Exam 3 Quiz Questions

In which of the following locations would you expect to see the lowest level of primary production by phytoplankton?

In the middle of the Pacific Ocean

Blue whale were nearly exterminated in the 20th century, with numbers being reduced to about 0.15% of their initial numbers. In what way was the near extinction of the Blue whale another example of the tragedy of the commons?

There was a lack of international agreements to limit the hunting of Blue whales in international water.

What is the most likely source of your steak / hamburger is you get it at a supermarket or resturant?

a feedlot in the great plains

What was the Green Revolution?

a package of agricultural practices and techniques that superseded traditional agricultural practices

Is the toilet a life-saving device?

Yes, the general use of toilets saves lives

Identify ALL of the following ecosystem services that are provided by aquatic habitats:

-protection from floods/storm surges -filtration of pollutants -nursery grounds for fish and wildlife -resources such as food or wood

Where does the water supply for Indianapolis come from?

-surface water -ground water

Select ALL the following statements about water that are TRUE:

-the water in Colorado River Basin is over-appropriated by humans -groundwater depletion in the Great Plains threatens the future of agriculture in that region

Select ALL of the following statements about water that are TRUE:

-water conservation can be very effective at reducing water use -wastewater containing sewage can be made safe for drinking by appropriate treatment -seawater can be converted into freshwater

What percent of the total volume of the earth is water?

0.1%

About how much does one gallon of tap water cost in Indianapolis?

0.5 cents

When water is not piped to people's homes, the burden of fetching it falls disproportionately on women and children, especially girls. The United Nations Children's Fund estimates that, worldwide, women and girls spend ___________ every day collecting water.

200,000,000 hours

At its peak, the amount production of North Atlantic Cod off of the east cost of Newfoundland was:

800,000 tons

Globally, how much production come from commercial fishing?

90 million metric tons

What does the acronym CAFO stand for?

concentrated animal feeding operation

What is the name for the physical process by which water vapor becomes tiny droplets of liquid water (known as clouds)?

condensation

Which of the following grains is the largest crop in Indiana by yield (most bushels produced)?

corn

Which of the following agricultural techniques describes the alternation of crop species?

crop rotation

How do primary consumers obtain nitrogen:

from the food that they eat

The movement of water between the oceans, atmosphere, and freshwater environments is known as the _____ cycle.

hydrologic

What term refers to a low oxygen concentration?

hypoxia

What is the status of the Atlantic cod fish stock? It is:

in a state of collapse

What is a major threat to the biodiversity and ecological function of the Great Lakes?

invasive species

Which state grows the most corn (most bushels produced)?

iowa

Which of the following is the largest factor in primary production in the oceans?

nutrient availability

Almost all of the water on Earth is found in the:

oceans

About two-thirds of the freshwater on Earth is inaccessible. Where is it?

polar ice caps and glaciers

What is the came of the type agriculture in which more than one species is grown at the same time and place in imitation of the diversity of natural ecosystems.

polyculture

Which of the following biomolecules contains nitrogen?

proteins

Precipitation that does not infiltrate the soil or evaporate into the air but rather moves across the surface of the land is called:

runoff

Which of the following statements about water is FALSE?

seawater can easily be converted into freshwater; this is a cheep way to make water for irrigation

The Columbia River dam system has benefited many people, but it has:

sharply reduced populations of wild salmon

Bycatch is the term used to describe the destruction of noncommercial species during commercial fishing.

true

Careful experimentation shows that biodiversity has a significant positive influence on productivity.

true

Climate (temperature and precipitation) is one of the most important factors influencing the amount of biomass an ecosystem can produce.

true

Eating less meat is an easy way to lessen the hefty environmental footprint from industrial meat production.

true

Globally, the ocean is an important source of food for humans.

true

Increased biodiversity in agriculture can increase agricultural production and reduce the need for chemical and energy inputs.

true

Insufficient understanding of an area's ecology can lead to soil erosion.

true

Intensive agriculture is a type of agriculture utilizing higher levels of input and output per cubic unit of agricultural land area.

true

Intensive farms are widespread in developed nations and increasingly prevalent worldwide.

true

Many commercially important fish stocks are in collapse.

true

Most of the meat, dairy products, eggs, fruits, and vegetables available in supermarkets are produced by intensive agriculture.

true

Oceans store and move heat around Earth.

true

Overharvesting / removing top-level predators has major food web consequences.

true

Overharvesting has major impacts on food webs.

true

Planting a mix of crops in a polyculture can improve biodiversity and can be much more productive per acre than monoculture.

true

Poor land-use practices cause soil erosion.

true

Reduced plant cover increases soil erosion.

true

Reduction in soil fertility is one of today's major global environmental concerns.

true

Some previous civilizations have collapsed in part due to soil damage.

true

Technological improvements made the harvesting of some fish species much easier.

true

Technology is amoral (that is, no embedded morality). It requires humanity's best values to steer it in a way that's empowering, and not detrimental to societal progress.

true

The best approach to combating malnutrition and undernourishment around the world will likely be to help local farmers produce more food.

true

The creation of additional marine reserves have been good for both fish and for human fishing.

true

The development of soil takes a long time.

true

The ocean stores much more heat than the land surfaces on the Earth.

true

Wind-driven and ocean-current circulations move warm water toward the poles and colder water toward the equator.

true

What is "fossil water"?

water in an aquifer that infiltrated millennia ago and often under climatic conditions different from the present, and that has been stored underground since that time

The area of land that collects water falling as precipitation which then flows into an aquifer or a river system is a:

watershed

Whales have slow intrinsic rate of population growth, whale calves require lots of parental care, whales have few offspring, and require a long time to sexual maturity. What term describes this life history?

whales are K-selected

Are CSOs an environmental problem for Indianapolis?

yes

Is it important to keep sewage out of a city's streams and river?

yes

Select ALL of the following statements about the Dust Bowl that are TRUE:

-The Dust Bowl was a period of severe dust storms that greatly damaged the ecology and agriculture of the American and Canadian prairies during the 1930s -The Dust Bowl was caused by the farming of marginal land during a severe drought and the failure to apply farming techniques to prevent wind erosion. -The root cause of the Dust Bowl was insufficient understanding of the ecology of the plains

Select ALL of the statements about the cost of water that are TRUE:

-The need for fresh water has a high human cost; worldwide, women and girls spend 200 million hours every day collecting water. -The need for fresh water has a high cost to the environment; human extraction of freshwater has harmed aquatic ecosystems.

Select ALL of the following statements about oceans that are TRUE:

-The ocean is integral to life on the planet -The ocean is the driver of the water cycle -The ocean stores CO2, making it an important component of the carbon cycle -The ocean effects climate and weather patterns -The ocean home to 230,000 known species -The oceans help to feel humanity

Select ALL of the following statements about corn that are TRUE:

-Corn is a productive and versatile crop -Corn it has incredibly high yields compared with most other crops -Corn can be grown across a wide geographical range -Corn can be turned into a staggering array of products

Dams have wide-ranging ecological affects. Select ALL of the following that are TRUE:

-Dams threaten biodiversity -Dams trap sediment that supplies nutrients downstream -Dams alter temperature patterns below the dam -Dams can block the passage of migrating fish

Identify ALL of the following statements about the outcomes of the Green Revolution that are TRUE:

-Global food production had increased, making food more widely available, especially in developing countries facing famine -There has been widespread adoption of unsustainable farming practices such as monocultures and industrial agriculture -Over one billion human lives have been saved from famine

Pick ALL of the following statements about the water (hydrologic) cycle that are TRUE: Correct!

-Heat from the sun causes water to evaporate from the oceans, moving water into the atmosphere -The water cycle moves the Earth's water across the biosphere -The water cycle is essential for the maintenance of most life and ecosystems on the planet.

Identify ALL of the following that characterize intensive meat production:

-It is characterized by keeping livestock such as cattle, poultry, and fish at high stocking densities, at large scale, and uses modern machinery, biotechnology, and global trade. -It requires large quantities of feed (such as corn). -Because there are trophic losses when grain and vegetables are fed to animals to produce meat, less food is available for human consumption compared to directly eating grains and vegetables. -This practice is noted to be one of the leading causes of greenhouse gas emissions and produces odorous/volatile compounds such as carbon dioxide, methane, hydrogen sulfide, and ammonia.

Select ALL of the following that are benefits for eating / buying local?

-Local foods can preserve green space and farmland. -Local foods promote food safety (you can know exactly where it came from and how it was raised/grown). -Local foods support the local economy. -Local foods promote food safety -- you can know exactly where it came from and how it was raised/grown.

Pick ALL of the bodies of water that supply Indianapolis with water:

-Morse Reservoir -Geist Reservoir -Eagle Creek Reservoir -White River -Fall Creek

Select ALL of the following statements about water that are TRUE:

-Most of the fresh water on earth is not readily assessable -About 97% of all water on earth is saltwater

Select ALL of the following statements about the Haber-Bosch process that are TRUE: Correct!

-Nitrogen fertilizers are made from ammonia, which is produced by the Haber-Bosch process. -Nearly 50% of the nitrogen found in human tissues originated from the Haber-Bosch process. -In combination with pesticides, fertilizers produced from the Haber-Bosh process have quadrupled the productivity of agricultural land.

Select all of the following statements about nutrient pollution that are TRUE:

-Nutrient polluted runoff stimulates coastal algae blooms -There is a large hypoxic zone (dead zone) in the Gulf of Mexico at the mouth of the Mississippi River caused by nutrient runoff

Identify ALL of the following that can be involved in river restoration:

-Planting of native riparian vegetation. -Restoring the natural form of rivers channels -Removing dams

Identify ALL of the following statements about forest fires that are TRUE:

-Western forests in the Western United States were historically caused by lightning strikes -mature Western forests with widely spaced trees allowed for many low-intensity fires -the practice of fire suppression has led to increased tree density / fuel load in forests -increased tree density / fuel load in forests causes larger, more destructive fires

Select ALL of the following factors that would make a desalination plant appropriate for supplementing a domestic water supply:

-a lack a freshwater supply -a strong demand for freshwater -a cheap supply of energy -a justification of the cost for this more expensive method

Intensive agriculture can generate which of the following types of pollution? Select ALL that apply.

-air pollution -soil pollution -water pollution

Identify ALL of the following practices that can cause soil loss:

-conventional tillage -overgrazing -deforestation -desertification

Identify ALL of the potential uses of corn:

-ethanol or fuel -animal feed (turned into meat) -high-fructose corn syrup -export to Mexico -turned into plastic -corn flour -cornmeal -hominy -grits

Although floods can harm crops and damage buildings, flooding is an important process that is important to wetlands and maintains floodplain biodiversity. Select ALL of the following statements that are TRUE:

-floods disperse organic matter and nutrients -floods rearrange the landscape and make new habitat -floods create oxbow lakes and wetlands, which help to purify water

Select ALL of the following statements about water that are TRUE?

-humans use about half of the world's accessible fresh water supply -many arid regions have maxed out their water supplies -in many places, groundwater is being depleted faster than it is being replenished -how people control water for human use can threaten aquatic biodiversity

How many people died in 2017 due to diarrheal diseases?

1,800,000

Per World Health Organization estimates, the minimum water needed per person per day to ensure adequate sanitation and health is about _____ liters:

50

Currently humans appropriate about _____ of the Earth's accessible freshwater runoff.

50%

Approximately how many liters of water does the average person in the United States use per day?

500

Globally, how much production come from aquaculture?

60 million metric tons

The Grand Banks are fishing grounds off the coast of Newfoundland. For centuries, explorers and fishermen described this region as home to an endless supply of cod fish. In the 1960s and 1970s, advances in fishing technology allowed huge catches of cod. Following a few dramatically large seasons, the fish populations dropped, forcing fishermen to sail farther to maintain large catch sizes each season. By the 1990s, cod populations were so low that the Grand Banks fishing industry collapsed. It was too late for regulation and management; the cod stocks had been irreparably damaged. What is this an example of?

A Tragedy of the commons

What form of nitrogen, noted for being the most cost-effective nitrogen fertilizer, is widely used by farmers in the Midwest?

Anhydrous ammonia (NH3)

Which of the following is a planetary boundary specifically involving the phosphorus and nitrogen cycles?

Biogeochemical flows

The name of the process resulting in the deflection of winds from a N-S direction as a result of the Earth's rotation is the:

Coriolis effect

Ocean acidification is defined as rising levels of acid in ocean waters due to the ocean's absorption of ____ from the atmosphere.

CO2 (carbon dioxide)

What is the name for the deep-rock tunnel system that will collect Indianapolis's combined sewer overflows (CSO) that occur during rainstorms, keeping the sewage out of the city's streams and river.

DigIndy

Name the novel, written by John Steinbeck and published in 1939, that focuses on the Joad Family, a poor family of tenant farmers driven from their Oklahoma home by economic hardship and bank foreclosures following the Dust Bowl. It is considered Steinbeck's masterpiece and part of the American literary canon.

Grapes of Wrath

What is the name of the artificial nitrogen fixation process that is the main industrial procedure used to produce ammonia?

Haber-Bosch process

Where is the Ogallala aquifer located?

High Plains of the United States

In what form is nitrogen found in the atmosphere?

N2

In what form of nitrogen is produced by the Haber-Bosch process?

NH3

We discussed several important people over the course of the semester. Who from the following list of people is credited with saving a billion lives?

Norman Borlaug

What is the name of the body of water in Central Asia that has been nearly emptied to irrigate farmland, particularly for the production of cotton? This has caused one of the planet's worst environmental disasters by disrupting the local climate, destroying the region's once-prosperous fishing industry, bringing unemployment and economic hardship, and causing regional public health issues.

The Aral Sea

The amount of "farmed" fish has increased dramatically over the past 30 years. What impact has this had on wild fisheries?

The farmed fish has been used to supplement the amount of fish harvested from the oceans; most wild fish stocks are still fully fished or overfished.

The largest use of freshwater by humans is for:

agriculture

What term refers to an excessive growth of algae and affects the entire ecosystem?

algal bloom

The controlled, intensive production of aquatic resources is called:

aquaculture

Ground water collects in pockets underground between sand, gravel or pores. What is the name of the geologic formation containing a deposit of groundwater?

aquifer

One result of the increasingly efficient global hunt for fish is that larger individuals of commercially valuable wild species are:

becoming scarce

For every shark that injures or kills a person, people kill about ____ sharks.

between 1 and 10 million

The term used to describe the destruction of noncommercial species during commercial fishing is:

bycatch

This is the most common and economically profitable method of logging. However, it also creates detrimental side effects, such as the loss of topsoil and ecosystem disruption.

clear cutting

What does CSO stand for?

combined sewer overflow

What term describes hypoxic areas in the world's oceans and large lakes?

dead zone

What is the name of the process that removes salts from seawater or brackish water to form freshwater?

desalination

Sea-bottom habitats are being threatened by:

dredging operations and trawlers

What is the LEAST Common use of the corn grown in the United States?

food for people (made into corn meal and corn flakes)

Historically, what has set the limits on human population for agrarian societies?

food supply

The layer of the ocean where there is sufficient light to support photosynthesis is the:

euphotic zone

What term describes when a body of water becomes overly enriched with nutrients? Correct!

eutrophication

Water moves from the ocean to the atmosphere by which physical processes?

evaporation

What is the name of the farming technique in which arable land is left without sowing for one or more vegetative cycles.

fallow

Aquaculture is a nonpolluting, issue-free, food production system.

false

Aquaculture is limited to marine (ocean) species of fish.

false

Aquaculture makes up a small fraction of total fisheries production today.

false

It is easy to repair damaged soil or replace eroded soil.

false

Soil is physically and biologically simple.

false

What is the name for the type of bargain that is made with a power that the bargainer recognizes as evil or amoral.

faustian bargain

As large species of fish are overfished, the fishing industry is shifting to smaller marine species. About 90% of this catch of small fish is converted to fishmeal and fish oil, most of which is:

fed to farmed fish

What is the name of the phenomena that transports heat from tropical waters across the Atlantic Ocean, making Western and especially Northern Europe warmer than it otherwise would be expected?

gulf stream

Several changes to farming techniques lead to increased agricultural production beginning most markedly in the late 1960s. Which of the following was NOT one of those changes?

increased human / manual labor on farms

What is the name of the agricultural practice characterized by high levels of input and output per unit of agricultural land area, higher use of large machinery, and higher chemical inputs?

industrial agriculture

Orange roughy (Hoplostethus atlanticus) is a fish with firm flesh and a mild flavor that has become popular in the United States and China. It is a deep-water dwelling fish. The life span for individuals of this species is well over 100 years and they are late to mature. Based on the life history characteristics for this species, what would you anticipate for this fish?

it would be a very susceptible to overfishing

The clearing of mangrove forest in the expansion of tropical aquaculture has been accompanied by all of the following EXCEPT:

loss of inland agricultural land

What is the name of the type of fertilizer comprised mostly of animal feces?

manure

What is the name of the agricultural practice of producing or growing a single crop, plant, or livestock species in a field or farming system at a time?

monoculture

What name would describe the process by which soil bacteria convert atmospheric nitrogen (N2) into ammonia (NH3)?

nitrogen fixation

In which Mississippi River sub-basin is Indiana located?

ohio

The most productive areas in the ocean are where nutrients are found near the surface. Which of the following areas is LEAST productive?

open ocean

Warmer and more acidic ocean water is stressing ____, the foundation of the marine food web.

phytoplankton

What is the name of the transitional zone between a river and a terrestrial environment? They are important in ecology, environmental resource management, and civil engineering because of their role in soil conservation, their habitat biodiversity, and the influence they have on fauna and aquatic ecosystems, including grasslands, woodlands, wetlands, or even non-vegetative areas.

riparian zone

What is the name for a self-sufficiency farming system in which the farmers focus on growing enough food to feed themselves and their entire families.

subsistence agriculture

The global water cycle is powered by:

the evaporation of water by the Sun's heat energy

Increased aquaculture production of shrimp in Asia had what environmental cost?

the loss of mangrove forests

An example of intercropping was practiced by some Native Americans, who co-planting beans (which fix nitrogen to fertilize soil), corn (which provides structure for beans to grow on), and squash (which shades the soil to reduce water loss).

true

An international moratorium on whaling has been crucial to allow the population of several specials of whale to rebound.

true

Aquaculture is one of the fastest growing food production sectors in the world.

true

Biodiversity contributes to the productivity and stability of fisheries.

true