Skywizard
5th December 2013, 19:40
http://i.livescience.com/images/i/000/059/970/iFF/wash-mima.jpg?1386193605
Mima mounds in western Washington as seen from the air.
A new twist on an old mystery may finally settle the debate over the origin of Mima mounds, which bulge out of the ground like enormous, grass-covered bubble wrap.
Mima mounds (sounds like dime-a) were named in 1841, when a vast pimply prairie (the Mima Prairie) was discovered in western Washington during the United States Exploring Expedition. In the centuries since, the source of this strange landscape has defied explanation. A single field may be covered in a million mounds that are several thousand years old, yet no builder has ever been found.
Early explorers thought Mima mounds were Native American burial sites, but no skeletons or grave relics were inside. Armchair experts have suggested many other hypotheses, from earthquakes to floods to extraterrestrials.
Because the rich prairie soil at many Mima mound sites turns sodden when it rains, scientists often blamed burrowing pocket gophers, the same rodents that pockmark golf courses and lawns — perhaps, scientists surmised, the gophers built up to escape drowning. But the mounds are 8 feet (2.5 meters) tall and 30 feet (9 m) wide, and their sheer size led some researchers to pooh-pooh the idea that wee gophers could ever create such vast earthen citadels.
Now, a study analyzing the interplay between gopher and ground vindicates the humble rodent.
Read Full Story: http://www.livescience.com/41693-mima-mound-mystery-explained.html
peace...
skywizard
Mima mounds in western Washington as seen from the air.
A new twist on an old mystery may finally settle the debate over the origin of Mima mounds, which bulge out of the ground like enormous, grass-covered bubble wrap.
Mima mounds (sounds like dime-a) were named in 1841, when a vast pimply prairie (the Mima Prairie) was discovered in western Washington during the United States Exploring Expedition. In the centuries since, the source of this strange landscape has defied explanation. A single field may be covered in a million mounds that are several thousand years old, yet no builder has ever been found.
Early explorers thought Mima mounds were Native American burial sites, but no skeletons or grave relics were inside. Armchair experts have suggested many other hypotheses, from earthquakes to floods to extraterrestrials.
Because the rich prairie soil at many Mima mound sites turns sodden when it rains, scientists often blamed burrowing pocket gophers, the same rodents that pockmark golf courses and lawns — perhaps, scientists surmised, the gophers built up to escape drowning. But the mounds are 8 feet (2.5 meters) tall and 30 feet (9 m) wide, and their sheer size led some researchers to pooh-pooh the idea that wee gophers could ever create such vast earthen citadels.
Now, a study analyzing the interplay between gopher and ground vindicates the humble rodent.
Read Full Story: http://www.livescience.com/41693-mima-mound-mystery-explained.html
peace...
skywizard