Climate change blamed for dead trees in Africa

Honestly, this is a little misleading.

The region in this study is one of the most sensitive in the world to NATURAL climate change, and has been experiencing tremendous desertification and climate change for all of recorded history.

There are even several dry mega-lakes in the region which predate recorded history by thousands of years, having apparently dried up 1 or 2 thousand years before the Egyptian civilization even existed.

Lake Chad is a last remnant of that.

I'm not being denialist. It's just plain facts.

In this case, the majority of the changes really are natural variation continuing to do what it has always done for seven thousand years now.

There's GEOENGINEERING going on throughout the world! This is causing abnormal weather. Where's the reporting on these facts???

There's GEOENGINEERING going on throughout the world! This is causing abnormal weather. Where's the reporting on these facts???

If by "geoengineering" you mean dams, levees, tunnels, and irrigation, then yes it causes abnormal weather.

Entire basins have been drained in the U.S., not by global warming, but by diverting river waters for drinking and irrigation.

This caused desertification which was unrelated to CO2, simply because if you dry up a very large lake you alter the micro-climate of the surrounding area, and lower the humidity, etc.

Now they even had to install sprinklers in some locations to wet the soil in the dry lake bed and surrounding land to keep it from being blown away in the wind!!

No joke.

They pumped it dry for drinking water, and now they have to pump water back in to try to prevent further environmental damage.

This started like 100 years ago. It's a complete catastrophe.

The Everglades swamp in Florida has been continuously drained as much as possible for the purpose of drinking water for the huge amount of population in southern Florida. This is also the case in southern Georgia where the Okeefenokee (sp) has been slowly drained in many parts of it, thus creating a climate for forest fires that burn hundreds or thousands of acres with the acrid smoke affecting many towns and cities according to the prevailing winds. The problem is that of increasing population and where farms and ranches were bought up and converted to housing developments, strip malls and parking lots to accommodate the people moving to Florida and Georgia. These measures increase the chances of limited rainfall and dead and dying plant life. The wild animal population suffers accordingly. People don't generally retire to Idaho. They prefer warm climates and that taxes the natural environment because of too many humans living in any given area.

What was once a natural setting in Florida for good amounts of rainfall, has been criss-crossed with canals bringing drinking and irrigation water to Miami and other cities of southeast Florida. Due to the fact that southeast Florida now gets a lot less rainfall than normal, certain water companies have attempted to bail out the water problem by conning the central and northern Florida city governments to allow these companies to bottle the water from their natural springs and/or to build pipes underground to pipe that water to south Florida, which, of course, would then deplete the water supplies for the more northern latitudes of Florida. The water companies would also have made a fortune selling that water to local gov'ts in the southern areas at the expense of the North. Nobody in their right mind in central and north Florida would agree to such a ridiculous and callous offering. I hope common sense continues.

If you did solar boliers properly, you could do desalination and make net gain in electric power simultaneously.

Been saying it for several years now, but nobody seems to listen.

Well, yes. . .the Sunshine State could do that, but it would take a lot of desalinated seawater to make fresh drinking water. A large portion of offshore deep water would be needed and miles of piping, but how could the seawater be retained so that there is no recontamination after desalination? I can't formulate an answer to that. I doubt they would want to build a desalination plant close to the shoreline. You know that Florida isn't that high above sea level, right?

@Nanobanano said:

If by "geoengineering" you mean dams, levees, tunnels, and irrigation, then yes it causes abnormal weather.

Grudgingly, reluctantly, and as if by its own volition, a state of "being in agreement with Nanobanano" forces its way through my consciousness and out through my hands.

There! I said it! But I will retain possession of my soul, thank you, by modifying your statement somewhat:

"If by "geoengineering" you mean dams, levees, tunnels, and irrigation, then yes it CAN cause abnormal weather, and this is sometimes a great improvement. Look at Texas, for example. In its native condition, the Lone Star State had arguably only part of one natural lake. All of the rest - in a huge state now covered in lakes - are man-made. This has caused quite a beneficial change to our climate and weather."

Not for nothing was Texas stereotyped in the olden days as being a desert.

(Hmmm... I wonder if they'll take the bait...)

So, please save the trees cause...
Quote-""People in the Sahel depend upon trees for their survival," said Gonzalez. "Trees provide people with food, firewood, building materials and medicine."-end quote

..because..
Quote-"Trees are dying in the Sahel, a region in Africa south of the Sahara Desert, and human-caused climate change is to blame"-end quote.

Which means if the trees are not being used up so much, we could see them rebound more?(course, that goes for the world in general)

Well that explains it then. . .that close to the Sahara. . .the desert wind is sending out grains of its sand and creeping up on Sahel. . .only to overwhelm it at some point. . .maybe in a few years, a few decades. . .or a century. That's what deserts do, for pete's sake. . .they spread out, wind driven. . .the mighty hand of Mother Nature at work. And you can quote me on that. :)

This is the worst climate article I have ever seen on Physorg.

Did anyone else notice how old the data is?

Did anyone notice the dead tree pictured is one of well more than a dozen trees (not one of six) - and that only includes trees which lie directly behind it?

This article is nothing but a fabrication. The Sahel has been greening, and greening significantly. Even from the time of this article's "data" it was greening.

"Analyses made by several independent groups of temporal sequences of satellite data over two decades since early 1980s, showed a remarkable increasing trend in vegetation greenness."

http://www.eoeart...hel#gen2

This map is from the period of 1982-1999:

http://maps.grida...getation

And, Sahel farmers plant lots of trees:

http://www.voanew...649.html

So, the man gist of the comment here is, "Oh, my g-d, THIS CAN'T BE HAPPENING!!!"

I was just contemplating how here is Chicago, when I was a child we used to have Stag Beetles and Junebugs all over the place, every summer. Then, every 7 and 14 years an army of cicadas would emerge from the earth. I also used to remember finding caterpillars here and there.

Haven't seen anything like that for YEARS! The cicadas come out half on the wrong year and 10% of what they used to be.

But, it can't be that this observable and quantifiable phenom could be caused by man-made global warming. Why?

Because then we would have to get off our lazy butts and make sacrifices to do something about it ("or else", which is not good and seems to be the direction towards which most of y'all don't seem to mind collectively dragging us.)

This is the worst climate article I have ever seen on Physorg.

Did anyone else notice how old the data is?

Did anyone notice the dead tree pictured is one of well more than a dozen trees (not one of six) - and that only includes trees which lie directly behind it?

This article is nothing but a fabrication. The Sahel has been greening, and greening significantly. Even from the time of this article's "data" it was greening.

"Analyses made by several independent groups of temporal sequences of satellite data over two decades since early 1980s, showed a remarkable increasing trend in vegetation greenness."

http://www.eoeart...hel#gen2

Hmm wonder why you havent used more recent data? It couldnt be due to biassed cherrypicking couldnt it?

Naaaaaa!

Another factor in tree loss in much of the Sahel is, ironically, French Colonial policies designed to preserve them. It was decreed by French Colonial Governments in that region that all trees were the property of the Government. That lead to the locals not being interested in growing or preserving trees on thier property. Trees became the target of deliberate sabotage in favor of things other than trees, such as grazing forage. That had a chain reaction effect of allowing wind to transport more sand, which contributed to even more dead trees and drier soils.

The locals have learned that planting trees as wind breaks is a good thing though, so things are starting to recover in more recent decades.

As said above, the "greening of the Sahel" has made headlines on quite a few occasions, and you can easily google it.

In the Sahel, drying out of the soil directly kills trees. Tree dieback is occurring at the biome level. It's not just one species that is dying; whole groups of species are dying out.

Typical effect of global warming and climate change. I can't believe the morons posting excuse this as some local effect and even claim the Shahel are to be greening, when long term its a desert from AGW.

Geeze these rightwingers are toally goofy in the head.

Hmm wonder why you havent used more recent data? It couldnt be due to biassed cherrypicking couldnt it?

Uh... maybe it was because I was arguing the data and conclusions of the article? Did you think of that? Can you say, "D'oh!"

Besides, I did use some recent data, particularly in regards to tree planting (May 9, 2011). Can you say, "Double d'oh!"

@Orac, er... I mean Howhot:

Typical effect of global warming and climate change. I can't believe the morons posting excuse this as some local effect and even claim the Shahel are to be greening, when long term its a desert from AGW.

Geeze these rightwingers are toally goofy in the head.

What's the matter, are you having difficulty reading the references?

What's the matter, are you having difficulty reading the references?

Just ignore her. She's obviously just a troll.

From the article: "In the Sahel, drying out of the soil directly kills trees. Tree dieback is occurring at the biome level. It's not just one species that is dying; whole groups of species are dying out." ER-go its a global warming issue. I was wondering why trolls where all over this story like syrup on a pancake.

From the article: "In the Sahel, drying out of the soil directly kills trees. Tree dieback is occurring at the biome level. It's not just one species that is dying; whole groups of species are dying out." ER-go its a global warming issue. I was wondering why trolls where all over this story like syrup on a pancake.

Like I said, the article is full of it. Tree death cycles are natural.

For instance, it meantions the bark beetle death of U.S. trees. This is an occurence that happens naturally during dry years, because the trees can't produce enough sap to push the beetles out. But, if this was a long-term problem, deforestation would be the result. However, U.S. trees are thriving like never before. There's so many that during the dry months they pose a significantly increasing fire risk.

Hmm wonder why you havent used more recent data? It couldnt be due to biassed cherrypicking couldnt it?

Uh... maybe it was because I was arguing the data and conclusions of the article? Did you think of that? Can you say, "D'oh!"

Besides, I did use some recent data, particularly in regards to tree planting (May 9, 2011). Can you say, "Double d'oh!"

Still see you cherrypicking ;)

Still see you cherrypicking ;)

How is using the Encyclopedia of Earth cherrypicking? D'oh!

How is using United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) data cherry picking? Double d'oh!

How is using the Voice of America's Special English Agriculture Report cherry picking? Triple d'oh!

If you don't like my references, explain why and find your own dang references which refute them.

I doubt you can, or will. Can you say, "Quadruple d'oh!"

Like I said, the article is full of it. Tree death cycles are natural.

Not like this! Your another right wing plant aren't you? If not, you certainly didn't even read the article. Here is the conclusion of the article;

Hotter, drier conditions dominated population and soil factors in explaining tree mortality, the authors found. Their results indicate that climate change is shifting vegetation zones

That must all be caused by conservative wishful thinking. Actually is man made global warming from burning fossil fuels.
The best part about this AGW joke is it's going get worst.

Not like this! Your another right wing plant aren't you? If not, you certainly didn't even read the article. Here is the conclusion of the article;

Oh, so because it's in this particular article, it must be true? No other data matters? D'oh!

That must all be caused by conservative wishful thinking. Actually is man made global warming from burning fossil fuels.
The best part about this AGW joke is it's going get worst.

The biosphere is actually booming, as a result of CO2 production. D'oh!

Here's data from the same era as from the article (not that it'll matter to your faith-based alarmist mentality):

http://www.scienc...abstract

'Climate change blamed for .........'.

Fill in the blank.