droughts' effects on texas ecoregions
This page will describe the effects that droughts have on Texas ecoregions around the state.
What is a drought?
A drought is an extended period of time that occurs with little to no rain. It is probably the most common catastrophe to occur in Texas due to Texas's common dryness.
Effects:
Droughts have many negative effects to the ecoregions of not only Texas, but all over the world. Here are just a few of the impacts drought may have.
Perhaps one of the most important impacts that a drought can have on ecoregions is to the soil. The lack of water can quickly dry up the soil, killing any plants in that soil. And when plants die, so do their roots. Without any roots to anchor the soil together, the soil is more vulnerable to erosion, and therefore easily eroded by wind and any scarce water that does fall. This causes the soil to be unable to support any plant life, even long after the drought has ended.
Also, when the soil is ruined by droughts, this kills the decomposers existing in that soil.
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Another, quite obvious effect of droughts in Texas is its ability to quickly dry up small bodies of water such as rivers, creeks, or lakes.
Droughts can also be very dangerous if they ruin the foundations of buildings. Far underneath the ground is a layer of clay, on which the foundation of buildings is built on. Clay is greatly affected by the amount of water it retains. If clay has lots of water, it puffs up. If it has little water, then the clay will shrink. This can cause the concrete forming the foundation of the building to crumble, possibly getting so bad that it actually causes the building to crumble as well.
All living things require water to survive, so when water is scarce, both plants and animals die.
- This lowers biodiversity in ecosystems.
- This also results in a chain reaction in the food chains and webs. When a primary producer dies, the primary consumer that eats that also dies off, causing the secondary consumer that eats that to die as well.
- The air quality decreases due to the lesser amounts of plants.
A long term effect may be that a continual drought will cause the plants and animals in the ecoregion to overtime adapt to be able to easily thrive off of and collect any amount of water that falls.
Droughts can cause the water table to drop, possibly causing people's water supply to decrease, if they use ground water as drinking water.
current texas Droughts
As conditions begin to worsen all over the state, 87% of the state is in a moderate to severe drought.
Houston finally looked like it was going to be able to pull itself out of the severe drought of 2011 in 2012. But now, in 2013, we are experiencing another severe drought that has been going on for months now.
"Texas has only received 68 percent of its normal rainfall, and reservoirs are at their lowest levels since 1990," says Texas's state climatologist, John Nielsen-Gammon, recently, speaking about 2013's Texan drought.
Bibliography
- Berger, Eric. "Severe Drought Returns to Houston." Chronicle. The Houston Chronicle, 29 Mar. 2013. Web. 04 May 2013.
- Hylton, Hilary. "The Great Dry State of Texas: The Drought That Wouldn't Leave Has Lone Star Farmers Scared." Time. Time Magazine, 10 Aug. 2011. Web. 4 May 2013.
- SciGuy. "It’s Official: Houston Now Back in a ‘severe’ Drought." Blog.Chron. Houston Chronicle, 28 Mar. 2013. Web. 04 May 2013.