CH04: Phenology: Changes in Timing of Biological Events Due to Climate Change

FIGURE 4.1 Accelerating ice breakup and delayed ice formation. Ice breakup and formation is shown for major rivers and lakes of North America. Ice breakup is occurring significantly earlier, whereas ice formation is significantly delayed. Source: From Magnuson et al. (2000). Reproduced with permission from AAAS.

FIGURE 4.2 Phenology of flowers, seeds, and fruits in a tropical forest tree. The production of flowers, seeds, and fruits in a single tropical tree from a 7-year record. Time is indicated in months from January 1987. Flowering, fruiting, and seed production are all cued to the end of the dry season, peaking in September in most years. Note the unusually high production in September 1992, followed by failure of fruit and seed production the following year (approximately month 80—September 1993). Source: From Condit (1998). With kind permission from Springer Science Business Media.

FIGURE 4.3 Modeled bark beetle emergence. Pine bark beetles emerge in synchrony in defined temperature bands. The regions of the graph marked A, B and C are characterized by damaging synchronous emergence. This model output shows the simulated emergence synchrony associated with a slightly over 2 degree C increase in phloem temperature—a threshold that was crossed in much of western North America between 1998 and 2006. Source: Logan et al. (2003). Reproduced with permission from the Ecological Society of America.

FIGURE 4.4 Blue tit (Cyanistes caeruleus) resting on a branch. Source: From Wikimedia Commons.

FIGURE 4.5 Blue tit egg laying is earlier in warmer years, and progressive warming is resulting in an advance of more than 10 days in less than two decades. Source: Courtesy of Environmental Data Compendium.

FIGURE 4.6 Tracking penguins from space. Changes in ice cover and temperature are affecting phenology of penguin food sources and the location and size of penguin colonies. Scientists are tracking changes in penguin colony locations from space using the guano marks they leave on the ice. In this photo, a colony and its guano mark show up distinctly against the white background of snow and ice. Source: Courtesy of the British Antarctic Survey.

Budburst stages in North American fruit trees Budburst stages in North American fruit trees. From left to right: swollen buds, apricot, early April; apricot flower, late April; cherry buds, early April; budburst, cherry, late April. Source: Courtesy of Jon Clements and the University of Massachusetts.

Continuous Plankton Recorder and Results. Source: From Hays, G. C Continuous Plankton Recorder and Results. Source: From Hays, G.C., Richardson, A.J., Robinson, C., 2005. Climate change and marine plankton. Trends in Ecology & Evolution 20, 337–344.