Talk:Loess Plateau

Loess Plateau pollen records
A google search of "Loess Plateru" and "pollen records" shows research that seems to suggest that the Loess Plateau was a grassland with frequent fires and never a heavy forest. I am not a scholar, does any one else have any knowledge or information? KAM 13:34, 20 October 2006 (UTC)


 * I'll check my own research but I can say off the top of my head that the Loess Plateau was at somewhat forested because a) the Shang graph for farming indicated that Shang agriculture (Which developed on the plateau) took place among trees and b) the common Non-Arboreal Pollen vs. Arboreal Pollen counts indicate, at least ituitively, that there were trees to compare to non-tree sources. Whether it was a "heavy" forest, I don't know, but will check. Elijahmeeks 13:45, 20 October 2006 (UTC)

Formation: source of the dust
A recent programme in the BBC series How Earth Made Us fronted by Professor Iain Stewart stated that the dust that forms the loess came off the Himalayas ie the wind was blowing from west to east. Does anyone have a ref for this? The BBC prog is still availbale online here for a while: the ref was in the Wind programme but I don't know if it can be cited.86.159.39.99 (talk) 14:47, 8 February 2010 (UTC)

map request
It would be nice if the article showed a small map of China indicating where the plateau is, in relation to the rest of the country. 69.111.193.46 (talk) 02:35, 30 March 2012 (UTC)
 * That's already done in effect by the present map, which even prominently shows Beijing (albeit spelled in the French Pekín) despite the plateau not reaching into neighbouring Hebei. Wikipedia is not a media outlet, and I would oppose any attempt to treat Chinese geography in the same manner most news sources do, as if either China were a monolith or all Wiki readers were completely ignorant of the PRC apart from the top 3 cities&mdash;you should be familiar with the absurd usage of distance from Beijing as a one-size-fits-all metric or maps showing even villages yet pretending provincial boundaries don't exist! GotR Talk 01:59, 8 January 2013 (UTC)

Comments from Graeme
Hi Christycheungkayan

In relation to File:GeoMap of Loess Plateau.png, you claim it is your own work. But it looks as if it is a scan of a map with a red line on it and a scale superimposed. If so you will need to credit the original map. And if it is not free, then it cannot be used. The map is so busy looking that we cannot really tell where it is.

Please don't add footnotes to the headings, as it disturbs the contents. Instead add your references to the paragraphs. Every paragraph should have at least one reference to say where info comes from.

Also what is Eu/Eu? It looks like the ratio of europium to europium. Graeme Bartlett (talk) 10:34, 13 October 2021 (UTC)

Comment from Andy
Introduction Perhaps you can add some links on geology terms such as Quaternary, Gobi Desert and escarpments. The table 'Climate and environmental changes'is incomplete. Also, which event(s) lead to the changes in those aspects? In the 'Natural Hazards' table, it would be more informative if it showed the impacts/ causes that are closely related to Chinese Loess Plateau, especially for 'Dust storms' and 'Floods and droughts'. — Preceding unsigned comment added by LklAndy (talk • contribs) 06:42, 14 October 2021 (UTC)

Comments from Jasmine
Great use of tables! Very informative! Well organised outline.

I think you need a title.

It would be better if you could add a map showing which part of China is the Loess Plateau located in. Just a map with a red dot will do.

I had a misunderstanding in "This figure shows the change in geomorphology in the Loess Plateau." in the second figure. I read the figure before I read the paragraphs so I thought it was a change in geomorphology through time (from mountain to alluvial plane to river). Could change it into "This figure shows the relationship between the formation different geomorphology in the Loess Plateau".

In the third figure, "This map shows the geological development and sediments thickness in the Loess Plateau", well I don't quite see the geological development in the map. I think the geological development of the area is nicely presented in the table.

There are two blanks in the "climate and environment table". I guess you can say "NA" or "No effect" to clarify them a bit. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jasminesongy (talk • contribs) 06:23, 15 October 2021 (UTC)

Comment from Keith
Hi, The concepts are easy to understand, and the extensive usage of tables makes the page very organised. Some tables have missing content. Is it because we do not have such data or they are not important? I am a bit confused on this sentence: ‘Although not enough studies have been done for the impact of the population growth on the frequency of natural hazards in the Loess Plateau, there are more and more abnormal and extreme natural hazards.’ Is this sentence making the previous statement of ''‘People clear the forest to get more land for agriculture activities and use the wood for fuel and building materials. This is the reason why the forest cover has decreased dramatically.’'' invalid if there is not enough studies to support this cause? — Preceding unsigned comment added by TseKiChun (talk • contribs) 03:09, 18 October 2021 (UTC)

Comment from Triton
Hi Christy,

I think you have illustrated all the main ideas clearly. However, in my opinion, listing the sources and the origins of loess are better to be done like what you have done in the tables i.e. to literally mark them with points (the * code). While you may consider simplifying the points in the tables with incomplete sentences.

I appreciate your diagrams, they are simple but useful to understand the ideas and is also artistic. However, it would be even better to add a satellite image to show its location in the introductory part.

One minor thing is that there is a large potential Wiki pages with keywords that you could link to. No offense but another issue is the occasional Chinese-style writing e.g. "If an area has gully erosion" → "If there is gully erosion in an area"/ "If an area suffers from gully erosion". Triton Chiu63 (talk) 08:50, 14 November 2021 (UTC)

Comment from Lawrence
I think you can try to use Geomapapp to outline the boundary of Loess Plateau and put it on the introduction part. I appricate with those 3D diagrams. Obviously you put great effort on it. One minor thing is that I think the table of geological development should follow the stratigraphic column (i.e. the oldest events at the bottom while the younger on top) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Skhlaw (talk • contribs) 10:02, 14 November 2021 (UTC)

Comment from Candy
Hi Christy! These are my comments and hope they would help!

1.	Good to add tables at the last part as a summary for the audience to read, the organization is really good.

2.	Maybe better separate the introduction into two paragraphs, so readers can read more conveniently.

3.	For the geology part, better to separate the three lithologies into three subsections, and with details under the subsections 4.	Better add a scale to the diagram.

5.	Good illustration for the geological development, easy to understand.

This page is very comprehensive and concise! Keep up with your work! :) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Candyyeung168 (talk • contribs) 17:13, 15 November 2021 (UTC)

Content of the article
The article spends great length discussing geology and such of the Plateau, but there are no information on human activities, no matter past, modern, current, and future planned activities on the Plateau, how people living on it being affected by the Plateau, and how human activities are changing the Plateau, are all missing from the article.C933103 (talk) 08:28, 15 February 2022 (UTC)
 * This section has several paragraphs describing human activities that cause soil erosion in the Loess Plateau. Jarble (talk) 04:26, 8 January 2024 (UTC)