Goh Cheng Leong Chapter 18 – Hot Desert & Mid-Latitude Desert Climate YouTube Lecture Handouts
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Goh Cheng Leong Chapter 18: Hot Desert & Midlatitude Desert Climate
- Scanty Rainfall
- Hot Climate
- Cause of aridity? ?
- Offshore trade winds (trade wind desert)
- Temperate desert – rainless due to interior location
- Sahara Desert – 3200 miles long & 1000 mile wide – 3.5 million square miles – more than 50 states of USA
- Next Biggest – Great Australian Desert
- Atacama/Peruvian Desert – Driest of all desert
- Patagonian Desert – rain shadow position on leeward side of Andes
- Rainfall < 10 inches – ARIDITY
- Hot Desert – across Horse latitude or Subtropical High Pressure Belt – air is descending - off shore trade winds – wind from cold to warm area (low Relative Humidity - 30%)
- Depressions in Asiatic continental mass – light rainfall
Vegetation
- Scrub & herbs
- Dormant vegetation
- Xerophytic or drought – resistant scrub cactus, thorns, trees are rare & date palms
- Salinity of soil – salt accumulates – hard pans
- Deficient in humus
- Leaves are waxy and leathery, needle shaped – reduce transpiration
- Cactus – thick succulent stems
- Seeds have thick and tough skin
Life in Deserts
Bedouin of Arab
- Best nomadic herdsman
- Trade
- Caravan merchants
- Oases people
- Wander for water & pastures
- Animals – sheep, goat, camel, horse – dairy milk and cheese, skin, hair, wool
Bushmen of Kalahari (Nomadic Hunters & Food Gatherers)
- bow & poisoned arrows
- skill to obtain water in desert – store in ostrich shell
- suck water from ground by hollow reed
- travel in family groups (sherms)
Bindibu of Australia (Nomadic Hunters & Food Gatherers)
- Lean and dark, healthy
- Wooden stick – boomerangs
- Domesticate – dingo (wild dog)
- Women gather grass and roots
- Lives in groups
- Close to water supply
- Houses called wurlies (simple shelters)
Nomadic Herdsman
- Ride animals
- Bedoiuns – ride horse, live in tents
- Tuaregs (Shara) – camel rider, dwell in grass zeriba
- Gobi Mongols – ride horse to herd yaks & live in yurts (tents)
Camel
- Ship of desert
- Hooves to walk in sand
- Broad padded feet
- Store water in stomach
- Store fat in hump
Settled Cultivators
- Irrigation
- Network of canals
- Egypt – Nile delta – basin irrigation
- Summer – rice & cotton
- Winter – Wheat, barley, beans
- Dam – Aswan & Sennar
- Indus in Pakistan, Tigris – Euphrates in Iraq, Colorado river in Imperial valley of California
- Oasis formation – Tafilalet in Morocco (5000 square miles) & Ghadames oasis of Libya – wall constructed to keep away simoom (dust storms)
- Mud brick houses with flat roof
- Narrow streets, suq (central market place)
Mining Settlers
- Gold – Great Australian Desert
- Diamond & copper – Kalahari Desert
- Caliche (sodium nitrate) – Atacama
- Copper – Chuquicamata, Antofagasta, Iquique, Nevada
- Silver – Mexico
- Uranium – Utah
- Oil- Sahara & Arab desert – liquid gold
✍ Manishika