New USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Map for gardeners shows a warming climate
Wintertime minimum temperatures in the U.S. have risen so much in recent decades that the United States Department of Agriculture decided last week to update their Plant Hardiness Zone Map for gardeners for the first time since 1990. The Plant Hardiness Zone Map is the standard by which gardeners and growers can determine which plants are most likely to thrive at a location. The map is based on the average annual minimum winter temperature, divided into 10-degree F zones. Compared to the 1990 version, zone boundaries in the new 2012 edition of the map have generally shifted one 5-degree Fahrenheit half-zone warmer than the previous map throughout much of the United States. This is mostly a result of using temperature data from a longer and more recent time period. The old 1990 map was based on temperature data from only a 13-year period of 1974-1986, while the new map uses data from the 30-year period 1976-2005.
Figure 1. Comparison of the 1990 and 2012 USDA Plant Hardiness Zone Maps. Image credit: USDA and Arbor Day Foundation
Northwards, ho!
While humans are generally not attuned enough to nature's rhythms to tell if the climate is changing, plants and animals know the climate is changing. Many species of animals, insects, and plants have shifted their ranges poleward and to higher elevations in recent decades because of global warming. The 2007 IPCC report stated that "numerous studies document a progressively earlier spring by about 2.3 to 5.2 days per decade in the last 30 years in response to climate warming. That report also documented over 400 species that have moved their ranges poleward or to higher elevations because of climate change. For example, conifer trees expanded northwards into former tundra areas at a rate of 12 km per year between 1982 - 2000 in portions of Canada (Fillol and Royer, 2003.) Holly plants moved northwards by several hundred kilometers in recent decades into coastal Norway, Northeast Germany, Denmark, and coastal Sweden in response to warming temperatures (Walther et al., 2005.) As the climate continues to warm, plant and animal species previously unknown in many regions will appear, and will disappear from places they used to inhabit.
Figure 2. Change in the boundary line between conifer forest (taiga) and tundra between 1982 (grey line) and 2000 (white line) over Canada. In the grey box marked "Transect", the rate of northwards migration was 12 km per year, or 228 km (142 miles) in nineteen years. Image credit: Fillol and Royer, 2003, "Variability analysis of the transitory climate regime as defined by the NDVI/Ts relationship derived from NOAA-AVHRR over Canada", Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium, 2003. IGARSS '03. Proceedings. 2003 IEEE International.
Jeff Masters
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The growing concern is that the deadly snakes, that can live for up to 35 years and were originally brought to the Sunshine State for commerical reasons, are now quite at homein the wild and are having a devastating effect on the survival chances of other animals living in America's largest eco-system.
Partial to rabbit, opossum, raccoon, bobcat, birds and even the odd alligator, the Burmese Pythons are believed to have multiplied at such a rate that it is now a question of management rather than elimination for South Florida snake hunters who are trying to protect the world's largest wetlands system from a food chain crisis.
The study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Scientists, says: "These findings suggest that predation by pythons has resulted in dramatic declines in mammals within Everglades National Park and that introduced apex predators, such as giant constrictors, can exert significant top-down pressure on prey populations.
"Severe declines in easily observed and/or common mammals, such as raccoons and bobcats, bode poorly for species of conservation concern, which often are more difficult to sample and occur at lower densities."
Water temperatures in the Gulf of Mexico may reach 95 this summer lol.
Well, I think we can expect a lot of DOOM, considering they are predicting the world to end this year. I'm sure we'll see another active hurricane season :)
It's a pretty epic fail.
Source Article
160 die as Eastern Europe sinks further into deep freeze
Posted on February 2, 2012
February 2, 2012 – POLAND - A cold snap kept Europe in its icy grip on Thursday, pushing the death toll to 160 as countries from Italy to Ukraine struggled to cope with temperatures that plunged to record lows in some places. Nine more people died in Poland overnight as temperatures hit minus 32 Celsius (minus 25.6 Fahrenheit) in the southwest, bringing the overall toll to 29 since the deep freeze began last week, national police said. In Ukraine, tens of thousands of people have headed to shelters trying to escape the freeze that the emergencies ministry said has now killed 63 people. Most of them literally froze to death on the street, with only a handful making it to hospital before succumbing to hypothermia, the ministry said. Shivering and hungry, tens of thousands of Ukrainians have sought help in the more than 2,000 temporary shelters set up by the authorities to help the poor survive the fearsome spell of cold weather. The shelters offer warmth and hot food in a country where temperatures fell to minus 33 degrees Celsius in the Carpathians in the west of the country and minus 27 in the capital Kiev. “I am unemployed. I have somewhere to live but nothing to eat. I ate here and it was good — bread with a slice of fat and an onion as well as porridge,” said Olexander Shemnikov, an out-of-work engineer after visiting a shelter in Kiev.
Frigid cold: In Romania, eight people died overnight because of the cold, bringing the overall toll to 22, the health ministry said. Schools remained closed in some parts of the country as temperatures reached minus 31 degrees Celsius. In Bulgaria, where the mercury dipped to lows not seen in a century, at least 10 people have died, according to media. Authorities have not released official figures. With parts of the Danube freezing, authorities moved some vessels to ports further away to protect them from the advancing ice. And in the capital Sofia, some residents found their money frozen as automated teller machines stopped functioning, according to local media. In Latvia, 10 people have died around the capital Riga alone, with no figures available for the rest of the country. In neighboring Lithuania a 55-year-old homeless man found in the ruins of an abandoned house in the port city of Klaipeda became the ninth victim of the chill. In Italy, hundreds of people were trapped overnight on trains as freezing temperatures and heavy snowfalls in the centre and north caused widespread chaos on roads, railways and at airports. The cold has so far killed an infant in Sicily and a 76-year-old pensioner in Parma during what forecasters say is the coldest weather in Italy in 27 years. In Austria, an 83-year-old woman was found frozen to death in the woods after apparently slipping on her daily walk and not managing to get up again, becoming the country’s second victim of the cold snap, officials said. In Serbia, the cold has killed seven people and trapped some 11,500 others, mostly in remote mountain villages inaccessible by road. -AFP
IS01WU (Interesting System 01 WUnderground) is being mentioned now in the MIA NWS discussion. Could be a wet several days for many in the peninsula. I am wondering if atmospheric triggers, other than the NINO3/4 region, have already lined up and pointing to a transition to El Nino. This hypothetical system bears the markings of such.
000
FXUS62 KMFL 021455
AFDMFL
AREA FORECAST DISCUSSION
NATIONAL WEATHER SERVICE MIAMI FL
955 AM EST THU FEB 2 2012
EXTENDED PERIOD...SUNDAY THROUGH WEDNESDAY...ON SUNDAY THE GREAT
PLAINS LOW PRES SYSTEM MOVES E AND MOVES OFF OF THE CAROLINAS WITH
THE ASSOCIATED COLD FRONT MOVING INTO N FLA AND STALLING. THE ATLC
RIDGE REMAINS IN PLACE OVER CENTRAL FLA. MONDAY THROUGH WEDNESDAY
.LOW PRES DEVELOPS AND DEEPENS IN THE GULF PULLING DEEPER MOISTURE
TOWARD S FLA. ISENTROPIC LIFTS DEVELOPS AND THE PROSPECT OF
INCREASING CHANCES OF RAIN ACROSS THE AREA...NOT JUST THE E
COAST... APPEARS TO BE DEVELOPING.
So today, i had 6 school lessons. tomorrow, only 2. WHy couldnt it be balanced out at 4 today n tomorrow?
Maybe when dis system comes off Cape York peninsula it will develop into TC...hopefully :D
Wait a second - there are actually 2 people in the world that were able to beat Chuck Norris?
Put THAT into your resume, and get hired on the spot.
I just read in a recent newspaper that someone called Bruce Lee defeated him in the Roman Coliseum....
Where are my Alzheimers pills? ....
looks similar to the early 70s version but does have the hardiness
zones shifted a little to the north of the 70s version.
Growers who uses these maps also need to be aware of what the
occasional extreme arctic outbreak or an extreme winter can do
to high visibility high value plantings.
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