Giant African Baobab Trees Die Suddenly After Thousands of Years (theguardian.com)

Some of Africa's oldest and biggest baobab trees have abruptly died, wholly or in part, in the past decade, according to researchers. From a report: The trees, aged between 1,100 and 2,500 years and in some cases as wide as a bus is long, may have fallen victim to climate change, the team speculated. "We report that nine of the 13 oldest ... individuals have died, or at least their oldest parts/stems have collapsed and died, over the past 12 years," they wrote in the scientific journal Nature Plants, describing "an event of an unprecedented magnitude." "It is definitely shocking and dramatic to experience during our lifetime the demise of so many trees with millennial ages," said the study's co-author Adrian Patrut of the Babes-Bolyai University in Romania. Among the nine were four of the largest African baobabs. While the cause of the die-off remains unclear, the researchers "suspect that the demise of monumental baobabs may be associated at least in part with significant modifications of climate conditions that affect southern Africa in particular." Further research is needed, said the team from Romania, South Africa and the United States, "to support or refute this supposition."

Comments

Well now we know how the cat is doing

[SuperKendall]

Baobob trees were fine for thousands of years... ...until 2005 when researches started examining them, then nearly 70% of the oldest ones die.

HMM.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[oic0]

Nope! definitely climate change. Always climate change.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[thomst]

SuperKendall mused:

Baobob trees were fine for thousands of years... ...until 2005 when researches started examining them, then nearly 70% of the oldest ones die.

HMM.

I highly doubt climate change did them in. It just doesn't work that way.

I suspect a newly-introduced pathogen is responsible, as turned out to be the case with sudden oak death syndrome a few years ago.

Don't get me wrong. I do, indeed, expect climate change to negatively impact baobob trees, and many, many other species (coastal and montane redwoods, anyone?) - eventually. Just not yet, and not this suddenly ...

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[DarkOx]

Makes you wonder. I have a oak that is about a century old on my property. The damn carpenter ants are attacking it. The arborist checked it out recently (I love this giant old tree). He said there is not much you can do. Bugs get oaks eventually its what ultimately kills them all. You take it down or you can just wait and let it fall down when its time comes (it won't hit anything but other trees) is what I was advised.

He also told me trees that age don't recover from shocks as easily as younger trees. Don't limb it anymore, if you want to let it go and see how long she lasts. Only cut obviously dead limbs out. Otherwise leave it alone, look enjoy don't touch. Was the rest of his advice.

A few points
1) Trees like all organisms have a finite life span (maybe these baobab trees are just getting to that age)
2) Trees like all things can only take so much abuse maybe being studied is in someway harmful to them.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[Greyfox]

Yeah, we've got the ash borer in Colorado. For 45 years I'd never seen a tree die at any house I lived at, then all of a sudden 3 of them in one year. And the pine beetle was killing the hell out of the pine trees up in the park, too. You'd come around a mountain curve and all the trees on the side of the mountain would be dead. Crazy. Guess it's a bad decade for trees.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[Anonymous Coward]

Pathogens may themselves be the result of climate change. An organism that previously existed only within some very narrow bounds of tolerance, may find that it can now thrive across a much wider area.

I'm not trying to argue with you, just saying - even if it was a pathogen, that doesn't mean climate change had nothing to do with it.

Yes, it's conjectural, but so is the whole "pathogen" hypothesis.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[blindseer]

Just not yet, and not this suddenly ...

Using "suddenly" and "over 12 years" together does not compute. I'd be interested in seeing some kind of evidence on how these trees fared in the past. It's quite amazing for these trees to have lived for so long but it would seem feasible to me that 1000 years ago we could have seen trees of this type die off then too. The changing of the climate then could have also done them in.

Consider an analogous situation on a human. We see a 150 year old man fall ill and die. Do we blame this on climate change too? Perhaps his diet of only fresh milk and fruit killed him. Maybe it was the pipes he smoked when he was in his 40s, 50s, and 60s. Or maybe it just that he's 150 years old and a person living this long is quite unusual to begin with and it's impossible to tell what the final nail in his coffin was.

A more humorous take on this human analogy... I recall a TV character making fun of another about how he takes such great care to eat healthy, exercise, abstain from alcohol, not smoke, and generally fixate on living for a long time. The punch line was something about looking foolish in his old age, lying in a hospital bed, dying of NOTHING. Everything alive dies sometime, pinning the cause on something specific can be a fool's errand.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[Patent Lover]

I was just in Rocky Mountain National park last week. Their paper they give you says that now 65% of the pine trees in the park are dead due to the pine beetles. Sobering and sad.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[Luckyo]

Far more common case is that people who study trees carry pathogens that jump cross tree species. Another point is that studying trees involves invasive procedures like drilling holes in them to make assessments of age, and as any arborist worth his salt will tell you, older trees are very bad at recovering from such shocks than young trees.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[Anonymous Coward]

North Carolina used to have oaks so big that the entire floor of a room could be made from a slab cut through the center of it (and some were). In other words, they were larger in diameter than the shortest measure of a typical room. Sadly, none today come close.

Imagine how long those took to grow.

And guess what... there were people there the whole time. It was only when people of European descent invaded that the trees were utilized in a non-sustainable fashion.

Trees fall to disease early today because of the harsher environment they are in.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[Jzanu]

Don't ignore ecology: why are there more ants alive and foraging for food specifically in your area, and in such elevated numbers that they kill century old trees? Elevated temperatures increase the hatching of innumerable insects, shift them to earlier in the year, they then act as food for the ants, etc.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[plover]

This has long been a concern of mine. Our area used to be in agricultural "Zone 2", meaning we'd usually experience a few day snap of -22F winter weather. This killed off a wide variety of non-native pests, such as those that arrived here on trucks and railcars from warmer clones during the summers. After a decade of record warm winters, we've been re-classified as Zone 4 and the transient beasts never die off now. So we've now got emerald ash borers; gypsy moths; new wasps, bees, and ants; and various roaches and snakes we've never had to deal with before, They're killing vast numbers of native trees and plants.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[Anonymous Coward]

climate change increasing pathogen range is way beyond the understanding of a closed-minded idiot. A lot of people think the Earth is flat. I mean when you are there, how do you get to second or third-level systems thinking? It's amazing how close-minded people can be, their brain "protecting" them. How... lesser-evolved animal-like of them. Almost like we evolved from, well, lesser animals. Damnit I hate the half of the populace holding the earth down. :( They are the same people that litter, too. Because someone else will pick it up.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[phantomfive]

Makes you wonder. I have a oak that is about a century old on my property. The damn carpenter ants are attacking it. The arborist checked it out recently (I love this giant old tree).

Well get rid of the carpenter ants, anyway.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[Tablizer]

Dr. Schrodinger examined them.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[thomst]

An Anonymous Coward opined:

Pathogens are finding new territories worldwide as the climate change makes that possible, in fact. Sudden Oak Death is a perfect example.

Yes, pathogens are spreading globally. Whether that's related to climate change depends on the particular pathogen and the circumstances of its appearance in new locations.

I doubt SOD is an example of climate change-mediated pathogen migration. I think it's far more likely that it was imported on the shoes of hikers who had previously visited South Asia. There are lots of Northern Californians who have traveled to Nepal, for instance, or to popular locations in the Himalayan foothills in India, such as Jammu and Kashmir, where SOD is suspected to have originated, who also enjoy hiking in California state and national parks.

It's a fact that researchers themselves were important vectors for SOD in California. (It was, as you might expect, kind of a big deal there - and those researchers were very publicly apologetic once they realized what they'd accidentally done.)

I'm just glad the oaks on our property weren't infected ...

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[thomst]

blindseer commented:

Using "suddenly" and "over 12 years" together does not compute.

I beg to disagree.

When several 1500-2000 year old trees die in the same area over a period of 12 years, for no apparent reason, I'd call that "sudden."

In fact, that's exactly what I did call it. In terms of your analogy, if a half-dozen 150-year-olds die in the same area over a period of 12 months, for no apparent reason, I'd also call that "sudden," because it's the cluster of deaths that would make them stand out. One 150-year-old dying for no apparent reason is just a datum. 3 or more dying in the same area over a short time (relative to the length of their lives) is unusual enough to warrant a search for a common cause, rather than simply saying, "Oh, well. They were old. What can you do?"

Were I living in that area, and approaching my 150th birthday, I'd certainly want answers - and a ticket to somewhere else ... !

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[fatwilbur]

I call BS on this anecdote after reading into it.. most agricultural zone systems have levels separated by multiple degrees (F), and there's no place on earth that's experienced that level of warming over a single decade. The periods like that which I can find (they do exist) were typically in the past and part of random noise in the data; eg. there were always periods of very cold winters to follow. No different from flipping heads 10 times in a row - it does occur in large variable data sets but not common. Even the reference documentation I can find (all climate change advocate sites) note changes to ag zones typically occur over 30 year periods or more.

While local fauna may no doubt have to adapt to new threats in the future, the much, much larger and quicker threat is invasive species introduction by human means.

Oh and know what else that ag zone shift means? The area can support growing much more food, and much more valuable food.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[Maxo-Texas]

It's a bit more than that.

It's like a half dozen people between 40 and 85 all suddenly died in the same area over a period of less than a 6 months.

The trees were between "1,100 and 2,500".

The young 1,100 year old trees contradict the age argument.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[arglebargle_xiv]

The purpose of the study was to learn how these Africans become so enormous

Two words for the scientists: "Chicken Licken".

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[valnar]

Are you getting in a car to go to work? I'm pretty sure liberals drive just as much.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[Anonymous Coward]

over 50 some years my area has gone from a low zone 4 to a mid zone 5... while we haven't been reclassified officially on the maps, the reality is the annual low temperatures aren't getting down to the -30f they used too... they are only getting down to -15F or -10F...

If a region was a high zone 2 they could very reasonable be a zone 4 now...

So I call BS on your call of BS, because I've watched it happen as I've been gardening, but if that's not enough, here is some data from a meteorologist... https://blogs.mprnews.org/updraft/2016/01/thursday-thaw-how-cold-will-minnesota-get-this-winter/

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[religionofpeas]

Well get rid of the carpenter ants, anyway.

Or ask them to make you a bookshelf, or something. Try to keep them busy with useful stuff instead of eating trees.

Re: Well now we know how the cat is doing

[Holi]

"North Carolina used to have oaks so big that the entire floor of a room could be made from a slab cut through the center of it (and some were). In other words, they were larger in diameter than the shortest measure of a typical room."

I would hardly call this romanticizing. It's just stating a fact.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[drinkypoo]

Yeah, and some of those pathogens and insect Invaders are probably spreading due to climate change. We know for sure that it's happening with insects.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[laie_techie]

Don't go to the hospitals people dies there! Very good line of reasoning. +5 Interesting. Oh forgot, I am on /. Sigh.

Time line : 1. the trees are getting ill ; 2. researchers start to study the cause because they are sick ; 3. the trees die ; 4. /.tters conclude the cause is the researcher ; 5. ... 6. PROFIT!

Only we don't know that the trees were getting ill.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[terrycarlino]

You could actually try to find out why the trees are dying rather than propose an hypothesis base on nothing.

It couldn't possibly be due to an unknown pathogen, parasite or chemical/ecological conditions.

You know it's not science if you're just guessing based on your politics.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[Citizen of Earth]

If anything kills plants dead, it's CO2!

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[Agent0013]

The trees also form a network under the ground. The roots are connected to fungus and they share nutrients and sugars back and forth. If you start killing off some of the other trees it can affect the others nearby, even different species.

A link to a RaidoLab episode if anyone is interested.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[Luckyo]

Baobabs tend to grow far away from any major forested areas. Wikipedia has pretty good images of common habitat of them:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[Luckyo]

Scientists do need to take samples from the tree to establish data for data sets so they can actually do scientific work.

Unfortunately much of such sampling is highly invasive, such as drilling out small parts of the tree.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[cthulhu11]

Hooray for snakes!

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[thomst]

Maxo-Texas pointed out:

It's a bit more than that.

It's like a half dozen people between 40 and 85 all suddenly died in the same area over a period of less than a 6 months.

The trees were between "1,100 and 2,500".

The young 1,100 year old trees contradict the age argument.

Good point.

I'd mod you +1 Insightful, if I could ...

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[thomst]

Jane Q. Public noted:

If some of them were even close to 2,000 years old, they have survived both much warmer and much colder conditions than today.

The Medieval Warm Period was 300 years long.

Good point.

I'd mod you +1 Informative, if I could ...

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[Maxo-Texas]

Well I would mark you +1, Nice and Agreeable. :-)

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[thomst]

Maxo-Texas confessed:

Well I would mark you +1, Nice and Agreeable. :-)

While I appreciate and thank you for the compliment, the fact is that scoring points doesn't interest me. I'd much rather participate in and encourage thoughtful, fact-based discussions of this and other subjects. For me, that means awarding mod points on that basis, rather than because the poster agrees or disagrees with me.

I also very much appreciate it when people who respond to my posts point out salient facts that I've overlooked or failed to give sufficient weight.

I try very hard not to view discussions of important issues as zero-sum games ...

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[Maxo-Texas]

As I hope you can tell from my post, I prefer fact-based, civil conversation.

Disagreement indicates a potential for learning unless the person disagreeing is irrational.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[plover]

I call BS on this anecdote after reading into it.. most agricultural zone systems have levels separated by multiple degrees (F), and there's no place on earth that's experienced that level of warming over a single decade.

Minnesota has always had pronounced extremes of weather, from -60F (-51C) to +114F (+45C). And this wasn't simply a single ten year rise in averages - the temps have been steadily rising since my childhood (several decades ago), back when we were Zone 2B. I was just noting that the last decade has not only continued the rise; but the old extremes no longer contain the current temperature range. Given that our average annual temperature has been rising by an average of 0.776F per decade, it's not all that surprising.

Also, we should be taking into account that plant hardiness zones aren't defined by the average temperature, but by the coldest minimum temperature experienced during a winter. It's those periods of extremes that kill off the non-hardy plants and animals, and that give the native plants the chance to outlast the invaders.

Re:Well now we know how the cat is doing

[Jane Q. Public]

You know, it's funny.

Slashdot used to be a civilized, high-tech-and-science-oriented place.

But these days, make one simple factual statement that goes against the narrative, and get marked down (as I did).

It's pretty sickening, really. The extent some people will go to push lies.

Confirmation Bias

[Tulsa_Time]

Get ready.

Well, what did they think would happen?

[ScentCone]

You stop using ground-up rhinoceros horn fertilizer on the trees, and look what happens.

Re:Wow

[Fly Swatter]

or at least their oldest parts/stems have collapsed and died

So they still have newer growth that is not dead, so.... Not even dead yet.

As to a political angle, couldn't care less about that.

Re:Segregation is the answer

[vux984]

"Remove all minorities back to their origin"

Quick Mexico! Flood the borders. If you can tilt the scales so that you have the majority, this asshat has just agreed to deport himself and his kind and confine himself to Britain or Holland or whatever.

I mean, that's assuming he's american, and white, and a he... but who is going to be against that here?

Must be climate change with humans, too.

[Ungrounded Lightning]

In other news: The oldest humans on the planet are dying, or having parts of their bodies fail, MUCH more often than even those a few years younger.

(According to the Social Security administration's Period Life Table for 2015, the probability of death within a year for a person 119 years old is 90%, while at 107 years it's only 50%. Research papers and tables compiled by other insurance operations give similar numbers.)

Baobab tree trunks are not a single stem growing from the roots, but a cluster of them, of varying ages. This looks like a strategy for achieving long life for the overall organism without having to achieve long life for all of its parts: Just grow additional trunk stems. When the older ones get feeble and die off, the younger ones are still there and take over. (Of course sometimes you end up with a lot of old ones, and losing most of them all at once is the end of the show.)

This is not to say that the deaths observed here are NOT caused, in whole or great part, by climate change or some other stress in recent years. But the study seems to be just a recent look, with nothing in the past to compare it to. So while it indicates that, recently, the oldest individuals and oldest chunks of them died off more than the younger instances, it does nothing to distinguish whether this is the normal condition of the trees vs. the result of something recent.

Re:I hope most of humanity is next

[Gojira Shipi-Taro]

After you.

Re:I hope most of humanity is next

[ChrisMaple]

nothing of value will be lost.

Of value to whom? In order to reach what goal?

We are human beings, and the proper purpose of all human action is to make things better for humans.

Re:I hope most of humanity is next

[jwhyche]

No we are not, but you are a idiot. I've tried to take the high road lately but this kind of talk is just imbecile.

Re:Or maybe they die of old age?

[another_twilight]

They do realize that trees actually do eventually die of old age right?

I put it to you that the researchers involved in this study are at least as knowledgeable as you on this topic. That the conclusions you have considered after reading an article based on their research is likely to have occurred to them (it's not especially novel) and the reason it isn't mentioned is that it has been dismissed.

at least as likely

I'd appreciate you sharing the methodology by which you reached that evaluation.

The summary of the original paper is more cautious than the article (linked, above) and calls for more research to prove/disprove the possible link to climate and environmental changes.

Truthiness

[sd4f]

I love it when science doesn't have the answers, but tries to look like it does. The article is a case in point; they don't know what killed the trees, or why they died, but... it was climate change...

Re:Truthiness

[Patent Lover]

It's not the science, it's the article. Two completely different things. This is The Guardian, not the journal Nature.

Re:Truthiness

[avandesande]

They don't mention obvious stuff like possible local irrigation causing salinity or lowering the water table.

Re:Truthiness

[CaffeinatedBacon]

Local irrigation spread across entire countries...

All were in southern Africa – Zimbabwe, Namibia, South Africa, Botswana, and Zambia

Did you misspell global warming?

Re:I hope most of humanity is next

[Brett Buck]

Classic sociopath.

Don't give up on mankind... just yet

[Alwin Henseler]

Maybe you're right, and this planet deserves to get rid of humans. But look at it this way:

In geological / planetary timescales, humans have only been around for the blink of an eye. Yes we're stupid. Careless. Stomping out species wherever we go. Using this planet's resources wasteful. Poisoning its air, soil & waters. And it probably wouldn't hurt the planet's ecosystems if all humans disappeared yesterday.

BUT: we're also learning. Sloooowwwwly, yes, but learning. How to avoid mistakes made in the past. How to make more efficient use of resources. How to curb population growth (again: slooooowwwwly). How to clean up rivers & lakes. And in a few cases, how to revive almost-extinct animal or plant species. Or at least preserve a few living specimens in zoos, gardens and seed banks around the world. Over time, chances are we'll become better stewards of this planet than some of our ancestors were.

Now suppose all humans would disappear in short order. The planet would go through some climate change cycles. Many species would disappear. New species would evolve. And perhaps a few million years from now another 'intelligent' (?) species might evolve. Probably only to make the same mistakes again. Or worse.

So... give us time. Mechanisms are in place to bring humans to a halt should things get out of hand. Like a limit on amount of arable land. Oil running out. Or climate change, turning some population centres into un-liveable areas. One way or another, at some point something will have to give.

When naked survival is at stake, humans can learn quick & become very inventive. If / when we learn, both ourselves and our planet may turn out for the better. And should we spread out over the solar system (or even further out) and take those lessons with us, perhaps not make the same mistakes elsewhere.

So if you care: try and do your bit. Help others do the same. And be patient. We're not done on this planet. And this planet is not done with us. Not yet, anyway... :-)

We all know who to blame

[viperidaenz]

It's the millennials' fault

Re:Wow

[NicknameUnavailable]

This isn't even an argument. Baobab trees are extraordinarily common in Africa. Having less than 10 of the oldest ones die over the span of over a decade isn't even close to being statistically significant by any measure beyond saying "things are more likely to die as they get older," well no shit. The only remarkable thing about this is that it is being spun as "omg climate change," that says a lot more about the people pushing "climate change" research than it says about a particular tree (since this same exact thing applies to all known life, if that weren't the obvious point here.)

Re:Segregation is the answer

[omnichad]

Why don't you go back to your homeland? Where is that, again?

Re:I hope most of humanity is next

[omnichad]

A biological imperative is not a purpose.

Re:Life does not thrive

[rahvin112]

You aren't any kind of biological expert of any kind. This has nothing to do with CO2 affecting the tree, it's about the change in the climate, in particular in this case changing rainfall patterns in the area of the world where these trees grow.

They are blaming climate change because the trees exist in a part of the world that has seen one of the biggest changes in rainfall in the world over the last 20 years with around a 40% reduction in annual rainfall for over two decades. That change in rainfall amount has a drastic effect on the oldest trees because they are less able to handle changes and need significant amounts of water due to their size.

Re:Wow

[Anonymous Coward]

Nonsense, these things live for thousands of years. They pretty much all died at the same exact time on those timescales. If that happened normally they would never be able to live that long. Use some common sense.

Re:Or maybe they die of old age?

[another_twilight]

Unfounded hypothesis.

Unproven I'll own, but it's not unfounded.

Speculation

True. I'm offering an alternative specualtion to the GPs speculation. In doing so I'm offering what I consider a more likely interpretation than the GP has reached. If you'd like to challenge that assessment, I am interested.

An appeal to a standard you do not meet

Given that I make no evaluation, such as the GPs 'at least as likely', which I took the trouble to quote, I'm not sure what your point is. I'm calling out the GP to explain his assertion. You seem to want me to justify my calling them out.

So essentially it's an admission that they do not, in fact, know, justifying the original skepticism.

I've qualified my criticism of the GP by trying to more accurately report the summary of the researchers. To consider their caution justification for the speculation as to their failure to consider 'old age' is still an overreach and based on ... nothing, except possibly the assumption that the researchers are less knowledgeable or qualified than the GP.

I'm genuinely interested in whether you have a reason or position that supports the 'it's old age' thesis and/or the implication that this has been overlooked by the researchers. My reading suggests that it has been considered, but the timing and numbers led them to suspect that there may be more than this.

Re:Wow

[bill_mcgonigle]

that it is being spun

The /. editors post "stupid people saying stupid things" stories just to get reacts and ad impressions. Topical comments are what ad farms crave.

"Suddenly"

[kriston]

"Suddenly"

"individuals have died, or at least their oldest parts/stems have collapsed and died, over the past 12 years"

Pick one. It can't be both.

Re:"Suddenly"

[DamonHD]

Why not? Death is not exactly the same for large plants as it is for humans.

And "suddenly" seems entirely justified as a in a very short span relative to their mean age.

Rgds

Damon

Disingenuous verbiage

[BubbaJonBoy]

How the hell can you say "suddenly" after thousands of years have elapsed?
Suddenly maybe on a geologic scale...

Re:I hope most of humanity is next

[Provocateur]

Oh. (I know you really are John Wick, posting on /. with a really, really low UID.) John, let us act like civilized me--

Re:Life does not thrive

[eaglesrule]

"It is very surprising to visit monumental baobabs, with ages greater than a thousand to two thousand years, which seem to be in a good state of health, and to find them after several years fallen to the ground and dead," Adrian Patrut, a researcher at Babes-Bolyai University, told National Geographic. "Statistically, it is practically impossible that such a high number of large old baobabs die in such a short time frame due to natural causes."--source

These trees are also a type of succulent, like a cactus, that evolved to store water within its trunk in order to be better drought resistant. A few years of reduced rainfall would seem to be a 'natural cause' this researcher would be willing to rule out.

While I'm not arguing that stress from environmental factors could not have caused the complete collapse of these trees, I have to have some cynicism towards the people who were in contact with these trees are also making the claim. If they introduced a pathogen into the tree or the soil due to negligence on their part, that resulted in the death of specimens that were also considered notable landmarks, would they take responsibility for it?

Either way, I want to see more evidence before leaping to the conclusion this is climate change related.

Re:I hope most of humanity is next

[eaglesrule]

man is the measure, the planet is ours. we don't have to settle any score, we owe no other species anything.

Fools eat their seed corn.

Likewise, biodiversity is a treasure that should not be spent frivolously. We owe it to ourselves and future generations to preserve what cannot be replaced.

Re:Life does not thrive

[bane2571]

You're right but I never once said that climate change specifically didn't harm the Baobabs, what I did say was that there is no mechanism mentioned only the nebulous "Climate change" which is generally, warmer temps, more CO2. Surely you would agree that for an incredibly heat tolerant, low water species like the Baobab, those two specific factors increasing should at least have no effect and at best be helpful.

You've thrown in a few other red herrings that are not related to my point: "humidity, soil hydrometry, soil acidity, soil NH4 concentration" the article never mentions these as a mechanism for the death of the Baobab so the fact that they could have been, further proves my point. Your pollinator point is flawed because these are not species failing because of lack of reproduction, they are individuals dying.

I want to reiterate that my main point was that there is no claimed process by which climate change killed these trees, only a statement that it did. That just feels dishonest, "Climate Change" should never be seen as some monolithic beast that just makes bad stuff happen, it makes anyone claiming that look simple.

Re:Or maybe they die of old age?

[another_twilight]

"Further evidence is required to support or refute..." is not a strong statement of confidence.

I agree. I think the article that links to the research paper overstates the case for climate being responsible, and doesn't do justice to the caution of the original paper. It's useful and necessary to publish weak, inconclusive or even failed results. And the researchers have. Criticising the lack of a strong conclusion isn't useful. This isn't bad science, it's inconclusive science - and reporting that is useful.

My contention is with armchair commentators who post things like "They do realize that trees actually do eventually die of old age right?"

Water Table

[surfcow]

They are having a genuine water crisis right now in some South African cities.

I recall reading that aggressive farming can suck a water table dry.

Big trees have tap roots that drill down to the water table,
which contains 'fossil water' - old water that does not get replenished
easily or at all.

Re:I hope most of humanity is next

[DamnOregonian]

nothing of value will be lost.

What a ridiculous fucking assertion.
We are raping this place. Ya, we're shitting all over the environment that sustains us. Half of us because we believe the sky fairy wasn't lying when he said that the Earth was unchanging, and that we were its master, and that it'd stay bountiful as long as we kept fucking it and each other. The other half are just greedy parasites.
We don't disagree here.
But nothing of value lost? Get the fuck out of here. You see any other footprints on the moon? We could be, for all we know, the most advanced species in the galaxy, or ever to emerge. We're a deeply flawed animal, but we're also mind blowingly incredible. If you can't see that, you should seek psychiatric help for your depression, or just fucking off yourself.

Climate change? Seriously?!

[fygment]

... end of life maybe? You do know trees don't live forever, right? But hey, "climate change" gets you in the news.

Other spontaneously idiotic possibilities: it was the Russians, Chinese, or North Koreans ... or Trump. So many possibilities.

On the plus side, they WERE NOT CUT DOWN. So yay team humans!