From Harvard University
An early sign of spring, earlier than ever
Researchers say record-high temperatures led to earliest spring flowering in history
Record warm temperatures in 2010 and 2012 resulted in the earliest spring flowering in the eastern United States in more than 150 years, researchers at Harvard University, Boston University and the University of Wisconsin have found.
“We’re seeing plants that are now flowering on average over three weeks earlier than when they were first observed – and some species are flowering as much as six weeks earlier,” said Charles Davis, a Harvard Professor of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology and the study’s senior author. “Spring is arriving much earlier today than it has in the past.”
To explain spring’s early arrival, Davis and his co-authors, Boston University biology Professor Richard Primack, BU postdoctoral researcher Elizabeth Ellwood and Professor Stanley Temple at the University of Wisconsin, point to temperature increases resulting from global climate change. Using data collected in Massachusetts and Wisconsin from the mid-1800s to the present day, they show that the two warmest years on record – 2010 and 2012 – also featured record breaking early spring flowering.
Significantly, researchers found that the early arrival of spring was predicted by historical records, and that plants haven’t shown any sign of reaching a threshold for adjusting to warming temperatures.
“It appears that many spring plants keep pushing things earlier and earlier”, Davis said.
To conduct the study, Davis and colleagues relied on two “incredibly unique” data sets.
“The data were initiated by Henry David Thoreau in the mid-1800s,” Davis said. “He was making observations on flowering times across Concord, Massachusetts for nearly a decade. In central Wisconsin, the data were collected by environmental pioneer Aldo Leopold beginning in the mid-1930s.
“The striking finding is that we see the same pattern in Wisconsin as we see in Massachusetts,” Davis said. “It’s amazing that these areas are so far apart and yet we’re seeing the same things–it speaks to a larger phenomenon taking place in the eastern United States.”
“Thoreau and Leopold are icons of the American environmental movement and it is astonishing that the records both kept decades ago can be used today to demonstrate the impacts of climate change on plant flowering times,” Primack said.
While it’s clear that continued monitoring of flowering times is needed, Davis also expressed hope that the study provides a tangible example of the potential consequences of climate change.
“The problem of climate change is so massive, the temptation is for people to tune out,” Davis said. “But I think being aware that this is indeed happening is one step in the right direction of good stewardship of our planet.” Davis continued. “When we talk about future climate change, it can be difficult to grasp. Humans may weather these changes reasonably well in the short-term, but many organisms in the tree of life will not fare nearly as well.”
“D Böehm Stealey says:
January 18, 2013 at 3:28 pm
Shehan says:
“Pacific Islanders whose homes are 2 metres or less above current sea level and are suffering from more frequent inundations with storm surges do not consider global warming a good thing.”
I was discussing pacific Islands. The Maldives are not on the Pacific.
The people of the Pacific islands of Kiribati are not reacting to nonsense. They are reacting to their own experience:
Villagers with seawater lapping at their feet have been forced to abandon settlements. Freshwater supplies and crops have been ruined by salt water, while storms are causing shoreline erosion…
”This is the last resort, there’s no way out of this one,” Mr Tong said. ”Our people will have to move as the tides have reached our homes and villages.”
Mr Tong, who said the effects of climate change were a daily battle for his people,
In response to your off topic attack on me I once again I ask:
What is the purpose of series 7 and the entirely superfluous yellow line on this graph if not to hide the truth about the magnitude and rate of global temeprature rise?
http://tinyurl.com/bkoy8or
Pardon me. Left out the link on Kiribati:
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/sea-levels-force-kiribati-to-ask-fijians-for-new-home-20120308-1unan.html
@William Howard McClenney:
Per “anyone else”: Yes. Me.
http://chiefio.wordpress.com/2013/01/04/lunar-cycles-more-than-one/
http://chiefio.wordpress.com/2012/12/15/d-o-ride-my-see-saw-mr-bond/
Shows up at a 1/2 period as well in history:
http://chiefio.wordpress.com/2011/02/22/intermediate-period-half-bond-events/
Externally driven, multi-factor. Primary driver, planetary orbital gravity shifts. Orbital resonance then turns that into at least 2 major secondary effects.
1) Lunar tidal ( that lunar cycle link)
2) Solar variations ( that then cause things like cloud changes)
both coordinated in onset and direction of effect (so endless arguing over sun vs not and total TSI is pointless )
These are then reflected in weather cycle changes (that cause some folks to attribute the changes to ‘natural cycles’ and ‘ocean cycles’) via things like changes in ENSO / PDO / AMO and the bipolar see-saw (that may have some direct tidal component) and that whole loopy vs flat jet stream change… For major cold Europe events, it is a slow down of the gulf stream.
Cycles times happen on all scales, with known common periods matching various lunar / solar cycles (as they are driven by common causes). So 10-12 year 20 year, 58-60 year, 178 year and 1800 year (with variations each way) that give a 1470 / 1500 year average but some harmonics show up at about 900 years ( half 1800 ) and on it goes.
D.O., and Bond events are the same cause / process just in different contexts ( glacial or not) while Heinrich Events are longer cycle.
Most likely we are not due for a Bond Event this time, but we are at a peak of a warming cycle and it is all down hill toward cold for the next 40 years, minimum. Then we get a small warming (but not back to where we are now) and that’s when we head down hard. My best guess is about 300 years. Once we start down on that “dip”, it’s non-recoverable. Doesn’t matter if the next “short” 1500 year Bond Event comes later, or not, we’re past the stability point on insolation north of 60 degrees. Next significant cold excursion, we start the ice cycle…
http://chiefio.wordpress.com/2012/12/29/annoying-lead-time-graph/
There is a very very small chance we can put this off to 700 years, but that is highly unlikely. IFF we can do that, we might make it all the way to the next larger down cycle, but don’t hold your breath. We just don’t have the sunshine up north to make it happen without major coercion
Enjoy..
Notice to Climate Ace, Shehan and others who peddle panic over coral atolls: No Sale
Here’s why- there are thousands of these and none are over a few feet above sea level. If one is being inundated by rising sea levels, then they all must be.
But in fact, none of them are threatened by rising sea levels. One or two might be threatened by subsidence, however.
Shehan and the rest like to frighten themselves. But here is the truth: atolls are coral platforms built atop of ancient volcanos and these giant, weighty masses slowly subside into the oceanic crust of the planet- very slowly. Ordinarily, the growth of the coral keeps pace with the subsidence. But sometimes a sudden tectonic shift will quicken the subsidence. Such shifts are unusual, but do happen.
One such inexplicable tectonic movement involved the Maldives about a half century ago. This time the movement was up, not down, and the Maldives rose about 20 cm in just a decade.
So Shehan, Climate Ace, the rest, go peddle your climate panic elsewhere, please. You will have better luck at SKS or RealClimate or with Joe Romm. Why not try that Laden creep? He would be glad to hear it.
Philip Shehan:
My post at January 18, 2013 at 7:26 am replied to your post at January 18, 2013 at 4:48 am which was addressed to me.
My reply debunked the silly assertions in your post and concluded by asking you
Since then you have mentioned my post but not provided the requested details.
I again ask you to explain what has induced you to think you have supernatural powers to predict the future.
Alternatively, of course, it would be acceptable if
(a) you were to admit you have wasted space on this thread with your nonsense
and
(b) you were to provide readers of the thread with an apology for your nonsense.
Richard
Richard Courtney
I did not answer your post on my supernatural powers as that it was clearly rhetorical and sarcastic and invites the obvoius answer:
I rely on the findings of climate scientists.
By the way your mate D. Boehm Stealey posted this:
“D Böehm Stealey says:
January 18, 2013 at 6:44 am
Unless I am mistaken, Shehan holds the belief that global warming is still accelerating…”
Not a word on the topic of this thread.
You also introduced the subject of my posts on other threads with this statement ( and you bolded it to make sure everyone noticed)
“In conclusion, your post I am answering is as mistaken as your silly assertions (on two WUWT threads) that global warming is “accelerating” when global warming has stalled for 15+ years.”
I responded to your accusation regarding my “silly assertions”.
You come back berating me from mounting a defence of my position, telling me not to go “off topic”.
Well Boehm has gone off topic with an attack on me.
I await your admonition of his conduct.
Philip Shehan:
At January 19, 2013 at 2:57 pm you at last answer my questions concerning your supernatural powers to predict the future saying to me
Oh! So you are relying on the supernatural powers of unstated others?
OK, for sake of argument I will accept that, and I rephrase my question into an alternative set of questions; i.e.
What “findings”?
How is it ;possible to have “findings” about the future?
Are the “climate scientists” who made these “findings” astrologers or are they palmistry readers?
Who are they?
Thanking you in anticipation of your answers
Richard
DDP says:
January 17, 2013 at 11:52 am
So we essentially have a study with limited data from two out of the lower 48. Excellent. And the location of said results were collated from where geographically? I’m going to hazard a guess that some of those locations weren’t quite so urbanized in the 1930s, and definitely not the mid 1850s.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
That triggered a memory. Last spring or the spring before WUWT had a thread on cherry trees in DC maybe? blooming early but it was linked to the Urban Heat Island Effect….
FOUND THESE:
Trees do 8 times better in the New York City Urban Heat Island
Rainfall has a greater impact than rising temperature on crop yields
While looking I found this June 2009 First Ever Ice Wine in Brazil
To make Ice wine the grape have to freeze on the vine just before harvest.
Richard Courtney:
Now let me get this straight.
You tell me off for “disrupting this thread” by responding to your your remarks concerning another thread, tell me to stick to the topic of early flowering plants because “it’s interesting”, refuse to admonish your mate D Boehm Stealey for posting a comment that attacks me and has nothing whatsover to do with the topic, and now you wiant me to answer some stupid question on the entire basis of the climate change question.
People, you see what I am up against here.
Shehan says:
“The people of the Pacific islands of Kiribati are not reacting to nonsense.”
Yes, they are.
Shehan, you are such a complete know-nothing. Here is a thorough explanation of Micronesian islands and sea levels. They are not being inundated by sea level rise, no matter what nonsense you may have been led to believe. Fast-rising sea levels simply are not happening.
And here are more articles debunking all your globaloney nonsense regarding fast-rising sea levels in the South Pacific. It isn’t happening. The fact is that nothing unprecedented or unusual is happening, so quit trying to sell your stupid anti-science alarmism here. We know better. Honestly, you come across like a cult member, trying to convince everyone that your world view is connected to reality. It isn’t.
Shehan, you have swallowed some panic peddling concerning coral atolls, and that is the trouble with you global warmers. You swallow everything uncritically except the truth.
The one thing that is clearly demonstrated, for those who are unfamiliar with D. Boehm Stealey’s missives, is his complete inability to conduct a scientific discussion without descending into personal abuse. But as you can see he has plenty of mates, like mpainter and Richard Courtney.
Boehm’s first link shows a graph indicating that sea levels are rising. It starts at 1992, and the author claims the rise is not “a whole lot”.
A longer term view is available in Figure 3 of this article which explains global sea temperature rises:
http://academics.eckerd.edu/instructor/hastindw/MS1410-001_FA08/handouts/2008SLRSustain.pdf
The highest point on many of these islands is two metres above sea level
The claim that sea water cannot contaminate fresh water in coral islands from below has nothing to do with contamination from storm surges that wash over the islands with increasing frequency as sea levels rise.
The idea that coral atolls “float” is correct, coral island build up over time in response to sea level changes. However this takes time. Time that is not available to Pacific islanders when the sea level rise is rapid due to anthropogenic global warming.
Shehan, the atolls are not threatened by sea level rise. Not the Gilberts, not the Maldives, not Tuvalu, none of them.
You are trying to peddle panic and sell it for science, and you get offended when you are called out. That is your measure.
Philip Shehan:
I am copying all your post at January 19, 2013 at 5:35 pm so it is clear that I am not misrepresenting anything.
NO!
You are disrupting this thread (and other threads) by spouting unsubstantiated nonsense, and I am trying (with no success so far) to get you to consider why your assertions are – and can only be – nonsense.
Your problem is that you are “up against” your own gullibility which has induced you to unquestioningly accept superstitious drivel.
And you have demonstrated your problem in this thread by claiming certain things “will happen”.
For example, at January 18, 2013 at 4:48 am you wrote to me
I replied by demanding you to explain how you can know what “will” happen unless you have supernatural powers to foretell the future.
Eventually, I got you to admit that you were trusting the supernatural powers of unstated “climatologists”.
Let us be clear. NOBODY CAN KNOW WHAT “WILL” HAPPEN.
So, your fears are without foundation.
At best, we can assess possibilities and probabilities. But you are promoting irrational fears of what “will” happen because you have accepted the sales pitch of pseudoscientists.
In this thread, several people have replied to your irrational fears by explaining why and how we know there is no threat of e.g. sea level rise inundating coral atolls. But you are failing to consider these explanations.
In summation:
You are incapable of considering reality because you have adopted superstitious assertions of hucksters. I am trying to help you to escape from their thrall because you will then stop disrupting WUWT threads by spouting their superstitious nonsense.
Richard
The best article explaining in simple terms what is going on with coral island is Here and a companion here and here
The sea level rise is not accelerating, because for one reason there just isn’t much ice left and you also have isostatic rebound due to the weight of tons and tons of ice disappearing. The earth is dynamic anyway with subduction zones and mountain building and erosion.
Article on Is Sea Level Rise Accelerating?
Even that article missed the real point. The true look of sea level rise is show in these
graph 1 and graph 2 the legend to the two graphs states
I really really wish the panicking types could learn the one point that the earth is ALWAYS changing and we have been DARN lucky during the Holocene that it has changes so very very LITTLE. graph 1 and graph 2
They really need to take a couple of courses in geology.
Richard Courtney,
I replied to your sarcastic rhetorical question in as much detail as it deserved, which is very little.
Your response shows what a waste of time responding even that much was with your idiotic rendering of my remarks:
‘Eventually, I got you to admit that you were trusting the supernatural powers of unstated “climatologists”.’
Of course there are uncertainties involved in any prediction based on scientific theories. That is simply a statement of the bleeding obvious to a scientist who also has a postgraduate qualification in the history of science and the nature of scientific knowledge.
I will again provide a link on scientific understanding of sea level rises. http://academics.eckerd.edu/instructor/hastindw/MS1410-001_FA08/handouts/2008SLRSustain.pdf
The paper is somewhat outdated (2008) in that it points out there was a considerable doubt as how much melting of the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets was contributing or will contribute to sea level rise. So much so that the alarmists at the IPCC left out such a contribution to their forecasts of sea level rises to 2100 and the projections relate largely to thermal expansion.
Recently however, measurements have affirmed that Greenland and West Antarctica are losing ice. So I’m afraid Gail Combs statement that “The sea level rise is not accelerating, because for one reason there just isn’t much ice left” is a bit wide of the mark.
http://www.businessinsider.com/antarctica-and-greenland-are-melting-2012-11
Philip Shehan:
Your post at January 20, 2013 at 4:19 am in reply to my post at January 20, 2013 at 3:04 am says
(a) you interpret serious questions as being “sarcasm”
and
(b) you are so locked in your delusions that you reject attempts at help in escaping them.
OK. You have my sympathy for that.
However, since you refuse to even question your superstitious beliefs, it would be helpful if you were to refrain from wasting space on WUWT threads by spouting them.
This is a science blog where superstitious drivel is treated with the contempt which it deserves.
Richard
Richard Courtney: Your colossal arrogance is once again on display. You think this blog should be confined only to comments that agree with your world view.
You claim that I was being “disruptive” because I would not bow to your and Stealey’s hysterical denunciations of my argument that the line in this graph:
http://www1.picturepush.com/photo/a/11901124/img/Anonymous/hadsst2-with-3rd-order-polynomial-fit.jpeg
fits the temperature data in this graph:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3vgl/compress:12/offset/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1880/to:2010/trend/offset
One of the skeptics on this blog capable of engaging in civil discussion, Graham W, conceded my point:
“Philip Shehan: When drawing a straight line through the data from 1880 to 2007, compared to an exponential curve through the same data…Yes, the exponential curve fits the data better than the straight line. “
Your own and Stealey’s attempts to shut down discussion by arrogance, bombast, abuse and misrepresentation will not work on me.
Philip Shehan:
I read your silly post at January 20, 2013 at 2:11 pm.
It wasted seconds of my life. Since you claim to know the unknowable, perhaps you would be so kind as to tell me how I can get those seconds back?
Richard
Philip Shehan says:
January 19, 2013 at 8:45 pm
…..The idea that coral atolls “float” is correct, coral island build up over time in response to sea level changes. However this takes time. Time that is not available to Pacific islanders when the sea level rise is rapid due to anthropogenic global warming.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
RAPID??? It can not be a rapid sea level rise. At least not compared to the onset of a interstadial.
Phillip go take a geology course before you have a heart attack brought on by swallowing this BS.
Shehan says:
“The one thing that is clearly demonstrated, for those who are unfamiliar with D. Boehm Stealey’s missives, is his complete inability to conduct a scientific discussion without descending into personal abuse. But as you can see he has plenty of mates, like mpainter and Richard Courtney.”
Those names are only a very few of those who disagree with Shehan. The list is long.
Note that the rest of us do not snivel and cry over perceived slights. Rather, we are interested in the real world. To the extent that Shehan complains about “bombast”, etc., he is avoiding facing the verifiable fact that sea levels are not rising any more than they have since the LIA. Thus, Shehan’s argument fails.
Stealey again misses the point.
I am a scientist and disagreement is part of normal scientific discourse. I have no problem with those who disagree with me. It is unsurprising that on a website run and populated by climate skeptics, many will disagree with me. So what?
My problem is with people like Stealey and Courtney who are unable to engage in reasoned scientific debate. The fact that Stealey writes about “snivelling” and “crying” over “percieved slights” when I object to repeated accusations that I am a fraud and a liar and many other personal insults shows just what these characters think normal scientific discussion is about.
These people are not skeptics. They have an utter intolerance of any argument with disagrees with their fixed position and resort to abuse and misrepresentation.
Courtney call the entire field of climate science “pseudoscience” and “superstition” . He also writes:
“This is a science blog where superstitious drivel is treated with the contempt which it deserves.”
That is not skepticism. That is outright antiscience nonsense.
True skeptics critically examine the science, without rancour, and are prepared to change their ideas in the light of the examination of the evidence.
As a professional scientist I have always been and remain a skeptic. I was for a long time unconvinced that AGW was real. Skeptical enquiry cased me to change my opinion. Further evidence may cause me to change my opinion again.
This is impossible for fanatics like Courtney and Stealey.
Actually, Shehan, if you would only look into the matter, you will find that atolls can evolve quite rapidly. They will change shape, grow in area or diminish, as storm and storm tide move coral debris onshore or offshore. The slight rise in sea level is no sweat for an atoll- if you would only look into it. But, Shehan, if it don’t spell panic you are not interested. I know your type well.
@mpainter is right, Shehan really should learn about atolls. I used to think exactly like he did, that SLR would in fact be a problem for Kiribati and places like it, then I learned how atolls work. Even the government of the islands doesn’t believe the SLR claims. As evidence, they’ve gone on a building campaign to put in more airports, without fear of inundation. See here:
http://www.maldivestourismupdate.com/2009/07/11-new-airports-to-be-constructed-in.html
http://doingadvancework.blogspot.com/2011/09/maldives-crying-for-climate-reparations.html
Shehan says:
“I am a scientist …”
Not a very good one. The only honest kind of scientist is a skeptical scientist, and Shehan is anything but skeptical. He believes in catastrophic AGW, but without any credible, verifiable facts supporting his belief. AGW may exist to some minor extent. But it is so minuscule that it can be completely disregarded.
A scientific skeptic rigorously follows the scientific method. Shehan does not; he follows the alarmist and unreliable SkS blog instead. A corollary of the scientific method is the Null Hypothesis, which has never been falsified [cf: Dr. Roy Spencer]. The climate Null Hypothesis states that current climate parameters have been routinely exceeded in the past. Therefore, current conditions are neither unprecedented, nor unusual. The very minor 0.7ºC natural global warming rise over the past century and a half is extremely benign by the standards of the Holocene — during which global temperatures have abruptly changed by tens of degrees over short, decadal time scales — without CO2 being a factor. Direct observation shows that CO2 simply does not matter at current or projected levels. That is why global temperatures are not rising, despite CO2 being at 395 ppmv. Any effect from CO2 on global temperature is just too small to measure.
Shehan is not a good scientist because his mind is made up and closed air tight. He is a True Believer in the repeatedly debunked runaway global warming fantasy. The CO2=CAGW conjecture has been shown to be nonsense by the ultimate Authority: Planet Earth. But some folks are so fixated on “carbon” that they are incapable of accepting reality: global warming is not accelerating. It is decelerating. Most folks can deal with that fact. But not all.
Thank You Mr Watts I will read the links.
However I still have concerns based on the links I provided including the 2008 paper on sea level rise and the recent studies showing the loss of Ice from the Greenland and the Antarctic.
The matter of sea levels is different for different islands in different oceans as islands can go up or down with local subsidence or uplift of the seabed or the building of more coral reefs.
The Maldives may be unconcerned but that of Kiribati clearly is as its leader was shown at the recent climate change meeting pleading that the issue of AGW was a matter of his country’s survival. He may be wrong but he is certainly concerned.
@Philip Shehan – the president is paid to be concerned. Follow the money.