Environment & Ecology Mixed Quiz: Set 20

The correct answer is B, Kerala. Silent Valley National Park lies in the Palakkad district of Kerala, in the Nilgiri hills of the Western Ghats, and protects one of the last stretches of undisturbed tropical evergreen forest in the country. It is best known as a stronghold of the lion-tailed macaque, a threatened primate found only in the Western Ghats, and it was saved from a hydroelectric project by a long public campaign before being declared a national park. Option A is wrong because Tamil Nadu, though it shares the Nilgiri landscape, holds Mudumalai and Mukurthi instead. Option C is wrong because Odisha is the state of Simlipal and the Gahirmatha turtle coast. Option D is wrong because Chhattisgarh has Indravati and Kanger Valley. Tie Silent Valley to Kerala and to the lion-tailed macaque.

The correct answer is B, Haryali. Haryali is a centrally sponsored watershed development project launched in 2003 by the Ministry of Rural Development, and its whole point is that the village panchayat plans and carries out the work itself. Under it gram panchayats build check dams, farm ponds, percolation tanks and contour bunds so that rain is held where it falls; wells recharge, and dryland farmers get water for a second crop. The watershed committee is chosen by the gram sabha, and the villagers share part of the cost and the upkeep of the structures. A is wrong because the Arvary Pani Sansad is a people's parliament of villages on the Arvari river in Alwar, Rajasthan, a community effort and not a central scheme. C is wrong because Jal Kranti Abhiyan was a later water awareness campaign of the water resources ministry. D is wrong because Neeru-Meeru was a state water conservation programme of Andhra Pradesh. Exam tip: Haryali 2003, central and panchayat-led; Neeru-Meeru is Andhra Pradesh; Arvari Pani Sansad is Rajasthan.

The correct answer is A, earthworms. Vermicomposting uses earthworms, which swallow organic waste, grind it in their gizzard and pass it out as casts that are rich in nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium, so the product is a finer and more nutritious manure than ordinary compost and is ready sooner. Option B is wrong because termites do digest cellulose, with the help of protozoa in their gut, but they are pests of wood and buildings and are never used in a composting pit. Option C is wrong because honey bees are pollinators that collect nectar and pollen and play no part in decomposition. Option D is wrong because blue-green algae, or cyanobacteria, fix atmospheric nitrogen in paddy fields and are used as a biofertiliser, which is a different service altogether. Remember that the earthworm is called the farmer's friend for exactly this reason, and that vermicompost is a decentralised method well suited to housing societies and schools.

The correct answer is B. Mulching means covering the bare soil between plants with a layer of organic matter such as straw, dry leaves, husk or grass clippings. The cover shades the ground, so less water evaporates and the soil stays moist and cool, and it also softens the blow of falling rain, which would otherwise loosen the topsoil and wash it away. As the mulch rots it adds humus to the field, and by cutting off light it keeps weeds down. Farmers use it widely in orchards and vegetable plots, and in dry regions it is one of the cheapest ways to hold moisture. A is wrong because raising barriers of stone, grass and soil along the contours is contour barrier work. C is wrong because growing different crops in alternate rows is strip cropping. D is wrong because piling up rocks to slow the flow of water describes a rock dam. Exam tip: mulching covers the soil, strip cropping alternates rows, terracing cuts steps into a hillside.

The correct answer is C, 1975. CITES was drafted and signed at Washington in 1973, but a treaty begins to bind its members only after enough countries ratify it, and that stage was reached in 1975. It controls cross border trade through three appendices, of which Appendix I forbids commercial trade in the most threatened species such as the tiger and the rhinoceros. Option A is wrong because 1971 is the year of the Ramsar Convention on wetlands, signed in Iran. Option B is wrong in this particular question because 1973 is the year of signing, not of entry into force, and the paper asks for the latter. Option D is wrong because 1992 is the year of the Rio Earth Summit and the Convention on Biological Diversity. Keep the pair 1973 signed and 1975 in force firmly in mind.

The correct answer is C, SDG 6. Sustainable Development Goal 6 is clean water and sanitation, and its aim is to ensure the availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all. The seventeen goals were adopted by the United Nations General Assembly in September 2015 as part of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, and they took over from the Millennium Development Goals. Goal 6 covers safe drinking water, toilets and an end to open defecation, better treatment of waste water, efficient use of water in farming and industry, and the protection of rivers, lakes and groundwater. A is wrong because SDG 4 is quality education. B is wrong because SDG 7 is affordable and clean energy. D is wrong because SDG 5 is gender equality. Exam tip: SDG 4 education, SDG 5 gender equality, SDG 6 clean water and sanitation, SDG 7 clean energy; the seventeen goals were adopted in 2015 with 2030 as the target year.

The correct answer is B, decomposition of waste by heating in the absence of oxygen. In pyrolysis the waste is heated to a high temperature in a closed chamber from which air is kept out, so the material does not burn but breaks into a liquid oil, a solid char and a combustible gas, all of which can be used as fuel or feedstock. Option A is wrong because burning in excess air is incineration, which leaves ash and releases heat directly and needs careful cleaning of the flue gases. Option C is wrong because decomposition by earthworms is vermicomposting, a biological process that works at ordinary temperatures. Option D is wrong because compaction in a lined pit describes a sanitary landfill, where the waste is merely stored under a soil cover while it slowly generates methane and leachate. The prefix pyro points to heat and lysis to breaking, so the word itself carries the definition.

The correct answer is C, Garhwal Himalayas. The Chipko movement began in 1973 in the Garhwal Himalayas, in Chamoli district of what is now Uttarakhand, when villagers hugged trees to stop contractors from felling them. Its name comes from the Hindi word chipko, to cling. Chandi Prasad Bhatt led the first protest at Mandal village, Gaura Devi led the women of Reni village in 1974, and Sunderlal Bahuguna carried the message across the hills with the slogan that the soil, water and pure air are the real produce of a forest. The movement led to a fifteen-year ban on green felling above 1,000 metres in the Himalayan forests of Uttar Pradesh in 1980. Option A is wrong because Patna in Bihar has no link with it. Option B is wrong because Thrissur is in Kerala, far from the movement. Option D is wrong because Jammu was never its centre. Exam tip: Chipko 1973, Garhwal; Appiko 1983, Karnataka.

The correct answer is D, all three pairs. The Himalayan region is home to wild goats such as the ibex and the tahr and to the snow leopard, which hunts them above the tree line, so pair (a) is right. The tropical evergreen forests of the Andaman and Nicobar Islands yield hardwood timber including mahogany and rosewood, so pair (b) is right. The Gir forest of Gujarat is the only wild home of the Asiatic lion, so pair (c) is right as well. Options A, B and C are therefore wrong because each leaves out a pair that is correctly matched. Matching questions of this kind reward a candidate who has learnt the species with its landscape rather than the species alone, and the safest habit is to check every pair before choosing an option that excludes one.

The correct answer is B, 5th June. The United Nations General Assembly named 5 June as World Environment Day in 1972, and the day has been observed every year since 1974. The date recalls the opening day of the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment held at Stockholm from 5 to 16 June 1972, the first big world meeting on the environment. The same conference led to the creation of the United Nations Environment Programme, or UNEP, which leads the celebrations each year. Every year the day has a new theme and a host country; India hosted it in 2018 with the theme 'Beat Plastic Pollution'. A is wrong because May's main environment date is 22 May, the International Day for Biological Diversity. C is wrong because July has World Population Day on 11 July, not World Environment Day. D is wrong because 5 August is not linked with this day at all. Exam tip: 22 April, Earth Day; 22 May, Biodiversity Day; 5 June, World Environment Day; 16 September, World Ozone Day.

The correct answer is B, 2 October 2014. The mission was launched on the 145th birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi, whose insistence on sanitation the campaign invokes, and it runs in two wings, one for urban areas and one for rural areas. Option A is wrong because 15 August 2014 was the Independence Day speech in which the campaign was announced from the Red Fort, but the formal launch came later that year. Option C is wrong because 26 January is Republic Day and carries no connection with the sanitation mission. Option D is wrong because 5 June is World Environment Day, marked since 1973 after the Stockholm Conference of 1972, and is not the launch date of any Indian sanitation programme. Two more dates are worth carrying with this one: 2 October is observed as Swachh Bharat Diwas every year, and cities have been ranked annually under the Swachh Survekshan cleanliness survey since 2016.

The correct answer is D, Tamil Nadu. Tamil Nadu is the first state in India to make rooftop rainwater harvesting structures compulsory for all houses and buildings across the state, through a law brought in 2003. The state depends heavily on the north-east monsoon and on groundwater, and Chennai faced severe water shortages, so collecting roof water and sending it into the ground became a priority. Rooftop harvesting collects rain from roofs and stores it in tanks or uses it to recharge wells and aquifers, which raises the water table. Option A is wrong because Kerala gets heavy rain and has promoted harvesting, but it was not the first to make it compulsory for every house. Option B is wrong because Gujarat is known for check dams and other water works, not for this first law. Option C is wrong because Rajasthan is known for traditional harvesting, such as the tankas of Bikaner and Phalodi, not for the first statewide law. Exam tip: Tamil Nadu was the first state to make rooftop rainwater harvesting compulsory (2003); tankas are Rajasthan's traditional underground tanks.

The correct answer is A, Dachigam National Park. The hangul, also called the Kashmir stag, is the only surviving Asiatic subspecies of the red deer in India and its last viable population lives in Dachigam, a park in the hills above Srinagar whose name means ten villages. It is a Schedule I animal and the state animal of Jammu and Kashmir. Option B is wrong because Hemis in Ladakh is the high altitude park associated with the snow leopard and the bharal. Option C is wrong because Kanha in Madhya Pradesh is tiger country and the home of the hard ground barasingha, a swamp deer that candidates often mix up with the hangul. Option D is wrong because Manas in Assam protects the pygmy hog, the rhinoceros and the tiger. Deer questions turn on this one distinction.

The correct answer is A, Jim Corbett National Park, in what is now Uttarakhand. It is the oldest national park of India, and the project was formally launched there on 1 April 1973.

Option B, Kanha in Madhya Pradesh, and option C, Bandipur in Karnataka, were both among the nine reserves with which the project began, which is what makes them good distractors, but the launch took place at Corbett. Option D, Kaziranga in Assam, is not a launch site either; it is known above all for the one horned rhinoceros and became a tiger reserve much later. A candidate should remember the nine original reserves as a set: Corbett, Manas, Palamau, Similipal, Kanha, Melghat, Bandipur, Ranthambore and the Sunderbans. The park is named after Jim Corbett, the hunter turned naturalist whose writings did much to make the tiger a matter of public concern in India.

The correct answer is A, 1 July 2022. From that date the manufacture, import, stocking, distribution, sale and use of a listed set of single-use plastic articles became an offence across the country; the list covers earbuds with plastic sticks, plastic sticks for balloons and flags, candy and ice-cream sticks, thermocol used for decoration, plates, cups, glasses, cutlery, straws, stirrers and the wrapping film around sweet boxes and invitation cards. Option B is wrong because 2 October 2019 saw a nationwide appeal and drive against single-use plastic, but no ban was notified on that date. Option C is wrong because the notification of 2021 dealt with carry bag thickness and set the ban date a year and a half ahead, giving the industry time to change over. Option D is wrong because no fresh nationwide list took effect in August 2023. Pair this date with the thickness rule: 75 microns from 30 September 2021 and 120 microns from 31 December 2022.

The correct answer is A, Norman Myers, the British ecologist who put forward the idea in 1988 to direct scarce conservation money to the places where it would save the most species. A region qualifies when it is exceptionally rich in species found nowhere else and has already lost most of its original vegetation.

Option B, Charles Darwin, gave the theory of evolution by natural selection and has no connection with this classification. Option C, Robert Whittaker, is a real trap because he did give the terms alpha, beta and gamma diversity, which belong to the same chapter, and he is also remembered for a widely used classification of living organisms into five kingdoms. Option D, Alexander von Humboldt, described how species richness rises with the area of a region. Four hotspots extend into India: the Himalaya, Indo-Burma, the Western Ghats with Sri Lanka, and Sundaland.

The correct answer is B, the Gangetic river dolphin. This nearly blind freshwater dolphin of the Ganga, Brahmaputra and Meghna systems finds its prey by echolocation and was declared the National Aquatic Animal of India in 2009, a step meant to draw attention to the pollution and damming of its rivers. It is a Schedule I species. Option A is wrong because the olive ridley turtle, famous for its mass nesting at Gahirmatha in Odisha, is protected but carries no national title. Option C is wrong because the dugong or sea cow is a threatened marine mammal of the Gulf of Mannar and the Andaman waters, and is not the national aquatic animal. Option D is wrong because the Ganges shark is a rare river shark with no such status. Remember the trio of tiger, elephant and dolphin for national titles.

The correct answer is A, Madhya Pradesh. Kanha Tiger Reserve lies in the Mandla and Balaghat districts of Madhya Pradesh, in the Maikal hills at the eastern end of the Satpura range. It was among the first nine tiger reserves created when Project Tiger was launched in 1973. Kanha is best known for saving the hard-ground barasingha, a swamp deer that had almost died out and is now the state animal of Madhya Pradesh. Its open sal forests and grassy meadows make it one of the best places in India to see tigers in the wild. Madhya Pradesh's other well-known tiger reserves include Bandhavgarh, Panna, Pench and Satpura. B is wrong because Karnataka's famous tiger reserves are Bandipur and Nagarhole. C is wrong because Odisha's main tiger reserve is Similipal. D is wrong because Maharashtra's best-known tiger reserves are Tadoba-Andhari and Melghat. Exam tip: Kanha = Madhya Pradesh = barasingha; one of the first nine Project Tiger reserves of 1973.

The correct answer is D, 1992. Project Elephant was launched in 1992 to protect elephants, their habitat and the corridors along which herds move between forests, and it also deals with human elephant conflict and the welfare of captive elephants. Option A is wrong because 1972 is the year of the Wildlife (Protection) Act, the law under which such projects operate. Option B is wrong because 1973 belongs to Project Tiger, which came first and became the model for later species programmes. Option C is wrong because 1986 is the year of the Environment (Protection) Act, passed after the Bhopal gas tragedy, and has nothing to do with elephants. The elephant was later declared the National Heritage Animal in 2010, a fact often asked together with the year of the project.

The correct answer is A, global warming. Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas: it lets in the short wave radiation of the sun but absorbs a part of the long wave infrared radiation that the warmed earth sends back, and radiates it downwards again. As its concentration rises with the burning of coal, oil and gas and with deforestation, more heat is held in the lower atmosphere and the average surface temperature of the earth rises. That rise is global warming, and it is the central driver of present day climate change.

Option B, air pressure, depends on temperature, altitude and the mass of air above a place, not on the share of a trace gas. Option C, conservation, is the protection and wise use of resources and is a human activity, not a consequence. Option D, rains, may change in pattern as the climate warms, but that is an indirect effect rather than the direct result asked for here.