
circular pathways, while energy
flows in a linear fashion. Explain. top. Give an example of an inverted
numbers pyramid.
15. What is the ratio of human-caused
carbon releases into the atmo-
sphere shown in figure 2.18 compared
to the amount released by
critical thinking and discussion terrestrial respiration?

critApply
ical the principles you have learned in this chapter to discuss these
thin
questions with king and discussion
other students.
lasting for years or even centuries. What would our world be like if
all chemical bonds were either very weak or extremely strong?
1. Ecosystems are often defined as a matter of convenience because 4. If you had to design a research project to evaluate the relative
Apply the principle
we can’t s you
studyhave
everything
learnedatinonce. biomass of producers and consumers in an ecosystem, what would
this How would
chapter you describe the
to discuss these
questions withcharacteristics
other students.and boundaries of the ecosystem in which you live? lasting for years
you or even(Note:
measure? This. What
centuries could would
be a natural system or a human-
our world be like if
1. Ecosystems In what respects is your all chemical
made bonds
one.)were either very weak or extremely strong?
are often defined as aecosystem an open one?
matter of convenience because
we can’t study everythin
2. Think of some practical 4. If you5.had to design a research
Understanding storageproject
compartments is essential to understanding
g at once.examples
How would you describe the in everyday
of increasing entropy to evaluate the relative
characterlife.
isticsIsand
a messy room biomass of producer
material s andsuch
cycles, as the carbon cycle. If you
consumers in an ecosystem, what would look around your
Orangutans are among the most critically endangered of all the great apes. boundari es really
of the evidence
ecosystemofinthermodynamics
which you live?
at work, or
In what respects you measure? (Note:
backyard, howThis
many carbon
could storagesystem
compartments are there?
LEARNING OUTCOMES merely personal preference?
Over the past 20 years, about 90 percent of their rainforest habitat in Borneo is your ecosystem be a natural
an open one? or a human-
and Sumatra has been destroyed by logging and conversion to palm oil plantations. 2. Think3.of some made one.) Which ones are the biggest? Which ones are the longest lasting?
Some practical
chemicalexamples
bonds areofweak and have
increasin a very short half-life
g entropy in everyday
After studying this chapter, you should be able to answer the following questions: life. Is a messy
(fractions
roomofreally
a second, in some
evidence cases); others
of thermody namicsare strong and stable, 5. Understanding storage compartments
is essential to understanding
merely personal preference? at work, or material cycles, such as the carbon cycle.
If you look around your
What portion of the world’s original forests remains? How are the world’s grasslands distributed, and what 3. Some chemical bonds are weak and backyard, how many carbon storage
have a very short half-life compartments are there?
activities degrade grasslands? (fractions of a second, in some cases); Which ones are the biggest? Which
What activities threaten global forests? What steps can be others are strong and stable, ones are the longest lasting?
taken to preserve them? What are the original purposes of parks and nature
preserves in North America?
Why is road construction a challenge to forest conservation?
What are some steps to help restore natural areas?
Where are the world’s most extensive grasslands?

Critical Thinking and Discussion Questions

Brief scenarios of everyday occurrences or ideas challenge
Learning Outcomes students to apply what they have learned to their lives.
Final PDF to printer
Questions at the beginning of each chapter
cun36070_ch06_127-151 127 07/07/15 06:46 PM
48 Principles of Environmental Science

challenge students to find their own answers. 48 Principles of Environmental Science

cun32517_ch02_026-049.indd 48 12-09-05 4:53 PM

in a Wetland Syste
cun32517_ch02_026-049.indd
m
DATA ANALYSIS Examining Nutrients
48

12-09-05 4:53 PM
cycling will also help you in later
this chapter. Understanding nutrient
and phosphorus are among the
As you have read, movements of nitrogen chapters of this book.
wetland systems, because high by the Environmental Protec-
most important considerations in many One excellent overview was produced
algae and bacteria growth. description of the figure shown here,
levels of these nutrients can cause excessive tion Agency. Go to Connect to find a
many studies have examined how t of our dominant nutrient, nitrogen,
This is a topic of great interest, and and to further explore the movemen
in a wetland, as well as in other ecosystems. Taking a
nutrients move through environmental systems.
cycles in detail will draw on your
little time to examine these nutrient
systems, cycles, and other ideas in
knowledge of atoms, compounds,

Data Analysis
Plant biomass

At the end of each chapter, these exercises Litterfall

NH3

give students further opportunities to apply N2, N2O Volatilization

Outflow
critical thinking skills and analyze data. Inflow
Organic
Mineralization
NH4+ Water column
NH4
These are assigned through Connect in an Soil – AEROBIC

interactive online environment. Students NO3– [NH4+]s

Plant [NH4+]s
uptake
are asked to analyze data in the form of Denitrification
Microbial Adsorbed NH4+
Organic N biomass N
documents, videos, and animations. Soil – ANAEROBIC
N2, N2O (g)

the online original to fill in the boxes.

nitrogen cycle in a wetland. Study
FIGURE 1 A detailed schematic diagram of the ience/criteria/nutrient/guidance/.
Guidance Manual, www.epa.gov/watersc
SOURCE: EPA Nutrient Criteria Technical

VISIT CONNECT AT
ES FOR THIS CHAPTER, PLEASE
TO ACCESS ADDITIONAL RESOURC
www.connect.mheducation.com Earth™ Google
e and adaptive reading experience,
You will find Smartbook, an interactiv Data Analysis exercises.
and
Exercises, additional Case Studies,

GU ID ED TO U R  xxii
Topical Photos and Instructional Art
Support Learning
USA All others 25%
21%
Japan 4%
CO2 from fossil fuel use CO2 from deforestation,
decay, and peat
China
CH4 from agriculture, N2O from agriculture 24% India
waste, and energy and other sources 8%
Fluorine gases
60 Western Europe
Russian 12%
51.0 Federation
50 6%
44.7 (b) Production by country or region
39.4
40
35.6
Gt CO2 eq/yr

28.7
30
Land clearing, Atmospheric CO2
Photo- burning
Respiration synthesis 2 Gt
20 100 Gt
100 Gt
Burning of
10 Rocks fossil fuels
5 Gt 92 Gt 91 Gt
Biological and chemical
0 processes
1970 1980 1990 2000 2010
Year
(a) Production by sources
Soil
Plants Dissolved CO2
Deposits of 650 Gt in water
Numerous high-quality photos and realistic fossil fuels—
coal, oil, and
illustrations display detailed diagrams, graphs, natural gas
and real-life situations. 40 50
Gt Gt
Organic
Marine plankton
sediment
respiration and
Sedimentation 10 Gt
photosynthesis
forms fossil
fuels.

Springtail

Wood roach
Pseudo-
scorpion Termite

Snail
Mite

Centipede
Sow bug
Carabid
(ground)
beetle
Slug
Nematode and
Soil fungus
nematode-killing
Ant
constricting fungus
Earthworm
Cicada
nymph Wireworm
(click beetle
larva)
Soil protozoan

xxiii GU I DE D TO U R
GU ID ED TO U R  xxiv
CHAPTER

1 Understanding Our Environment

Students work on landscape plantings at Furman University’s Shi Center for Sustainability cottage.
LEARNING OUTCOMES Students here contribute energy and ideas while they learn about sustainability.

After studying this chapter, you should be able to answer the following questions:
Describe several important environmental problems facing
the world.
List several examples of progress in environmental quality.
Explain the idea of sustainability and some of its aims.
Why are scientists cautious about claiming absolute proof
of particular theories?
What is critical thinking, and why is it important in
environmental science?
Why do we use graphs and data to answer questions
in science?
Identify several people who helped shape our ideas of
resource conservation and preservation—why did they
promote these ideas when they did?
 CASE STUDY
Assessing Sustainability
I f you’re taking a course in environmental science, chances are you
are interested in understanding environmental resources and our
impacts on them. You might be interested in water resources, bio-
diversity, environmental health, climate change, chemistry, population
change, ecology, or other aspects of our environment. You might also
be interested in how you can apply your knowledge for ensuring the
longevity, or sustainability, of environmental resources over time.
One of the ways you can apply your knowledge at your own col-
lege or university is by helping with sustainability assessment and
reporting. Sustainability assessments ask a range of questions: Does
an institution actively conserve water or energy? Does it work to pro-
mote biodiversity or reduce pollution? Does it cooperate with the
local community to improve living conditions around it?
Furman University, in Greenville, SC, is one of about 240 schools
that have been using the Sustainability Tracking, Assessment and
Rating System (STARS) to track their progress. STARS is one of sev-
eral reporting systems that help colleges and universities understand,
compare, and ideally improve environmental performance in relation
to peer institutions. The rating system is run by the Association for
the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education (AASHE), an
organization of institutions that also provides a network for sharing
ideas and gives a platform for schools to show off their successes.
In 2015, Furman’s assistant sustainability coordinator Yancey ­Fouché
turned in the university’s third report, raising the school’s rating from
Silver to Gold. This improvement reflects the work of students, faculty,
administrators, staff, and alums who want to see their university do well
and do good. The report also reflects the contributions of students who
assisted with data collection and analysis, a valuable contribution to their
educational experience. Furman is one of only about 80 colleges and
universities to get a Gold rating in the recent round of submissions.
How did Furman achieve its high score? By performing well across
a wide range of criteria. STARS gives points for evidence of sustain-
ability in the curriculum, in research activities by students and ­faculty,
and for campus engagement and community service. There are
points for operations: greenhouse gas emissions, building manage-
ment, use of renewable energy, purchasing of environmentally safe
cleaning products, and other practices. Grounds management that
preserves biodiversity, conserves water resources, reduces storm
water runoff, and cuts pesticide use also gets points. Policies on
transportation and waste management (especially ­ recycling and
composting rates) matter. Governance—the ways administrators
and committees support these practices—also c­ontributes points.
STARS also gives credits for measures of health and well-being: are
there wellness programs in place, health and safety, and comfortable
work spaces? Points are also available for sustainable investment
practices with an institution’s endowment. Some of these points are
easier to achieve than others. New sustainability courses can be
instituted relatively rapidly. Building efficiency and energy systems,
“operations,” are expensive and difficult to change (fig. 1.1).
Furman did especially well in curriculum, research, and campus
engagement, getting 50 of 52 possible points in these categories.
Like other schools, it didn’t do as well on building operations—­
Furman earned only 15 of 36 points in these categories—or on waste
minimization and transportation (8 of 17 points). The fact that Furman
2 Principles of Environmental Science
is better than average shows that most institutions
have considerable room for improvement.
Even though it’s hard to change an institution’s energy use and
transportation practices, having benchmarks to aim for, and peer
institutions for comparison, is essential. These measures motivate
improvements when opportunities arise, and provide a common
framework for campus conversations. Renovations and new build-
ings, like Furman’s showcase Shi Center for Sustainability Cottage
(opening photo), are always an opportunity to invest in new systems
that save both energy and money over the long term.
Most of us won’t submit a STARS report ourselves—it requires
a lot of specialized data collection—but just about anybody can
do something that helps improve a STARS rating, and with it the
­campus environment. Student environmental activities add points.
Participation in student governance, environmental coursework,
work with the local community, and many other activities contribute.
And student groups are essential in pushing administrations to sup-
port energy conservation, waste reduction, local foods, community
­empowerment, and other priorities.
All this has a great deal to do with the environmental science
you’re about to study. Almost every resource and environmental ques-
tion in a STARS report is related to a topic you’ll explore here. Biodiver-
sity, water conservation, energy use and alternative energy resources,
waste management, sustainable food resources, environmental
health, and environmental policy are all concerns of a STARS report,
and you will learn about them in an environmental science course.
Environmental science also emphasizes the value of quantify-
ing answers. If you can measure something, from pollution levels to
STARS index values, you have the opportunity to see if progress is
happening over time.
The chapters that follow are intended to give you grounding in
the knowledge you need to make these contributions. They also aim
to help you understand the basics of scientific approaches to under-
standing our environment.
Average Scores in STARS
Innovation
Education & Operations
Research
Planning, Administration & Engagement
FIGURE 1.1 This pie chart shows the proportion of a STARS score
contributed by different categories (slice width) and overall average score
(length of slice) for all reporting institutions. Operations tend to score low,
while innovation and engagement tend to score higher, on average.
DATA SOURCE: Association for the Advancement of Sustainability in Higher Education.

Today we are faced with a challenge that calls
for a shift in our thinking, so that humanity stops
threatening its life-support system.
—WANGARI MAATHAI,
WINNER OF 2004 NOBEL PEACE PRIZE
1.1 WHAT IS ENVIRONMENTAL
SCIENCE?
Environmental science is the use of scientific approaches to under-
stand the complex systems in which we live. It is the systematic
study of our environment and our place in it. Much, though not all,
of environmental science involves applying basic knowledge to real-
world problems: an environmental scientist might study patterns of
biodiversity or river system dynamics for their own sake. An envi-
ronmental scientist might also study these systems with the larger
aim of saving species or cleaning up a river. Environmental scien-
tists often get involved in sustainability efforts, such as the issues in a
STARS report, in their home universities, colleges, or communities.
In this chapter we will examine some main ideas and ap-
proaches used in environmental science. You will explore these
themes in greater depth in later chapters. We will examine the
­scientific method, critical thinking, and other approaches to evalu-
ating evidence. Finally we will examine some key ideas that have
influenced our understanding of environmental science.
Environmental science is integrative
We inhabit both a natural world of biological diversity and physical
processes and a human environment of ideas and practices. Envi-
ronmental science involves both these natural and human worlds.
Because environmental systems are complex and interconnected, the
field also draws on a wide range of disciplines and skills, and multi-
ple ways of knowing are often helpful for finding answers (fig. 1.2).
Biology, chemistry, earth science, and geography contribute ideas
and evidence of basic science. Political science, economics, commu-
nications, and arts help us understand how people share resources,
compete for them, and evaluate their impacts on society. One of your
tasks in this course may be to understand where your own knowl-
edge and interests contribute (Active Learning, p. 4). Identifying
your particular interest will help you do better in this class, because
you’ll have more reason to explore the ideas you encounter.
Environmental science is not the same as environmental advo-
cacy. Environmental science itself requires no positions regarding
environmental policy. However, environmental science is an ana-
lytical approach that is needed to make us confident that policy
positions we do take are reasonable and are based on observable
evidence, not just assumption or hearsay.
Environmental science is global
You are already aware of our global dependence on resources and
people in faraway places, from computers built in China to oil
extracted in Iraq or Venezuela. These interdependencies become
Environmental Economics
What are the long-term costs and
benefits of a marine preserve?
Political Science Population Biology
How do we develop How many fish are
equitable fishing policies? needed for reproduction?
Problem:
Depleted fishery
Ecology
How does the reef
support fish?
Chemistry Anthropology, Religion
What levels of oxygen, nutrients What is the cultural value
are best for reef health? of fishing for in coral reefs?
FIGURE 1.2 Many types of knowledge are needed in environmental
­science. A few examples are shown here.
clearer as we learn more about global and regional environmental
systems. Often the best way to learn environmental science is to
see how principles play out in real places. Familiarity with the
world around us will help you understand the problems and their
context. Throughout this book we’ve provided links to places you
can see in Google Earth, a free online mapping program that you
can download from googleearth.com. When you see a blue
globe in the margin of this text, like the one at left, you can
go to Connect and find placemarks that let you virtually visit
places discussed. In Google Earth you can also save your own
placemarks and share them with your class.
Environmental science helps us understand
our remarkable planet
Imagine that you are an astronaut returning to the earth after a trip
to the moon or Mars. What a relief it would be, after the silent void
of outer space, to return to this beautiful, bountiful planet (fig. 1.3).
We live in an incredibly prolific and colorful world that is, as far as
we know, unique in the universe. Compared with other planets in
our solar system, temperatures on the earth are mild and relatively
constant. Plentiful supplies of clean air, fresh water, and fertile soil
are regenerated endlessly and spontaneously by biogeochemical
cycles and biological communities (discussed in chapters 2 and 3).
The value of these ecological services is almost incalculable,
although economists estimate that they account for a substantial
proportion of global economic activity (see chapter 15).
CHAPTE R 1 Understanding Our Environment 3
 Active LEARNING
Finding Your Strengths in
This Class
A key strategy for doing well in this class is to figure out where
your strengths and interests intersect with the subjects you will
be reading about. As you have read, environmental science
draws on many kinds of knowledge (fig. 1.2). Nobody is good
at all of these, but everyone is good at some of them. Form a
small group of students; then select one of the questions in
section 1.2. Explain how each of the following might contribute
to understanding or solving that problem:
artist, writer, politician, negotiator, chemist, mathematician,
diversity of life.
hunter, angler, truck driver, cook, parent, builder, ­planner,
economist, speaker of multiple languages, musician,
­business person
ANSWERS: All of these provide multiple insights; answers will vary.
Perhaps the most amazing feature of our planet is its rich
diversity of life. Millions of beautiful and intriguing species popu-
late the earth and help sustain a habitable environment (fig. 1.4).
This vast multitude of life creates complex, interrelated communi-
ties where towering trees and huge animals live together with, and
depend upon, such tiny life-forms as viruses, bacteria, and fungi.
Together, all these organisms make up delightfully diverse, self-
sustaining ecosystems, including dense, moist forests; vast, sunny
savannas; and richly colorful coral reefs.
From time to time we should pause to remember that, in
spite of the challenges of life on earth, we are incredibly lucky
to be here. Because environmental scientists observe this beauty
around us, we often ask what we can do, and what we ought to do,
to ensure that future generations have the same opportunities to
enjoy this bounty.
Methods in environmental science
Keep an eye open for the ideas that follow
as you read this book. These are a few of
the methods that you will find in sci-
ence ­generally. They reflect the fact
that environmental science is based on
careful, considered observation of the
world around us.
Observation: A first step in
understanding our environment
is careful, detailed observation
and evaluation of factors involved
in pollution, environmental health,
FIGURE 1.3 The life-sustaining ecosystems on
which we all depend are unique in the universe,
as far as we know.
4 Principles of Environmental Science
FIGURE 1.4 Perhaps the most amazing feature of our planet is its rich
conservation, population, resources, and other issues.
Knowing about the world we inhabit helps us understand
where our resources originate, and why.
The scientific method: Discussed later in this chapter, the
scientific method is an orderly approach to asking questions,
collecting observations, and interpreting those observations
to find an answer to a question. In daily life, many of us have
prior expectations when we start an investigation, and it
takes discipline to avoid selecting evidence that conveniently
supports our prior assumptions. In contrast, the scientific
method aims to be rigorous, using statistics, blind tests,
and careful replication to avoid simply confirming the
investigator’s biases and expectations.
Quantitative reasoning: This means understanding how
to compare numbers and interpret graphs, to perceive
what they show about problems that matter. Often this
means interpreting changes in values, such as population
size over time.
Uncertainty: A repeating theme in this book is that
uncertainty is an essential part of science. Science is
based on observation and testable hypotheses, but
we know that we cannot make all observations
in the universe, and we have not asked all
possible questions. We know there are
limits to our knowledge. Understanding
how much we don’t know, ironically,
can improve our confidence in what
we do know.
Critical and analytical thinking:
The practice of stepping back to
examine what you think and why
you think it, or why someone says
or believes a particular idea, is
known generally as critical thinking.
Acknowledging uncertainty is one part
of critical thinking. This is a skill you can
practice in all your academic pursuits, as
you make sense of the complexity of the world
we inhabit.

2 2.8 3.6 5 7 9 11 13 15 20°F
Projected winter temperature increase
FIGURE 1.5 Climate change is ­projected to raise temperatures,
­especially in ­northern winter months. DATA SOURCE: NOAA, 2010.
1.2 MAJOR THEMES IN
ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE
In this section we review some of the main themes in this book.
All of these are serious problems, but they are also subjects of
dramatic innovation. Often solutions lie in policy and economics,
but environmental scientists provide the evidence on which policy
decisions can be made.
We often say that crisis and opportunity go hand in hand.
Serious problems can drive us to seek better solutions. As you
read, ask yourself what factors influence these conditions, and
what steps might be taken to resolve them.
Environmental quality
Climate Change The atmosphere retains heat near the earth’s
surface, which is why it is warmer here than in space. But burn-
ing fossil fuels, clearing forests and farmlands, raising billions
of methane-producing cattle, and other activities have greatly
increased concentrations of carbon dioxide and other “greenhouse
gases.” In the past 200 years, concentrations of CO2 in the atmo-
sphere have increased nearly 50 percent. Climate models indicate
that by 2100, if current trends continue, global mean temperatures
will probably increase by 2° to 6°C compared to 1990 tempera-
tures (3.6° to 12.8°F; fig. 1.5), far warmer than the earth has been
since the beginning of human civilization. For comparison, the
last ice age was about 4°C cooler than now. Increasingly severe
droughts and heat waves are expected in many areas. Greater storm
intensity and flooding are expected in many regions. Disappearing
glaciers and snowfields threaten the water supplies on which cities
such as Los Angeles and Delhi depend.
Military experts argue that climate change is a greater global
threat than terrorism. Climate change could force hundreds of
millions of people from their homes, trigger economic and social
catastrophe, and instigate wars over water and arable land. Many
people have argued that recent insurgencies and terrorism result
from the dislocation and desperation of climate refugees in regions
now too dry and hot for reliable farming.
On the other hand, efforts to find solutions to climate change
may force new kinds of international cooperation. New strategies
for energy production could reduce conflicts over oil and promote
economic progress for the world’s poorest populations.
Clean Water Water may be the most critical resource in the
twenty-first century. At least 1.1 billion people lack access to safe
drinking water, and twice that many don’t have adequate sanitation.
Polluted water contributes to the death of more than 15 m ­ illion peo-
ple every year, most of them children under age 5. About 40 percent
of the world population lives in countries where water demands now
exceed supplies, and the United Nations projects that by 2025 as many
as three-fourths of us could live under similar conditions. Despite
ongoing challenges, more than 800 million people have gained access
to improved water supplies and modern sanitation since 1990.
Air Quality Air quality has worsened dramatically in newly indus-
trializing areas, especially in much of China and India. In B
­ eijing and
Delhi, wealthy residents keep their children indoors on bad days
and install air filters in their apartments. Poor residents become ill,
and cancer rates are rising in many areas. Millions of early
deaths and many more illnesses are triggered by air pollution each
year. Worldwide, the United Nations estimates, more than 2 billion
metric tons of air pollutants (not including carbon dioxide or wind-
blown soil) are released each year. These air pollutants travel easily
around the globe. On some days 75 percent of the smog and airborne
particulates in California originate in Asia; mercury, polychlorinated
biphenyls (PCBs), and other industrial pollutants accumulate in arc-
tic ecosystems and in the tissues of native peoples in the far north.
The good news is that environmental scientists in China,
India, and other countries suffering from poor air quality are fully
aware that Europe and the United States faced deadly air pollution
decades ago. They know that enforceable policies on pollution con-
trols, together with newer, safer, and more efficient technology will
correct the problem, if they can just get needed policies in place.
Human population and well-being
Population growth There are well over 7 billion people on
earth, about twice as many as there were 40 years ago. We are add-
ing about 80 million more each year. Demographers report a transi-
tion to slower growth rates in most countries: improved e­ ducation for
girls and better health care are chiefly responsible. But present trends
project a population between 8 and 10 billion by 2050 (fig. 1.6a).
The impact of that many people on our natural resources and ecolog-
ical systems strongly influences many of the other problems we face.
The slowing growth rate is encouraging, however. In much
of the world, better health care and a cleaner environment have
improved longevity and reduced infant mortality. Social stability
has allowed families to have fewer, healthier children. Population
has stabilized in most industrialized countries and even in some very
CHAPTE R 1 Understanding Our Environment 5
 12 produce about half again as much food as we need to survive, and
consumption of protein has increased worldwide. In most coun-
Constant
10
tries weight-related diseases are far more prevalent than hunger-
High related illnesses. In spite of population growth that added nearly a
billion people to the world during the 1990s, the number of people
Population (billions)

8
Low facing food insecurity and chronic hunger during this period actu-
ally declined by about 40 million.
6 lity Despite this abundance, hunger remains a chronic problem
ferti
um worldwide because food resources are unevenly distributed. At the
M edi
4 same time, soil scientists report that about two-thirds of all agri-
cultural lands show signs of degradation. The biotechnology and
2
intensive farming techniques responsible for much of our recent
production gains are too expensive for many poor farmers. Can we
find ways to produce the food we need without further environmen-
0
1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010 2020 2030 2040 2050 tal degradation? And can we distribute food more equitably? In a
Year world of food surpluses, currently more than 850 million people
(a) Possible population trends are chronically undernourished, and at least 60 million people face
acute food shortages due to weather, politics, or war (fig. 1.7b).
8.0 Information and Education Because so many environmen-
tal issues can be fixed by new ideas, technologies, and strate-
7.0 L east-develop
gies, expanding access to knowledge is essential to progress. The
Total fertility (children per woman)

e d co
Less-deve un
6.0
trie
s increased speed at which information now moves around the world
lo

offers unprecedented opportunities for sharing ideas. At the same

pe

W orld
d

5.0 gi time, literacy and access to education are expanding in most regions
re

on
s of the world (fig. 1.7c). Rapid exchange of information on the Inter-
4.0
3.0 More-d
eve
lope
d r egion
2.0 s access to education is helping to release many of the world’s popu-
1.0
0.0
1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010 2020 2030 2040 2050
Year
(b) Fertility rates
FIGURE 1.6 Bad news and good news: globally, populations continue to
rise (a), but our rate of growth has plummeted (b). Some countries are below
the replacement rate of about two children per woman. SOURCE: United
Nations Population Program, 2011.
poor countries where social security, education, and democracy
have been established. Since 1960 the average number of children
born per woman worldwide has decreased from 5 to 2.45 (fig. 1.6b).
By 2050 the UN Population Division predicts, most countries
will have fertility rates below the replacement rate of 2.1 children
per woman. If this happens, the world population will stabilize at
about 8.9 billion rather than the 9.3 billion previously expected.
Infant mortality in particular has declined in most countries,
as vaccines and safe water supplies have become more widely
available. Smallpox has been completely eradicated, and polio has
been vanquished except in a few countries, where violent conflict
has contributed to a resurgence of the disease. Life expectancies
have nearly doubled, on average (fig. 1.7a).
Hunger and food Over the past century, global food produc-
tion has increased faster than human population growth. We now
net also makes it easier to quickly raise global awareness of environ-
mental problems, such as deforestation or pollution, that historically
would have proceeded unobserved and unhindered. Improved
lation from cycles of poverty and vulnerability. Expanding educa-
tion for girls is a primary driver for declining birth rates worldwide.
Natural Resources
Biodiversity Loss Biologists report that habitat destruction,
overexploitation, pollution, and the introduction of exotic organ-
isms are eliminating species as quickly as the great extinction that
marked the end of the age of dinosaurs. The United Nations Envi-
ronment Programme reports that over the past century more than
800 species have disappeared and at least 10,000 species are now
considered threatened. This includes about half of all primates and
freshwater fish, together with around 10 percent of all plant spe-
cies. Top predators, including nearly all the big cats in the world,
are particularly rare and endangered. A nationwide survey of the
United Kingdom in 2004 found that most bird and butterfly popu-
lations had declined by 50 to 75 percent over the previous 20 years.
At least half of the forests existing before the introduction of agri-
culture have been cleared, and many of the ancient forests, which
harbor some of the greatest biodiversity, are rapidly being cut for
timber, for oil extraction, or for agricultural production of globally
traded commodities such as palm oil or soybeans.
Conservation of Forests and Nature Preserves While
exploitation continues, the rate of deforestation has slowed in many
regions. Brazil, which led global deforestation rates for decades,
has dramatically reduced deforestation rates. Nature preserves and
protected areas have increased sharply over the past few decades.

6 Principles of Environmental Science

Ecoregion and habitat protection remains uneven, and some areas
are protected only on paper. Still, this is dramatic progress in bio-
diversity protection.
Marine Resources The ocean provides irreplaceable and
imperiled food resources. More than a billion people in develop-
ing countries depend on seafood for their main source of animal
protein, but most commercial fisheries around the world are in
steep decline. According to the World Resources Institute, more
than three-quarters of the 441 fish stocks for which information is
available are severely depleted or in urgent need of better manage-
ment. Some marine biologists estimate that 90 percent of all the
large predators, including bluefin tuna, marlin, swordfish, sharks,
cod, and halibut, have been removed from the ocean.
Despite this ongoing overexploitation, many countries are
beginning to acknowledge the problem and find solutions. Marine
(a) Health care
(c) Education
(d) Sustainable resource use
protected areas and improved monitoring of fisheries provide
opportunities for sustainable management (fig. 1.7d). The
strategy of protecting fish nurseries is an altogether new approach
to sustaining ocean systems and the people who depend on them.
Marine reserves have been established in California, Hawaii, New
Zealand, Great Britain, and many other areas.
Energy Resources How we obtain and use energy will
greatly affect our environmental future. Fossil fuels (oil, coal, and
natural gas) presently provide around 80 percent of the energy
used in industrialized countries. The costs of extracting and burn-
ing these fuels are among our most serious environmental chal-
lenges. Costs include air and water pollution, mining damage, and
violent conflicts, in addition to climate change.
At the same time, improving alternatives and greater effi-
ciency are beginning to reduce reliance on fossil fuels. The cost
(b) Hunger
FIGURE 1.7 Human welfare is improving in some ways and stubbornly
difficult in others. Health care is improving in many areas (a). Some 800 ­million
people lack adequate ­nutrition. Hunger persists, especially in areas of violent
­conflict (b). Access to education is improving, including for girls (c), and local
control of fishery resources is improving food security in some places (d).
CHAPTE R 1 Understanding Our Environment 7
of solar power has plummeted, and in many areas solar costs the
same as conventional electricity over time. Solar and wind power
are now far cheaper, easier, and faster to install than nuclear power
or new coal plants.
1.3 HUMAN DIMENSIONS
OF ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCE
Aldo Leopold, one of the greatest thinkers on conservation,
observed that the great challenges in conservation have less to
do with managing resources than with managing people and our
demands on resources. Foresters have learned much about how
to grow trees, but still we struggle to establish conditions under
which villagers in developing countries can manage plantations
for themselves. Engineers know how to control ­pollution but not
how to persuade factories to install the necessary equipment. City
planners know how to design urban areas, but not how to make
them affordable for everyone. In this section we’ll review some
key ideas that guide our understanding of human dimensions of
environmental science and resource use. These ideas will be use-
ful throughout the rest of this book.
How do we describe resource use
and conservation?
The natural world supplies the water, food, metals, energy, and
other resources we use. Some of these resources are finite; some are
constantly renewed (see chapter 14). Often, renewable resources
can be destroyed by excessive exploitation, as in the case of fisher-
ies or forest resources (see section 1.2). When we consider resource
consumption, an important idea is throughput,
the amount of resources we use and dispose of.
A household that consumes abundant consumer
goods, foods, and energy brings in a great deal
of natural resource–based materials; that house-
hold also disposes of a great deal of materials.
Conversely a household that consumes very
little also produces little waste (see chapter 2).
Carbon capture,
Ecosystem services, another key idea, atmospheric regulation
refers to services or resources provided by (regulating, supporting)
environmental systems (fig. 1.8). Provisioning
of resources, such as the fuels we burn, may
be the most obvious service we require. Sup-
porting services are less obvious until you
start listing them: these include water purifica-
tion, production of food and atmospheric oxy- Decomposition,
gen by plants, and decomposition of waste by nutrient cycling
by decomposers
fungi and bacteria. Regulating services include (supporting)
maintenance of temperatures suitable for life by
the earth’s atmosphere and carbon capture by
green plants, which maintains a stable atmo-
spheric composition. Cultural services include
a diverse range of recreation, aesthetic, and
other nonmaterial benefits. Usually we rely on
these resources without thinking about them.
They support all our economic activities in FIGURE 1.8 Ecosystem services we depend on are countless and often invisible.
8 Principles of Environmental Science
some way, but we don’t put a price on them because nature doesn’t
force us to pay for them.
Are there enough resources for all of us? One of the answers
to this basic question was given in an essay entitled “Tragedy of
the Commons,” published in 1968 in the journal Science by ecol-
ogist Garret Hardin. In this classic framing of the problem, Hardin
argues that population growth leads inevitably to overuse and then
destruction of common resources—such as shared pastures,
unregulated fisheries, fresh water, land, and clean air. This classic
essay has challenged many to explore alternative ideas about
resource management. In many cases, agreed-upon rules for regu-
lating and monitoring a resource ensure that it is preserved.
Another strategy is to assign prices to ecological services, to
force businesses and economies to account for damages to life-
supporting systems. This approach is discussed in chapter 15. The
idea of sustainable development is yet another answer.
Sustainability means environmental
and social progress
Sustainability is a search for ecological stability and human
progress that can last over the long term. Of course, neither eco-
logical systems nor human institutions can continue forever. We
can work, however, to protect the best aspects of both realms
and to encourage resiliency and adaptability in both of them.
World Health Organization director Gro Harlem Brundtland has
defined sustainable development as “meeting the needs of the
present without compromising the ability of future generations
to meet their own needs.” In these terms, development means
bettering people’s lives. Sustainable development, then, means
CO2 O2
Photosynthesis
(provisioning,
supporting)
Food, fuel
(provisioning)
Water purification
by streams, soil bacteria
(supporting)
Temperature regulation
by water bodies
(regulating)

FIGURE 1.9 In impoverished areas, survival can mean degrading
resources that are already overstressed. Helping the poorest populations
is not only humane, it is essential for protecting our shared environment.
progress in human well-being that we can extend or prolong over
many generations, rather than just a few years.
This idea became widely publicized after the 1992 Earth Sum-
mit, a United Nations meeting held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. The
Rio meeting was a pivotal event. It brought together many diverse
groups—environmentalists and politicians from wealthy countries,
indigenous people and workers struggling for rights and land, and
government representatives from developing countries. The meet-
ing helped these better understand their common needs, and it
forced wealthy nations to admit that poorer populations also had a
right to a healthy and comfortable life.
Addressing uneven distribution of resources is one of the first
tasks of sustainable development. While a few of us live in increas-
ing luxury, the poorest populations suffer from inadequate diet,
housing, basic sanitation, clean water, education, and medical
care, while the wealthiest consume far more resources than we can
readily understand. Policymakers now recognize that eliminating
poverty and protecting our common environment are inextricably
interlinked. The world’s poorest people are both the victims and
the agents of environmental degradation (fig. 1.9). Desperate for
croplands to feed themselves and their families, many move into
virgin forests or cultivate steep, erosion-prone hillsides, where
soils are depleted after only a few years. Others migrate to the
crowded slums and ramshackle shantytowns that now surround
most major cities in the developing world. With no way to dispose
of wastes, the residents have no choice but to foul their environ-
ment further and contaminate the air they breathe and the water
they use for washing and drinking. Children raised in poverty and
illness, with few economic opportunities, often are condemned to
perpetuate a cycle of poverty.
Affluence is a goal and a liability
Economic growth offers a better life, more conveniences, and more
material goods to the billions of people currently living in dire
poverty. But social scientists have frequently pointed out that a
major reason for both poverty and environmental degradation is
that the wealthy consume a disproportionate share of food, water,
energy, and other resources, and we produce a majority of the
world’s waste and pollutants. The United States, for instance, with
less than 5 percent of the world’s total population, consumes about
one-quarter of most commercially traded commodities, such as oil,
and produces a quarter to half of most industrial wastes, such as
greenhouse gases, pesticides, and other persistent pollutants.
To get an average American through the day takes about
450 kg (nearly 1,000 lb) of raw materials, including 18 kg (40 lb)
of fossil fuels, 13 kg (29 lb) of other minerals, 12 kg (26 lb) of farm
products, 10 kg (22 lb) of wood and paper, and 450 liters (119 gal)
of water. Every year Americans throw away some 160 million tons
of garbage, including 50 million tons of paper, 67 billion cans and
bottles, 25 billion styrofoam cups, 18 billion disposable diapers,
and 2 billion disposable razors (fig. 1.10).
As the rest of the world seeks to achieve a similar standard of liv-
ing, with higher consumption of conveniences and consumer goods,
what will the effects be on the planet? What should we do about
this? Can we reduce our consumption rates? Can we find alternative
methods to maintain conveniences and a consumption-based econ-
omy with lower environmental costs? These are critical questions
as we seek to ensure a reasonable future for our grandchildren.
What is the state of poverty and wealth today?
In 2011 the student-led Occupy Wall Street movement used the
statistic “99 percent” to draw attention to growing economic dis-
parities in the United States. While many Americans are jobless
or homeless, the wealthiest 1 percent control over 35 percent of
the nation’s wealth. This imbalance has not been seen since the
years leading up to the Great Depression. Students leading the
Occupy movement argued that such imbalance destabilizes both
FIGURE 1.10 “And may we continue to be worthy of consuming
a disproportionate share of this planet’s resources.”
© Lee Lorenz/condé Nast Publications/www.cartoonbank.com
CHAPTE R 1 Understanding Our Environment 9
 60
TABLE 1.1 Quality-of-Life Indicators
LEAST-DEVELOPED MOST-DEVELOPED
COUNTRIES COUNTRIES
50
Per capita income (thousands of US $)

GDP/Person1 (U.S.)$1,671 (U.S.)$35,768

Poverty Index2 78.1% ~0
40
Life Expectancy 58 years 80 years
Adult Literacy 58% 99%
30 Female Secondary 11% 95%
Education
Total Fertility3 4.8 1.8
20 4
Infant Mortality 120 5
Improved Sanitation 23% 100%
10 Improved Water 61% 100%
CO2/capita5 0.2 tons 13 tons
1
0 ANNUAL gross domestic product.
2
1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010 2020 PERCENT living on less than (U.S.)$2/day.
3
AVERAGE births/woman.
Year 4
PER 1,000 live births.
5
North America East Asia & Pacific METRIC tons/yr/person.

European Union Middle East & North Africa SOURCE: UNDP Human Development Index, 2011, http://hdr.undp.org/en/statistics/.

Sub-Saharan Africa South Asia

the average family in the poorest countries has more than four
FIGURE 1.11 Per capita income in different regions (in 2015
U.S. ­dollars). Overall income has climbed, but the gap between rich and times as many children as those in richer countries—although that
poor ­countries has grown faster. DATA SOURCE: World Bank 2015. number is dropping rapidly in much of the world. In most wealthy
countries, total fertility is slightly less than the replacement rate of
democracy and the economy, because a small but powerful elite two children per woman. The poorest countries continue to grow at
can easily make shortsighted policy decisions that undermine the 2.6 percent per year (Exploring Science, p. 11).
rest of society.
Wealth is also unevenly divided at the global scale. The world’s
richest 200 people have a combined wealth greater than that of
Indigenous peoples safeguard biodiversity
the 3.5 billion people who make up the poorest half of the world’s In both rich and poor countries, native, or indigenous, peoples
population. Countries with the highest per capita income, more than are generally the least powerful, most neglected groups. Typically
$40,000 (U.S.) per year, make up only 10 percent of the world’s descendants of the original inhabitants of an area taken over by more
population. These countries are all in Europe or North America powerful outsiders, they are distinct from their c­ ountry’s dominant
(the average U.S. income in 2010 was about $48,000), plus Japan, language, culture, religion, and racial communities. Of the world’s
Singapore, Australia, and the United Arab Emirates (fig. 1.11). nearly 6,000 recognized cultures, 5,000 are indigenous, and these
More than 70 percent of the world’s population—some account for only about 10 percent of the total world population. In
­5 ­billion people—live in countries where the many countries, traditional caste systems, discrim-
average per capita income is less than $5,000, inatory laws, economics, and prejudice repress
roughly one-tenth of the U.S. average. These indigenous people. At least half of the world’s
countries include China and India, the world’s 6,000 distinct languages are dying because they
most populous countries, with a combined are no longer taught to children. When the last
population of over 2.5­­billion people. Of the elders who still speak the language die, so will
50 poorest countries, where income is less the culture that was its origin. Lost with those cul-
than $2.50 per day, 33 are in sub-Saharan tures will be a rich repertoire of knowledge about
Africa. There the ­destabilizing and impover- nature and a keen understanding of a particular
ishing effects of colonialism continue to influ- environment and way of life (fig. 1.12).
ence ongoing conflict and underdevelopment. Nonetheless, the 500 million indigenous
The gulf between the richest and the poor- people who remain in traditional homelands still
est nations affects many quality-of-life indica- possess valuable ecological wisdom and remain
tors (table 1.1). Where poverty is widespread
and health care is not, life spans are shorter FIGURE 1.12 Indigenous cultures may have
and illness is common. Because of high infant unique and important traditional knowledge about
mortality rates and low access to education, their environment.

10 Principles of Environmental Science

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 DANCE ON STILTS AT THE GIRLS’ UNYAGO, NIUCHI

Newala, too, suffers from the distance of its water-supply—at least

the Newala of to-day does; there was once another Newala in a lovely
valley at the foot of the plateau. I visited it and found scarcely a trace
of houses, only a Christian cemetery, with the graves of several
missionaries and their converts, remaining as a monument of its
former glories. But the surroundings are wonderfully beautiful. A
thick grove of splendid mango-trees closes in the weather-worn
crosses and headstones; behind them, combining the useful and the
agreeable, is a whole plantation of lemon-trees covered with ripe
fruit; not the small African kind, but a much larger and also juicier
imported variety, which drops into the hands of the passing traveller,
without calling for any exertion on his part. Old Newala is now under
the jurisdiction of the native pastor, Daudi, at Chingulungulu, who,
as I am on very friendly terms with him, allows me, as a matter of
course, the use of this lemon-grove during my stay at Newala.
 FEET MUTILATED BY THE RAVAGES OF THE “JIGGER”
(Sarcopsylla penetrans)

The water-supply of New Newala is in the bottom of the valley,

some 1,600 feet lower down. The way is not only long and fatiguing,
but the water, when we get it, is thoroughly bad. We are suffering not
only from this, but from the fact that the arrangements at Newala are
nothing short of luxurious. We have a separate kitchen—a hut built
against the boma palisade on the right of the baraza, the interior of
which is not visible from our usual position. Our two cooks were not
long in finding this out, and they consequently do—or rather neglect
to do—what they please. In any case they do not seem to be very
particular about the boiling of our drinking-water—at least I can
attribute to no other cause certain attacks of a dysenteric nature,
from which both Knudsen and I have suffered for some time. If a
man like Omari has to be left unwatched for a moment, he is capable
of anything. Besides this complaint, we are inconvenienced by the
state of our nails, which have become as hard as glass, and crack on
the slightest provocation, and I have the additional infliction of
pimples all over me. As if all this were not enough, we have also, for
the last week been waging war against the jigger, who has found his
Eldorado in the hot sand of the Makonde plateau. Our men are seen
all day long—whenever their chronic colds and the dysentery likewise
raging among them permit—occupied in removing this scourge of
Africa from their feet and trying to prevent the disastrous
consequences of its presence. It is quite common to see natives of
this place with one or two toes missing; many have lost all their toes,
or even the whole front part of the foot, so that a well-formed leg
ends in a shapeless stump. These ravages are caused by the female of
Sarcopsylla penetrans, which bores its way under the skin and there
develops an egg-sac the size of a pea. In all books on the subject, it is
stated that one’s attention is called to the presence of this parasite by
an intolerable itching. This agrees very well with my experience, so
far as the softer parts of the sole, the spaces between and under the
toes, and the side of the foot are concerned, but if the creature
penetrates through the harder parts of the heel or ball of the foot, it
may escape even the most careful search till it has reached maturity.
Then there is no time to be lost, if the horrible ulceration, of which
we see cases by the dozen every day, is to be prevented. It is much
easier, by the way, to discover the insect on the white skin of a
European than on that of a native, on which the dark speck scarcely
shows. The four or five jiggers which, in spite of the fact that I
constantly wore high laced boots, chose my feet to settle in, were
taken out for me by the all-accomplished Knudsen, after which I
thought it advisable to wash out the cavities with corrosive
sublimate. The natives have a different sort of disinfectant—they fill
the hole with scraped roots. In a tiny Makua village on the slope of
the plateau south of Newala, we saw an old woman who had filled all
the spaces under her toe-nails with powdered roots by way of
prophylactic treatment. What will be the result, if any, who can say?
The rest of the many trifling ills which trouble our existence are
really more comic than serious. In the absence of anything else to
smoke, Knudsen and I at last opened a box of cigars procured from
the Indian store-keeper at Lindi, and tried them, with the most
distressing results. Whether they contain opium or some other
narcotic, neither of us can say, but after the tenth puff we were both
“off,” three-quarters stupefied and unspeakably wretched. Slowly we
recovered—and what happened next? Half-an-hour later we were
once more smoking these poisonous concoctions—so insatiable is the
craving for tobacco in the tropics.
Even my present attacks of fever scarcely deserve to be taken
seriously. I have had no less than three here at Newala, all of which
have run their course in an incredibly short time. In the early
afternoon, I am busy with my old natives, asking questions and
making notes. The strong midday coffee has stimulated my spirits to
an extraordinary degree, the brain is active and vigorous, and work
progresses rapidly, while a pleasant warmth pervades the whole
body. Suddenly this gives place to a violent chill, forcing me to put on
my overcoat, though it is only half-past three and the afternoon sun
is at its hottest. Now the brain no longer works with such acuteness
and logical precision; more especially does it fail me in trying to
establish the syntax of the difficult Makua language on which I have
ventured, as if I had not enough to do without it. Under the
circumstances it seems advisable to take my temperature, and I do
so, to save trouble, without leaving my seat, and while going on with
my work. On examination, I find it to be 101·48°. My tutors are
abruptly dismissed and my bed set up in the baraza; a few minutes
later I am in it and treating myself internally with hot water and
lemon-juice.
Three hours later, the thermometer marks nearly 104°, and I make
them carry me back into the tent, bed and all, as I am now perspiring
heavily, and exposure to the cold wind just beginning to blow might
mean a fatal chill. I lie still for a little while, and then find, to my
great relief, that the temperature is not rising, but rather falling. This
is about 7.30 p.m. At 8 p.m. I find, to my unbounded astonishment,
that it has fallen below 98·6°, and I feel perfectly well. I read for an
hour or two, and could very well enjoy a smoke, if I had the
wherewithal—Indian cigars being out of the question.
Having no medical training, I am at a loss to account for this state
of things. It is impossible that these transitory attacks of high fever
should be malarial; it seems more probable that they are due to a
kind of sunstroke. On consulting my note-book, I become more and
more inclined to think this is the case, for these attacks regularly
follow extreme fatigue and long exposure to strong sunshine. They at
least have the advantage of being only short interruptions to my
work, as on the following morning I am always quite fresh and fit.
My treasure of a cook is suffering from an enormous hydrocele which
makes it difficult for him to get up, and Moritz is obliged to keep in
the dark on account of his inflamed eyes. Knudsen’s cook, a raw boy
from somewhere in the bush, knows still less of cooking than Omari;
consequently Nils Knudsen himself has been promoted to the vacant
post. Finding that we had come to the end of our supplies, he began
by sending to Chingulungulu for the four sucking-pigs which we had
bought from Matola and temporarily left in his charge; and when
they came up, neatly packed in a large crate, he callously slaughtered
the biggest of them. The first joint we were thoughtless enough to
entrust for roasting to Knudsen’s mshenzi cook, and it was
consequently uneatable; but we made the rest of the animal into a
jelly which we ate with great relish after weeks of underfeeding,
consuming incredible helpings of it at both midday and evening
meals. The only drawback is a certain want of variety in the tinned
vegetables. Dr. Jäger, to whom the Geographical Commission
entrusted the provisioning of the expeditions—mine as well as his
own—because he had more time on his hands than the rest of us,
seems to have laid in a huge stock of Teltow turnips,[46] an article of
food which is all very well for occasional use, but which quickly palls
when set before one every day; and we seem to have no other tins
left. There is no help for it—we must put up with the turnips; but I
am certain that, once I am home again, I shall not touch them for ten
years to come.
Amid all these minor evils, which, after all, go to make up the
genuine flavour of Africa, there is at least one cheering touch:
Knudsen has, with the dexterity of a skilled mechanic, repaired my 9
× 12 cm. camera, at least so far that I can use it with a little care.
How, in the absence of finger-nails, he was able to accomplish such a
ticklish piece of work, having no tool but a clumsy screw-driver for
taking to pieces and putting together again the complicated
mechanism of the instantaneous shutter, is still a mystery to me; but
he did it successfully. The loss of his finger-nails shows him in a light
contrasting curiously enough with the intelligence evinced by the
above operation; though, after all, it is scarcely surprising after his
ten years’ residence in the bush. One day, at Lindi, he had occasion
to wash a dog, which must have been in need of very thorough
cleansing, for the bottle handed to our friend for the purpose had an
extremely strong smell. Having performed his task in the most
conscientious manner, he perceived with some surprise that the dog
did not appear much the better for it, and was further surprised by
finding his own nails ulcerating away in the course of the next few
days. “How was I to know that carbolic acid has to be diluted?” he
mutters indignantly, from time to time, with a troubled gaze at his
mutilated finger-tips.
 Since we came to Newala we have been making excursions in all
directions through the surrounding country, in accordance with old
habit, and also because the akida Sefu did not get together the tribal
elders from whom I wanted information so speedily as he had
promised. There is, however, no harm done, as, even if seen only
from the outside, the country and people are interesting enough.
The Makonde plateau is like a large rectangular table rounded off
at the corners. Measured from the Indian Ocean to Newala, it is
about seventy-five miles long, and between the Rovuma and the
Lukuledi it averages fifty miles in breadth, so that its superficial area
is about two-thirds of that of the kingdom of Saxony. The surface,
however, is not level, but uniformly inclined from its south-western
edge to the ocean. From the upper edge, on which Newala lies, the
eye ranges for many miles east and north-east, without encountering
any obstacle, over the Makonde bush. It is a green sea, from which
here and there thick clouds of smoke rise, to show that it, too, is
inhabited by men who carry on their tillage like so many other
primitive peoples, by cutting down and burning the bush, and
manuring with the ashes. Even in the radiant light of a tropical day
such a fire is a grand sight.
Much less effective is the impression produced just now by the
great western plain as seen from the edge of the plateau. As often as
time permits, I stroll along this edge, sometimes in one direction,
sometimes in another, in the hope of finding the air clear enough to
let me enjoy the view; but I have always been disappointed.
Wherever one looks, clouds of smoke rise from the burning bush,
and the air is full of smoke and vapour. It is a pity, for under more
favourable circumstances the panorama of the whole country up to
the distant Majeje hills must be truly magnificent. It is of little use
taking photographs now, and an outline sketch gives a very poor idea
of the scenery. In one of these excursions I went out of my way to
make a personal attempt on the Makonde bush. The present edge of
the plateau is the result of a far-reaching process of destruction
through erosion and denudation. The Makonde strata are
everywhere cut into by ravines, which, though short, are hundreds of
yards in depth. In consequence of the loose stratification of these
beds, not only are the walls of these ravines nearly vertical, but their
upper end is closed by an equally steep escarpment, so that the
western edge of the Makonde plateau is hemmed in by a series of
deep, basin-like valleys. In order to get from one side of such a ravine
to the other, I cut my way through the bush with a dozen of my men.
It was a very open part, with more grass than scrub, but even so the
short stretch of less than two hundred yards was very hard work; at
the end of it the men’s calicoes were in rags and they themselves
bleeding from hundreds of scratches, while even our strong khaki
suits had not escaped scatheless.

NATIVE PATH THROUGH THE MAKONDE BUSH, NEAR

MAHUTA

I see increasing reason to believe that the view formed some time
back as to the origin of the Makonde bush is the correct one. I have
no doubt that it is not a natural product, but the result of human
occupation. Those parts of the high country where man—as a very
slight amount of practice enables the eye to perceive at once—has not
yet penetrated with axe and hoe, are still occupied by a splendid
timber forest quite able to sustain a comparison with our mixed
forests in Germany. But wherever man has once built his hut or tilled
his field, this horrible bush springs up. Every phase of this process
may be seen in the course of a couple of hours’ walk along the main
road. From the bush to right or left, one hears the sound of the axe—
not from one spot only, but from several directions at once. A few
steps further on, we can see what is taking place. The brush has been
cut down and piled up in heaps to the height of a yard or more,
between which the trunks of the large trees stand up like the last
pillars of a magnificent ruined building. These, too, present a
melancholy spectacle: the destructive Makonde have ringed them—
cut a broad strip of bark all round to ensure their dying off—and also
piled up pyramids of brush round them. Father and son, mother and
son-in-law, are chopping away perseveringly in the background—too
busy, almost, to look round at the white stranger, who usually excites
so much interest. If you pass by the same place a week later, the piles
of brushwood have disappeared and a thick layer of ashes has taken
the place of the green forest. The large trees stretch their
smouldering trunks and branches in dumb accusation to heaven—if
they have not already fallen and been more or less reduced to ashes,
perhaps only showing as a white stripe on the dark ground.
This work of destruction is carried out by the Makonde alike on the
virgin forest and on the bush which has sprung up on sites already
cultivated and deserted. In the second case they are saved the trouble
of burning the large trees, these being entirely absent in the
secondary bush.
After burning this piece of forest ground and loosening it with the
hoe, the native sows his corn and plants his vegetables. All over the
country, he goes in for bed-culture, which requires, and, in fact,
receives, the most careful attention. Weeds are nowhere tolerated in
the south of German East Africa. The crops may fail on the plains,
where droughts are frequent, but never on the plateau with its
abundant rains and heavy dews. Its fortunate inhabitants even have
the satisfaction of seeing the proud Wayao and Wamakua working
for them as labourers, driven by hunger to serve where they were
accustomed to rule.
But the light, sandy soil is soon exhausted, and would yield no
harvest the second year if cultivated twice running. This fact has
been familiar to the native for ages; consequently he provides in
time, and, while his crop is growing, prepares the next plot with axe
and firebrand. Next year he plants this with his various crops and
lets the first piece lie fallow. For a short time it remains waste and
desolate; then nature steps in to repair the destruction wrought by
man; a thousand new growths spring out of the exhausted soil, and
even the old stumps put forth fresh shoots. Next year the new growth
is up to one’s knees, and in a few years more it is that terrible,
impenetrable bush, which maintains its position till the black
occupier of the land has made the round of all the available sites and
come back to his starting point.
The Makonde are, body and soul, so to speak, one with this bush.
According to my Yao informants, indeed, their name means nothing
else but “bush people.” Their own tradition says that they have been
settled up here for a very long time, but to my surprise they laid great
stress on an original immigration. Their old homes were in the
south-east, near Mikindani and the mouth of the Rovuma, whence
their peaceful forefathers were driven by the continual raids of the
Sakalavas from Madagascar and the warlike Shirazis[47] of the coast,
to take refuge on the almost inaccessible plateau. I have studied
African ethnology for twenty years, but the fact that changes of
population in this apparently quiet and peaceable corner of the earth
could have been occasioned by outside enterprises taking place on
the high seas, was completely new to me. It is, no doubt, however,
correct.
The charming tribal legend of the Makonde—besides informing us
of other interesting matters—explains why they have to live in the
thickest of the bush and a long way from the edge of the plateau,
instead of making their permanent homes beside the purling brooks
and springs of the low country.
“The place where the tribe originated is Mahuta, on the southern
side of the plateau towards the Rovuma, where of old time there was
nothing but thick bush. Out of this bush came a man who never
washed himself or shaved his head, and who ate and drank but little.
He went out and made a human figure from the wood of a tree
growing in the open country, which he took home to his abode in the
bush and there set it upright. In the night this image came to life and
was a woman. The man and woman went down together to the
Rovuma to wash themselves. Here the woman gave birth to a still-
born child. They left that place and passed over the high land into the
valley of the Mbemkuru, where the woman had another child, which
was also born dead. Then they returned to the high bush country of
Mahuta, where the third child was born, which lived and grew up. In
course of time, the couple had many more children, and called
themselves Wamatanda. These were the ancestral stock of the
Makonde, also called Wamakonde,[48] i.e., aborigines. Their
forefather, the man from the bush, gave his children the command to
bury their dead upright, in memory of the mother of their race who
was cut out of wood and awoke to life when standing upright. He also
warned them against settling in the valleys and near large streams,
for sickness and death dwelt there. They were to make it a rule to
have their huts at least an hour’s walk from the nearest watering-
place; then their children would thrive and escape illness.”
The explanation of the name Makonde given by my informants is
somewhat different from that contained in the above legend, which I
extract from a little book (small, but packed with information), by
Pater Adams, entitled Lindi und sein Hinterland. Otherwise, my
results agree exactly with the statements of the legend. Washing?
Hapana—there is no such thing. Why should they do so? As it is, the
supply of water scarcely suffices for cooking and drinking; other
people do not wash, so why should the Makonde distinguish himself
by such needless eccentricity? As for shaving the head, the short,
woolly crop scarcely needs it,[49] so the second ancestral precept is
likewise easy enough to follow. Beyond this, however, there is
nothing ridiculous in the ancestor’s advice. I have obtained from
various local artists a fairly large number of figures carved in wood,
ranging from fifteen to twenty-three inches in height, and
representing women belonging to the great group of the Mavia,
Makonde, and Matambwe tribes. The carving is remarkably well
done and renders the female type with great accuracy, especially the
keloid ornamentation, to be described later on. As to the object and
meaning of their works the sculptors either could or (more probably)
would tell me nothing, and I was forced to content myself with the
scanty information vouchsafed by one man, who said that the figures
were merely intended to represent the nembo—the artificial
deformations of pelele, ear-discs, and keloids. The legend recorded
by Pater Adams places these figures in a new light. They must surely
be more than mere dolls; and we may even venture to assume that
they are—though the majority of present-day Makonde are probably
unaware of the fact—representations of the tribal ancestress.
 The references in the legend to the descent from Mahuta to the
Rovuma, and to a journey across the highlands into the Mbekuru
valley, undoubtedly indicate the previous history of the tribe, the
travels of the ancestral pair typifying the migrations of their
descendants. The descent to the neighbouring Rovuma valley, with
its extraordinary fertility and great abundance of game, is intelligible
at a glance—but the crossing of the Lukuledi depression, the ascent
to the Rondo Plateau and the descent to the Mbemkuru, also lie
within the bounds of probability, for all these districts have exactly
the same character as the extreme south. Now, however, comes a
point of especial interest for our bacteriological age. The primitive
Makonde did not enjoy their lives in the marshy river-valleys.
Disease raged among them, and many died. It was only after they
had returned to their original home near Mahuta, that the health
conditions of these people improved. We are very apt to think of the
African as a stupid person whose ignorance of nature is only equalled
by his fear of it, and who looks on all mishaps as caused by evil
spirits and malignant natural powers. It is much more correct to
assume in this case that the people very early learnt to distinguish
districts infested with malaria from those where it is absent.
This knowledge is crystallized in the
ancestral warning against settling in the
valleys and near the great waters, the
dwelling-places of disease and death. At the
same time, for security against the hostile
Mavia south of the Rovuma, it was enacted
that every settlement must be not less than a
certain distance from the southern edge of the
plateau. Such in fact is their mode of life at the
present day. It is not such a bad one, and
certainly they are both safer and more
comfortable than the Makua, the recent
intruders from the south, who have made USUAL METHOD OF
good their footing on the western edge of the CLOSING HUT-DOOR
plateau, extending over a fairly wide belt of
country. Neither Makua nor Makonde show in their dwellings
anything of the size and comeliness of the Yao houses in the plain,
especially at Masasi, Chingulungulu and Zuza’s. Jumbe Chauro, a
Makonde hamlet not far from Newala, on the road to Mahuta, is the
most important settlement of the tribe I have yet seen, and has fairly
spacious huts. But how slovenly is their construction compared with
the palatial residences of the elephant-hunters living in the plain.
The roofs are still more untidy than in the general run of huts during
the dry season, the walls show here and there the scanty beginnings
or the lamentable remains of the mud plastering, and the interior is a
veritable dog-kennel; dirt, dust and disorder everywhere. A few huts
only show any attempt at division into rooms, and this consists
merely of very roughly-made bamboo partitions. In one point alone
have I noticed any indication of progress—in the method of fastening
the door. Houses all over the south are secured in a simple but
ingenious manner. The door consists of a set of stout pieces of wood
or bamboo, tied with bark-string to two cross-pieces, and moving in
two grooves round one of the door-posts, so as to open inwards. If
the owner wishes to leave home, he takes two logs as thick as a man’s
upper arm and about a yard long. One of these is placed obliquely
against the middle of the door from the inside, so as to form an angle
of from 60° to 75° with the ground. He then places the second piece
horizontally across the first, pressing it downward with all his might.
It is kept in place by two strong posts planted in the ground a few
inches inside the door. This fastening is absolutely safe, but of course
cannot be applied to both doors at once, otherwise how could the
owner leave or enter his house? I have not yet succeeded in finding
out how the back door is fastened.

MAKONDE LOCK AND KEY AT JUMBE CHAURO

 This is the general way of closing a house. The Makonde at Jumbe
Chauro, however, have a much more complicated, solid and original
one. Here, too, the door is as already described, except that there is
only one post on the inside, standing by itself about six inches from
one side of the doorway. Opposite this post is a hole in the wall just
large enough to admit a man’s arm. The door is closed inside by a
large wooden bolt passing through a hole in this post and pressing
with its free end against the door. The other end has three holes into
which fit three pegs running in vertical grooves inside the post. The
door is opened with a wooden key about a foot long, somewhat
curved and sloped off at the butt; the other end has three pegs
corresponding to the holes, in the bolt, so that, when it is thrust
through the hole in the wall and inserted into the rectangular
opening in the post, the pegs can be lifted and the bolt drawn out.[50]

MODE OF INSERTING THE KEY

With no small pride first one householder and then a second

showed me on the spot the action of this greatest invention of the
Makonde Highlands. To both with an admiring exclamation of
“Vizuri sana!” (“Very fine!”). I expressed the wish to take back these
marvels with me to Ulaya, to show the Wazungu what clever fellows
the Makonde are. Scarcely five minutes after my return to camp at
Newala, the two men came up sweating under the weight of two
heavy logs which they laid down at my feet, handing over at the same
time the keys of the fallen fortress. Arguing, logically enough, that if
the key was wanted, the lock would be wanted with it, they had taken
their axes and chopped down the posts—as it never occurred to them
to dig them out of the ground and so bring them intact. Thus I have
two badly damaged specimens, and the owners, instead of praise,
come in for a blowing-up.
The Makua huts in the environs of Newala are especially
miserable; their more than slovenly construction reminds one of the
temporary erections of the Makua at Hatia’s, though the people here
have not been concerned in a war. It must therefore be due to
congenital idleness, or else to the absence of a powerful chief. Even
the baraza at Mlipa’s, a short hour’s walk south-east of Newala,
shares in this general neglect. While public buildings in this country
are usually looked after more or less carefully, this is in evident
danger of being blown over by the first strong easterly gale. The only
attractive object in this whole district is the grave of the late chief
Mlipa. I visited it in the morning, while the sun was still trying with
partial success to break through the rolling mists, and the circular
grove of tall euphorbias, which, with a broken pot, is all that marks
the old king’s resting-place, impressed one with a touch of pathos.
Even my very materially-minded carriers seemed to feel something
of the sort, for instead of their usual ribald songs, they chanted
solemnly, as we marched on through the dense green of the Makonde
bush:—
 “We shall arrive with the great master; we stand in a row and have
no fear about getting our food and our money from the Serkali (the
Government). We are not afraid; we are going along with the great
master, the lion; we are going down to the coast and back.”
With regard to the characteristic features of the various tribes here
on the western edge of the plateau, I can arrive at no other
conclusion than the one already come to in the plain, viz., that it is
impossible for anyone but a trained anthropologist to assign any
given individual at once to his proper tribe. In fact, I think that even
an anthropological specialist, after the most careful examination,
might find it a difficult task to decide. The whole congeries of peoples
collected in the region bounded on the west by the great Central
African rift, Tanganyika and Nyasa, and on the east by the Indian
Ocean, are closely related to each other—some of their languages are
only distinguished from one another as dialects of the same speech,
and no doubt all the tribes present the same shape of skull and
structure of skeleton. Thus, surely, there can be no very striking
differences in outward appearance.
 Even did such exist, I should have no time
to concern myself with them, for day after day,
I have to see or hear, as the case may be—in
any case to grasp and record—an
extraordinary number of ethnographic
phenomena. I am almost disposed to think it
fortunate that some departments of inquiry, at
least, are barred by external circumstances.
Chief among these is the subject of iron-
working. We are apt to think of Africa as a
country where iron ore is everywhere, so to
speak, to be picked up by the roadside, and
where it would be quite surprising if the
inhabitants had not learnt to smelt the
material ready to their hand. In fact, the
knowledge of this art ranges all over the
continent, from the Kabyles in the north to the
Kafirs in the south. Here between the Rovuma
and the Lukuledi the conditions are not so
favourable. According to the statements of the
Makonde, neither ironstone nor any other
form of iron ore is known to them. They have
not therefore advanced to the art of smelting
the metal, but have hitherto bought all their
THE ANCESTRESS OF
THE MAKONDE
iron implements from neighbouring tribes.
Even in the plain the inhabitants are not much
better off. Only one man now living is said to
understand the art of smelting iron. This old fundi lives close to
Huwe, that isolated, steep-sided block of granite which rises out of
the green solitude between Masasi and Chingulungulu, and whose
jagged and splintered top meets the traveller’s eye everywhere. While
still at Masasi I wished to see this man at work, but was told that,
frightened by the rising, he had retired across the Rovuma, though
he would soon return. All subsequent inquiries as to whether the
fundi had come back met with the genuine African answer, “Bado”
(“Not yet”).
 BRAZIER

Some consolation was afforded me by a brassfounder, whom I

came across in the bush near Akundonde’s. This man is the favourite
of women, and therefore no doubt of the gods; he welds the glittering
brass rods purchased at the coast into those massive, heavy rings
which, on the wrists and ankles of the local fair ones, continually give
me fresh food for admiration. Like every decent master-craftsman he
had all his tools with him, consisting of a pair of bellows, three
crucibles and a hammer—nothing more, apparently. He was quite
willing to show his skill, and in a twinkling had fixed his bellows on
the ground. They are simply two goat-skins, taken off whole, the four
legs being closed by knots, while the upper opening, intended to
admit the air, is kept stretched by two pieces of wood. At the lower
end of the skin a smaller opening is left into which a wooden tube is
stuck. The fundi has quickly borrowed a heap of wood-embers from
the nearest hut; he then fixes the free ends of the two tubes into an
earthen pipe, and clamps them to the ground by means of a bent
piece of wood. Now he fills one of his small clay crucibles, the dross
on which shows that they have been long in use, with the yellow
material, places it in the midst of the embers, which, at present are
only faintly glimmering, and begins his work. In quick alternation
the smith’s two hands move up and down with the open ends of the
bellows; as he raises his hand he holds the slit wide open, so as to let
the air enter the skin bag unhindered. In pressing it down he closes
the bag, and the air puffs through the bamboo tube and clay pipe into
the fire, which quickly burns up. The smith, however, does not keep
on with this work, but beckons to another man, who relieves him at
the bellows, while he takes some more tools out of a large skin pouch
carried on his back. I look on in wonder as, with a smooth round
stick about the thickness of a finger, he bores a few vertical holes into
the clean sand of the soil. This should not be difficult, yet the man
seems to be taking great pains over it. Then he fastens down to the
ground, with a couple of wooden clamps, a neat little trough made by
splitting a joint of bamboo in half, so that the ends are closed by the
two knots. At last the yellow metal has attained the right consistency,
and the fundi lifts the crucible from the fire by means of two sticks
split at the end to serve as tongs. A short swift turn to the left—a
tilting of the crucible—and the molten brass, hissing and giving forth
clouds of smoke, flows first into the bamboo mould and then into the
holes in the ground.
The technique of this backwoods craftsman may not be very far
advanced, but it cannot be denied that he knows how to obtain an
adequate result by the simplest means. The ladies of highest rank in
this country—that is to say, those who can afford it, wear two kinds
of these massive brass rings, one cylindrical, the other semicircular
in section. The latter are cast in the most ingenious way in the
bamboo mould, the former in the circular hole in the sand. It is quite
a simple matter for the fundi to fit these bars to the limbs of his fair
customers; with a few light strokes of his hammer he bends the
pliable brass round arm or ankle without further inconvenience to
the wearer.
SHAPING THE POT

SMOOTHING WITH MAIZE-COB

CUTTING THE EDGE

 FINISHING THE BOTTOM

LAST SMOOTHING BEFORE

BURNING

FIRING THE BRUSH-PILE

 LIGHTING THE FARTHER SIDE OF
THE PILE

TURNING THE RED-HOT VESSEL

NYASA WOMAN MAKING POTS AT MASASI

Pottery is an art which must always and everywhere excite the
interest of the student, just because it is so intimately connected with
the development of human culture, and because its relics are one of
the principal factors in the reconstruction of our own condition in
prehistoric times. I shall always remember with pleasure the two or
three afternoons at Masasi when Salim Matola’s mother, a slightly-
built, graceful, pleasant-looking woman, explained to me with
touching patience, by means of concrete illustrations, the ceramic art
of her people. The only implements for this primitive process were a
lump of clay in her left hand, and in the right a calabash containing
the following valuables: the fragment of a maize-cob stripped of all
its grains, a smooth, oval pebble, about the size of a pigeon’s egg, a
few chips of gourd-shell, a bamboo splinter about the length of one’s
hand, a small shell, and a bunch of some herb resembling spinach.
 Nothing more. The woman scraped with the
shell a round, shallow hole in the soft, fine
sand of the soil, and, when an active young
girl had filled the calabash with water for her,
she began to knead the clay. As if by magic it
gradually assumed the shape of a rough but
already well-shaped vessel, which only wanted
a little touching up with the instruments
before mentioned. I looked out with the
MAKUA WOMAN closest attention for any indication of the use
MAKING A POT. of the potter’s wheel, in however rudimentary
SHOWS THE a form, but no—hapana (there is none). The
BEGINNINGS OF THE embryo pot stood firmly in its little
POTTER’S WHEEL
depression, and the woman walked round it in
a stooping posture, whether she was removing
small stones or similar foreign bodies with the maize-cob, smoothing
the inner or outer surface with the splinter of bamboo, or later, after
letting it dry for a day, pricking in the ornamentation with a pointed
bit of gourd-shell, or working out the bottom, or cutting the edge
with a sharp bamboo knife, or giving the last touches to the finished
vessel. This occupation of the women is infinitely toilsome, but it is
without doubt an accurate reproduction of the process in use among
our ancestors of the Neolithic and Bronze ages.
There is no doubt that the invention of pottery, an item in human
progress whose importance cannot be over-estimated, is due to
women. Rough, coarse and unfeeling, the men of the horde range
over the countryside. When the united cunning of the hunters has
succeeded in killing the game; not one of them thinks of carrying
home the spoil. A bright fire, kindled by a vigorous wielding of the
drill, is crackling beside them; the animal has been cleaned and cut
up secundum artem, and, after a slight singeing, will soon disappear
under their sharp teeth; no one all this time giving a single thought
to wife or child.
To what shifts, on the other hand, the primitive wife, and still more
the primitive mother, was put! Not even prehistoric stomachs could
endure an unvarying diet of raw food. Something or other suggested
the beneficial effect of hot water on the majority of approved but
indigestible dishes. Perhaps a neighbour had tried holding the hard
roots or tubers over the fire in a calabash filled with water—or maybe
an ostrich-egg-shell, or a hastily improvised vessel of bark. They
became much softer and more palatable than they had previously
been; but, unfortunately, the vessel could not stand the fire and got
charred on the outside. That can be remedied, thought our
ancestress, and plastered a layer of wet clay round a similar vessel.
This is an improvement; the cooking utensil remains uninjured, but
the heat of the fire has shrunk it, so that it is loose in its shell. The
next step is to detach it, so, with a firm grip and a jerk, shell and
kernel are separated, and pottery is invented. Perhaps, however, the
discovery which led to an intelligent use of the burnt-clay shell, was
made in a slightly different way. Ostrich-eggs and calabashes are not
to be found in every part of the world, but everywhere mankind has
arrived at the art of making baskets out of pliant materials, such as
bark, bast, strips of palm-leaf, supple twigs, etc. Our inventor has no
water-tight vessel provided by nature. “Never mind, let us line the
basket with clay.” This answers the purpose, but alas! the basket gets
burnt over the blazing fire, the woman watches the process of
cooking with increasing uneasiness, fearing a leak, but no leak
appears. The food, done to a turn, is eaten with peculiar relish; and
the cooking-vessel is examined, half in curiosity, half in satisfaction
at the result. The plastic clay is now hard as stone, and at the same
time looks exceedingly well, for the neat plaiting of the burnt basket
is traced all over it in a pretty pattern. Thus, simultaneously with
pottery, its ornamentation was invented.
Primitive woman has another claim to respect. It was the man,
roving abroad, who invented the art of producing fire at will, but the
woman, unable to imitate him in this, has been a Vestal from the
earliest times. Nothing gives so much trouble as the keeping alight of
the smouldering brand, and, above all, when all the men are absent
from the camp. Heavy rain-clouds gather, already the first large
drops are falling, the first gusts of the storm rage over the plain. The
little flame, a greater anxiety to the woman than her own children,
flickers unsteadily in the blast. What is to be done? A sudden thought
occurs to her, and in an instant she has constructed a primitive hut
out of strips of bark, to protect the flame against rain and wind.
This, or something very like it, was the way in which the principle
of the house was discovered; and even the most hardened misogynist
cannot fairly refuse a woman the credit of it. The protection of the
hearth-fire from the weather is the germ from which the human
dwelling was evolved. Men had little, if any share, in this forward
step, and that only at a late stage. Even at the present day, the
plastering of the housewall with clay and the manufacture of pottery
are exclusively the women’s business. These are two very significant
survivals. Our European kitchen-garden, too, is originally a woman’s
invention, and the hoe, the primitive instrument of agriculture, is,
characteristically enough, still used in this department. But the
noblest achievement which we owe to the other sex is unquestionably
the art of cookery. Roasting alone—the oldest process—is one for
which men took the hint (a very obvious one) from nature. It must
have been suggested by the scorched carcase of some animal
overtaken by the destructive forest-fires. But boiling—the process of
improving organic substances by the help of water heated to boiling-
point—is a much later discovery. It is so recent that it has not even
yet penetrated to all parts of the world. The Polynesians understand
how to steam food, that is, to cook it, neatly wrapped in leaves, in a
hole in the earth between hot stones, the air being excluded, and
(sometimes) a few drops of water sprinkled on the stones; but they
do not understand boiling.
To come back from this digression, we find that the slender Nyasa
woman has, after once more carefully examining the finished pot,
put it aside in the shade to dry. On the following day she sends me
word by her son, Salim Matola, who is always on hand, that she is
going to do the burning, and, on coming out of my house, I find her
already hard at work. She has spread on the ground a layer of very
dry sticks, about as thick as one’s thumb, has laid the pot (now of a
yellowish-grey colour) on them, and is piling brushwood round it.
My faithful Pesa mbili, the mnyampara, who has been standing by,
most obligingly, with a lighted stick, now hands it to her. Both of
them, blowing steadily, light the pile on the lee side, and, when the
flame begins to catch, on the weather side also. Soon the whole is in a
blaze, but the dry fuel is quickly consumed and the fire dies down, so
that we see the red-hot vessel rising from the ashes. The woman
turns it continually with a long stick, sometimes one way and
sometimes another, so that it may be evenly heated all over. In
twenty minutes she rolls it out of the ash-heap, takes up the bundle
of spinach, which has been lying for two days in a jar of water, and
sprinkles the red-hot clay with it. The places where the drops fall are
marked by black spots on the uniform reddish-brown surface. With a
sigh of relief, and with visible satisfaction, the woman rises to an
erect position; she is standing just in a line between me and the fire,
from which a cloud of smoke is just rising: I press the ball of my
camera, the shutter clicks—the apotheosis is achieved! Like a
priestess, representative of her inventive sex, the graceful woman
stands: at her feet the hearth-fire she has given us beside her the
invention she has devised for us, in the background the home she has
built for us.
At Newala, also, I have had the manufacture of pottery carried on
in my presence. Technically the process is better than that already
described, for here we find the beginnings of the potter’s wheel,
which does not seem to exist in the plains; at least I have seen
nothing of the sort. The artist, a frightfully stupid Makua woman, did
not make a depression in the ground to receive the pot she was about
to shape, but used instead a large potsherd. Otherwise, she went to
work in much the same way as Salim’s mother, except that she saved
herself the trouble of walking round and round her work by squatting
at her ease and letting the pot and potsherd rotate round her; this is
surely the first step towards a machine. But it does not follow that
the pot was improved by the process. It is true that it was beautifully
rounded and presented a very creditable appearance when finished,
but the numerous large and small vessels which I have seen, and, in
part, collected, in the “less advanced” districts, are no less so. We
moderns imagine that instruments of precision are necessary to
produce excellent results. Go to the prehistoric collections of our
museums and look at the pots, urns and bowls of our ancestors in the
dim ages of the past, and you will at once perceive your error.
MAKING LONGITUDINAL CUT IN
BARK

DRAWING THE BARK OFF THE LOG

REMOVING THE OUTER BARK

 BEATING THE BARK

WORKING THE BARK-CLOTH AFTER BEATING, TO MAKE IT

SOFT

MANUFACTURE OF BARK-CLOTH AT NEWALA

To-day, nearly the whole population of German East Africa is
clothed in imported calico. This was not always the case; even now in
some parts of the north dressed skins are still the prevailing wear,
and in the north-western districts—east and north of Lake
Tanganyika—lies a zone where bark-cloth has not yet been
superseded. Probably not many generations have passed since such
bark fabrics and kilts of skins were the only clothing even in the
south. Even to-day, large quantities of this bright-red or drab
material are still to be found; but if we wish to see it, we must look in
the granaries and on the drying stages inside the native huts, where
it serves less ambitious uses as wrappings for those seeds and fruits
which require to be packed with special care. The salt produced at
Masasi, too, is packed for transport to a distance in large sheets of
bark-cloth. Wherever I found it in any degree possible, I studied the
process of making this cloth. The native requisitioned for the
purpose arrived, carrying a log between two and three yards long and
as thick as his thigh, and nothing else except a curiously-shaped
mallet and the usual long, sharp and pointed knife which all men and
boys wear in a belt at their backs without a sheath—horribile dictu!
[51]
Silently he squats down before me, and with two rapid cuts has
drawn a couple of circles round the log some two yards apart, and
slits the bark lengthwise between them with the point of his knife.
With evident care, he then scrapes off the outer rind all round the
log, so that in a quarter of an hour the inner red layer of the bark
shows up brightly-coloured between the two untouched ends. With
some trouble and much caution, he now loosens the bark at one end,
and opens the cylinder. He then stands up, takes hold of the free
edge with both hands, and turning it inside out, slowly but steadily
pulls it off in one piece. Now comes the troublesome work of
scraping all superfluous particles of outer bark from the outside of
the long, narrow piece of material, while the inner side is carefully
scrutinised for defective spots. At last it is ready for beating. Having
signalled to a friend, who immediately places a bowl of water beside
him, the artificer damps his sheet of bark all over, seizes his mallet,
lays one end of the stuff on the smoothest spot of the log, and
hammers away slowly but continuously. “Very simple!” I think to
myself. “Why, I could do that, too!”—but I am forced to change my
opinions a little later on; for the beating is quite an art, if the fabric is
not to be beaten to pieces. To prevent the breaking of the fibres, the
stuff is several times folded across, so as to interpose several
thicknesses between the mallet and the block. At last the required
state is reached, and the fundi seizes the sheet, still folded, by both
ends, and wrings it out, or calls an assistant to take one end while he
holds the other. The cloth produced in this way is not nearly so fine
and uniform in texture as the famous Uganda bark-cloth, but it is
quite soft, and, above all, cheap.
Now, too, I examine the mallet. My craftsman has been using the
simpler but better form of this implement, a conical block of some
hard wood, its base—the striking surface—being scored across and
across with more or less deeply-cut grooves, and the handle stuck
into a hole in the middle. The other and earlier form of mallet is
shaped in the same way, but the head is fastened by an ingenious
network of bark strips into the split bamboo serving as a handle. The
observation so often made, that ancient customs persist longest in
connection with religious ceremonies and in the life of children, here
finds confirmation. As we shall soon see, bark-cloth is still worn
during the unyago,[52] having been prepared with special solemn
ceremonies; and many a mother, if she has no other garment handy,
will still put her little one into a kilt of bark-cloth, which, after all,
looks better, besides being more in keeping with its African
surroundings, than the ridiculous bit of print from Ulaya.
MAKUA WOMEN