Aussie Adaptions to Climate Change….

“Koala climbing tree” by Diliff – Own work. Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Wikimedia Commons.

The timing of life cycle events and their interaction with the seasonal climate is called phenology. Now, phenology is sensitive to small changes in the environment. The life cycles of many plants and animals affect our day-to-day lives, and understanding these cycles is important for our survival. To effectively produce food or hunt, we need to understand animal behaviour and plant growth, and how these are linked to the environment.

I have been doing a little research about how Climate Change affects our environment. There seems to be a lot of information from the Northern Hemisphere, this is probably due to the noticeably visible seasonal changes over this region e.g the first snow event of the season.

Documented ‘firsts’ in these countries, like the arrival of migratory birds or flowering, are very obvious and easy to record. Other phenological events have also been recognized because of cultural significance -in Japan, the date of the first bloom of their cherry trees is known from as far back as the ninth century.

Whilst our records here in Australia are less extensive the University of Melbourne, Earthwatch and the Bureau of Meteorology have set up a ‘citizen science project known as ‘Climatewatch’. Data from this project suggests that the breeding season and migration of many birds is beginning earlier by an average of 2-3 days each decade. According to the Bureau of Meteorology some Australian plants are flowering, fruiting and being harvested as earlier as an average of 9 – 10 days per decade.

The term ‘flowering’ doesn’t just mean the development of flowers but also means the presence of pollen in the air. What was once thought of as the “pollen season” is also changing as the climate changes.

Researchers in Italy have found that the pollen season for several allergenic plants (birch, cypress, olive, grass, and Parietaria) was up to 85 days longer in recent decades, with the pollen season starting earlier now than in the 1980’s.

Wine grapes in southern Australia are also maturing earlier, as much as an average eight days earlier per decade since 1985. These changes are related to increasing air temperatures and decreasing moisture in the soil.

Box-ironbark forests are unusual in that they have trees that flower during winter. These flowers are a vital food source for nectar-dependent woodland birds, and are known as a ‘keystone’ element, because if these ironbarks fail to flower, leaving dependent woodland birds short of a vital food supply.

Records from 1945 to 1970 of red ironbark flowering in the Rushworth Forest in Victoria, indicate that no flowering occurred in only four of the 26 years. However, a more recently between 1997 to 2007 of red ironbark flowering found that the number of years with no flowering had increased. Over the 11-year study, there were four years with no flowering, with three of the failures occurring in the final six years. These flowering failures may have contributed to recent declines in the number of woodland birds in that forest.

This type of information comes from the public, you and me…There are over 170 species of plants, birds, mammals, marine creatures and insects that are being studies. If you like me are interested observation methodologies and details about this project can be found at www.climatewatch.org.au. This month along 44 people have downloaded information detailing some 125,939 bits of data. Wow!