Climate and Ag in the news
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The Panhandle e-News blog from northern Florida posted a useful article this week on management of cool-season forages. This is particularly challenging this year following a late start last fall and the cold weather conditions this winter. It includes an interesting photo comparison of crop conditions for ryegrass planted at three different times during the…
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In spite of cold conditions this winter, the trend to warmer minimum temperatures since 1970 has been for higher annual extreme minimum temperatures across the Southeast (and the US). Climate Central has published a set of graphs showing how the lowest temperature each station reported each year starting in 1970 has trended upward over time.…
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Atlas Obscura has an interesting story about how white-letter hairstreak eggs have been found in Scotland for the first time since 1884. They used to be fairly common but the population declined for a number of reasons. One of them was Dutch Elm disease, since elm trees were favored plants for the caterpillars to feed…
Posted in: Climate and Ag in the news -
Normally I don’t post political stories on this blog, because they make everyone mad and don’t promote either good climate science or agriculture. But as a former National Weather Service employee I was unhappy when I read an article today on Yahoo News which described the effects that the budget recently released by President Trump…
Posted in: Climate and Ag in the news -
Weather Underground published an interesting analysis of severe weather this year earlier in February. Considering how cold the East Coast has been, it’s probably not a big surprise that severe weather, which is usually linked to thunderstorms, would be limited this year. By comparison, last year there was well above-normal activity. Still, I did not…
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According to the NASDAQ newsletter, a heat wave in Argentina has increased stress on corn and soybeans already being threatened by drought in South America. Fortunately, a wet start to the growing season has so far limited the worst consequences of the drought, but if they don’t get more rain soon, yields are going to…
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Ten miles off the coast of Alabama, an underground cypress forest is being studied by scientists to help learn about the climate of 50,000 years ago, when the forest was alive, according to a recent story by National Public Radio. The ice-age forest may be able to provide new clues about how forests grew in…