green sahara digs

Though some years old this is a very nice example of findings in the sahara desert once green, about 9,000 BC in the Neolithic Subpluvial period.

Photographer Mike Hettwer has shot some extraordinary of these, including dinosaurs, and it was published in national geographic and others.
have fun..

archive.boston.com...

The climate changed overnight. Lack of water seems to be the real cause of death. A 14 day trail of death.

Where are all these dead people's cars and factories??? Where are all their carbon producing, smog belching, ozone eating, greenhouse gas emitting, machines?

The industrial age didn't happen until another 9,000 (yes NINE THOUSAND) YEARS had passed! The Sahara desert existed thousands of years before this.

So there you have it, undeniable proof that mankind has nothing to do with global climate change!

Case CLOSED.

Hooray....more dead stuff.

I keed I keed....that giraffe is pretty amazing really.

originally posted by: Flyingclaydisk
Where are all these dead people's cars and factories??? Where are all their carbon producing, smog belching, ozone eating, greenhouse gas emitting, machines?

The industrial age didn't happen until another 9,000 (yes NINE THOUSAND) YEARS had passed! The Sahara desert existed thousands of years before this.

So there you have it, undeniable proof that mankind has nothing to do with global climate change!

Case CLOSED.

Some of the deserts could have been formed because of people scraping the clay layer off of the land to make pottery and bricks and stuff. The water did not float on the surface anymore, it sunk into the earth. This happened near Mexico somewhat where the clay layer was not thick and in areas like where the big cities were in the middle east. They did not realize the clay layer was important back then, they knew about the topsoil but were ignorant of the clay. Once the wind blew around the sand and dust from the dry earth blew over the good earth and made the areas into deserts. This is only how some deserts were formed, ones around pyramids and where a lot of clay was used to make pottery, idols, and bricks and the sort. The areas where they trashed the clay layer to sell their products to other areas was the ones that were hurt the most. People could make clay pots in ancient days and trade them for food and supplies and these pots wound up all over Europe from Egypt and those areas.

originally posted by: Flyingclaydisk
Where are all these dead people's cars and factories??? Where are all their carbon producing, smog belching, ozone eating, greenhouse gas emitting, machines?

The industrial age didn't happen until another 9,000 (yes NINE THOUSAND) YEARS had passed! The Sahara desert existed thousands of years before this.

So there you have it, undeniable proof that mankind has nothing to do with global climate change!

Case CLOSED.

Actually, it was the goats (no fooling) that did it. So, yes, humans did cause the Sahara to become desert faster. In the absence of goats, it would probably look more like the Great Plains of America, with a smaller desert near Egypt.

Excellent find! S&F!

I particularly love the giraffe... but the forensic anthropology geek in me also loves the skeletons.

a reply to: Byrd

yes, extraordinare fotos..do you know some recommended sites with nice sahara petroglyphs?


this looks awesome..

a reply to: Byrd

But your link says:

A new study suggests humans played a big role.

Then is says:

Scientists generally attribute the transformation of the Sahara to changes in the Earth’s orbit, which deprived the tropics of sunlight, leading to a drop-off in summer rainfall. Wright says that human migration pushed the region to a tipping point.

Then it also says:

Wright says his hypothesis still leaves plenty of unanswered questions.

Then this follows:

Several researchers interviewed for this story, however, cast doubt on Wright’s explanation, including Jon Foley, climatologist and executive director of the California Academy of Sciences. Foley said the loss of vegetation across the Sahara, provoked by changes in the Earth’s orbit, could explain the phenomena described in the study. Plants soak up moisture from the ground and sweat it through their leaves, adding water vapor to the atmosphere. When vegetation disappears, the atmosphere loses a key source of water, worsening drought.

Foley said Wright’s research offers “a thought-provoking idea, worthy of more debate and study, but the current body of evidence does not prove the hypothesis.”

So, it most likely was not goats/livestock; that's one guy's hypothesis that can be explained by other processes that are more generally accepted by other scientists.

I'm not trying to argue for argument's sake, but when you say that it was something based off of the hypothesis of one guy, then add a hypothetical after that as to what it would look like without said 'something,' that does a disservice to honest debate when you're trying to call someone out for being wrong about it not having anything to do with the AGW theory.

a reply to: Byrd

Yes, Goats are the creators of desert.
But, you can't blame it completely on goats.
The change in the east african monsoon ~12-13kya also affected the rainfall patterns of north central africa and had a direct impact on the formation of the sahara.
Its too close tp the equator to have an environ similar to the plains, it would be more like the Sahael to the south.

originally posted by: punkinworks10
a reply to: Byrd

Yes, Goats are the creators of desert.
But, you can't blame it completely on goats.
The change in the east african monsoon ~12-13kya also affected the rainfall patterns of north central africa and had a direct impact on the formation of the sahara.
Its too close tp the equator to have an environ similar to the plains, it would be more like the Sahael to the south.

I seem to remember reading decades ago that the area underwent alternating monsoons and desertifaction over very long periods in the past.
If that's true, I'd be willing to speculate that the Sahara will be green again, sometime in the future.

Harte

originally posted by: anti72
a reply to: Byrd

yes, extraordinare fotos..do you know some recommended sites with nice sahara petroglyphs?


this looks awesome..

Not offhand, no. I'm far more familiar with the petroglyphs of the American Southwest.

originally posted by: punkinworks10
a reply to: Byrd

Yes, Goats are the creators of desert.
But, you can't blame it completely on goats.
The change in the east african monsoon ~12-13kya also affected the rainfall patterns of north central africa and had a direct impact on the formation of the sahara.
Its too close tp the equator to have an environ similar to the plains, it would be more like the Sahael to the south.

Agreed... it's not completely on goats. However, they did exacerbate the effects of the weather. I confess I picked the most accessible article on this to prove the point... that the Sahara's creation was indeed influenced by humans (who caused it to get worse much faster) to counter the point that 'humans didn't cause things like the Sahara.

Extraordinary photography! thank you very much for posting, I am particularly enamoured with the Giraffe

originally posted by: Byrd
Excellent find! S&F!

I particularly love the giraffe... but the forensic anthropology geek in me also loves the skeletons.

That’s pretty Much where my head was at when I got to the photo of the mother buried with her 2 children. There was a lot of care taken in that particular burial between interlocking their hands among one another and the layers of flowers above and below the bodies.