Who would have thought – apparently a few degrees of global warming won’t make the cold North Eastern states of America, and Eastern Canada, into blazing hot uninhabitable deserts.
Northeastern North America as a potential refugium for boreal forests in a warming climate
A future for boreal forests
Conservation under climate change presents the challenge of predicting where will be suitable for particular organisms and ecological communities in the future. D’Orangeville et al. assess the probable future range for boreal forests in eastern North America, which are expected to be subject to large temperature increases in their natural range. Using tree-ring data from many thousands of forest stands, they delineate the geographical extent of the region where tree growth responds favorably to higher temperatures and where the forest should persist at least until 2070.
Abstract
High precipitation in boreal northeastern North America could help forests withstand the expected temperature-driven increase in evaporative demand, but definitive evidence is lacking. Using a network of tree-ring collections from 16,450 stands across 583,000 km2 of boreal forests in Québec, Canada, we observe a latitudinal shift in the correlation of black spruce growth with temperature and reduced precipitation, from negative south of 49°N to largely positive to the north of that latitude. Our results suggest that the positive effect of a warmer climate on growth rates and growing season length north of 49°N outweighs the potential negative effect of lower water availability. Unlike the central and western portions of the continent’s boreal forest, northeastern North America may act as a climatic refugium in a warmer climate.
Read more: http://science.sciencemag.org/content/352/6292/1452
The press release;
The Most Hopeful Place On Earth For Climate Change
Eastern Canada’s black spruce forests are one of the largest untamed wilderness areas on Earth. And in refreshingly optimistic news, parts of this ecosystem are expected to flourish in a warmer world, creating a refuge for species escaping drought-stricken regions to the south and west.
That’s the conclusion of a sweeping new analysis of black spruce trees across 225,000 square miles of forest in Canada’s Quebec province. The research, published today in Science, offers clues as to how this vast ecosystem will fare under human-caused climate change. While the boreal forest’s southern and western regions are likely to struggle with drought in a hotter future, parts of eastern Canada north of the 49th parallel could see a net benefit as the growing season lengthens.
“Climactically speaking, this looks like a system that can take what we think is going to happen in the next 20 or 30 years,” Harvard ecologist and study co-author Neil Pederson told Gizmodo. “It’s hope. It’s a bright spot.”
The boreal forests of North America and Eurasia are some of the most pristine wildlands on the planet. In addition to providing habitat for dozens of charismatic animals, from moose and caribou to foxes and migratory birds, they’re a massive carbon sink, locking away hundreds of billions of tons of organic matter in their soils. That means these forests are not only a sanctuary for biodiversity, but an important regulator of global climate.
“The trees are telling us that it might not be so bad.”
Read more: http://gizmodo.com/the-most-hopeful-place-on-earth-for-climate-change-1782054245
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
@ur momisugly Tom in Texas
I know the (last 43 years) Gleisberg from my own data on maxima and minima
(as shown earlier on this thread)
looking at rainfall is also interesting, chaotic year-to-year, yet it [always] works like the pendulum of a clock
But, but but —- what about them cute little rat thingies on the tiny island barely above sea level…?? Oh yeah… they all drownd’ed. As white-coated specialists in endangered species watched and counted down to zero, gleefully anticipating the demise for its publicity value.
“We shall avenge your death.”
“This is taking too long.”
“Get off my leg!”
“Now little fella don’t struggle, just let it happen.”
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=nn8YubD01sk
But perhaps Eccles’ “l talk to the trees: that’s why they put me away” is more appropriate.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=e61uC-5s9VU
There are no inductive inferences.
Karl Popper
@MarkW
going west or east is dumb
going south is smart
during the coming cooling period
go figure
Going south in a cooling period is only smart if you live in the Northern hemisphere. It might surprise you to learn that not everyone does.
Howdy
yes it is true
i who live in the SH should move north towards the equator
glad to know somebody knows what to do when the big drought starts.
@Samuel
I am convinced that rainfall (water) is the dominant factor that would influence tree growth.
You can believe what you want, but your story of great differences between trees standing 100 yards apart is hard to accept.
if you want to learn about solar cycles, there is no easy way.
It is a long way to Tipperary…
@ur momisugly HenryP
In many locales, rainfall is a dominant factor, …… but is really unimportant in other locales.
Tree growth does not depend on any rainfall ….. iffen those trees are growing at a Desert Oasis, …. or growing on the “flatland” of a river channel with their roots in the “water table” ….. or growing on the banks of a lake, river, stream or pond,
HenryP, I can only offer you “the FACTS”, …. it’s your option to believe or not believe them to be true.
A tree out in “the open” will grow faster than multiple trees in a group.
Mineral nutrients in the soil can be different 50 to 100 yards apart.
Soil moisture decreases as elevation increases, …. thus a tree growing 50 to 100 yards up on top or on the side of a hill DO NOT HAVE ACCESS to as much ground moisture as do the trees growing down-slope or at the bottom of the hill.
Trees that are growing in “the shade” of hills, mountains, buildings or the canopy of other trees …. for a portion of every day … do not grow as fast as a similar tree that is not “shaded”. The morning Sunshine never strikes the trees growing on the Western side of a hill until the afternoon. And the trees growing on the Eastern side of the hill gets no direct Sunshine during the afternoon.
And HenryP, just what makes you think I need to “learn about solar cycles”? Or was that just an “ad lib” for lack of something knowledgeable to say?
So
compare tree rings of trees at same altitude and latitude….
going south in a period of global cooling makes sense to me
you tell me why
@ur momisugly HenryP
I am not sure what you are asking me to tell you.
Anyway, my learned opinion (given my AB in Biological Science which included Botany) is, …. the use of “growth rings” as proxy data for determining past weather or climate conditions of hundreds to thousands of years BP (Before Present) is little more than an act of futility on the part of the researcher.
HenryP, ‘click’ this hyperlink and read about the Science of “growth ring” dating, ….. Dendrochronology
But don’t get too excited when you read where it states …… “used to determine certain aspects of past ecologies (most prominently climate)” ….. simply because 1 or 2 or a few ancient timbers, that no one knows where they were timbered at, makes for a highly questionable “climate guessing” game.
Dear Sam
I appreciate your comments and they do make great sense to me.
I know a lot about chemistry and about stats.
Your comments tell me exactly what the problem is –
which I faced as well when putting together my own graphs of global minima and maxima:
you have to design a very specific sampling procedure if you want to make the tree rings tell you something important.
perhaps, like me, it would help if you balanced your (tree) samples to zero latitude and a certain altitude and look only at the [average] rate of changes in size per annum?
Unfortunately that is already 3 parameters, which is one too many.
@Sam
perhaps to further clarify:
my sample of weather stations here:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/06/16/claim-the-trees-are-telling-us-it-might-not-be-so-bad/comment-page-1/#comment-2239042
is balanced on latitude (to zero)
I figured longitude would not matter as long as we looked at the change per annum
I remember having an argument with Anthony about the validity of the graph as altitude was excluded as a factor.
I think in my case, altitude does not matter as long as we look at the rate of change, which is an absolute figure.