Cover crops, crop rotation and no-till practices can improve soil health, improve nutrient and water-use efficiency and boost yields while simultaneously reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Photo: NRCS

The Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) is a Department of Agriculture agency that helps farmers, ranchers and other landowners both mitigate and adapt to the consequences of climate change.

For example, the NRCS promotes conservation practices that store, or sequester, carbon in the soil, reducing the amount of atmospheric greenhouse gasses while simultaneously adding organic matter to the soil. Farmers benefit not only from increased soil fertility but from the expanded capacity of such soil to capture and retain water, which builds resiliency to several recognized hallmarks of climate change: extreme precipitation events, high temperatures and drought.

Another NRCS program attacked the root cause of climate change, the burning of fossil fuels, by providing financial assistance to replace old combustion engines with newer, less polluting ones.

Studies conducted by the NRCS help farmers and ranchers understand and prepare for what they are likely to face under climate change. Identifying conservation standards that positively reduce greenhouse gas emissions and increase carbon sequestration, the NRCS enables conservation planners to choose practices that are most effective in addressing the consequences of a rapidly changing climate. The NRCS has developed the world’s largest soil carbon data set, establishing a benchmark against which future soil carbon levels can be measured. (more…)

More jack pines are cut as weather limits access to other species. Graphic: dnr.wi.gov

Winter warming is reducing lumberjack access to New England forests, declare loggers who have worked outdoors in upstate New York for decades. Late freeze dates and early thaws are shortening the harvest season and lengthening the seasons of mud, during which forests become inaccessible. Unreliable winter roads reduce the number of work days for loggers and increase costs as outfits build gravel roads to ensure access to operations. Converting skidders to swamp “balloon” tires to ply the mud  is possible, but poses risks to the environment as knubby tires on heavy equipment can tear up fragile soils and cause silting in streams

The loggers’ observations, related in a story first published in The Daily Climate, are corroborated by a study of seven Wisconsin counties that correlated records of public-land harvests to temperatures over the past 60 years . The  study determined that frozen-ground conditions have declined by two to four weeks since 1949. Weather also influences the kind of tree cut: as winter conditions become more variable, Wisconsin loggers are favoring cutting timber grown on sandy, well-drained soils.

Sure seems like apple trees were blooming this time last year, or is that just a failure of memory? Was last year normal, or is this year? Are we experiencing customary annual fluctuations, or a trend toward a different climate norm?

In order to answer such questions the National Phenology Network relies on volunteers across the continent reporting their observations. Set up under the aegis of the U.S. Geological Survey and the National Science Foundation, the network aims to develop a technical daybook of seasonal changes. Beyond satisfying the simply curious and the scientifically minded, such data is useful in agricultural forecasting, wildlife management and health advisories.

The more widespread the observation points and thorough the data collection, the more valuable the collected data will be. Therefore there is an ongoing need to enlist volunteers willing to do local observation, species inventory and project monitoring. The network provides broad support for individuals, groups and organizations interested in recording what’s happening to local plant and animal populations, either seasonally or on a long-term basis.

The network attracts even those who never set a foot outdoors. People can delve into data on the network’s web site and get answers about when those apple trees flowered in past years. Interactive tools make it easy to select sites, map species, track present and historic phenology and overlay temperature and precipitation information. Reports available for downloading summarize regional observations, booklets describe monitoring methodologies and a bibliography has links to papers examining various aspects of phenology and climate change.

That this story was deemed worthy of an article in the Wall Street Journal might harbinger another kind of change: could mainstream media’s interest in and coverage of climate issues be warming up?

A warming world is reducing global biodiversity and threatening the provision of ecosystem services that people depend on, say scientists contributing to the report Technical Input to the 2013 National Climate Assessment.

Forest die-offs such as occurred in these New Mexico pinon pines between October 2002 and May 2004 are projected to become more frequent. Photo: USGS

It occurred millennia ago, and it unfolded over 20,000 years, but the Earth has experienced global warming and acidification of its oceans before.

In a paper published in Nature  (subscription required), researchers propose that the cause of the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum 55 million years ago was the release of stored soil carbon from melting permafrost. As the Earth’s orbit shifted, the overall temperature warmed, leading to thawing in Arctic and Antarctic regions.

“Similar dynamics are at play today” says the paper’s lead author, Rob DeConto,  professor at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. “Global warming is degrading permafrost in the north polar regions, thawing frozen organic matter, which will decay to release CO2 and methane into the atmosphere. This will only exacerbate future warming in a positive feedback loop.”

The researchers point out that melting permafrost will release about as much carbon as deforestation, if current deforestation rates continue. But permafrost releases methane, a more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, which could more than double the overall effect on climate. Whereas ecosystems had thousands of years to adjust to changes during the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum, current global warming is occurring so speedily that natural adaptation could be severely limited.

The paper contributes to the scientific examination of the consequences of warming polar regions, as reviewed by Climate Progress.

Habitat shifts reducing chipmunks’ genetic diversity

As temperatures in Yosemite National Park have warmed more than five degrees Fahrenheit over the past 100 years, alpine chipmunks have shifted their habitat from 7,800-foot elevations to more than 9,400 feet.  The upslope migration to the cooler climes has fragmented populations of the small mammal, leading to isolated pockets of chipmunks that have become more genetically homogenous when compared to their historic counterparts. 

Conducted by researchers at the University of California Berkeley, the study suggests that “genetically impoverished populations” are more vulnerable to the effects of inbreeding, disease and other problems that threaten species survival. “Under continued warming, the alpine chipmunk could be on the trajectory towards becoming threatened or even extinct,” says the study’s lead author, Emily Rubidge. 

As noted  February 19 in the journal Nature Climate Change (subscription required), the chipmunk study is hailed as the first to empirically link a climate-driven geographic shift in habitat to a species’ loss of genetic diversity. 

Study relates genetic diversity to extinction vulnerability

Looking at genetic composition within plant species, authors of a paper published on line in the Proceedings of the Royal Society, Biological Sciences (available at no charge),  demonstrates the importance of genetic diversity in plants’ adaptive capacity and consequent survivability under changing habitat conditions.  

Species, the scientists say, respond to climate change through local adaptation, range shift, range reduction, or a combination of these actions. Range shift could increase genetic diversity within a species, while range reduction would reduce diversity and diminish the species’ adaptive capacity.   

A species’ method of seed dispersal and its growth form are traits that influence distribution of genetic diversity within and among populations. Considering these factors increases the accuracy of predicting a species’ genetic vulnerability due to climate change.   

Butterfly exhibits evolutionary adaptation to a changing climate

www.free-images.org.uk

British scientists studying the expanded distribution of the Brown Argus butterfly propose that variations in habitat preference exhibited among different populations of the insect improve the species’ adaptive capacity and promotes successful expansion of its range as climate conditions change.

The study (available free of charge) was conducted by scientists from the Universities of Bristol and Sheffield and published in Molecular Ecology. The authors undertook to “understand the role of evolution in helping a species to successfully track ongoing climate change.” Genetic variation in ecological traits throughout a specie’s distribution, the study posits, bolsters the speed and success of potential adaptation.

The draft of the National Fish, Wildlife and Plants Climate Adaptation Strategy is available for review and comment until March 5.  A collaborative effort among  federal, state, and tribal partners with input from many other diverse groups from across the nation, the strategy proposes a unified approach for reducing the negative impacts of climate change on fish, wildlife, plants, and the natural systems upon which they depend.

Hunters and anglers may be first to notice fish and wildlife responses to climate change. Photo: AFWA

Seeking to establish a nation-wide framework  for conserving fish, wildlife and ecosystem functions in a changing climate, the draft document

• summarizes the impacts of climate change and ocean acidification on various ecosystems
• sets seven goals for immediate and future actions to protect natural resources
• suggests ways that government, conservation organizations and private stakeholders can integrate and implement the strategy

Public workshops will be held at several locations around the country as well as on line to promote discussion of the draft strategy. Comments may be submitted on line.