Record Hot Arctic: NOAA’s 2015 Report Card Shows Signs of Failing Climates

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Overall warming of the Arctic is at a much more rapid pace than the rest of the world. This accelerated pace of warming is due, in large part, to loss of snow and sea ice reflectivity during the Spring and Summer months. As a result, more heat is absorbed into dark land and ocean surfaces — a heat that is retained throughout the Arctic over longer and longer periods. And, though NOAA doesn’t report it in the above video, overall higher concentrations of greenhouse gasses like methane and CO2 in or near the Arctic region also contribute to a higher rate of warming (see NOAA’s ESRL figures). In a world that is now rapidly proceeding beyond the 400 ppm CO2 and 485 ppm CO2e threshold, this is exactly the kind of Northern Hemisphere polar amplification we would expect to see.

From: robertscribbler.com

 

A call to UN/UNESCO to establish “World Heritage Species” program

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“Lions are not protected! We can change this.

“Join the petition that calls on the United Nations to establish a World Heritage Species program.

“Imagine the world with no more lions – a world where they are just a memory. It is hard to imagine, but this is the direction we are heading. The number of lions in the world has declined so dramatically that they are at a critical point of survival. Immediate action is required. And the involvement of the world’s governing body is now a necessity.”  www.change.org

GR:  Large animals are critically important for balanced ecosystems. If we want to have any hope of repairing Earth’s natural systems, we have to protect our wildlife.

Address the Cause, Not the Symptoms

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“We must recognize that we shot past the opportunity to stabilize our population at a sustainable level of 2 billion about 80 years ago. We must now focus on humanely reducing population on the planet. Some recognize this harsh truth, but most are focused on symptoms. The issue of overpopulation is feared, ignored, misunderstood, falsely represented and demonized by people from all political and religious persuasions. The concept of too many people using up the earth’s limited resources lies outside the parameters of the typical activist’s world. It flies in the face of current norms and doesn’t fit into society’s dominant anthropocentric worldview.

“Bindi [the photograph] is the precocious animal-loving daughter of the late Australian “crocodile hunter,” conservationist and personality Steve Irwin. Bindi was invited to submit an essay on wildlife conservation to Hillary Clinton’s e-journal. She chose to focus on the threat human overpopulation poses to wildlife. “How is it possible that our fragile planet can sustain these masses of people?” Bindi wrote. She used the analogy of too many people showing up for a party and not having enough food to go around.

“Clinton or her lackeys heavily edited the piece before publication, censoring the overpopulation angle, but the feisty Bindi would have none of it. She refused to allow the gutted essay to appear in Clinton’s journal, and instead went about publicizing how Clinton had tried to silence her.”  From: www.capsweb.org

GR:  This is a well-written review of an excellent book on population. So, what must we do?  We need to act right now to stop greenhouse-gas emissions, and we need to act right now to begin reducing our population.

 

Fighting Climate Change with Trees in Africa

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“Restoration holds the potential to shield us from those dangers while also providing a wide range of benefits: trees as a source of energy; trees as a source of nutritious food; trees to bind the soil so that agriculture thrives; trees that make our landscapes beautiful. And especially in the developing world, restoring landscapes and planting trees is something we can do right away — we have boots on the ground! By investing in this amazing opportunity, we can tackle a suite of problems with one useful tool.

“A new movement called AFR100 is poised to take advantage of this opportune moment. This new pan-African, country-led effort aims to restore 100 million hectares (386,000 square miles) of degraded and deforested landscapes in Africa by 2030. It’s an ambitious goal, but within reach — at the initiative’s launch in Paris during COP21, African countries have already committed to restore more than 30 million hectares (116,000 square miles), an area larger than the nation of Gabon or the United Kingdom. And AFR100 partners are earmarking more than $1 billion in development finance and $600 million in private sector investment to support restoration activities.”  From: emiliocogliani.wordpress.com

GR:  There is no mention of population control in this article, and without it, the program is doomed to failure.  Perhaps not in the next 15 years during which it proposes to restore 386,000 square miles of forest, but in the 30 years after that.  The reason? Deforestation is taking place to make room for crops to feed meat animals and people.  Ignoring the influence of demand by a growing population makes the whole thing appear sham-like.

Decline of Tropical Animals Could Hasten Climate Change

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“Hunting and poaching threatens 19 percent of all tropical forest vertebrates, with large vertebrates, including frugivores, disproportionately favored by hunters, the study says. As the frugivore population declines — a process called “defaunation” — fewer seeds of carbon-dense trees are spread throughout the forest, study co-author Mauro Galetti, a Sao Paulo State University ecologist, said.

“The result is a new forest dominated by smaller trees with milder woods which stock less carbon,” study lead author Carolina Bello, a Sao Paulo State University PhD student, said in a statement.”  From: www.climatecentral.org

GR:  It seems common sense that wildlife loss injures ecosystems and that impaired ecosystems sequester less carbon.  It also seems common sense that defaunation is a lawless species’ evil act as horrendous as genocide.

NASA Reports 2015 Hottest Year Yet

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Record Breaking Heat as Climate Change Accelerates

NASA reports that 2015 average temperature was .84 C above the 20th Century baseline. The Northern Hemisphere (where most people live) had the highest temperature gain.  Read more about this year’s record at robertscribbler.com, and at NASA.gov.

The graph is a PDF file:  Hemisphere Temps

 

Decline in over three-quarters of UK butterfly species is ‘final warning’, says Chris Packham

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“More than three-quarters of Britain’s 59 butterfly species have declined over the last 40 years, with particularly dramatic declines for once common farmland species such as the Essex Skipper and small heath, according to the most authoritative annual survey of population trends.

“But although common species continue to vanish from our countryside, the decline of some rarer species appears to have been arrested by last ditch conservation efforts.

“This is the final warning bell,” said Chris Packham, Butterfly Conservation vice-president, calling for urgent research to identify the causes for the disappearance of butterflies from ordinary farmland. “If butterflies are going down like this, what’s happening to our grasshoppers, our beetles, our solitary bees? If butterflies are in trouble, rest assured everything else is.”  From: www.theguardian.com

GR:  Coldwater Farm butterflies have declined over the past few years.  This year was the worst with many of my butterfly/bee flowers going untended. Perhaps butterfly numbers will rebound in 2016, but knowing nothing of the specific causes of the decline, I have no assurance they will.

Butterflies Decline at Coldwater Farm

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Butterfly Decline in Arizona

Coldwater Farm butterflies have declined over the past few years.  This year (2015) was the worst with many of my butterfly/bee flowers going untended. For instance, Mourning Cloaks (Nymphalis antiopa) were present only in late spring and early summer. In earlier years, the Mourning Cloaks were so abundant that I had nominated they to represent the Agua Fria River ecosystem. Perhaps butterfly numbers will rebound in 2016, but knowing nothing of the specific causes of the decline, I have no assurance they will. Click here for a checklist of the butterfly and moth species known to live in Arizona. Here are pictures of a few of the common butterflies and moths (Please excuse the fx experiments).

Cabbage White Butterfly
Two-tailed Swallowtail (AZ State Butterfly) on Butterfly Bush
Two-tailed Swallowtail (AZ State Butterfly)
Black Swallowtail Butterfly
Acmon Blue Butterfly (?)
Huge catterpillar
Tiny catterpillars on grape leaf
Two-tailed Swallowtail (AZ State Butterfly)
Moth
Buckeye Butterfly
Buckeye Butterfly
Two-tailed Swallowtail (AZ State Butterfly)
Two-tailed Swallowtail (AZ State Butterfly)
Two-tailed Swallowtail (AZ State Butterfly)
Moth
Mourning Cloak FX
Monarch butterfly at Coldwater Farm.
Two-tailed Swallowtail (AZ State Butterfly)
Red Admiral Butterfly
Black Swallowtail Butterfly
Buckmoth
Two-tailed Swallowtail (AZ State Butterfly)
Black Swallowtail Butterfly
Buckmoth
Black Swallowtail Butterfly
Two-tailed Swallowtail (AZ State Butterfly)
Monarch Butterfly
Buckmoth
Mourning Cloak Butterfly
Black Swallowtail Butterfly
Tiny catterpillars on grape leaf
Two-tailed Swallowtail (AZ State Butterfly)
Melissa Blue Butterfly?
Black Swallowtail Butterfly

Audacious ‘Desert Wheat’ Scheme Wilts in Saudi Arabia

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With depletion of fossil aquifer used for irrigation, cultivating wheat in Saudi Arabia’s desert proves just another pipe dream.

“Flush with hundreds of billions of dollars in revenue from its humongous oil exports several decades ago, and understandably uneasy about its utter dependency on grain and food imports to feed one of the fastest growing populations in the world, Saudi Arabia embarked on a grand scheme to grow wheat in the desert using irrigation water from a fossil aquifer (one that is not replenished) beneath the dry, shifting sands of the desert kingdom.

“Saudi Arabian Farms “Make the desert bloom!” – at least until the groundwater runs out… Photo:  Center-pivot irrigation wheat fields in the Saudi Arabian desert. Each green crop circle is 0.5 mile in diameter.

As international commodity traders quipped, the Saudis would no longer have to “sell hydrocarbons to buy carbohydrates.”

“But because the aquifer is a relic or “fossil” of an earlier, wetter geologic age – no longer replenished by rainfall and infiltration/percolation – it is a nonrenewable resource subject to depletion. In this sense, it is not unlike Saudi Arabia’s other great nonrenewable or fossil resource – oil – which is also pumped out of vast subterranean reservoirs that are not refilled.

“Every gallon of water withdrawn amounts to “mining” the aquifer, since the water is not replaced. From the moment the first droplet of water was pumped upward and sprinkled onto wheat crops, this short-lived scheme’s days were numbered.”

Sourced through Scoop.it from: www.capsweb.org

GR:  Aquifer depletion is a global problem. Groundwater pumping would have turned central Arizona into a desert if developers had not covered the land with houses. Residential developers have been mining water in my neighborhood for years. While local city governments do everything they can to support the developers in their quest for more immigrants, they ask current residents to conserve water. The most outlandish hypocrisy they’ve committed is to ask children to turn the water off while they brush their teeth. Saving water makes no sense when our governments are doing all they can to spend it.

See on Scoop.it – GarryRogers Biosphere News