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jim_w_ny

Climate change and roses

18 years ago

I can't find my last post on this subject but I do remember some of the responses. Mostly from those who doubt such a thing exists. And if it does what does it have to do with roses? The subject of this site.

An odd question since roses are plants and as plants are highly sensitive to their environment.

Now as a great believer in CC I've become also sensitive to changes in the weather. Or climate. Our summer has been unusually cool. With dry air. With rain that is now drought followed by downpours. Needing careful attention to the need of watering in between rains. Abnormal for here!

One change in our garden has been the early blooming of Hostas. Normally in late August. Has our cool summer triggered their earlier bloom?

So far is is hard to see change in roses except repeaters are repeating less. I worry mostly about what winter will be like. If it is cooler now will winter be also colder?

By the way CC is fact. It has been clouded by those who need to resist change for economic reasons. A tragedy as the changes that are now occuring, once accepted, it will be too late to avoid the really drastic impact of CC.

Comments (26)

  • 18 years ago

    I suppose it all depends where one lives. Your summer has been cool.. mine has been hotter than blazes... and while it has rained to my north.. and to my south.. very little rain here for my garden.

    On the plus side, my tiny Crepuscule band planted last fall has taken off (and they said it wouldn't grow here...lol) and very very little blackspot. On the negative side... oh my water bill!

  • 18 years ago

    I believe climate change will become so drastic in a few years that it will make believers out of most of us. Unfortunately, by that time it may be too late to reverse the damage. The impact on our roses will probably be the least of our problems. Scientists have warned us for many years but without political backing not much can be done. All we can do as individuals is be respectful of the environment and live in harmony with nature.

    Ingrid

  • 18 years ago

    Every year ending in 8 has bizarre weather patterns. Nothing man has ever done will change that.

  • 18 years ago

    Below is a link to a USA TODAY site that has a map that shows the difference between 1990 & 2006 in the US (drag the "scrubber" beneath the map to show the changes). Notice that Z3 has almost dissapeared from the US.

    Here is a link that might be useful: USA TODAY zone map

  • 18 years ago

    Lets look at this climate thing in perspective of earth's climate history and the micro effects of the cycles of the sun on today's hysteria. Research these topics and you may get a better understanding of the current alarmist rhetoric is hyperbole.

  • 18 years ago

    petzold

    I watched The Inconvient Truth again last night. It is boring but delves into all of the scientific evidence on CC. Watching that should convince anyone that this nonsense about the earth's climate history, ice ages, etc. is just that nonsense.

    None of the scientists disagree on the basis of CC. Well except those that are paid to disagree. Gore's movie talks about core samples of glaciers that go back 650,000 years and which confirms CC. His movie is replete with scientific documentation something the makes the movie boring. I don't know how his audience's manage to get through it.

    My daughter's movie, The 11th Hour narrated by Leonardo di Caprio, is more interesting as they interviewed, I don't remember the number but let's say 50 experts in the field. And they wove their comments into a much more compelling narrative. It is being shown around the world. Just lately a German bank sponsored a tour of schools in Japan showing the movie.

    So anyone who makes the comment you made do not themselves understand the danger we live in by not doing something about CC. Above all it is not alarmist rhetoric.

  • 18 years ago

    Both here and in north Texas, my associates in public gardens commented on how many tropicals are now over-wintering outdoors. Amaryllis & agapanthus have thrived in a display bed at the arboretum with no protection other than an inch of mulch. The arborists and our friends at the Depr. of Forestry are amazed at how difficult it is for newly planted dogwoods here in SE VA-- our state tree! Established dogwoods are hanging in there, but newly planted ones just up and die. Oh, 30 years ago many yellow and apricot roses would not overwinter in z5/6 Ohio without elaborate protection; now people in Z5 and 6 are growing tea roses. The change is happening and the USDA is changing boundaries of zones to reflect that. North Texas, once 7 is now 8. Ditto SE VA-- once 7 now 8!

  • 18 years ago

    Here we go again...

  • 18 years ago

    I've talked to folks who grow tropicals in London, England, and are now finding that they
    can overwinter them outdoors, in the London Squares.

    I know that our local climate has changed markedly, just in the 20 years I've been here.
    Moreso, in the 30+ years DH has been here.

    But the whole sweep of climate change isn't going to occur in one consistent climb in
    temperatures -- or increase or decrease in rainfall.
    It'd overall statistics that show the picture. And they do show a changing picture.

    Call it whatever you want, here in SoCal, we're staring down the throat of
    water rationing.

    My roses already get all of my dishwater, and I want a system that will give them my
    laundry and shower water.
    And little-by-little, cultivars that can't stand some drought conditions are being
    removed. Some will be replaced with Chinas and Teas, others won't be replaced at all.
    I'd just as soon have fewer, healthier roses.

    Jeri

  • 18 years ago

    Here are some of your threads from the searchable past.
    Search criteria were jim ny global

    Here is a link that might be useful: Some of them

  • 18 years ago

    Here's my theory/observation. I don't have stats or studies to back me up, just a generic botany and my observations as a professional landscaper.

    So far, one effect of CC seems to be inconsistent weather patterns. It seems to me that one year it is drier than ever before; the next year everything is flooded. And even within seasons, there seem to be wilder swings. Plants, like most living things, can generally adjust to new conditions, even those at the extremes of their range, provided they are consistent. But chronic inconsistency over an extended period of time, is very stressful. Obviousy there have always been some swings and variatons, but usually within a predictable range and for brief periods of time. And even within those normas, many of us have experienced plants getting stressed out by heat or cold spells.

    What makes the CC different is larger swings more frequently, so the plant never has a sense of norms. To simplify: If a plant moves from a temperate, moist environment to a very hot, dry one, it will "learn" to send its root deeper. But if one year it is hot and dry and the next two years are inundated, and the fourth year rains thru June and then gets no water until Nov, when it's hit with a blizzard, the plant never knows where to put its roots, when to bud, when to go dormant. Eventually, plants become "nervous wrecks."

    I posted a shorter version of this on another thread because several people in various regions were complaining that their roses just didn't seem to be healthy, weren't blooming as they should, have unidentifiable problems. I think we are going to see more of this kind of thing: Climate Change Malaise.

  • 18 years ago

    I don't know if it is or not, but i just ordered my ccc today. Climate Change China. I will use it as a barometer to detect if the weather really is getting warmer. People are too difficult to read, and sometimes it's difficult to follow the money trail. The hardiness of the china rose in my climate will be a better forcaster.

  • 18 years ago

    catsrose

    Climate Change malaise! Great!

    My wife commented this morning about the fact that our morning glories where not blooming. Same for the sweetpeas and that our old grape vine has only 4 grapes growing. The morning glories have huge healthy leaves but ony one flower so far. They are all over the arbor, a large one built on the foundation of an old farm building. The grape vine came with the house and has always had loads of grapes.

    And as to roses Rosarium Uetersen that had a fantastic first bloom has flowers now that barely resemble those in the Spring. Elmshorn the most consistent rebloomer of all my roses is not keeping up.

    I know that may not prove anything but might be something.

    It seems messing with nature can have unpredictable consequences.

  • 18 years ago

    I have certainly observed many changes in various plants-like Cassia bicapsularis blooming from Sept. to June, when normally it blooms from Oct. to Feb., and Amarylis (planted in ground) blooming in April, May when they normally bloom in July where they are located. This year My Barbra Striesand rose was the first rose to bloom, in March, followed closely by all the others-we are on the 4th bloom cycle for Carefree Beauty, Dorolla, Charles Aznavour,Olympiad and Gemini. Cherry Parfait, Queen E, and Moondance have not stopped-I do not believe they have been without at least 5-10 blooms, with cycles of up to 150 flowers each---this has to be weather related. I have never seen them bloom this early, this heavy, and this non-stop. And in early April, the temps went over 100 degrees for 3 consecutive days, in the last week of April it again went into the hi 90's, with the first week of May in the mid-90's and Mid May had a week in the Mid-90's. April, May, and June are usually balmy, foggy, and this year it was clear. Now in late July, early August we are having heavy fog in the A.M. Unheard of! But the roses seem to think we are into an early fall-as do the Liquidambers, which have started to color up in as early as the last two weeks of July. It is easy to say here we go again, but that doesn't undo the damage we are doing to this planet and our plants may be much more attuned to the changes than we are.

    Here is a link that might be useful: World Meterological Organization

  • 18 years ago

    Jim I don't think many people disagree that the climate is changing (as it always has since the beginning of Earth), but they disagree as to whether we have caused it or not.

    With cooler weather this summer, maybe our recent pattern of increased temps in the northeast for the past 10 years or so has come to an end and we are reverting back to a more usual climate. But my rebloomers are reblooming just fine.

  • 18 years ago

    If you have two towns of 10,000 people with a dirt road between them on which horses and buggies travel, the average temperature along the road will be X. If you asphalt that road, it will retain and reflect more heat. The temperature goes up to X+1. If the towns double in size, and the traffic is doubled, you go up to X+2. If you add a few hundred combustion engines generating more heat (engines are hot), as well as emissions, the temp goes up to X+3. If the towns double again and you double the width of the road and triple the number of cars (which have become more accessible), the temp becomes X+6. Eventually the towns become cities of millions of heat-emitting bodies and the road becomes a 6-lane highway with millions of cars going bumper-to-bumper. It doesn't take a meteorologist to figure out what caused climate change.

    I suspect that people who don't believe we caused climate change are the same people who don't believe their kids have tried drugs.

  • 18 years ago

    Heeeeerrrrreee we go again. Jim isn't fooling me. I don't think he really believes this. He's just trying to stir up a stink again.
    "It has been clouded by those who need to resist change for economic reasons?" What about big Al, don't you think he's a little biased for economical reasons?! He's making a killing off this.

  • 18 years ago

    If people are causing global warming, then there are too many people, and anything short of killing off people is not going to solve global warming, and i think that we are not going to go there and shouldn't, so to me it is such a non-issue really.

  • 18 years ago

    Just one of the odd facts about CC. Both ice caps are melting. Soon it will be Greenland. The amount of water in those huge deposits of ice will raise the level of the oceans by 40 feet. Submerging large areas. Major parts of New York City will be under water along with Florida, the Netherlands, etc.

    Some of the comments from those doubting CC reminds me of that movie where this man decides to build an ark. Near Washington DC. The media have a lot of fun with it. Until the dam breaks and everyone scrambles aboard. Far fetched but it is very similar to CC in that people can only see in front or their nose and ignore scientists that have spent their lives studying climate. And will instead cling to irrelevant personal observations.

  • 18 years ago

    Yea Jim, saw the movie, Evan Almighty. It was fiction!! Just the figment of someones imagination. The sole purpose of that movie was for entertainment and to make some folks a whole lot of money. Sound familiar?
    .

  • 18 years ago

    I do not know what is causing global warming, but I cannot deny it is taking place. Winters are now seldom below 0 C, when I was a child I played with frozen water, and sometimes even the sea froze, near the coast... And I am not hundeed years old!!
    Many plants have changed in my garden. The Cacti are very happy and have multiplied like crazy. Idem for the Yucca.

    With regards to roses, I simply have added some more chinensis in full sun in southern exposure, and I have put the rugosa roses in a northern exposure, in shady areas.
    Such compromise seems to be successful: none has suffered.
    Both are drought tolerant, although drought is -fortunately- a very minor issue here usually.

  • 18 years ago

    My understanding is that global warming makes all weather more extreme. Gee. Does that mean like triple-digit temperatures day after day here in Texas, and melting of the polar ice cap???
    Of course, there were people who truly truly believed that the earth was flat and you could fall off the edge. Some of them wore garlic around their necks to prevent disease. Lately they claim that global warming is a hoax or a misunderstanding of natural cycles...hope they live on the coast so that they get to test their beliefs in person.

  • 18 years ago

    Len511, you've hit the nail on the head. It's the question nobody wants to talk about. However, if we ignore climate change, allow guns, resist socialized medicine, open up off-shore and arctic drilling, ban abortion, keep HIV shameful, keep lowering our literacy rate, ignore the needs of developing nations, promote war as a solution, shop 'til we drop, and by-pass the human rights courts, we should solve the problem fairly soon.

    Nature bats last.

  • 18 years ago

    Jim, the roses dying again?

  • 18 years ago

    Must be getting close to election time. Some are taking sides and trying to insult the other. Think I'll let y'all play in the mud.

  • 18 years ago

    Just today there was an article in the NY Times about jellyfish. Seems their numbers are inreasing due to a number of factors most of which have to do with the decline of the oceans health.

    It's a major problem in the Mediterrean where tourists end up with painful bites even some deadly from the Portugese Man of War.

    Just another tid bit in the ongoing saga of man's life on earth.