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Animal and plant species have begun dying off or changing sooner than predicted because of global warming, a review of hundreds of research studies contends.

These fast-moving adaptations come as a surprise even to biologists and ecologists because they are occurring so rapidly.

At least 70 species of frogs, mostly mountain-dwellers that had nowhere to go to escape the creeping heat, have gone extinct because of climate change, the analysis says. It also reports that between 100 and 200 other cold-dependent animal species, such as penguins and polar bears are in deep trouble.

"We are finally seeing species going extinct," said University of Texas biologist Camille Parmesan, author of the study. "Now we've got the evidence. It's here. It's real. This is not just biologists' intuition. It's what's happening."

Her review of 866 scientific studies is summed up in the journal Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution and Systematics.

Source and the rest of the story:
http://www.cnn.com/2006/TECH/science/11/21/climate.species.ap/index.html


DA Morgan
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This ties in with something seen here where I live that's never been seen before. Humpback Whales swim up from the Antactic, along the Kermadec Trench, the Tonga Trench and past us on their way to Hawaii where the females calve. They're often spotted from the beach, mostly on the lightly populated North Shore. This year biologists have recorded 5 New Born Humpbacks. They figure the mothers don;t have the strength to make it to Hawaii. Not enough krill in the Antarctic, they're too "skinny". They've brought in a little helicopter to better study the animals.

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We've lost Orcas here in the Puget Sound this year to starvation (and human indifference to a disaster of our own creation).


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My Dad's 80 years old. He doesn't use the Internet, he sends me Newspaper clippings of items he thinkd I'd be interested in. Today I got a clipping from the Vancouver (BC) Sun with a story about Russia building a fleet of Special Fishing Trawlers that will allow them to haevest Cod and herring in the Arctic Ocean. As the Arctic melts it will open up hugea areas of International Waters where the fish can be exploited. The artical features a map indicating the degree to which the Ice Cap has shrunk and states that it will be completely gone by between 2080 and 2100. It claims that 3.3 million square kilometers have already vanished.

Now, get ready for certain members of this Forum to say, "Sez Who?" That's the attitude (Hubris) that has gotten us into this mess.

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I don't think it's so much "Is it happening?" as it is "How is it happening?" i.e. anthropogenic vs. the multitude of other "forces."

Below is a broad look at what we may be facing.
I was surprised to see just how high CO2 levels can go.

From:

Effects of Past Global Change On Life
Studies in Geophysics
Author:

Publication:
Washington, D.C. National Academies Press, 1995.
Product ID: 851
eBook ISBN: 0585030677
ISBN: 0309051274
Subject: Paleoecology. Paleoclimatology.
Language: English

Ch.3
Global Change Leading to Biodiversity Crisis in a Greenhouse World: The Cenomanian-Turonian (Cretaceous) Mass Extinction
by:
Earle G. Kauffman
University of Colorado

From the abstract:

The Cenomanian-Turonian (C-T) mass extinction occurred during a peak global greenhouse interval, with eustatic sea level elevated nearly 300 m above present stand;
atmospheric CO2 at least four times present levels;
and global warm, more equable climates reflecting low thermal gradients from pole to equator, and from the top to the bottom of world oceans.

. . . and

Development of an integrated real-time scale for the Cenomanian-Turonian extinction interval, blending new 40Ar-39Ar ages from volcanic ashes (bentonites), with 100,000- and 41,000-yr Milankovitch climate cycle deposits across the boundary, allows a precise timetable for environmental perturbation and C-T mass extinction to be developed at a resolution comparable to Quaternary studies of global change. The Cenomanian-Turonian mass extinction may thus serve as a model for the rates, patterns, causes, and consequences of a global biodiversity crisis, leading to mass extinction, in a greenhouse world.


~samwik


Pyrolysis creates reduced carbon! ...Time for the next step in our evolutionary symbiosis with fire.
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There are still people claiming it is not happening.

More intelligent people are questioning why it is happening.

A few of us are saying ... reverse it if we can no matter why it is happening.

It is far too late to be pointing the finger of blame. It is time to save our quality of life from what is increasingly seeming inevitable.


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I agree, DA, entirely. The time for pissing matches is over, something drastic, something radical may well be the only thing that can save the environment now. I was web-surfing yesterday and saw an item warning that the Perma-frost of Northern Canada, Alaska and Siberia is now starting to thaw. We should expect to see methane being released into the atmosphere in quantities never before recorded. The article stated that methane is 23 times worse for the depletion of Ozone as is CO2.
Happy Thanksgiving, all.

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"...times worse for the depletion of Ozone as is CO2." -753
You mean global warming, not "depletion of the Ozone," don't you?
Correct me if I'm wrong about this, but I don't think CO2 or methane have anything to do with the ozone hole.

We do seem to be on the verge of several "tippng points," like the "tundras" and also oceanic clathrates. I wish climate forcers were better understood and quantified.

What we need is a big fleet of space umbrellas, so we could "adjust the thermostat."

~~samwik

P.S. -from a New Scientits article: "Although less of it is emitted into the atmosphere than carbon dioxide, it is a more powerful greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide: one tonne of methane has the same warming effect as 21 tonnes of CO2."
Why are we in this handbasket; and where are we going so fast. ~S


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Let me, if I may, put forward one very simple question that could be answered soon and whose implications are beyond measure.

How much more must the world's ocean's warm for the methane hydrate reserve to return to the atmosphere?

Because when that happens it will be to late to do more than dig a hole six feet deep and six feet long into which humanity can put its last memory of life as it had been.

For those not familiar with methane hydrate:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methane_hydrate
http://www.gsfc.nasa.gov/topstory/20011212methane.html


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Methane Hydrate, Ouch, talk about a ticking bomb. I had never heard of this.
Something that I HAVE heard of is the possibility that the Siberian Forests could dry out enough that huge fires, the likes of which have never been seen, could corrupt the atmosphere. Apparently there are huge reserves of frozen Sphagnum Moss there just under the surface that would thaw, releasing even more methane into the Biosphere. Not a pretty picture.

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A ticking timebomb indeed. It is information about things such as we have both pointed out that need to be part of the public discourse at least as much as Paris Hilton's or Madonna's latest antic.

How can citizens make informed decisions ... when the media do not inform them?

When the fires start ... we can at least in theory put them out.

When the methane hydrate starts to bubble to the surface ... there will be nothing we can do except kick ourselves for our collective inability to pay attention to what is truly important.


DA Morgan
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I'm amazed how much more time I have when cut out the "news" about celebreties or entertainment, and also about 'developing' stories. When a story breaks, it is news. When a story ends, it is news. As a story develops, it isn't news, it's "olds."

Media is too much driven by profit/ratings; and people too much driven by need to escape.

~samscape


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It is inconceivable to me that after 5,000+ years of what we call civilization we are no more advanced in our ability to deal with humanity's problems than we ever were.

Sure we've made technological progress. We have developed huge pools of knowledge around medicine, nutrition, physics, chemistry, etc. But we still have Darfur. We still have Iraq. We still have Lebanon. And we still have Paris Hilton making more money than a school teacher.

We have given people freedom of choice. And they have chosen poorly. That doesn't mean a King or Emporer or aristocrisy would make better choices. But the evidence of self-inflicted tragedy is everywhere to see.

On our plate right now and being soundly ignored:
1) global warming
2) oceans running out of fish
3) genocide in many countries

The dreams of Jean-Jacques Rousseau and Thomas Jefferson are given nothing but lip service.


DA Morgan
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I think it's because there hasn't been enough justice to balance all the freedom we've "spread" around the world.

Freedom without justice leads to poor choices.

~samwik


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Freedom without a sense of responsibility leads to poor choices.

Justice is not given. It is demanded. And in my country I have watched it taken for granted and then thrown away, in a few short years, in exchange for a few shiny beads.


DA Morgan
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?Strains of life on Earth may have existed about 700 million years earlier than previous thought....?

http://today.colostate.edu/index.asp?url=display_story&story_id=1000765

?We suspect that life has not only adapted to environments but also has exerted controls on Earth's environment.?

Gee, who'd have thought that living organism could change the environment? (sarcastically)

~samwik

P.S. And here's a link to the source of that ?fish loss by 2048? news story going around.

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/sci;314/5800/787

...not exactly a climate change related extinction, but....

~S


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I emailed her for a list of the 70+ species that have become extinct. I have failed to recieve an answer.


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