CYBER WAG Eating Maple Bars!

It has come to this! When CYBER WAG (computer generated Wild Ass Guess) went after the Polar Bears, or Tweety Bird, or even when CYBER WAG brought out the stochastic weather generator to kill crops in California I held out hope that these modelers of mayhem could be stopped.

Perhaps I have naively assumed reasonable scientist would step forward and unplug these....these...these fantasy world demons of darkness and destruction who lurk amongst us. These scientific panderers of flim flammery who appear to be normal  human beings, but who in fact live in a Matrix world of computer games and are hell bent on pulling the few sane amongst us into their apocalyptic world of never ending crisis and disaster. Not to be confused with the MSM.

Since childhood I have loved these simple but delicious delicacies, perhaps even more, yes indeed even more, than the salmon which the CYBER WAG is attempting to devour, but now CYBER WAG has set it's covetous eyes upon my Maple Bars.

Snuck away in the pages of a local rag newspaper we find this:

Sugar maples and climate change

Michael J. Caduto

Unlike the Ents in Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings, real trees can’t walk away from danger or fight their own battles. When climate becomes inhospitable, forests can only shift ranges over long periods of time. This isn’t a problem when natural climate change occurs slowly. At the end of the recent post-glacial period, it took 4,300 years for the ice sheet to melt back from Middletown, Conn., to St. Johnsbury -- averaging 245 feet a year. Forest communities in front of the glacier gradually migrated northward in its wake.

Starting about 9,000 years ago and stretching for the next 4,000 to 5,000 years, the average temperature in the New England area became nearly 4°F warmer than it is today, and the climate was similar to modern-day Virginia. Hemlock and white pine grew 1,300 feet higher up the mountain slopes. Evidence now shows that the engines of the industrial age are taking today’s climate forward, into the past. U.S. Climatological Network Data reveals that the mean annual temperature has increased by 3.8 degrees F since 1835, but 70 percent of this rise in temperature has occurred since 1970.

 Being the trusting soul that I am I will allow that the facts presented thus far are correct, although it is a bit disconcerting being as they are intertwined with the Ents from the fantasy world of JRR Tolkien. Perhaps that is appropriate both from  the fantasy aspect and that Lord Of The Rings was a metaphor for the struggle against oppressive centralized statism.

Please do remember however that according to this article temperatures in New England have already increased 3.8 degrees F since 1835, but also according to this article that  temperatures were 4 degrees F warmer than today, just 4 to 5 thousand years ago. This means that during the time that the Pharaoh's of Egypt were building the pyramids, Stonehenge was built, the calender was invented by the Mesopotamians, glass was invented, the first library was built, the first civilization in India was established, paper was invented, and a host of other accomplishments occurred , temperature were considerably warmer than today. If in fact the temperatures were that much warmer 4 thousand years ago, how are today's temperatures unprecedented? And more importantly how is it we did not tip the all important tipping point?


Onto the devouring of my maple bars:

Barry Rock, Professor of Natural Resources at the University of New Hampshire in Durham predicts that, based on two climate models in a New England regional climate assessment study, "Within the next 100 years, Boston could have a climate similar to either Richmond, Virginia, or Atlanta, Georgia." These computer models project that the average regional temperature will rise from between 6 degrees and 10 degrees over the next century.

 Here we see the introduction of CYBER WAG into the article "based on two climate models" in a New England regional climate assessment study." You also see how these people are constantly putting themselves in a pickle.

Let's do the math.

* In 1835 it was 3.8 deg F colder than today

* From 2000-3000 BC it was 4 deg F warmer than today.

* This means that in 1835 it was 7.8 deg F colder than when the Egyptians built the pyramids. Quite a difference isn't it? So much for the sensitivity of our eco-systems not to mention mankind to drastic climate change

Back to the maple bars, yum. In order to wipe out this delicacy, temperatures must be unprecedented in the future, they've already admitted that they are not now. So our CYBER WAG industrial Complex fires up the computer models and decides that it will be more than 4 degrees F warmer by 2100 than it is now. Why? Perhaps this may explain:

Figure 2. Natural range of sugar maple

You will note that neither Richmond Virginia or Atlanta Georgia are know for their sugar maples. But you will also notice that climates far and wide are capable of nurturing the goddess of the golden nectar. From the same Cornell paper:

Climate
Average temperatures within the geographic range of sugar maple have average January temperatures from 0 to 50° F and average July temperatures from 60 to 80° F. Maximum temperatures in the summer months range from 90 to 100° F, while winter minima vary from -40 to +20° F. Annual precipitation throughout the geographical range averages 20 to 50 inches of rain, plus from 1 to 150 inches of snow. In unusually wet years in the southern reaches of this broad range total annual rain in excess of 80 inches has been recorded.

The first killing frost usually occurs between September 1 and November 10 and the last from March 20 to June 15, depending on latitude and elevation. Thus average growing seasons are from 80 to 260 days.

It is also important for the narrative that drastic change in temperatures  be swift as Dr Rock explains:

If the models prove accurate, Rock says that, "In 100 years, New England’s cooler regions will no longer promote the growth of sugar maples, which are well adapted to the region’s current climate. This climate will support species that now grow to the south and in lower elevations, especially oaks and southern pines. On average, trees can only move their range from 10 to 25 kilometers over a 100-year period, and the current rate of climate change will not allow enough time for trees to ‘migrate’ northward in a smooth transition."

Always the big "If the models prove accurate", yes indeedy that really is the question of our times isn't it?

In order for the CYBER WAG to have its way with the trees, the warming must be fast and furious. Interesting that they are not only predicting  that this heat monster will wipe out our sweet maple in the next 100 years, but that we will be left with a barren wasteland, "This [new] climate will support species that now grow to the south and in lower elevations, especially oaks and southern pines.... But "... the current rate of climate change will not allow enough time for trees to ‘migrate’ northward in a smooth transition."

It's a CBER WAG twofer! A double apocalypse with one fell swoop, or more accurately a well placed entry on the keyboard. I guess this also means we will be growing oranges in Nashville soon?


Now it's time for the caveats. You know where the scientist and their lackeys in the media scare the bejezzuz out of everyone then say "well we did say this was just a possibility, I don't know why people take us so seriously"

Ultimately, under this scenario, the optimal range for sugar maples in New England could retreat up the high mountain slopes and to northern Maine. (Sugar maple’s current range extends as far south as Virginia and Tennessee, though only in the higher mountains.) Of the five computer models created by the U.S. Forest Service to predict the geographic shift in the ranges of forest species, only one foretells that global warming will cause sugar maples to disappear completely from parts of New England. Even if the climate warms considerably, our forests will still support the growth of some sugar maples, especially in higher terrains.

Although the range of sugar maples changes slowly, the flow of sap in a sugarbush is dynamic and depends on fine temperature variations that occur daily throughout late winter and early spring. Sap flows best when nighttime temperatures drop into the mid-20s and when daytime highs reach around 38-40 degrees.

From here the effects of climate change are harder to predict. If the daily cycling between freeze and thaw occurs less frequently, sugaring will suffer, as it will if the season is shortened by several weeks. But if sugaring as we now know it is simply shifted earlier into the year, the effect could be less pronounced. Making predictions about sugaring season has always been an uncertain but popular pastime, even before the dawn of climate change.

Ah yes the scenario gambit. Take the worst possible scenario, based upon computer projections whose output was derived from input entered by people who make a living by keeping everyone else on edge over the destruction of the planet. Then going to journalist 
who make their living  by keeping everyone else on edge over the destruction of the planet, or any other crisis for that matter. This sounds like a perfectly common sense way for science and the dissemination of science to be conducted, don't you think?

But they can not quite let it go. They know they must conclude with the dire threats they have unleashed upon humanity. So that there may be no doubt that temperatures returning to where they were at the cradle of human civilization is a bad thing.

The maple sugar industry can compensate somewhat for the uncertainties of the shifting climate. According to Dr. Timothy Perkins, director of the University of Vermont’s Proctor Maple Research Center, "The best equipment in the sugar house isn’t going to make you any more money. It’s how you manage the sugarbush that counts."

Producers need to tap their trees earlier, before the sap starts to flow, so they can gather the best quality sap of the season. Old tubing must be replaced with new, which is made of superior material and is more efficient. Getting rid of leaks in the system will help, as well as using a vacuum system for collecting sap. Collectively, these steps can help mitigate the problem.

No matter what steps are taken, the wheels have been set in motion. The question is: How far down the road will sugar maples have to travel before we put the brakes on climate change?

To view maps that predict shifts in the ranges of trees that will be brought on by global warming, visit www.fs.fed.us/ne/delaware/atlas/index.html.

Yes how far must the sugar maples travel?

Do you find it strange, or is it just me, that so called moderate scientist, you know those that are not "deniers" or "alarmist" do not see all the inconsistencies and hypocrisies in the scientific community when it comes to climate science? Here is one of literally hundreds of stories done to warn of the dire consequences of global warming which within the story itself states unequivocally that the very foundation of man made global warming "it is unprecedented!" states that it is not unprecedented at all.

It is not as if Mr Caduto made this all up out of thin air, he quotes scientist who one must assume have read the article in which they are quoted. If they thought that anything was inaccurate one would assume they would have corrected it or asked for a correction.

Do you see a mad rush to the cameras by these so called "moderate" scientist to correct or clarify the glaring inconsistencies constantly being foisted upon the general public? Does it not concern these scientist that if the very foundations on which the science of global warming is built is being shown to be a sham that the entire enterprise is probably a sham as well? Do they not care? Or as was written when temperatures were about 4 degrees F warmer than they are now.

"When I saw in the plunder a beautiful robe from Babylonia, two hundred shekels of silver and a wedge of gold weighing fifty shekels, I coveted them and took them. They are hidden in the ground inside my tent, with the silver underneath."

You can keep your shekels, just quit messing with my maple bars