Upstream | January 25, 2012 | 32 comments

Figs In Boston: New Plant Hardiness Zones Reflect Dramatic Global Warming

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coolplanet
By Brad Johnson

The Department of Agriculture’s plant hardiness maps are finally reflecting a fact that gardeners have already realized — the United States is changing dramatically with global warming pollution. The USDA released a new plant hardiness zone map to replace the 1990 map, reflecting twenty years of rapid global warming:

“The 1990 map was based on temperatures from 1974 to 1986, the new map from 1976 to 2005. The nation’s average temperature from 1976 to 2005 was two-thirds of a degree higher than it was during the old time period, according to the National Climatic Data Center.”

The new map is generally one half-zone warmer than the previous map throughout much of the United States. Cities as varied as Boston, Honolulu, St. Louis, Des Moines, Iowa, St. Paul, Minnesota, and Fairbanks, Alaska, are in newer, warmer zones. Almost all of Ohio, Nebraska and Texas are in warmer zones.

The Washington Post quoted several experts who noted the new map, whose changes in hardiness zones are based on rising minimum temperatures across the nation, isn’t news to gardeners.

Boston University biology professor Richard Primack: “People who grow plants are well aware of the fact that temperatures have gotten more mild throughout the year, particularly in the wintertime.”

George Ball, chairman and CEO of the seed company W. Atlee Burpee: “Climate change, which has been in the air for a long time, is not big news to gardeners.”

Stanford University biology professor Terry Root: “It is great that the federal government is catching up with what the plants themselves have known for years now: The globe is warming and it is greatly influencing plants (and animals).”

Vaughn Speer, an 87-year-old master gardener in Ames, Iowa, said he has seen redbud trees, appear ten miles north of their traditional limit in recent years. Our nation’s forests are dying with the changes. Lodgepole pines, aspens, walnut trees, and other dominant species adapted to a climate without greenhouse pollution are already suffering in our hotter planet.

In coming decades, the rate of global warming will increase significantly, a result of the rapid rise in fossil fuel pollution, making it ever more difficult for plants to adapt, and destabilizing all of our nation’s ecosystems.

http://thinkprogress.org/green/2012/01/25/411937/figs-in-boston-new-plant-hardin...
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    Climate Change,  Plants,  USDA
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32 comments // Figs In Boston: New Plant Hardiness Zones Reflect Dramatic Global Warming

  • letsliveinpeace
  • northernexpat
    • +4
      northernexpat  

    • To give you an example of how much warmer it is getting in the Northwest Territories (Canada's Arctic). My lilac bush has bloomed twice in a season both last summer and the summer before. Our lilacs (which are the hardier form of the plants) usually only bloom in July. Mine has started blooming both in early July and again in late August. It feels really creepy to see this. So I'm not surprised to hear about the changes in the growing season in the different places in the Sates.

    • 4 months ago
  • coolplanet
    • +4
      coolplanet  
    • northernexpat:

      We need more reporting like this!
      I have a 30 year old amaryllis ('Mary Alice') that has gone crazy blooming in the past few years. Instead of blooming once a year the old girl is now blooming four and even five times a year.
      From all I've read and heard this is not supposed to happen.

    • 4 months ago
  • LivingPong
  • coolplanet
    • +2
      coolplanet  
    • LivingPong:

      Thank you for contributing this important info!
      I saw this in the underground news today and considered posting it.
      There is just too much to choose from lately.
      Hats off to JanforGore who provided a forum to record and discuss this stuff in her group Climate Extremes. It is a valuable resource for the few people interested in what's really happening.
      It is just unbelievable how many weather records have been broken around the world in the past year! What is even more unbelievable is how everyone is ignoring it.

    • 4 months ago
  • northernexpat
    • +1
      northernexpat  
    • coolplanet:

      Wow, usually the amaryllis only blooms once a year as well. This is getting scary.

      By the way I just wanted to bring you up-to-date on the situation with the pipeline. The Northwest Territorial Government, along with our Member of Parliament, are very happy with Obama's decision not to give approval of the pipeline at this time. Also, the Dene National Chief has indicated that this delay gives the National First Nations an opportunity to be involved in discussion with the federal government they didn't have prior to the federal government's decision to send the pipeline Texas. They have already put up strong opposition for the pipeline to go to the West Coast through Brisish Columbia. All of them are all going for a full court press to ensure whatever decision is made lessens any environmental impact. They also do not expect any pipeline, if approved will proceed before 2014.

      Hopefully with this delay it will give us time to educate more people on the problems with tar sand oil and to push for alternate energy projects.

    • 4 months ago
  • coolplanet
    • +1
      coolplanet  
    • northernexpat:

      This is very good news. We all need more time to think about the reprecussions of all of this.
      Meanwhile we here in the lower 48 will try to forgive our Great Chief in Washington for being such a big oil whore.
      ;)

    • 4 months ago
  • northernexpat
    • +1
      northernexpat  
    • LivingPong:

      So I'm not alone with my lilacs blooming more than once. Of course your country has faced some extreme weather these last few years, as well. Between the wild fires and the flooding it must not be easy.

      We have been experiencing above average temperatures here too. There has been many time when we have been the hot spot in Canada in both summer and winter during the past five years. We have also had so much snow over the last few years, along with lots of rain in the summer. Keep in mind, the Northwest Territories is suppose to be semi-arid. 20 years ago our average winter temperatures was around -25c from October to May. Now it seems like our average temperature is around -15c from November to March. With temperature rising to above freezing often it creates real road hazards. This month it has snowed almost every single day. It used to be too cold to snow during this time of year. We use to get most of our snow in October and March, now it can be any month.

    • 4 months ago
  • northernexpat
    • 0
      northernexpat  
    • coolplanet:

      I believe that Obama is for alternate energy more than the other candidates in 2012. Although I would like to see him work harder on developing alternate energy sources, he can't make this happen alone, he need the public behind him pushing him in the right direction. There are even Democrats in oil and coal states that will not side with him. However, I believe the pipeline protests help him make the decision to delay it and if pressure is kept up, I believe he can be persuaded to stop it. Our Prime Minister (Harper) is pushing for Canada to be the number one oil producer and he is a BIG OIL WHORE. Harper is definitely in bed with big oil. I don't think Obama is.

    • 4 months ago
  • ecoalex
    • +1
      ecoalex  

    • Methane gas released from Arctic tundra now thawed is releasing so much gas that any reduction by mankind will not make any difference.We are past the tipping point.Way past.

    • 4 months ago
  • coolplanet
    • +1
      coolplanet  
    • ecoalex:

      I fear you are correct.
      BUT we could continue to make it a lot worse if we keep doing nothing about it.
      For the first time in Earth's six billion year history we humans can prevent a major extinction event because it is of our own making.
      The dinosaur could not unmake the asteroid that wiped them out 65 million years ago.
      The woolly mammoth could not unmake their extinction 11,000 years ago when melting ice shut down the Gulf Stream and deep-freezed the megafauna.
      But man can control the amount of carbon in the atmosphere.

    • 4 months ago
  • JanforGore
    • +2
      JanforGore  
    • Image

    • http://current.com/technology/93509871_crop-scientists-now-concerned-about-heat-...

      "Scientists at an annual meeting of U.S. agronomists last week in San Antonio said the focus was climate change.

      "Its impact on agriculture systems, impacts on crops, mitigation strategies with soil management -- a whole range of questions was being asked about climate change," said Jerry Hatfield, Laboratory Director at the National Soil Tilth Laboratory in Ames, Iowa.

      "The biggest thing is high night-time temperatures have a negative impact on yield," Hatfield added, noting that the heat affects evaporation and the life process of the crops.

      "One of the consequences of rising temperatures ... is to compress the life cycle of that plant. The other key consequence is that when the atmosphere gets warmer the atmospheric demand for water increases," Hatfield said.

      "These are simple things that can occur and have tremendous consequences on our ability to produce a stable supply of food or feed or fiber," he said."
      ~~
      This effects soil moisture evaporation rates and in turn higher usage of water. It damages crops and shortens their lives. Agriculture, especially in regards to food scarcity due to drought is something we are now seeing in the U.S. as well as globally, particularly in Africa. This is a crucial connection in understanding global warming as our lives and livelihoods depend on being able to grow food. It also facilitates the destructive and toxic fossil fuel industrial agioculture treadmill that is clogging our waterways with nitrogen fertilizers which in turn are causing hypoxia in our waterways. Fracking certainly isn't going to help in regards to destruction of land and toxification of water sources used to irrigate crops. I know where I am I have seen a definite difference in flowering times, season changes,etc. It truly is all connected.

    • 4 months ago
  • coolplanet
    • +1
      coolplanet  
    • JanforGore:

      The U.S. 'farm belt' is moving to Canada and is happening right before our eyes.
      Here in Pennsylvania we are having a North Carolina winter.
      I realize that we could be plunged into Arctic weather any day now if another 'blocking high' system strangely moves over the North Pole like it did the past two winters.
      We need to see this globally, not just locally.
      Few are connecting the dots.

    • 4 months ago
  • remanns
  • coolplanet
  • remanns
  • Anonmaly
    • +2
      Anonmaly  

    • Currently 65 here, not expected to go below 62 before morning.... 90% humidity (it's decreased some)....

      Hmmm, 2 years ago we had snow here in February.... Now we're looking at the warmest winter on record, and have had mid-day temperatures reach 80 a few days recently...

      Now if I lived in Miami, this should be about the norm, minus a little humidity, but I'm not quite that far south a good ways north actually, and the weather itself is messing with my head....

      Idk... Been wanting to head north for some time, thinking this will finally be the year...

      I still say we need to grow more hemp.... Allot more, and use it everywhere we can, and there are ways to use it to make it carbon negative...

      Could build some awesome geodesic dome structures/homes out of it (hemp-crete) in "tornado alley" and serve a pretty sweet dual-purpose, noting geodesic domes stand the highest chance of surviving tornadoes, actually they can be engineered and just about guaranteed to withstand everything but the worst... Which they might still survive anyway....

      But no, I'm probably just a dumb pipe-dreaming stoner.....

    • 4 months ago
  • coolplanet
  • remanns
  • coolplanet
  • bailey78
  • coolplanet
  • LivingPong
    • +1
      LivingPong  
    • Anonmaly:

      It was 30C last night, got down to about 20C in the morning and now back up to 34C. I'm in doors too, be damned if I'm going outside to measure the temperature. My dog didn't know what to do yesterday until I started popping him in the bath with some cold water. He's currently lying on his back cooling his balls in front of the fan, I might go and join him it's just getting way too hot.

    • 4 months ago
  • circlesquared
    • +1
      circlesquared  

    • climates have been changing, but I can't agree it has all been North to South...watch the poles, there is more going on than is clear or we are being told

    • 4 months ago
  • coolplanet
    • +1
      coolplanet  
    • circlesquared:

      It's happening in all directions, sort of like the Medicine Wheel, only not sacred.
      I am watching the magnetic poles move and the magnetic shield weaken. But so far science has not found a connection with this to climate change.
      I just noticed that my old haunt at Lake Erie went from zone 6 to zone 5. I worry about all the seguoias and black bamboo I planted there (they can't survive zone 5).

    • 4 months ago
  • coolplanet
    • +2
      coolplanet  

    • "Cities as varied as Boston, Honolulu, St. Louis, Des Moines, Iowa, St. Paul, Minnesota, and Fairbanks, Alaska, are in newer, warmer zones. Almost all of Ohio, Nebraska and Texas are in warmer zones."

      How can Americans ignore this any longer? It's everywhere you look!

    • 4 months ago
  • coolplanet
    • +2
      coolplanet  
    • coolplanet:

      I just noticed that my land in Colorado has gone from zone 4 to zone 5 (which is a 5 degree difference in winter low temps). Now I have a larger variety of plants I can grow there if not for the increased droughts.

    • 4 months ago
  • LivingPong
  • circlesquared
  • coolplanet
  • circlesquared
  • coolplanet
    • +1
      coolplanet  
    • circlesquared:

      One thing that is alarming climate scientists is that sea levels are rising twice as fast as any of their computer models predicted. South Pacific islanders are seeking refuge in Australia, New Zealand and South America as we speak.

    • 4 months ago
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