Guest essay by Eric Worrall
According to an outpouring of ecological grief from Inside Climate News, the Aussie bushfires are a sign all the trees in the world are about to die from heat stress and fire.
In Australia’s Burning Forests, Signs We’ve Passed a Global Warming Tipping Point
‘Nobody saw it coming this soon,’ one scientist said. ‘It’s likely the forests won’t be coming back as we know them.’
BY BOB BERWYN, INSIDECLIMATE NEWS
JAN 8, 2020As extreme wildfires burn across large swaths of Australia, scientists say we’re witnessing how global warming can push forest ecosystems past a point of no return.
Some of those forests won’t recover in today’s warmer climate, scientists say. They expect the same in other regions scarred by flames in recent years; in semi-arid areas like parts of the American West, the Mediterranean Basin and Australia, some post-fire forest landscapes will shift to brush or grassland.
More than 17 million acres have burned in Australia over the last three months amid record heat that has dried vegetation and pulled moisture from the land. Hundreds of millions of animals, including a large number of koalas, are believed to have perished in the infernos. The survivors will face drastically changed habitats. Water flows and vegetation will change, and carbon emissions will rise as burning trees release carbon and fewer living trees are left to pull CO2 out of the air and store it.
In many ways, it’s the definition of a tipping point, as ecosystems transform from one type into another.
The surge of large, destructive forest fires from the Arctic to the tropics just in the last few years has shocked even researchers who focus on forests and fires and who have warnedof such tipping points for years.
The projections were seen as remote, “something that would happen much farther in the future,” said University of Arizona climate scientist David Breashers. “But it’s happening now. Nobody saw it coming this soon, even though it was like a freight train.
“It’s likely the forests won’t be coming back as we know them.“
…
Read more: https://insideclimatenews.org/news/08012020/australia-wildfires-forest-tipping-points-climate-change-impact-wildlife-survival
The truth of course is such claims are just as absurd as “end of snow” predictions.
Will the forest change? Of course it will. Forests are dynamic systems, there is always change; especially after a major event like a large bushfire.
Will anybody notice anything different in 10 years? Hopefully what people will notice is the scorch marks of more frequent controlled burns and larger firebreaks, indications of competent forest management to ensure fewer koalas get crisped in the next large fire.
Somehow I remember the same forecasts being made after the Yellowstone fires of 1988. My family and I went on a trip up there in either 1990 or 1991, and yes, it was quite devastating to see all the destruction.
Fast-forward thirty years, and most of the destroyed areas have recovered quite nicely. There are now thirty-year old forests growing where there was barren char, and from what I understand, quite healthy. And yes, we’ve had dry years, and wet years, and every kind of (“normal”) weather since then. When you consider that most of what burned had to struggle with just 300 ppm of CO2, and today’s forests are able to eat air with about 25% more nutrient, it’s hard to imagine that the forest is “struggling” to survive.
Regards to all,
Vlad
Just so, Vlad! Climate Catastrophism impaled…..
I was at Yellowstone about that time too. Except then the Park Rangers kept telling us how good the fires were for the ecosystem. They probably will be unemployed, or blacklisted by the climate cabal, if they dared to say that today.
People do not realize that fires play an important role in the planet. For instance, in the southeastern US there is a pine tree called the long leaf pine. For the first 5 years of its life it hardly grows, but it is almost fireproof. Other trees grow at a steady rate. After those first 5 years, this tree grows faster than other trees. Without a fire, this tree will lose the competition for sunlight. But with a fire, this tree thrives. Why is there a tree that needs fire to survive if fire a problem in the climate change world?
Inside Climate News. Would “fake news” be more descriptive?
Weekly World News, aka Batboy Central.
https://youtu.be/upy63RIRcrc?t=76
CO2 puts out fires.
Not at 410 ppm, obviously.
But, but, but,
Why do I bother to check the CO2 fire extinguishers at work then?????
The only check is for pressure.
These predictions are invalidated by reality.
In the Mediterranean, the Roman period was, it has been proved, 1-1.5°C warmer. There were trees the and there are trees now, almost the same trees.
In southern France, wildfires used to burn thousands of hectares 20 or 25 years ago. Since then, forests have been managed differently. There are still some fires, but with a reduced extent and easier to control.
It hasn’t been “Proved”. It’s likely, but not a 100% certainty.
Some Oz sclerophyll forest botany for dummies although knowing the catastrophists they’ll likely lobby YouTube to pull it and those parks officers will go the way of Peter Ridd-
Good pick observa. For those unfamiliar with the ecology of eucalypt forests, this is a good lesson on how they have adapted to the wildfire regime. Producing prolific regrowth to promote the fuel needed for the next fire so the rotation can continue.
Thank you for finding and posting this.
I was up there12 months ago and can attest to the regeneration. The same can be said for the Mt Macedon fires a generation before. The recuperation powers of the Aussie bush is something you have to witness to believe. Now that the placard waving mobs have had their say, I hope they now get out of the way and let nature get on with the job.
and heres VERY recent fireburnt areas already doing their thing..
https://www.wakingtimes.com/2020/01/10/breathtaking-photos-show-plants-in-australia-already-regrowing-across-fire-ravaged-landscapes/
dont expect msm to rush to print this to cheer anyone up..or ruin their meme
Not only Australian forest fores are caused by CC, also Canadian forests ignited by ATV’s are due to all the horrible life-giving tax-giving CO₂ according to PM Trudeau.
“Fraud: Trudeau Uses Photo Of Forest Fire Caused By Wind Turbine Construction Project To Sell His Carbon Tax Scam”
https://wattsupwiththat.com/?s=fraud+trudeau+uses+photo+forest+fire
Everything happened before.
https://realclimatescience.com/2020/01/1937-alaskas-glaciers-shrinking-a-forest-fire-every-three-minutes/
Don’t the doomsters know we were all doomed by 2000 so there’s no need to labour the point for the kiddies sakes- https://apnews.com/bd45c372caf118ec99964ea547880cd0
Well I suppose they could tell Greta to go home and give mum and dad a serve for having her after the dooming.
Yes, we have reached a tipping point where guilt driven mindlessness has won over logical thought. Climate science is just one of many victums.
From the article: “Some of those forests won’t recover in today’s warmer climate, scientists say.”
Today’s climate is actually cooler, not warmer, having cooled by 0.3C since 2016. Those “scientists” can’t be talking about the present day, and so they are not describing reality today. They are describing a situation that only exists in their minds.
UAH satellite chart:
http://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/UAH_LT_1979_thru_December_2019_v6.jpg
“It’s likely the forests won’t be coming back as we know them.”
The trees may be the same species but they will be different trees, so no the forests won’t be coming back as we know them.”
True. Remember, you can’t bathe twice in the same river….
No the fires get rid of a lot of the introduced weed species as the locals are adapted to fire and reseed and come back quicker.
“It’s likely the forests won’t be coming back as we know them.”
Apparently we have reached peak trees.
Who needs trees? Just throw up another 50,000 wind turbines. No problem.
(Saves cutting the trees down in the first place. A win-win.)
Exactly. Clear the land to pave the way for unobstructed wind turbine and pv panel placement. Also, in addition to planned population schemes, implement sardine or crabs in a bucket population management practices. It worked for China to occupy the land, progress the Green blight, and facilitate human resource management through behavior modification – a new religion in deference to mortal gods and secular ambitions.
The best places for wind turbines have very few or no trees. The survivors are blasted by wind into interestingly twisted, living wreckage.
“It is worse than we expected, much worse”. Funny how they so often admit they were very wrong. How can they be trusted for the future. Chances are they are just as wrong in the opposite direction!
‘The End Is Nye!”
Mass psychosis, writ large…. by the latest in a looooong string of climate catastrophists.
Peak arson?
“Nobody saw it coming this soon,”
—————————-
Oh gimme a break! The econuts saw it coming much sooner than this. They’ve been setting deadlines and dates (that passed without happening) for decades. When it doesn’t happen, you’ll deny you ever said it.
Malibu is not in the news the way it was but it looks remarkably…THE SAME ! ! ! After two major fire years, Da Bu is alive and well. The thing that gets me is that if the Leftwinger Warmunist Climateers want to “live in harmony with nature” then fire, driven by hot, dry 50 mph Santa Ana winds are part of the package. Nature.
Someone forgot to tell the trees they won’t recover.
http://countryconservatives.proboards.com/thread/10165/australia?page=2
In my area of Australia in 2009 we had large bushfires and sadly , as we did not have the warning systems we have today, 173 lives were lost.
A few week after the fires I stood in a car layby outside the totally devasted town of Kinglake. It was totally burnt from floor to canopy, black as far as you could see and devoid of any sound or life. The same spot today is healthy young forest. The people are doom spreaders and have no idea of natural cycles and how nature recovers. We have had some rain over much of the fireground area, the process will already have begun.
Ditto Yarpos. I came up to the area in early March 2009 to visit our daughter who had had a harrowing time (we were living back in England at the time of the fires). There was the long way round drive to get here as the Black Spur road was still closed. Everything was black and brown for miles and miles but it rained and the first shoots of growth were already showing. In Marysville, on the 15th March, where our old place had been, there were loads of new shoots and now, 11 years later, everything is burgeoning…too much in fact.
Just try stopping robust old nature…
The tipping point claim should be the turning point for the direction of government action. Once the tipping point has been past which is claimed then all attempts to change things should cease. The passing of the tipping point implies all actions to avert the coming calamity is futile. No more funds spent on subsidies for renewables , no need to develop electric vehicles , no point in having an Emmission Trading Scheme, no funding of climate change research ( the science is settled anyway). Whatever funds or wealth being created should be spent not on trying to change the climate from it cataclysmic direction but keeping your financial ammunition dry to fight climate change by spending those resources on adaption. Spend money on forest management, cheap electricity , seaside walls, coal fired power stations. It’s too late to stop the consequences of climate change, the best way to manage is to make sure every human being has access to air conditioning and the only way to do that is with affordable electricity.
So the only conclusion one can make is that there has to be a complete stop to spending on trying to stop climate change for the sake of future generations.
Most of the World today is too cold or too dry, or both, for trees to grow.
50 million years ago, during the Eocene hothouse the World was essentially one huge forest, from Pole to Pole.
“Hundreds of millions of animals”…
Did they count all the ants?…
Now, it is actually true that this interglacial is unique in Australia. In earlier interglacials eucalypts were much less dominant. There was a lot more of e. g. Dacrydium, rain forests and other forest types.
However about 40,000 years ago things changed. Here is a pollen profile from Lynch’s Crrater on Atherton Tablelands:
This is one of the longest continuous records in Australia and goes right back to MIS 7, the second interglacial back. Notice how rainforest and Dacrydium dominate during interglacials and Araucaria during ice-ages. Eucalypts are a not very common, though they do increase a bit during (the drier) glacial periods. (For those not familiar with the Pleistocene, MIS 2, 4 and 6 were glaciations, MIS 1, 5 and 7 interglacial. MIS 3 was a milder interval during the last glaciation, an “interstadial”.)
Then, about 40,000 years ago something happens. Eucalypts and Poaceae (=grasses) increase abruptly, and everything else almost disappears. The reason? Look at the right column, charcoal, previously quite rare, suddenly becomes common. The aborigines, and with them fire, had come to Australia.
If only it were possible to avoid all bushfires for several centuries it is quite likely that Australian forests would ultimately change into something much more like earlier interglacials, and much less fire-prone than the current eucalypt-dominated forests.
If only…., or as my grandmother used to say, “if it hadn’t been for the “if”, the farmer would have gored the bull”.
I’m not totally convinced that the rise of the eucalypts was entirely to do with fires, although that certainly played a crucial part. The change to a drier climate along with regular burning would seem to have been a perfect storm for many competing vegetation types.
In short, eucalypts dominate a continent and one of the World’s largest islands partly due to climate change. Real climate change. This cannot have been the only climate change the lineage experienced either. The likelihood is that, as possibly with marsupials as well, their origins were outside Australia (but still in old Gondwana). The break-up of Gondwana and subsequent continental drift is just one major change that they obviously survived.
Releasing a bit of plant food into the atmosphere isn’t going to kill them off. Anyone who thinks otherwise is not listening to the science.