Warming climate causing drastic forest decline

In various regions of the world, huge tracts of trees are perishing. Scientists have observed that a common factor of their often sudden demise has been increased heat and drought.

Across western North America, for instance, forest die-off has been especially disastrous, with 70,000 square miles being lost in the Canadian and US Rocky Mountains to beetle infestation as warming temperatures cause the insects to move to higher and higher altitudes.

In Australia, a recent report stated that nearly a third of the trees had died in a 20,000 square-mile savanna area, while a study in Russia of 9,400 square miles of tree-covered land also observed significant losses, with hot, dry conditions in forested regions like Siberia bringing extreme wildfires in eight of the last 10 years.

In Africa, climate change is being identified as the cause of demise for local trees such as the quiver tree, camel-thorn, and the giant 30-foot-tall succulent known as euphorbia.

Although when alive, these wondrous lungs of our Earth are continuously absorbing carbon dioxide, US Geological Survey ecologist Dr. Craig Allen, who has studied forests around the world, warns that as the trees perish, they actually become a source of greenhouse gases. We thank Dr. Allen and all international researchers for this reminder that our own well-being is truly linked to the health of the world’s forests.

May we all attend now to their silent calls of distress through our own swift adoption of more life-sustaining ways. Supreme Master Ching Hai has long highlighted the need to care for the ecosphere, including the world’s trees, and shield them from the tolls of global warming, as during a videoconference in Formosa (Taiwan) in July 2008.

Everyone knows by now that protecting the environment, protecting the animals, are actually protecting ourselves. So we must protect the environment.

We should have more rules, more guidelines, to protect natural habitats. Because sometimes we overlook the long run effect. Then the consequence is very, very detrimental to ourselves and to the planet, just like what we are facing right now.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: People must be more aware of our dire situation and that everyone’s responsible action does help to minimize or stop global warming. We should act fast.

Be veg. Go green.

http://e360.yale.edu/content/feature.msp?id=2252
http://blog.climateandenergy.org/2010/03/16/forest-die-offs-in-the-rocky-mtns-and...
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/mar/16/forests-insects
http://e360.yale.edu/content/feature.msp?id=2252
http://wildfiremag.com/tactics/russian_fire_season/

US scientist assesses regional impact of climate change

Professor Steve Running of the University of Montana, former member of the Nobel laureate UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), recently published results of a study assessing the impact of global warming to the Rocky Mountains in the western USA. His findings include a forecast that climate change in the region was likely to significantly affect wildlife as well as ecosystems and the economy.

The report specifically warned of temperature increases having dramatic impact on forests in the coming decades, with a corresponding worsening of droughts that would incur epidemics of insect infestations and catastrophic wildfires throughout the states of Montana, Wyoming and Idaho.

Professor Running, we appreciate this informative report, despite its disturbing implications for the iconic Rocky Mountain range. Let us join in concerted care and act now to bring a sustainable future for our planet.

In speaking of her concern about the consequences of global warming, Supreme Master Ching Hai has also offered a solution to alleviate its effects, as during an August 2008 videoconference with our Association members

Supreme Master Ching Hai: Even if we plant more trees, there will be something else happening, maybe wildfire, or the beetle will be more in abundance, and then they will also begin to eat away all the forest.

So this is a really terrible situation. The only thing is we have to be morally fit. And have to be virtuous. Otherwise, there’s no getting away from the bad karma, meaning the retribution, for whatever we do.

http://www.newwest.net/topic/article/long_drought_ahead_from_global_warming_study_says/C41/L41/
http://www.missoulian.com/news/local/article_544db786-fb4e-11de-805b-001cc4c002e0.html
http://www.ilpi.com/msds/ref/tempunits.html

Australian wildlife pushed to extinction by bushfires

Climate change seen in Australia’s more extreme weather. The recent wildfires in the southern state of Victoria, the worst in the nation’s history, claimed at least 210 human lives and caused over a million animals to perish, with destruction to native habitats and some species being lost completely. The global temperature rise in southeastern Australia has resulted in extreme heat waves and more intense wildfires, while the northern part of the continent is getting more powerful rainfall. Around 60 percent of northeastern Queensland State is covered by floodwaters after weeks of drenching rain. Australian Green Party leader Bob Brown stated, "The fires are a sobering reminder of the need for this nation and the whole world to act and put at a priority the need to tackle climate change.”

We pray that through our compassion for all beings and the environment, the effects of climate change will be minimized.

As in numerous other occasions, Supreme Master Ching Hai spoke of the urgent period we are in during an international seminar on August 23, 2008, as well as the only hope we have to save the planet.

Supreme Master Ching Hai: It’s just getting worse and worse now, and I really I don’t know how to do. If I could just go out and beg everybody on the street, “Just please stop eating meat and stop raising livestock and stop abusing the resource of the Earth, stop wasting water!” I would do that. Okay, but the critical mass may be coming soon, and it might work by itself! And we can celebrate one day that we saved the planet. If people repent in their heart and react quick enough, turn to a vegetarian diet, with the grace from Heaven, with the interference from the positive power, we might be able to save 80% of the population of the planet.