Water 's Effect On Michigan

The water cycle in the deciduous forest occurs mostly in the stage of transpiration. Although there are bodies of water in the deciduous forest, water also evaporates from the leaves of the plants and into the atmosphere. The water vapor will condense into tiny droplets which form clouds; the clouds will then return the water back to the ground in the form of precipitation. The water falls to the floor of the deciduous forest and travels into the roots of the plants. The cycle will then start over again.

The shape of Michigan is something very unique to us. Anytime you look at a map of the Earth, you can find Michigan in two seconds. If you’re in the Upper Peninsula, you can point to exactly where you are. Or if you want to tell someone where a city is located in Michigan, and you don’t have a map, you can just hold up your hand and point. For those of us born and raised in Michigan, it seems like a completely normal thing to do. The shape of Michigan is really unique, with two separate peninsulas to tell the story of how our state was shaped into the land we see today. Water has been the predominant factor in shaping Michigan, starting with glaciers over ten million years ago, to rivers, rain and lakes that still shape it today. Water

Michigan is one of the fifty states within the United States of America and is favored with having the largest shoreline within the U.S. It is characterized by two peninsulas, the upper peninsula (which is obviously cooler) and the lower peninsula which holds a vast majority of the land and also a big chunk of us, Michiganders. The name Michigan comes from the Chippewa Indian word Michigama which means great or large lake. Lake Michigan was called Michigama by the Chippewa Indians. Our unique state is luckily surrounded by four of the five Great Lakes. The Great Lakes in our region have vastly influenced our state and those around us. Without Lake Michigan, Lake Superior, Lake Huron, and Lake Erie, we would not have the large fresh water sources we currently are blessed with, many jobs would not exist, recreational activities would be slim to none, and we simply wouldn’t have the gorgeous views all around us. To say the very least, the state of Michigan is

Evaporation happens every day, everywhere on Earth. It is the process of water turning into water vapor. It then travels to the clouds and condenses. This is condensation, where water vapor turns into clouds. When the clouds get too heavy, they then drop all the water in them. This stage is precipitation, or rain, snow, sleet, or hail. It then runs off into a stream, lake, creek, or ocean, the cycle then repeats. This cycle is called the water cycle.

The processes of water erosion that were listed above are also main contributors to the elevation levels of Michigan.

For many years, I have always wondered how Michigan was shaped. I did not realize that water could have such a huge impact on the way Michigan was made. From doing research, I recognized that there has been four Ice Ages on Earth. The last Ice Age, Pleistocene Epoch began and ended two million years to 12,000 years. At this time, hot and cold temperatures swayed and glaciers receded to advance into the interglacial periods. In the United States, and around the world glaciers have carved out our landscape, making what the world is today.

On April 25, 2014 a press conference was held to announce switching from the city of Detroit water supply to Flint River water. The city of Detroit gets its water supply from Lake Huron, which is the third largest fresh water

Living around the Great Lakes like we do in Michigan brings a lot of advantages. We have a great amount of water, unlike much of the United States. Water has shaped Michigan to its shape over the past thousands of years. The total area of Michigan is 96,716 miles squared. The total surface of the Great Lakes is 94,250 miles squared. Michigan is surrounded by 4 of the 5 Great Lakes like shown in figure 1. The Great Lakes include Lake Superior, Lake Michigan, Lake Huron, and Lake Erie. Water has shaped Michigan to the shape it is by many different ways. Erosion, transportation, deposition, glaciers, and manmade causes.

The hydrologic cycle keeps the Great Lakes up and running. Without it, Michigan would not have the inhabitants it does today. The abundant supply of water allows a vast array of wildlife to live in Michigan, and made it a desirable place for early settlers to inhabit. However, the Great Lakes did not just appear out of thin air. There is a long history of how the Great Lakes came to be.

The hydrological cycle is where water is stored in places like oceans and ponds, and then evaporated. Next, the water is condensed. Finally, water is rained down as precipitation and accumulates in ponds and oceans. This cycle continues repeatedly. Human activities that are detrimental to this cycle

It is best described as water evaporating into the atmosphere and continues to condense into the clouds. It will than fall back to earth as precipitation. This precipitation soaks down into the soil as a process called infiltration, where it joins the groundwater, or it will run off over the landscape to join surface water. The surface water may evaporate out of the lake and back into the atmosphere or the water will move through the soil towards the groundwater and be taken up by plants that will put it back into the atmosphere. This process will just keep continuing and continuing over and

Erie, Michigan is located in southeast Michigan which is part of Monroe County, and has slowly grown to a community of just under 5,000 people and has remained a largely rural community. Erie was started in 1790, where there was a log church named St. Joseph and then in 1827 there was a post office established, which was named Bay Settlement. The township covers 30 square miles, 25 of those square miles are land and 5.6 square miles is water. Erie township boarders Lake Erie, which is the fourth largest lake of the five great lakes, and the tenth largest lake globally.

In the county of Waukesha lies a small city of the same name where there have been several issues with water. These issues, tainted / polluted groundwater, have led to the city’s need of Great Lakes water, specifically from Lake Michigan. This seems like an easy fix, however the Waukesha County and Wisconsin government is still a bit weary to allow all of Waukesha Lake Michigan water. Waukesha citizens see this issue as being “but a drop from the gigantic Great Lakes bucket.” There are several reasons why the government will not allow water from the Great Lakes to Waukesha, but also several good examples of why they need the water. These reasons being the 2008 compact made specifically for this type of incident and the fact that Waukesha

HYDROLOGIC CYCLE The hydrologic cycle is a constant movement of water above, on, and below the earth's surface. It is a cycle that replenishes ground water supplies. It begins as water vaporizes into the atmosphere from vegetation, soil, lakes, rivers, snowfields and oceans-a process called evapotranspiration. As the water vapor rises it condenses to form clouds that return water to the land through precipitation: rain, snow, or hail. Precipitation falls on the earth and either percolates into the soil or flows across the ground. Usually it does both. When precipitation percolates into the soil it is called infiltration when it flows across the ground it is called surface run off. The amount of precipitation that infiltrates, versus the

The hydrologic cycle is the movement of water within the biosphere. Earth is a closed system, meaning that water can never leave Earth. Due to human interaction, humans have managed to hurt and alter the water cycle. Water that falls on the land does one of three things : evapotranspiration, evaporation and transpiration, be absorbed by the soil and go down into the groundwater, or move as a runoff into rivers and streams and reach the ocean where the water evaporates the cycle starts over again. Humans harm the hydrologic cycle by cutting down trees. By reducing evapotranspiration and its biomass, it causes runoff and percolation to increase. An increase in runoff leads to erosion and flooding. Humans harm the cycle by covering land resources due to paving roads. This decreases the amount of percolation in a specific area and leads to more evaporation and runoff. Humans have the ability to change the water cycle by moving water from area to another for