{"id":103808,"date":"2022-11-09T06:41:34","date_gmt":"2022-11-09T06:41:34","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/alj.com\/?post_type=spotlight-fadyjameel&p=103808"},"modified":"2023-02-06T06:12:17","modified_gmt":"2023-02-06T06:12:17","slug":"keeping-in-tune-with-the-rhythms-of-nature","status":"publish","type":"spotlight-fadyjameel","link":"https:\/\/alj.com\/en\/spotlight-by-fady-jameel\/keeping-in-tune-with-the-rhythms-of-nature\/","title":{"rendered":"Keeping in tune with the rhythms of nature"},"content":{"rendered":"

Many of my business trips this year have caused me to think about the changing patterns of nature and our sensitivity to its messages.\u00a0 As time passes, we don\u2019t need empirical data to decode the clues we can see with our eyes or feel on our skin.\u00a0 Rising temperatures and unpredictable seasons are becoming apparent to even the most casual observer. \u00a0<\/p>\n

As humans, confident in our position as the planet\u2019s champion predators, we sometimes imagine ourselves separate from the quiet protests of the ecosystem in which we exist.\u00a0 It\u2019s too hot?\u00a0 Simply turn on the air conditioning.\u00a0 The cupboard is bare?\u00a0 Go to the shop and load up your trolley.\u00a0 Taps run dry at home?\u00a0 Easy \u2013 buy water by the gallon in plastic bottles.<\/p>\n

With our Homo Sapien wisdom and technological might, surely, we are above the mercy of external pressures and remain fully in charge of our destiny?<\/p>\n

Except, the truth is far less simple, and far less reassuring.\u00a0 Our society may be hugely complex and sophisticated, powered by technologies our ancestors could never even dream of, but humanity remains one single, fragile component in a complex and interdependent ecosystem; as vulnerable to the overwhelming forces of nature as the humblest bug, tiniest plant or single celled organism at the bottom of \u2013 and holding up – the global food chain.<\/p>\n

If through our actions \u2013 and inactions \u2013 we weaken or destroy one strand of nature\u2019s delicate web, we risk triggering an uncontrollable cascade of changes that could, quite literally, engulf us, destroying our way of life and curtailing the refined civilization we have developed over the millennia.<\/p>\n

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Edward Norton Lorenz (1917 \u2013 2008) American mathematician and meteorologist established the theoretical basis of weather and climate predictability, and the basis for computer-aided atmospheric physics and meteorology.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

This idea \u2013 that a small change in one part of an interconnected system can lead to much larger changes elsewhere in that system \u2013 is called the \u2018butterfly effect\u2019 (now part of the mathematical field of \u2018Chaos Theory\u2019). \u00a0<\/p>\n

It\u2019s largely based on the work of mathematician and meteorologist Edward Norton Lorenz.\u00a0<\/p>\n

He gave the metaphorical example of the size, duration or path of a tornado being influenced by minor changes like the distant flapping of a butterfly\u2019s wings several weeks earlier.\u00a0<\/p>\n

It doesn\u2019t take a mathematician or a meteorologist to see the small changes happening all around us a result of man-made climate change; small changes that are disrupting the lifecycle patterns of plant and animal species; the portents of potentially much bigger changes to come if we do not take positive action.<\/p>\n

Yet, all is not lost.\u00a0 By acknowledging the impacts of our rapacious industrial\/consumer culture, we begin the inevitable process of accepting responsibility.\u00a0 Further, we empower ourselves to begin counteracting the planetary vandalism which has constituted such a gross act of self-harm.<\/p>\n

Phenology exposes human recklessness<\/h2>\n

Climate change<\/em>.\u00a0 Two words which have been almost neutered by overuse.\u00a0 But what does it actually mean for our day to day lives?<\/p>\n

In real terms, it means that in 2021 the Earth\u2019s surface temperature was 0.84\u02daC hotter than the 20th<\/sup> Century average, and 1.04\u02daC hotter than in pre-industrial times.\u00a0 The nine years between 2013 and 2021 each rank among the ten warmest on record.[1]<\/a>\u00a0 Worse, without intervention the picture might become bleaker still.\u00a0 Human activity currently emits around 11 billion metric tons of carbon into the atmosphere annually, and even a rapid reduction by 2050 might not prevent temperature rises of 2.4 degrees or more this century.<\/p>\n

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At face value those numbers might not sound enormous, but Earth has taken notice, and its flora and fauna begun to react.\u00a0 The science behind this \u2013 phenology \u2013 involves studying plant and animal life in the context of cyclical natural phenomena.<\/p>\n

One recent study showed that three-quarters of North American bumblebee species were awakening from hibernation an average of 35 days earlier than in years past \u2013 before the flowers that nourish them have bloomed.[2]<\/a><\/p>\n

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Climate change: three-quarters of North American bumblebee species were awakening from hibernation an average of 35 days earlier. Image credit: \u00a9 Damien Tupinier<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Insects in general, those pillars of the food chain, have proven most susceptible to climactic shifts. \u00a0In the tiny, unheralded realm of the insect, climate is everything. \u00a0One study shows that by 2100 insect habitat loss will be two-thirds more expansive if temperatures rise by 2\u02daC, rather than 1.5 \u02daC \u00a0\u2013 a far greater sensitivity than that displayed by plants and vertebrates.[3]<\/a><\/p>\n

It\u2019s not just insects who are suffering.\u00a0 On August 9, 2022, the port of Valencia in Spain recorded a seawater surface temperature of 29.72 degrees, more than a degree warmer than the previous record from 2015.\u00a0 The resulting reduction, i.e., increased acidity, in seawater pH hinders the formation of calcium-based skeletons and shells essential for sea life.<\/p>\n

Still, these harbingers of nature\u2019s changing rhythms are fairly inconsequential, are they not?\u00a0 Bees, fish . . .\u00a0\u00a0 they\u2019re not people, are they? \u00a0Well, yes, except, we rely on bees to pollinate our crops.\u00a0 Studies suggest an 8% decline in crops in low-to-middle income countries if pollinator insects disappear.[4]<\/a><\/p>\n

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As for those fish and crustaceans which can no longer properly grow or reproduce and are now prone to extermination by invasive species \u2013 billions of people worldwide rely on fish as their main source of protein.\u00a0 Yet the number of overfished stocks has tripled in the last 50 years, leaving one-third of fisheries \u201cpushed beyond their biological limits.\u201d[5]<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n

Remove one of the ecosystem\u2019s foundations and the whole edifice begins to teeter.\u00a0 And that is why phenology is gaining traction in scientific and environmental communities alike.<\/p>\n

Evidence bridges continents, spans species<\/h2>\n

On land, plants and animals typically rely on day length (photoperiod) and temperature to activate the next stage of their life cycle.\u00a0 Fish, meanwhile, detect seasonal rainfall in river discharges, using this to time their migrations.\u00a0 Other life forms, such as fir cones, need fires to stimulate seed release and germination.<\/p>\n

Relationships can be even more intricate than they first appear: \u00a0interdependent species might have different triggers so won\u2019t necessarily \u2018shift\u2019 to the next stage of the cycle in tandem.<\/p>\n

\"United\u201cWithin food chains, plants may shift their development more quickly than animals that feed on them, leading to phenological mismatches,\u201d<\/em> notes the UN Environment Programme (UNEP<\/a>) in its Frontiers 2022: Noise, Blazes & Mismatches<\/em><\/a> report.\u00a0 This leads to a predator\/prey imbalance with inevitable consequences for reproduction, growth and survival.[6]<\/sup><\/a><\/p>\n

If our actions as custodians of planet Earth interfere with epochs-old triggers, nature falls out of synch.\u00a0 Breeding seasons start too early, crops fail, species numbers enter freefall, and in a world with an ever-growing human population (which could hit 9.7 billion in 2050 and 11.2 billion by 2100[7]<\/a>) hunger escalates.<\/p>\n

The UNEP report notes widespread emergence of phenological mismatches across the globe, from the UK to the European Alps and into the southern hemisphere, among terrestrial and marine environments alike.\u00a0 Several examples leap out.<\/p>\n