I had two Peterson Western United States bird guides, one from 1990 and another from 2010. Before I gave away the older one, I went through both books page by page, noting if any species’ range maps had changed in that time.
Most of the ranges looked similar to their older version, but some showed a trend in which the changes either revealed more northern or higher elevation ranges. No exceptions to those changes. I marked the pages for those species with !! (“keep watch”).
Two days ago I found a scorpion inside. It was the most dangerous kind, small but with the worst venom. I had seen scorpions in West TX and in AZ, but never in CO, though CO does have them. My husband had found a different kind of scorpion last week—outdoors, whew—which was also the first one he saw in CO.
Yeah, I killed the scorpion. It was INDOORS. But it makes me wonder if this is going to happen more often as climate here gets hotter and drier. We are now at the end of six weeks of nonstop higher-than-average temps, no rain, and daily high wind.
Any Arizonans have tips on eradicating scorpions, in case they proliferate? Mountain lions and bears don’t worry me nearly as much as scorpions and Africanized bees do.
I have seen some shift in birds, for ex a decade ago we suddenly had black vultures in my area. Had never seen them north of Maryland.
Of course every tick borne disease that used to only be in the south is now also in the northeast.
Part of what may happened w the Bering Sea crab stocks is their moving north to get colder water. Like into Russian controlled waters.
Thus far, happily. I have not had to worry scorpions in upstate NY. But some kind of vicious new creature is probably gradually moving towards me…
Another change here is that we no longer have little brown bats flying around at night, hunting insects. They’re susceptible to whitenose disease, a fungal infection. For at least a decade, there were warnings about the cave bats at Carslbad Caverns and other such places being infected with that. Apparently, it has spread.
Fungi used to not tolerate heat well. That, too, has changed—better for THEM, worse for other species, including humans.
If you are sleeping in a tent in the desert you place jars underground in the sand all around the tent and they fall in.
I have found quite a few at the Nevada house. I didn’t realize they were so poisonous but I did read The Pearl.
I know the ticks that carry Lyme disease are spreading to other areas.
We don’t use any pesticides for anything but the neighbors always come to the door bringing us the card for their “Bug Man” and tell us that if we don’t spray for scorpions that it will impact them. I call them the pesticide mafia. For awhile five people in the neighborhood had bladder cancer and they are always spraying all kinds of stuff.
Normally we go without shoes in the house but I’ve seen enough that now I wear slippers. It’s my own fault because I leave the door open to the pool
and they walk right in along with the rattle snakes.
They stand on the back legs if you threaten them, you probably noticed.
I had a giant centipede crawl up the AC coolant line in to my split system in Hawaii and fall in bed and sting me on the arm in the middle of the night.
After four or five years without seeing any bats, I’ve seen a few this year and last. I welcome their voracious appetite for insects, but not the “calling cards” they leave by the front door. Gotta take the bitter with the better, I suppose.
And, as much as I love to surf great waves, I dread the upcoming months of August, September and October for the hurricanes that will made landfall, unlike the unusual but benign “fish storm” that is TS Don.
So many signs indeed. Most beach closures are due to high E. coli counts, a bacterium endemic to organic waste, not oceans. Yet we resist building adequate sewage treatment facilities for our cities and towns (unless someone else pays), or properly managing agricultural, commercial and residential runoff.
Some effects of a warming climate will be difficult or impossible to mitigate, but others are much easier. We already have the know-how to keep E. coli out of our rivers, lakes and oceans. What we don’t have (yet) is the political will to make it a priority.
So, Boston Harbor and the Charles River were filthy and the butt of jokes locally and nationally. The Boston “Dirty Water” was even sang about:
In the local environmental movement of the 70’s and 80’s, activists worked against the polluters, naysayers and penny pinchers to clean up the Charles and Mystic Rivers as well as the Boston Harbor. It took decades and billions. But, the work was hailed as a success story:
While much has much has been done to build up the water and sewer infrastructure, more needs to happen. The recent heavy rains and flooding showed that our systems need to be build up even more, as these weather events become more the norm rather than the exception.
I am just glad to have seen and benefitted from what can be done with public will. As a kid in Boston, I remember swimming in the city beaches in the early 60’s. By the early 70’s, one could get sick if one were to fall into the river or the inner Harbor. By the 2010s, the local waters were largely restored. I swim, fish and regularly paddle in Boston Harbor. My goal is to keep it that way for my granddaughters.
I don’t know anything about scorpions but I’m wondering if the crows are preparing for a big change. About half the crows here in my part of central NC are now Fish Crows. They used to only be seen / heard at the coast. I might have waterfront property in a few years.
The nuclear genie was unleashed long ago, with development and use of the atomic bomb. As Robert Oppenheimer requoted the Bhagavad Gita, “Now I am become Death, the destroyer of worlds ,” in anguish perhaps (?) for his role in developing the bomb. He subsequently advocated for putting more controls (trying to get the genie back into the bottle?). For his effort, President Truman called Oppenheimer “a cry baby scientist” (sounds familiar in how some talk about climate scientists).
When my son was in the Airborne contingent, supporting the retaking of the Mosul airport in 2016, he mentioned, in his understated way, of seeing things on patrol. As he put it, “Yeah, there’s a bit of genocide going on…”
The fact is that humans are capable of great generous feats, as they are capable of atrocities and (self) destruction.
I did protest the war in the 70’s as well as environment danger of nuclear power as part of the “Clam Shell Alliance”. Did it make a difference? Maybe, maybe not. I have no illusion about impact. I can only choose and control my own actions (which is separate issue about individual volition and meaning). As far as the end of humanity, I think it’s inevitable. It could be later but I think it is more likely sooner.
Yes, I am convinced it did. The scale and frequency of war protests garnered lots of network evening news coverage, which was more influential then because networks made some effort to be objective (rather than pander to one political tribe or another). Then, Cronkite went to Viet Nam and found the truth to be something very different than what LBJ, McNamara and Westmoreland were telling us. He declared the war to be an unwinnable stalemate and LBJ and his “light at the end of the tunnel” crowd were done.
Could a similar grass-roots movement happen today? I hope so, but we’ll need to rekindle the notion that there are common goods worth some sacrifice, and get past the me-first selfishness that happily accumulates huge debt for our grandchildren to pay off. That is, if our legacy of environmental destruction leaves them anything worth paying off.
I’m trying very carefully not to comment here on topics I don’t know much about. E.g. almost everything regarding US or Canadian politics or society. Never been there. But as somebody who spent his childhood in the former Eastern Bloc (specifically Czechoslovakia) I have to say that even during that time we ( = my family, etc., who weren’t exactly friends of communism or Soviet Union, despite having to live in the regime) always saw the nucelar weapons as a major “common sense” factor that was making even the craziest warmongers think twice. Without them I think the Cold War would have been much hotter.
TL;DR: A lot of people in communist Czechoslovakia were actually friends of American nukes
I’m really interested in Eastern Europeans take on things because we don’t get a lot of exposure. We spent a lot of time talking to people in Prague, especially about Anthropoid and relations with Germany. Wow, that shoot out from the church.
I am naturally an optimist, but it is very hard to be one today.
I believe we have already passed the point of runaway global warming. The sheer size of our global population and economy based on growth is driving mass extinctions and climate change. Destroying the “web of life” at an alarming rate. We are locked into an economic system that rewards greed, and I believe it will take a catastrophic collapse that forces us to change.
As a social animal we have definite altruistic behaviors toward others within a group and individuals outside of the group. Yet we can also have competitive and aggressive behaviors with other groups or with rivals within the group. Both types of behaviors had to have survival advantages. We are apex predators which make us very dangerous!
Our population size is way greater than during most of human history. I remember reading years ago about studies of the effect of overcrowding among rats and how they became much more aggressive toward each other.
For awhile five people in the neighborhood had bladder cancer and they are always spraying all kinds of stuff.
We like to call ourselves “Central Europeans”