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Would it be possible to turn a desert region into a rain forest? For example if Nevada decided to plant trees in the dessert is it possible with enough irrigati
by andy_ppp 8y ago
Would it be possible to turn a desert region into a rain forest? For example if Nevada decided to plant trees in the dessert is it possible with enough irrigation or would all the trees just die?
- keithnz 8y agohttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpTHi7O66pI https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpTHi7O66pI I watched this talk a while back, TL;DW Yes, you can.
- novalis78 8y agoThose are quite impressive results
- onefuncman 8y agoit was a little mystifying that he answered the question about how they bootstrap the process with "we've never had to supplement feed" alongside "no grass in sight for 100 miles"... does anyone have a longer answer?
- bottled_poe 8y ago> enough irrigation Pretty big if.
- FrozenVoid 8y agoSome problems: 1.Forest fires within a dry climate(vs humid jungle). 2.If the water table is too deep, trees will need artificial irrigation, forever. 3.It seems easy to create a single-point of failure : monoculture of "best-performing" tree species which would succumb easily to specialized insects or fungus.
- marcus_holmes 8y ago1. Forest fires need base fuel load to propagate. This is the organic matter at ground level, formed from the dead stuff that trees drop (leaves, branches, whole dead trees, etc). In other words, forest fires only happen in mature forests that are left alone to accumulate base fuel load. 2. Tree raise the water table under them, by providing shade (so water on the ground doesn't evaporate as quickly and gets a chance to soak into the ground). They also prevent water tables from surfacing (by drawing the water up from their root systems). In other words, a mature forest will manage the water table, rather than being managed by the water table. You get water table problems if you cut down too many trees. Growing more will solve that. 3. this is true. There are lots of ways around it, though, if your goal is to green the desert rather than creating lots of cheap timber quickly.
- ex3ndr 8y agoIn UAE it works well. You need artificial irrigation, but only one or two generations of trees. Everywhere around UAE there are many new plants randomly popped from the sand only after about 10-15 years of artificial forests.
- mr_toad 8y agoSalt would be a problem in the low-lying areas, and irrigation can increase salinisation. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dry_lake https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dry_lake https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soil_salinity https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soil_salinity
- youngtaff 8y agoI suspect it's about recreating the ecosystems rather than just planting trees and irrigating i.e. multi-decade process Geoff Lawton's permaculture work on 'Greening the Desert" is well worth a watch e.g. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yI9wMtTvWps https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yI9wMtTvWps (plenty more videos around if you search)
- topmonk 8y agoEven if you did that, unless you bury the trees after they grow, they'll just rot and release the co2 back in the atmosphere. Trees aren't supposed to be a buffer for increasing co2 levels. They just use co2 as a reusable resource.
- noselasd 8y agoNormally if you get a forest going, it would replenish itself, not just grow old and then vanish - thus being a buffer.
- topmonk 8y agoI agree, but a tiny one. You can't pump half the oil out of the earth's crust that formed there after millions of years, burn it into the atmosphere, and recover the co2 by growing a forest on the surface, no matter how big it is.
- Cthulhu_ 8y agoAre there any useful nutrients in the desert floor? Or would it also require fertilization?
- deleted 8y ago[deleted]