Odd Question

[kriadydragon]

Very hypothetical, and because it's hypothetical I have no idea where I would go to look it up.

What would happen if a previously landlocked section of, well, land suddenly became an island? Most especially a piece of land that has a tropical climate? What kind of climate changes, and therefore geological changes, would that piece of land be looking at? Or would there be changes?

Mind you, that this one landlocked piece of land is now an island would have taken place several hundred years ago (about 300 years). So I'm not asking about immediate changes, but long term changes.

And, yes, this is for a story. An original story. Up until now I've been dealing mostly with coastal regions and mostly in the north. Now I plan to have my characters head on over to Africa - possibly Zambia, which is landlocked and mostly tropical (according to my research). In my story, many of the continents have shattered, which means many once landlocked countries have now become islands.

Anyone able to help?

Comments

[black-raven135.livejournal.com]

the weather would definitely change now that the land mass was surrounded by water........there would not only be climate changes but changes in
the flora.......
The people inhabiting the islands would no doubt change their way of living
given they were now an island.....more fishing and less hunting etc. for substance.

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

I'm more interested in the flora and fauna aspect. The way of life for the majority of the world already changed a long time ago due to a completely different event that eventually led to the event that turned a lot of land into islands.

[black-raven135.livejournal.com]

I'm more interested in the flora and fauna aspect.

That is why I mentioned flora............it would change radically
and so would the fauna.......It would be due to the radical changes
in the land mass.......and fact it is now surrounded by water.

[sholio]

Initially you'd be looking at massive geological catastrophes, earthquakes and such, but you probably already know that -- I guess the extent of it depends on what caused the continents to break up in the first place.

Climate-wise, island climates are much milder and wetter than most land-locked areas. I like designing fantasy and sci-fi worlds, so I can yak at you all day about this if you let me. *g* The basic rule of thumb is that the presence of water is going to make your climate milder, wetter, and windier than a corresponding area inland. Inland areas usually have much more extreme temperatures -- they are much hotter and much colder. Even at the equator, islands tend to be mild all year 'round -- humid and in the 70s or 80s. An equatorial area that might have gotten into the 100s and had noticeable seasons will probably not be that hot any more and won't have particular seasons to speak of.

Just exactly how much rainfall you get, and where, is determined primarily by the global wind belts (and here is the Wikipedia article. Typically areas close to the equator get winds coming from the east(ish) and in temperate zones the wind moves from the west. You can see this on the east coast of the US, where weather systems invariably move up from Florida towards New England, rather than blowing in straight across the Atlantic; it's because the prevailing wind blows from the west. So if your island has mountains or highlands, they will be much wetter in the direction of the prevailing winds. If your land mass actually *rotates* when it breaks off from the main continent, then the weather patterns and wet/dry areas will shift noticeably as new parts of the land mass are exposed to the weather systems being pushed in by the prevailing winds.

Hmm, let's see. Islands are typically pretty windy due to uneven cooling/heating of ocean and land. Smaller islands usually don't have as many trees or trees that are as tall as they get in inland areas, because of the wind and just more extreme weather in general. But the bigger your island is, the more like a continent its weather patterns will become.

Because of the change in climate, a lot of the plant life, and correspondingly the animal life, will probably die off. A small island won't be able to support a lot of large animals, especially large herd animals. (There is usually nothing living naturally on an island that is bigger than a goat or pig. Large animals tend to become smaller over generations -- some island ecosystems have populations of very tiny deer, for example.) If your island is not very large (say, more like Fiji than Madigascar) and it started out with a lot of big hoofed animals such as gazelles and zebras and whatnot, they will probably overgraze and reduce a lot of the island to barren grassland or even desert, but then they'll have mass die-offs and damp-climate vegetation will edge back in. The herd animals will either die off completely or become smaller so they don't impact the ecosystem so much. Of course, if you have a lot of predators to begin with, they'll probably kill off the animals and then begin dying themselves.

Of course, you could have your big cat predators learn to survive on fish. Fishing, swimming tigers - that's a cool thought. :D

Islands in the same general area tend to end up, over time, with vaguely similar kinds of vegetation because birds and water currents bring seeds from one island to another. But anything which is isolated on the island will develop in a unique way compared to what's on the island next door ... like Darwin's finches, for example.

Hmm ... that's all I can think of for now. :D

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

Thank you. This was of great help (and has given me a lot of food for thought).

What I have happen - or I should say had happen as the story takes place several hundred years after the event - is a magical cataclysm. Basically, a really big spell went wrong and the continents shattered, sort of like how a plate breaks when dropped straight down (though magically controlled at the last minute to prevent major cities from taking the brunt). It's mostly land along the outer edges of the major continents that have ended up as islands, while deeper inland everything is relatively intact (though there may be a lot more rivers and lakes than there were).

So far, for various reason I haven't had to show the major effects of this event, but I hope to in the second book. So your insight was of great help :D

[sholio]

Glad it was of some help! And sorry about going on and on. :D I definitely oughta point out that I'm not an expert on any of this; this is just based on what I've read over the years. But I love talking about world-building matters, and so rarely get an opportunity to do so!

(Oh, off the topic, talking about world-building - I keep flashing back on that discussion about making up fantasy animals at writers_lair a year or two ago, and feeling kind of guilty; I feel like I harshed on your world-building squee in that discussion by insisting on perfectly science-compliant fantasy critters and I'm feeling guilty about it lately ... especially since my own fantasy critters are not necessarily plausible themselves! And if I made you feel bad in that discussion, I'm very sorry.)

Anyway, that sounds like a really interesting premise for a book (it makes me think a little bit of the Death Gate books - not like a ripoff, because it isn't even that similar, but the idea of an Earth that has been hugely changed and partially destroyed by magic). Checking out the other comments, I think my own thoughts would be to go more for vague than specific on the details in the appendix - unless it's really well-researched! *g* That's generally the direction that I go with my own writing - to avoid being too specific (with medical stuff, for example) unless I'm 100% sure of what I'm talking about. Of course, it is possible to go too far in the other direction and be TOO vague, but it sounds like you're putting enough thought into the world that you aren't in any danger of that, and I don't think most readers will notice if there is a bit of vagueness as to the nitpickety details of what happened.

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

I love talking world-building :D I'd probably talk peoples ears off in my journal if I wasn't so paranoid about giving away ideas. I was even reluctant to touch on the current topic of discussion for that reason, but was in dire need of some direction.

"I feel like I harshed on your world-building squee in that discussion by insisting on perfectly science-compliant fantasy critters and I'm feeling guilty about it lately ... especially since my own fantasy critters are not necessarily plausible themselves! And if I made you feel bad in that discussion, I'm very sorry.)"

Heh, I don't even really remember that discussion. Well, I do, distantly, but I don't recall getting offended. Plus I like discussions that present all sides to a situation or idea ;)

"Checking out the other comments, I think my own thoughts would be to go more for vague than specific on the details in the appendix"

Definitely. I wouldn't even be able to begin fitting all the details into the story, let alone the appendix. All I can really do in the story itself is show the changes when and where I can. For example in the first book, I make mention of new islands created from land upheaval and volcanic activity. There may even be volcanoes active, such as Kilimanjaro (though I'm not sure if I'll be able to fit that in the story, but we'll see). Crashbarrier mentioned cliffs and waterfalls, which is something I've really been thinking about - waterfalls spilling into the ocean. That and elephants in South Africa starting to shrink (still pending on whether I'll make mention of that).

I am starting to reconsider turning Zambia into an island, but instead may just make it a coastal region. Not because I think it would be difficult to turn it into an island, but because after much pondering over the cause of the continents losing land, I came to realize that the eastern side of Africa wouldn't be as affected as the Western side (the botched magic took place on the Atlantic side of the world.) So Zambia would most likely stay connected to the continent.

I think this is what I really like about research. Not so much getting my facts straight but getting the story itself straight. There was quite a lot that I hadn't considered until I asked for help, and now I'm starting to feel a lot more comfortable with the plot :D

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

I forgot to say that I'm going to have a really big acknowledgments page when I finally get the book together :P

[crashbarrier.livejournal.com]

This takes me back to my geology/geography studies.

Firstly what happens will depend on the shape and size of the island created and whether it is created due to sea incursion or river erosion or both..

the climate will remain essentially the same i.e. because of its placement the ambient temp will be the same, but if the prevailing wind goes over the water instead of the land it will pick up more water and so rainfall is likely to go up at least on one side of the island. (if you have a mountainous island then the mountain will trap the clouds and there will be more rainfall promoting lush growth - if the island is flat then it may not get much in the way of rainfall as the clouds blow over and out so sea, or where ever)

Animals will become locked onto the island and probably begin divergent mutation as studied by Darwin.. you may occasionally get survivors travelling over the sea like the pacific islands get so some species may be comparable with those on mainland..

Plant life will probably stay vaguely the same as when the island split off but perhaps mutate in a similar fashion to the animals with the only original plant life begin what ever blows in on the wind or floats in off the sea/water.

its very hard to speak of specifics unless you have a loose plan of what the "island" will look like, then you can build the weather patterns and tides which influence what actually happens ...:) hope this helps

[parisindy.livejournal.com]

this probably doesn't help you but you never know
http://www.geosc.psu.edu/Courses/Geosc320/Campbell_Cont_Drift_Climate.pdf

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

Thanks for this :D Basically, the new island will be the same in terms of shape (no new mountains or the like). A spell goes horribly wrong, causing land mass along the outer edges (and a little ways within) of the continents to split off suddenly - so lots of cliffs. The new island my characters go to doesn't drift that far from the main continent, in that they can still see the main continent as a dark line along the horizon.

[crashbarrier.livejournal.com]

Sorry to ask but does this spell move the land as in speeding up Continental drift, with all the fun and games that entails. Or are you thinking of a more physical and immediate "moves the land mass some distance to the left/right". or are you thinking that the land between the main continent and the new island crumbles away to nothing allowing the sea in and the separation of the island? (sort of like the great cataclysm in dragon lance where the land was dropped down and the sea rushed in?..).

not that this will have to much of an effect in the long term but it might have some effect on the land shape and tides and stuff..

(Sorry i am getting into this :D)

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

No, get into it. The more to consider the better. I would say the second one. The land mass that becomes the new island breaks off - like breaking off a piece of cookie - and is shoved some distance away from the main landmass. Needless to say that, yes, it was a nasty process. And despite the efforts made to protect the major areas habitation (namely large cities) lots of lives were lost and things went all to heck.

I'm still working out how deep the divide goes. Must research tectonic plates, now.

One thing I did forget to factor in, though, is wizardry. Since wizards caused this mess, of course they are going to try and fix it. They can't move the land back (though they do manage to get it moving back in the right direction toward the main land mass, though it's going to be a very long time before the land is whole again. And in the meantime people have to suffer periodic earthquakes). They can make it so the land is sustainable for life. Yeah, I know that sounds kind of like I'm cheating, but it really works out for what I have in mind. People are pretty furious at magic in general, but since magic is what's keeping them alive, they can't go around burning wizards willy-nilly.

[crashbarrier.livejournal.com]

Tectonics is easy.. simply put, you have a constructive plate margin and a destructive plate margin the constructive one pushes out new plate matter (plate building, which is what is going on along the Atlantic ridge) destructive plate margins are where plate s impact each other forcing one to go down and one to go up, the downward one melts, sometimes the upward one can become mountains sometimes not, depends on density. Then you have slip faults where two plates rub against each other as the plates move.

what I would suggest in your case would be that the spell goes wild and rends the tectonic plate cracking it like your cookie analogy, the spell then pushes the lump out to sea.. this would cause tsunami elsewhere, earthquake maybe volcanic activity.. all the fun knock on effects.. on the mainland.

as for afterwards well the movement of the land may or may not affect weather patterns and tidal patterns in the immediate area

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

"what I would suggest in your case would be that the spell goes wild and rends the tectonic plate cracking it like your cookie analogy, the spell then pushes the lump out to sea.. this would cause tsunami elsewhere, earthquake maybe volcanic activity.. all the fun knock on effects.. on the mainland."

I wonder if Mt. Kilimanjaro would go off?

Weather and tide I won't worry "too" much about. Since this takes place centuries after the event, the characters won't really notice the more detailed changes. Plus I won't be able to touch on everything, at least in the story. I do plan on writing and appendix, though, to fill in details I wasn't able to in the story. The question is whether I want to go uber detailed with all the changes of the landmasses splitting, or just touch on it enough to give readers an idea of what went down? Because this is hypothetical, and because I'm not geological-savvy, I need to tread carefully.

[crashbarrier.livejournal.com]

ooo Kilimanjaro going Krakatoa would be quite awesome.. kinda like when st Helens went up....

[crashbarrier.livejournal.com]

this sounds weird but i9 was actually thinking what the knock on effect would be to the local populace.. you know legends of great waves, the day that the sea went away.. stories of plumes of smoke in the air for months, the sky being red as blood and crying tears of black dirt... The earth screaming in mortal agony as it was rent asunder...

okay i am getting really into this now and its not even my story:D

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

Oh, nice :D I may have to steal that from you ;) Well, sort of. I do plan to credit you all for the help :D

[crashbarrier.livejournal.com]

Its not "stealing" its brain storming:)..

I world build for LARPS, thinking up myths and legends is cool:)

[ninja007.livejournal.com]

It's usually a 'domino' effect. Has the water changed from fresh to salt? Then you have a complete series of changes that will occur. Animal and plant life are the first to change. Changing to an island means sand. Some plant life cannot survive with sand. The same with animal life, sea and land animals.

One change will lead to other changes. Some drastic, others not. Some animals will cease to exist there or at all. Others will thrive.

So, if man is there. His diet will definitely change and this will also affect his evolution.

I'm an anthropology/archaeology student, so sorry about the lecture like answer... ;D

[sholio]

Oh wow, *water*! I hadn't even thought of that, but water would be a huge change, wouldn't it? Any water sources that have their headwaters outside the new "island" would be completely lost, and former river canyons might fill up with salt water if they were below sea level, further subdividing the new island. Shallower wells and aquifers along the new coast might run the risk of being contaminated with salt, though I'm not sure how much of a risk it would actually be.

[ninja007.livejournal.com]

Exactly. I think the level at which the wells are located will be a huge difference. There are so many changes that will occur, Kriadydragon should sit down and draw a 'tree' (like a family tree) showing what could be affected or changed by this.

This could be huge undertaking...

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

Thus why, so far in the story, I've only touched on it rather than delved deeply into it.

[crashbarrier.livejournal.com]

Its not as big a problem as it could be depending on the underlying rock bed of the island. I mean if its a solid metamorphic or igneous based rock (given the island hasn't eroded away in the years its been "at sea" there is a good chance that that would be the case)then there is a good chance that fresh water storage areas will be protected from the salt water. As the area has been described as coastal to begin with (just becoming more extremely coastal - thanks to those darn troublesome mages) then I am working off the idea that fresh water would have been supplied by river run off from the main land.. once that was removed due to the sudden relocation then the only other source (apart from de-salination plants) would be ambient rainfall caused by the weather. which would be encouraged or not by the plant life and shape of the land.

then again it could be limestone based - like the Yucatan peninsula where all the cenonotes (sp?) are in fact joined together by the same fresh water source...

[sholio]

ooooo ... yeah, you're right, rock types would make a big difference not just for water but in the eventual shape of the island and the amount of erosion that occurs.

kriadydragon said she was thinking southern Africa - Zambia area - so ... *googles*

(How did people do research before Google? *g*)

It looks like southern and central Africa is made up mostly of plateaus of extremely ancient metamorphic rock. So it would be very erosion-proof, like you said, and would probably retain its aquifers - I'm guessing - unless the upheavals caused changes.

It also looks like Zambia has the headwaters of the Zambezi River; also Victoria Falls. So Zambia is pretty high, then -- the sudden continent breakup would leave some really amazing cliffs ... and waterfalls!

[crashbarrier.livejournal.com]

and if its high up then there would be a decent rain catchment, so continuous water falls....:)

Before Goggle there were libraries... i liked libraries when they used to house books.

[sholio]

Hee! Yeah, my tongue was mostly in cheek there. I remember the pre-google days, going to the library and checking out a ton of books on whatever it was I was researching. And using photocopiers!

I still love going to the library, but I don't go nearly as often now. Of course, part of that is because I can afford to buy books now that I'm not a college student anymore ... *g*

and if its high up then there would be a decent rain catchment, so continuous water falls....:)

Am going to be rather dense here - what you mean by rain catchment is a lot of rain falls on the mountains and soaks into the ground, so lots of springs, right?

As I've thought about this more and compared to islands I've been on, I think you're right that the water thing really wouldn't be much of a problem, at least after an adjustment period during which some of the water sources would probably shift and change in various ways (but after 300 years that wouldn't really matter anymore). Nearly every island of any decent size has springs - at least any island that people have historically lived on - and I know that Kodiak Island is large enough to support rivers, and it's not a terribly huge island.

[crashbarrier.livejournal.com]

I don't know why but libraries these days (at least in the UK) seem to be moving away from books and drifting towards technology:( its sad because books were always my friend.

I apologise sometimes I use words which are not quite what they should be (i try not to), I should have specified rain catchment rather than a more generic term.... I am aware that Catchment area is usually used in conjunction with lakes and rivers.. I sometimes forget that people can't see the images I am trying to describe in my head:/.. What I am trying to describe/talk about is rain catchment, as in the amount of humidity that is caught by the ground as it passes over or at least tries to pass over the ground. I lived for a long time on the west side of a hill range, our prevailing winds are westerly and the sea is roughly 55 miles away. The winds picked up the water from the sea which then condensed and precipitated out on my town as the clouds tried to get over the hills. A similar thing happens to an island between Ireland and the UK mainland (isle of Man) it rises up to a high peak which catches the rain from the Irish sea .. and has the most gorgeous waterfalls and gorge habitats.. and is very wet and swampy up in the hills. So you get a lot of surface water - becks, tarns and the like as well as springs. If the island is hard rock then you are more likely to have surface water than springs, because the water has no where to go.

I am also thinking about Mount Roraima in south America as well which has those awesome waterfalls caused by surface water...

[kriadydragon.livejournal.com]

No, this is great stuff :D Much to consider.