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The UK’s Erratic Weather and Wildlife
The UK’s cooling climate, wet summers and generally erratic weather over the past two years has had a negative effect on some of the UK’s wildlife. The BBC reported The National Trust as saying:
Birds, mammals and particularly insects have all suffered from a cold, late spring, a wet summer with little sunshine and a long, dry autumn.
The trust says species under threat include puffins, marsh fritillary butterflies and lesser horseshoe bats.
They warned another wet summer in 2009 could be a disaster for insects.
Studies of the past year by the trust’s conservation experts show the impact of the weather and how some wildlife has become out-of-step with the usual seasonal patterns:
• Snowdrops and red admiral butterflies were first spotted in January, earlier than normal.
• Bees were hit hard in April by frost and snow
• Rain in late May caused many birds’ nests to fail, including those of the blue and great tits, because of the lack of insect food
• It was a poor summer for migrant insects – butterflies, moths, hoverflies, ladybirds and dragonflies – because of the wet and cold June
• In July, puffin numbers on the Farne Islands were down 35% on what they had been five years earlier
• The common autumn cranefly, usually in pest proportions in September, was all but absent
It’s not all bad news though:
The cold and wet October made it a bumper year for fungi, with 26 species of waxcap spotted.
Unseasonal weather also led to a spectacular display of red, yellow and orange autumn leaves.
Poor weather in August had its benefits for certain cabbage white butterflies which prospered as their predators were depleted.
Classic quote from the Trust’s Matthew Oates:
“After two very poor years in a row we desperately need a good summer in 2009 otherwise it’s going to look increasingly grim for a wealth of wildlife in the UK.
“Global warming Climate change is not some future prediction of what might happen, it’s happening now and having a serious impact on our countryside every year.”
Looks as though we need some global warming in 2009. What a pity we can’t control the weather/climate.
BBC News website: Erratic weather ‘harms wildlife’
January 15th, 2009 at 2:45 am
Today’s climate change is very unusual. Not only to UK but all over the world. The worst case is, we can’t control the weather and not only us people are suffering about the weather but also the little insects has been affected too. ;(