Environmental History

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Environmental History

• Earth Systems Resources

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Essential Learning Questions / Objectives

• Define three major cultural and environmental
  changes that have occurred since humans were
  hunter-gatherers.
• Describe the environmental history of the United
  States in terms of the Tribal and Frontier Eras,
  the Early Conservation Era, and the Environmental
  Era.
• Compare slash-and-burn agricultural practices
  with the modern advanced forms of farming. State
  the advantages and disadvantages of each.
• List individuals who made major contributions to
  conservation/environmental movements in the
  United States and briefly describe these
  contributions.
• Define environmental backlash. Briefly describe
  the effects of this backlash.
• Summarize the key environmental events of the
  1980s in the U.S. and the World
• Compare and contrast the environmental policies
  of the Clinton administration and the Bush
  administration.

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Early History

• Earth has existed for an estimated 4.6 billion
  years
• Homo sapiens have been on earth only about 60.000
  years
• Until about 12,000 years ago men were mostly
  hunter-gatherers.

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Cultural Changes the Environment
Hunter-Gatherers Humans (Homo sapiens) have been
in existence for about 160,000 years, a mere
blink of an eye in terms of biological life.
(early humans lived off the land
nomadic) Agricultural (Neolithic)
Revolution (10,000 to 12,000 years
ago) Industrial-Medical Revolution (began in the
1700s in England Progressed to United States in
the 1800s) Information and Globalization
Revolution (since 1950 and especially since 1970)
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Hunter-Gatherers

• Survived by eating edible wild plants, fishing,
  hunting, and scavenging meat killed by other
  animals
• Lived in small bands
• Were nomads
• They discovered
• Which plants and animals could be eaten and used
  as medicine
• Where to find water
• How plant availability changed throughout the
  year
• How game animals migrated

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Advanced Hunters-Gatherers

• Used more advanced tools and fire
• Contributed to the extinction of some animals
  (saber-toothed tiger)
• Altered distribution of plants by carrying seeds
• OVERALL IMPACT ON THE ENVIRONMENT WAS LOW DUE TO
• Small population
• Low resource use/person
• Migration allowed ecosystem to repair itself
• Lack of technology

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Agricultural Revolution

• 10,000-12,000 years ago
• Also called Neolithic revolution
• Gradual shift from nomads to settling in
  agricultural communities
• Domesticated animals and cultivated wild plants

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Slash-and-Burn Cultivation

• Slash and Burn did destroy local environment, but
  was usually very small and had a limited impact.
• Still a problem
• in some parts
• of developing
• World. (Amazon)

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Shifting cultivation
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The Agricultural Revolution Trade offs
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The Agricultural Revolution

• Most early farmers practiced SUSTAINABLE
  CULTIVATION
• Had little impact on the environment because
• Depended on human muscle power and crude tools
• Low population size and density
• Land was available for movement to other areas

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The Industrial Revolution
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The Industrial Revolution

• Began in England in the mid 1700s and in America
  in the 1800s
• Based on dependence on coal (nonrenewable fossil
  fuel) rather than renewable wood
• Invention of the steam engine
• Switched from small-scale localized production to
  large-scale production of machine-made goods.
• People began to live longer
• Movement from rural to cities
• Often very bad living and working conditions

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Resulted in

• Fossil-fuel powered farm machinery
• New plant-breeding techniques increasing yield
  per acre
• More reliable food supply
• Longer life spans
• Increase in population size

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Information Globalization Revolution

• Many new technologies telephone, computers, tv,
  etc
• Automated data bases
• Remote sensing satellites
• A shift took place where humans moved from
  relying on wood and flowing water to a dependence
  on machines run by nonrenewable fossil fuels
  (first coal, then later oil and natural gas)