Healthy soil and sustainable growing

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USDA: climate change affecting crops, livestock
http://www.azdailysun.com/articles/2008/05/28/news/national/20080528_us_news_27.txt

Wednesday, May 28, 2008


DENVER (AP) -- Climate change is increasing the risk of U.S. crop failures, 
depleting the nation's water resources and contributing to outbreaks of 
invasive species and insects, the U.S. Department of Agriculture said in a 
report released Tuesday.

Those and other problems for the U.S. livestock and forestry industries will 
persist for at least the next 25 years, said the report compiled by 38 
scientists for use by water and land managers. "I think what's really 
eye-opening is the depth and breadth of the impacts and consequences going on 
right now," said Tony Janetos, a study author and director of the Joint 
Global Change Research Institute at the University of Maryland.

Scientists reviewed and synthesized research from more than 1,000 
publications, rather than conduct new research, to produce the report. It's 
part of a federal assessment of global warming for the U.S. Climate Change 
Science Program, sponsored by 13 federal agencies.

"Just to see it all there like that and to realize the impacts are pervasive 
right now is a little bit scary," said Peter Backlund, director of research 
relations at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder.

Drought-strained forests in the West and Southeast are easy prey for 
tree-killing insects like bark beetles. Snow in the Western mountains is 
melting earlier, making it more difficult for managers overseeing a 
long-established system of reservoirs and irrigation ditches that serves 
Western states.

The Southeast doesn't have the same kind of storage system because rain 
historically has been more consistent. Current weather disruptions have the 
region struggling with drought, Janetos said.

Rising carbon dioxide levels are changing the metabolism of grasses and 
shrubs on range land, decreasing the protein levels in plants eaten by 
cattle. Sea corals are dying as water temperatures rise.

Warmer, drier weather is altering the biodiversity of deserts in the 
Southwest and the high, colder deserts of Nevada, Utah and eastern 
Washington, said Steve Archer of the University of Arizona. Plants and 
animals already living in extreme conditions face threats from wildfires and 
nonnative species, he said.

"These areas historically support a large ranching industry, wildlife 
habitat," Archer said. "They are major watersheds and airsheds."

The scientists said longer growing seasons provided by higher temperatures 
don't necessarily translate into bigger crop yields because plants have 
certain growth patterns.

Their report focuses on the next 25 to 50 years, rather than the next 100 
years as other studies have done.

"Sometimes it's so far out that people just don't grasp that it's a problem. 
This really brings it home," said Jerry Hatfield, lab director of the 
National Soil Tilth laboratory in Ames, Iowa.

The report makes no recommendations. Hatfield said it could help farmers 
consider breeding new strains of drought-tolerant varieties of corn and other 
crops and new planting cycles to accommodate seasonal changes.

Tom Lauridson said the report confirms what he has seen as a wheat farmer in 
northeastern Colorado.

The third-generation Colorado farmer, who has a doctorate in plant physiology 
and does outreach work for Colorado State University, said the region's 
droughts seem longer than usual.

"It's enough that we're definitely in the process of rethinking if it is 
really a good idea to invest in farm land," Lauridson said.

On the Net:

U.S. Climate Change Science Program, Report on the Effects of Climate Change 
on Agriculture, Land and Water Resources and Biodiversity:

http://www.climatescience.gov/Library/sap/sap4-3/default.php