Global Warming Spreading Pests Far and Wide According To Study

An anonymous reader writes "New research has concluded that global warming is helping pests and diseases that attack crops to spread around the world. 'Researchers from the universities of Exeter and Oxford have found crop pests are moving at an average of two miles (3km) a year. The team said they were heading towards the north and south poles, and were establishing in areas that were once too cold for them to live in. The research is published in the journal Nature Climate Change.'"

Comments

Wrong

[Anonymous Coward]

No their knot! La La La! I can't here you!

ClimateChangeDenialBot37

Still want it?

[GameboyRMH]

I wonder if the selfish and short-sighted people who want global warming to continue because they live in areas that would benefit are still so enthusiastic...but I guess pests are as at least as easy to ignore as wars, refugees and food shortages.

Re:Still want it?

[MightyMartian]

In scientific circles, there is very little debate. This isn't a scientific debate, it's a PR debate instigated by fossil fuel companies. As to your last sentence, either you're wilfully lying, or you're an ignoramus.

Re:Still want it?

[MightyMartian]

It's hard to see such people as myth when monster international corporations and uber-rich guys like the Koch Brothers are very much behind a massive campaign to discredit AGW researchers. I can't say whether they want the climate to continue to warm. They could be more mundanely evil in not giving a sweet fuck what happens 50 or 100 years from now, so long as their net worth continues up in the short and medium term.

Re:Still want it?

[Nimey]

Why, if you're investigating a scientific theory, would you both considering what Al Gore or the Koch Brothers had to say?

Because it's not about science for the denialists, it's about tribalism and primate dominance.

Re:Still want it?

[lightknight]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colorado_potato_beetle

"The beetle was discovered in 1824 by Thomas Say from specimens collected in the Rocky Mountains on buffalo-bur, Solanum rostratum. The origin of the beetle is somewhat unclear, but it seems that Colorado and Mexico are a part of its native distribution in southwestern North America.[2] In about 1840, the species adopted the cultivated potato into its host range and it rapidly became a most destructive pest of potato crops. The large scale use of insecticides in agricultural crops effectively controlled the pest until it became resistant to DDT in the 1950s. Other pesticides have since been used but the insect has, over time, developed resistance to them all.[3]"

So, when you stop patting yourself on the back for confirming your bias, you can spare a moment, and read up on one of the pests mentioned in that article. The Colorado Potato Beetle is immune to DDT (an achievement in of itself), as well as a number of other pesticides, which were holding it at bay. In other words, this thing used to destroy potato crops, and only by blanketing crops with pesticides did we slow it down some. It evolved...our pesticides have not; what more, I imagine many of the farmers in the affected areas have decided to ride the 'organic' cash cow, and not use any pesticide on their crops...thus ensuring that this pest won't even be slightly dinged by whatever extra proteins it has to manufacture to get around the poisons we normally spread on those crops; instead, it will grow fast...much faster.

Global Warming had jack shit to do with this pest's rise...only the laziness of mankind let it reclaim ground. And I imagine that the other pests are, perhaps, due to similar, or other, explainable reasons. But I guess a little fact checking takes too much time these days...

Why not, if other things can flourish also?

[SuperKendall]

This theory (that pests are moving farther north because it's no longer as cold) ALSO supports the idea that other things, like plants and animals can also be raised farther north because it is warmer.

If you think that's offset by some parts becoming too warm to support some crops and animals, then you must ALSO weigh that with the aspect that some pests will find it too warm and so there is some benefit. But since jungles grow everything in abundance it's pretty hard to argue that warming is not a net gain overall in terms of food production.

Basically, the fact that habitable zones increasing in size brings an expansion of everything that lives in those zones should not really be news to anyone, and you shouldn't be foolish enough to play up a very tiny negative aspect of it in a desperate grab to make other people fear the way you want them to.

Re:Why not, if other things can flourish also?

[pixelpusher220]

You're assuming the warming stops at 'habitable'...

Re:Why not, if other things can flourish also?

[MightyMartian]

The problem here is that it seems rather likely that the habitable zones won't grow in size. Rather they will shift in latitude. There will be very real geopolitical ramifications to the North American and Eurasian growth zones jumping northward. Imagine the North American Grain Belt heading a few degrees north. All of a sudden, large areas currently under cultivation in the United States cease to arable, or at least cheaply arable. At the same time, Canada gains large amounts of arable land much farther north. In a few generations, you could see US food security compromised, with large amounts of the grain it needs suddenly in another sovereign country. The US will almost certainly be able to come to some accord with Canada, but other parts of the world may not be so lucky. A brief survey of historic and prehistoric migrations heavily suggests that people don't just sit on their asses and quietly die out when they can no longer get enough food and water.

Re:All roads leed to Rome/more goverment power

[MightyMartian]

I'm curious. Do you think the universe gives one sweet fuck about your political ideology. We can debate the scientific merits of these claims, but to attack them because they somehow collide with your political ideology is so fucking stupid I can only assume your either a moron or mentally ill.

Re:Pests

[lightknight]

Dr Bebber said: "The most convincing hypothesis is that global warming has caused this shift."

*facepalms* Allow me to translate: "We really like the idea that global warming is responsible for this shift; bear in mind that this is a hypothesis, not a theory, so it has not been tested or validated in even a casual sense."

Show me group think!

Re:All roads leed to Rome/more goverment power

[MightyMartian]

Um, because they want to study climate? Oddly enough, people enter scientific fields to do science.

Re:Generalized Hypothesis in a Generalized World

[Genda]

So first thing, there are no laws created by environmentalists... those would be legislators. The stupid you're impugning lives with folks who use environmental concerns exactly the same way the folks on the other side of the legislative fence use concerns about energy. Backroom deals with monied corporate interests getting stupid laws passed in their own interest that in fact exacerbate the issues in the real world, but make someone a lot of money. Real environmentalists appreciate that human beings are a inseparable part of the environment, and that ideas that force suffering or deprivation on vast populations would undermine ecological sanity on a global scale.

Technology is already beginning to provide huge opportunities to create environmentally sound alternatives to our current lifestyles, while at the same time giving us access to a world that is truly human compatible, even socially empowering. Agendas and dogmas are indications of people with ideologies to inflict on others, and these people seldom the source of workable solutions.

Re:Pests

[Genda]

That's not exactly correct, but it's really poor science to talk about an entire body of work involving thousands of separate research projects and researchers, in overly broad and general ways. Some work certainly has more rigor (and is therefore more authoritative) than others, and this news blurb talks about such a diverse population of pests (virii, viroids, bacteria, fungi, insects, nematodes... ad-infinitum) impacting everything from forest health to the growing occurrence of tropical fungal disease in humans occurring in temperate regions, that the trends spoken of here are a powerful indictment on issues of global climate change.. the average movement for pests (most thrive in warm climates) is about 3 km per years north and south (migration towards the poles.)

So at one level you're right, this could be gremlins herding trillion of lifeforms from dozens of different classes away from the equator, however watching these creatures move in lockstep with local changes in climate (and even micro climate), and watching what amounts to tropical conditions carry these lifeforms to places they've never been before, suggests that your observation, while humorous lacks a certain intellectual vision.