Updated – Calling All Climate Sleuths

Lets see a picture of the location of the temperature recording location. That might tell the story.

I went to GoogleEarth to check the area out. The place is not available in high res. However, we can see zones of significantly browner tone, between due west and south-west of Mohonk lake. Is that darker area fresh tree cutting areas or are they rocky mountaintops?
If these are tree cutting areas, the area is significantly larger that the lake and ridge area itself (between one and two order of magnitude), located quite close, with spacing between the two being only a fraction of the characteristic dimension of the brown area itself. Could the wind heated from this darker ground cover blowing from that direction reach the lake at an artificially high temperature?

I’ve said it before, one station should NOT adjust another, period. That’s just making up data. It could be that the local climate really is that different from one site to another just a couple miles apart. I live on Whidbey Island in Washington State. My dad lived on the west side facing the sound, and I live more on the east side over the inner sound. It would often be raining at his place and never rain at mine, about 10 miles away. He would receive direct winds from the sound, the winds I received were diluted and diverted much of the time, so yes, his local climate could be pretty different from mine.
Dee, are there other stations within 50 miles? Might give a better idea of the regional trend, but I’d say it’s more likely a bias due to siting, like others have pointed out.
Reply – Oh yes… And they all are available for your investigation here: USHCN Trend Calculations — New York
Here is a map of the NYS sites to chose from: NYS Station Siting Map
I have no idea what I am going to find there, so your analysis is a good as mine. – Dee Norris

USHCN shows Mohonk site as existing from 1948 (here’s their graph):
http://cdiac.ornl.gov/cgi-bin/broker?id=305426&_PROGRAM=prog.gplot_meanclim_yr.sas&_SERVICE=default&param=TAVE&minyear=1948&maxyear=2005
so I assume that data for years prior to 1948 is a filenet fudge factor.
Hope you make it to Mohonk and can get some photos of the site that might shed some light on the warming of the past ten years.

Records from nearby stations at Poughkeepsie (urbanish) and Walden (rural) are basically flat. Local effects are suspect for Mohonk lake.

Ugh, guess img tags don’t work. Here are the links
http://jalberts.net/images/graphaMohonk1925-2006.png
http://jalberts.net/images/graphaPough1925-2006.png
http://jalberts.net/images/graphaWalden1925-2006.png

Quick question commenters: did you notice that the source article source articleaddresses many of the usual culprits re: local mesaurement bias? I’m thinking that is why Dee is asking us to “put on our thinking caps”.
The sizzle in the article is the quality of the site and the observations:
<blockquote cite =”If the procedure seems old-fashioned, that is just as it is intended. The temperatures that Mr. Huth recorded that day were the 41,152nd daily readings at this station, each taken exactly the same way. “Sometimes it feels like I’ve done most of them myself,” said Mr. Huth, who is one of only five people to have served as official weather observer at this station since the first reading was taken on Jan. 1, 1896.”
That extremely limited number of observers greatly enhances the reliability, and therefore the value, of the data. Other weather stations have operated longer, but few match Mohonk’s consistency and reliability. “The quality of their observations is second to none on a number of counts,” said Raymond G. O’Keefe, a meteorologist at the National Weather Service office in Albany. “They’re very precise, they keep great records and they’ve done it for a very long time.”
Mohonk’s data stands apart from that of most other cooperative weather observers in other respects as well. The station has never been moved, and the resort, along with the area immediately surrounding the box, has hardly changed over time. Rain and snow are measured in the original brass rain gauge issued in 1896 by what was then known as the United States Weather Bureau. Mr. Huth also checks the temperature and pH of Mohonk Lake daily, and he measures the level of the lake according to its distance from the top of an iron bar that was bolted to the Shawangunk conglomerate in 1896. ”
I’m going to keep an open mind and see what Dee comes back with. If the record really is as pristine as reported then it makes for quite a puzzle – especially when considered in the context of the nearby Maryland site.

Jeff Alberts,
Strangely, when I went to the link Dee provided and punched up Poughkeepsie for 1828-2006, I got a very different graph — one that has a 2 degree or so uptick? Where did you get your graph for Poughkeepsie?
Eric

I would counsel people to check here: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/16/science/earth/16moho.html?scp=1&sq=mohonk&st=cse The coolest temp in the graph published by the Times shows a mean below 32 degrees fahrenheit, whereas the graph provided here by Dee never goes below a mean of 41 degrees.
The Times graph, provided by Ben Cook of GISS, shows a swing of nearly 20 degrees in MEAN values! He answered an e-mail query I sent him about this, but did not answer the question about the value below freezing near the turn of the last century. I sent him a follow-up and I’m still waiting.
As for the surprising heating showed at this station, it doesn’t appear to be a very pristine measuring environment, now that we put it under pressure…

“Mr. Huth opened the weather station, a louvered box about the size of a suitcase, and leaned in.”
Wonder about the condition or upkeep of the ‘louvered box’, or for that matter the potential for canopy changes around the box (?).

Does this site have more cloud cover? The first graph seems to have a larger ratio of warm nights.
Warm nights, that seems to be a recurring bias in most of the UHI Effect.
Something is bottling up the heat at night.

Has Hansen ever stayed there?

Something that changed about 50 years ago: Fire suppression (ie, “Smokey the Bear”). The region’s forests are pine barrens and chestnut oak, which are dependent upon regular fire… and they’ve been burning regularly for 9,000 years. The result tends to be grassy or herb ground cover with tall-limbed large trees, and often it’s easy to walk (or drive a horse-drawn carriage) through. That’s not what recent photos show.
http://www.savethegunks.com/npj112303.htm
http://www.gunksfireplan.org/fire_biodiversity.html
http://www.ecostudies.org/ecofocus_2008-05-11.html
http://www.forestsandrangelands.gov/success/documents/2006_ny_fs_shawaangunks_hfr.pdf
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shawangunk_Ridge

“Ron McCarley (11:50:37) :
Has Hansen ever stayed there?”
Don’t know, but Gore stayed at the closest holiday Inn and it made him real smart.

Here is a link to a page comparing Mohonk Lake with Poughkeepsie and Falls Village. Mohonk and Falls Village are very similar until the warming at Mohonk in the mid-nineties. This data is from the NOAA GHCN database.
http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/MohonkLake.htm
See also the comparison of New York City with its rural neighbors, showing a case of urban warming.
http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/NewYorkCity.htm

The article mentions that the observers have to trek up the gray granite rock outcropping. This gived me the impression that the weather station is far enough from the buildings/parking lots to avoid their affects.
Also, if the weather station is located on or very near granite, how would this affect the observations?

Normally a lurker but can’t resist a challenge!
Given that the USHCN Trend Calculations are correct, I dug up the closest 4 temperature histories to Mohonk Lake that date past 1896. Those were Port Jervis, Poughkeepsie, Maryland and Troy… all in the general area of Mohonk. From those, I computed the temperature anomaly from each stations average. From that I computed the difference between Mohonk’s anomaly and the other station’s anomalies. I then color coded them and started looking for odd stuff to pop up. Here’s what I have:
1: The temperature data for Maryland matches Mohonk EXACTLY from 1898 to 1903 and 1921 to 1924.
2: The Mohonk temperature anomaly was exceptionally low compared to other stations in the area between 1898 and 1901. Excluding the duplicate Maryland data, Mohonk’s average anomaly was over 3 degrees lower than everything else in the area for this period. 1920 and 1923 were also exceptionally cool years for Mohonk compared to other stations. 1924 and 1925 were exceptionally warm compared to the surrounding area.
3: From 1896 to 1951 (First half of data), Mohonk’s anomaly was lower than the surrounding stations 34 times and higher 22 times while the average anomaly was .46 degrees lower in Mohonk than in the surrounding stations. From 1952 to 2005, Mohonk’s anomaly was lower than the surrounding stations 14 times and higher 40 times while the average anomaly was .48 degrees higher in Mohonk than in the surrounding stations.
4: Pinning down a specific event from the data isn’t quite as easy. 1984 is a suspiciously warm year but this is the only year from 1950 to 1983 where Mohonk’s anomaly was higher than all other area anomalies. The one area that sticks out is from 1997 to 2005 when the Mohonk anomaly consistently ran hotter than anything in the surrounding area. This is especially dominant from 1999 where Mohonk was running an anomaly 1.5 to 2 degrees higher than all other stations.
My guess based on the data (provided it is accurate and I analyzed anything meaningful): Mohonk saw a lot of locally cool weather during the first half of the century followed by an influx of tourism in the late 90s. I’d look for something that might have been build or installed in 1997 or 1999.
I should note that this is just 4 stations and all of the stations reported temperature anomalies that weren’t seen by the other stations in the area in various years.

ok i’ll try…given mr watts background, i would guess, based on reading of the article, someone suspects something is wrong with the weather station box or the manually resetting of its components…its interesting nevertheless, how the mohonk’s profess ecological eden while building anthropogenic hotels, spas and research facilities while fighting all other developement that encroaches their resort…

Has the turbidity of the lake increased due to increased nutrients. If so, the surface waters would be warmer (in summer) and may influence the station. It would be interesting to see the water temperature record for the lake.

Ric (14:03:46), I got to slightly disagree with you. The Newburgh/Poughkeepsie area has changed considerably in the past century and is almost an extension of the greater NY metro area. FYI almost every transiting Low (of which we have a large yearly number) results in a period of S to SE winds in the area. While it’s not a prevailing wind it’s enough to have a small effect throughout the Hudson Valley and surrounding areas.
I personally think most of the rise can be attributed to unmentioned changes at the observation site and no, there isn’t any proof that Henry Hudson set up the Wx station.

Mohonk Mountain House is in New Paltz.
http://www.newpaltz.org/historynp.html
” the motor car started replacing the train and in the early 1950’s, the New York State Thruway was built and brought New Paltz, as Exit 18, fully in touch with the world. ”
1958 was the coldest year. Then it started to warm.
Al those people streaming by on the Thruway couldn’t cause a change .. could it?

“The Stevenson Screen thermometer. shelter and US Weather Bureau rain gauge have never. been moved from their original locations.”
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22and+methodology.+The+Stevenson+Screen+thermometer%22

Reply to reply of my previous post:
The graphs in the links of my previous two posts are from the NOAA GHCN database. The graphs are created at:
http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/climate.aspx
That page provides links to the source data at NOAA (and for data at Hadley).

Mohonk Lake is no different than the nearby stations. Here is a graph of 4 of the area stations (including Mohonk Lake). The plots are virtually indistinguishable.

Hmm, they look pretty distinguishable to me. The three graphs I posted from the GHCN network all with the same time frame showed the two closest sites (Walden and Poughkeepsie) with a flat to slight downward trend, and Monhonk Lake with an upward trend.
Does it mean anything? Maybe, maybe not. The point is you can’t look at one site and take global or even regional meaning.

Odd how the reporter made it sound as if the weather observer had to trek out to this isolated Stevenson screen, uphill both ways, blah blah… Just like the old days.
It looks to be a mere 40 ish? feet from the office, under the comforting shade of a well established tree.
http://www.mohonkpreserve.org/index.php?weatherdata#warmtrend
Then again the picture on that page doesn’t show it’s relation to the long term parking or the green technology visitors center. Or the victorian maze added to the resort in 1998. Or the new 30,000 sq ft spa with a 2000 sq ft green roof garden terrace, heated outdoor mineral pool and of course no mention of the Six hundred tons of quartz conglomerate stone excavated from the site and recycled into stone walls, fireplaces and retaining walls throughout the spa.
http://www.mohonk.com/pdfs/New30000squarefootSpa.pdf
Now, I would assume the resort and the preserve are two different entities with enough seperation to avoid contamination of the data from all the new additions, however we have all seen how land use changes can contaminate data from quite a distance. Other than the addition of the Victorian maze in 1998, I found no dates for the other rennovations mentioned above but they sound fairly recent. They also would seem to require quite a bit of clearing of established vegitation for the construction…
In any event I hope the links and the picture of the Stevenson screen help in some way. Enjoy your outing.Odd

The only way to solve this would be to switch the equipment between the sites and see what that shows. It would either prove or eliminate any equipment or siting issues.

I was going to guess that something changed about 1990, Anthony’s post mentions it went to MMTS in 1991. I am curious about Dee’s comment re: the tannic acid production, inferring that the area was once forested in oak, probably very old oak, and then replanted in maple. I wonder what the differences in the two types of forests might be. Oaks tend to sprawl out horizontally and maples grow more vertically.
Reply – In a forest where their is competition for sunlight, oaks will be vertical as well and eventually tower over the maples. In an open pasture, both will get pretty wide. – Dee Norris

Since the resort is crowded around the lake, waste or cooling-water discharge into it could be a factor since warmed water will float on the surface affecting air temp above it — perhaps more so in the winter (when it’s not frozen).

Note the ground cover in this picture:
Is that mulch or some other natural gound cover? I wonder if they started landscaping the area around the weather box with yearly fresh mulch somtime in the late 90s.

It’s called local warming. Mohonk has a fever and we must save Mohonk. We need to call Al Gore and then have a big rock concert. Or raise taxes. Or both.

Well, no MMTS as of December 21, 2006 according to this article. Also it was a 2.3 deg F increase over 100 years reported at that time.
http://www.mohonkpreserve.org/pdf/NPTimes12-21-06DSRC.pdf

Since they have such good records, I wonder what the water temps look like over time? and how that compares to the air temperatures. Maybe the water is hotter causing the air to be hotter? Yeah, I know this is not Yellowstone, but just a thought.

Anonymoose gave me an idea.
At the beginning of the interglacial, the world was not a very green place. Over the last 12,000 years it has grown progressively greener, especially with fire suppression in our forests. Now, I understand that since the industrial age, globally, we have lost about 50% of our forests for crops and other land uses. However, most of the warming of the last 30 years has been in the Northern hemisphere where many developing countries are seeing reforestation due to environmental measures.
Deforestation is occurring in the topics and in the southern hemisphere, and temperatures have not risen as much there.
Obviously, a greener planet or hemisphere has a much different albedo than a not so green planet, and add to this the heat absorbtion in urban areas, it is clear that less sunlight is being reflected back to space and we are absorbing more heat from the sun than 5-10,000 years BP.
Also, the increased mass of the trees seems likely to absorb more heat and reduce the rate of heat loss from the surface, especially in the evening when it is pumping out CO2.
Maybe this is why Hansen is suggesting using trees as fuel (obviously he does not want to say trees are causing global warming, since too much has been bet on CO2).
It might be that trees are causing the warming we have had, or at least contributing, and thats not necessarily a bad thing. I still remember the blizzard of 78. Brrrrrr.

Is there a single public source for all the USHCN data? This “challenge” was interesting but I spent most of the time grabbing data for each individual site and then converting it into something Excel could use. I’d like to tinker w/ this in my spare time but I have no interest in pulling the data from each individual site a piece at a time.

Thanks, Jerry

The fact that one person is responsible for taking the readings at the remote station may be a glaring weakness — not the claimed strength — in the process.
It sounds like quite the uphill climb. No disrespect intended, but what if the record-keeper did not make it up to the remote station everyday, yet “estimated” what the readings may have been for the missed day(s). In the summer, especially (as it appears that the reported rise is concentrated in the summer months), the readings are vulnerable to the following scenario:
Instrument reset on Day Zero.
Day 1 has a unseasonably high temp of 90 degrees and a low of 70 degrees on a clear day/night. On Day 2, 4:00pm rolls around, and for whatever reason the reading is not made (busy or too hot to climb — the solitary reader is much older than he used to be). On Day 2, it “felt” just as warm or warmer than Day 1, so when the instrument is read on Day 3, the high was shown as 90 degrees — even though Day 2 may have only been 82 degrees with higher humidity than Day 1 — Day 2 is officially recorded at an estimated 90 degrees, even though the true temperature reading was 82 degrees. If this scenario occurred more often as the years ensued, an upward trend in Max Temp would occur.
I am not calling anyone a liar or cheat — just pointing out that all humans have weaknesses — and the possibility I described above COULD be one many factors (other than AGW) affecting the instrument readings.

I do not wish to appear argumentative with commenter, ‘j.connor’. I only know what I read in the NYT article:
“Every day for the last 112 years, people have trekked up the same gray outcropping to dutifully record temperatures and weather conditions.”
As for the referenced picture, it is unlabeled. I do see the building right beside the weather station. Hmm. I wonder when the building was constructed? Assuming the picture is of the Mohonk weather station, the building could be a factor in the temperature rise. Again, does anyone know when it was erected?
Also, the NYT article states the following:
“The station has never been moved, and the resort, along with the area immediately surrounding the box, has hardly changed over time.”
Personally, I think the Mohonk folks and the NYT have jumped-the-gun carelessly (an all too common trait among the AGWers). Until, the above quoted “hardly changed” is defined and extensively researched and photographed with the survey released publicly, this is, at best, a highly unscientific, anecdotal account of warming.
Finally, is it just me, or does the actual reported warming seem confined to only the Summer Max Temp records?

Thanks for the link, j. connor: http://www.mohonkpreserve.org/index.php?weatherdata#warmtrend
That looks like wood chips on the ground. Someone’s going to have a fun survey. Incidentally, I’m not finding when wood chippers became common; it was only a few decades ago. Wood chips were not common mulch before wood chippers. And due to the material, I suspect bark chips have different biological and thermal characteristics.

No worries Dave the Denier

Apart from the wood chips on the ground, look at the height of the screen from the ground. The observer’s eye level is above the top of the enclosure. I’m thinking the specified height is greater than that(?) And the stand that it’s on appears to be some sort of wooden home-made affair…
Very much looking forward to seeing the survey results!

Blah, just enter Mohonk in the search field of the Library of Congress for the historic photos… Should have predicted that one wouldn’t work as I hoped.