Wild Free and Happy Sample 23

[Note: This is the twenty-third sample from my rough draft of a far from finished new book, Wild, Free, & Happy.  I don’t plan on reviewing more books for a while.  My blog is home to reviews of 202 books, and you are very welcome to explore them.  The Search field on the right side will find words in the full contents of all rants and reviews, if you are interested in specific authors, titles, or subjects.]

 Super Grass

I previously mentioned the notion that humans are creatures of the grass.  Recently, I stumbled on information that added a deeper dimension to this theme.  It all began when I read that the area of global forest cover has been sharply reduced since the early Miocene Epoch.  This stimulated my curiosity, and led to an exciting wild factoid chase.  The Miocene spanned from 23 to 5.3 million years ago.  It seems that the early Miocene was wet and warm, and many ecosystems were forests.  I was surprised to learn that as late as 20 million years ago, much of Antarctica was covered with temperate forests.

Anyway, later in the Miocene, maybe 6 to 8 million years ago, it got cooler and dryer, and a new type of major ecosystem emerged — grasslands.  They can thrive where it’s too dry for trees.  Over time, expanding grassland displaced large areas of forest.  This shift was an important turning point in the human saga.  As forests shrank, there was less habitat for tree-dwelling primates, causing a number of species to tumble off the stage.  Some primates moved out onto the savannah, and figured out how to survive in open country as ground-dwelling primates.  They included the ancestors of baboons and humans. 

So, it was a gradual but substantial shift in climate patterns and ecosystems that made it possible for our ancestors to invent a new career path as hunters of large herbivores.  As the climate got cooler and dryer, grass species more tolerant of arid conditions rose in importance.  At this point, we need to take a brief side trip into some technical stuff.  I’ll keep it as short and simple as possible.

The entire family of life is solar powered.  Incoming solar energy is received by green plants, who use it to produce sugar.  This process is photosynthesis.  It converts solar energy into a form of chemical energy that plants and animals must have in order to survive.  Some animals acquire it directly by eating plant material, and others get it indirectly by dining on plant-eating animals.  Thus, photosynthesis is the foundation of life on Earth.

The process begins by splitting water molecules (H₂O) into hydrogen and oxygen atoms.  Then, in a fancy magic act, hydrogen is stirred together with CO₂ to make sugar (C₆H₁₂O₆).  The process results in some leftover oxygen atoms, which are released to the atmosphere.  Notice that animals exhale the CO₂ that plants must have, and plants exhale the oxygen needed by animals, a sacred circle dance.  Plants can use the sugar to fuel their growth, or they can convert it to starch, and save it for later.  Plants can also make fat, protein, and vitamins.  They’re much smarter than they look.

The act of snatching carbon from the air, and incorporating it into living plant tissues, is called carbon fixation, or carbon sequestration.  As more carbon gets sequestered into the plants and surrounding topsoil, then less of it remains in the atmosphere.  This is great, because too much carbon in the atmosphere can lead to catastrophic climate juju, like the freaky changes we’re now just beginning to experience.

I should also mention that petroleum and coal are substances made of sequestered carbon that accumulated over the course of 500 million years.  Big Mama Nature wisely stored it away in a safe place deep underground, where it could cause no mischief.  Unfortunately, it has become very trendy for ignorance-powered societies to retrieve enormous quantities of this ancient carbon and foolishly burn it up, in order to indulge in a decadent joyride of self-destructive childish whimsy.  Big brains can make big mistakes.  It’s so embarrassing!

And now, (gasp!) the plot thickens.  There are two categories of plant species, based on the mode of photosynthesis they use: C₃ or C₄.  C₃ produces a compound that has three carbon atoms, and C₄ produces a compound that has four carbon atoms.  Both types are very old, but the shift to a cooler and dryer climate greatly boosted the expansion of C₄ species.  Maybe 85 percent of the plant species on Earth are C₃.  Their method of carbon fixation is simpler and less efficient than C₄. 

Elizabeth Kellogg studied C₄ plants.  In one experiment she found that, under ideal conditions, C₃ plants could theoretically capture and store up to 4.6 percent of the solar energy they received, while C₄ plants could get up to 6 percent (i.e., 30 percent more than C₃).  While only 3 percent of flowering plant species are C₄, they account for 23 percent of all carbon fixation in the world.  In other words, they produce much more of the precious chemical energy (sugar) that the family of life depends on.  Kellogg calls the C₄ process a turbocharger.

There are four conditions under which C₄ plants have a big advantage — high temperature, high light, low moisture, and low nutrients.  Because they use much less water, C₄ plants better conserve soil moisture.  They also produce more root biomass, which increases their tolerance for drought and fire.  Of the 12,000 grass species, 46 percent of them are C₄, and they include corn (maize), sugar cane, millet, and sorghum.  (Mad scientists are now trying to alter DNA to make rice C₄ too.)

When critters consume C₄ grasses, this diet leaves behind physical tracks.  Spencer Wells wrote that the bones of Native Americans revealed whether they were corn farmers or hunter-gatherers.  Because corn is a C₄ grass, the bones of corn eaters contained molecular C₄ markers.  Baz Edmeades talked about the ferocious dirk-tooth cats (Dinofelis), a species that went extinct about 1.4 million years ago.  We know they were creatures of the savannah, not the forest, because analysis of their tooth enamel indicated that they dined on herbivores that ate C₄ grasses.

And now, dear reader, at long last, we are ready to proceed to the exciting conclusion of this tedious jabber.  It’s time to turn the spotlight on the heroes of this story, the C₄ grass species.  Kellogg noted that in the last 8 million years, as climate change drove the retreat of tropical forests, the domain of C₄ grasses has greatly expanded.  They are now significant components of major grasslands around the world.

C₃ grasses were better adapted to moist forest floors and limited sunlight.  They were less able to thrive on arid grasslands.  Out on the savannah, conditions were ideal for C₄ grasses, because they needed less water to enjoy a happy life.  Here they moved from the sidelines to the center stage.  Receiving many hours of direct sunlight every day, they were able to manufacture generous amounts of chemical energy (sugar), and this gave them the ability to grow rapidly. 

And so, these highly nutritious grasses became a highly desirable food source for the animals that were able to digest them, which required some adaptations.  Baz Edmeades noted that the blades of these grasses were tough, highly fibrous, and coated with abrasive silica.  Evolution responded by providing some animals with new and improved teeth that were more tolerant of abrasion, and better able to pulverize the plant fibers.  Other critters were issued new and improved digestive tracts, populated with bacteria that were fine-tuned for chemically breaking down fibrous glop.  The critters that succeeded in adapting to the new banquet made big gains in size and diversity.

Of course, too much of a good thing will have consequences.  If herds got way too large, the vitality of the grassland would be degraded, leading to starvation.  So, evolution came to the rescue by promoting a variety of big strong bloodthirsty carnivores, who delighted in inviting large herbivores to join them at lunchtime.  To make this sacred dance more sporting, evolution also encouraged the development of herbivores who could boogie across the grassland at high speeds.

Edmeades concluded that the rise of highly productive C₄ grasses radically changed the world.  It spurred the evolution and spread of an astonishing variety of grassland herbivores and their predators.  It led to the emergence of spectacular Serengeti-like ecosystems in Africa, Eurasia, and the Americas — fantastic wonderlands of abundant life.

Graham Harvey noted that the herds of grass-eating critters benefitted the grasses.  Grazing actually stimulated plant growth.  In a brilliant design, new blades of grass emerge from growing points located close to the ground, where they are less likely to be damaged by hungry teeth.  The faster that grasses can send up new blades, the more sunlight they can capture, the more sugar they can make, and the happier the whole ecosystem becomes.

Grazing also benefitted grasses by regularly nipping off the rising shoots of woody vegetation.  If trees and brush were allowed to grow and spread, they would compete with the grass plants.  Then, the herds of hungry herbivores would have less to eat, and so would the carnivores that adored red meat.  Herds religiously offered their deep gratitude to the grass people by lovingly depositing nutrient rich manure and urine all over the place.

The big picture here is that the shift to a cooler dryer climate encouraged the substantial expansion of grassland, which boosted the expansion of C₄ grass species, which propelled the evolution and expansion of large grazers and carnivores, which boosted the global tonnage of living meat.  These megafauna migrated and settled on five continents (not Australasia).  Around the world we find species of horses, bison, elephants, antelope, deer, hyenas, wolves, bears, and so on.  The moral of this story is that climate change can radically alter the face of the planet, and the family of life.

Later in this amazing transformation, another powerful agent of radical change joined the cast of the grassland soap opera.  These critters walked on two legs, and resembled what you see in the mirror.  They eventually assumed the role of apex predators, something that no other primate had ever attempted.  Our ancestors did not wait patiently for evolution to provide them with the speed, strength, fangs, and claws that are customary for natural born carnivores.  Instead, they invented hunting weapons, learned how to make fire, and began experimenting with a way of life that no other animal in the history of the planet had ever attempted.  It’s notable that every other animal species continues to live like they did a million years ago — ultra-conservative, and perfectly sustainable.

The advance of the new critters marked the emergence of an extremely spooky, highly contagious, multi-drug resistant virus known as cleverness fever.  For a few million years, its mind-altering effects gradually intensified.  Ten thousand years ago, they surged.  Today they are skyrocketing.  Humankind is now engaged in full scale warfare against the entire family of life, including itself.  A lively and entertaining soap opera has shape shifted into the mother of all horror shows.  Will the current swing to a much warmer climate provide the miraculous silver bullet cure for the mass hysteria of cleverness fever?  Stay tuned.

Wild Free and Happy Sample 22

[Note: This is the twenty-second sample from my rough draft of a far from finished new book, Wild, Free, & Happy.  I don’t plan on reviewing more books for a while.  My blog is home to reviews of 201 books, and you are very welcome to explore them.  The Search field on the right side will find words in the full contents of all rants and reviews, if you are interested in specific authors, titles, or subjects.] 

Mother Grassland

Hominins originated on the tropical savannahs of Mother Africa, about four million years ago.  Since then, we have evolved, gotten too clever, colonized six continents, driven many megafauna species extinct, maximized food production, and exploded in numbers.  The human saga has been a unique experiment in living that is entirely out of the pattern of all other animals.  In a fantastic joyride of blissful ignorance, we have unintentionally succeeded in rubbishing the planet.  The bedrock foundation of this grand adventure is our deep and enduring relationship with grassland ecosystems.

Grasslands are sprawling green arrays of solar energy collectors that transform sunbeams into carbohydrates.  These nutrients migrate from species to species, up and down the food chain, and enable the existence of the family of life, including large herbivores, the preferred food for prehistoric people.  For the effort invested, they provided the biggest jackpots of meat.  Our intense desire for these animals, and our ongoing dependence on them, guided our evolution from hominins to humans. 

It’s important to understand that herds of large herbivores do not usually reside in forests or jungles.  Large body size is an advantage on grasslands, but can be a disadvantage in dense woodlands.  In terms of vegetation, forests contain much more plant biomass than grasslands, but most of it is elevated out of the reach of hungry herbivores. 

For herd critters, grasslands are the best place to dine on high quality greenery, hang out with friends and relatives, and enjoy a wonderful life of fresh air, travel, and adventure.  Each year, grasslands produce much more new biomass per acre than forests, and it’s conveniently located close to the ground.  Consequently, grasslands are home to far more large animals.  I would expect that most mammalian megafauna species originated in grasslands.

Grasslands, grazers, and large carnivores coevolved for many millions of years.  Much more recently, hominins pushed into the game, and began competing with the carnivores.  By and by, the clever tropical primates, with their terrifying weaponry, expanded into every continent, migrating from grassland to grassland, hunting, feasting, singing, and dancing.

As expanding wild cultures perfected their hunting skills, large game became harder to find, and attention shifted toward smaller animals, birds, shellfish, and so on.  We kept bumping into limits, and some cultures began to lurch toward the domestication of animals and/or plants.

Over time, persistent control freaks eventually succeeded in domesticating some wild herbivore species.  Instead of spending their time chasing increasingly scarce wild critters all over the countryside, they could selectively breed passive dimwitted animals, confine them to limited pastures, and conveniently exploit them in every imaginable way.  Jared Diamond noted that the five most important domesticates were horses, cattle, sheep, goats, and pigs.  All five were domesticated on the grasslands of Eurasia by 4000 B.C.  No mammals were domesticated south of the equator in Africa, humankind’s ancestral homeland.

In some cultures, foragers gathered the energy-dense seeds of wild grasses.  Over time they encouraged these grasses to grow in more locations by sowing their seeds.  Foragers had a natural tendency to gather the seeds that were more convenient to reap, and leave behind seeds that readily fell to the ground.  For example, when wild wheat is ripe, the heads shatter, releasing all of their seeds.  This natural dispersal promotes the survival of the species. 

Year after year, foragers brought home seeds from plants that were (1) less prone to shattering, (2) ripened at the same time, and (3) produced larger seeds.  Over centuries, the seeds they planted became significantly different from wild seeds.  Today, more than half of the calories consumed by humankind come from three grasses: rice, wheat, and corn (maize).  Other popular grasses include oats, barley, millet, sorghum, sugar cane, and bamboo. 

I’ll have more to say about plant and animal domestication in later chapters.  Here, I just want to point out that some hunter-gatherer cultures transitioned into farmers and herders.  Their diet continued to major in grassland plant foods and large herbivores, but it was shifting toward domesticated varieties.  What remained constant was the continued dependence of many cultures on grassland ecosystems.

Graham Harvey, a grass worshipping wordsmith, concluded that humans are essentially creatures of the grass, like hyenas and horses.  Deep inside, we still are.  Long ago we lost our ability to quickly scamper up trees, and leap from branch to branch.  We evolved into bipedal critters fine-turned for walking, running, and surviving in grasslands.

Nomadic Freedom

In the good old days, bands of nomadic hunter-gathers spent their lives wandering across vast grasslands.  It was a way of life that majored in freedom.  Our ancestors were as free as every other wild critter.  No rent, money, landlords, soldiers, slaves, taxes, kings, police, or smart phones.  Indeed, we evolved as nomads, and remained nomads for almost the entire four million year hominin saga.  For hunters to stop roaming, and put down roots, would have been very risky.  Their best option was to follow the herds, which never stopped wandering in search of grass.

Bruce Chatwin was fascinated by the freedom of nomadic life, and the deep human need to always keep moving.  He was born in England in 1940, and spent his entire life in an intensely overpopulated world, boiling with nonstop conflict and bad craziness.  Industrial civilization tends not to inspire a profound sense of joy, wonderment, and celebration among the billions of anxious stressed-out taxpayers born in captivity.

He mentioned a Hungarian epidemiologist who had studied the history of infectious diseases.  The man concluded that humans were not meant to settle down.  Whenever you confine dense populations of humans and other animals in a fixed location, poop happens — lots of poop — excrement all over the place.  Drinking water develops a crappy flavor and aroma.  Before long, pathogens rush through the crowds, weeding out the weak and unlucky — a gold rush for grave diggers.  Nomads live in small bands, and rarely crap in the same place twice.  Their water tastes like water, and their lifestyle is not a magnet for infectious diseases.  Freedom is good for your health.  We’ll take a closer look at disease in later pages.

Today, during the brief era of fossil fuel mania, developed societies can temporarily discourage epidemics by implementing complex, expensive, energy-guzzling systems for waste treatment and water purification.  In wealthy societies, antibiotics are currently controlling the spread of many pathogens, but the benefit of these wonder drugs can only be temporary, because pathogens will never stop mutating into drug-resistant forms.  We are approaching the post-antibiotic era.  Whistling while he works, the Grim Reaper is sharpening his scythe.  Breaking all the laws of nature has harsh consequences, and Big Mama Nature has a deep regard for justice.

Finally, nomadic cultures enjoyed great freedom as long as they remained hunter-gatherers.  These cultures were essentially egalitarian.  There was no hierarchy of power, everyone was equal.  Unequal status was toxic to group cohesion.  Folks who became big headed were a serious problem that had to be promptly resolved.  It was vital that folks in small bands cooperated, shared, and respected one another.

When nomadic cultures shifted from hunting wild animals to herding enslaved critters, they entered a path that led to ugly destinations.  Nothing more reliably turns humans into tyrants, conquerors, egomaniacs, and spectacular idiots than cultures that define personal status in terms of accumulated wealth — personal property.  The lad with 100 cattle looked down on the fellow with 10.  This mindset sparked an explosion of craziness — furious empires of Mongols and Huns spilling rivers of blood.  Status mania continues to this day, but on a dramatically larger scale.  We are not living at the zenith of freedom, or anywhere near it.

Grassland Basics

In the dry land regions of Earth, there are four primary biomes: grassland, forest, desert, and tundra.  Precipitation is a key factor.  Forests and jungles need to receive at least 30 inches (76 cm) per year.  Deserts receive less than 10 inches (25 cm).  Grasslands fit in the middle, 10 to 30 inches.  Grasslands have two seasons, productive and dormant.  In warm climates, they are dormant during the dry season, and recover when the rains return.  In temperate climates, they are dormant during the frosty months, and green when the soil thaws.

Grasslands have evolved to survive in arid climates.  Grasses can live where most other plant species cannot.  There are three basic categories of grasslands: savannah, steppe, and prairie.  [MAP]  Savannahs are grasslands speckled with some trees and brush.  Steppes are called shortgrass prairies, because most plants are less than one foot (30 cm) tall.  Prairies are wetter, and produce tall grass, which can grow up to 13 feet (4 m) high — a horse can disappear in it.

Graham Harvey noted that grasses first evolved about 70 million years ago.  There are now an estimated 12,000 grass species, and they grow in many temperate and tropical regions.  Grasslands are communities of different plants — primarily grasses, mixed with a wide variety of sedges and leafy forbs (wild flowers and herbs). 

These mixed communities maximize the capture of solar energy, make better use of soil resources, and create rich humus.  Humus boosts fertility, and helps retain moisture.  Some plants convert atmospheric nitrogen into a form that is essential for all plants and animals.  Others are good at retrieving essential mineral nutrients.

Following an intense disturbance, grasslands can recover in 5 to 10 years — far faster than a wrecked forest.  Evolution has done a remarkable job of fine-tuning grasslands for rugged durability.  They can go dormant during dry times, and revive when rains return.  They can survive extended droughts and six month winters.  They can recover more easily after wildfires because only a third of grassland biomass is above ground, and vulnerable to flames. 

Beneath the surface, the invisible portion of grasslands is astonishing.  Many plants send roots deep into the ground, to acquire moisture and nutrients.  Some grow as deep as 32 feet (10 m).  In some regions, densely interwoven roots created a thick sod that pioneer farmers cut into bricks that were used to build homes and schools.  Because of unreliable precipitation, trees and shrubs often die before they can grow roots deep enough to tap dependable water.

The seeds of many grassland species can remain dormant for an extended period, until appropriate conditions return, and inspire them to germinate.  Some seeds can survive a ride through an herbivore’s gut and remain fertile, enabling the colonization of new locations.

In 1872, Kansas senator John James Ingalls celebrated the power of grass.  He wrote: “Grass is the forgiveness of nature — her constant benediction.  …Streets abandoned by traffic become grass-grown like rural lanes, and are obliterated.  Forests decay, harvests perish, flowers vanish, but grass is immortal.  …The primary form of food is grass.  Grass feeds the ox: the ox nourishes man: man dies and goes to grass again; and so the tide of life with everlasting repetition, in continuous circles, moves endlessly on and upward, and in more senses than one, all flesh is grass.”