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= Tropical =
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Introduction
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The tropics are the region of Earth surrounding the Equator. They are
delimited in latitude by the Tropic of Cancer in the Northern
Hemisphere at N and the Tropic of Capricorn in
the Southern Hemisphere at S; these latitudes correspond to the axial
tilt of the Earth. The tropics are also referred to as the tropical
zone and the torrid zone (see geographical zone). The tropics include
all zones on Earth where the Sun contacts a point directly overhead at
least once during the solar year (which is a subsolar point). Thus
the maximum latitudes of the tropics have the same value positive and
negative. Likewise they approximate, due to the earth not being a
perfect sphere, the "angle" of the Earth's axial tilt. The "angle"
itself is not perfectly fixed due chiefly to the influence of the
moon, but the limits of tropics are a geographic convention, being an
averaged form, not least the variance is very small.
In terms of climate, the tropics receive sunlight that is more direct
than the rest of Earth and are generally hotter and wetter. The word
"tropical" sometimes refers to this sort of climate rather than to the
geographical zone. The tropical zone includes deserts and snow-capped
mountains, which are not tropical in the climatic sense. The tropics
are distinguished from the other climatic and biomatic regions of
Earth, which are the middle latitudes and the polar regions on either
side of the equatorial zone.
The tropics constitute 40% of Earth's surface area and contain 36% of
Earth's landmass. , the region was home to 40% of the world's
population, and this figure was then projected to reach 50% by 2050.
Etymology
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The word "tropic" comes from Ancient Greek τροπή ('tropē'), meaning
"to turn" or "change direction"
Seasons and climate
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"Tropical" is sometimes used in a general sense for a tropical climate
to mean warm to hot and moist year-round, often with the sense of lush
vegetation.
Many tropical areas have a dry and wet season. The wet season, rainy
season or green season is the time of year, ranging from one or more
months, when most of the average annual rainfall in a region falls.
Areas with wet seasons are disseminated across portions of the tropics
and subtropics. Under the Köppen climate classification, for tropical
climates, a wet-season month is defined as a month where average
precipitation is 60 mm or more. Tropical rainforests technically do
not have dry or wet seasons, since their rainfall is equally
distributed through the year. Some areas with pronounced rainy
seasons see a break in rainfall during mid-season when the
intertropical convergence zone or monsoon trough moves poleward of
their location during the middle of the warm season; typical
vegetation in these areas ranges from moist seasonal tropical forests
to savannahs.
When the wet season occurs during the warm season, or summer,
precipitation falls mainly during the late afternoon and early evening
hours. The wet season is a time when air quality improves, freshwater
quality improves and vegetation grows significantly, leading to crop
yields late in the season. Floods cause rivers to overflow their
banks, and some animals to retreat to higher ground. Soil nutrients
diminish and erosion increases. The incidence of malaria increases in
areas where the rainy season coincides with high temperatures.
Animals have adaptation and survival strategies for the wetter regime.
The previous dry season leads to food shortages into the wet season,
as the crops have yet to mature.
However, regions within the tropics may well not have a tropical
climate. Under the Köppen climate classification, much of the area
within the geographical tropics is classed not as "tropical" but as
"dry" (arid or semi-arid), including the Sahara Desert, the Atacama
Desert and Australian Outback. Also, there are alpine tundra and
snow-capped peaks, including Mauna Kea, Mount Kilimanjaro, and the
Andes as far south as the northernmost parts of Chile and Perú.
Ecosystems
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Tropical plants and animals are those species native to the tropics.
Tropical ecosystems may consist of tropical rainforests, seasonal
tropical forests, dry (often deciduous) forests, spiny forests, desert
and other habitat types. There are often significant areas of
biodiversity, and species endemism present, particularly in
rainforests and seasonal forests. Some examples of important
biodiversity and high endemism ecosystems are El Yunque National
Forest in Puerto Rico, Costa Rican and Nicaraguan rainforests, Amazon
Rainforest territories of several South American countries, Madagascar
dry deciduous forests, the Waterberg Biosphere of South Africa, and
eastern Madagascar rainforests. Often the soils of tropical forests
are low in nutrient content, making them quite vulnerable to
slash-and-burn deforestation techniques, which are sometimes an
element of shifting cultivation agricultural systems.
In biogeography, the tropics are divided into Paleotropics (Africa,
Asia and Australia) and Neotropics (Caribbean, Central America, and
South America). Together, they are sometimes referred to as the
Pantropic. The system of biogeographic realms differs somewhat; the
Neotropical realm includes both the Neotropics and temperate South
America, and the Paleotropics correspond to the Afrotropical,
Indomalayan, Oceanian, and tropical Australasian realms.
Tropicality
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Tropicality refers to the image that people outside the tropics have
of the region, ranging from critical to verging on fetishism. The idea
of tropicality gained renewed interest in geographical discourse when
French geographer Pierre Gourou published 'Les Pays Tropicaux' ('The
Tropical World' in English), in the late 1940s.
Tropicality encompassed two images. One, is that the tropics represent
a 'Garden of Eden', a heaven on Earth, a land of rich biodiversity -
aka a tropical paradise. The alternative is that the tropics consist
of wild, unconquerable nature. The latter view was often discussed in
old Western literature more so than the first. Evidence suggests over
time that the view of the tropics as such in popular literature has
been supplanted by more well-rounded and sophisticated
interpretations.
Western scholars tried to theorize reasons about why tropical areas
were relatively more inhospitable to human civilisations then those
existing in colder regions of the Northern Hemisphere. A popular
explanation focused on the differences in climate. Tropical jungles
and rainforests have much more humid and hotter weather than colder
and drier temperaments of the Northern Hemisphere. This theme led to
some scholars to suggest that humid hot climates correlate to human
populations lacking control over nature e.g. ' the wild Amazonian
rainforests'.
See also
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