Dobrowski expected he’d see the same trend when he looked into historical movements of plants in a vast area of northern California. He dug through a remarkable record of the region’s vegetation, collected back in the 1930s thanks to a federal project started during the Great Depression. He and his colleagues from the University of Idaho and the University of California, Davis then compared that with modern vegetation surveys.
“What we found was counter to our expectations,” he says. “We found that in fact the preponderance of plants in our study area had actually moved downhill 80 meters, or roughly 240 feet.”
The author doesn’t accept the obvious explanation that the 1930s were warmer, but he has collected some interesting data.
Can Hansen adjust the plants back uphill?
LOL – 240 feet of elevation – these guys are tools. Is that like 240 feet +- 250, 500 or 1000 feet ? They should have just reported no statistically valid difference and called it good, if that was what was meant.
The reality is that 240 feet of elevation change is likely meaningless as far a quite chaotic environmental conditions.
Remember Mann…the SIGN of the change is irrelevant for their magical statistical tools
Hi Steven! Again thanks for adding another must-checkout-site to the internet.
I have made a little test: What happens to global temperature trends if we simulate that the present La Nina will have the impact as the 1999-2001 La Nina period?
http://hidethedecline.eu/modules/news/modify_post.php?page_id=27§ion_id=27&post_id=216
Feel free to use.
K.R. Frank
Frank,
Your link brings up a login/password page.
Wops, correct link:
http://hidethedecline.eu/pages/posts/status-on-global-temperature-trends-216.php
This is a perfect example of accepting false premises. This researcher has got to be capable of some critical thinking and realize the most likely reason for what his own data is telling him, but accepts what Hansen and Gore tell him instead.
Science has got to get past this nonsense.
Can Hansen adjust plants uphill you ask? hmmm; You can adjust plants uphill but you can’t make ’em photosythethise.
p.s. Franks little test with La Nina is very interesting
an extensive study here in the eastern sierra showed the same results as above. their conclusion: it’s been getting colder over the entire holocene. if there is global warming, it’s not hitting the eastern sierra!
With the reported effect equal to 240 FEET of elevation, how would you know if there was any effect whatever? Every species responds in it’s own way for its own reasons. Temperature, precipitation, and elevation are just 3 of the gross variables affecting the microhabitat conditions which actually control the abundance of any species. The microhabitats are so variable that they are likely to confound observed effects in the range reported. One would likely have to resort to displaying statistical effects only, which is fine but not really of any importance in the greater scheme. Unless they are only looking at short lived plant like forbs, I would expect older individuals of long lived species eg trees to confound any short term effects such as those from the past few decades and microhabitat differences to overwhelm those due to their 3 gross effects.
Truly they are straining at gnats.
i think you are right about the microclimates and time lengths, and the complexity is definitely amplified in mountainous regions.
i could see short lived species moving up and down rather quickly, however.
in the eastern sierra at least, there are distinct zones sharply defined primarily by altitude. also, over the course of the holocene, entire plant communities have relocated hundreds of miles within the eastern sierra. that said, here, we are still in the LIA (A.K.A the Mathis Glaciation) as far as glaciation and location of plant communities.
the bristlecone pines, for instance, a 240ft change in altitude range would be obvious. and as you said about the timescale, they are right where they have been for 500 years.
and 240 ft would correspond to what, .84F?….i guess that is quite a bit colder!
I could see a short lived species evolving to environmental change rather quickly and certainly in the periods we consider climate to span as well. And in fact they always do.
Yes, it makes sense to consider responses of vegetation to broad periods of climactic change, but species are the basis in which we perform that analysis. Plant communities can only be understood in the terms of their constituent species, and in most northerly temperate environments are poorly co-evolved.
I very much doubt anyone has taken the time to analyze the microhabitat environmental conditions in that study area on any systematic basis. Certainly not in such a manner to gauge if a degree or 2 of temp differential is significant.