Amazon Rainforest

In the Amazon Rainforest, new research is being done that has completely changed the way that we now see the Amazon. European accounts from centuries ago, tell of large Amazonian cities all up and down its banks. This idea was thought to be untrue due to finding that the Amazon soils were not actually fertile at all. But, that idea is now being challenged, with the finding of, terra preta. The reason that I decided to choose this topic is because I think it needs much more attention than it is given. Until this class, I had zero knowledge of Native Americans living in the Amazon at all. Therefore, I choose this topic because it has gone through large amounts of change in recent years and deserves more concentration. Lastly, this topic both
Mann describes it, is a complex fertile soil. It consist of ceramics or pottery, charcoal and organic refuse of different types (Mann 2011: 355). Terra preta is manmade soil, that is not produced by slash and burn, but by slash and char. By just charring and leaving large chunks of wood, or charcoal, instead of burning the wood completely, it would produce enough nutrients and contain more carbon to fertilize the soil (Mann 2011: 356). Ancient farmers came up with this method in order to plant clops, and their famous orchards. Scattered through the Amazon are essentially "orchards" that were planted for their abundance of food that they would provide the indigenous people. Terra preta not only allowed for a greater number of people living in one area of the Amazon, but it can have potential benefits today. Mann does not go into great detail about terra preta in his book or many of the villages that have been discovered recently, but now I am going to present some recent research that has gone on in regards to terra preta and some impacts its findings have been on the
In this article, it says that after the creation of terra preta soils, it has so many nutrients (like phosphorous, calcium, magnesium, manganese, zinc and carbon) that those soils can be used for thousands of years (Fraser, 2011). Fraser et al. also discussed how before and after contact with the Europeans they had a diverse array of plants that they were farming. Over the last couple decades there have been over one hundred ADE archaeological sites found in the Amazon (Fraser, 2011). Through the finds and better understanding of ADE it has change the way farming and soil is looked at (Fraser, 2011). These new developments in soil could spread across the globe and in places where there are not rich soils, this now form of soil can be