PLANT RESPONSE TO CLIMATE CHANGE SURPRISES SCIENTISTS
Climate scientists that have studied the response of plants to global warming have declared themselves ‘surprised’ because instead of moving up to cooler climates as global temperatures rise, plants seem to be moving downward, towards the equator.
This flies in the face of global warming proponents because as temperatures rise, plant and animal life will be expected to move away from the equator towards the poles, in search of cooler, more comfortable climes.
But recent studies have shown that plants are moving downwards, toward the equator. Is it possible that they prefer hotter weather?
Of course not. No one thinks that. Scientists involved in this study are trying to explain this ‘weird’ phenomenon by suggesting that precipitation is another factor that governs plant behaviour. The explanation is that warmer climate leave more precipitation in the air, and since precipitation is important for plants, they prefer the humid, hot weather to cold, dry weather.
‘It’s a double-edged sword,’ says one of the scientists involved in this study, ‘because as temperatures rise, so will water needs.’ Plants therefore need to balance their requirement for precipitation with their requirement for water, and make sure that they don’t tip the balance either way.
However, in all of this, the most obvious question is not being asked. If plants are moving down towards the equator, is it possible that the Earth’s temperature is actually cooling instead of warming up? There has been no evidence of mean temperature rise over the last eighteen years on Earth. Is it possible, then, that the poor plants are what they’re doing what they normally do but we’re just caught up in our theories to see it?
What the mind does not know, the eye cannot see.