Geography Alive Chapter 4

Flashcards fo r Chapter 4.

39 cards   |   Total Attempts: 182
  

Cards In This Set

Front Back
Where do more than 1/10 pf the US population and 1/4 of the Canadian population live?
The Great Lakes region
What is a watershed?
A geographic are that includes all of the waterways that drain into a body of water.
What is another name for the Great Lakes and why?
The sweetwater seas. They have little or no salt.
What is a food web?
All of the feeding relationships within an ecosystem. Each living thing in a food web provides food energy to other living things within that ecosystem.
What is a food chain?
A series of plants and animals, each of which depends on the one below it for food. A food chain usually forms part of a much larger food web.
How does the concept of a food web and food chain relate to the problem of pollution?
Since all creatures in that food web are connected and dependent on each other for survival, poisoning from pollution will affect all other parts either directly or indirectly through loss of food supply.
Define freshwater
Made up of water that is fresh, not salty. Also used to describe creatures that live in freshwater, such as freshwater fish.
Define ecosystem
A community of all the living things in an area and the environment in which they live.
Define watershed and give another name for it.
A geographic area that includes all of the land and waterways that drain into a body of water. Sometimes also called a drainage basin.
How much of the world's fresh water is contained in the Great Lakes?
Almost one fifth (1/5).
What were some of the problems in the Great Lakes in the late 1960's?
Polluted rivers flowing into them (Cuyahoga caught on fire!), out of control algae from phosphorus in detergent, DDT poisoning (esp bald eagle), pollution from industry, and invasion of non-native species (lampreys and alewives crowd out native fish).
Name the author and book that included a reference to the polluted Lake Erie.
Dr. Seuss, the Lorax
What did the first Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement pledge to do?
Reduce point-source pollution by placing limits on industry and sewage treatment.
Name 3 limits placed on industry by the first Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement.
Limiting phosphorus and other chemicals that industry and sewage treatment plants could release into the water, industries stopped dumping oil and pollutants into rivers and other laws banned toxic chemicals such as DDT and PCBs.
What is point source pollution?
Water pollution from a single place such as a discharge pipe at a sewage treatment plant or a factory.