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Bog Body
Bog Butter
A bog is a wetland type that accumulates acidic peat, a deposit of dead plant
material. The term peat bog in common usage is not entirely redundant, although
it would be proper to call these sphagnum bogs if the peat is composed mostly of
acidophilic moss (peat moss or Sphagnum spp.). Lichens are a principal component
of peat in the far north. Moisture is provided entirely by precipitation, and
for this reason bog waters are acidic and termed ombrotrophic (or cloud-fed),
which accounts for their low plant nutrient status. Excess rainfall outflows,
with dissolved tannins from the plant matter giving a distinctive tan color to
bog waters. See also blackwater river.
Distribution and extent
Bogs are widely distributed in cold, temperate climes, mostly in the northern
hemisphere (Boreal). The world's largest wetlands are the bogs of the Western
Siberian Lowlands in Russia, which cover more than 600,000 square kilometres.
Sphagnum bogs were widespread in northern Europe. Ireland was more than 15% bog;
Achill Island off Ireland is 87% bog. There are extensive bogs in Canada and
Alaska (called muskeg), Scotland (called mosses), the Netherlands, Ireland,
Sweden, Denmark, Estonia (20% boglands), Finland (26%), and northern Germany.
There are also bogs in the Falkland Islands. Ombrotrophic wetlands - that is,
bogs - are also found in the tropics, with notable areas documented in
Kalimantan; these habitats are forested so would be better called swamps.
Extensive bogs cover the northern areas of the U.S. states of Minnesota and
Michigan, most notably on Isle Royale in Lake Superior. The pocosin of the
southeastern United States is like a bog in that it is an acidic wetland but it
has its own unusual combination of features. In certain areas such as Ireland
and Scotland, coastal bogs are frequently intruded upon by low lying dunes
called Machairs.
Bog habitats
Virgin boreal acid bogs at Brown's Lake Bog, Ohio. The tree cover is not typical
of a bog. Bogs are recognized as a significant habitat type by a number of
governmental and conservation agencies. For example, the United Kingdom in its
Biodiversity Action Plan establishes bog habitats as a priority for
conservation. Bogs are challenging environments for plant life because they are
low in nutrients and very acidic. Carnivorous plants have adapted to these
conditions by using insects as a nutrient source. The high acidity of bogs and
the absorption of water by sphagnum moss reduce the amount of water available
for plants. Some bog plants, such as Leatherleaf, have waxy leaves to help
retain moisture. Bogs also offer a unique environment for animals. For instance,
English bogs give a home to the boghopper beetle and a yellow fly called the
hairy canary.
Sphagnum bog vegetation, Tříjezerní slať, Šumava.
Uses of bogs
Industrial uses
A bog is a very early stage in the formation of coal deposits. In fact, bogs can
catch fire and often sustain long-lasting smouldering blazes, producing smoke
and carbon dioxide, thus causing health and environmental problems. After
drying, peat is used as a fuel. More than 20% of home heat in Ireland comes from
peat, and it is also used for fuel in Finland, Scotland, Germany, and Russia.
Russia is the leading producer of peat for fuel at more than 90 million metric
tons per year. Ireland's Bord na Móna (peat board) was one of the first
companies to mechanically harvest peat.
The other major use of dried peat is as a soil amendment (sold as moss peat or
sphagnum) to increase the soil's capacity to retain moisture and enrich the
soil. It is also used as a mulch. Some distilleries, notably Laphroaig, use peat
fires to smoke the barley used in making scotch whisky. More than 90% of the
bogs in England have been destroyed.
Other uses
Bog Huckleberry at Polly's Cove, Nova ScotiaBlueberries, cranberries,
cloudberries, huckleberries, wild strawberries and lingonberries are harvested
from the wild in bogs. Bog oak, wood that has been partially preserved by bogs,
has been used in manufacture of furniture.
Sphagnum bogs are also used for sport, but this can be damaging. All-terrain
vehicles are especially damaging to bogs. Bog snorkelling is popular in England
and Wales and has even produced the associated sport of mountain bike bog
snorkelling. Llanwrtyd Wells, the smallest town in Wales, hosts the World Bog
Snorkeling Championships. In this event, competitors with mask, snorkel, and
scuba fins swim along a 60-meter trench cut through a peat bog.
Archaeology
In parts of Denmark, Germany and the United Kingdom, peat bog conditions exist
where the subsurface chemistry of moisture combined with an anaerobic
environment, such that remarkable preservation of animal organisms can result.
Some bogs have preserved ancient oak logs useful in dendrochronology, and they
have yielded extremely well-preserved bog bodies, with organs, skin, and hair
intact, buried there thousands of years ago after apparent Germanic and Celtic
human sacrifice. Excellent examples of such human specimens are Haraldskær Woman
and Tollund Man in Denmark. In the Iron Age culture of Denmark, a discovery of
several victims of ritual sacrifice by strangulation was recorded. The corpses
were thrown into peat bogs where they were discovered after 2000 years,
perfectly preserved down to their facial expressions, although well-tanned by
the acidic environment of the Danish bogs. The Germanic culture has similarities
to the characteristics of the probably Celtic Lindow man found at Lindow Common
and with the Frisian culture described in the story of St. Wulfram. In Ireland,
at Ceide fields in County Mayo, a 5000 year old neolithic farming landscape
complete with field walls and hut sites has been found preserved under a raised
blanket bog.
Fiction and song
Gothic Fiction is commonly set on a moor, a type of landscape common in Great
Britain and Ireland which often has extensive bogs. One example is "The Hound of
the Baskervilles", a Sherlock Holmes story by Arthur Conan Doyle which is
largely set on Dartmoor and contains the fictional bog Grimpen Mire, said to
have been based on Fox Tor in Devon.
Several comic book characters are based on the idea of a half-plant/half-human
creature living in a bog, notably The Heap, Swamp Thing, Man-Thing, and Solomon
Grundy.
German industrial band Bigod 20 had their biggest hit with 1990's "The Bog", in
which the narrator, a fell creature living within the bog or perhaps the bog
itself, describes how he's swallowing the listener's body. American post-punk
band be your own PET also has a song called "Bog", where the singer mentions
having drowned her boyfriend in a bog.
The main character in Jethro Tull's song Aqualung "goes down to the bog and
warms his feet."
One of Europe's best-known protest songs, "Peat Bog Soldiers", was written by
prisoners in Nazi moorland labour camps in the Emsland and describes their penal
labour in bog drainage.
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