Cold summer blamed for low Big Butterfly Count numbers

The coldest summer for 18 years has been blamed by conservationists for an 11% fall in butterflies seen during this year's Big Butterfly Count.

More than 34,000 people took part in the survey and recorded 322,000 butterflies and day-flying months.

The gatekeeper butterfly was seen the most, while numbers of common blue were down by 61% on last year's figures.

Butterfly Conservation said eastern Scotland was among the areas worst hit by cold and wet weather.

The charity had expected a bumper count after a warm and dry spring.

But temperatures dropped and there were prolonged spells of rain.

According to the Met Office, 2011 had coolest June across the UK since 2001, the coolest July since 2000 and the coolest August since 1993.

It said the season was the coolest since summer 1993 with only about 10 days when the temperature exceeded 25C widely.

Butterfly Conservation said insects' activity was impaired by low temperatures and heavy rain.

Moths and butterflies are unable to fly, feed, find mates or lay eggs during bad weather.

Richard Fox, Butterfly Conservation surveys manager said: "The fantastic response of the UK public to Big Butterfly Count 2011 has given us a detailed snapshot of how butterflies fared this summer. Twice as many counts were carried out this year as in 2010.

"Unfortunately, the results show that it was a poor summer for butterflies with many species showing declines compared to last year.

"The dismal summer weather, the coldest for 18 years, is undoubtedly to blame, although many butterflies have suffered long-term declines as a result of destruction of their habitats by human activities."

He added: "In bad summers, butterflies need all the help they can get from people to maintain their breeding areas."

The gatekeeper was the most commonly seen species this year, up three places from 2010, but numbers of butterfly were also down by 12%.

The survey also suggested that numbers of small tortoiseshell stabilised during 2011 after a severe decline.

Three times as many small tortoiseshells were recorded per count in Scotland than in England.

Red admirals enjoyed a "fantastic" summer with numbers up by 98%, Butterfly Conservation said.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-14932544

Bacteria Living in 'Cloud Cities' May Control Rain and Snow Patterns

Some bacteria can influence the weather. Up high in the sky where clouds form, water droplets condense and ice crystal grow around tiny particles. Typically these particles are dust, pollen, or even soot from a wildfire.


But recently scientists have begun to realize that some of these little particles are alive -- they are bacteria evolved to create ice or water droplets around themselves. Some of them live in clouds , and here and there they may be numerous enough to change rain and snowfall patterns.

Might make you think twice about trying to catch snow flakes or raindrops with your tongue.


One of these weather gifted bacteria is called Pseudomonas syringae. Known to live on agricultural crops, this bacteria does more than provide any old surface for the ice crystal to grow.

Thanks to a special protein, the bugs promote freezing at higher temperatures than usual, an attack mechanism that damages plants so the microbes can feed.

But David Sands, a scientist from Montana State University, and other researchers believe the bacteria are part of a little known weather system.

The magical ability of this protein is well known. Ski resorts use cannons to shoot this protein into the air to promote snow formation.

The fact that these bacteria employ the protein is the intriguing part (and, oh yeah, they can LIVE IN CLOUDS!) and could open up doors for more than the snow-building industry.

The most nagging question for scientists, however, is determining just how widespread this and other species of bacteria are, and how much they influence precipitation patterns. From Tuesday's New York Times article about the discovery, cloud physicist Roy Rasmussen of the National Center for Atmospheric Research said:

“The question is, do these guys get into the atmosphere in large enough concentrations to have an effect? My gut feeling is this may be important for specific places and specific times, but it’s not global.”

If bacteria really do play an important role in modifying weather patterns, it could help explain how poor land use practices like overgrazing and logging contribute to droughts. Rid an environment of plants and the microbes have nothing to eat. Strip away enough vegetation and there aren't enough bugs around to seed clouds -- and the rains disappear.

The flip side of the coin is that certain crops could be planted to encourage bacteria growth, and thus bring rain to a dry region.

"Wheat or barley might differ a thousandfold” in terms of bacteria amount, Sands said, “depending on the variety.”

But before scientists attempt to engineer weather patterns -- which could open up its own can of worms -- they must understand the full extent of these bugs' miraculous ability to work as natural rainmakers.

(Submitted by Chad Arment)

Whale poo could aid climate, say Aussie scientists

Agence France-Presse
as of 04/25/2010 10:27 AM

SYDNEY – Australian scientists have discovered an unlikely element in the fight against climate change -- whale poo.

Experts from the Australian Antarctic Division have found that whale excrement -- much of which is derived from the huge mammals' consumption of krill -- effectively places a plant-friendly fertilizer into ocean waters.

"When whales consume the iron-rich krill, they excrete most of the iron back into the water, therefore fertilising the ocean and starting the whole food cycle again," scientist Steve Nicol said.

The research suggests that if whale numbers grow, their droppings could help marine plant life flourish, thereby improving the ocean's ability to absorb carbon dioxide blamed for global warming.

Iron is a vital element in the production of marine plants, known as algae, which suck up carbon dioxide as they grow, although it is a scarce element in the "anaemic" Southern Ocean, said chemical oceanographer Andrew Bowie.

"One-third of the world's oceans are low in trace element iron," the researcher at the Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems Cooperative Research Centre told AFP.

Bowie said whales consumed several tonnes of krill, small shrimp-like crustaceans, each day and this found its way back into the ocean via liquid-form, reddish brown emissions from the giant mammals.

He said while the researchers were pretty confident that whale poo would contain iron, they were surprised at the high concentration, about 10 million times that of Antarctic seawater.

http://www.abs-cbnnews.com/lifestyle/classified-odd/04/25/10/whale-poo-could-aid-climate-say-aussie-scientists

Lovelock: 'We can't save the planet'

http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_8594000/8594561.stm

Lovelock: 'We can't save the planet'

Professor James Lovelock, the scientist who developed Gaia theory, has said it is too late to try and save the planet.

The man who achieved global fame for his theory that the whole earth is a single organism now believes that we can only hope that the earth will take care of itself in the face of completely unpredictable climate change.

Interviewed by Today presenter John Humphrys, videos of which you can see below, he said that while the earth's future was utterly uncertain, mankind was not aware it had "pulled the trigger" on global warming as it built its civilizations.

What is more, he predicts, the earth's climate will not conveniently comply with the models of modern climate scientists.

As the record winter cold testifies, he says, global temperatures move in "jerks and jumps", and we cannot confidently predict what the future holds.

Prof Lovelock does not pull his punches on the politicians and scientists who are set to gain from the idea that we can predict climate change and save the planet ourselves.

Scientists, he says, have moved from investigating nature as a vocation, to being caught in a career path where it makes sense to "fudge the data".

And while renewable energy technology may make good business sense, he says, it is not based on "good practical engineering".

Renewable technology 'doesn't really work'

At the age of 90, Prof Lovelock is resigned to his own fate and the fate of the planet. Whether the planet saves itself or not, he argues, all we can do is to "enjoy life while you can".

Trying to save the planet 'is a lot of nonsense'

Butterflies offer climate warning

Butterflies offer climate warning

NICKY PHILLIPS
March 18, 2010

SCIENTISTS have shown for the first time that man-made climate change is the direct cause of changes to the life cycle of a native Australian animal species.

Researchers have found that because of a rise in temperature, caused by an increase in greenhouse gas emissions by humans, the common brown butterfly now emerges from its cocoon 10 days earlier than it did 65 years ago.

"This is the first study in Australia, and one of the first studies around the world, that has linked changes in a natural system to regional climate change, and shown that the change in regional temperatures are due to increases in greenhouse gases in the
atmosphere,'' said an author of the study, David Karoly, of the University of Melbourne.

Until now, many studies have only been able to demonstrate "links" between climate change and observed changes in flora and fauna. It has been hard to prove that climate change was the direct cause of such changes.

In the case of the brown butterfly, observations around Melbourne over the past 65 years have suggested it has been emerging earlier in spring each year. The butterfly is also found in South Australia, and the east coast of NSW.

Melbourne's weather over that period has been getting warmer, said the lead author, Michael Kearney, also of the University of Melbourne, whose research is published in Biology Letters.

To determine if the two changes were linked, Dr Kearney and his graduate student measured how fast a group of common brown caterpillars developed at different temperatures. They then compared their lab experiments with temperature records for Melbourne over the past 65 years, to predict when the butterflies would have emerged
each year.

Dr Kearney said these predicted emerging times ''matched'' the actual butterfly emergence times that had been observed and recorded by scientists.

It was then left to the leading climate scientist, Dr Karoly, to discover if the rise of almost 1 degree since 1944 as recorded by the Bureau of Meteorology was caused by greenhouse gas emissions released by humans.

Using multiple climate models, Dr Karoly was able to show that the increase in temperature observed in Melbourne was outside the range of natural climate variability. The rise in temperature could be explained only when the effect of greenhouse gas emissions were added to the models, he said.

Dr Kearney said man-made climate change probably had a similar effect on other butterfly species.

Polar bear trade ban is rejected

QATAR: A plan to outlaw the trade of skins, claws and teeth of polar bears was rejected at a UN meeting yesterday. The US-backed plan was turned down at the 175-nation Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species because a ban would affect indigenous peoples' economies and the trade does not pose a big threat to bear numbers. Canada, Norway and Greenland led the opposition to the proposal. Washington argued the trade was compounding the loss of the animals' habitat due to climate change.

http://e-edition.metroherald.ie/2010/03/19/ - p14.

Australian Study Shows Climate On The Rise

Posted on: Monday, 15 March 2010, 10:43 CDT

Australia's average temperature is on the rise, providing compelling evidence of the validity of climate change, claims the country's top group of scientists in a report released on Monday.

The Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO), in a joint "State of the Climate" report with the Bureau of Meteorology, presented findings that the country's mean temperature has increased by 0.7 degrees Celsius in the past 50 years, though some areas have experienced as much as a 1.5 to 2 degree hike in temperatures.

Furthermore, this past decade was the hottest in Australia's recorded history and rainfall amounts in the southeast and southwest parts of the country are decreasing, the report found.

"We are seeing significant evidence of a changing climate," CSIRO head Dr. Megan Clark recently told ABC public radio. "We are warming in every part of the country during every season and as each decade goes by, the records are being broken. We are also seeing fewer cold days so we are seeing some very significant long-term trends in Australia's climate."

According to the report, as it was quoted in a March 15, 2010 Reuters UK story, "There is greater than 90 percent certainty that increases in greenhouse gas emissions have caused most of the global warming since the mid-20th century. Evidence of human influence has been detected in ocean warming, sea-level rise, continental-average temperatures, temperature extremes and wind patterns."

Based on data collected over the past 100 years, the CSIRO scientists claim that they expect the average temperatures in Australia to spike by another 0.6 to 1.5 degrees Celsius in the next two decades.

---

On the Net:

• Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO)
• Bureau of Meteorology
• Megan Clark

Source: RedOrbit Staff & Wire Reports

http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1836372/australian_study_shows_climate_on_the_rise/index.html?source=r_science

Climate change causes wolverine decline across Canada

Wednesday, 3 February 2010

By Matt Walker
Editor, Earth News

The wolverine, a predator renowned for its strength and tenacious character, may be slowly melting away along with the snowpack upon which it lives.

Research shows wolverine numbers are falling across North America. Their decline has been linked to less snow settling as a result of climate change.

The study is the first to show a decline in the abundance of any land species due to vanishing snowpack.

Details of the wolverine's decline are published in Population Ecology.

The wolverine lives in boreal forest across Scandinavia, northern Russia, northern China, Mongolia and North America, where it ranges mostly across six provinces or territories of western Canada.

This largest member of the weasel family eats carrion and food it hunts itself, including hares, marmots, smaller rodents and young or weakened ungulates.

It has evolved for life on the snowpack, having thick fur and outsized feet that help it move across and hunt on snow.

Striking trend

Wildlife biologist Dr Jedediah Brodie of the University of Montana, in Missoula, US, wondered how climate change might be having an impact on snowpack levels, and on the animals that depend on it.

He had previously researched how declining levels of snow in the US Yellowstone National Park, caused by climate change, was changing the abundance of aspen trees and how elk feed on them.

Dr Brodie and his colleague, Professor Eric Post of Pennsylvania State University, at University Park, US, gathered data on snowpack levels across six provinces or territories of Canada: Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba, the Northwest Territories, Saskatchewan and the Yukon Territory.

In all bar the Yukon, he found that snowpack depth declined significantly between 1968 and 2004.

Other studies have shown corresponding rising temperatures and declining precipitation across much of the western US.

"It occurred to me that a good first place to look for ecological impacts of that snowpack decline would be with a snow-adapted species like the wolverine," Dr Brodie told the BBC.

"Fortuitously, Canada has good records of both snowpack trends over time as well as trends in the harvest of all sorts of fur-bearing animals."

So Dr Brodie and Professor Post examined the records of wolverine numbers caught by fur trappers over the same period.

They found a striking correlation between declining snowpack and falling numbers of the predator.

"In provinces where winter snowpack levels are declining fastest, wolverine populations tend to be declining most rapidly," the researchers wrote in the journal article.

"Spring snowpack also appears to influence wolverine population dynamics."

The researchers found only one territory, the Northwest Territories, where wolverine numbers are increasing. There, snowpack levels are declining but they remain much higher and less variable than in most other provinces.

Food scarcity

Dr Brodie cannot be sure why wolverine numbers are falling, but he has his suspicions.

"Recent work shows that wolverines appear to use areas with deep snowpack for dispersal. So reduced snowpack could make dispersal more difficult or dangerous, potentially reducing the success rate with which individuals can establish new home ranges," he says.

"Reduced snowpack may also make it harder for wolverines to get food, for several reasons.

"First, harsh winters and deep snow are major causes of mortality for ungulates like elk, moose, deer and caribou.

"If milder winters mean that fewer of these animals die over the course of the winter, then there will be fewer carcasses for wolverines to feed on," he explains.

"Wolverines also hunt rodents, and this food source may be important for wolverine reproductive success in some areas.

"But shallower snowpack is bad for a lot of rodents because it provides less insulation from the cold.

"So if declining snowpack reduces rodent abundance, that could be bad for wolverines."

Dr Brodie believes that his is the first study to show a decline in species abundance due to a reducing snowpack - for any land animal, not just those in North America.

But he says there are interesting parallels in marine systems.

"For example, sea ice is critical for polar bear foraging."

Polar bear body condition, reproductive rates, and survival have declined significantly in Hudson Bay as sea ice breaks up earlier in the spring, he says.

"At the other end of the globe, Antarctic sea ice has increased over recent decades.

"This may have negative impacts on adelie penguin populations that depend on ice-free areas for breeding and foraging.

"But we don't have to just sit back and watch climate change drive animals extinct," he says.

"As climate change worsens, we should reduce trapping levels and also disturbance to boreal forest habitats.

"Reducing the impact of these anthropogenic stressors could help 'offset' the impacts of climate change on wolverines."

http://news.bbc.co.uk/earth/hi/earth_news/newsid_8494000/8494397.stm
(Submitted by Lindsay Selby)

Do Herbie's tree rings hold secrets?

Scientists hope to track climate, and the elm's age

Jan. 31, 2010

YARMOUTH, Maine - Herbie, the giant American elm tree, is giving his trunk over to science.

Since the tree was felled two weeks ago, scientists from Columbia University, the University of Maine and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration have contacted the Maine Forest Service about examining Herbie's trunk to see what can be learned about the tree's age and about the climate over the years.

Peter Lammert of the Maine Forest Service said his computer has been clogged with e-mails from scientists interested in the stories that Herbie's growth rings might tell.

In particular, Herbie's demise is bringing out of the woodwork highly specialized scientists who study tree rings: Dendroclimatologists, who look to tree rings for answers about the climate, and dendrochronologists, who specialize in determining the age of trees based on rings.

The tallest American elm in New England, the 110-foot-tree survived 14 bouts of Dutch elm disease, thanks to the town's long-time tree warden, Frank Knight, who's now 101.

But Herbie was cut down on Jan. 19 after the fungal disease became fatal. Most of the tree's remains will go to artisans who'll create salad bowls, cutting boards and furniture, but several cuttings will be displayed prominently in the town hall, state arboretum and elsewhere. Scientists are interested in taking a look, as well. The tree, with a circumference of 244 inches, had a diameter of about 6.5 feet.

Looking to track anomalies

George Jacobsen, Maine state climatologist, said it'll be interesting to see whether Herbie's trunk reflects climatic anomalies such as the "year without a summer" in 1816, when volcanic activity halfway around the world led to an exceptionally cold summer in New England.

That year, frost was recorded in every month of the summer, and the colder temperatures and lack of sunlight caused by volcanic ash might be seen in Herbie's rings, Jacobsen said.

"I'm glad that people are interested in this type of analysis. We'd have to know more about the tree and its environment and its history before we know what its scientific value is," he said.

For now, Lammert is focused simply on determining the tree's age. Based on the growth rings, Lammert announced after Herbie was cut down that the tree was about 212 years old. But that's subject to change.

On Friday, Lammert and others returned to Herbie's stump to slice away a cross-section of the stump. An examination indicated Herbie likely grew in the wild for 10 to 20 years under the shade of other trees before being transplanted, said Jan Ames Santerre, senior planner with the Maine Forest Service.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/35169907/ns/us_news-environment/
(Submitted by D.R. Shoop)

The Ungreening of America: Why are people caring less and less about the environment?

by Ed Kilgore
December 14, 2009

If you've been following the Copenhagen process this week, you may have noticed that the "debate" over climate change and what to do about it has regressed. Whereas, just a few years ago, George W. Bush acknowledged the human role in global warming and John McCain was a leading proponent of climate-change legislation, know-nothingism is now resurgent. The GOP pins its electoral hopes on slogans like "drill, baby drill" and "cap-and-tax"; McCain has soured on cap-and-trade; and on the nation's airwaves and op-ed pages, climate-change deniers (and their more circumspect brethren, the "skeptics") crow triumphantly at every snowstorm and every controversy, real or imagined, that puts climate scientists on the defensive.

Worse yet, many years of painstaking efforts to explain climate change to the American people and get them concerned about it seem to be gradually unraveling. As Chris Mooney notes in a piece on the 'disastrous' turn in the narrative, an October 2009 Pew report shows that, since April 2008, the number of Americans who believe there is "solid evidence the earth is warming" has dropped from 71 percent to 57 percent. During that same period, the proportion who accept the existence of climate change and attribute it to human activity has dropped from 47 percent to 36 percent — not exactly a robust constituency for immediate action. (There is a brand new poll from the World Bank that suggests more robust support among Americans for carbon emissions limits; I hope — but don't believe, in the absence of more details — that it's accurate.)

What is causing this apparent unraveling? There are three competing theories as to its source:

(1) The first and most obvious is that support for allegedly expensive or growth-threatening environmental action always declines during economic downturns. Gallup periodically asks Americans which they value more: environmental protection or economic growth. Interestingly, from 1984–2008, a plurality (and usually a strong majority) of Americans always prioritized the environment over growth (even when their voting behavior indicated otherwise). But this tendency to prioritize environmental action does flag during recessions, as was evidenced by a steep slide in the "top priority environment" / "top priority growth" ratio from 70 percent / 23 percent in 2000 to 47 percent / 42 percent in 2003. After an uptick in support for the environment as a priority over the economy from 2004–2007, the ratio nose-dived during the most recent economic crisis, to the point where an actual majority said the economy is more important in March 2009 (51 percent / 42 percent), the first time that has happened in Gallup’s polling.

(2) A second possibility is that the change in public opinion is largely a byproduct of the radicalization of the Republican Party. There’s certainly some support for that proposition in the Pew surveys. As recently as 2007, 62 percent of self-identified Republicans told Pew they believed there was solid evidence for global warming. That percentage dropped to 49 percent in 2008 and then to 35 percent this year. (There’s also been a similarly large drop in belief about global warming among self-identified independe—s -- a group that includes a lot of people who are objectively Republicans. The drop among Democrats has been less than half as large.) It's probably no accident that this change of opinion occurred during the 2008 campaign, when Republicans suddenly made offshore drilling their top energy-policy priority, and this year, when virtually anything embraced by the Obama administration has drawn the collective wrath of the GOP.

(3) Then, there's the third factor that might explain the changes in public opinion: a determined effort by the hard-core anti-environmental right to dominate the discussion and change its terms. This is the main subject of Mooney’s essay, which focuses on the "statistical liars" like columnist George Will who have distorted climate data to raise doubts about the scientific consensus, and on the continuing brouhaha in the conservative media about “Climategate.” Matt Yglesias has gone further, arguing that climate-change deniers have scored a coup by convincing the mainstream media (most notably the Washington Post, which regularly publishes Will’s columns, and recently published a predictably shrill op-ed by Sarah Palin on the subject) to treat the existence of climate change as scientifically debatable.

I have no compelling evidence to demonstrate which of these factors has contributed most to the gradual ungreening of America, but there are ways to mitigate the negative impacts from all three. Fears that environmental protection is "unaffordable" in a poor economy are obviously cyclical, so unless we are in a recession that will endure for many years, this problem should at some point recede. What's more, there's some evidence that suggests efforts to sell action on climate change as "pro-growth" via investments in green technologies can help cushion the public's skepticism.

Meanwhile, the second and third causes — GOP radicalization and the revival of a powerful denialist media presence — are clearly interrelated. Self-identified Republicans who spend a lot of time watching Fox News are obviously influenced by the torrent of "information" about the "hoax" of global climate change; while both conservative opinion leaders and GOP politicians are invested in promoting polarization on a historic scale. But this toxic environment would be largely self-contained if misinformation weren't bleeding over into the broader discourse that includes Americans who don’t think Obama is a committed socialist or that environmentalists want to take the country back to the Stone Age.

And that’s why Yglesias is right: This is one area of public policy where "respect for contrary views" and "editorial balance" is misplaced. Sure, there are many aspects of the climate-change challenge that ought to be debated, and not just between those at the ideological and partisan extremes. But we shouldn’t be "debating" whether or not the scientific consensus on climate change actually represents a vast conspiracy to destroy capitalism and enslave the human race, any more than we should be debating whether "death panels" are a key element of health care reform.

Today at TNR (December 14, 2009)

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=121404318

The Ungreening of America: Why are people caring less and less about the environment?

by Ed Kilgore
December 14, 2009

If you've been following the Copenhagen process this week, you may have noticed that the "debate" over climate change and what to do about it has regressed. Whereas, just a few years ago, George W. Bush acknowledged the human role in global warming and John McCain was a leading proponent of climate-change legislation, know-nothingism is now resurgent. The GOP pins its electoral hopes on slogans like "drill, baby drill" and "cap-and-tax"; McCain has soured on cap-and-trade; and on the nation's airwaves and op-ed pages, climate-change deniers (and their more circumspect brethren, the "skeptics") crow triumphantly at every snowstorm and every controversy, real or imagined, that puts climate scientists on the defensive.

Worse yet, many years of painstaking efforts to explain climate change to the American people and get them concerned about it seem to be gradually unraveling. As Chris Mooney notes in a piece on the 'disastrous' turn in the narrative, an October 2009 Pew report shows that, since April 2008, the number of Americans who believe there is "solid evidence the earth is warming" has dropped from 71 percent to 57 percent. During that same period, the proportion who accept the existence of climate change and attribute it to human activity has dropped from 47 percent to 36 percent — not exactly a robust constituency for immediate action. (There is a brand new poll from the World Bank that suggests more robust support among Americans for carbon emissions limits; I hope — but don't believe, in the absence of more details — that it's accurate.)

What is causing this apparent unraveling? There are three competing theories as to its source:

(1) The first and most obvious is that support for allegedly expensive or growth-threatening environmental action always declines during economic downturns. Gallup periodically asks Americans which they value more: environmental protection or economic growth. Interestingly, from 1984–2008, a plurality (and usually a strong majority) of Americans always prioritized the environment over growth (even when their voting behavior indicated otherwise). But this tendency to prioritize environmental action does flag during recessions, as was evidenced by a steep slide in the "top priority environment" / "top priority growth" ratio from 70 percent / 23 percent in 2000 to 47 percent / 42 percent in 2003. After an uptick in support for the environment as a priority over the economy from 2004–2007, the ratio nose-dived during the most recent economic crisis, to the point where an actual majority said the economy is more important in March 2009 (51 percent / 42 percent), the first time that has happened in Gallup’s polling.

(2) A second possibility is that the change in public opinion is largely a byproduct of the radicalization of the Republican Party. There’s certainly some support for that proposition in the Pew surveys. As recently as 2007, 62 percent of self-identified Republicans told Pew they believed there was solid evidence for global warming. That percentage dropped to 49 percent in 2008 and then to 35 percent this year. (There’s also been a similarly large drop in belief about global warming among self-identified independe—s -- a group that includes a lot of people who are objectively Republicans. The drop among Democrats has been less than half as large.) It's probably no accident that this change of opinion occurred during the 2008 campaign, when Republicans suddenly made offshore drilling their top energy-policy priority, and this year, when virtually anything embraced by the Obama administration has drawn the collective wrath of the GOP.

(3) Then, there's the third factor that might explain the changes in public opinion: a determined effort by the hard-core anti-environmental right to dominate the discussion and change its terms. This is the main subject of Mooney’s essay, which focuses on the "statistical liars" like columnist George Will who have distorted climate data to raise doubts about the scientific consensus, and on the continuing brouhaha in the conservative media about “Climategate.” Matt Yglesias has gone further, arguing that climate-change deniers have scored a coup by convincing the mainstream media (most notably the Washington Post, which regularly publishes Will’s columns, and recently published a predictably shrill op-ed by Sarah Palin on the subject) to treat the existence of climate change as scientifically debatable.

I have no compelling evidence to demonstrate which of these factors has contributed most to the gradual ungreening of America, but there are ways to mitigate the negative impacts from all three. Fears that environmental protection is "unaffordable" in a poor economy are obviously cyclical, so unless we are in a recession that will endure for many years, this problem should at some point recede. What's more, there's some evidence that suggests efforts to sell action on climate change as "pro-growth" via investments in green technologies can help cushion the public's skepticism.

Meanwhile, the second and third causes — GOP radicalization and the revival of a powerful denialist media presence — are clearly interrelated. Self-identified Republicans who spend a lot of time watching Fox News are obviously influenced by the torrent of "information" about the "hoax" of global climate change; while both conservative opinion leaders and GOP politicians are invested in promoting polarization on a historic scale. But this toxic environment would be largely self-contained if misinformation weren't bleeding over into the broader discourse that includes Americans who don’t think Obama is a committed socialist or that environmentalists want to take the country back to the Stone Age.

And that’s why Yglesias is right: This is one area of public policy where "respect for contrary views" and "editorial balance" is misplaced. Sure, there are many aspects of the climate-change challenge that ought to be debated, and not just between those at the ideological and partisan extremes. But we shouldn’t be "debating" whether or not the scientific consensus on climate change actually represents a vast conspiracy to destroy capitalism and enslave the human race, any more than we should be debating whether "death panels" are a key element of health care reform.

Today at TNR (December 14, 2009)

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=121404318

Sierra Nevada Birds Move In Response To Warmer, Wetter Climate

by Staff Writers
Berkeley CA (SPX) Sep 16, 2009

If the climate is not quite right, birds will up and move rather than stick around and sweat it out, according to a new study led by biologists at the University of California, Berkeley.

The findings, to be published the week of Sept. 14 in an online early edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, reveal that 48 out of 53 bird species studied in California's Sierra Nevada mountains have adjusted to climate change over the last century by moving to sites with the temperature and precipitation conditions they favored.

The few species, including the Anna's Hummingbird and Western Scrub-Jay, that did not pack up and leave when the climate changed were generally better able to exploit human-altered habitats, such as urban or suburban areas, the researchers said.

"In order to conserve biodiversity in the face of future climate change, we need to know how a species actually responds to a warming climate," said study lead author Morgan Tingley, a Ph.D. student in the Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Management and at the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology at UC Berkeley.

"Comparing past and present ranges of species that experienced climate change is one of the best ways to gain this knowledge. Understanding how species will respond to climate change allows us to take steps now to restore key habitats and create movement corridors that will help them respond to the changes we have coming."

The study, conducted in collaboration with Audubon California, a non-profit state program of the National Audubon Society, includes data from a survey of 82 sites in the Sierra Nevada and details the changes in birds' geographic range over the course of a century. On average, those sites have seen a 1.4 degree Fahrenheit increase in temperature and nearly a quarter of an inch more rainfall during the breeding season since the early 1900s.

While individual species responded differently to environmental change - some birds gravitated towards warmer temperatures while others preferred cooler climes - these idiosyncratic responses were successfully predicted for the majority of species by standard models that scientists employ to forecast the impact of climate change.

The researchers focused on abundant bird species whose range was restricted to the western United States. Based upon information from the species' entire North American breeding range, the biologists determined the optimal average temperature and precipitation conditions in which the species breed.

These conditions are known as the "Grinnellian niche," named after famed UC Berkeley ecologist Joseph Grinnell, who first developed the concept.

The study builds upon pioneering surveys conducted between 1911 and 1929 and led by Grinnell, who was the founding director of the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology. Grinnell and his legion of researchers methodically cataloged the birds, mammals, reptiles and amphibians they observed as they hiked throughout the Sierra Nevada, establishing an invaluable record of wildlife before mining, grazing and agriculture irreversibly altered the landscape.

Since then, global warming has emerged as another threat to Sierra Nevada habitats, presenting an additional impetus for scientists to resurvey those sites, which spanned as far north as Lassen Volcanic National Park, through Yosemite National Park, and south to Mount Whitney.

To that end, Craig Moritz, UC Berkeley professor of integrative biology and director of the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, began the Grinnell Resurvey Project in 2003 with funding from the National Science Foundation, the Yosemite Foundation and the National Park Service.

In many cases, the biologists were able to hike along the same trails that Grinnell and his colleagues walked some 90 years earlier. When comparing modern data with those earlier records, the researchers used statistical methods that minimized false absences of species when cataloging the occurrence of wildlife.

In 2008, 100 years after the founding of the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, the UC Berkeley-led team published the first study based upon the resurvey. That study found that small mammals were moving to higher elevations or reducing their ranges in response to global warming.

"When we did the mammal work in Yosemite, we saw some species moving up in elevation, but some did not, and we didn't really know why," said Moritz, who is also co-author of this study. "This new paper is giving us a clue about whether or not a species will be forced to shift when climate change alters its niche."

Some bird species, such as the Dusky Flycatcher and the Green-tailed Towhee, were more sensitive to temperature changes, while precipitation was the motivating factor for the move of species such as the Yellow-rumped Warbler and the Lazuli Bunting. About a quarter of the species tracked were affected by both temperature and rainfall.

Modeling responses to future climate change typically assumes that species will move according to their preferred "Grinnellian" or "climatic" niche, but few studies have directly examined whether those assumptions were valid.

"This study shows the assumptions that underlie existing forecasts of how species will respond to climate change are valid, at least for most bird species in the mountains of California," said study co-author and conservation biologist Steve Beissinger, UC Berkeley professor of environmental science, policy and management.

"This is alarming because forecasts suggest many species will go extinct with the climate warming that we expect to occur, but it also gives us confidence that costly conservation investments made now based on climate forecasts will have a valuable payoff in the future."

Tingley said that future studies should determine whether these findings are true for other species. "Birds are arguably more mobile than many other species, so it remains to be seen whether other animals will be

http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Sierra_Nevada_Birds_Move_In_Response_To_Warmer_Wetter_Climate_999.html

Sierra Nevada Birds Move In Response To Warmer, Wetter Climate

by Staff Writers
Berkeley CA (SPX) Sep 16, 2009

If the climate is not quite right, birds will up and move rather than stick around and sweat it out, according to a new study led by biologists at the University of California, Berkeley.

The findings, to be published the week of Sept. 14 in an online early edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, reveal that 48 out of 53 bird species studied in California's Sierra Nevada mountains have adjusted to climate change over the last century by moving to sites with the temperature and precipitation conditions they favored.

The few species, including the Anna's Hummingbird and Western Scrub-Jay, that did not pack up and leave when the climate changed were generally better able to exploit human-altered habitats, such as urban or suburban areas, the researchers said.

"In order to conserve biodiversity in the face of future climate change, we need to know how a species actually responds to a warming climate," said study lead author Morgan Tingley, a Ph.D. student in the Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Management and at the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology at UC Berkeley.

"Comparing past and present ranges of species that experienced climate change is one of the best ways to gain this knowledge. Understanding how species will respond to climate change allows us to take steps now to restore key habitats and create movement corridors that will help them respond to the changes we have coming."

The study, conducted in collaboration with Audubon California, a non-profit state program of the National Audubon Society, includes data from a survey of 82 sites in the Sierra Nevada and details the changes in birds' geographic range over the course of a century. On average, those sites have seen a 1.4 degree Fahrenheit increase in temperature and nearly a quarter of an inch more rainfall during the breeding season since the early 1900s.

While individual species responded differently to environmental change - some birds gravitated towards warmer temperatures while others preferred cooler climes - these idiosyncratic responses were successfully predicted for the majority of species by standard models that scientists employ to forecast the impact of climate change.

The researchers focused on abundant bird species whose range was restricted to the western United States. Based upon information from the species' entire North American breeding range, the biologists determined the optimal average temperature and precipitation conditions in which the species breed.

These conditions are known as the "Grinnellian niche," named after famed UC Berkeley ecologist Joseph Grinnell, who first developed the concept.

The study builds upon pioneering surveys conducted between 1911 and 1929 and led by Grinnell, who was the founding director of the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology. Grinnell and his legion of researchers methodically cataloged the birds, mammals, reptiles and amphibians they observed as they hiked throughout the Sierra Nevada, establishing an invaluable record of wildlife before mining, grazing and agriculture irreversibly altered the landscape.

Since then, global warming has emerged as another threat to Sierra Nevada habitats, presenting an additional impetus for scientists to resurvey those sites, which spanned as far north as Lassen Volcanic National Park, through Yosemite National Park, and south to Mount Whitney.

To that end, Craig Moritz, UC Berkeley professor of integrative biology and director of the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, began the Grinnell Resurvey Project in 2003 with funding from the National Science Foundation, the Yosemite Foundation and the National Park Service.

In many cases, the biologists were able to hike along the same trails that Grinnell and his colleagues walked some 90 years earlier. When comparing modern data with those earlier records, the researchers used statistical methods that minimized false absences of species when cataloging the occurrence of wildlife.

In 2008, 100 years after the founding of the Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, the UC Berkeley-led team published the first study based upon the resurvey. That study found that small mammals were moving to higher elevations or reducing their ranges in response to global warming.

"When we did the mammal work in Yosemite, we saw some species moving up in elevation, but some did not, and we didn't really know why," said Moritz, who is also co-author of this study. "This new paper is giving us a clue about whether or not a species will be forced to shift when climate change alters its niche."

Some bird species, such as the Dusky Flycatcher and the Green-tailed Towhee, were more sensitive to temperature changes, while precipitation was the motivating factor for the move of species such as the Yellow-rumped Warbler and the Lazuli Bunting. About a quarter of the species tracked were affected by both temperature and rainfall.

Modeling responses to future climate change typically assumes that species will move according to their preferred "Grinnellian" or "climatic" niche, but few studies have directly examined whether those assumptions were valid.

"This study shows the assumptions that underlie existing forecasts of how species will respond to climate change are valid, at least for most bird species in the mountains of California," said study co-author and conservation biologist Steve Beissinger, UC Berkeley professor of environmental science, policy and management.

"This is alarming because forecasts suggest many species will go extinct with the climate warming that we expect to occur, but it also gives us confidence that costly conservation investments made now based on climate forecasts will have a valuable payoff in the future."

Tingley said that future studies should determine whether these findings are true for other species. "Birds are arguably more mobile than many other species, so it remains to be seen whether other animals will be

http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Sierra_Nevada_Birds_Move_In_Response_To_Warmer_Wetter_Climate_999.html