... Today is changing the natural cycles. Thus, the caterpillars emerge from eggs with a delay, when the leaves that they eat, have not so juicy. And some fish species, on the contrary, spawn too early, before the will of plankton, which feed on the fry.
Shifting seasons: spring arriving in Europe for 6-8 days earlier than 35 years ago, and the autumn ends later. In China, the flowering period starts 2-4 days earlier in Japan, sakura bloom for 5 days earlier than half a century ago. The same thing happens with many other plants.
The changes affect all continents. Just a few years, beetles, proliferated on the Kenai Peninsula in Alaska, and destroyed all the spruce forests - and it is 1.6 million hectares. In Central and South America, spread pathogenic fungus led to the extinction of 70 species of frogs.
The last 30 years, the warm climate zones shift towards the corresponding polar regions at a speed of 40 km per year. According to researchers, the 1700 species of plants and animals are migrating toward the poles.
European winters have become milder and wetter, but the continent is increasingly experiencing a period of summer heat. In 2003, she hit 35 thousand people - from Rome to Helsinki. Climatologists believe that after 80 years every second summer in Europe will be abnormally hot. 1998 was the warmest since the beginning of meteorological observations in the world. From him not far behind 2005-th, 2002 th, 2003 th and 2004 th. At present, according to estimates by the World Health Organization, the annual number of deaths caused by climate change, to 150 thousand.
Most experts who study climate change believe that by 2100 the temperature on Earth will increase by 2-4,5 ° C. Oceans, albeit with some delay, also will be heated - and thus their volume, according to the laws of physics, will increase. Only it - for certain conditions - can lead to an increase in sea level by 43 cm And if you melt the polar ice caps in Greenland and Antarctica, the threat of flooding of the continents is real. Already, data from satellites show: the level of the Pacific Ocean increases annually by 1-2 mm.
Particularly worrying climatologists that the polar ice to melt armor can not gradually, but, under certain conditions - rapidly. This sudden thawing may be caused by a change in albedo - the reflectivity of the earth's surface. The fact that snow and ice almost completely reflect the sun's rays, while the land and oceans absorb a large part of them and heated. The smaller ice surface, the warmer to free him from the surfaces - and the faster the melting.
Thus the shrinkage of glaciers, continental and polar ice starts processes could exacerbate warming. In Greenland, temperatures rise enough for another 3 ° C, so the ice melted completely.