Climate Change & Anthropocene Extinction 24: Insects Germany declined 76% in just 27 years(!)

The numbers of flying insects in nature reserves throughout Germany show a staggering decline. Taken on average over the months of April to October between 1989 and 2016 insect numbers declined 76%. In mid-summer measurements show an even more rapid … Continue reading

Climate Change & Anthropocene Extinction 23: Amazon ‘tipping point’ is a sliding process, from +1C

In this article we try to quantify the Amazon rainforest climate tipping point, based on available scientific literature. We conclude there’s no real basin-wide threshold temperature to activate the forest-killing biome switch. Rather it seems to be a sliding process, … Continue reading

Climate Change & Anthropocene Extinction 22: Central American rainforests may also dry out – and die

In our previous article we saw how climate change dries out the Amazon rainforest from the South – killing all remaining rainforest in Bolivia and Paraguay, and most in Peru and Brazil. So, we wonder, what’s going on with the … Continue reading

Climate Change & Anthropocene Extinction 21: Amazon rainforest die-off starts in the South, models show

People who follow climate science will likely be well aware that the Amazon rainforest is particularly vulnerable to anthropogenic climate change – as the basin becomes increasingly prone to droughts under rising global temperatures. Much of the Amazon ecosystem, the … Continue reading

Climate Change & Anthropocene Extinction 20: Amazon tree transpiration crucial to keep rainforest wet

The individual trees in the Amazon rainforest play a crucial role in keeping the rainforest intact. Not just because the trees together create the forest, but also because – together – they create the climate (through something called the shallow … Continue reading

Climate Change & Anthropocene Extinction 19: Earth has 60,065 tree species, almost half threatened

When we think of the Holocene-Anthropocene Mass Extinction we may think of coral reefs, birds, amphibians and iconic mammal species – essentially following the IUCN Red List. But it really is time we started to take a closer look at … Continue reading

Climate Change & Anthropocene Extinction 18: Widespread effects ‘biodiversity redistribution’ unaccounted

We can all imagine that climate change-driven migration of species will have global consequences. But what do the actual effects look like – and how do these feed back on ecology, climate and human societies?

Climate Change & Anthropocene Extinction 17: These 6 killers still bigger drivers than warming – IUCN study

An analysis of IUCN’s Red List of endangered species places 10 drivers of the Holocene-Anthropocene Mass Extinction in order of severity. It concludes that classical environmental threats like deforestation, hunting and overfishing – in 2016 – still top the list … Continue reading

Climate Change & Anthropocene Extinction 16: Land use & warming exert same stress on tropical biodiversity

Anthropogenic climate change and land use change in the form of agricultural expansion (‘habitat conversion’ – a sweet description for deforestation) act as synergistic drivers of biodiversity loss – in a Costa Rican environmental experiment – literally drying out the … Continue reading

Climate Change & Anthropocene Extinction 15: On 65% Earth surface biodiversity is beyond safe limit

Again, the use of a geographical approach (and here defining biodiversity as ‘biotic intactness’) shows the Holocene-Anthropocene Mass Extinction is progressing faster then generally thought – and ‘biodiversity safe limits’, however arbitrarily defined, have already been passed on most of … Continue reading