February 3, 2021
Welcome back to the High School Corner!
Many students are taking the AP Environmental Science course this year. This week, they were asked to create a selection of memes related to topics such as the Green Revolution and pesticides to give them a more creative way to explore these topics. While we couldn’t include all of the memes here, you can check out a collection of highlights as well as an explanation of the science and history behind each meme written by the students themselves! We have also included some background information on the three overarching topics of the memes if you are interested in learning more.
Thank you for reading!
Jacob Blackman, Isabella Godfrey, Julia Lewis, and Sarah Lopez
The Green Revolution was a shift in agricultural practices in the twentieth century that included new management techniques, mechanization, fertilization, irrigation, and improved crop varieties that resulted in increased food output, but had negative environmental impacts.
Integrated Pest Management (IPM) is an agricultural practice that uses a variety of techniques designed to minimize pesticide inputs. The application of pesticides presents environmental problems, including killing more than their intended target and polluting groundwater.
Alternative farming methods exist where labor is relatively inexpensive and farm machinery and fossil fuel are much more costly. Examples include: shifting agriculture and nomadic grazing, along with more sustainable methods such as intercropping, crop rotation, agroforestry, and no-till agriculture.
|
By Isabella Godfrey For a long time farmers used pesticides as their main form of pest control, but now farmers are promoting IPM (integrated pest management) strategies. Pesticide companies are the ‘jealous girlfriend’ in this scenario, realizing pesticide use is decreasing. |
|
|
|
|
|
By Vittoria La Matta The Green Revolution meant new management techniques allowing farmers to use fewer people and make more money to feed more people, even though there are negative environmental impacts associated with these new techniques. |
|
|
|
|
|
By Julia Lewis IPM is an agricultural practice that uses a variety of techniques designed to minimize pesticide inputs. When it is used correctly, it benefits the environment and decreases the negative impacts of pesticides. The cat is much happier with IPM than pesticides. |
|
|
|
|
|
By Sarah Lopez Norman Borlaug, who created wheat that was disease-resistant, kick-started the Green Revolution.
|
|
|
|
|
|
By Emma Nowlin Norman Borlaug was the scientist who started the Green Revolution when he created new strains of wheat crops that allowed for them to be resistant to insects and diseases.
|
|
|
|
|
|
By Jackson Uitenbroek Perennial plants live more than two years while annual and biennial plants live only one to two years, promoting the need for no-till agriculture methods.
|
|
|
|
|
|
By Tesch Wheatley Bugs become resistant to pesticides which means the pesticides are no longer effective, showcasing the negative effectives of the “pesticide treadmill”.
|