Ice caps I concede, but I don’t consider mountains and valleys to be different biomes if they consist of the exact same soil type and fauna (none). I don’t know what’s the case on Mars, I’m just saying. That’d be like saying the Moon has different biomes as well. But maybe it does, by some definition.
It’s an interesting topic. 😄 Need a geologist or something to chime in here.
If you applied an atmosphere to mountains and valleys you would see a lot more difference. The thinner air on top the high mountains will cause them to be colder which affects other local weather including rain and snow formation that will erode them at different rates than flat ground and cause erosion products to accumulate in the valleys. The varying temperatures and weather conditions would then cause different flora and fauna to appear in the different zones and given a billion years you would end up with biomes not too dissimilar to the ones on earth
the moon has biomes, it’s got tunnels and shit, i’m 90% certain i’ve read about collapsed tunnels on the moon where the sun never reaches and thus there’s still ice down there which we can detect.
I wouldn’t call tunnels a biome though. That’s like saying a cave in a tundra biome on Earth is its own biome. (Is it? I’m not even sure. First instinct, no.)
caves are definitely their own biomes, they have totally different environmental conditions and will see life evolve specifically for them. There’s even biomes within caves, the entrance which is bright, the twilight zone further in, and the pitch black inside.
Ice caps I concede, but I don’t consider mountains and valleys to be different biomes if they consist of the exact same soil type and fauna (none). I don’t know what’s the case on Mars, I’m just saying. That’d be like saying the Moon has different biomes as well. But maybe it does, by some definition.
It’s an interesting topic. 😄 Need a geologist or something to chime in here.
If you applied an atmosphere to mountains and valleys you would see a lot more difference. The thinner air on top the high mountains will cause them to be colder which affects other local weather including rain and snow formation that will erode them at different rates than flat ground and cause erosion products to accumulate in the valleys. The varying temperatures and weather conditions would then cause different flora and fauna to appear in the different zones and given a billion years you would end up with biomes not too dissimilar to the ones on earth
the moon has biomes, it’s got tunnels and shit, i’m 90% certain i’ve read about collapsed tunnels on the moon where the sun never reaches and thus there’s still ice down there which we can detect.
I wouldn’t call tunnels a biome though. That’s like saying a cave in a tundra biome on Earth is its own biome. (Is it? I’m not even sure. First instinct, no.)
caves are definitely their own biomes, they have totally different environmental conditions and will see life evolve specifically for them. There’s even biomes within caves, the entrance which is bright, the twilight zone further in, and the pitch black inside.
I only found one classification that includes caves/cave systems, but I guess it passes.
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biome