Flashback: Greens Stump for a Treeless Christmas – Recommend ‘a storm-felled branch’ instead
The Sierra Club, in its publication Sierra Magazine, recommends that people look for “a storm-felled branch, or a piece of driftwood” to decorate in their homes, instead of the traditional Christmas tree.
Eric Antebi, the Sierra Club’s national secretary, also suggested that people consider celebrating Hanukah instead of Christmas because Hanukah is a more earth-friendly celebration.
Environmental activists also appear to be struggling over which type of Christmas tree to condemn the most.
“The choice between real and not real is especially painful for some environmentalists. Either they desecrate the Earth and chop down a tree or buy a fake one that’s full of landfill-clogging polyvinyl chloride, which is kryptonite to greenies,” stated an article in the San Francisco Chronicle on Dec. 15, titled “Choosing a Christmas tree can be an ethical quagmire for environmentalists.”
But critics of the environmental movement ridiculed what they saw as an unwarranted attack on Christmas trees.
“Having tried to shame us for our 4th of July barbecues and fireworks because of air pollution, and our Thanksgiving turkeys because of hunting and farm issues, it’s no surprise that some of our more egg-nogged environmentalist friends have now come a-carolin’ over the outrage of Christmas trees,” said David Rothbard, president of the Washington-based Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT) in an interview with Cybercast News Service.
“As for the Sierra Club’s idea that we make our own trees out of storm-downed branches or driftwood, I think someone’s been standing alone under the mistletoe for too long. I can’t imagine what waking up to presents under that kind of tree would look like, but I think I’d rather try the mangy, forlorn tree from Charlie Brown’s Christmas first.” Rothbard said.
Rothbard’s sarcasm notwithstanding, some environmentalists see a genuine ethical dilemma involving Christmas trees.
San Francisco forest activist Kristi Chester Vance summed up her environmental concerns when she described how she had to warn her eco-friendly friends that there would be a “dead tree” at her Christmas party.
“I’m a forest activist and there’s a dead tree in the middle of my house,” Vance told the San Francisco Chronicle earlier this month.
“Geez, if I have a
‘Global warming can’t slow growth of redwoods or sequoias, new study shows’ — Stupid northern California redwoods: ‘…growth rates since the 1970s up to 45 percent faster now than at any time in the past 200 years”
Stupid northern California redwoods: “…growth rates since the 1970s up to 45 percent faster now than at any time in the past 200 years”
http://tomnelson.blogspot.com/2013/08/stupid-northern-california-redwoods.html
Global warming can’t slow growth of redwoods or sequoias, new study shows – San Jose Mercury News”We’re not seeing any evidence of declining growth rates,” said Steve Sillett, a forestry professor at Humboldt State and nationally known redwoods expert. “In fact, a lot of the sites are exhibiting increasing rates of growth over the last 100 years.”It may be that the trees prefer warmer temperatures, or that they are benefiting from more sunlight, a longer growing season or even decades of fire suppression. Or they might even be responding well to higher levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere…Redwood forests near the California-Oregon border have seen the largest surge in wood production, with growth rates since the 1970s up to 45 percent faster now than at any time in the past 200 years.
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We’re saved!: California might reward you with CO2-induced-bad-weather prevention cash if a tree is cut down with a fossil-fueled chainsaw, hauled to a fossil-fueled lumber mill with heavy fossil-fueled equipment, then transported by another fossil-fueled truck to a fossil-fueled furniture factory, then transported by a another fossil-fueled truck to a furniture store, then transported by another fossil-fueled truck to someone’s fossil-fueled mansion …and you get to keep the cash even if the mansion immediately burns to the ground along with the furniture!
…New paper finds tropical forests are producing more flowers, a sign of vitality
New paper finds tropical forests are producing more flowers, a sign of vitality
http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com/2013/07/new-paper-finds-tropical-forests-are.html
Temperature increases causing tropical forests to blossom
by Staff Writers Tallahassee FL (SPX) Jul 10, 2013
File image.
A new study led by Florida State University researcher Stephanie Pau shows that tropical forests are producing more flowers in response to only slight increases in temperature. [What about the increase in CO2 that is greening the planet?]
The study examined how changes in temperature, clouds and rainfall affect the number of flowers that tropical forests produce.
Results showed that clouds mainly have an effect over short-term seasonal growth, but longer-term changes of these forests appear to be due to temperature. While other studies have used long-term flower production data, this is the first study to combine these data with direct estimates of cloud cover based on satellite information.
The results of the study, “Clouds and Temperature Drive Dynamic Changes in Tropical Flower Production,” was published July 7 in the journal Nature Climate Change.
“Tropical forests are commonly thought of as the lungs of the earth and how many flowers they produce is one vital sign of their health,” said Pau, an assistant professor in Florida State’s Department of Geography. “However, there is a point at which forests can get too warm and flower production will decrease. We’re not seeing that yet at the sites we looked at, and whether that happens depends on how much the tropics will continue to warm.”
U.S. Geological Survey Senior Scientist Julio Betancourt, who was not involved in the study, described Pau’s research as “clever.”
“It integrates ground and satellite observations over nearly three decades to tease apart the influence of temperature and cloudiness on local flower production,” Betancourt said. “It confirms other recent findings that, in the tropics, even a modest warming can pack quite a punch.”
Pau led a team of international researchers who studied seasonal and year-to-year flower production in two contrasting tropical forests — a seasonally dry forest on Barro Colorado Island, Panama, and an “ever-wet” forest in Luquillo, Puerto Rico.
The seasonally dry site, according to Pau, has been producing more flowers at an average rate of 3 percent each year over the last several decades, an increase that appears to be tied to warming temperatures.
“We studied flowers because their growth is a measure of the reproductive health and overall growth of the forests, and because …
Study: Trees using water more efficiently as atmospheric carbon dioxide rises
Study: Trees using water more efficiently as atmospheric carbon dioxide rises
“Our analysis suggests that rising atmospheric carbon dioxide is having a direct and unexpectedly strong influence on ecosystem processes and biosphere-atmosphere interactions in temperate and boreal forests.” The media release is below. ### Trees using water more efficiently as atmospheric carbon dioxide rises DURHAM, N.H., July 10, 2013 – A study by scientists with the […]…
NO… Western forest fires cannot be blamed on global warming: ‘Until federal bureaucrats and environmentalists came up with the excuse of climate change, it was widely recognized that this was a forest-management problem dating back to the hellacious Yellowstone fires of the late 1980s’
…Quietest Year On Record For US Forest Fires: ‘2013 is having the coldest spring on record, the fewest tornadoes on record, and also the fewest forest fires on record’
…Greens questioning Organic food: Agricultural scientist Steve Savage: ‘Contrary to widespread consumer belief, organic farming is not the best way to farm from an environmental point if view’
Related Links:
Claim: ORGANIC FOOD: JUST A SUPERSTITION — ‘If organic were healthier, African subsistence farmers would have been outliving American housewives and stockbrokers for the past 90 years’
New study finds ‘organic crops yield 25% less overall than conventional crops’ — ‘Debunks claims by organic activists that organic yields can equal or exceed conventional yields’ — ‘I will continue to believe what I saw with my own eyes while carrying out over 500 organic farm inspections: that organic yields are closer to half what conventional and biotech yields are’…
Study: Tropical forests unexpectedly resilient to climate change: ‘Tropical forests are unlikely to die off as a result of the predicted rise in atmospheric greenhouse gases this century’
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Settled science: New paper challenges climate science consensus on winds & rainfall — Published in Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics
The paper finds that forests themselves are a significant factor in causing rainfall which “opens up a lot of potential to improve rainfall in dry areas through reforestation.” If true, the atmospheric model the scientists have developed “could revolutionize the way we understand local climates, and their vulnerability, with many major implications,” according to the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR), which participated in the new study.
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