Asia, The Wondrous Workings of Planet Earth

Lions, tigers, and bears! (Oh my!) Asia is the largest continent on Earth, with an amazing diversity of ecosystems, from the burning hot deserts of the Middle East to the wet fertile grasslands of China. In the south, tropical monsoons soak India with rainfall for months at a time. In the north lies Siberia, a cold land of mostly frozen tundra. Asia is home to many mountain ranges, including the Himalayas, the world’s highest. These mountains are so tall they block wind currents and create many different climates across central and Southeast Asia. They also act as a natural wall that has controlled animal migration and provided protection from outside invaders for ancient Asian empires.

Asia was home to some of the first human cradle civilizations in its river valleys: the Fertile Crescent of ancient Mesopotamia, the Indus Valley in ancient India, and the Yangtze River Valley in ancient China. As humans began to grow crops and transformed the landscape around them, the human population boomed, and civilization entered a new era. More advanced farming techniques meant less time spent searching for food and more time for thinking and inventing. Around 5,000 BCE Mesopotamia became home to several large civilizations and gave birth to inventions like the wheel, irrigation, domesticated animals, record keeping, and mathematics. Now Asia is the most populous continent on Earth, home to over half of the human population. Ecosystems in Asia have a huge impact on the entire world. It is vital to protect its beautiful and important wildlife.

“The Land of Little Sticks” or “The Sleeping Land” were the first names for Siberia and the cold, dry, seemingly endless forest that makes up northern Russia. The taiga of Siberia is the largest unaltered forest of its kind in the world, spanning over 1.5 million square miles. Its hardy pine trees have adapted to grow in one of the coldest climates on Earth. The winter is long and bitterly cold (with lows dipping to -70°F/-56°C), with very little snowfall, and summers are brief but hot (with temperatures that reach an average of 60°F/16°C, thawing the snow). This cold weather makes Siberia home to the furriest animals on Earth. Ferocious lynx with fluffy spotted coats and the heavily furred and dangerous Siberian brown bear hunt small mammals such as hares.

The Siberian taiga butts up against the Arctic Circle, and most of the soil has been frozen for millennia. This permafrost makes growing crops almost impossible, but as climate change raises temperatures, the permafrost throughout the Arctic Circle has begun to melt for the first time. This melt is also rapidly releasing carbon and methane gases that have been safely stored in ice for thousands of years. As carbon and methane are released into the atmosphere, they contribute even more to global warming.

The Siberian taiga is one of the largest untouched wildernesses in the world. This massive evergreen forest is doing what plants do best: breathing oxygen into our atmosphere and creating a base for the entire furry food chain that calls this harsh, cold land home.

BIGGEST BENEFITS

This large, year-round forest is a global carbon sink. This means the forest is crucial in global absorption of CO2 from the atmosphere and the production of oxygen. The taiga helps to regulate the global climate. Siberia is also rich in mineral resources like coal, fossil fuels, iron, and gold.

Many rocks in the Siberian forest are volcanic and date back to the Permian–Triassic period.

Worldwide, taiga biomes cover 17 percent of the earth’s surface.

In the summer, 300 bird species visit Siberia, but only 30 species remain throughout the cold Siberian winter.

The Batagaika crater, caused by melting permafrost, is the largest of its kind. In local folklore it’s considered a gateway to the underworld, due to the strange noises that emanate from it.

Melting permafrost is revealing the fossils of prehistoric woolly mammoths and ancient bacteria.

GREATEST THREAT

Global warming is causing the permafrost to melt, releasing stored greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. The abundance of trees in Siberia has led to excessive logging without replanting. Coal mining and excessive fur trapping also threaten Siberia’s wildlife.

Ecosystem of the Indochina Mangroves

Along the coastline of Southeast Asia are the tangled roots of the mangrove forests. Mangroves are uniquely evolved to grow in between fresh and salty ocean waters, with root systems able to filter out salt. Living between ecosystems, they are an important ecotone and have protected the coastlines of Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam, and Malaysia. Their branches and roots create natural barriers for storms, stop tidal erosion, and create a maze-like refuge for many animals. Mangroves are also an important breeding ground and nursery for baby marine life and an essential part of the marine ecosystems throughout the Pacific and Indian Oceans. A Thai fisherman on the Andaman Coast said it best: “If there are no mangroves, then the sea will have no meaning. It is like having a tree without roots, for the mangroves are the roots of the sea.”

These important mangrove forests were almost completely destroyed during the Vietnam War. Large portions of the forests on the central coastline of Vietnam were decimated by tanks driving through them and exposure to napalm and Agent Orange, a biochemical weapon made from the same ingredients as herbicide (weed killer). It destroyed parts of the mangrove forest and surrounding ecosystems and farms throughout Vietnam and Korea. Herbicides are also harmful to people in large doses, causing cancer, birth defects, and genetic disorders that can affect future generations. The effects of Agent Orange are still felt by millions today, but there is hope. Now conservationists are making huge strides in the reforestation of this area, and there is new life in this once damaged land.

BIGGEST BENEFITS

Mangrove forests serve as natural barriers that protect the shoreline from storms and erosion. Although no mammals are native to the Indochina mangrove forest, many depend on the trees as a daily hunting ground. Many fish and crustaceans use submerged mangrove roots to lay their eggs, since it is the perfect place for baby fish to grow and hide.

Many lizards depend on the mangrove forest including the monitor lizard and the false gharial, which looks like a crocodile.

Some of the world’s rarest water birds are found in Indochina mangroves, including the white-winged wood duck and the spot-billed pelican.

The Indochina mangrove forest is a part of a larger network of many different mangrove-based ecosystems that stretch all the way from Thailand to Australia. Many fish born in the mangroves go on to populate the Great Barrier Reef.

Enjoy shrimp cocktail? Thank the mangroves! Massive amounts of shrimp come from fisheries in Vietnam that directly benefit from the coastal mangrove forest.

Young tapirs, found in the mangrove forest, have white stripes and dots that help them hide. After around seven months, they will lose their baby fur and their markings.

GREATEST THREAT

Many people wrongly think that Indochina mangroves are useless, and they will clear them for new buildings and farm development. In Thailand, half of the country’s mangroves have been cut down to create charcoal. Additionally, explosives and dragnets are sometimes used in fishing practices near the mangroves, which damages the trees and wildlife, especially juvenile marine animals.

Ecosystem of the Eastern Mongolian Steppe

The Eastern Mongolian Steppes are home to the world’s largest intact temperate grasslands. While grasslands all over the world are shrinking at an alarming rate, over a million white-tailed gazelles roam freely in Mongolia. Mongolia is slightly smaller than Alaska and a large part of it is covered by rolling hills, grassy plains, and soggy wetlands. With clear skies about 250 days a year, the region has earned its local nickname, “The Land of the Blue Sky.” But this mostly-flat land is unprotected by the surrounding Altai mountains, making it open to the extremes of the seasons. The summers on the grassland are warm and see massive amounts of fast-growing grass. Winter on the steppes is brutally windy, with temperatures below freezing. Throughout Mongolia, temperatures can drop to an extremely cold -40°F/C—it is so harsh that there is a special Mongolian word for it: zud.

The Eastern Mongolian Steppes are a UNESCO World Heritage Site because of their pristine and vast wilderness and abundance of unique wildlife. In these grasslands you can find animals like the chubby raccoon dog, the elegant corsac fox, and the endangered Przewalski’s horse. The reason the steppes’ grassland is still intact is thanks to the Mongolian people and their traditional land management. Mongolia is still mostly undeveloped, so many of its citizens depend on the health of the land and have prioritized the care of it. In fact, in the twentieth century, the number of people living as traditional nomadic herders in Mongolia increased. One of the world’s largest wildernesses exists today thanks to the Mongolian people and the important relationship they have with the steppes.

BIGGEST BENEFITS

The largest intact temperate grasslands in the world support an entire country. The Mongolian economy is based on the production of meat, wool, and cashmere from domesticated herd animals. The national government enforces restrictions on hunting and promotes the preservation of traditional land steward techniques to keep the grasslands intact and plentiful.

Many Mongolian farmers still live in yurts and wear traditional herding clothes.

Mongolia’s native wild horses were nearly wiped out due to illegal hunting and competition with livestock.

The Eastern Mongolian Steppes are part of a larger 5,000-mile-long grassland biome that stretches across Asia from Ukraine to China.

Mongolia is home to the argali, the world’s largest mountain sheep.

GREATEST THREAT

Cashmere, which comes from goats, is one of Mongolia’s most lucrative exports. But large populations of these goats can be destructive to the landscape. When they graze, they eat the roots as well as grass, which can destroy entire pastures, leaving sand dunes (which can’t be farmed) in their place. Herders are working with conservationists to graze their goats in more strategic and sustainable ways. If they are successful, the overgrazed grasslands will grow back in about ten years. But the demand for cashmere keeps growing. Even in the most rural places, farming, agriculture, and development need to be done with conservation in mind.

Ecosystem of the Himalayan Mountains

“Himalaya” means “abode of snow” in Sanskrit, and the world’s tallest mountains have been the basis of myth and legend throughout Asia. In the twentieth century, the Himalayas became a point of conquest for climbers to reach the top of the mountain’s peaks. But the Himalayas are more just an adventure destination.

The higher up the mountain range, the colder the climate gets. At the very top of the Himalayas are its glacier ice caps. Besides the North and South Poles, the Himalayan peaks hold the third-largest deposit of ice and frozen snow on the planet. As you descend to lower elevations, the temperature begins to warm and the ice and snow begin to melt, flowing into rivers.

Below an elevation of 16,400 feet is western alpine scrubland and montane grasslands. Here the elusive snow leopard hunts musk deer on the rocks. Another 3,000 feet lower, in the inner valley, lives the endangered red panda among pine and spruce trees. As you continue to descend, the climate becomes more tropical. At around 9,800 feet, the eastern forest is filled with huge oak trees, beautiful orchids, and 500 species of birds. Finally, at the base of the mountains, at an elevation of 3,300 feet and lower, the tropical broadleaf forest starts, where tigers and elephants are hidden by the dense foliage.

Although these mountainside terrains are very different, they often overlap. A mountain is a giant complex web of interaction from top to bottom, and each different ecosystem depends on its neighbors for survival.

BIGGEST BENEFITS

The huge glaciers of the Himalayan Mountains are the source of fresh water for most of Asia. The snowcap melt feeds three major Asian river systems: the Indus, the Yangtze, and the Ganges-Brahmaputra. The mountains also create a huge natural barrier that affects the climate of the southern Asia. They physically block cold northern winds from reaching southern India in the winter, and block the southwestern monsoon winds, causing clouds to release most of their rainfall before reaching the north.

The Eastern Himalayas are home to Asia’s three biggest mammals: the Asian elephant, the one-horned rhinoceros, and the wild water buffalo.

Landslides, earthquakes, and avalanches are common because the tectonic movement that created the mountains is still active in the area.

At 29,029 feet, Mt. Everest is the tallest mountain in the world. It takes most climbers about two months to summit the mountain.

The first people to summit Mt. Everest were Sherpa mountaineer Tenzing Norgay and Sir Edmund Hillary in 1953.

GREATEST THREAT

Climate change is causing a rapid melt of glacier mountain caps around the world. The glaciers of the Himalayans are melting at an alarming rate and this threatens the fresh water source that most of Asia relies on. Along with this, mountain forests are overused for timber and grazing. Farmers in the Eastern Himalayas are grazing animals in the mountain forests because of a lack of grasslands, but the forests cannot support this large number of farm animals. Conservation groups are working to protect the land while improving the livelihoods of the people who depend on agriculture in the mountains.