From the UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH FLORIDA (USF HEALTH) and the whackadoodle department comes this press release that just screams “robust science”. I mean, just look at that poor butterfly in the photo included in the press release, can’t you tell just how “out of whack” it is?
Changing weather patterns throwing ecosystems out of whack
TAMPA, Fla (Feb. 5, 2018)- Day and night will soon align, marking the start of spring. But the timing of nature’s calendar is starting to fall out of sync.
In a study published in Nature Climate Change, a team of researchers from the University of South Florida in Tampa found that animal species are shifting the timing of their seasonal activities, also known as phenology, at different rates in response to changing seasonal temperatures and precipitation patterns.
“As species’ lifecycles grow out of alignment, it can affect the functioning of ecosystems with potential impacts on human food supplies and diseases,” said lead author Jeremy Cohen, PhD, postdoctoral researcher at the University of South Florida Department of Integrative Biology. “We rely on honeybees to pollinate seasonal crops and migratory birds to return in the spring to eat insects that are crop pests and vectors of human diseases. If the timing of these and other seasonal events are off, ecosystems can malfunction with potentially adverse effects on humans.”
Dr. Cohen and his team found that cold-blooded species and those with small body sizes are breeding or aggregating earlier than warm-blooded or large-bodied species in spring. They come to this conclusion after reviewing thousands of records of phenological shifts dating back to the 1950s.
“Our research elucidates the drivers of phenological responses and the traits of organisms that influence their ability to track changing climates,” said co-author Jason Rohr, PhD, professor at the University of South Florida. “We expect these findings to improve our ability to forecast the locations, systems and species that might be at the greatest risk from climate change and ideally mitigate any adverse effects that these changes might have on the services that ecosystems provide to humans.”
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The study: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-018-0067-3
A global synthesis of animal phenological responses to climate change
Abstract
Shifts in phenology are already resulting in disruptions to the timing of migration and breeding, and asynchronies between interacting species1,2,3,4,5. Recent syntheses have concluded that trophic level1, latitude6 and how phenological responses are measured7 are key to determining the strength of phenological responses to climate change. However, researchers still lack a comprehensive framework that can predict responses to climate change globally and across diverse taxa. Here, we synthesize hundreds of published time series of animal phenology from across the planet to show that temperature primarily drives phenological responses at mid-latitudes, with precipitation becoming important at lower latitudes, probably reflecting factors that drive seasonality in each region. Phylogeny and body size are associated with the strength of phenological shifts, suggesting emerging asynchronies between interacting species that differ in body size, such as hosts and parasites and predators and prey. Finally, although there are many compelling biological explanations for spring phenological delays, some examples of delays are associated with short annual records that are prone to sampling error. Our findings arm biologists with predictions concerning which climatic variables and organismal traits drive phenological shifts.
Figures: (captions are theirs, yes, really.)
I notice Yamal has no study done, that a great place to go if you want to just study one animal and call it a proxy for world climate change. Just ask Mann and Briffa.
Fig. 3: The ability of phenology to track temperature varies among taxonomic classes of animals, ecto- or endothermy, and trophic level.
So in summary, it is a synthesis. “Here, we synthesize hundreds of published time series of animal phenology from across the planet to show that temperature primarily drives phenological responses at mid-latitudes, with precipitation becoming important at lower latitudes, probably reflecting factors that drive seasonality in each region. ”
There’s nothing like synthesized results to “settle the science”. Perhaps the undue worry is synthesized too. Meanwhile, the animals are adapting, just like they always have, while worried scientists go on with their hand-wringing.
And, they reference this horridly messed up paper:
Parmesan, C. & Yohe, G. A globally coherent fingerprint of climate change impacts across natural systems. Nature 421, 37–42 (2003).
IMHO, Parmesan’s work is garbage, as biologist Jim Steele has told us time and again.
Fabricating Climate Doom – Part 1: Parmesan’s Butterfly Effect
How the American Meteorological Society Justified Publishing Half Truths
Fortunately, Parmesan has fled to France, where she can complain about the schools there.
Where is New Zealand on that map and why has Moscow had it’s biggest snowfall in a Century?
Figure 2 shows an interesting effect. There is a very high correlation between places that studies have been made, and climate researchers. Somebody should do a study on this. Funding, please…
I should have said “the locations of climate researchers”.
“Abstract
This paper is concerned mainly with the differences between obligate and facultative migration in birds. Obligate migration is considered “hard-wired”, in that the bird seems pre-programmed to leave its breeding area at a certain time each year, and to return at another time. Timing, directions and distances are relatively constant from year to year. This type of migration is thus characterised by its regularity, consistency and predictability. It is found in both short-distance and long-distance migrants, but mainly in the latter. In contrast, facultative migration is considered optional, occurring in response to conditions at the time. Individuals may migrate in some years but not in others, depending on the prevailing food supplies or weather conditions. The timing of autumn migration, and the distance travelled, can be highly variable between individuals and, at the population level, between years. Facultative migration is typical of many partial migrants, but is found in its most extreme form in so-called irruptive migrants. While individual obligate migrants typically return to the same breeding localities year after year, and sometimes also to the same wintering localities, individual irruptive migrants typically breed or winter in widely separated areas in different years, wherever conditions are favourable. It is suggested that these two types of migration are best considered not as distinct, but as lying at opposite ends of a continuum of variation in bird migratory behaviour. Both systems are adaptive; one to conditions in which resource levels vary regularly and predictably in space and time, and the other to conditions in which resource levels vary unpredictably. Suggestions are made for experimental work on captive irruptive species.”
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10336-011-0765-3
Key point: “Both systems are adaptive; one to conditions in which resource levels vary regularly and predictably in space and time, and the other to conditions in which resource levels vary unpredictably.”
The migration patterns of many birds have been changed by human activities… like agricultural waste and bird feeders which allow many species to winter further north (and thus ‘arrive’ earlier). These distributions and migration changes are also changed by the (mostly increasing) abundance of bird species. The APPARENT arrival dates are also influenced by the vastly increased number of birdwatchers looking for them. And other factors.
NONE of these factors are considered in the nonsensical Climate Change stories.
That’s a good point, Extreme.
I remember when there was a theory called evolution that talked about natural changes. Poor Darwin, kicked to the curb by global warming theory.
Exactly. The only believe in evolution when it is convenient.
Are you saying “global warming theory”, like evolutionary theory is just another convenient boondoggle?
@zazove.
No. he is saying AGW theory is creationist thinking at work, as if Eden existed and humans were destroying it right now. Now, they may claim they despise creationists, but the fact is, they hail the Pope for supporting just that creationist stance.
paqyfelyc – That is a very odd hypothesis. And what does the Pope have to do with it? Catholicism isn’t creationist.
Oh, but, Sheri, Trofim Lysenko disputed natural changes and insisted that Lysenkoism was superior to Mendelian genetics. He kicked Darwin to the curb, too!
All that quackery resulted in the starvation deaths of ONLY several million Russians and about 30+ million Chinese.
My attempt at understanding their paper led me to the description == “gobbledygook”.
What they have discovered is that things change — the timing of biological events, the weather, the rainfall, leaf out, leaf fall, first frost, last frost, — all of these change. Their findings of correlations between what’s changing in sync with what is …. well, statistical gobbledygook.
As some ancient Greek once said: Nothing endures but change. Or: Change is the only constant. Or more obtusely: You never cross the same river twice. They said it in Greek of course.
If we could just eliminate time we could stop it.
“Parmesan’s work is garbage, as biologist Jim Steele has told us time and again.”
Oy. Just because someone says another’s work is garbage doesn’t make it so. It’s very easy to criticize someone who isn’t around to argue their point. That becomes a very convenient and extremely common strategy when one is trying to convince the public of something.
Indeed unsupported criticisms are easy. Likewise unsupported rebuttals are easy.
However my criticisms are totally backed by strong evidence, so you must now provide your evidence that my criticisms of Parmesan are not justified.
Start by reading http://landscapesandcycles.net/American_Meterological_Society_half-truth.html
Then tell us why the harsh criticisms of Parmesan’s bunk “science” is not justified!
Hello Jim, nice to see a response from the man himself.
I read your argument and the letter you sent and the responses. Then I went to Parmesan’s ariticle to see what your beef was about. I’m afraid I find for Parmesan. She says “set of populations,” not all populations. She is discussing what happens in this set. That is interesting in itself, independently of the information about the other populations; whether they were near or far, thriving or not doesn’t alter the fact that the butterflies in some habitats were vulnerable to mass die-off due to weather/climate. Not terribly interesting in itself, but because this is a review and not the original paper there doesn’t need to be any mention of the other set of populations. That’s something for the original paper to discuss; it can’t be adequately addressed in the review without taking an inordinate amount of space.
I do, though, think “carving a path to extinction in a whole set of populations” is hyperbole. It’s hard to completely dehumanize one’s technical writing, but that’s a little much. At least it could have said, “extirpation.”. There is certainly nothing here worthy of retraction, in my opinion, in fact that seems a bit odd. You are talking about the review, right?.
Anyway, that’s my honest opinion. I’m an ecologist and though I don’t do research anymore I’m no stranger to the literature, methods and, most important, the methodology of science like this – but neither would you be. Is it all about the climate issue?
From your website:
” It became clear that the Sierra Nevada were not overheating despite publications blaming wildlife extinctions on global warming. The most important factors affecting local climate change were the cycles of El Nino and the Pacific Decadal Oscillation as well as landscape changes that had greatly altered the regional microclimates. Believing the politics of global warming have been misguiding conservation efforts,…. “.
Huh. I don’t see how you got from the first bit to the last sentence. No one says the whole planet will get warmer. It could well be that the most important factors in LOCAL “climate change” are natural cycles -.but that that’s not climate change. Landscape changes could alter the local climate, and they have altered global climate. None of this, though, contradicts AGW theory.
“There’s nothing like synthesized results to “settle the science”.”
This should read: more solid research showing many species are probably being affected by AGW – but conspicuously not, a small number of English speaking homo sapiens.
Species are just labels put on living beings (or even dead beings, for that matter. the last T. Rex was long dead before someone cared to name the specie). They are unaffected by climate.
Living being are affected by weather, not climate, either.
“many species are probably being affected by AGW” is just nonsense.
LOL
Could someone please quantify this ‘Whack’ – preferably using known SI-units. Thanks.
“published in Nature Climate Change”
Says it all. You NEED trash bins, and this journal is just that.
It is very surprising and delightful that such irresponsible discourse may be created on the basis of our present knowledge. During history, perhaps, this was not the case when outdated views resisted so controversial despite the facts. Maybe this is the survival of the Middle Ages.
Insect, fish and many invertebrates are continually changing their phenology. That is how insects and marine fish have been around for so long. Rothschild hypothesized marine fishes’ reproductive strategy was to continually “taste” the environment. Billfish and Tunas spawn over a fairly broad area, beginning early in the spring and spawning several times before the end of their spawning season usually in late summer and early fall some months later. Insects have similar strategies. It allows both groups to adapt to continually changing environmental conditions, which have in their long history included more than a few dramatic climate changes. I had a real problem with their graph b and c in the first set of graphs. Those graphs tell me nothing. A shotgun blast would be just as meaningful.