The Unnatural Kingdom

The first method described in the article is manipulating predator-prey relationships to control the number of animals. Conservationists keep track of the number of predators in an area and how they affect the population of the prey, and if necessary, reduce the number of predators in an area. They do this with collars they place on the animals to keep track of their locations. The second method is relocation. Conservationists move animals to different locations so they can continue to reproduce and spread. Both involve the use of technology to keep track of the animals, but the second is closer to the natural way populations grow. Instead of reducing one population to help increase another, they grow naturally. I think the second will be more successful because both populations will be allowed to grow more than if they were being controlled by humans.

The bighorn sheep have less diversity than they did 200 years ago because the species almost went extinct, so the gene pool is not as diverse. Many of the gene variations were lost as the species began to die out. The species is being bred more in order to try and increase the gene pool once again.

 I think that the restored populations will be considered wild once they are released and able to maintain stable populations on their own. While their populations are being manipulated by humans, they aren't wild, however they still can be one day.

Topic 4: Rural America

     In recent times, agriculture has become very industrialized. There are no longer a large number of family-owned farms producing diverse crops, as they have been replaced with large-scale farms usually only producing one crop or animal product. This has hurt the smaller farms and has brought lower wages and increased poverty rates. Smaller farms cannot compete with the efficiency of the larger ones, and often are forced to go into contracts to sell their products. The increased efficiency is a good thing because it helps feed people as the population continues to grow, but because of it, the standards of living in rural America are growing worse.
 
     CSA is one way to support local farmers. It stands for Community Supported Agriculture and is a commitment between farmers and a community of supporters that provides a direct link between producers and consumers, instead of being sold to stores beforehand. CSA members cover a share of the farm's yearly operating budget and the harvest for that season is distributed among them. The goal of CSA arrangement is sustainability and to keep crop prices at the fairest they can be. Most products bought from stores are much more expensive because of what is known as 'externalities.'  Stores have to mark up their prices from what they paid to buy food from distributors, who have to sell for more than what they paid buying from slaughterhouses, and so on. The cost eventually ends up higher for the family buying the meat so the store can make a profit.

     A solution to the poverty in rural America can be more farmers keeping their farms independent of the larger industrial ones and selling their products at farmers markets. Many people enjoy getting food straight from the markets because they're fresher and haven't been treated with any chemicals. People also like to support local farmers which they can do at the markets. In places where there's no CSA arrangements, this can help farmers make money.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/how-to-bring-farmers-markets-to-the-urban-poor/2013/09/20/23cbe10c-14ac-11e3-880b-7503237cc69d_story.html

EROI

1) We should use tar sands to extract oil because it has a higher EROI.

2) A similarity is the use of heat. Heat is used to form crude oil in oil shale. Heat is used to get the oil from the tar sands.

3) A key difference is that with oil shale, heat is needed to change the substances into something else to use it. With tar sands, the heat does not change any substances, but only helps extract the oil.

4) The author believes this because when oil with a low EROI is drilled, there isn't as much gained and we don't have as much to use. Because of this, we end up buying foreign oil to make up for what we don't have. Lots of foreign oil isn't as clean, so when it's burned more greenhouse gases are released.

5) I always do my easy homework first because I don't want to do the hard stuff

Haber-Borsch process

The Haber-Bosch Process is a process which converts nitrogen and hydrogen into ammonia, NH3, developed by Fritz Haber around 1907. It's been useful to humans because it can be used in nitrogen-based fertilizers, which help increase the amount of crops grown and people that can be fed. It is used so widely that, according to the article, "humans are now likely responsible for fixing more nitrogen than all terrestrial ecosystems combined." Though being able to feed more people is a positive thing, the Haber-Borsch process has not had an overall beneficial impact on humans and the Earth.
The Haber-Borsch process actually allowed for a population boom that the Earth cannot support. Before this process was invented, the world population was at around 2 billion. The Earth reached one billion people in 1798 and doubled that in about 1898. From there, it began to increase much faster. Three billion people lived on Earth by 1968. Today, only 47 years later, the population has increased to 7 billion. The reason behind this is that the more people there are, the quicker it will take for that population to double. The article says that "population 'increases in a geometrical ratio.'" Geometric ratio means multiplying - therefore, the population will increase more rapidly as there are more people to reproduce. The article goes on to say that “subsistence increases only in an arithmetical ratio.” Subsistence, the things we need to continue supporting us on the planet, will not continue to grow with us. Humans might grow more rapidly over time, but we will continue to produce the same amount of food. Resources would eventually run out over time.
This has to do with the T.F.R, total fertility rate, of places on Earth. The T.F.R  is about how many children a woman will have in her lifetime, which is different for every country. 2.1 is the rate at which the population would stay steady and not grow or decrease. In some places, such as China and Japan, this number is actually below 2.1. These countries have decreasing populations which would help solve the possible overpopulation issue coming, if it weren't for extremely high T.F.Rs of other countries. Many places in Africa, such as Niger and Somalia, have a T.F.R of over 5. More people will be added to the world than lost, despite the shrinking populations of other countries, because of this.
To get to a point where the world can sustain it's population, it's clear the number of people in the world cannot keep increasing at the rate which it currently is. There wouldn't be enough resources for everyone and it would be a worse future, including a possible worldwide famine. The Haber-Borsch process, while making it possible to feed more people, only created a population boom that there is no room for. Because of this, the Haber-Borsch process had an overall negative effect on the world.

Seneca Lake Lab Report

Introduction: The pH and DO of the water in an aquatic ecosystem is very important to the plant and animal life living there. According to the USGS Water Science School, a pH below five can affect the reproduction of fish. If it is below 4, adult fish will begin to die. According to Lenntech, a water with too high alkalinity can also affect fish. In water with a pH of about 9.6, gills and eyes may be damaged and the fish may die. The Science on Seneca manual says that a pH of less than 5 or higher than 8.5 will place a strain on plant life. Dissolved oxygen is also important in an aquatic ecosystem because plants and animals need the oxygen in the water to use for respiration. When it falls below 3 ppm, (Science on Seneca manual) fish cannot survive. Water with a high DO level is considered healthy. Low DO can affect an ecosystem in many ways, such as harming the biodiversity (oocities.org) and allowing dangerous chemicals to dissolve into the water. An example is cadmium, which stays solid in the presence of oxygen and sinks to the bottom of lakes. If the water lacks much oxygen the cadmium will dissolve, which is a problem because it's poisonous to fish.

Research question: How does the water quality of Seneca Lake affect the plant and animal life in the lake?

Hypothesis: The pH and DO will both be at safe levels for the support of plant and animal life in the lake, and both will be healthy.

Variable identification:

Controlled Variable	Method to control variable
Amount of water	The amount of water used for each sample was measured
Methods used to collect data	The same tools were used for each group
Areas data was collected from	The latitude and longitude was used to make sure each group collected data from the same spots

Experimental setup: The lab was performed on Seneca lake on the 5^th of November. Three locations, a deep, medium depth, and shallow area, were used to collect data from. At each of the three locations, one of the three groups on the boat performed a certain test. This happened twice; in the morning and afternoon.

Procedure:

·  Collect water sample to perform pH test

·  Turn pH meter on, remove cap to expose glass bead

·  Pour at least an inch of water into a glass beaker rinsed with lake water and place pH meter in the beaker

·  Let number on readout stabalize for 5-10 seconds and record

·  Rinse off pH meter with distilled water, replace protective cover, and turn off

·  Find LaMotte sample bottle. Add 8 drops of the manganese(II) sulfate solution (bottle 4167) followed by 8 drops of the alkaline potassium iodide azide solution (bottle 7166).

·  Carefully cap the bottle and mix by inverting gently. Allow precipitate that has formed to settle on shoulder of the bottle. Wait 3-4 minutes for this.

·  Add one gram of sulfamic acid (bottle 6286) to the solution. Cap the bottle and mix until the white crystals and precipitate have completely dissolved.

·  Pour solution into the titration tube, up to the 20 mL line. Add 8 drops of starch solution.

·  Fill the Direct Reading Titrator (0337) up to the 0 mark with the sodium thiosulfate solution (bottle 4169).

·  Insert titrator though the small hole in the cap of the titration tube and titrate solution slowly. Swirl the solution until the blue color disappears permanently with one drop of titrant. You may have to fill the titrator more than once. Record how much titrant you used before refilling. 

·  Dump remaining contents of the LaMotte bottle and titratration tube into labeled waste container. Rinse with distilled water and place back into kit.

Data: The weather for the morning samples was partially cloudy. There was a bit of sun towards the end. The water was choppy but clear, with the secchi disk visible at about 8 meters. The dredge sample for group 2A had a temperature of 50 degrees Fahrenheit with quagga mussels scattered throughout and some plant material. It had distinct layers. The bottom was black while the top was brown.

Plankton Collection

	Species #	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8
Sample
1A		2	2	2	3
2A		2	2	1	7	2	1
3A		1	1	3	1	1	1	1
1P		1	1	1	16+	2
2P		1	1	1	2	5	2	4	1
3P		6	1	7	3	1	1

Water Chemistry

	1A	2A	3A	1P	2P	3P
Latitude	42°50 N	42°51 N	42°51 N	42°49 N	42°50 N	42°50 N
Longitude	76°57 W	76°58 W	76°57 W	76°57 W	76°57 W	76°57 W
Sample temp (°C)	13	13	13	7	14	13
Sample depth (m)	46.6	22.7	8	62.6	22.3	7.5
pH	7.3	7.4	7.5	7.4	7.4	7.3
Chloride (ppm)	200	300	200	180	143	140
DO (ppm)	30	6	10	10	10	10

                                                             

                                                                      Data Logger Graph


                                                        DO and Chloride Graph

Discussion: The data is mostly consistent for each area. The temperature and pH are almost the same for every one, showing that they are similar throughout the whole lake regardless of depth or specific spot. The DO and Chloride levels vary, though it could be due to the time the data was collected or the depth.

The data logger graph printed on the boat shows the temperature and conductivity levels of the water as it gets deeper. They are steady until about 45 feet, when they change. The conductivity could be due to the salt mines that the lake was exposed to. There were many of them around the lake in past years and much of the salt ended up in Seneca Lake, where it mixed in with the water. Salt increases the water's conductivity. It can also be due to salt deposits in the water. Because New York was once a shallow ocean, it's possible there may be some deposits under the lake that's getting into it. The temperature changes could be due to the density. Dense water is colder and at the bottom, so it would make sense that the temperature changes where it's deeper.

Evaluation: The largest limitation in this lab was human error. As this was the first time any of the students have done this kind of testing, there was room for many mistakes. To fix this, more than one test at each station could have been done. Then, the students could compare all the data they collected and be sure they did it correctly. There was also very little time to do each station. The students could have done the testing more accurately and carefully if they were given more time to. At each location, the depths were not exactly the same. For example, the “deep” location had a different depth for every group – 46.6m and 62.6m. This led to variations in the data.

To test my hypothesis, more information on the plant and animal life in the lake was needed. Tests needed to be done on how healthy they were and how well the lake supported them to be able to draw any conclusions about the effect of pH and DO.

Conclusion: The data collected from Seneca Lake shows that it is very healthy. The pH and DO levels that were found are in the standard for human drinking water. On this trip we did not find anything pertaining to the life in the lake, except for the mussels living there. To test the research question more data would need to be collected on how healthy the plants and animals are.

References:

"Dissolved Oxygen." Dissolved Oxygen. Utah State University, n.d. Web. 28 Oct. 2015.

"Effects of Changes in PH on Freshwater Ecosystems." DissolvedOxygen. Lenntech BV, n.d. Web. 28 Oct. 2015.
Halfman, B., J. Halfman, C. De Denus, T. Curtin, and S. Myers. Science on Seneca. Geneva, New York: HOBART AND WILLIAM SMITH COLLEGES, 2008, 2011. PDF.

"PH -- Water Properties." PH: Water Properties, from the USGS Water-Science School. USGS, n.d. Web. 28 Oct. 2015.

"Water Treatment Solutions." Effects of Acids and Alkalis on Aquatic Life. Lenntech BV, n.d. Web. 28 Oct. 2015.