The 5000-year environmental change and associated human activities at Sokho-nor Lake, Inner Mongolia, P.R. China

1997 ◽  
Vol 123 (1-4) ◽  
pp. 460-463 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lu Xiangyang ◽  
Yuan Baoyin ◽  
Guo Zhiyu ◽  
Li Kun
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Change ◽  
Human Activities ◽  
Inner Mongolia

scholarly journals A Clear Past and a Murky Future: Life in the Anthropocene on the Pampana River, Sierra Leone

Land ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 72 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Marcantonio ◽  
Agustin Fuentes
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Change ◽  
Sierra Leone ◽  
Complex Adaptive Systems ◽  
Human Activities ◽  
Adaptive Systems ◽  
Participant Observation ◽  
Earth System ◽  
Sierra Leonean ◽  
The Earth ◽  
Complex Adaptive

The impacts of human activities on ecosystems are significantly increasing the rate of environmental change in the earth system, reshaping the global landscape. The rapid rate of environmental change is disrupting the ability of millions of people around the globe to live their everyday lives and maintain their human niche. Evidence suggests that we have entered (or created) a new epoch, the Anthropocene, which is defined as the period in which humans and human activities are the primary drivers of planetary change. The Anthropocene denotes a global shift, but it is the collective of local processes. This is our frame for investigating local accounts of human-caused disruptive environmental change in the Pampana River in Tonkolili District, Northern Province, Sierra Leone. Since the end of the Sierra Leonean civil war in 2002, the country has experienced a rapid increase in extractive industries, namely mining. We explored the effects of this development by working with communities along the Pampana River in Tonkolili, with a specific focus given to engaging local fishermen through ethnographic interviews (N = 21 fishermen and 33 non-fishermen), focus group discussions (N = 21 fishermen), and participant observation. We deployed theoretical and methodological frameworks from human niche construction theory, complex adaptive systems, and ethnography to track disruptive environmental change in and on the Pampana from upstream activities and the concomitant shifts in the local human niche. We highlight the value of integrating ethnographic methods with human evolutionary theory, produce important insights about local human coping processes with disruptive environmental change, and help to further account for and understand the ongoing global process of human modification of the earth system in the Anthropocene.

The dynamics of sand-stabilization services in Inner Mongolia, China from 1981 to 2010 and its relationship with climate change and human activities

2018 ◽  
Vol 88 ◽  
pp. 351-360 ◽  
Author(s):  
Dajing Li ◽  
Duanyang Xu ◽  
Ziyu Wang ◽  
Xiaogang You ◽  
Xiaoyu Zhang ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Human Activities ◽  
Inner Mongolia ◽  
Sand Stabilization

Relatively stable metal(loid) levels in surface soils of a semiarid Inner Mongolia steppe under multiple environmental change factors

Geoderma ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 352 ◽  
pp. 268-276
Author(s):  
Jun-Jian Wang ◽  
Ze-Rui Liu ◽  
Shi-Qiang Wan ◽  
Hong-Yan Han ◽  
Wen-Zhou Zhu ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Change ◽  
Inner Mongolia ◽  
Surface Soils ◽  
Change Factors

Grassland dynamics in response to climate change and human activities in Inner Mongolia, China between 1985 and 2009

2013 ◽  
Vol 35 (3) ◽  
pp. 315 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. J. Mu ◽  
Y. Z. Chen ◽  
J. L. Li ◽  
W. M. Ju ◽  
I. O. A. Odeh ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Land Use ◽  
Ecological Restoration ◽  
Human Activities ◽  
Inner Mongolia ◽  
Management Practices ◽  
Net Primary Productivity ◽  
Temporal Dynamics ◽  
Driving Forces ◽  
Landscape Patterns

China’s grassland has been undergoing rapid changes in the recent past owing to increased climate variability and a shift in grassland management strategy driven by a series of ecological restoration projects. This study investigated the spatio-temporal dynamics of Inner Mongolia grassland, the main grassland region in China and part of the Eurasia Steppe, to detect the interactive nature of climate, ecosystems and society. Land-use and landscape patterns for the period from 1985 to 2009 were analysed based on TM- and MODIS-derived land-use data. Net Primary Productivity (NPP) estimated by using the Carnegie-Ames-Stanford Approach model was used to assess the growth status of grassland. Furthermore, the factors related to the dynamics of grassland were analysed from the perspectives of two driving factors, climate change and human activities. The results indicated that higher temperatures and lower precipitation may generally have contributed to grassland desertification, particularly in arid regions. During the period from 1985 to 2000, a higher human population and an increase in livestock numbers were the major driving forces responsible for the consistent decrease in NPP and a relatively fragmented landscape. From 2000 to 2009, the implementation of effective ecological restoration projects has arrested the grassland deterioration in some ecologically fragile regions. However, a rapid growth of livestock numbers has sparked new degradation onnon-degraded or lightly degraded grassland, which was initially neglected by these projects. In spite of some achievement in grassland restoration, China should take further steps to develop sustainable management practices for climate adaptation and economic development to bring lasting benefits.

Ecological correlates of fish movement in a network of Virginia streams

2004 ◽  
Vol 61 (6) ◽  
pp. 857-869 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brett Albanese ◽  
Paul L Angermeier ◽  
Sundar Dorai-Raj
Keyword(s):  
Body Size ◽  
Environmental Change ◽  
Water Temperature ◽  
Human Activities ◽  
Habitat Complexity ◽  
Day Length ◽  
Fish Movement ◽  
Population Declines ◽  
The Cost ◽  
Colonization Rates

Identifying factors that influence fish movement is a key step in predicting how populations respond to environmental change. Using mark–recapture (four species) and trap capture (eight species) data, we examined relationships between three attributes of movement and 15 ecological variables. The probability of emigrating from a reach was positively related to intermittency (one species) and body size (one species) and negatively related to distance from the mainstem creek (two species) and habitat complexity (one species). The number of fish moving upstream through traps was positively related to increases in flow (five species), day length (three species), and water temperature (two species); the number moving through downstream traps was positively associated with increases in flow (three species). Distance moved was greater for fish moving through unsuitable reaches (one species). Floods have a pervasive effect on fish movement, and human activities that affect flows will have widespread implications. The importance of other factors varies interspecifically, which may translate into variation in persistence and colonization rates. For example, species that exhibit reach fidelity in complex habitats may increase movement if habitats are homogenized. These species may suffer population declines because of the cost of increased movement and may ultimately be replaced by ecological generalists.

The Cyrenaican Prehistory Project 2008: the second season of investigations of the Haua Fteah cave and its landscape, and further results from the initial (2007) fieldwork

2000 ◽  
Vol 39 ◽  
pp. 175-221 ◽  
Author(s):  
Graeme Barker ◽  
Laura Basell ◽  
Ian Brooks ◽  
Lucilla Burn ◽  
Caroline Cartwright ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Change ◽  
Human Activities ◽  
Ground Surface ◽  
Upper Palaeolithic ◽  
The 1950S ◽  
Climatic And Environmental Change ◽  
Botanical Remains ◽  
Initial Results

AbstractThe second (2008) season of fieldwork of the Cyrenaican Prehistory Project has significantly advanced understanding of the Haua Fteah stratigraphy and of the archaeology and geomorphology of the landscape in which the cave is located. The excavations of the McBurney backfill have reached a total depth of 7.5 m below the present ground surface, the depth at which two human mandibles were found in the 1950s excavations. Reconnaissance at the Hagfet ed-Dabba established that the sediments associated with the Upper Palaeolithic ‘Dabban’ industry were more or less entirely removed by the McBurney excavation. Exploratory excavations in the Hagfet al-Gama, a coastal cave west of the Haua Fteah, found evidence of Mesolithic, Neolithic, and Hellenistic occupation. The initial results from the study of botanical remains, both macroscopic and microscopic, obtained in the 2007 season at the Haua Fteah confirm the potential of the site to yield a rich suite of materials to inform on climatic and environmental change, and on human activities in the cave.

scholarly journals Environmental Reconstructions in the Upper Tana region, Kenya

2020 ◽  
Vol 1 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-10
Author(s):  
Lazarus Kinyua Ngari
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Change ◽  
Human Activities ◽  
Vegetation Change ◽  
Environmental Changes ◽  
Climatic Factors ◽  
Livestock Grazing ◽  
Plant Succession ◽  
Economic Activities ◽  
Agricultural Communities ◽  
The Past

This article sets out to unravel aspects of environmental changes in the Upper Tana during the second millennium AD. This aspect has not been adequately addressed in the Upper Tana. This makes it clear that a lacuna exists in the study of communities of the Upper Tana and the way they interact with their environment in the past and present times. The objective of this article is to evaluate the relationship between human activities and environmental change in the Upper Tana from AD 1000 to 1950. It is hypothesized that the advent of iron technology and its attendant economic activities led to the depletion of indigenous forests and the general environmental degradation. The article has employed archaeological, ethnographic, oral and historical methodologies to gather data on vegetation change in the Upper Tana and other related regions.  The article, argues that livestock grazing, iron smelting, slush and burn agriculture, and the clearing of forests for housing are key contributors to vegetation change in the Upper Tana.  Results from oral reconstruction of the past vegetation of the area, and using the plant succession theory, shows that the lowland area of the Upper Tana is actually savanna with scattered trees probably inhabited by grazers. It is posited that the above factors, together with persistent droughts have altered the vegetation cover of the area.  What we have today is colonization of less desirable stunted growth. The theory advanced here is that the vegetation change has been a result of human activities.  Overwhelmingly, results the study that the researcher carried out, showed that the causes of these changes have been socio-economically associated with the expansion of agricultural communities into the area; rather than through climatic factors. Colonisation and other forces of modernistion have also contributed to the underlying problem. The article concludes that anthropogenetic factors have greatly contributed to environmental change in the upper Tana. Certainly, environmental change is a global phenomenon that has elicited research interests due to its negative impacts on human population. It is recommended that knowledge of environmental change in the past should be used to extrapolate modern environmental challenges affecting African ecosystems.

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