The climate change equation gathers variables from all walks of life. NewScientist magazine (December 8-18) has a blurb about the environmental impact of divorce. Split couples occupy more properties and so use more energy and water; in the U.S.: 46% more electricity and 56 more water.
OUTCOMES
Invasive species are aided as our "planet is being homogenized by expanding human population and the frequent and rapid movement of people and goods." This is not particularly new news, but an article in the December 10th issue of New Yorker by Richard Preston goes on to note how climate change impacts the easier spread of these species as the "walls come down" on unique biospheres .
Winters in the north are becoming steadily warmer, and the insects are not being hit as often with deep cold. Summers in the southern Appalachians have lately become drier and hotter, and drought stress makes infected hemlocks far more susceptible to dying. Climate change may also mean that the adelgids are more active when birds fly south (carrying the insects along).The adelgid he speaks of is the hemlock woolly adelgid an invasive insect introduced in Virginia in 1911. We have seen their tiny cotton-like bodies floating in the sunlight from our porch this summer here in New York; a summer whose warmth lingered long into October.
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