PDS APES 8th Period 2009-10

Plate Tectonics and the Rock Cycle http://www.merrittcartographic.co.uk/plate_tectonics.html The theory of plate tectonics came about in the mid twentieth century after compiling centuries of speculation andcontemporary  oceanographic studies that suggested that the earth’s surface was actually made up of moblie plates of solid rock floating on a sea of liquid hot mantle that flows at a [...]

So, last year the APES text (published 2008) had a section on carbon offsets-first time I’ve seen it in a school textbook. There are many companies out there now marketing carbon offsets to reduce your “carbon footprint.” Terrapass is a popular one. You can offset one year’s worth of air travel (an estimated 8,000 pounds [...]

We always hear a lot about “Global Warming” or “Global Climate Change,” but is there even any solid evidence to back it up? The truth is that, even though the idea that global climate is changing at an unnatural rate because of human activities is still not 100% proven to be fact, there have been [...]

Global climate change is a touchy subject due to its recent entanglement with politics. But politics aside, we can all look at the data report from the IPCC and agree that in the last 150 years our global climate has been growing increasingly warmer. Whether this warming is cause by anthropogenic actions is another story, [...]

*Note: Yet another guest post from Kevin H. in the other class as I forgot to ask for a scribe! At the end of class on Friday Mr Willard left us with 5 questions regarding global climate change. These questions were as follows: 1. Is the Earth warming? 2. If so, is this warming unnatural? [...]

Alright yall, this could not be a more perfect current events issue for what we are talking about.  Its got algal blooms, cultural eutrophication, overfishing, food webs, dead zones, D.O., and government intervention of course!  Its pretty much exactly what we are talking about but a real world example.  Crazy picture too. http://reefbuilders.com/2010/03/08/algae-blooms-threaten-choke-baltic-sea/

In class, we uncovered 3 different issues causing ocean pollution. I want to focus on one, runoff of nutrients. It occurs only in lakes, streams, or coastal areas (the nutrients have to run off from the land), and only includes nitrogen and phosphorus. This nutrient runoff from fertilizers and feedlot manure is also called “cultural eutrophication“– when bodies [...]

So, since we introduced the idea of cover crops, I thought I would mention my garden. We moved last fall, and so I decided to start a new veggie garden in my back yard last spring. I grew tomatoes, squash, cucumbers, carrots, onions, potatoes, and herbs–all in a 10 x 20 foot plot. Here’s a [...]

The Carbonotron wants to know “have you studied your biogeochemical cycles yet?” Here is a good nutrient cycle story, by Ursula in 5th period, that may be helpful to review: A Carbon Story My name is Carbon. For the couple days or so I have been in the sky, stuck with my two twin brothers, [...]

I know this is last chapter (ecosystems/cycles), but I think it illustrates how important knowledge of the nitrogen cycle is for managing an aquarium. It was a rough weekend for my trout. When I went in to check on them Saturday, I found this… …and about 19 more like him! I immediately checked the tank [...]