SQA Higher Geography Physical Environments overview quiz quiz

Near the Equator the Sun is high so energy is concentrated, while near the poles it is spread over a larger area, crosses more atmosphere and is reflected by ice

The Equator is physically much closer to the Sun than the poles are, so it simply receives far more of the Sun's heat energy all year round than the cold high latitudes ever do

High latitudes receive no sunlight whatsoever at any point during the year

The atmosphere happens to be far thicker over the Equator than the poles

The hard iron pan layer found deep within a podzol soil profile

Warm ocean currents such as the North Atlantic Drift

The watershed that marks the boundary of a drainage basin

Longshore drift moving material along the line of the coast

Erosion, transport, deposition and weathering

Source, course, mouth and delta

Inputs, stores, transfers and outputs

Precipitation, condensation, evaporation and runoff

Permeable rock, gentle slopes and dense vegetation that all slow the water down before it reaches the river channel

A long lag time together with a low peak discharge across the storm

That the river in the drainage basin has completely dried up

A short lag time and high peak from impermeable rock, steep slopes, little vegetation or urban surfaces

Plucking is ice freezing onto rock and tearing it away; abrasion is embedded debris grinding and smoothing the bedrock

Plucking is the process that grinds and smooths the bedrock, while abrasion is the freezing of ice onto rock that then tears it away from the valley floor

They are simply two different names for exactly the same glacial process

Plucking only ever happens at the coast, while abrasion only ever happens in rivers

Stack, stump, arch, cave

Cave, arch, stack, stump

Beach, spit, bar, stack

Corrie, arete, pyramidal peak, tarn

The Sahel

The Clyde waterfront

The Cairngorms

The North Atlantic Drift

Brown earth

Gley

Mull humus

Podzol

Poor drainage and waterlogging make it anaerobic, cold and blue-grey with mottling, so it needs artificial drainage

It is far too dry and sandy, so the loose grains drain away water far too quickly for any crop roots to take it up before it is lost

It is simply far too fertile, so it grows nothing but thick weeds

It contains a hard iron pan layer that actually improves the drainage

Acidic mor humus formed under conifer woodland

Mild mull humus from deciduous leaf litter

Waterlogged blue-grey gleyed humus from a gley

Heavily leached ash-grey humus from a podzol

The Hadley cell

The Polar cell

The Ferrel cell

The convection cell

By the glacial plucking and abrasion that hollows out a corrie

By longshore drift slowly carrying material right across the mouth of a wide bay

When a waterfall slowly retreats upstream leaving a gorge behind it

When the neck of a meander is cut through and the old loop is sealed off