Deck 19: Deserts and Winds

Question 1

Why doesn't interior drainage, such as the drainage that develops in deserts, flow out of the desert?

A)The water flows underground.
B)The water fills large lakes.
C)The water evaporates.
D)The water freezes.

Answer 1

C

Question 2

There are many names for ephemeral desert streams that remain empty for most of the year.Which of the following is not another name for an ephemeral desert stream?

A)Arroyo
B)Wadi
C)Playa
D)Wash

Answer 2

C

Question 3

Within water-deficient regions, two climatic types are recognized.What are they?

A)Subpolar high and subpolar low
B)Ephemeral and playa
C)Desert and steppe
D)Saltation and tropical

Answer 3

C

Question 4

Traditionally, a region is defined as a desert if it receives less than ________ centimeters of rain per year.

A)10
B)25
C)15
D)2

Question 5

Inselbergs are generally associated with a(n)________ stage desert landscape.

A)early
B)middle
C)late

Question 6

What percentage of Earth's land area is covered by dry regions such as deserts and steppes?

A)14 percent
B)30 percent
C)9 percent
D)50 percent

Question 7

Which desert location in the United States consists of alternating mountain ranges and flat-bottomed valleys as a result of fault block mountains?

A)Rocky Mountains
B)Ohio River Valley
C)Marathon Uplift
D)Basin and Range Province

Question 8

From a climatological perspective, a region is a desert if ________.

A)yearly precipitation exceeds evaporation
B)yearly precipitation is equal to evaporation
C)yearly precipitation is less than evaporation

Question 9

Which of the following desert landforms is carved from solid rock rather than consisting of accumulated sediments?

A)Playa
B)Inselberg
C)Alluvial fan
D)Bajada

Question 10

Most dry lands exist between ________ degrees latitude on either side of the equator.

A)50 and 60
B)35 and 40
C)20 and 30
D)0 and 10

Question 11

In a desert environment, in which area would surface water infiltrate into the local groundwater system most effectively?

A)Playa lakes with thick mud bottoms
B)Streams flowing across an alluvial fan
C)Streams flowing across bare bedrock
D)Steep-walled mountain streams

Question 12

A true desert is defined by a lack of what substance?

A)Oxygen
B)Plant life
C)Rocks
D)Water

Question 13

Which of the following areas is known for its rainshadow deserts?

A)The Sahara in Africa
B)South America east of the Andes
C)Central Iran
D)Great Valley of Central California

Question 14

Which of the following statements about deserts is true?

A)Although rainfalls are infrequent, erosion and deposition related to water are important in deserts.
B)Deserts are located where there are ascending air masses and low atmospheric pressure.
C)Deserts are defined by their sand content.
D)Deserts are always located in hot, humid coastal areas.

Question 15

How was the Salt Pan at Death Valley created? What is the name of such a desert feature?

A)Stream erosion; wadi
B)Precipitation; nullah
C)Evaporation; playa
D)Chemical reactions; ephemeral

Question 16

Why do deserts lack thick deposits of soil?

A)Low temperatures and high soil moisture contents accelerate chemical weathering.
B)Warm temperatures and high soil moisture contents accelerate chemical weathering.
C)Warm temperatures and low soil moisture contents allow some mechanical weathering.
D)Temperature has no effect on rock weathering.

Question 17

________ weathering is most common in a desert environment.

A)Mechanical
B)Erosional
C)Chemical
D)Dissolution

Question 18

________ refers to the bouncing motion sands will display when transported by moving water or wind.

A)Yardang
B)Saltation
C)Deflation
D)Slithering

Question 19

What is the definition of an ephemeral stream?

A)A distributary channel on a stream delta
B)A stream that meanders back and forth across a valley
C)A stream that has interweaving channels and is choked with sediment
D)An intermittent stream that only has water after specific episodes of rain

Question 20

Which of the following can contain large quantities of evaporite minerals such as borate and halite?

A)Playa
B)Inselberg
C)Alluvial fan
D)Bajada

Question 21

What is a yardang?

A)A wind-sculpted landform oriented parallel to the prevailing wind, often narrow at the base
B)A small rock polished and pitted on the exposed surface
C)A shallow depression created by deflation
D)A pit worn into a rock by circular currents of flowing water

Question 22

The world's driest desert is the Atacama Desert in South America.

Question 23

A(n)________ is a smooth, polished rock that has been abraded by the wind.

A)blowout
B)bajada
C)inselberg
D)ventifact

Question 24

A true desert is defined by how hot it is.

Question 25

The world's largest arid desert is the Sahara.

Question 26

The ________ was a period of drought in the 1930s in the United States that resulted in significant dust storms blowing fine sediment for hundreds of miles.

A)Dust Bowl
B)driftless area
C)rainshadow
D)basin and range

Question 27

Middle-latitude deserts and steppes are more numerous and extensive in the Northern Hemisphere than in the Southern Hemisphere.

Question 28

There is no one maximum depth for desert blowouts.They vary in depth depending on conditions present at the location.What controls the depth of all blowouts?

A)Force of the moving wind
B)Velocity of water eddy
C)Elevation of water table
D)Amount of water available for dissolution of underlying materials

Question 29

Which set of characteristics would best fit a geologically recent fault block mountain uplift?

A)Large, broad bajadas with many inselbergs
B)Small playas and large alluvial fans
C)Flat upland surface, steep slopes, and small alluvial fans
D)Extensive playas ringed by large sand dunes

Question 30

What process creates desert blowouts?

A)Moving water
B)Evaporation
C)Herd animals pawing at the ground
D)Deflation by wind

Question 31

Which size(s)of sediment commonly make up most of wind's suspended load?

A)Sand
B)Clay
C)Silt
D)Gravel

Question 32

________ are mounds and ridges of sand that are deposited by the wind.

A)Ventifacts
B)Desert pavements
C)Blowouts
D)Dunes

Question 33

Which one of the following statements about landforms is correct?

A)Alluvial fans typically rim desert valleys.
B)Playas form on high cuestas in arid areas.
C)Inselbergs are composed of coarse sands and gravels.
D)Inselbergs are found in low, circular depressions.

Question 34

What are the two primary sources for loess?

A)Lakes and streams
B)Deserts and glacial deposits
C)Atmosphere and volcanoes
D)Shallow seas and lakes

Question 35

Deposits of silt carried by blowing winds are referred to as ________.

A)deflation deposits
B)loess
C)eolian sands
D)alluvium

Question 36

Which mechanical weathering process will be most common in an arid environment?

A)Salt wedging
B)Abrasion
C)Root wedging
D)Exfoliation

Question 37

Salt wedging is a weathering process that is more common in humid areas than arid.

Question 38

Why is it so difficult for wind to pick up clay-sized particles?

A)They are too large for the wind to carry.
B)The wind has a near-zero velocity closest to the surface and can't pick them up.
C)The clay particles are often buried under larger sediments.
D)There is too much clay to carry.

Question 39

Streams in arid areas generally lack an extensive network of tributaries because they tend to be ephemeral.

Question 40

The central United States is covered with extensive deposits of loess.Where did this loess come from?

A)Alluvium deposited during major floods
B)Rock flour from the braid plains of Pleistocene glacial streams and rivers
C)Decomposing sandstone from the St.Peter Sandstone
D)Weathering and erosion of western mountains

Question 41

Wind in arid regions produces more erosional landforms than depositional landforms.

Question 42

What role (if any)will our changing climate play in future desertification?

Question 43

Compare and contrast major floods in a humid environment (i.e., along the Mississippi River)against those in a desert environment.

Question 44

The Basin and Range Province of the American southwest is known for containing regions that display each stand of landscape evolution in an arid climate.

Question 45

Compare and contrast sediment transportation by wind and by water.

Question 46

Wind is the most powerful agent of erosion in a desert.

Question 47

Sandstorms should be more accurately referred to as siltstorms because most sediment carried by wind for long distances is actually silt-sized.

Question 48

Explain how circulation patterns in the atmosphere generate the bands of low-latitude deserts around the equator.

Question 49

What process is illustrated in this image?

A)Formation of a bajada
B)Rainshadow effect
C)Saltation
D)Migration of sand dunes

Question 50

Streams in arid regions are generally small and die out before reaching the sea.Explain two ways that streams lose water in this environment and why this loss occurs.

Question 51

Why does the rainshadow desert form on the downwind side of the mountains?

A)The air mass has absorbed all the moisture on that side as it descended.
B)The mountains block wind from that region, making it hot.
C)The sediments on the downwind side are porous.
D)The moisture was precipitated from the air mass on the upwind side.

Question 52

What are the three stages of desert landscape evolution? Provide examples of landforms for each.

Question 53

Rates of physical weathering in deserts are high, even though there isn't a great deal of precipitation, because it is usually heavy when rain does fall.

Question 54

How can cold coastal currents along the west coasts of continents generate subtropical deserts?

Question 55

Moving wind that is free of sediment is enough to create a ventifact.

Question 56

Due to the lack of chemical weathering, there is a great deal of clay-sized sediment in desert areas.

Question 57

Fine particles such as clays and silts are often flat and platy in shape.Evaluate their ability to be transported by wind based on this shape.

Question 58

Explain how the environmental conditions in the headwaters of the Colorado River affect the longevity of the river as it moves through the desert.

Question 59

Why is erosion by wind more effective in an arid region than in a humid region?

Question 60

Saltating sand grains in a desert are carried by the wind and rarely more than 1 meter above the surface in normal circumstances.

Question 61

The figure above is a cross-section of a dune.Based on the shape of the dune, which way was the prevailing wind coming from?

A)Left
B)Right
C)Top
D)Bottom

Question 62

Which deposition of which desert landform would result in the angled layers visible in this image?

A)Inselberg
B)Desert pavement
C)Playa lake
D)Dune

Question 63

What sedimentary structure is visible in this image?

A)Cross-bedding
B)Bedding
C)Deflation
D)Bajada

Question 64

What feature is visible in this image?

A)Blowout
B)Bajada
C)Desert pavement
D)Ventifact

Question 65

Which part of the wind's sediment load is visible in this image?

A)Bed load
B)Saltated load
C)Dissolved load
D)Suspended load

Question 66

What desert feature is visible in this image, indicated by an arrow?

A)Playa lake
B)Desert varnish
C)Sand dunes
D)Inselberg

Question 67

What feature is present in this image?

A)Blowout
B)Yardang
C)Desert pavement
D)Dune

Question 68

How was this feature created?

A)Erosion via water
B)Scouring via ice
C)Deflation via wind
D)Deformation via stress

Question 69

What desert feature is visible in this image?

A)Playa lake
B)Sand dune
C)Desert pavement
D)Yardang

Question 70

What desert landform is visible here?

A)Inselberg
B)Normal fault
C)Playa lake
D)Bajada

Question 71

Based on the precipitation data available here, which region in Washington State would be the most likely location of a rainshadow desert?

A)West in the Olympic Mountains
B)Southeastern Washington
C)Central Washington in the Cascade Mountains
D)Southwestern Washington

Question 72

What factor in this image would control the depth of this feature? (What might stop it from getting deeper?)

A)Presence of large boulders will stop the wind.
B)Sediment will be frozen in place.
C)Scouring will go down to bedrock and run out of sediment.
D)Presence of vegetation will hold sediment in place.