Positive Changes That Are Occurring

Jeff · October 8, 2018, 9:07am

You know how I just showed you how the Feds want to ‘kill the Cormorants to save the salmon’, who’ve never been more numerous? Below, check out how there’s a push on to kill the seals to ‘save the fish’. Only – so sorry – the seals don’t happen to eat commercial fish.

Fortunately, unlike the more advanced Cormorant killing programme on the Columbia, here the evil news article is more of a trial balloon, where they say the increase in seals ‘prompts some to call for hunt’. That 'residents are ’ frustrated ', that the hunt will be ’ controlled '. That the seals ‘foul beaches’ . It goes on and on.

That’s called ‘dissembling’. Synonyms: pretend, feign, act, masquerade, sham, fake, bluff, poster, hide one’s feelings, put on a false front.

Notice how the article earnestly states that ‘many fishermen say’ , but won’t quote any? And that the person who is quoted is a ‘local resident and recreational fisherman’ - who somehow gets to be in a national news story and become a driver in Seal Death?

The Secret Handshake Club is not enormous. It is comprised of actual individuals. And they conspire .

Speak out against them, stop them when you see them where you live and work.

http://boston.cbslocal.com/201……-for-hunt/

Booming New England Gray Seal Population Prompts Some To Call For Hunt

July 20, 2014

ROCKLAND, Maine (AP) – Decades after gray seals were all but wiped out in New England waters, the population has rebounded so much that some frustrated residents are calling for a controlled hunt .

The once-thriving New England gray seal population was decimated by the mid-20th century because of hunting, with Massachusetts keeping a seal bounty on the books until the 1960s. But scientists say conservation efforts, an abundance of food and migration from Canada combined to revive the population.

Environmentalists cheer the resurgence, saying the gray seal boost is good for biodiversity and a boon for popular seal watch tours in coastal New England. But many fishermen say the seals interfere with fishing charters and steal catch. Beachgoers bemoan the 600-plus-pound seals taking over large stretches of shore, befouling beaches and attracting sharks, which feed on seals.

Some residents of Nantucket are so fed up over the huge seal population that now calls the affluent island home that they have suggested a controlled hunt, similar to the way states manage deer.

Nantucket resident and recreational fisherman Peter Krogh, whose Seal Abatement Coalition has collected 2,000 signatures asking federal officials to amend laws that prevent dispersion of gray seals, said gray seals are a threat to fishing and tourism on the island.

Asked if he supports a seal cull, Krogh said “all options” should be on the table for managing the population.

“This is a real threat to the traditional way of life on this island ,” Krogh said.

Conservationists scoff at the idea of providing amendments to the Marine Mammal Protection Act, which protects seals. They say culling the herd would undo the results of the act, which allowed the species to recover in New England.

The seals’ burgeoning population is a blessing for at least one industry.

Business is booming for Keith Lincoln, who operates a seal watch ferry to Monomoy Island off Cape Cod. Seal sightings have skyrocketed from about 50 per trip in 1989 to about 2,000 per trip now, he said. The curious seals frequently come close to the boats, a thrill for gawking tourists, he said.

“Once the word spread out, the word spread quick,” Lincoln said. “The cuteness of them is what draws everybody.”

Some also believe the seals’ negative impact on fishing is overstated. Brian Sharp, the manager of marine mammal rescue for the Cape Cod-based International Fund for Animal Welfare, said gray seals feed mostly on fish species of little commercial value, like sand lance.

Others in the commercial fishing industry don’t see seals as a threat. Lobstermen off Rockland, Maine, where gray seals are often spotted, say the seals and fishery coexist with little strife.

“Culls of gray seals have not been shown to increase fish populations. It’s not that simple,” Sharp said. “What we’re seeing is a normal growth curve of seals repopulating an area.”

The gray seals, also called horsehead seals, can grow to more than 10 feet long and inhabit both sides of the North Atlantic Ocean. They are sometimes found in the same areas as their smaller cousins, harbor seals.

Encounters with humans frequently don’t end well for the seals, Sharp said. They sometimes become entangled in fishing gear, and six of them were illegally shot and killed on the southern ridge of Cape Cod in 2011, he said.

For now, the seal population is flourishing, and its ability to sustain seal watch businesses off Massachusetts and Maine is evidence that it can have an economic benefit, said Gordon Waring, fishery research biologist at the Northeast Fisheries Science Center in Woods Hole, Massachusetts.

“Seals are just another large marine predator, and they are part of the diversity of the marine environment,” he said. “And they are able to thrive and recover.”

Jeff · October 8, 2018, 9:08am

This article is cool in that it involves the reappearance of what I intuit to be a fragile life form in the Adriatic Sea after an interim of seventy years . Click the link if you have time, the picture is beautiful.

The article is also funny, in that it takes pains to note that ‘marine biologists’ are not “sure whether the species’ sudden re-emergence in the Adriatic is linked to the effects of global warming.” That’s to reinforce what is called a ‘meme’.

Meme: “an idea, behavior, or style that spreads from person to person within a culture.”

Please notice how they don’t specifically quote any actual ‘marine biologists’ in regard to those ‘warming seas’, but rather just say it , as if it came down from heaven, or something. That’s called ‘talking out one’s ass’.

The marine biologist who is quoted gives a grade school level Jellyfish primer, but does not even mention the warming meme. They probably asked him a bunch of leading questions, and when they didn’t get him to bite, had to run with what they had – which was nothing but lies and fabrication. This is called ‘dishonest journalism’.

The Secret Handshake Club is not enormous. It is comprised of actual individuals. And they conspire .

Speak out against them, stop them when you see them where you live and work.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/new……d-War.html

Giant, fuchsia-pink jellyfish has been spotted in the Adriatic Sea for the first time in 70 years.

August 7, 2014
The Drymonema dalmatinum, which can grow to more than three feet in diameter, was photographed by amateur divers off the northern coast of Italy.

It is one of the rarest jellyfish to occur in the Mediterranean and had not been documented in the Adriatic since 1945.

The bizarre but beautiful creature derives its Latin name from the fact that it was first discovered off the coast of Dalmatia in the 1880s by a German naturalist, Ernst Haeckel. It was observed on a few occasions after that but sightings dried up at the end of the Second World War, only for the species to emerge again now.

Little is known about the jellyfish – marine biologists do not even know how powerful its sting is. Nor are they sure whether the species’ sudden re-emergence in the Adriatic is linked to the effects of global warming.
Experts say that jellyfish such as Drymonema dalmatinum have two distinct phases in their lives – an early phase when they are bottom-dwelling polyps, and a secondary phase in which they coalesce into floating jellyfish.

It may be that this particular species spends decades living at the bottom of the sea before evolving into a fully-formed jellyfish and that its reappearance has nothing to do with warmer seas.

“The polips are normally small and can live for a long time,” said Ferdinando Boero, from Salento University in Puglia, one of Italy’s foremost experts on jellyfish.

“Every now and then they produce jellyfish. Some species remain small, others become much bigger,” he told La Stampa newspaper.

Jeff · October 8, 2018, 9:08am

Remember how in the last post the author was ‘talking out his ass’, vs. quoting an actual person, as reporters are supposed to do? They use that technique to give the reader the feeling that information is coming down from Heaven, or something…that the author is an Authority, and you’d be better off not inquiring any further. It’s kind of like that nasty little green doorwarden in the Wizard of Oz.

Right out of the gate in the article that follows - just after you learn that the prawns are doing great - ‘ climate change has been suggested as one explanation ’ is floated. Really, it has been? Suggested by whom, please? And when? And in what way was it suggested ? Shouldn’t something be proven, vs. suggested ?

Later in the article, the header " Vulnerable to Climate Changes ’ is used, which is declamatory, an implied statement of truth. But, wait, didn’t the author earlier say – and in an unsubstantiated way, mind you – that it was merely suggested ? This header is what is known as a fait accompli , “a thing that has already happened or been decided before those affected hear about it, leaving them with no option but to accept.”

The wholly-immoral author then dutifully says ‘ Earlier research shows that prawns or shrimp are generally vulnerable to climate changes .’ Really? What earlier research, precisely? Research by whom? And when? And what did the research elucidate?’ Crickets are chirping, because the author is a serially-lying con artist.

Despite scientific evidence earlier in the article that the prawns are recovering, the author says “the stock in Skagerrak seems to be recovering now.” Seems ? The prawns either are recovering, or they are they not. What does the data say? Here, ’ seems ’ is the used to create a seed of doubt, to spin the news, to weaken the message of good news. It’s a technique within the larger genre of neurolinguistic programming.

The Secret Handshake Club author is catapulting the propaganda , all right, and unfortunately for them I’m offering withering return fire, here, and now.

Merrily, the scientist that the scoundrel reporter interviewed tells us a veritable host of things about prawn stocks, but strongly rebuts the ‘Global Warming Lie’ thesis. Saying (politely): "we should be careful about using climate change as an explanation of the weak stock in the Skagerrak in recent years.”

That quote was probably uttered after the on-the-take-reporter-with-an-obvious-agenda asked the scientist six or ten leading questions about how global warming was impacting the situation.

And you may be certain that, if they did have a pro-Global-Warming-Lie quote to use from the scientist, they’d use it . And it would be positioned high in the article, not deliberately buried deep down near the bottom, as the honest, non-serial-liar marine scientist’s rebuttal was, here.

Also true to formula, you’ll note the WWF trying to restrict prawn catches, under the guise of being pro-prawn , albeit in an environment where the prawns are actually doing great. That is of course because they’re not pro-prawn, as they allege, but are rather anti-human . This simply just another of the multitudinous pyramidal control organizations that the barely-closeted Death worshippers who rule us use to try to take their black agenda forward upon humanity. How they must laugh as the checks roll in for ‘Save the Prawns!’ sweatshirts.

In lock-step, the large grocery store chains - headed by fellow Secret Handshake Club members - agree to not sell the ‘red listed’ prawns, which are actually not in short supply, at all, as professed. And so the anti-human agenda may be forwarded, under the hand-wringing guise of ‘concern for prawns’ .

I think the great thing about this thread is that it documents, again and again and again, the same tactics, put in play by the same people. My hope is that someone who had previously bought into the con will wake up when they see the larger pattern over time, and become immune to it going forward.

“Teach a man to fish”, smirk.

http://sciencenordic.com/skage……ks-rebound

Skagerrak prawn stocks on the rebound

July 21, 2014

Stocks of prawns in the Skagerrak have been insubstantial for years. Climate change has been suggested as one explanation. But the stock now appears to be making headway. A surge in offspring in 2013 gives hope that numbers will continue to rise in years to come , according to Norway’s Institute of Marine Research.

Prawns have short lives, a maximum of three to five years, in the Skagerrak – the Atlantic Ocean area between southern Norway, south-western Sweden and Denmark’s Jutland – and the Norwegian Sea (the Atlantic Ocean between Iceland, Svalbard and Norway). So strong stocks depend on regular recruitments.

On a voyage in 2013 oceanographers found plenty of year-old prawns, which should promise solid recruitment this year.

Two seas, one stock

As the stocks of prawns in the Skagerrak and the Norwegian Sea have not risen and fallen in synchrony, marine biologists have speculated as to whether they might be different stocks.

Norwegian, Swedish and Danish researchers have now compared the prawns’ DNA in both parts of the Atlantic.

“Our genetic analyses did not differentiate between the prawns from the two ocean areas, showing that a single stock apparently migrates around,” says Halvor Knutsen at the Marine Research Institute’s Flødevigen Research Station near Arendal, Norway.

Separate stocks in the fjords

While prawns in these portions of the open sea share the same DNA, certain fjords have been found to have distinct stocks. “When the ocean stocks rise and fall from year to year, the fjords can increase their stability to a certain extent,” asserts Knutsen. Genetic analyses show there is little contact between the prawns out in the open ocean and those in the ocean fjords and inlets.

Halvor Knutsen has led a project to give both researchers and prawn fishermen enhanced knowledge about prawn [shrimp] stocks. “Prawn fishermen net some in the fjords and some out in the ocean. It’s good for them to know whether or not they are fishing from their own stock or not. If the stocks in a fjord decline, they can only count on limited ‘help’ from outside. So reduced exploitation in the fjord will be needed to help replenish the fjord stocks,” says Knutsen.

He says that even though the fjord stocks have little commercial value, they help maintain a viable coastal culture. After the find that the prawns in the Skagerrak and the Norwegian Sea are likely to comprise a single stock, their counterparts in fjords can be regulated and managed by fisheries authorities independently. This is already being done in some sounds and inlets in Sweden.

Cooperation with fishermen

In addition to acquiring information for a better management of sustainable prawn catches in the Skagerrak, the research project has aimed at improving communication between fishermen, local authorities and researchers in the three Scandinavian countries. “The fishermen have a well of knowledge and it’s been interesting linking it to what we researchers know about the prawn stock,” says Knutsen. “We have much to learn from each other. Fishermen have a lot of local knowledge about how isolated a fjord can be, about fishing spots and catching methods,” says Knutsen.

Vulnerable to climate changes

Earlier research shows that prawns or shrimp are generally vulnerable to climate changes. The prawns caught in Norway are a deep-water variety, Pandalus borealis. This is a northern species in the Eastern Atlantic which has a habitat from Norway’s Arctic Archipelago of Svalbard all the way down to the Skagerrak.

The Skagerrak is the prawn’s southern frontier. This makes it likely that warmer seas will put the crunch on the crustaceans and force them to move northwards.

“But we should be careful about using climate change as an explanation of the weak stock in the Skagerrak in recent years,” says Guldborg Søvik, another researcher at the Marine Research Institute.

“The low recruitment might be attributed to changes involving plankton, the food of the prawns. No research has been conducted on a prospective link,” says Søvik.

Many prawn trawlers have encountered lean years. But the stock in Skagerrak seems to be recovering now.

The researchers are now working with a model for studying how the prawn larvae drift with the sea currents. Prawn larvae float freely in the upper layers of the ocean. Søvik thinks that if the models accurately depict how they drift this could provide key information about how annual recruitments rise and fall.

WWF wants to reduce catches

In February the World Wildlife Fund in Sweden red-listed prawns on the Swedish West Coast. As a result, many supermarket chains in Sweden will stop buying Swedish prawns. In Norway, the WWF warns against fishing any more than international quota advisories recommend.

However, Søvik would not characterise the Skagerrak prawns as being endangered. The stock has been poor earlier and then made rebounds.

But one thing researchers do agree on is that the Skagerrak is an important cradle for replenishments of the entire stock trawled for by Scandinavian fishermen.

“As far back as our data goes, the Skagerrak has always been the area with the most one-year-old prawns,” she says.

“West of Lindesnes [in the North Sea] the recruitment has always been very low, while in the Skagerrak we’ve seen oscillations between good and bad years. So if small prawns are overfished in the Skagerrak it can have an impact on the entire region.”

Jeff · October 8, 2018, 9:08am

Since it’s unlikely to be repeated in the mainstream media, I’ll remind readers that the MS Akademik Shokalskiy is a polar research vessel that was on its way to Antarctica last year full of folks bent on proving how much Global Warming had changed everything, down there…but ended up getting caught in the largest mass of Antarctic ice ever, in history. They had to be evacuated…by the Chinese! Wait, I’m laughing so hard I can’t type.

What makes this story so amazingly awesome is the fact that I’m being asked, with a straight face, to believe that Warming is causing the increase in ice .

That might ring a bell, in that, in Orwell’s ‘1984’, one of the slogans of the Party is “War is peace, freedom is slavery, and ignorance is strength.”

I can only suppose there’s some sort of deep, witchy, black-magic-spell thing going on with the use of this sort of tactic, but I can say with confidence that it is frightfully easy to rebut, and truth trumps lies, every time.

I think the only reason it ever works at all is that many have been duped, by either ignorance or innocence, and will grasp any straw to avoid allowing themselves that realization, because they’re embarrassed, ashamed, angry at themselves. It’s human nature. And the social engineers who rule us with barely hidden ill-intent know it , it’s an actual science for them.

But rejoice, as awareness is rising, and the duped are awakening, never to sleep again.

And the fact that our adversaries are being pressed to actually say the words ’ warming is causing the increase in ice’ ? That’s a ‘going out of business metric’. It’s game over for these people.

http://notrickszone.com/2014/0……-more-ice/

The recent fate of the MS Akademik Shokalskiy has prompted arguments from the CAGW crowd that the global warming is causing more ice around Antarctica. The problem with this argument is that there has been no warming around Antarctica.

All the trends show cooling, especially in the area where the ship is trapped. The southern ocean is cooling, and has been for a long time, especially since 1996. The latitudes in the vicinity of Commonwealth Bay have been cooling since 1980. There is more ice because Mother Nature is freezing more ice.

If we look at a annual temperature trend map of the globe covering the last eight years, we see cooling especially at latitudes north and south of 45°, and at the equator. Of course, the southern ice has responded to this decreased temperature by increasing, slowly since the low of 1980, but then much faster in the last three years following the local temperatures.

But for whatever peculiar reason, despite all the observations, global warming scientists insist it’s more logical to blame the extra ice on warming! The warmists never seem to realize that Antarctica can melt only if the temperature rises above freezing there. For all practical purposes, it almost never does rise above freezing. The summer ice only reduces because the wind breaks it up and blows it away into latitudes where the sea is warm enough to melt it. The air temperatures blowing off the continent rise high enough (to just freezing) so that the ice blowing away is not immediately replaced as it is in the Antarctic winter. Ice flows off the continent not because it is melting, but because the pressure of two-mile-thick ice behind the edges is forcing it to flow. Average air temperatures at bases on the edge of the continent rise to just freezing in January despite 24 hours of daylight. This is why it can snow off-shore at the position of the trapped ship in late December. Rain is an extremely rare event anywhere in Antarctica except the peninsula.

No global warming – it’s over As one can see from Figure 3, there is no global warming. It’s over. Both poles are now cooling, the tropics are cooling. Ice is increasing at both ends of the earth. Over the last eight years, there were a few isolated pockets of warming, a spot in the North Pacific, the Middle East, north-eastern North America, and off the west coast of Australia. Those spots are constantly shifting, and will soon go away.

Jeff · October 8, 2018, 9:08am

Last post I mentioned ‘going out of business metrics’. Here’s another one: ‘McDonald’s monthly sales worst in more than 10 years.’ And it’s ‘at risk to be reduced further.’

One of my favorite aspects of ‘the Adventures of Don and Carol Croft’ is the sudden segues from dramatic etheric reportage over to witty, honest food commentary re: places they ate along the way, and I’m emulating that style, here.

I love cheeseburgers, and it makes me so mad that McDonald’s, which was probably awesome back when they got started, has slowly and steadily weaponized their food, then to now. I think it was last year when the celebrity chef got on them for the ‘pink slime’ they used in their burgers, and public outcry caused them to remove it. That’s a Positive Change That Occurred, and I think I may even have featured it in this thread, back then.

The article blows smoke and throws chaff about how this or that brought down sales. But, so sorry, globally, people are waking up to the fact that if you eat bad food, it’s going to have a negative effect on your health. That’s a big deal. It’s taboo to say that out loud, of course, which is why all the fake reasons are put forth in the article.

There’s a lot of new-school chains making burgers out of just actual beef, these days, and In-and-Out burger’s been doing it without cease since they opened in the late 1940’s. I had a White Castle burger for the first time, recently, in Cincinatti, Ohio, it was crazy good. I got the feeling it was virtually unchanged from when they opened, in 1921. Yocco’s hot dogs, in my hometown, has been using the same suppliers and ingredients since 1922.

I just read that the first McDonald’s was in San Bernadino, CA, opening in 1948. The Hell’s Angels were founded in San Bernadino in…wait for it…1948.

I once read ‘San Berdoo’ has a higher ratio of Satanists per capita than anywhere else in the nation. I visited there, once, and I believe it. The energy was terrible.

Ray Croc came right out and said he was a Satanist on the Phil Donohue show in May of 1977, an event which has been largely memory-holed, and is now referred to as an ‘Urban Legend’.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/……story.html

McDonald’s monthly sales worst in more than 10 years

August 8, 2014

McDonald’s Corp. served up a disappointing July, largely due to food-safety concerns in Asia as well as widespread problems in the United States, the world’s largest restaurant company said on Friday.

For the second time this week, McDonald’s said that this year’s sales forecast “is now at risk” to be reduced further.

Sales at longstanding McDonald’s restaurants around the globe fell 2.5 percent last month, the company said. Same-store sales, or sales at restaurants open at least 13 months, fell 3.2 percent in the United States and fell 7.3 percent in the Asia/Pacific, Middle East and Africa region, or what the company calls APMEA.

Analysts had anticipated a 1.1 percent decline overall, with a 2.6 percent drop in the United States and a 0.5 percent decline in APMEA, according to Consensus Metrix.

July’s 2.5 percent decline in global comparable sales matched McDonald’s performance in June. Those are the worst comparable sales McDonald’s posted since March 2003, when its global comparable sales plunged 3.7 percent.

Shares of Oak Brook-based McDonald’s fell 21 cents to $93.10 in trading on Friday.

McDonald’s had already warned on Monday that its full-year sales forecast may have to come down because of a variety of factors that had worsened from when it reported quarterly results on July 22. On Friday, the company again said that its 2014 same-store sales forecast – which called for relatively flat same-store sale – “is now at risk.”

McDonald’s Corp. warned Monday that its full-year sales forecast may have to come down due to a variety of factors that have worsened from when it reported quarterly results less than two weeks ago.

McDonald’s Corp. warned Monday that its full-year sales forecast may have to come down due to a variety of factors that have worsened from when it reported quarterly results less than two weeks ago. ( Jessica Wohl )

Janney analyst Mark Kalinowski said he now expects McDonald’s annual global comparable sales to decline by 0.3 percent. If such sales fall, 2014 would mark the company’s weakest annual sales performance since 2002 , Kalinowski said.

In the United States, McDonald’s said it struggled in part because it had a big Monopoly event running in July 2013 . At the same time, this year the chain was promoting premium beef and chicken options, which may have turned off some value-conscious diners . Currently, McDonald’s is promoting fare such as a $2 Jalapeno Double burger on its “Dollar Menu & More” board.

McDonald’s U.S. same-store sales have now fallen in eight of the past nine months.

On July 20, a Shanghai Husi Food plant in China was shut down after a Chinese TV report showed workers picking up meat from a factory floor, as well as mixing meat beyond its expiration date. The plant, owned by Aurora-based OSI Group, had been a supplier to some of McDonald’s restaurants in China and to other major chains there, including Yum Brands.

McDonald’s said its performance in China, Japan and certain other markets fell significantly after the food safety issue. The markets affected represent about 10 percent of the company’s global systemwide sales. Government and internal investigations at the supplier are proceeding.

Earlier this week, OSI said that withdrawing products produced at the plant was proceeding smoothly and that six Shanghai Husi employees had been detained by the Shanghai branch of the Public Security Bureau.

Jeff · October 8, 2018, 9:08am

Today I didn’t have to search for good news, it was right there, mainstream: whales in New York harbor! And the story fesses up, in the subhead, that cleaner waters are believed to be the driver. Usually you’d see something like ‘Global Warming-driven boom-bust cycles cause whale populations to flee collapsing areas and take refuge in New York Harbor!’, or ‘Scientists Baffled by Whale Appearance!’, or something like that.

The headline should actually be ‘Dude, there are whales in New York freaking harbor!’, but they have to throw Great White Sharks in there to create fear, you see. Great Whites are booming, and that’s great, of course, but you can see the wholly controlled and coopted mainstream media taking any opportunity to spin the story in the wrong, and worst direction. A not-on-the-take reporter would have written ‘the increase in whales has also been seen in Cape Cod, where numbers have also boomed, from X to Y’, et al. But here they focus momentarily on the whales and then spin it away to shark fear .

“The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has reported a surge in (Great White shark) numbers on the east coast but has yet to record detailed data.” But, wait, isn’t recording detailed data their job? This thread has copiously documented the ongoing omission, wherever possible, of data from 2013 and 2014, because it’s so explosive and so paradigm-breaking. Aside: they use the word surge a lot in connection with things like ‘enemy combatants’.

And, funny, they don’t mention Stanford’s 2011 west coast shark research that said ‘only 200 Great White left!’, the repudication of which was documented previously in this thread. That was a major University’s brave but feeble attempt at keeping the ‘Poor Mother Gaia is Dying’ meme alive. What’s really great is they said ‘200’, and now, just three years later, stories referring to that same research are saying ’ 500 ', because what Stanford had said previously was so embarrassingly and obviously a lie. It’s like why the Most Important and Truthful Movie Ever Made, ‘An Inconvenient Truth’, is never shown on TV, nor in schools.

Speaking of doing their jobs, you can see how, just last month, the Feds opened up the entire East Coast of the U.S. to sonic cannon surveying, which has a side function looking for oil and gas but whose primary purpose is doing as much harm as possible to whales and dolphins. You can’t expect them to take the burgeoning whale population thing sitting down, after all. This is a real and actual war, and The Brotherhood of Death is not at all happy that they are losing it, on every front.

http://www.theguardian.com/wor……ork-waters

Cleaner New York waters see surge in whale and shark numbers

• Humpbacks and great whites abundant off NY and NJ coast
• Cleaner waters believed responsible for rise in ocean giants

Humpback whales and great white sharks are surging in numbers in the waters around New York City this summer, in a wildlife bonanza that is delighting naturalists, environmentalists and fishermen – if not necessarily bathers.

Off New York and New Jersey, some of the largest creatures in the ocean are being spotted in greater abundance than has been the case for decades. Paul Sieswerda, head of the Gotham Whale volunteer marine wildlife tracking group, believes the increasing abundance of whales around the Big Apple is largely prompted by cleaner waters that have encouraged huge rises in the populations of fish which the whales eat.

Sieswerda takes boat tours to locations where giant humpback whales can be seen feeding – with the iconic Manhattan skyline in the background.

“I would say it’s only about four miles from the Statue of Liberty,” he told the Guardian.

Gotham Whale counted 29 whales, all humpbacks, in New York waters from the start of the feeding season in the spring to the end of July 2014, compared with 43 for the whole 2013 season, 25 in 2012 and five in 2011.

Sieswerda, a former curator at both the New York aquarium and the New England aquarium in Boston, keeps records of whale sightings with a team of trained volunteers, identifying individual whales by their unique tail markings. His team has seen humpbacks “lunge feeding”, where the whales rise up under giant shoals and take hundreds of thousands of pounds of fish into their mouths in one gulp, filtering out the seawater through their baleen grills and swallowing the fish.

Sieswerda praised the gradual cleaning up of the Hudson river, which flows into New York harbour, for bringing to the sea nutrients which feed the plankton that feed the fish the whales eat. “The river used to bring nothing but pollution but in the last five years or so there is cleaner water, more nutrients and less garbage,” he said, adding that other conservation and protection measures elsewhere in the region have also improved the ocean waters considerably.

“My boat captain says New York is the new Cape Cod,” Sieswerda said. Gotham Whale runs research and tourist trips from Breezy Point, Queens. The surge in whale numbers can also lead to problems – in May, after a sei whale was hit by a cruise ship and dragged up the Hudson River, increased numbers of collisions between whales and ships were reported in the New York and New Jersey area. Last month, the US government’s decision to open the Atlantic seaboard from Florida to Delaware, south of New Jersey, for oil prospecting using sonic cannons also caused concern.

Whales and great white sharks are most commonly spotted off the Massachusetts and Maine coasts in summer and have been increasing there in recent years. But improved food supplies in the waters around New York and New Jersey appear to be attracting more sharks and whales to linger , instead of heading north for the summer feeding season.

Jeff · October 8, 2018, 9:09am

Best fishing summer in 10-15 years in Southern California. “You usually have to travel to Mexico to experience this kind of fishing,

You’ll notice that, since it’s a local report, the piece is devoid of neurolinguistic programming witchery and simply reports the news truthfully, something not seen in news outlets farther up the food chain, where Secret Handshake Club membership is required.

** http://www.dailybreeze.com/sports/20140806/phil-friedman-offshore-fishing-is-booming **

Offshore fishing is booming

08/06/14

The 2014 offshore fishing season continued red hot this week with excellent catches of yellowfin and bluefin tuna, yellowtail, some dorado and even a few striped marlin. The Freedom from 22nd St. Landing in San Pedro reported 105 yellowfin tuna, 8 bluefin tuna, 1 yellowtail and two dorado on Wednesday fishing about 60 miles from port. “Great fishing for our anglers today,” said Captain Jeff Jessop.

The Ultra, also from 22nd St. had a similar days fishing on Tuesday. Captain Jacob Moreno saw some birds picking baitfish off the surface of the ocean and headed over there in a hurry. Captains know that when they see birds feasting on bait on the surface, its because there are bigger fish below.

“The Captain told us to cast our lines out and as soon as we did, we were hooking up with yellowfin tuna,” said Scott Buchert from Corona del Mar. “It really got crazy for everyone on board.” Recommended tackle for the offshore trips has been 25-pound test with a 2-O size hook and a quarter-ounce egg sinker. Most of the tuna have been from 15-25 pounds while the yellowtail have been 5-12 pounds.

The wild card here is that there have been occasions when bigger bluefin tuna to over 100 pounds have shown up. That’s when a 50 pound test and a two speed reel come in very handy. Catalina Island has also been producing some excellent fishing for 3/4 day boats from LA/OC-based landings. The Pursuit from 22nd St. Landing had 140 yellowtail for 47 anglers on Monday.

“We have been catching our yellowtail on sardines and the iron (lures),” said Captain John Woodrum. “This is one of the best summers we have had in years, maybe a decade.”

Don Ashley from Pierpoint Landing in Long Beach agrees.

“This is and has been the best fishing we have seen in 10-15 years , and I don’t think it’s over by a longshot,” he said.

The overnight boat Toronado has been catching lots of yellowfin tuna on a regualr basis, most of them within 60 miles from home.

“You usually have to travel to Mexico to experience this kind of fishing,” Ashley said. “It’s got everyone excited.”

Big barehanded catch

How about Malibu resident Diana Armstrong’s barehanded catch of a 37-pound bluefin tuna on the beach in front of her house? The Malibu Times reported that Armstrong saw birds diving and heard a fish flapping on the beach, so she went down, and what do you know: a sashimi party ensued. Armstrong got the fish up to her house, where it was carved up for an unexpected feast.

Jeff · October 8, 2018, 9:09am

Check out how the Haddock are not collapsing, as tirelessly stated in the media, but rather doing fine…and how Canadians are managing to catch plenty, while in the U.S. “the fisheries disaster keeps unfolding.”

“This year, the US will land far less than 10% of the 26,000 ton quota of Haddock on Georges Bank, while the Canadians fishing the same stock will catch 70% to 80% of their quota.”

In the article, you’ll see how each successful Canadian method and technique has a purpose-built, hostile response on the U.S. side. Perhaps the most blatantly obvious example of the U.S. government’s hostility to it’s own people being the fact that, in Canada, the fishery is 100% observed by independent observers , whereas, in the U.S., the observers must be on the Secret Handshake Club payroll, and cost exponentially more – both tactics working as desired and designed, to hurt the fishermen.

Just another series of examples of the anti-human programme being ceaselessly taken forward, in this case under the hand-wringing guise of ‘concern for Haddock.’

‘Yankee Ingenuity’ used to be world famous. Perhaps we will again return to a place where we are able to recognize an obvious threat and stand up against it.

Canadian haddock booming, New England haddock is a bust – yet fishing the same stock

February 18, 2014

Why can’t US fisheries managers accept solutions that fall into their lap? The haddock stock on George’s Bank is a glaring example of US government failure to address easily solvable fisheries problems.

We have been struck by the success of the recent Canadian winter haddock season. In January, in just a few ports in Nova Scotia, Canadian boats landed more than 2,000 tons of haddock (nearly 4.5 million pounds). The newspapers were filled with stories of overloaded harbors, full processing plants, and higher revenue based on great market prices.

Meanwhile, the fisheries disaster in New England keeps unfolding. According to a recent letter from the chair of the New England council to the head of the Dept. of Commerce, 2013 groundfish landings in New England will be around 43.4 million lbs, with revenue of only $55.8 million. This represents a 38% reduction in revenue since 2011. No wonder New England fishing businesses outside of the scallop industry are facing extinction.

In this context, there are some booming stocks. US Haddock quotas for 2013 on Georges Bank were over 26,000 tons (or nearly 60 million lbs.) If just 50% of this quota had been landed, New England groundfish landings would have exceeded 2011. Instead, with only a little of the fishing year left, only 1680 tons (3.7 million lbs) of haddock has been landed and the landings for the year will be around 10% of the quota.

The fishing disaster in New England is not just a matter of biology and low cod stocks; it is a failure of NMFS and the dept. of commerce to manage for economic success. Jim Odlin, a former member of the NE council and trawler owner in Maine, says in all his years of fishery management, “I’ve never gone into a meeting room where some one said how can we catch more fish.”

For the US side, the situation is even worse – as the industry has sacrificed for years to rebuild stocks, and now is prevented from harvesting those stocks that have been rebuilt.

Alain De’ Entremont, who operates several vessels in the Canadian haddock fishery, pointed out some of the factors allowing them to catch higher levels of their quotas.
First, the Canadians use a smaller mesh. This year a pilot project allowing vessels to try a 5.7 inch mesh in a diamond configuration, which scientific studies showed did not change the catch composition from their previous 5.1 inch mesh in a square configuration. Observer coverage was added to monitor the catch composition to ensure that the catch composition was not vastly changed and did not increase the catch of sensitive cod and yellowtail bycatch.

Second they use a trawl separator. The bottom meter of the trawl is left open – allowing cod to escape. In Nova Scotia, the ratio of cod by-catch to haddock this winter was around 78 to 1 with some variation depending on the vessels, meaning that they catch 78 pounds of haddock for each pound of cod. This allows haddock to be caught in volume, even when there are severe constraints on cod. The mobile gear’s ratio this season based on the current quotas is 70 to 1.

Third, they all use a system of ITQ’s and the boats with extra cod quotas trade with boats that need it to maximize haddock volumes.
Fourth, their fishery is 100% observed by independent observers who measure the bycatch rates and size composition of the haddock catch. These observers are paid by the industry at a cost of approximately $400 per day.

Even with these positive benefits, the trawl sector will likely only catch about 70% or so of their total allocation. In some years they have caught 90% or 95%.
The US harvesters are well aware of this success, and have consistently pointed out the NMFS rules holding back a similar approach on the US side. One of the key issues is the closed areas. These were closed 20 years ago on the US side as a conservation measure; but now with hard TAC’s that rationale no longer exists. At some times of the year the Canadians fish on the nose of Georges Bank, right next to the US closed area.

On the US side, haddock vessels have to use 6.5 inch mesh; they have no access to closed areas without paying 100% of observer cost, and they must pay observer cost of $700 to $1000 per day if they are to use a separator trawl with a 6 inch mesh. For a haddock trip to Georges, this would add $7000 to $10,000 in expense.

The New England council voted to open the closed areas, but was attacked for doing so despite the fact that the rationale for the closures no longer existed. As a result the openings were subject to a range of restrictions. The council did vote to allow a smaller mesh (6 inches rather than 6.5 inches) with separator trawls. NMFS came back with a requirement for 100% industry funded observer coverage, that made these changes uneconomical for an experimental fishery.

The Council had asked the closed areas be open for traditional haddock fishing areas, fully respecting all sensitive habitat areas. NMFS got 20,000 letters generated by environmental organizations opposing any opening of the closed areas, despite the fact that the rationale for closure – to manage effort – no longer exists under the IFQ sector scheme with hard TAC’s.

The council had also warned NMFS that given the current reduction in revenue, the industry could not support an industry-funded observer requirement, and if that was included in the rule, it would kill the proposal.

Instead of working with the council, NMFS came back with requirements for 100% observer coverage, no allowance for experimental fishing or finding where the most appropriate haddock fishing areas might be, and no flexibility. Trawler owners said okay, if we can’t agree on observer payments, why don’t you let us try to fish haddock in the new area on the 30% of the trips we are assigned an observer. NMFS refused.

Many of them already use and have separator trawls, and those that have fished haddock report getting 50 to 1 ratios between haddock and cod. They are convinced they could go much higher – up to 100 to 1 or more, with a smaller mesh gear. Today, on the 2010 year class that Canada is feasting on, New England trawlers release 80% of the legal size fish that come into their nets. A health target for this ratio should be 50% – which could be achieved with a smaller mesh size.

The fastest way to bring New England’s Fisheries back to health are to address the obstacles that prevent trawlers from accessing healthy stocks. Given the fisheries disaster, and the fact that money will be allocated to the states, one of the most effective uses of funds would be for NMFS to guarantee paid observer coverage for all efforts to increase landings of abundant stocks, like haddock and redfish. It is unconscionable that NMFS is not focusing on the single most cost effective ways of raising fishing income, but instead is perpetuating the fisheries disaster.

Secondly, NMFS must excersize some leadership – all the extensive data supports the use of separator trawls and smaller mesh, and the opening of some of the closed areas. Yet NMFS is swayed by the campaign that says any relaxation of a closed area is a slippary slope back to overfishing. It is simply not true, and NMFS has an advocacy responsibility here, when public comments are not based on science.

This year, the US will land far less than 10% of the 26,000 ton quota of Haddock on Georges Bank, while the Canadians fishing the same stock will catch 70% to 80% of their quota.

NMFS needs a tiger team to tackle all the regulations that are preventing access to New England’s largest healthy stock – and set a goal of landing 50% of the quota. This would go a long way towards nursing the industry outside of scallops back to health.

It is time to have meetings where the only question on the table is how can US fishermen catch more haddock.

Jeff · October 8, 2018, 9:09am

Sardine numbers are said to be ‘plummeting’, and the Feds have cut the harvest back 100%, because, you know, they care so much about Sardines .

But, hey, wait, check out how the government’s acoustical surveys don’t include the ocean’s surface, where the species actually resides . Industry surveys double the Feds’ estimate…can you see the exact same pattern as in the previous post? On-the-take, Secret Handshake Club observers, taking it to the people who fish for a living? Same exact tactic.

Anchovies are off the charts booming, with people who’ve observed fish their whole lives saying they’ve never seen so many. What do the Feds have to say? “So far there is no empirical evidence of an anchovy resurgence in California."

Lying, hostile, anti-human . And deadly-consistent, story after story, case after case.

The dumbfounding ‘slick’ of anchovies off Southern California is documented earlier in this thread. Isn’t it amazing that people can lie so brazenly? “No empirical evidence”? That’s because “and do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law” is the motto that this crowd lives by.

The article documents that Anchovies do better in cooler water, and that the Pacific’s been cooling. So the deviant Greenboot talking head says, with a straight face: “a warmer world – one with elevated levels of CO2 in the ocean’s surface – favors anchovies over sardines.”

The article says he’s ‘adding a wrinkle’. I say he’s a lying deviant with an agenda.

http://www.montereycountyweekl……0f31a.html

Tiny Sardines, Mighty Lessons

The modest little fish – and Monterey icon – contains grand teachings on how to manage fish populations.

Whale spouts shoot up from the left, right and center, lighting up in the setting sun. Off the starboard side of the boat, juvenile sea lions number in the hundreds, roiling the water’s surface into whitecaps. Then, two humpbacks break the surface just 50 feet from the boat, rolling massive, majestic bodies forward on their way back under. The last part of the whales to touch air are the tailfins, flipping up against the horizon, stopping, and then slowly sinking back to the deep.

There’s so much poetry in motion that it’s hard to resist the idea that you are witnessing something historic, that these humpback whales – nearly all of whom normally migrate to Mexico some time in the fall – are trying to tell us something. And they are, if we listen.

There’s a simple explanation why this fall’s whale watching season was so unusually epic on Monterey Bay: anchovies. Thousands of tons of oily, wriggling anchovies, far more than whale watch operators are accustomed to seeing this time of year, or ever.

Nancy Black, a marine biologist and owner of Monterey Bay Whale Watch, has been leading bay trips for 26 years.

“We’ve never seen so many whales,” she says, “and never this many anchovies.”

CWPA’s Pleschner-Steele is more specific with her criticism of the cuts, saying that government acoustical surveys don’t include the ocean’s surface, where the species resides. “They’re missing the top 30-odd feet,” she says, “which is where most of the sardines are.”

Industry surveys – using aerial spotting – put the number of sardines at 900,000 metric tons, more than double NOAA’s estimate.

—–

Like sardines, anchovies are schooling fish that provide important food for mammals and bigger fish. Like us, they mostly gather close the coast because they’re smaller than sardines and not big enough to migrate.

That was the case this fall, when millions of them schooled in Monterey Bay, fueling the frenzy of humpback whale and sea lion feeding so incredible it had to be seen to be believed.

Only a dearth of scientific attention accompanies the societal ignorance, making it hard for research fishery biologists like NOAA’s Kevin Hill – who authored the agency’s sardine stock assessment – to announce the anchovy is on the rise.

“At the moment, we know a lot more about the status of sardine than we do anchovy,” he writes in an email. “So far there is no empirical evidence of an anchovy resurgence in California … I’ve heard reports of the anchovy fishery picking up in Monterey, but we’ve seen similar [even larger] upticks in the catch over the past 15 years.”

But the locals who live and breathe the Monterey Bay fishery know a boom when they see one.

“We’re seeing a lot of them,” says Pleschner-Steele. “A lot a lot a lot.”

“It’s never been like this with sardines,” says Monterey Bay Whale Watch’s Nancy Black.

In his quarter-century of fishing, Crabbe knows how abundant anchovies can become.

“I saw mountains of anchovies,” he says. “Under the right conditions, there’s an amazing amount of fish. It wasn’t uncommon to have massive amounts in the Moss Landing channel, well over 100,000 tons… continual for a square mile.”

MBARI’s Chavez adds a wrinkle, saying that a warmer world – one with elevated levels of CO2 in the ocean’s surface – favors anchovies over sardines.

~ ~ ~

Jeff · October 8, 2018, 9:11am

I’m leading with Chicago because it’s the drum that the media beats to underscore how things are so violent and how we need to ban guns.

L.A.'s crime has dropped each year for eleven straight years . Tracking pretty accurately against the onset of orgonite gifting, by Don Bradley, Don and Carol Croft, and many others, in that reptilian hotbed.

‘Los Angeles’ is a reference to demons, by the way. Hollywood from the ‘Holy Wood’ of the murderous Druids.

In Chicago, IL, the first three months of 2014 saw 6 fewer murders than the same time frame in 2013 – a 9 percent drop – and 55 fewer murders than 2012. There were 90 fewer shootings and 119 fewer shooting victims, drops of 26 and 29 percent respectively. Compared to the first quarter of 2012, there have been 222 fewer shootings and 292 fewer shooting victims. Overall crime is down 25 percent from last year.

Crime statistics for Los Angeles, CA for 2013 show the lowest number of homicides since 1966 and the lowest number of Part I crimes since 1956 – with the lowest per capita Part I crime rate since 1949 , the year before the Korean War. Every LAPD bureau experienced a reduction in crime last year.

7/9/2014 – Dayton, Ohio has had 222 gun crimes so far this year compared to 266 at this time last year, a more than 16 percent reduction. Gun injuries have also dropped from 71 to 52, a 27 percent reduction.

7/17/2014 – Detroit has experienced 37 percent fewer robberies in 2014 than during the same period last year, 22 percent fewer break-ins of businesses and homes, and 30 percent fewer carjackings.

7/24/2014 – In San Francisco, CA, violent crime, including rape, murder and aggravated assault dropped from the first half of 2013 to the first half of 2014 by 27 percent.

7/29/2014 – South Minneapolis, MN – The stats from the first half of 2014 are startling. Robbery, aggravated assault, simple assault, vandalism and motor vehicle theft reports in Southwest’s Fifth Precinct are the lowest since at least 2000. Homicide, rape, larceny and narcotics reports are all down from 2013. The previous record-low January through June —2011 — saw about 4,200 reports of so-called “Part I” and “Part II” crimes. This year, it’s about 3,600. As recently as 2006, it was 6,300.

8/1/2014 – South Miami reports steep drop in crime. Crime in South Miami was down 29 percent for the first six months of this year compared to the same period in 2013.

8/2/2014 – The Escambia County, Florida Sheriff’s Office reported Friday morning the crime rate from January to June of this year has decreased 11 percent compared to the first six months of 2013.

Jeff · October 8, 2018, 9:12am

Check out how rising awareness is scuttling yet another Bad Guy plan to do harm: in the 70’s and 80’s, ‘researchers’ argued that we should kill whales, you know, to save the krill . Actually, their ostensible reason was to save the krill so that other more commercially-valuable fish could eat them, instead. Notice how they just say ‘researchers’ and don’t actually name them?

The rising awareness is seen in the fact that we now know, concretely, that krill populations go down when whale populations go down, cutting off that scurrilous line of attack on the whales – which you’ll notice was hidden behind another reason, plausible to at least some: ‘we’re, um, trying to make more money fishing !’. As opposed to the actual truth: ‘We worship Death and love killing whales.’

That’s a technique called ‘plausible deniability’ – the subconscious is given a straw to grasp - vs. the terrible truth - and almost always chooses the former over the latter.

You’ll see how the article says “some say” and “some argue”…that’s because what is being said, and argued, is so repellant and repugnant that they cannot and will not name whom, exactly would say or argue such a thing. Rather, they keep the argument going, just the same, and imply that whoever said it or argued it was so important they didn’t need to identify themselves. You know, like the Great and Powerful Oz? That’s why it’s called the ‘lapdog’ media.

The article states, with a straight face, that ‘fisheries face multiple threats’ (wring hands), when in fact they are booming to a level not seen, literally, in our lifetimes. The author says that to plant a subtle seed that they hope will make you more amenable to whale killing. That’s called ‘neurolinguistic programming’ or ‘spin’.

One of the reasons that the krill populations drop concurrent with whale populations is the absence of the whales’ gigantic ‘fecal plumes’. And with that I blow a gigantic, nutritious fecal plume toward the barely-closeted, malefic parasites who rule us under the guise of serving in our best interests.

Malefic: "causing or capable of causing harm or destruction, especially by supernatural means. Astology: “relating to the planets Saturn and Mars, traditionally considered to have an unfavorable influence.”

That’s why the big shoe company’s logo is an outline of Saturn’s rings, why the big car company just happened to pick ‘Saturn’, why the Pope wears a snazzy ‘Saturno’ hat.

Rebounding whale populations are good for ocean ecosystems

July 3, 2013

Far from depleting the resources of ocean ecosystems, growing numbers of large whales may be critical to keeping these environments healthy. That’s the conclusion of a new study, which finds that rebounding populations of baleen and sperm whales may be boosting marine food webs around the world . The work is the latest volley in a long-running debate about the ecological role of whales and how their return to the oceans may affect global fisheries that face myriad threats.

Scientists have noted the gradual global recovery of various species of large whales. But many disagree about the impact this is having on ocean ecosystems. Some have cast whales as potential competitors to fishing fleets , because they vacuum up tons of invertebrates and small fish that might otherwise be available to commercially valuable species. Under that line of reasoning, some have argued in favor of the continuation of commercial whaling . In the 1970s and 1980s, for example, researchers argued that reducing certain whale populations would aid stocks of krill, a ubiquitous crustacean in the Southern Ocean that is a key food source for baleen whales and other marine species.

But the new study notes that krill populations remained constant or even declined after great whales experienced big declines. How so? The authors reason that the whales helped provide nutrients critical to krill and other species low on the food web. For instance, the mammals release massive “fecal plumes” and urine streams that fertilize surface waters with nitrogen and iron, the authors note, and help enhance productivity by mixing up the top layers of the ocean when diving.

Whales also move nutrients horizontally around the ocean. Humpback whales, for example, are a species of baleen whale known for grand migrations from the upper latitudes—like Pacific waters near Alaska—to the subtropics where nutrients are more scarce, near Hawaii and Mexico. Using historic and current population data, the study’s authors calculate that rebounded populations of whales could increase the productivity of phytoplankton in some subtropical waters by as much as 15% above current levels.

Another underappreciated contribution to marine ecosystems, the authors report online today in Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment , is the bounty of organic material the animals provide to deep-sea ecosystems when they die. A so-called whale fall of a 40-ton gray whale provides a boost of carbon to the seafloor community equivalent to more than 2000 years of normal detritus and nutrient cycling.

“The reduction of whale carcasses during the age of commercial whaling may have caused some of the earliest human-caused extinctions in the ocean,” writes the study’s first author, conservation biologist Joe Roman of the University of Vermont in Burlington, in an e-mail. “More than 60 species have been discovered that are found only on whale falls in recent decades. By removing this habitat through hunting, we may well have lost many species before we even knew they existed.”

Such new understandings, Roman and his colleagues write, “warrants a shift in view from whales being positively valued as exploitable goods … to one that recognizes that these animals play key roles in healthy marine ecosystems.”

The new study is a useful addition to the debate on the role of whales in global ecosystems, writes marine ecologist Lisa Ballance of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in San Diego, California, in an e-mail. “As [whales] recover, we can indeed expect their influence on marine ecosystems to change the structure and function of those systems relative to the past 100 years.”

Jeff · October 8, 2018, 9:12am

The following story, which is wonderfully positive, comes from an online college newspaper. You’ll notice it doesn’t contain a steady stream of witchery and poison, like that which I painstakingly chronicled in the previous mainstream media account.

No shaking of the ‘Global Warming’ voodoo doll. No ’ some say Ospreys will attack babies in cradles’. No ‘Scientists puzzled about surge in Osprey population, warn they may be fleeing other collapsing Osprey hatcheries’. Nothing.

That’s because you don’t graduate to that sort of malign stuff until you get a job at one of the big Secret Handshake Club media organs, where you have to go along to get along. The first rule about Fight Club is: you don’t talk about Fight Club.

Malign: “evil in nature or effect; malevolent.”

Ten years ago there were no Ospreys around Ithaca, NY. Five years ago there were six nests. As of this year there are thirty eight nests. “We are having an osprey population explosion around the lake.”

Positive Changes are Occurring.

http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/2014/07/rebounding-ospreys-nest-first-time-near-campus

Rebounding ospreys nest for first time near campus

July 8, 2014

In the last five years, the number of observed osprey – fish-eating birds of prey – in the Cayuga Lake basin have increased sevenfold , including a new nest this year near Game Farm Road on university athletic fields near Cornell’s campus.

Ten years ago, osprey nests did not exist around Ithaca , and five years ago, there were only six known active local nests, said Candace Cornell, a biologist, osprey enthusiast and retired Cornell Lab of Ornithology staff member who has been tracking ospreys in the Cayuga Lake area. But this year, Cornell and others have identified at least 38 active breeding nests.

The sole nest on Cornell property houses a breeding pair and their two chicks and sits on top of a light pole next to the soccer field. One of the two chicks was born June 16 and the other two days later. The male has been seen fishing in Beebe Lake, Six-Mile Creek and Cayuga Lake, all within a few miles of the nest.

“The 38 active nests I observed are all visible from public roads, and I am sure there are far more unreported nests on private property,” Cornell said. She hopes to find more nests in the Cayuga basin in a fall survey of the area by boat and helicopter.

Currently, active nests are found along Cayuga Lake, Game Farm Road, Cass Park’s Union Fields and the Robert Treman Marina in Ithaca. Lansing also hosts two active nests at Salt and Portland points. More nests have been sighted along the I-90 Corridor and at the Montezuma National Wildlife Refuge, among other areas.

“Ospreys like to nest in the open on tall strong structures, like utility poles and light poles,” Cornell said. That way, they can see the chicks’ mortal enemies, primarily eagles during the day and Great-horned Owls at night.

Failed nests this year were probably started too late and will be used for breeding next year, Cornell said.

The pair at Union Field got a late start nesting and probably won’t brood this year, said Cornell. After building on a hazardous athletic field light, New York State Electric and Gas Corp. moved the nest to a safe riser, which further disrupted the pair. Even though they may not breed, they are working on their nest. They will probably have a brood next spring, Cornell said.

“We are having an osprey population explosion around the lake,” she said. “We need to identify target areas and put up more platforms to meet the growing demand.”

Ospreys nearly went extinct from the 1940s to the 1970s due to DDT spraying, but since such contaminants have been banned, these highly adaptable birds have rebounded across the Northeast U.S. and elsewhere.

The rise in local populations are likely a result of a number of factors, including a high breeding success rate, long-lived adults capable of reproducing into their 20s, excellent fishing in Cayuga Lake, clean water replete with shallow fishing areas, and ample artificial nest sites such as utility poles and athletic field lights, Cornell said.

Also, surrounding populations in the Great Lakes and along the Eastern Seaboard have done very well, creating a spillover effect around the Finger Lakes, said osprey expert Alan Poole, editor of Birds of North America Online and a senior research associate at the Cornell Lab of Ornithology.

Hacking programs, where young pairs have been relocated to sparsely populated locales, have also played a role in rebounding populations, Poole said.

Jeff · October 8, 2018, 9:12am

The North Sea is teeming with fish…there has been a dramatic recovery of fish species across the North East Atlantic which is “nothing short of remarkable”.

http://www.marinet.org.uk/nffo-claims-the-the-north-sea-is-teeming-with-fish-once-more.html

NFFO claims the the “North Sea is teeming” with fish once more

August 18, 2013

In a Press Release dated 22nd July 2013, and titled “ New Data Reveals North Sea Is Teeming ”, the National Federation of Fishermen’s Organisations (NFFO) says that there has been a dramatic recovery of fish species across the North East Atlantic which is “nothing short of remarkable”.

We provide here the full text of the NFFP Press Release:

“The National Federation of Fishermen’s Organisations (NFFO) – the country’s most influential body representing the UK fishing industry – has cited revolutionary partnership work between the fishing industry and scientists as helping bring about recovery levels in North East Atlantic fish stocks which are ‘nothing short of remarkable’. The findings which cover species including haddock, sole and herring follow recent reports that cod stocks in the North Sea are reaching sustainable levels.

“The fall in fishing mortality levels is being seen as significant as it applies to all of the three main species groups; pelagicLiving in the mid or surface water levels of the sea (including herring and mackerel), demersalLiving on the seabed (including cod, haddock and whiting) and benthicnoun: Benthosnoun: Benthos, the plants and animals which live on the seabed., the plants and animals which live on the seabed. (flat fish including sole and plaice). The ICES statistics also show the trend applies right across the North East Atlantic, with white fish stocks – including those in the North Sea – rebuilding rapidly.

“Barrie Deas, Chief Executive of the NFFO, said: “ The most recent ICES statistics are nothing short of remarkable and paint a long awaited, positive picture for both the UK’s fishing industry, as well as those of us who look to fish as a sustainable, traceable and healthy food source. Over the last decade, the relationship between fishermen and scientists has blossomed into a highly respected multi-project research programme, which has contributed greatly to corresponding decline in mortality across the main commercial fish stocks. Sustainability is now at the heart of the way the fishing industry operates and these figures are a major endorsement of the way practices have changed over the last ten years. There are some stocks yet to respond but the dominant downward trend is too well established, too wide in geographical terms and across too many fisheries to be dismissed as a blip.”

Jeff · October 8, 2018, 9:19am

“Doublethink is the acceptance of or mental capacity to accept contrary opinions or beliefs at the same time, especially as a result of political indoctrination.”

George Orwell, from " 1984 "

November 3, 2014 – 2014 Sees Record Harvests Worldwide

June 23, 2015 - Foodmageddon could be just 3 steps away

August 17, 2015 - Severe ‘Food Shocks’ More Likely Due to Extreme Weather , Experts Warn

Extreme weather such as intense storms, droughts and heatwaves will cause more frequent and severe food shortages as the global climate and food supply systems change.

January 13, 2016 – Agriculture is the next boom industry - Responsible Business

January 14, 2016 – Australian agricultural school enrolments at a record high - ABC Rural …

February 20, 2016 – Farm incomes at a record high : Agriculture Canada

May 6, 2016 – Australia – Ramsey Predicts Farming ‘Boom’

May 16, 2016 – Feed & Grain News - Are We on The Brink of an Agricultural Boom ?

Jeff · October 8, 2018, 9:20am

“Doublethink is the acceptance of or mental capacity to accept contrary opinions or beliefs at the same time, especially as a result of political indoctrination.”

George Orwell, from " 1984 "

April 21, 2016 - Climate: Africa’s Human Existence Is at Severe Risk — Global Issues

February 2, 2015 – Windfall for growers as ICoast posts record cocoa harvest - Phys.org

March 23, 2015 – Zambia’s record harvest bursts its granaries … - MG Africa

May 20, 2015 – Tanzania coffee harvest, exports to hit record high

June 6, 2013 - North Africa grain harvest up , Morocco bringing in record crop , Algeria also up

February 8, 2016 – Increased and more frequent rainfall was reported across large parts of Angola and South Africa in January 2016

March 12, 2016 – On Africa’s agricultural boom

April 3, 2016 – Africa – Sowing the Seeds of an Agriculture Boom

May 7, 2016 – Zambia - THE 2015/2016 crop forecasting survey has revealed that the country will record an increased maize harvest.

May 23, 2016 – Zim farmers driving Zambia maize boom ? - New Zimbabwe.com

June 2, 2016 – South Africa – SA Can Capitalize on an Agricultural Boom

Jeff · October 8, 2018, 9:20am

“Doublethink is the acceptance of or mental capacity to accept contrary opinions or beliefs at the same time, especially as a result of political indoctrination.”

George Orwell, from " 1984 "

September 28, 2015 – Some South Dakota harvest slowed by rain

October 20, 2015 - Dry weather aids South Dakota harvest , increases fire danger

Jeff · October 8, 2018, 9:20am

“The Ministry of Truth - Minitrue, in Newspeak - was startlingly different from any other object in sight. It was an enormous pyramidal structure of glittering white concrete, soaring up, terrace after terrace, three hundred meters into the air. From where Winston stood it was just possible to read, picked out on its white face in elegant lettering, the three slogans of the Party:

WAR IS PEACE, FREEDOM IS SLAVERY, IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH.”

George Orwell, from " 1984 "

December 28, 2016 – California - Record numbers of salmon are spawning in Putah Creek

May 17, 2017 – Report: Extinction Looming for Most of California’s Salmon and Trout

January 20, 2017 - Vietnam’s seafood exports could be left fishing in 2017 - Environmental disasters and slowing global demand have left the industry all at sea.

May 4, 2017 - Increase Demand for Frozen Sea Food Drives Growth - global cold chain market to grow 12.41% during 2017-2021

The two sets of quotes immediately above show that the folks in charge are not your friends, and are lying to you about basically everything, including fish over the entirety of the globe.

And even the official article I quoted saying there’s going to be growth hedges desperately by saying the market’s going to " grow at a CAGR of 12.41% 2017 to 2021 ." 12.41%? Over four years? How am I supposed to believe that crap when Iran’s seafood exports just grew 15%, in one year , to the highest levels, ever? Pakistan up 13% for the first eight months of the most recent fiscal year, and up 34% in February, year over year. Norway up 23%, in one year , to the highest levels, ever.

There’s a lot of talk about " Fake News " these days, and most people can’t fathom they’d need to check the guys writing the seafood articles, but, hey, I’m here for them.

The great news is that it’s June, 2017, and Nature is booming and burgeoning to a level not seen in my lifetime. Since that statement directly refutes our State Religion, which holds that “ Poor Mother Gaia is Dying, Crushed by the Virus-Like Burden of Mankind ”, I’ve appended multiple recent examples below to support it.

Thats extremely bad news for the people running the " Poor Mother Gaia " confidence game, so there’s a lot of really negative spin in the controlled-press reportage below. I’ve italicized it for your convenience.

The headline of the story from Pakistan reads “ Seafood exports increase by 12.99pc .” I have to scratch my head at that 12.99. Doesn’t it round up to 13%? But let’s move on. That 12. 99 % is for the first 8 months of the current financial year. While February’s growth was 34.1%, year-over-year. So you can see the growth in marine life increasing, rapidly.

The chaff throwing in the article entitled “ UK exports record amount of food and drink ” is really impressive. “ Food and drink ”, so broad! If you read the story, you’ll see that’s a cloud of chaff to hide one simple fact: it’s the salmon.

“ sales of the fish leapt more than 50% by value - to £186.7m - and 13% by volume .” They kept volume to last, of course.

“ The rise in the value of UK salmon sales is thanks in part to rising global demand for the fish, that has been hard to meet due to widespread lice infestations that have hampered production .”

Would you consider an industry that increased production 13% year-over-year to have “hampered production”? It’s desperate negative spin, wouldn’t you agree?

The official reason for the record “food and drink” exports from the tiny island nation?

“ FDF credited better promotion of UK goods abroad, and the weaker pound .”

Booming marine life unmentioned. Salmon are booming and burgeoning in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans to levels not seen in our lifetime, and that fact is scrupulously unmentioned, here.

But even a steadfast, duplicitous controlled press - impressive as that is on some levels - is not going to change the facts of the situation, and I think the charade is going to collapse quickly enough, going forward.

In the meantime, I invite you to review the data below and use your personal discernment in the matter:

November 24, 2015 - Record-setting Chinook salmon season drawing to a close

The federal government says fall Chinook salmon are returning to the Hanford Reach section of the river in record-setting numbers.

COLUMBIA RIVER — Some 953,706 fall Chinook passed Bonneville Dam as of Nov. 12, the most fall Chinook passing the dam since it was built 77 years ago . The previous record was set in 2013 when 953,222 fish passed the dam.

Upriver the number of fall Chinook spawning at Hanford Reach is also breaking records and passage of fall Chinook into the Snake River is the second best year since the four lower Snake River dams were built in the 1970s.

June 06, 2016 - Iran - Seafood Exports Rise 15%

Some $350 million worth of seafood were exported in the last Iranian year (March 2015-16), registering a 15% rise compared to a year before, the head of Iran’s Fisheries Organization said. “Of the 82,000 tons of seafood exported last year, only 1,000 tons headed to Russia. This is while the Russian market has the capacity to absorb some 200,000 tons and our northern provinces must take advantage of this opportunity,” Hassan Salehi was also quoted as saying by IRNA. Salehi noted that per capita fish consumption in Iran amounts to 10 kilograms, which is way below the global average of 20 kilograms. Iran produced a record high of more than 1 million tons of seafood last year.

December 28, 2016 – California - Record numbers of salmon are spawning in Putah Creek

January 20, 2017 - Vietnam’s seafood exports could be left fishing in 2017

Environmental disasters and slowing global demand have left the industry all at sea.

Slowing demand in major markets could restrict Vietnam’s seafood exports in 2017, despite the industry seeing a breathtaking result in 2016.

Data from the Vietnam Association of Seafood Exporters and Producers (VASEP) showed that the country collected $7 billion from seafood exports in 2016, rising 7.4 percent from the year before.

February 11, 2017 - Almost 500,000 coho forecast to Columbia River in 2017

April 10, 2017 - 2016 was a record year for Norwegian seafood exports

Norwegian seafood exports reached a milestone in 2016. Sales were up 23% from 2015.

April 26, 2017 - Ireland - Asia Pacific is one of the prominent regions globally in the seafood market for both export as well as import. It is projected that by 2030, the Asia Pacific region will account for approximately 70% of the global demand for fish and seafood products. Hence, to meet this increasing demand of seafood , production of seafood globally is expected to grow rapidly in the coming years.

May 4, 2017 - Global Cold Chain Market 2017-2021: Increase Demand for Frozen Sea Food and Sea Food Products Drives Growth - The global cold chain market to grow at a CAGR of 12.41% during the period 2017-2021.

April 7, 2017 – Pakistan - Seafood exports increase by 12.99pc

Seafood exports from the country during first eight months of current financial year increased by 12.99pc as compared the exports of the corresponding period of last year.

On a month-on-month basis, seafood exports from the country in the month of February 2017 grew by 34.1 pc in comparison to the same month of last year.

May 17, 2017 – Report: Extinction Looming for Most of California’s Salmon and Trout

May 31, 2017 – UK exports record amount of food and drink

31 May 2017
Surging sales of salmon helped the UK to export a record amount of food and drink in the first quarter of 2017, the Food and Drink Federation has said.

The industry group said sales of the fish leapt more than 50% by value - to £186.7m - and 13% by volume.

The rise in the value of UK salmon sales is thanks in part to rising global demand for the fish, that has been hard to meet due to widespread lice infestations that have hampered production.

That has led to higher prices for salmon across the board.

British food and drink exports as a whole grew by 8.3% year-on-year to £4.9bn - the largest first quarter figure on record.
FDF credited better promotion of UK goods abroad, and the weaker pound.

Jeff · October 8, 2018, 9:21am

THE BREAKING OF THE GREAT ARTIFICIAL DROUGHT

Updated from the beginning of the thread on June 13, 2013, through page 18, to September 17, 2014

“The Ministry of Truth - Minitrue, in Newspeak - was startlingly different from any other object in sight. It was an enormous pyramidal structure of glittering white concrete, soaring up, terrace after terrace, three hundred meters into the air. From where Winston stood it was just possible to read, picked out on its white face in elegant lettering, the three slogans of the Party:

WAR IS PEACE, FREEDOM IS SLAVERY, IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH.”

George Orwell, from " 1984 "

January 4, 2013 - There Is No Link Between Rising Temperatures And Increased Rainfall

September, 2013 - NASA Study Projects Warming-Driven Changes in Global Rainfall

September, 2013 - Climate change might be causing abundant rainfall

February 7, 2013 - 2013 had the fewest U.S. forest fires since 1984

March, 2014 - Abundant rainfall could mean more intense grass fire season

As you can see from the two sets of quotes immediately above, the folks in charge are lying to you about basically everything, including temperature, rainfall and forest fires.

It’s June, 2017, and the great artificial drought has been broken by the slow, steady, widespread and ever-increasing distribution of simple, inexpensive Orgonite devices in the vicinity of the weather warfare infrastructure that many still mistakenly presume only carries cell phone traffic and weather radar data.

That’s really bad news for the folks who have built, expand and maintain build and the global, Death energy-based weather control and modification system. A great many of the nodes on their “network” are “UNESCO World Heritage Sites” - the most important, oldest nodes.

Rainfall has been slowly, steadily and deliberately mitigated, back into history, via an intentional, malefic effort driven by Death energy - first via human sacrifices in key places on the Earth’s energy grid, and later augmented by the “modern technologies” we’ve been steadily assured all have no deleterious effects whatsoever. Telegraph, telephone, radio, radar, television and, at the last, cell phone technology.

The folks in charge have worshipped Storm gods of various names all the way back, and one of them was the Canaanite Ba’al. I’ve previously advanced the thesis that stone Ba’al pillars were the first death-tech, collecting and transmitting the Death Energy of sacrifices performed at their bases. Fast-forward to today, and you can note the worldwide network of antennaed and steepled structures festooning the World Grid. They are, all of them, simply newer- and newer-school Ba’al pillars. Or so I have subjectively concluded.

Baal was also known as ‘Lord of the Air’. It’s why the famous car and Southern California suburb are called ‘Bel Air’ (from B’el Air, Ba’al Air). It’s why you have shoes called ‘Air’, and why the big cell phone company’s advertising campaign was ‘Rule the Air’…all hail, Ba’al, our dark master.

Ba’al Pillers to cell towers, Lord of the Air to ‘Rule the Air’ - they imagined the rubes would never figure it out. Well, a certain small subset of us have, and, unfortunately for our ill-intended, erstwhile masters, we’ve also figured out that simple orgonite flips the polarity of these structures, and they become Positive Orgone Radiation generators and transmitters.

It was Don Croft who taught me that Las Vegas was green and verdant when the Spaniards arrived. 1829: “Armijo dispatched a young Mexican scout named Raphael Rivera to search for an oasis ; he returned thirteen days later with news of a verdant spring covered with the rolling green fields the Spanish call las vegas . Meadows there were, and plenty of water too ; the traders refreshed themselves and reached Los Angeles less than three weeks later.”

Here’s wiki’s take:

“ It was called Las Vegas by the Spanish. The name means The Meadows in the Spanish language. It had a lot of these in 1854. The city is known for its dry weather, as is the rest of southern Nevada. It is surrounded by deserts .”

Can you see how they say “ known for its dry weather ” and have erased “oasis”?

Here’s a different wiki entry:

“ In the 1800s, areas of the Las Vegas Valley contained artesian wells that supported extensive green areas or meadows (vegas in Spanish), hence the name Las Vegas. ”

Ah, the greenery was artificial , I see! More deliberate obfuscation.

This is from a book on blackjack: “ years ago, Las Vegas was just another uninhabitable tract of land. That was until late in the 1820s when Spaniards located a well , thus creating an oasis .”

For those unaware, artesian wells are artificial, they’re drilled. While a verdant spring or an oasis are natural. Yes, even more deliberate spin, lies and obfuscation to cover the desertification agenda that these barely-closeted Death worshippers have been implementing all the way back to Babylon, and before.

The negative light in which rain, the giver of life is portrayed in the media goes back deep into the past, as well. " Rain, rain, go away ." It’s an incantation, a Black magic spell.

And it’s not just drought creation and desertification these people are into, of course. It’s Death in all its manifestations – killing the animals, the plants, the humans – generating as much Death energy as possible for the dark gods they worship.

I know this is really hard for many or most to grasp, or deal with, but it’s like coming to terms with a deadbeat friend who’s been crashing on your couch for too long. It’s time to come to terms with this situation, and get our house in order.

The great news is that the tide has turned, the game is over for these people:

“April 28, 2016 - Record-breaking rain in April for Las Vegas, and it’s not done yet”

All the Las Vegas rainfall records, below, aren’t strange, and anomalous, they’re a return to the way things always were .

And that’s true about everywhere else, too.

I don’t know how long it’s going to take for wider humanity to awaken from the carefully crafted spell they’ve been placed under, but I’m quite awake, and if you’ve reached this Obscure Internet Forum, I’m guessing that, so are you, too.

Everyone’s waking up, together.

If you haven’t already done so, please consider distributing simple, inexpensive Orgonite devices where you live and work, today, or sponsor a gifter, perhaps even through a vehicle such as this forum.

October 27, 2012 - After decades of decline, Texas quail rebounding this year

Over the past 20 years or so, Texas’ quail population has declined by as much as 70 percent.

Rains this past winter and spring jump-started vegetation growth , and that burst of grasses and other plants provided food and cover for adult quail, triggering a strong nesting effort, he said. Quail chicks found plenty of insects to eat. August and September rains greatly aided survival of chicks and encouraged late nesting.

“I’ve seen a marked and impressive increase in quail numbers,” Ledbetter said. “Where I was seeing coveys with just six or eight birds in them last year, I’ve counted 18-22 birds.” The best quail numbers were in South Texas. " But I’ve seen more quail this year in the Hill Country - Edwards Plateau - than I have in years ," Ledbetter said.

January 4, 2013 - There Is No Link Between Rising Temperatures And Increased Rainfall

"In viewing the three portions of the above figure, it can readily be seen that from approximately 1939-2009, there were no significant trends in any of the three precipitation parameters over that seven-decade interval , when the bulk of the global warming most recently experienced by the Earth has been claimed by climate alarmists to have been unprecedented with respect to the past millennium or two. In addition, they note that the most intense events (those over the 90th, 95th and 99th percentiles) have small trends over the full period analyzed, which are rarely significant even on a local scale. And these sets of observations cast a huge amount of doubt upon climate-alarmist predictions of greater precipitation – including more intense precipitation extremes – occurring in tandem with rising temperatures."

January 4, 2014 - Latest storm likely to make the 2010s the snowiest decade in the east in the NOAA record

It was quite a storm. I have never seen Logan Airport report heavy snow with an air temperature of 1F (not wind chill) before. The ended up with 15.1 inches. Boxford had 23.8 inches.

Even as more cold and snow invades the central, near the east coast, the post storm blues have set in with the inevitability of an inside runner following rapidly on its heels. But snow loving friends, we have lived through quite a decade and the millennium so far has been a boon to snow lovers despite the continuing claims that snows are becoming rare and hurting winter sports as erroneously reported last week in Boston Magazine.

We here are using NOAA’s own NESIS scale – which we used to call the Kocin/Uccellini storms.

The Northeast Snowfall Impact Scale (NESIS) Overview

While the Fujita and Saffir-Simpson Scales characterize tornadoes and hurricanes respectively, there is no widely used scale to classify snowstorms. The Northeast Snowfall Impact Scale (NESIS) developed by Paul Kocin and Louis Uccellini of the National Weather Service (Kocin and Uccellini, 2004) characterizes and ranks high-impact Northeast snowstorms. These storms have large areas of 10 inch snowfall accumulations and greater. NESIS has five categories: Extreme, Crippling, Major, Significant, and Notable. The index differs from other meteorological indices in that it uses population information in addition to meteorological measurements. Thus NESIS gives an indication of a storm’s societal impacts. This scale was developed because of the impact Northeast snowstorms can have on the rest of the country in terms of transportation and economic impact.

This week’s storm was at least as impactful and covered a wide stretch back to the Midwest. If it joins the NESIS list, it will be storm 49 and make the 2010s the snowiest decade for the east coast in the record, surpassing the 1960s.

February 7, 2013 - Least extreme U.S. weather year ever?

2013 shatters the record for fewest U.S. tornadoes — 15% lower than previous record — 2013 also had the fewest U.S. forest fires since 1984

‘Whether you’re talking about tornadoes, wildfires, extreme heat or hurricanes, the good news is that weather-related disasters in the US are all way down this year compared to recent years and, in some cases, down to historically low levels.’

Extreme Heat: The number of 100 degree days may ‘turn out to be the lowest in about 100 years of records’

Hurricanes: ‘We are currently in the longest period (8 years) since the Civil War Era without a major hurricane strike in the US (i.e., category 3, 4 or 5)’ ( last major hurricane to strike the US was Hurricane Wilma in 2005)

The latest data show both tornadoes and now wildfires in dramatic decline.

February 27, 2013 - What’s behind Lake Tahoe’s ‘Amazing’ Gain in Clarity

The crystal blue water of Lake Tahoe is getting clearer. Clarity in the alpine lake has improved for two years in a row.

March 3, 2013 - Lake Tahoe Water Clarity Improving

A recent trend in improved water clarity at Lake Tahoe has scientists and regional agency planners confident that 15 years of environmental measures are beginning to bear fruit.

Last year’s annual average clarity depth at the lake was recorded at 75.3 feet – more than an 11-foot improvement from the all-time worst recorded in 1997 , according to data from the UC Davis Tahoe Environmental Research Center.

April, 2013 – In Britain, weeks of freezing weather are set to be followed by a wet and cool summer , forecasters warned yesterday

April, 2013 - Forecast is for May is for near-normal to cooler than normal temperatures. Wet March and April have wiped out the drought in Georgia!

May 15, 2013 - The long range summer forecast for Ireland would suggest that we are in for another year of cooler and wetter than normal conditions

May 26, 2013 - German meteorologists say that the start of 2013 is now the coldest in 208 years – and now German media has quoted Russian scientist Dr Habibullo Abdussamatov from the St. Petersburg Pulkovo Astronomical Observatory [saying this] is proof as he said earlier that we are heading for a “Mini Ice Age.” Talking to German media, the scientist who first made his prediction in 2005 said that after studying sunspots and their relationship with climate change on Earth, we are now on an ‘unavoidable advance towards a deep temperature drop.’”

Faith in Global Warming is collapsing in formerly staunch Europe following increasingly severe winters which have now started continuing into spring.

“Here in Britain, where we had our fifth freezing winter in a row, the Central England Temperature record – according to an expert analysis on the US science blog Watts Up With That – shows that in this century, average winter temperatures have dropped by 1.45C, more than twice as much as their rise between 1850 and 1999, and twice as much as the entire net rise in global temperatures recorded in the 20th century.”

Last week it was reported that 3,318 places in the USA had recorded their lowest temperatures for this time of year since records began . Similar record cold was experienced by places in every province of Canada. So cold has the Russian winter been that Moscow had its deepest snowfall in 134 years of observations .

June, 2013 - Corn farmers are feeling the impact of a cool, wet spring but are still expected to bring in a record crop this year

(A record crop was the result - yet the farmers are said to " feel the impact" - blatant negative spin inserted prior to the good news - ed)

June, 2013 – Rice output in India is set to climb to a record as early arrival of monsoon rains over the biggest growing regions spurs planting

Showers have been 23 percent more than a 50-year average since June 1, with Andhra Pradesh getting at least 70 percent more rains , bureau data showed. Andhra Pradesh and West Bengal are the nation’s top growers, representing about 29 percent of the crop."

(Headline deliberately misleads, says it’s " early arrival " to avoid saying “plentiful rain” - ed)

July, 2013 - Canada - Larry Robinson…(has) been giving horse-drawn wagon rides through the “desert” for nearly two decades under company name Spirit Sands Wagon Outfitters. (His tours include) a stop at the Devil’s Punch Bowl, a 45-metre depression of sand where blue-green water pools.

This year alone has seen a surge in vegetative cover, thanks to rain seemingly every second or third day in the Spirit Sands, as the dunes are called.

The Manitoba government has not ruled out using herbicides to stop vegetation from covering the sandhills at Spruce Hills Provincial Park, said Conservation Minister Gord Mackintosh.

Other options to preserve the sandhills include controlled burns and plowing up the vegetation to bring back exposed sand. Part of the justification is that Manitoba will lose unique species such as skinks, our only native lizard, that rely on areas of open sand.

"The area ‘looked like the Sahara’ two decades ago."

July 9, 2013 - Rising Carbon Dioxide Levels Cause Desert Greening, Satellite Observations Reveal

“According to new research reported in the Geophysical Research Letters, increased levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) over the past three decades have caused an 11 percent increase in green foliage over the globe’s arid regions through a process called CO2 fertilization.”

(The satellite observations simply reveal greening - the leap to it being caused by rising CO2 levels is their own. A careful misdirection -ed)

July 13, 2013 – (North Texas) Summer weather shocker : Cool and rainy

(The words " mystery ", " baffled " and " puzzled " are memes, used, among numerous similar variants, whenever anyone in the wholly-controlled-and-coopted Political, Academic, Scientific and Media establishments wants to lie about, well, basically anything. One of those variants is " shocked ". -ed)

September, 2013 - N AS A Study Projects Warming-Driven Changes in Global Rainfall

September, 2013 - Mosquitoes plentiful, hungry in Chattanooga area after 7 inches of rain

September, 2013 - Crop Diseases Linked to Abundant Rainfall, Cooler Temperatures

September, 2013 - Climate change might be causing abundant rainfall

September, 2013 - Rain Dampens Local Economy

September, 2013 - Record rainfa l l may dampen fall color show

September, 2013 - Plentiful Rainfall puts Pressure on Dams

September, 2013 - Plentiful rain brings disease to Alabama soybeans, cotton

September, 2013 - Abundant rainfall could mean more intense grass fire season

September, 2013 - Abundant Rainfall Could Spell Trouble For Willamette Valley Crops

September, 2013 - Abundant rainfall worries NC farmers, water department

September, 2013 - Abundant rainfall delays some crops

September, 2013- Abundant rain, cool weather may lead to standout fall allergy season

September, 2013 - Abundant rainfall attracts fall pests early

September, 2013 - Despite plentiful rainfall , water restrictions remain

September, 2013 - Despite spring’s abundant rain , drought is again just inches away

December 19, 2013 - According to the research, water clarity has been increasing in a majority of the Great Lakes .

January 11, 2014 - Twenty-three Americans died from lightning in 2013, the fewest since records began in 1940 .

The year 2013 set a record for the fewest lightning deaths in a year in the USA. There were 23 fatalities directly attributed to lightning, according to data from the National Weather Service. The previous record low was in 2011, which had 26 deaths. Accurate lightning death records go back 73 years to 1940.

Over the past 30 years, about 52 people on average die each year from lightning strikes. Going way back, in the 1940s, hundreds of people were killed each year by lightning; in 1943 alone, 432 people died. “While we don’t like to see any lightning deaths, the continuing reduction in yearly fatalities is encouraging,” Jensenius said.

Why the huge drop in deaths, especially compared with decades ago, even though the population is more than twice what it was then? "Comparisons show that the decrease in lightning risk to people coincides with a shift in population from rural to urban regions," wrote meteorologist Ronald Holle in an article in the Journal of Applied Meteorology .

“There were many, many more small farmers who were out working in fields,” Jensenius said, which resulted in many more chances to be struck by lightning.

Other reasons for the drop in lightning-related fatalities over the years:

All phones were corded, and there were quite a few deaths due to people speaking on the phone.
Better lightning protection, suppression and grounding in electrical and phone lines.
More concern and awareness of lightning safety, due in part to advances in media communication.
Medical advances in treating lightning strike victims.

Last year was also a relatively quiet year in the USA for severe thunderstorms , which produce large hail, tornadoes or very strong winds. Could this have been a factor in the record low number of lightning deaths?

"I have never tried to correlate the two; however, I doubt that there’d be much of a correlation," Jensenius said. "Very few lightning deaths seem to occur during ‘severe’ weather. As for non-severe thunderstorms, overall, the number of thunderstorms doesn’t vary much from year to year across the United States, so I don’t think there’s much of a correlation there either."

February 4, 2014 - OSHKOSH, Wisconsin – Just days before the 2014 Winnebago lake sturgeon spearing season opens Feb. 8, state fisheries officials reported that water clarity and ice conditions, the best in a decade and the keys to spearing success, continue to improve.

Feb 10, 2014 – Mt. Tam gets 21 inches of rain as three Marin reservoirs spill

March 1, 2014 – For the first time in nearly three years, downtown Los Angeles received more than 2 inches — doubling its total for the rainy season that began in July.

April 24, 2014 – As the rain keeps pouring down, Seattle sets rainfall record

May 1, 2014 – Record-setting rainfall : 3-7 inches fall across Washington, D.C. area.

May 13, 2014 - A new study on lake clarity across eight Midwestern states relies solely on data from citizen scientist s. The records dated back to the late 1930s and spanned eight Midwestern states. The trend across more than three thousand lakes was a slight increase in water clarity. And in Wisconsin and Minnesota, that trend was stronger in the northern regions.

May 15, 2014 - Cleveland’s May rain doubles normal and leads Ohio. It’s rained 11 out of the first 15 days this month.

May 15, 2015 – Cleveland’s May rain doubles normal - It’s rained 11 out of the first 15 days this month .

May 23, 2014 - LUBBOCK, TX – Lubbock’s official rainfall total for 2014 more than doubled Friday morning.

May 27, 2014 – Seattle surpasses 6-month rainfall record in just 4 months

May 28, 2014 – MID-MICHIGAN – We’re now experiencing one of our wettest Mays since records began in Flint.

May 26, 2014 – Philadelphia, PA - WEATHER BLOG: Will Gorgeous Holiday Weather Last?

May 31, 2014 – Saturday’s forecast: Gorgeous weather on the West coast …

June 2014 was Minnesota’s wettest June, and wettest month, of the modern record .

June 18, 2014 – Davis, CA - Lovely weather brings the students out on campus

June 19, 2014 – West Michigan rainfall breaks record.

June 20, 2014 – Excellent Conditions for 2014 Colorado Fly Fishing and Hunting Seasons

With snow still melting from the peaks and the weather slowly warming, summer is slowly arriving this year in the Colorado high country. The conditions are already green and lush , and the health of our grazing and water in the Flat Tops is the best we have seen in years .

Guided Fly Fishing trips in Colorado Wilderness areas We expect to see a very exciting fishing season with these conditions unfolding. Our timberline lakes will be full, and our headwaters streams will continue to fill with clear, cold water for our native trout.

With all of the moisture on the ground and in th e waterways, insect life should also provide healthy nourishment for trout throughout the summer . Aquatic insects like caddis, mayflies and stoneflies all rely on cold, oxygenated water. This should result in prolific hatches and some excellent dry fly fishing throughout the summer months!

Bull Elk Our big game herds are certainly benefiting from the lush vegetation as well. We are already seeing a banner year for antler growth in bull elk and mule deer bucks. Last year at this time, grass around our base camp was already beginning to brown. This year, the grass in camp is more than eight inches tall. With the peaks still white and plenty of snow yet to melt, elk cows and calves will have excellent grazing conditions. Our herds should go into this fall in great shape.

Of course, all of this moisture is also leading to very healthy wildflowers. Our horseback riding guests will enjoy and excellent wildflower season this year. The hills are already coming alive with flowers. With plenty of snow still melting off the peaks, the flowers should continue to bloom well into the summer.

June 23, 2014 - The Midwest Receives Two Months Of Rainfall In One Week

June 23, 2014 – U.K. - Enjoying the lovely weather here in East London

June 26, 2014 - Texas’ Recent Rains Improve Drought, Lake Level. Lakes around the state have benefited and are at nearly two-thirds of capacity. Statewide Texans got more rain in May (4.03 inches) than normal, and June is on track to also surpass its normal of 3.44 inches.

June 28, 2014 – Lancaster, PA - June’s final weekend will give us lovely weather

June 18, 2014 - Another wave of heavy thunderstorms in Minnesota dumped flooding rains on Mankato and New Ulm overnight and pushed the Twin Cities into record territory for precipitation so far in 2014.

June 18, 2014 – Abilene, Texas - This year’s cotton crop is going into the ground and June showers are getting things off to a good start. This time last month, the outlook for the 2014 cotton crop was dismal. Rainfall was more than five inches below average, with no sign of immediate improvement. Then the calendar rolled over to June and our annual rainfall nearly doubled. As of June 18, we’ve seen 3.36" of rain in June. That’s almost half of the yearly total so far.

July 1, 2014 – Despite a painfully dry winter, most of the Bay Area didn’t set any records for low rainfall this past year. In San Francisco, where records go back to the Gold Rush, last year didn’t even rank in the bottom 10.

July 8, 2014 - Coffee Output in India Seen Rising to Record as Rains Spur Beans

July 8, 2014 - Weather underpins hopes for huge US corn crop

(headline uses the neutral ’ weather ’ to carefully avoid saying “cool, rainy” - ed)

Weather forecasts maintained hope for US corn production prospects as crops entered the key pollination period in historically strong condition, with soybeans and spring wheat seen thriving too.

An outlook for temperatures to remain below average throughout the Midwest over the next 10 days “sets the stage for excellent pollination conditions”, said Paul Georgy, president of Chicago broker Allendale.

"If the forecast comes true it would make it the fourth coolest pollination period since 1980.

“This would put this year in the category with 2004 and 2009 when record yields were set in corn.”

US farmers achieved a corn yield of 160.3 bushels per acre in 2004, beating by a margin the previous record of 142.2 bushels per acre set the previous year, while in 2009 setting the current all-time high of 164.7 bushels per acre.

Cool conditions are beneficial to pollination, with heat and dryness hampering the process, as seen in 2012, when the yield fell to 123.4 bushels per acre, the lowest since 1995.

‘Bumper yield prospects’

At RJ O’ Brien, Richard Feltes also highlighted that the two-week outlook for Midwest temperatures was “not only cooler than last week’s models, but normal-to-below average through the peak of corn pollination in mid-July”.

He added: "US farmers, grown accustomed to sub-160 bushels per acre US corn yields in eight of the last 10 years, are unexpectedly faced with the prospect of a 170 bushels-per- acre 2014 US corn yield."

The comments followed the release of data overnight showing that as of Sunday 15% of corn was silking, part of the pollination process, at a time when 75% of the crop was in “good” or “excellent” condition.

While unchanged on the week, that rating was the second best of the past 20 years for the time of year , beaten only by the 1999 figure.

‘High humidity was beneficial’

The increase reflected largely an improvement in southern growing states, such as Texas, where USDA scouts reports that " corn experienced rapid growth as a result of recent rainfall ", with 66% rated good or excellent, up 2 points week on week.

In Kansas, where " cooler temperatures prevailed and rain fell " last week in southern parts of the state last week, the proportion of corn rated good or excellent increased by 3 points to 58%.

’Spring wheat is flourishing’

Indeed, the proportion of Iowa soybeans rated good or excellent fell too, by 2 points to 73%, although this was, again, insufficient to offset improvements in other states, such as Kansas, Kentucky and Nebraska.

The rating of the national crop, steady at 72% good or excellent, is the best in 20 years for the time of year.

For spring wheat, the proportion seen as in good or excellent condition held at 70%, including 83% of the crop in North Dakota, the top growing state.

"Northern spring wheat is flourishing in a cool, rainy summer," said Gail Martell at Martell Crop Projections.

July 24, 2014 – Weather: Gorgeous day expected - Cincinnati Enquirer

August, 2014 - Cleaner New York waters see surge in whale and shark numbers

“I would say it’s only about four miles from the Statue of Liberty,” he told the Guardian.

August 2, 2014 – Lovely weather we’re having this August.

August 3, 2014 – Portland weather: Gorgeous , sunny Sunday

August 5, 2014 - Surprising facts about climate change in Portugal: Why the climate catastrophe is not happening

As Portugal came out of its second unusually wet winter in a row , some people already fear these could be the first signs of global climate change . Can the seemingly endless rainy period be blamed on ourselves because we are driving our cars to work, heating and air-conditioning our homes, and flying on holidays or on business to Brazil? Undoubtedly the atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) concentration has been steadily increasing over the past 150 years. In its latest report released last September the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) warned of dire consequences should CO2-emissions not be drastically curtailed in the near future.

Among the contributors to the IPCC report were also two Portuguese academics, Dr Pedro Viterbo, Director at the Portuguese Instituto de Meteorologia, and Professor Filipe Duarte Santos of the Lisbon University’s Faculty of Sciences, both serving as review editors for the IPCC. In conjunction with the report’s launch Santos warned that Portugal would be among the European countries most vulnerable to climate change. He suggested that the country in the future will suffer from more extreme weather events like heat-waves and droughts, which in turn will lead to more forest fires and reduced agricultural output. Santos prognosis sees an overall drop in rainfall but with the threat of short bursts of torrential rains that will raise the risk of flooding. Moreover, the Lisbon-based professor expects sea level to rise by more than half a metre before the end of this century, which would put two thirds of Portugal’s coastline at risk for a loss of terrain.

But is it really so? Checking the facts

Are these scary IPCC future scenarios really justified? This is an important question, especially as the European Union has decided to spend at least 20 percent of its entire 2014-2020 European Union budget on climate-related projects and policies – money that is already lacking in other fields. It is clear that the global temperature has risen by nearly one degree since 1850. A similar amount of warming has occurred also in Portugal, as evidenced by historic temperature measurements and geological investigations in the Tejo delta area.

What is interesting, however, is that there has been no warming in Portugal over the last 19 years. This corresponds with the global situation, which has not warmed in the past 16 years, a situation that all of the IPCC’s highly praised climate models failed to foresee. Scientists have been taken by surprise and are now nervously discussing what might have gone wrong in their models. A first explanation emerging is that important 60-year natural ocean cycles apparently had been overlooked. Historical temperature data recorded by weather stations in Lisbon and Coimbra during the last 140 years confirm these stunning cycles. Hardly known today is the fact that around 1950 temperatures in Portugal were as warm over a ten-year period as they are today. And 60 years before that, during the late 19th century, another warm peak had occurred in Portugal, though temperatures were not quite as high as modern levels. Strangely many high temperatures recorded at many places around the world during the 1940s and 1950s have been “corrected” downwards recently by official climate agencies such as NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS). Whether these data alterations are justified is today the subject of heated debate among some climate scientists.

How stable was the climate before CO2 levels rose?

To better understand the context of global warming since the industrial period started in 1850, it is also important to study pre-industrial temperature development when atmospheric CO2 concentrations were low and fairly stable at about 280 ppm. Obviously any change in climate during those pre-industrial times would essentially have to be owing to natural factors. Geological studies from all over the world have documented the occurrence of significant climate fluctuations during the last 10,000 years. Warm phases and cold phases alternated about every thousand years, often in sync with changes in solar activity. For example 1000 years ago, during the Islamic Period in Portugal, average global temperatures were at or above the present-day level. This period is referred to as the Medieval Warm Period and coincides with a phase of high solar activity.

A research team led by Fatima Abrantes from the Laboratório Nacional de Energia e Geologia (LNEG) investigated this period and examined a sediment core they had drilled out of the Tagus delta. In their report published in 2005 in the Quaternary Science Reviews journal, the scientists document temperatures that were on average more than half a degree warmer than today for the Lisbon area. The water discharge of the Tagus during this time was less.

A few years later Fatima Abrantes and her team expanded their studies to the Porto area. Not surprisingly the data confirmed the existence of the Medieval Warm Period also at this location. In their study the researchers recorded persistently elevated temperatures between AD 960-1300 and documented climatic conditions for northern Portugal that were at times more than one degree warmer than today. Studies in Spain show similar results.

The warm medieval climate allowed the Vikings to establish settlements in Greenland. The King of Norway-Denmark at the time reportedly sent a number of white falcons from Greenland as a gift to the King of Portugal and received the gift of a cargo of wine in return. The Medieval Warm Period is one of the greatest mysteries in climate science. How could it have been so warm when CO2 in the atmosphere was so low? Climate models still cannot reproduce this warm phase or other warm phases that had occurred earlier. International scientists met in Lisbon in September 2010 to discuss this dilemma, yet the problem remains unresolved to this day.

An inconvenient truth: climate has been always changing

On a global scale cold phases prevailed before and after the Medieval Warm Period. The influx of Germanic tribes to the Iberian Peninsula at the beginning of the 5th century was triggered by the so-called Dark Ages Cold Period. A decrease in agricultural yields in the north contributed to the European migration. Living conditions were equally difficult in central and northern Europe during the Little Ice Age of 1350-1850 AD. Harvests failed regularly and disease spread. Temperatures in Portugal also fell, as shown by Fatima Abrantes and her team show. During some of these winters heavy snowfall was recorded in Lisbon, such as in 1665, 1744 and 1886. Solar activity during the Little Ice Age was unusually low and might have been the main cause of this globally cool period.

Researchers at the University of Coimbra support the idea that solar activity is one of the key climate control mechanisms on timescales of decades and centuries. In cooperation with a Danish colleague from the Danish Meteorological Institute, Anna Morozova and Maria Alexandra Pais analysed temperature variations in Portugal over the last 140 years and found that solar activity changes had a significant impact on climate, especially during the winter months.

Also little known is the fact that temperatures of 7000 to 5000 years ago were globally one or even two degrees warmer than those of today. This is a time referred to as the Holocene Climate Optimum. In collaboration with the Geological Survey of Spain, a scientific team of the LNEG led by Ana Alberto investigated the temperature changes of this natural warm phase using a sediment core extracted from the Atlantic sea floor about 300 km west of Portugal. The researchers confirmed the existence of this high temperature phase, which had been preceded and was followed by colder periods.

Theoretical climate models come under scrutiny

The unexpectedly strong climate variability of the pre-industrial past indicates that the current climate models used by the IPCC underestimate the significance of natural climate drivers and thus greatly overstate the climate potency of CO2. If this is so, then the scary temperature warnings previously issued by the IPCC are unlikely to come true. Consequently it is not surprising that recently there has been a flurry of publications proposing that the warming effect of CO2 in the climate model equations should be reduced. According to the IPCC the so-called climate sensitivity – the warming that is expected to result from a doubling of atmospheric CO2 – is thought to be between 2°C and 4.5°C, with a best estimate of 3°C. However, a recent study by the Norwegian Research Council has drastically lowered these estimates and assumes only a value of 1.9°C.

In the meantime other scientists and organisations have joined in calling for a downward correction, including the Austrian Central Institution for Meteorology and Geodynamics. The government of the Netherlands has urged the IPCC to include natural climate change processes more systematically and realistically in their models. In reality CO2 climate sensitivity values might actually be as low as 1.5°C or even 1.0°C once solar activity effects are fully factored in. Now that the IPCC future warming scenarios appear to be largely exaggerated , a multitude of other climate-related prognoses are looking more and more to be widely off the mark, e.g. those related to sea level rise, droughts, heat waves and storms.

Iberian winter rain in sync with an Atlantic oceanic cycle

In 2009 researchers of the Pyrenean Institute of Ecology (CSIC) publicly warned that rainfall over the Iberian Peninsula would decrease over the coming decades due to rising greenhouse gas emissions. The basis for their claim was an analysis of precipitation data from Spain over the past 60 years which seemed to indicate a decline in winter precipitation.

Only five years later, after several unusually wet Iberian winters, this prediction has begun to fail spectacularly. In particular the winters 2009/2010, 2012/2013 and 2013/2014 have turned out to be extremely rainy. What did CSIC scientists overlook? In 2011 the CSIC researchers found themselves what it was. They had obviously neglected an important 60-year oceanic cycle, the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) which had just entered its negative phase in 2009. The North Atlantic Oscillation is driven by the atmospheric pressure difference between the Icelandic low and the Azores high. It has been long known that winter rain in Portugal and Spain intensifies when this pressure difference is low, also refered to as a “negative NAO”. The NAO cycle began falling around 1990 and according to the 60-year cycle it is expected to remain at low levels for at least another decade thus bringing abundant rain to the Iberian Peninsula over the majority of the coming winters.

Obviously it is necessary to study climatic data series that are significantly longer than the 60-year ocean cycles in order to identify longer-term trends. This is exactly what a Spanish-Portuguese team led by María Cruz Gallego did in a study appearing in the Journal of Geophysical Research in 2011. The researchers studied Iberian rains over a 100-year period and found the opposite of what was found by their CSIC colleagues : the total number of rainy days and that of light rainfall was generally increasing . In 2013 a study led by Dario Camuffo involving researchers from the University of Lisbon and the University of Évora further corroborated this result. The team analysed precipitation data taken from the entire Western Mediterranean covering the last 300 years and found no specific trends over the whole period despite a warming of more than 1°C. It may not come as a surprise that in their data Camuffo and his colleagues found evidence of a 60-year Atlantic oceanic cycle influencing rainfall activity in the study region.

Over longer timescales of hundreds of years, Iberian rainfall was also affected by solar activity changes, as other studies show. Even the NAO itself is now assumed not to be oscillating fully independently, but is partly controlled by the varying energy output of the sun. Therefore the main rain drivers in Portugal and Spain are an Atlantic oceanic cycle and changes in solar activity.

What role could CO2 play in this development? Has it possibly led to an increase in more extreme rain events? A study by the Institute for Environment and Sustainability by the European Commission investigated an increase in insured losses associated with river flooding occurring in Spain between 1971 and 2008. After adjusting the data for socioeconomic factors, the researchers found that there had been no significant trend in the frequency or intensity of river flooding in Spain . Societal influences remain the prime factors driving insured and economic losses from natural disasters related to flooding.

No increase in droughts in Portugal over the past 70 years

IPCC-affiliated scientists have proposed that droughts in Portugal could become more frequent and intense in the future. However there are two concerns with this model. Firstly, this assumption is based on warming scenarios that are unlikely to materialise in reality because of an overestimated CO2 climate sensitivity. Secondly, calibration with historical drought statistics does not support the idea. A team from the Instituto Superior de Agronomia of the Universidade Técnica de Lisboa led by D.S. Martins studied the drought history of Portugal for the past 70 years and concluded that there is no linear trend indicating more drought events despite a warming of more than half a degree. Apparently there is no direct link between average temperature and drought frequency. In fact it seems that droughts were just as abundant during the pre-industrial past as they are today. A recent study by the Universidad de Extremadura analysed Iberian drought history during Muslim rule and identified three severe droughts: AD 748–754, AD 812–823 and AD 867–879.

The climate apocalypse is a false alarm

It is becoming ever clearer that the climate apocalypse so vividly promoted by some overly active scientists and organisations is not backed up very convincingly by scientific data. Theoretical models have failed spectacularly to reproduce the climate of the past. It turns out that climate has always been prone to natural variability, a fact that has been neglected for too long.

Meanwhile the public seem to have understood that the climate sciences have overplayed their hand. The people have had enough of dramatized reports predicting an imminent climate apocalypse just around the corner. According to a Eurobarometer poll conducted in July 2013, a mere 4% of the European population now cites the alleged climate catastrophe as their most pressing concern. Moreover, the number is zero percent in seven European countries, including Portugal.

August 11, 2014 – Gorgeous Weather Returns. Very nice weather is moving back into the Ozarks.

August 13, 2014 – Jackson, MS - Gorgeous stretch of weather!

August 15, 2014 - Watch 4 Billion Gallons of Mining Waste Pour Into Pristine B.C. Waterways

First Nations, environmentalists and just about everyone else are aghast at the severity of the toxic spill from a tailings pond.
On August 4 the tailings pond of the gold and copper open-pit Polley Mine, operated by Imperial Metals Corp., breached and sent billions of gallons of metals-laden silt and water into waterways awaiting the return of the salmon.

The mess has only just begun to wreak its environmental havoc, with campgrounds evacuated, a local emergency declared and a fishing ban imposed, among other immediate effects. Long-term damage is not yet known, and Imperial officials say they have no idea why it happened.

August 16, 2014 – State College, PA - Beautiful weather on tap for rest of week

August 18, 2014 – Baltimore, MD - Another Gorgeous August Day. Gorgeous August « CBS Baltimore

August 19, 2014 – Kentucky weather forecast Weather Lovely

August 22, 2014 – NYT Tries Hard to Jinx Our Beautiful Weather – NYMag

August 23, 2014 – Providence, RI - Dry and Gorgeous Weather Continue

August 24, 2014 – was a gorgeous day across the Hudson Valley.

August 24, 2014 - Washington, D.C. Weather Forecast: Lovely weather for the last week of August.

August 25, 2014 – Nice Weather - Forecast for Maritime Alps, Soaking Rain to Spread Across Europe.

August 26, 2014 - "Just to update with the last report back in June. This summer has remained spectacular here. Temperatures were in the 90’s for most of July. Typically it’s a hundred degrees or higher. More rain than usual for June, July and August. August? I can’t say enough about this month. It’s been raining like crazy. I’ve watered my lawn twice. Would have only been once, had I known that it was going to rain that same night. As I’ve said before, I work outside every day. And I can’t remember a summer like this, since? I really don’t remember a summer like this.

We didn’t get very good snow pack in our mountains last winter. So it’s going to be interesting how this winter is going to turn out. The mountains are visibly greener than normal . I didn’t say green. They’re usually very brown and dried out looking, for this time of year. Definitely an improvement.

EW’s Bryce Warner

August 26, 2014 - Rainstorm in the desert delays opening of ‘Burning Man’ festival.

The gates are open! Tens of thousands of stranded ‘burners’ flood into Burning Man site after festival is reopened following rare storm

Tens of thousands of so-called ‘burners’ were flooding through the gates of Burning Man this morning after the event was reopened following a rain storm that left Nevada’s Black Rock Desert looking more like a swamp on the festival’s opening day.

Vehicles were allowed into the event’s entrance on Highway 34 northeast of Gerlach from 6 a.m. Tuesday, organizers tweeted just after 1 a.m. Festival goers, or ‘burners,’ responded to the good news with excited tweets such as ‘time to get back on the road,’ and ‘all roads lead to #burningman.’ Yesterday, incredible pictures taken from the air showed the astonishing number of people stranded in the desert after rare heavy rains prevented them entering the site of the annual festival.

September 7, 2014 - Lukewarm wildfire season throws damper on climate-change predictions

2014 numbers below average

DENVER — This year’s below-average wildfire season comes as welcome news for Westerners, but it’s also burning a hole in the environmentalist narrative on climate change.

Although summer isn’t over, and fires are burning in California and Oregon, it has been a mild year in terms of the number of wildfires and acres burned , according to the National Interagency Fire Center.

The agency reports that 2.77 million acres have burned this year as of Sept. 5, a decline from the 3.9 million acres that had burned by the same date in 2013 and less than half the 10-year average of 6.2 million acres. The number of fires, 38,451, is also down considerably from the 10-year average of 56,278.

That reduction is even more impressive given that the Pacific Northwest was hit with an above-average wildfire season. In July Washington suffered the most destructive fire in its history, the Carlton Complex Fire, which burned 252,000 acres and destroyed 300 homes in the state’s north-central region.

So far the 2014 wildfire season is on pace to be the second-least destructive in the last decade , which could put a damper on the campaign to connect elevated carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere to an increase in extreme weather events, including wildfires.

That effort is being led by the White House. President Obama’s science adviser, John Holdren, says in a video released Aug. 5 on the White House website that climate change “has been making the fire season in the United States longer and, on average, more intense.”

“The National Climate Assessment released in May tells us, consistent with earlier studies, that longer, drier summers are expected to continue to increase the frequency and the intensity of large wildfires in the United States,” Mr. Holdren says in the video. “In the Western United States, the average annual area burned by large wildfires has increased severalfold in recent decades. The evidence is strong that climate change is responsible, at least in part, for this increase.”

Paul Knappenberger, assistant director of the Center for the Study of Science at the free market Cato Institute, argued that this year’s wildfire season comes as further evidence that Mr. Holdren and others have drastically overstated the impact of carbon dioxide emissions on weather conditions.

When these guys are making these predictions — ‘Wildfires are going to get worse’ — and then you have a wildfire season which is way below normal, it’s ripe for coming back to them and saying, ‘See? Why are you making these crazy predictions? It’s not going to happen like that all the time,’” said Mr. Knappenberger.

Jamie Henn, spokesman for 350.org, an advocacy group “building a global climate movement,” declined to comment on this year’s wildfire season but offered resources on the connection between wildfires and global warming, including a fact sheet from Climate Nexus.

“These wildfires are yet another indication that climate change has arrived, and the fire threat is only projected to get worse in the future. Unless we cut carbon pollution, extreme weather events like this will become more frequent in the future,” says the fact sheet.

Coleen Decker, NIFC assistant program manager for predictive services in Boise, attributed this year’s below-average wildfire activity to a combination of factors, starting with the virtual absence of wildfires in the Southeast as a result of cool temperatures and high moisture during the January-to-April fire season.

Wildfires were also down in the Southwest. “We never saw any extended period of warming or drying,” Ms. Decker said. “ They’d get a little warm, then they’d get a burst of rain.”

She also said there are too many variables involved in wildfire seasons to offer conclusions on how climate change may be contributing.

“The factors are weather, terrain and fuel, and it’s hard to filter out the noise and decide what’s been attributed to each factor, ” said Ms. Decker.

That Washington, Oregon and Northern California have been hard hit by wildfires this year suggests that other factors are playing a bigger role than hotter temperatures — because it’s actually getting cooler in the Pacific Northwest , said Myron Ebell, director of the Center for Energy and Environment at the Competitive Enterprise Institute.

Temperatures in the region peaked around 2007 and fell until 2013, when they ticked up slightly, according to figures from the National Climatic Data Center.

“The problem with wildfires is not climate change. For example, the number of big catastrophic fires has gone up in the Northwest, and yet the Northwest is in a cooling cycle,” said Mr. Ebell. “The problem with the Western forests is there’s just far too much fuel that’s been built up. Under pressure from the environmental movement, we have stopped logging in our national forests.”

The 1990 decision to list as threatened the Northern spotted owl has resulted in a huge reduction in the amount of timber being cut in the Pacific Northwest national forests. Timber production has dropped from 12 billion board feet to 2 billion since the early 1990s, according to the Forest Service.

“You can’t add 17 billion board feet of fiber every year and only cut 2 billion and not end up with these catastrophic fires,” said Mr. Ebell.

Analysts like Mr. Ebell and Mr. Knappenberger have been accused of being climate change “deniers,” but they say the only thing they’re denying are the environmental movement’s predictions of certain global warming catastrophe.

“What I’m denying is not the fact that fossil fuel emissions have some impact on the climate,” said Mr. Knappenberger. “What I’m denying is that the impact is detectable or going to be as bad as some people say it’s going to be. What I’m denying is the global warming alarmism.”

September 9, 2014 - All Great Lakes water level is at or above normal for first time in 14 years

Remember this alarmist whining from Joe Romm’s Climate Progress last year?

“How Climate Change Is Damaging The Great Lakes , With Implications For The Environment And The Economy

Great Lakes Michigan and Huron set a new record low water level for the month of December, and in the coming weeks they could experience their lowest water levels ever. It’s becoming certain that, like the rest of the country, the Great Lakes are feeling the effects of climate change.

Last year was officially the warmest year on record for the lower-48 states. The hot summer air has been causing the surface water of the Great Lakes to increase in temperature. One might think this causes more precipitation around the lakes, but the warmer winter air is causing a shorter duration of ice cover. In fact, the amount of ice covering the lakes has declined about 71 percent over the past 40 years. Last year, only 5 percent of the lakes froze over –- compared to 1979 when ice coverage was as much as 94 percent.”

What a difference a year makes.

Current data from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers shows that for the first time in 14 years, all five Great Lakes are at or above average water levels. Lake Michigan/Huron is up 18″ in the last year.

From a July 07, 2014 Chicago Tribune article:

“In January 2013, the average water levels in Lakes Michigan and Huron dipped to 576 feet, the lowest point since modern record-keeping began in 1918.

The all-time high of 582.3 feet was set in October 1986, representing a sizable range of about 6 feet.

The lakes tend to follow yearly cycles, swelling in the spring and summer and shrinking in the fall and winter, but they have never in 95 years of recordings remained below average for so long.

The last two years of relatively heavy winter and spring precipitation, however, have led to this year’s stronger-than-usual seasonal rise , according to Keith Kompoltowicz, chief of watershed hydrology for the Army Corps of Engineers Detroit District.

“We saw a tremendous amount of snow,” Kompoltowicz said of this winter. “We haven’t seen snow like that in a long time.”

In fact, the snowpack around the Michigan basin this year was 30 percent higher than at any time in the past decade. The past two months have also supplied above-average amounts of rain, quenching parched harbors and popular fishing holes like the Lincoln Park Lagoon.

So much for climate change effects , water is back to normal levels for now.

September 12, 2014 - Rapid City sees earliest snowfall since 1888

An early September winter storm in the Black Hills has dumped up to 8 inches of snow in the area , while Rapid City received its earliest snowfall in more than 120 years.

Jon Chamberlain, meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Rapid City, said almost 1 inch of snow had fallen in downtown Rapid City by 8:30 a.m. while 2 inches was measured in higher elevations in town.

The snowfall in downtown Rapid City is the earliest in the city since 1888 , the NWS said. The previous early snowfall mark was seven-tenths of an inch on Sept. 13, 1970.

Chamberlain said while it is unusual for Rapid City to see snowfall this early , it isn’t for the Black Hills.

"It’s a little on the high side, though," he said.

Jeff · October 8, 2018, 9:50am