By Leo Hickman 3 July 2012 Whenever an episode of extreme weather – heatwave, flood, drought, etc – hits the headlines, someone somewhere is sure to point the finger of blame at human-induced climate change. Such claims are normally slapped down with the much-aired mantra: “You cannot blame a single episode of bad weather on […]
By Carey Gillam, with additional reporting by Michael Hirtzer and Karl Plume in Chicago; Editing by K.T. Arasu, John Picinich, and Sofina Mirza-Reid13 July 2012 CENTERVILLE, Iowa (Reuters) – Ranchers are rushing to sell off some of their cattle as the worst drought in nearly 25 years dries up pastures, thins hay supplies, and sends […]
By Deborah Zabarenko; Editing by Dale Hudson and Cynthia Osterman19 July 2012 WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Hotter-than-normal temperatures are expected through October over most of the contiguous 48 U.S. states, with below-average precipitation for Midwest areas already hit by the worst drought in a half century, government forecasters said on Thursday. Experts at the National Oceanic […]
15 July 2012 (CBC News) – Most of Central and Eastern Canada is experiencing extreme heat and little rain causing drought conditions, a senior climatologist with Environment Canada says. “I’d call it a drought, no question about it,” David Phillips told the CBC News Network in an interview Sunday afternoon. “Besides the lack of precipitation, […]
By Elizabeth Kolbert 16 July 2012 (23 July 2012 issue of The New Yorker) […] It is now corn-sex season across the Midwest, and everything is not going well. High commodity prices spurred farmers to sow more acres this year, and unseasonable warmth in March prompted many to plant corn early. Just a few months […]
This time series shows the five warmest years that the contiguous U.S. has experienced, and how the year-to-date temperature evolved each month throughout those years. The time series also shows the 2012 year-to-date temperature through June, which was the warmest first half of any year on record for the lower 48. The year-to-date period of […]
13 July 2012 (CNN) – A severe drought is spreading across the Midwest this summer, resulting in some of the worst conditions in decades and leaving more than a thousand counties designated as natural disaster areas, authorities said. Farmers in the region are suffering, with pastures for livestock and fields of crops becoming increasingly parched […]
11 July 2012 (The Daily Impact) – As recently as six weeks ago, the Pollyannas of industrial agriculture were all over the industrial media trumpeting the imminent “huge” corn harvest in the United States. They knew it was going to be huge (see, for example, Bloomberg News on May 24) because more US acres were […]
By Tom Whipple 11 July 2012 One has to go back to the 1930’s to find a time when so much of civilization was in turmoil at once. The 30’s ended with World War II, tens of millions dead, and much of the industrialized world in ruins. It is not hard to argue that the […]
By Deborah Zabarenko; Editing by Bill Trott10 July 2012 WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Climate change increased the odds for the kind of extreme weather that prevailed in 2011, a year that saw severe drought in Texas, unusual heat in England and was one of the 15 warmest years on record, scientists reported on Tuesday. Overall, 2011 […]
