Tundra climate. What prevents water from seeping into tundra soil?

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:48

The word "tundra" in Finnish means a treeless bare hill. And in fact, it occupies vast territories of the Northern Hemisphere in the subarctic latitudes, where mossy and lichen vegetation prevails under conditions of a rather harsh climate. The spaces are distinguished by the absence of tall trees, although the tundra and forest-tundra border on luxurious taiga forests. Only perennial grasses and small shrubs cover the cold ground during periods of short summer.

Due to high relative humidity and low evapotranspiration, there is a waterlogged effect in these harsh places. But what prevents water from seeping into tundra soil?

Climate

The tundra zone stretches in a narrow strip along the north of Eurasia and North America, with larger areas located in Russia and Canada. The climate is subarctic and subantarctic. With a strong wind and air temperatures in winter down to -30°, and in summer barely reaching +5 + 10° Celsius, even coniferous trees are notgrowing.

Long snowy winter and only 2-3 relatively warm months a year contribute to the fact that the tundra suffers from an excess of moisture. The low temperature regime does not allow it to evaporate, swamping vast areas. Winter for the tundra is a polar night, and in summer the sun shines almost all day long. Spring and autumn, with the manifestation of all their signs, fit into a single month - May and September, respectively. They are characterized by the rapid disappearance of low snow cover and the same rapid return in early October.

Characteristic features of tundra soil

Features of the harsh subarctic and subantarctic climate, as well as the soil - that's what prevents water from seeping into the tundra soil. Thaws are only enough to thaw only the upper layers of the earth to an insignificant depth. Permafrost turns the tundra soil into an icy block, and this state does not change.

In winter, a lot of snow falls in these parts, but it falls on the desert plains in a thin layer, since strong winds blow away most of it.

Gley and stony soils have a characteristic rusty and gray coloration. The layers of the soil cover of the tundra either thaw or freeze, gradually mixing with each other. Thus, humus, humus and peat sink to a meter depth. With an abundance of moisture, clay and loamy soils become waterlogged. On flat plains, the earth literally bends under the weight of a person, trying to suck him into a densequagmire. However, the peat layer does not exceed 50 centimeters due to the poor cover of herbaceous plants and moss. On sandy dehydrated areas, the soil layer is podzols and podburs.

What prevents water from seeping into tundra soil?

While the issue is not fully resolved. What's blocking the water? Moisture seeps into the tundra soil only in summer, through a peat cushion and cracks formed by severe frosts. But since during the winter the earth freezes to a depth of one and a half kilometers and does not have time to thaw in a short warm period, the boundary layer, literally turned into a stone-ice crust, becomes an insurmountable barrier for water.

Thus, the answer to the question of what prevents water from seeping into the tundra soil is simple and logical: the permafrost prevents moisture from seeping deep, and the water does not warm up to such an extent as to melt the frozen ground. This is how the endless and unheated tundra lives for thousands of years.