Microclimates

Variation on Earth

The inclination of Earth on its axis while rotating around itself and the sun creates such variation in seasons. The spherical shape of the earth itself lends to interesting variation on earth. The presence of mountains and different altitudes also helps create even more variation on earth.

Variation can be with time or according to geographic location.

Microclimates

Isolation?

The concept of microclimate gives hope. It allows one to think that despite the destruction, pollution and deteriorating environment taking place globally, yet one can still live in a relative paradise and create his own microclimate and niche environment.

That does not mean that we should disconnect from what's going on around us and leave the earth to sink, as we are all connected and will get affected at the end no matter how 'isolated' we might be. It just means that in parallel with trying to "save the earth" we can still live in relative bliss by enjoying our own blessed microclimates in which we can thrive. Just planning some trees around your home can help you go that direction.

That's why an urban setting where trees are grown can be up to 10 degrees Celsius less in temperature than an adjacent one that has no trees.

Inspiration

The concept of microclimates also provides variation. It provides inspiration that in analogy to microclimates we can find people in urban communities who are living different states of life. The variation in such human communities can be great in a similar way that microclimates create variation. For instance, in a poor neighborhood there could exist some rich people. In an area where disease is rampant there could exist some health people. At a place where ethics have subsides there could exist ethical people. If such variation is lost, ecosystems become fragile and can fail, be destroyed and become replaced with other new ecosystems that allow for more variation and are more resilient.

This variation can perhaps explain the presence of fruits growing out of seasons for Mariam.

Permaculture

The concept of microclimates and variation in small areas can also be used in permaculture to provide for a variety of food in a small area of land.

So, we can find interesting variation, for instance, within Siwa itself at some scattered pieces of land that have springs.

Sea Moderates Temperature

Water from the sea absorbs a lot of heat in contrast to land which absorbs less heat. The land heats and cools very fast compared to the sea. Hence in Alexandria (Egypt) and other coastal cities weather is moderated by the waters in the sea. It can be warm at night and cool during the day.

Manmade Variation

Besides variation created by natural factors, human activity can also lead to a great deal of variation. For instance, during the Eid vacation where a large number of people who are working and living in Cairo (Egypt) go back to their governorates and industry ceases, a great positive variation in the local climates of Cairo shows up. Air pollution rates drop down sharply and the atmosphere becomes much more healthy. I have noticed during the last Eid vacation that birds increased and I believe I've even witnessed a species of bird that I had not been seeing around, it had a pleasant sound that I had not been familiar with earlier. As soon as the Eid vacation came to an end, such pleasant increased variation in species sadly subsided once again.

Island Patterns

Thoughts

1. Looking for unique species of plants at remote areas (Siwa, Aswan, Sinai).
2. White people in South Africa, how about those as 'founder populations'? How about White people in Australia, in North America?
3. I do not buy the idea that mutations are accidental! I only see it 'polite' way of saying that science has yet to discover the patterns by which mutations happen to serve a non-accidental evolution purpose.
4. I do not agree that species are not perfectly adapted to their environments. I sense that there is something wrong with that. I believe species are indeed most perfectly adapted to their current natural environments. Or what?
5. I see the events in history that result in the creation of islands or separation of land are no accident. I see them as natural developments that take place within grand patterns to serve a purpose.
6. My comments above about refusing the thought of accidents, and imperfection might sound unscientific, yet I believe science might prove them one day. Science, to me, is not and should not be the only source of knowledge and it can be guided and inspired by other sources of knowledge.

Digest

• Drosophila species (fruit flies): 1500 worldwide, 500 in Hawaiian islands, 100 picture-winged
• endemic: species found in only one area
• Dispersion of ancestor species (founder population) into new locations and isolation of such locations (such as isolated islands) allow forces natural selection to evolve them into new species
• Natural selection is confined to the gene pool of the ancestors save only for occasional rare mutations
• The lineages through which the Drosophila species have evolved can be traced by analyzing the banding patterns on the chromosomes in the salivary glands of the their larvae
• The oldest islands have the first ancestors while the newest formed islands have the most recently evolved species
• Island biotas illustrate that:
• there is a historical element in the match between organisms and environments
• there is not just one perfect organism for each type of environment

Drosophila

Questions

1. How do islands form?
2. How do species specialize and evolve on an isolated island?

Variation within Species with Manmade Selection Pressures

Thoughts

• How does manmade influences affect the species of cats, doges, mice, weasels, doves, hoopoe, craws, home sparrows and bats in urban areas in Cairo? (It probably has a lesser effects on birds, since they travel even more easily than the other animals. On the same token, trees must be affected the most, since they are immobile.)
• Pigeons at Siwa and donkeys at Siwa appeared to be much healthier than those in Cairo. They live amongst nature, feed on a healthy natural diet and live in a healthy environment with no air pollution. (Siwa also is in the North West of Egypt, from wear most of the wind comes, and is located at the lowest place in Egypt, almost, which makes it insusceptible to winds blowing off industrial pollution from anywhere.)
• It is good (for humans) to live away from the direction of wind that brings airborne industrial pollutants. Helwan is one such area where many suffer health issues due to high pollution caused by the presence of cement factories there.

Digest

• Local specialization within species (natural selection in action) has sometimes been driven by manmade ecological forces, especially those of environmental pollution.
• Dark (melanic) forms peppered moth (Biston betularia) increased in industrial polluted areas in the UK
• Many populations of peppered moths in the UK were polymorphic: melanic and nonmelanic forms coexisted
• Transient polymorphism:
• The dark form of moth increase in the UK
• The fall in the population of dark peppered moths after pollution was reduced is again a from of transient polymorphism
• Industrial melanism:
• Definition: Industrial melanims is the phenomenon in which black or blackish forms of species have come to dominate populations in industrial areas
• In the dark individuals, a dominant gene is typically responsible for producing an excess of the black pigment melanin
• Birds preying on peppered moth are those causing natural selection to work, they eat the typical (light colored) moths in industrial places while they prey on the dark ones in pollution free places
• Sulfur dioxide destroyed most of the moss and lichen on tree trunks on which nonmelanic moths rest thus depriving them from their ability to camouflage
• Transition from coal to oil and electricity in addition to legislation passed to impose smoke free zones and to reduce industrial emissions of sulfur dioxide in Western Europe and the US caused the frequency of melanic forms of peppered moth to falll back to near pre-industrial levels

Melanic and non-melanic peppered moth

Questions

1. What manmade factors, other than pollution, can affect selection in species?
2. How does breeding affect the balance of evolution?
3. Can manmade interference in any way have a positive effect on populations and communities compared to leaving them without any manmade influence?

Specialization within Species

Thoughts

The idea of mobility makes me think about people of Upper Egypt and how their mingling with Egyptians from the Nile Delta area creates a sort of hybridization which is healthy. On the other hand, people who live in Siwa and have been more or less in isolation from the external world for thousands of years have been forced to adapt more to their environment. Also people who live in Aswan in Egypt and are Nubians might have less genetic variation and are more adapted to their environment.

Digest

• The term species will be defined in the next section.
•  An ecotype was coined in 1922 by Göte Turesson for plant populations "to describe genetically determined differences between populations within a species that reflect local matches between the organisms and their environments."
• Only if the forces favoring divergence are strong enough to counteract the mixing and hybridization of individuals from different sites and  there is sufficient heritable variation on which selection can act evolution then forces the characteristics of populations to diverge from each other.
• Immobile organisms become differentiated most notably while mobile organisms are less exposed to the forces of natural selection and therefore do not have to match themselves to a fixed environment as much as immobile organisms have to.

Questions

1. Why is there no continuum of species along a spectrum of variation among organisms?
2. What is the definition of a species?
3. What about variation within the same species according to the environment they live in?