The Salton Sea (Classic Reprint): A Study of the Geography, the Geology, the Floristics, and the Ecology of a Desert Basin - Couverture souple

D. T. Macdougal

Couverture souple

ISBN 10 : 1331949890 ISBN 13 : 9781331949893

Editeur : Forgotten Books, 2018

Synopsis

Revealing how a desert lake reshapes life: a scientific look at the Salton Sea and its plants.

This nonfiction work gathers field observations and analysis of the Salton Sink as the lake formed, fluctuated, and gradually desiccated. It frames how water, soil, and climate drive which plants endure, which new communities appear, and how the landscape reclaims itself after dramatic change. Readers will encounter detailed descriptions of plant zones—from halophytic and xerophytic communities to mesophytic remnants—and the ways in which vegetation responds to brine, depth, and shifting grounds.

The book combines geology, soils, hydrology, and ecology to explain why certain shrubs dominate, why some species seem endemic to the Sink, and how seed dispersal and animal activity influence reestablishment on newly exposed ground. It also surveys the broader implications of rapid environmental change on desert flora, including how drought, salinity, and sediment shifts drive evolution and movement of plant life in arid regions.

• Learn how desert plant communities form and adapt to extreme conditions
• See how the Salton Sea’s rise and fall influenced which species spread or disappear
• Explore endemic plants and what their existence suggests about the Sink’s history
• Understand the processes that move vegetation across sterilized or newly exposed land

Ideal for readers of ecological field studies, desert environments, and environmental change, this edition offers clear, concrete insights into how life survives and spreads when water levels swing dramatically.

A propos du livre

Présentation de l'éditeur

By D. T. Mac Dotjoal. The geological and biological processes of the surface layers of the earths crust are profoundly different under subaerial exposures to those which prevail under subaqueous conditions. A ny region, therefore, which may be subjected to submergence and to weathering, alternately, will offer a changing complex of environic conditions, with accompanying disturbances in the balance and distributional movements of the organisms of the region. The solid ground, in one case, is subject to the erosion of precipitation-water and stream-flow, coupled with a leaching action of the water, while surface material will be variously transported and deposited. Wind effects will vary widely with aridity and other climatic features, while precipitation, evaporation, and temperature will act as determinants as to the character of the living forms supported. The submersion of any area may be expected to be followed by the complete or nearly complete destruction of the land flora and fauna. The temperature of the substratum is equalized, variations in moisture disappear, wind comes in only as an agency for transporting propagative bodies and as a cause of wave-action, sorting, wearing, and depositing material along shore lines. The deposition of sedimentary material in submerged areas under lakes takes place in such manner as to be easily distinguishable from the effects of stream-action. The superposition of the two groups of effects in any region such as the lowermost part of a desert basin, especially when submergence and desiccation alternate at intervals of sufficient length to give full force to the two extremes, might be expected to offer highly unusual physical conditions of the surface layers and of the soil, to which organisms would be expected to display reactions of interest and importance useful in the interpretation of phytogeographical phenomen
(Typographical errors above are due to OCR software and don't occur in the book.)

Détails de l'édition

• Éditeur: Forgotten Books
• Date d'édition: 2018
• Langue: anglais
• ISBN 10: 1331949890
• ISBN 13: 9781331949893
• Reliure: Broché
• Nombre de pages: 264
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