#sp2.2022

Tumblr keeps glitching on me saying it hasn't uploaded somthing but I can't figure out what is missing so I have placed it all in my sketchbook as a backup.

10 Animals in danger due to climate change

Our planet is getting warmer, the threat to climate change is real, and our dependence on fossil fuels is the biggest contributor. Unless we make some radical changes, global temperatures will continue to rise and it will have severe consequences for humans and animals.  

Amphibians such as frogs are vulnerable to desiccation and require moist conditions to reproduce. They are thus at risk from climate change. Decreasing water bodies in Yellowstone National Park, for example, is driving declines in the Columbia Spotted Frog population. Climate change is also causing the rapid spread of the deadly chytrid fungus Batrachochytrium Dendrobatidis, which is endangering amphibians worldwide.

Staghorn Coral (Acropora Cevicornis) has experienced a population decline of over 80% since the 1970’s, mostly due to climate change. It is listed as Critically Endangered on The IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. Staghorn coral is particularly vulnerable to bleaching, whereby increasing water temperatures cause coral to expel the symbiotic algae that provide its nutrition. Coral reefs are some of the most biodiverse ecosystems on Earth – as ocean temperatures continue to rise, we also risk losing the countless species that depend on reefs for their survival, such as clownfish and hawksbill turtles.

Close relatives of rabbits and hares, Pikas are adapted to cold alpine conditions and are very intolerant of high temperatures. The American Pika (Ochotona Princeps) has been retreating upslope to escape rising temperatures and it is feared the species will eventually have nowhere left to go. In some locations, American Pika populations have already entirely disappeared. Other Pika species native to Eastern Europe and Asia are facing the same dire fate.

The Adélie Penguin (Pygoscelis Adeliae), a well-established resident of Antarctica, is facing tough times due to climate change. The birds are declining on the West Antarctic Peninsula, which is one of the most rapidly warming areas on Earth. The Adélie Penguin’s coastal nesting grounds are becoming increasingly unsuitable for chick survival, and sustained periods of warmer than usual ocean temperatures is negatively affecting the ability of prey such as fish and krill to survive.

The Leatherback Sea Turtle (Dermochelys Coriacea), weighing in at half a tonne, is a giant among reptiles. Like all marine turtles, Leatherbacks are threatened by bycatch, poaching and pollution. Climate change is an additional, rapidly emerging threat to marine turtles globally. Rising sea levels and extreme weather events wash nests away and decrease nesting habitat. In sea turtles, sand temperature determines the gender of developing young – warmer eggs turn into females, cooler eggs turn into males. Under global warming, turtle sex ratios are likely to become skewed, resulting in population decrease.

The Koala (Phascolarctos Cinereus), Australia’s most iconic fluffy marsupial, is likely to become rarer over the next century due to global warming. Koalas have an extremely specialised diet consisting only of eucalyptus leaves. Increasing carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere are decreasing the nutritional value of leaves, resulting in Koala malnutrition and starvation. Longer and more frequent droughts will increase the occurrence of bushfires, which kill millions of forest-dwelling animals like Koalas. Koalas will also increasingly be forced to descend from trees in search of water and new habitats during dry conditions, exposing them to predators and road traffic.

A popular food fish, Atlantic Cod (Gadus Morhua) has been the victim of decades of disastrous overfishing. While the implementation of fishing quotas helped stocks to recover, recent rapid ocean warming has severely impacted cod spawning and survival, causing populations to plummet again. It is thought that warmer waters decrease the availability of zooplankton critical to juvenile fish survival and development. Moreover, to escape the high temperatures, young fish are likely to venture into deep water where they at greater risk of predation.

Beautiful Monarch Butterflies (Danaus Plexippus) are famous for their impressive migrations across North America to reach southern overwintering grounds. Like all butterflies, the Monarch is very sensitive to weather and climate. Increased frequency of extreme weather events is threatening the future of this charismatic species. Furthermore, Monarch caterpillars eat only milkweed – as the climate continues to warm, the butterfly’s range is becoming drier, resulting in loss of vital food plants.

Ringed Seals (Pusa Hispida), polar bears’ favourite prey, are highly dependent on Arctic sea ice and almost never come onto land. Warming spring temperatures and early sea ice breakup are causing nursing pups to be prematurely separated from their mothers. Additionally, warmer ocean temperatures are likely to boost seal parasite populations and the forced migration of seals to more stable ice habitats will facilitate the spread of disease.

The majestic Polar Bear (Ursus Maritimus), a flagship for climate change awareness, is facing an uncertain future due to dwindling sea ice in its Arctic habitat. Longer, warmer summers are causing much of the Arctic Ocean to be ice-free for extended periods of time, decreasing the bears’ access to their primary prey – seals. Consequently, the bears are forced to spend more time foraging on land, where they are at risk of coming into conflict with humans.

For my theme I will be focusing on climate change and how it effects the natural environment which includes the animals and plant life. I will find my research by reading articles online and in books and by observing the land around me.  

I have chosen climate change because I've always been interested in nature, the thing I like most is taken a long walk into a forest where I can just hear the birds singing or see a deer wondering by. The thing that made me choose climate change was the most recent weather we had over winter, I thought that the amount of storms we have experienced.

What storms have struck the UK this year?

As of January 2022, the UK has experienced a concerning total of five storms already.

Storm Malik was named on January 28, 2022, with the Met Office confirming its date of impact to be January 29, 2022.

Storm Corrie was named on January 29, 2022, with its date of impact listed to be January 30 to 31, 2022.

Storm Dudley, named on February 14, 2022, soon followed with an impact date of February 16 to 17, 2022.

Storm Eunice, the most severe yet, claimed at least four lives as winds of up to 122mph swept across Britain, was named on February 14, 2022, and impacted the UK on February 18, 2022.

With all the storms we've the previous year's none have been this bad, I remember being kept awake from the wind and rain pounding on my windows just waiting for them to break and then the sudden loud thud of one of my trees falling down that shocked me fully awake and then a few days later another storm hit just as bad where I had to tie a tree down with a rock to prevent it falling onto the house.

Last year there was a snow storm that pounded snow and ice onto the windows that made it sound like it was going to break through any moment, when I was a young girl I never remember the weather getting as bad as it is now, even when I lived near the ocean. I look back now at news articles on my old home from when I was a child and the difference with the weather from then to now is a dramatic change, the sea levels have risen and people had to evacuate the sea front because the waves came crashing into houses which has never happened before.  

Climate change 2010 article

Glaciers serve as early indicators of climate change. Over the last 35 years, a research team has recovered ice-core records of climatic and environmental variations from the polar regions and from low-latitude high-elevation ice fields from 16 countries. The ongoing widespread melting of high-elevation glaciers and ice caps, particularly in low to middle latitudes, provides some of the strongest evidence to date that a large-scale, pervasive, and, in some cases, rapid change in Earth's climate system is underway. This paper highlights observations of 20th and 21st century glacier shrinkage in the Andes, the Himalayas, and on Mount Kilimanjaro. Ice cores retrieved from shrinking glaciers around the world confirm their continuous existence for periods ranging from hundreds of years to multiple millennia, suggesting that climatological conditions that dominate those regions today are different from those under which these ice fields originally accumulated and have been sustained. The current warming is therefore unusual when viewed from the millennial perspective provided by multiple lines of proxy evidence and the 160-year record of direct temperature measurements. Despite all this evidence, plus the well-documented continual increase in atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations, societies have taken little action to address this global-scale problem. Hence, the rate of global carbon dioxide emissions continues to accelerate. As a result of our inaction, we have three options: mitigation, adaptation, and suffering

Climate change 2022 article  

As the climate evolves over the next century, the interaction of accelerating sea level rise (SLR) and storms, combines with confining development and infrastructure, will place greater stresses on physical, ecological, and human systems along with ocean-land margin. Many of these values coastal systems could reach "tipping points," at which hazard exposure substantially increases and threatens the present –day form, function, and viability of communities, infrastructure, and ecosystems. Determining the timing and nature of these tipping points is essential for effective climate adaptation planning.  

These are some photographs of the animals and plants I've focused on for my project. Some I took my self and some I found on google. I have noted down where I got each one in the book.

The bee work was created to go along side the bee page, so far I've made a crochet bee hive and bee and then I have this half completed piece which went wrong half way through so this is as far as I got with it. The threat got stuck because I used too many threads at once.

I forgot I didn't make a turtle page so instead I wrote the information for it on the step by step of my Amigurumi turtle I chose to draw a turtle to go along side that so people could get a better visual of what a turtle looks like.

This is for the pipistrelle bat page and so is the bat sewing piece.

I created these based on the swollowtail page, the Caterpillar is a swollowtail young and the butterflies were based of off monarch butterfly.

I choose to stick them in a frame because I had to use the hoops for another project. The butterflies took me 2 weeks to make and the caterpillar took about an hour.