Great Victoria Desert Analysis

Firstly, the biome has a low rainfall. In summer the average rainfall is 21 millimetres. In winter, the average rainfall is 39 millimetres. In summer the minimum temperature is 18 degrees and the maximum temperature is that of 34 degrees. In winter, the minimum temperature is 4 degrees and the maximum temperature is 18 degrees. Thirdly, the latitude of the Flinders Rangers is 31.4933 degrees south and 138.4897 degrees east. Furthermore, the semi-arid biome covers a wide area and therefore the climate has vastly differing characteristics. The average rainfall decreases with latitude, with the southern flinders region experiences a higher winter rainfall than the northern region. The northern region also has summer storms that are unpredictable from year to

a. The high temperatures of a desert are harsh for life to try to survive in. The extreme temperatures cause water to evaporate faster. This affects all organisms that need water to survive. The temperature also limits productivity by drying out organisms increasing the demand for water. The soil in deserts are dry and lack nutrients that are beneficial to plants. Both high temperature and poor soil greatly affects the photosynthesis of plants in a negative way. The annual precipitation in deserts are very low which is one of the reasons for low productivity. Little water is available for photosynthesis and organisms who depend on it. With little water available for organisms survival, deserts have extremely low productivity when compared to other

In an arid land, there is less precipitation than the potential evaporation which is not the case in humid regions.

Now, humans have a steady food supply so they do not have to move about. Therefore, people use fences to keep their animals in one place, which causes overgrazing. Today we see many subjects being affected by desertification. Ute Schaeffer reports the affects of desertification in, Down to Earth: News & Views on Desertification,“(doc.3) It has presented a challenge for governments and aid agencies in over 110 countries for some time, and is a contributing factor in poverty and regional conflicts, for example in Sudan. It has also been a major issue in Egypt, where 90% of the country’s land mass is desert. Faced with a rising population, the government has had to undertake a number of settlement and irrigation projects to create additional living and working space.” Necessary changes were made in order to adapt to the conditions of the desert and the obstacles that have to be faced. It is always presumed that there are only negative aspects to deserts but this isn’t always the case. There is a side to the Sahara desert that acts as a home to several living organisms. The Sahara has vegetation and access to water, which allows life to exist in this region. The Nile Valley, for example, is an area that is still quite full of foliage, trees and other growing things. This area is an exception, because of the way it is fed by the Nile River. Another area of the Sahara that has some vegetation to it is in the North, along the Mediterranean where olive trees grow

When thinking of a desert, one would think of a large, dry, and sandy area like the Sahara Desert. The Great Basin Desert is different because it is a cold desert. A cold desert is completely different from the typical desert with average temperatures of 55-57 degrees Fahrenheit in summer, and in winter it averages around 4 degrees Fahrenheit. Cold deserts will normally have much more water. Water is the lifeline of The Great Basin Desert (Pellant), which is a good thing and a bad thing. The term “basin” is used with the meaning no water from the ocean ever reaches this region (National Park Service). Water rights to the Great Basin Desert have been a problem for a long time and with the risk of water loss and risk of losing groundwater.

The landscape of Victoria is key to surviving down there. Located in the Western Cordillera, the mountainous area has long narrow inlets called fjords that separate this area. The Coastal Mountains, although rugged and glaciated at times, have many different large forests along the mountain that consist of cedar and oak trees that can work as protection from predators or animals lurking around. In addition, the rolling landscapes/lowlands contain granite rocks that create a beautiful scenery and make it easier to walk along when the road becomes in available to drive on.

Similarly, the Melbourne wrap has been active (Gill, 1961) leading to different faults that have decided deposition and landscape formation in the south Gippsland region of eastern Victoria (Jenkin, 1976b).

The 1997 four-part documentary series called Cadillac Desert: Water and the Transformation of Nature is about money, politics, water, and the transformation of nature as the title obviously suggests. The first three parts are based on the book written by Marc Reisner titled, Cadillac Desert, while the final portion of the film is based on Last Oasis by Sandra Postel. These parts together show the growth of a community in the deserts of the American West.

---. “Summer and Winter Drought in a Cold Desert Ecosystem (Colorado Plateau).” Utah State University, vol. 61, no. 1, 2005,

The soil commonly found is alkaline which allows the desert plants to grow and gain nutrients through the roots in the ground. the temperature allows for Predators to be able to hunt for longer stretches of time in cooler temperatures and often rest in the shade in preparation of hunting in the warmer temperatures. the sand dunes help to Prevent soil erosion by storing sand that replaces the eroded sand below with more sand so the total amount of sand in an area does not decrease.

In this investigation I will be using two different climates, The Desert and The Arctic

Rainfall is low and unpredictable in Australia. In summary, the environmental problems there are similar to Greenland under the Norse, including deforestation, overgrazing and soil erosion, but also salinization, introduced species, water shortage and man-made droughts (Diamond, 379).

The defining character of a desert is usually low levels of rainfall with under 25 cm per year. Additional to that, the relationship between rainfall and the evaporated and transpired water must be taken into consideration. “A desert is a biological community in which most of the indigenous plants and animals are adapted to chronic aridity and periodic, extreme droughts, and in which these conditions are necessary to maintain the community’s structure” (Phillips, Comus, 2000, p. 10). This means that it is the environmental and climatic conditions that have created an evolutionary pressure for the flora to develop.

Climate: Africa contains both the world’s largest desert (the Sahara) and the world 's longest river (the Nile).Temperatures are highest in desert areas, particularly the Sahara. They are cooler across the south and in mountainous areas and plateau highlands. Rainfall varies dramatically across Africa.Changing weather patterns, however patterns of weather are changing, both locally and across the continent. The Sahara is the world 's largest low-latitude hot desert. The area is located in the horse latitudes under the subtropical ridge, a significant belt of semi-permanent subtropical, warm-core high pressure where the air from the upper levels of the troposphere tends to sink towards the ground. This steady descending airflow causes a warming and a drying effect in the upper troposphere. The sinking air prevents evaporating water from rising and, therefore, prevents the adiabatic cooling, which makes cloud formation extremely difficult to nearly impossible.

Desertification is defined by Scott E Spoolman and G. Miller in their book Living in the Environment as “the conversion of rangeland, rain-fed cropland, or irrigated cropland to desert-like land with a drop of agricultural activity of 10% or more”. To put this as simple as possible desertification is turning usable soil into desert. Dissertation is hard to observe but over time