The Grasslands of North America and Russia

TY - CHAP

T1 - The Grasslands of North America and Russia

AU - Moon, David Gerard

PY - 2012

Y1 - 2012

N2 - The steppes of Russia and the Great Plains of North America share similarities in their natural environments and environmental histories. Both are semi-arid grasslands, with low and unreliable rainfall, but very fertile soil (chernozems, mollisols). Both were settled and plowed up by migrants from regions with higher rainfall and more trees. The settlers displaced smaller populations – nomadic pastoralists and Plains Indians – who herded or hunted animals that grazed on the grass. On both, farmers reaped bumper harvests in good years, but also experienced recurring droughts that caused soil erosion and crop failures. The steppes, however, have a slightly more continental and arid climate. The main focus of this chapter is the ‘Dust Bowl’ on the southern plains of the USA in the 1930s and the drought, crop failure and famine on the Russian steppes in 1891-2. Two Russian scientists, Aleksandr Chibilev and S.V. Levykin, have argued that by the turn of the twentieth century, the ‘barbaric’ plowing up of the steppes and the prairies had created the preconditions for the world’s first ecological crisis caused by plowing up virgin land. This chapter analyzes the responses to the two disasters in order to explore competing interpretations of the environmental histories of the two grasslands.

AB - The steppes of Russia and the Great Plains of North America share similarities in their natural environments and environmental histories. Both are semi-arid grasslands, with low and unreliable rainfall, but very fertile soil (chernozems, mollisols). Both were settled and plowed up by migrants from regions with higher rainfall and more trees. The settlers displaced smaller populations – nomadic pastoralists and Plains Indians – who herded or hunted animals that grazed on the grass. On both, farmers reaped bumper harvests in good years, but also experienced recurring droughts that caused soil erosion and crop failures. The steppes, however, have a slightly more continental and arid climate. The main focus of this chapter is the ‘Dust Bowl’ on the southern plains of the USA in the 1930s and the drought, crop failure and famine on the Russian steppes in 1891-2. Two Russian scientists, Aleksandr Chibilev and S.V. Levykin, have argued that by the turn of the twentieth century, the ‘barbaric’ plowing up of the steppes and the prairies had created the preconditions for the world’s first ecological crisis caused by plowing up virgin land. This chapter analyzes the responses to the two disasters in order to explore competing interpretations of the environmental histories of the two grasslands.

KW - Grasslands

KW - environmental history

KW - steppes

KW - great plains

KW - Russia

KW - USA

KW - dust bowl

M3 - Chapter

SN - 978-1-4443-3534-7

SP - 247

EP - 262

BT - A Companion to Global Environmental History

A2 - McNeill, J. R

A2 - Maudlin, Erin Stewart

PB - Wiley-Blackwell

CY - Oxford

ER -