[Rlsau1]

Increases in the level of CO2 will do the same thing, and is already doing it. While the increase CO2 level can’t do anything for soil erosion, it makes it much easier for plant life to flourish where other requirements are negligible.

[alloysteel]

Make the desert bloom. This would be easier if there were a fairly large body of water nearby. Drilling deep, to pull up “fossil water” from deep aquifers, only exacerbates the problem, as they dry up and the desert returns. Applying “dryland” agriculture, taking a crop only once every two or three years, leaving the land fallow for the intervening period, with a grassland cover, is much more sustainable, and selection of crops that can grow and mature, producing a harvest of adequate proportions, and do it with a minimum of water, extends this out even further.

Or perhaps the north slope of the Himalayan Mountains can be tapped for a source of water, and with the introduction of holding dams, much of the spring runoff can be held until released to irrigate the land throughout the season. This may involve moving the water through viaducts for perhaps hundreds of miles, but with enough will and proper engineering, this can be done as it once was in the San Joaquin valley in California, a truly remarkable system that worked quite well until it became necessary to “preserve” the habitat of the snail darter in the San Francisco Bay estuary, But that was a decision by politicians, and not by engineers.

[hinckley buzzard]

Apparently there is sufficient rainfall, the desert conditions being due to long term human activity. Soil conservation policies together with CO2 enrichment of the atmosphere should be sufficient to restore the area.

[Pollard]

A guy named Geoff Lawton did a project near in Jordan the Nile river and was making progress. Then he left it to the locals for a couple of years and they let it turn back to desert. They even brought goats in and let them eat all the vegetation he planted.

Another guy did projects further South but still muslim and the way he put it was; "They just can't be bothered".

Of course the USA has had it's issues like the dust bowl but that wasn't from laziness. That was from over-actively working the soil with machines and leaving it bare too often. Humus takes years to develop and we can wipe it out in mere months.

Greening the Desert project in Jordan. He's never worked it full time, year round. Started out with less vegetation than the first pic. This is about the hardest place on earth to renew. Below sea level, highly salted soils. The locals freaked out one time about something growing under the mulch. Mushrooms or fungus.

The area now fenced in supplies people inside and some outside with fruits and veggies. Some people outside the project have started working on the same thing. Not a huge project but proof that desert can have green stuff and shade and produce food. Most of the trees produce food too. He started out by cutting swales on contour to catch what little rain they get and planted drought tolerant trees on the back side of the swales. Then food producing understory trees and food producing ground vegetation. The locals thought he was crazy for not going in straight lines.

I think it makes more sense to start at the edge of where land is being turned into desert and try to reverse the loss, especially on the edge that gives afternoon shade.

My project is different. Turning 14 acres of hilly forest into partly shaded pasture. Without losing top soil.