Can Amazon trees survive global warming? UCL (UK) — Tree species in the Amazon are likely to survive climate warming in the coming century, having already weathered temperatures higher than any worst case scenario forecast for the year 2100.
A study published in the latest edition of Ecology and Evolution reveals the surprising age of some Amazonian tree species—more than 8 million years. Having survived warm periods in the past, the tree species will likely survive future warming, provided there are no other major environmental changes. Although extreme droughts and forest fires will impact Amazonia as temperatures rise, the trees will likely endure the direct impact of higher temperatures.
As well as reducing greenhouse gas emissions to minimize the risk of drought and fire, conservation policy should remain focused on preventing deforestation for agriculture and mining, researchers say. “The past cannot be compared directly with the future. Source: UCL. Hot days threaten corn crop yields. U.
LEEDS (UK) — Fertilizers and improved irrigation have increased corn production, but soaring temperatures could soon offset those recent gains. Increasingly hot summer weather could cause a fall in crop yields over the next two decades unless farming techniques are improved more quickly, scientists have found. High temperatures are having an increasingly damaging effect on maize (sweet corn) in France—the largest supplier of the crop to the UK—which may explain a recent slowdown in the trend towards higher yields, according to researchers.
Improvements in agricultural technology, such as fertilizers and new crop varieties, will need to increase yields by up to 12 percent by the 2020s to be confident about offsetting future decreases in yield from heat stress. Reduced Snowpacks Allowing Trees to Invade U.S. Mountain Meadows. 05 Nov 2012: Reduced Snowpacks Allowing Trees to Invade U.S.
Mountain Meadows Some mountain meadows in the U.S. Northwest are steadily disappearing as the effects of climate change have allowed trees to invade the ecosystemsin recent decades, a new study says. In an analysis of Jefferson Park, a 330-acre subalpine meadow complex in the Oregon Cascades once covered with Click to enlarge Oregon State University A meadow at the base of Mount Jefferson. grasses, shrubs and wildflowers, researchers found that tree occupation increased from 8 percent in 1950 to 35 percent in 2007, a rapid shift they say reflects a wider trend in many areas of the U.S. Yale Environment 360 is a publication of theYale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies. About e360ContactSubmission GuidelinesReprints Yale Environment 360 articles are now available in Spanish and Portuguese on Universia, the online educational network. Top Image: aerial view of Iceland. © Google & TerraMetrics.
Temperature-Dependent Sex Determination and Artificial Incubation of Tuatara, Sphenodon Punctatus. Warmer Temps May Turn Turtles Female : D-brief. The gender of a baby painted turtle is determined by the temperature of the soil in which its egg is incubated.
Warmer temperatures produce female turtles and cooler temperatures make males. Scientists now say that as the climate warms, the species is not likely to survive. Scientists at Iowa State University studied the nesting behavior of the painted turtle (Chrysemys picta), the most abundant and widespread species of native turtle in North America. They wanted to see if a mother turtle could shift the timing of her egg-laying enough to impact the gender and survival of her eggs.
By observing painted turtles in Illinois, the researchers found that a mother turtle can lay her eggs a few days earlier or later in the season to cope with changing environmental temperatures. However the researchers say these behavioral changes aren’t enough. Painted turtle laying eggs in the nest she dug in the ground.
Then they put future temperatures into their model. Many Species Will Have To Evolve 10,000 Times Faster To Adapt To Climate Change, Study Finds. By Katie Valentine "Many Species Will Have To Evolve 10,000 Times Faster To Adapt To Climate Change, Study Finds" A Rock Frog, a species in decline due to a combination of climate change, a fungus that has been killing amphibians around the world, and habitat loss.
(Credit: AP/Ricardo Arduengo) Climate change is moving too quickly for many vertebrate species to adapt, a new study has found. Climate Change 10,000 Times Faster Than Evolution. Evolution can be fast, but not fast enough to keep up with the rate of human-caused climate change, say two researchers who have studied the evolution rates of hundreds of species in the past.
In fact, many vertebrate species would have to speed up their evolution rate 10,000 times to match today's pedal-to-the-metal rate of global warming, according to John Wiens, an ecology and evolutionary biology professor at the University of Arizona, and Ignacio Quintero, a postgraduate research assistant at Yale University. "A big question is 'Can some species adapt quickly enough to survive? '" said Wiens. “So we looked at 17 groups of animals” comprising 540 species that included amphibians, birds, reptile and mammals, to see how they adapted to temperature changes in the past. “We estimated the rate of climate change for these species.” How Global Warming Will Change Your Life 10 Signs Climate Change Is Already Happening “Even if they have the genetic variation, it may not be enough,” said Holt.