Emissions from forests influence very first stage of cloud formation

Hopefully everyone here has taken their Ascension Island Syndrome vaccination shots ?

"Clouds are the largest source of uncertainty in present climate models. Much of the uncertainty surrounding clouds' effect on climate stems from the complexity of cloud formation. New research sheds light on new particle formation -- the very first step of cloud formation. The findings closely match observations in the atmosphere and can help make climate prediction models more accurate."

(source) 

Credit: © Dmitry Parvanyan / Fotolia

And the winner is ? Yes, forests and of course other old growth plant community groups. To bad many of these ecosystems have been declining as of late and are most notably never mentioned nor referenced as having major impact on climate change as a result of their absence. Historically, their absence has brought on drought and higher temperature ranges on average around many parts of the globe even when the scenario was localized. As I've written in this blog [which is mostly about how nature networks & cooperates] previously, more goes on in ecosystem function than mere fungi interconnecting differing types of vegetation, sharing water and exchanging various chemicals for the well being and survival of everyone and everything in that community. Our general global climate systems as well as localized weather phenomena are tied to these varying plant mechanisms. But as the article states, these systems are just the beginning of cloud formation. Finally more and more of NASA's Satellite intelligence imagery is picking up on the reality of what many have been pointing out for years, Earth's vegetation clearly is the first line of cloud formation and weather creation. This understanding of course was lost recently at the end of last year 2013 when freelance author Fred Pearce wrote about the amazing turn around of a once desert island into a tropical cloud forest. Evidently there is little if any interest by many in the scientific world for studying this amazing turn around, and understanding the natural mechanisms involved for which practical application just might halt & perhaps reverse Earth's global climatic disruption. Now why is that ? Because the official global Scientific Orthodoxy's view is that the cloud forest's mere existence is artificial and unnatural. In other words it didn't evolve naturally as it should have. Excuse me ?  Almost immediately every single religiously driven ideologue came out of the woodwork condemning Fred Pearce for his article calling for study of and practical application being done elsewhere. Do a serious Google on some of the folks in the comments section at the bottom of that article who were involved in demonizing Fred Pearce. You'll find many of them spend more time in political and ideological squabbling in attempts to highjack world power than they do with anything regarding science. Science apparently is nothing more than a dastardly cloak for something more insidious. Does anyone see why the present ongoing Climate Change disaster [which I know for a fact is happening] isn't being taken more seriously than it should be by the average person ? Now let's take a close look at what this latest NASA photo reveals below regarding vegetation and cloud formation.
 

(NASA image courtesy Jeff Schmaltz, MODIS Rapid Response at NASA GSFC )

 "These clouds are almost certainly a result of evapotranspiration. The clouds are distributed evenly across the forest, but no clouds formed over the Amazon River and its floodplain, where there is no tall canopy of trees. While water may evaporate from the Amazon River itself, the air near the ground is too warm for clouds to form. Trees, on the other hand, release water vapor at higher levels of the atmosphere, so the water vapor more quickly reaches an altitude where the air is cool enough for clouds to form. When water vapor condenses, it releases heat into the atmosphere."

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Photograph courtesy NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio

The border between Haiti (left) and the Dominican Republic highlights the relative deforestation of Haiti. Take note of the slight formation of clouds over the vegetative regions left intact. Subtle, but still there.

 Satellite Photos Reveal Desertification & Cloud Formation Anomalies

Previously, I've written a post back on February 6th 2013, using the above photograph of just such a cloud formation phenomena as observed from NASA Satellite photograph which was actually intended to illustrate the contrast between the still forested land of the Dominican Republic and the deforested land of Haiti. I'm actually surprised that it actually generated almost 600 reads or views. But all of the journals highlighting that photograph all missed something very important. Although it's not as spectacular as the above photo of the Paria River area of the Amazon near the top of this post, the evidence is nevertheless still present although subtle. Back in the late 1970s and 1980s, I never needed such NASA Satellite proof to tell or prove to me what I already knew and could observe from the ground up in Anza California. Back then it wasn't hard to do. Many old growth Chaparral/Oak Woodlands still existed back then and the cloud formation during the monsoon season was easier to observe over certain specific geographical locations which contained the deepest old growth Chaparral. This phenomena persisted year after year, only being disrupted when fire came through obliterating the locality. Such formation also was not necessarily limited to geological Orographic mountain top areas where uplift would & should be expected. Many of these heavily vegetated regions up in Anza were nothing more than rolling foothills far away from any higher mountain peaks where it would normally be assumed such formations would usually occur. The idea of course is that the warmer moister air moving upwards would condense into clouds as it met the cooler air at the higher elevations. While this can be a factor, it was still not necessary as such conditions of cloud formation can and do happen even over desert areas. It was also a fact that often times very little wind was associated during this formation, other than a slight gentle breeze. As the article above pointed out, this phenomena is mainly being associated with the aerosols being given off by the vegetation which provide the necessary particle nuclei for the water droplet creation. The chaparral plant community has very intense noticeable VOCs they give off during monsoonal events.

The sad thing here is that only forest areas with trees will ever be discussed, dismissing any reference to the importance of Chaparral and other plant communities like even those of desert ecosystems. As I've previously written about, Desert plants of the southwestern USA have also been observed to give off aerosols which react with the air to create a mere haze which acts as a sort of natural sunscreen when temps reach a high point and trigger a mechanical response withing the plant life's genetic mechanisms. Again, none of this will ever see the light of day in any of the Global Warming or Climate Change debates where nothing more than spitting or poop throwing contests by the usual ideologues are more preferred than actually reaching people's hearts to see the dire need of great & radical change in human behavior. Below is a paragraph from the Ascension Island's own conservation website which describes it's own forested mountains this way in surprising and negative terms. 

"Prior to human settlement, the native ecosystems present on Ascension were almost certainly at a relatively early stage of development, making them particularly susceptible to invasion by introduced plants. With the first human inhabitants also came the destruction of large areas of native habitats and large scale re-planting e.g. with trees/ shrubs that provided a source of wood. Perhaps the most significant event in the process of transformation was brought about by the eminent botanist Joseph Dalton Hooker. He implemented the mass planting of organised forests, shrublands and pastures on Ascension, introducing over 220 exotic plant species from diverse parts of the world, with the aim of greatly increasing mist interception, soil development, water storage capacity and of reducing erosion. Today, Green Mountain is largely covered with dense invasive vegetation and man-made cloud forest." 

"Even the lowland areas of Ascension have now been substantially invaded by non-native shrublands – guava (Psidium guajava) became widespread in the south-east of the island during the early 1800s, Mexican thorn (Prosopis juliflora) has spread rapidly since the 1970s and yellowboy (Tecoma stans) even more recently than this. Introduced species now comprise approximately 90% of the higher plant flora." 

http://www.ascension-island.gov.ac/government/conservation/our-species/endemic-plants/

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 - March 2013

The Administrator officially opening the new Elliotts Pass educational nature walk

The website then offers this critique under a picture of the tree vegetation and concludes with: "Artificial cloud forest on Green Mountain: a direct legacy of Hooker’s experiment"

image: Daily Mail

The Ascension Island website insists on utilizing the term "Artificial Cloud Forest". This is inaccurate because what exists is a true cloud forest which incorporate actual living biological components which manufacture and create the island's present day climate and rainfall. The idea of a cloud forest is to include the understanding of such a system's ability at tapping into moisture streams off oceans,  the creation of cloud formation, hence thereafter rainfall. So it's a true cloud forest in the natural sense. The image above of Meteo System's [Weather Modification Company from Switzerland] animated example of artificially creating rain over Dubai and other parts of the Arabian Penninsula is my idea of an artificial system. Natural systems are becoming far less and will most likely be out numbered in many areas around the globe as time goes on, by all these science-based artificial weather modification systems. So my preference for weather modification is a more natural one which was proposed by Botanist Joseph Dalton Hooker and illustrated by the reality that exists now on Ascension Island. Yet many of these Conservation Fundamentalists and the British government apparently would like to remove it under the guise of saving endemic plants. Seriously, the Fundies come in all flavours.

Here's another Fundie doctrine. It's the continued ongoing worship, romanticizing and praise of Native Americans using Fire to destroy supposedly dense forest vegetation and create more grasslands and meadows for big game animals like Deer to graze and feed upon. So let me get this right, Native burning and destroying forest vegetation equates to something natural, but Botanist Joseph Hooker and others planting trees on barren volcanic mountain constitutes an Artificial Cloud Forest ? Had the original Ascension Island pioneers brought over Native Americans as slave labor and made them plant the various types of exotic vegetation, would it then be considered a natural cloud forest as opposed to an artificial one because the native North American Tribes caused it to be so ? Are Native Americans to be considered nothing more than animals who were merely part of the ancient ecosystems ? What is it exactly that makes Europeans human by comparison ? I don't mean for these to be dumb questions, but many of the absurd positions taken by experts and the asinine assumptions and assertions found in many of the scientific publications lead one to believe that's what and how they think. Here is what I wrote much earlier on land mismanagement and differing opinions by different land stewards on the subject:

Forest Ecology & Management: Will Researchers ever get on the same page ?

NASA photo near Dolan Springs Arizona, Lake Mead & Grand Canyon

Above is my newest favourite picture on this subject of cloud formation over specific vegetated areas. The contrast is clear. This area is north of Dolan Springs Arizona, with Lake Mead to the left, Grand Canyon through the middle and a patchy vegetative landscape with small cloud cover overhead, indicating perhaps the beginning of the summer monsoon season kicking off. I love the natural cloud forming mechanism which can easily be observed and studied, but it's the destruction of important forested areas which can radically change the local and regional landscapes and perhaps climate in some cases forever. Many regions of the planet, this could be irreversible. Not one viable major vegetation rehabilitation program do you ever hear about as a viable climate change solution. It's all about Big Temps and CO2s. Evil Corporations and the supposed politicking behind them. Let's be honest here, no one political ideology is responsible for the destruction or going to bed with corporate interests. They all do it. Any political entity that champions eco-green over National economy loses big time. They all have to play the economy game. But once again, nobody in the public ever gets a thorough enough education on what creates and actually drives climate out there in Nature. As long as they use the same failed script they've been ordered to use in discussing climate change, don't expect the public to ever listen.

Photo by Brock Whittaker (Virga Clouds over Arizona Desert)

Proverbs 25:14    

14 "One who doesn’t give the gift he promised is like a cloud blowing over a desert without dropping any rain."

Ever experience a day in the middle of the summer hot sticky humid monsoonal season, where the clouds build up in the morning, seemingly providing a promise of relief later on in the afternoon, only to disappoint ? Those clouds are known as Virga Clouds. Virga is an observable rainy streak or shaft of precipitation that falls from a Thunder Cloud but evaporates before reaching the ground. These are dry Thunderstorms. They only offer a little shade from the intense hot summer sun. Something called dew point near the ground where there is very low humidity and high temperatures that can cause the rain to evaporate completely  in midair before your very eyes, shortly after its released from the thunder cloud. Desert areas often have clouds showing Virga Clouds, but they are also occurring in the mountains more frequently. In fact, the precipitation often starts out in the form of ice crystals and never reaches the ground. Hence the proverbs comparison of someone who promises but has no intention of delivering on the promise is like a Virga Cloud. Our planet's present leadership is almost the mirror image of the Virga Cloud phenomena. Folks need to reconsider what and who they are putting their complete trust without question in these days. Expect the forced change to not be pleasant. 

Those Conservation critics & indeed many of the Climate Change champions who down played the successes at Ascension Island are setting themselves up for a big fall. I'd like to think that these biologists and other ecologists will learn a lesson not to hasten to disparage an ecosystem success story and those who make noble attempts at rebuilding Earth's Forested climate mechanisms, calling their work artificial and unnatural, let alone mocking someone like Fred Pearce the way Kieran Suckling did so crudely in the comments section at the bottom of the ascension Island  article. Unfortunately, so-called higher scientific criticism like this often does years of damage on impressionable younger minds who are looking on and just starting to learn how our natural world really works before these criticisms are eventually debunked as the science envy & jealousy they truly are. One has to ask at this point, though, how many other great biomimetic inspired “eco-solutions” of climate change ideas are waiting for their turn at the intellectual guillotine of “superior knowledge”?  Don’t be so gullible as to believe that the present Climate Change leadership gang who claim all there is that is knowledge position is conclusive. This is been brought to you in the tradition of radio icon Paul Harvey’s famous pivotal phrase, “And now, the rest of the story.”

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Further Reading Interest

http://www.ascension-island.gov.ac/government/conservation/our-species/endemic-plants/

Earth's Internet: "Climate Change & Ascension Island

Forest Ecology & Management: Will Researchers ever get on the same page ?

Wow, So Trees Cause Cloud Formation and Create Climate ?

Old Growth Tree Roots are far far more than Nature's Climate Thermostat

Tropical Storms Linger Longer Over Wet Land & Fizzle Over Dry, But in Truth it's a Universal Phenomena Globally Speaking

Dances With Myths: Indigenous Native Peoples and Fire Ecology

How much Reverse Engineering of Earth happens before Humans Admit there's a Problem ?