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  1. #26
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    I thought we are supposed to refer to it as "climate change" now...?

  2. #27
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    Talking

    Quote Originally Posted by colsurfer View Post
    I thought we are supposed to refer to it as "climate change" now...?
    As long as it means I don't have to ski below zero and that the colorado snowpack will get wetter!
    Live each season as it passes; breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit, and resign yourself to the influences of each.
    Henry David Thoreau

  3. #28
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    Quote Originally Posted by DAFTC View Post
    when al gore comes up in a thread about deadfall, isn't it time for the move to asshattery??

    In terms of skiing, there's nothing controversial about "there's a new variable to consider", other than it not really being all that new. Don't confuse the relatively straightforward question of "what does beetle kill mean for how skiers navigate the backcountry?" (answered nicely by SheRa as: situational awareness and good decisions) with the much harder question of "what does beetle kill mean for how forests are changing and how do those changes relate to big-picture social decisions?"
    To which, "planting trees" is probably a necessary but nowhere close to sufficient answer.

    The large tree species and associated parasites that make up Western forests are operating under novel conditions. The complexity of interacting forces ("natural" topographic and genetic variation, population cycles, shifting management priorities and tactics, altered atmospheric conditions, etc.) means that "making predictions" is really more about "considering scenarios".

    Which is a familiar proposition to anyone who spends much time in a forest or above treeline, especially in the winter. We can go to a resort on days when we're not looking for the fun of making observations, putting those new observations into conversation with past knowledge and then making decisions with some amount of inherent risk.
    D@mn, you are smart!

    My thoughts with planting trees are more to help the human than the forest. It really is a fine thing for a young person like nick to do and will make him a wiser man more in touch with the world around him.

    When I look in the forest I see the next generation already there, laying in wait for the needles to fall and the sun to shine through.
    Live each season as it passes; breathe the air, drink the drink, taste the fruit, and resign yourself to the influences of each.
    Henry David Thoreau

  4. #29
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    first off, al gore didnt figure out shit having to do with GW he just publicized it.

    stop giving him smart scientists credit.

    and don't call it climate change. call it...


    ... OIL. leads to us overusing a resource and creating to much CO2 so it became an atmosphere around the earth that traps in heat and its not getting absorbed back into the earth fast enough and wont let it out so the pine beetle feast on lodgepole tonight and your gonna ski some deadfall and jackstraw and get avied...

    point is. Oil causes Avalanches. Its indirect OPEC terrorism or something i think.
    "I think people resist freedom because they're afraid of the unknown. But it's ironic....That unknown was once very well known. It's where our souls belong....The only solution is to confront them--confront yourself--with the greatest fear imaginable. Expose yourself to your deepest fear. After that, fear has no power, and fear of freedom shrinks and vanishes. You are free." -Jim Morrison

  5. #30
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    Quote Originally Posted by mitch_cumstein View Post
    Has anyone commenting in this thread actually studied forestry or NR? I'd like to hear an informed opinion.
    Bring on the dead fall.Bring on the Pine Beetle. We could use some better gladed areas, and with less needles on the trees holding snow in the canopy there is more snow on the ground. with any luck the dead tress will burn and them bamb .. instant alpine. I hate all this work to get above tree line.

  6. #31
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    Quote Originally Posted by Humble View Post
    first off, al gore didnt figure out shit having to do with GW he just publicized it.

    stop giving him smart scientists credit.

    and don't call it climate change. call it...


    ... OIL. leads to us overusing a resource and creating to much CO2 so it became an atmosphere around the earth that traps in heat and its not getting absorbed back into the earth fast enough and wont let it out so the pine beetle feast on lodgepole tonight and your gonna ski some deadfall and jackstraw and get avied...

    point is. Oil causes Avalanches. Its indirect OPEC terrorism or something i think.
    You have to look at it long term, if oil is causing avalanches now, in 50 years when it's 80 degrees at 11000 feet during winter, there will be no snow to slide. Oil is trying to stop avalanches!

    We should also stop volcanos, they pollute way more then humans.

  7. #32
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    Wouldn't beetle kill make for better skiing once the downed wood gets covered in snow? I mean, lodgepole is so dense it generally sucks to ski in when its alive. If its not windy, the danger of getting clobbered would have to be about zero.

    I've listened to some experts and read some papers on the topic, and I think most of the comments are fairly accurate. My understanding is that the current outbreak is unprecedented in known history/tree-core data, but the record doesn't go back very far. One crazy thing that just happened is that the beetles have crossed the rocky mtns and gotten into the boreal forest in canada. This hasn't ever been observed before and it looks like they might kill a lot of the spruce up there, but they also get colder temps up there so maybe not.

    I've heard that the spruce budworm generally doesn't kill trees, it just eats the buds/new growth so it slows them down.

    The fire danger comment in the article is not accurate. Fire danger goes up while the dead needles are still on the trees, but then drops to below that of a live stand after the needles fall.

  8. #33
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    Quote Originally Posted by karpiel View Post
    We should also stop volcanos, they pollute way more then humans.
    Don't listen to the whiny liberals: volcano pollution is good - the particulates they put into the upper atmosphere cause global cooling.

  9. #34
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    Physics Does Not Care

    Of course the connection between beetle kill and climate change is tenuous. There are plenty of other variables including fire prevention, insect vector habitat, human development patterns, logging history, etc.

    But dumbasses conflating Al Gore with the science of atmospheric physics is classic "Blame the Messenger".

    Maybe all the denialists should start blaming Svante Arrhenius, since he figured out the physics of carbon dioxide levels and temperature back in 1906. But blaming dead messengers is not as much fun. The science is clear and physics proceeds following natural law, no matter what humans think about the AlGore boogieman.

    From wikipedia ([ame]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svante_Arrhenius[/ame])
    "Arrhenius developed a theory to explain the ice ages, and first speculated that changes in the levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere could substantially alter the surface temperature through the greenhouse effect.[3] He was influenced by the work of others, including Joseph Fourier. Arrhenius used the infrared observations of the moon by Frank Washington Very and Samuel Pierpont Langley at the Allegheny Observatory in Pittsburgh to calculate the absorption of CO2 and water vapour. Using 'Stefan's law' (better known as the Stefan Boltzmann law), he formulated his greenhouse law. In its original form, Arrhenius' greenhouse law reads as follows:

    if the quantity of carbonic acid increases in geometric progression, the augmentation of the temperature will increase nearly in arithmetic progression.

    This simplified expression is still used today:

    ΔF = α ln(C/C0)

    Arrhenius' high absorption values for CO2, however, met criticism by Knut Ångström in 1900, who published the first modern infrared spectrum of CO2 with two absorption bands. ... . He later wrote Världarnas utveckling (1906), German translation: Das Werden der Welten (1907), English translation: Worlds in the Making (1908) directed at a general audience, where he suggested that the human emission of CO2 would be strong enough to prevent the world from entering a new ice age, and that a warmer earth would be needed to feed the rapidly increasing population. He was the first person to predict that emissions of carbon dioxide from the burning of fossil fuels and other combustion processes would cause global warming. Arrhenius clearly believed that a warmer world would be a positive change. From that, the hot-house theory gained more attention. Nevertheless, until about 1960, most scientists dismissed the hot-house / greenhouse effect as implausible for the cause of ice ages as Milutin Milankovitch had presented a mechanism using orbital changes of the earth (Milankovitch cycles), which has proven to be a powerful predictor of most of the past climate changes for millions of years. Nowadays, the accepted explanation is that orbital forcing sets the timing for ice ages with CO2 acting as an essential amplifying feedback.

    Arrhenius estimated that halving of CO2 would decrease temperatures by 4 - 5 °C (Celsius) and a doubling of CO2 would cause a temperature rise of 5 - 6 °C[4]. In his 1906 publication, Arrhenius adjusted the value downwards to 1.6 °C (including water vapour feedback: 2.1 °C). Recent (2007) estimates from IPCC say this value (the Climate sensitivity) is likely to be between 2 and 4.5 °C. Arrhenius expected CO2 levels to rise at a rate given by emissions in his time. Since then, industrial carbon dioxide levels have risen at a much faster rate: Arrhenius expected CO2 doubling to take about 3000 years; it is now estimated in most scenarios to take about a century."

  10. #35
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    Back On Topic

    But as far as beetle kill and skiing, it is definitely already affecting my Front Range stomping grounds. Some areas are "pickup stix" already and are pretty much unskiable. I spend a lot of time in the Eldora trees and more than half the trees are dead/infected. I hope Eldora gets Forest Service permission to clear the tangles that will develop when they all fall down. I like the current tree spacing in the glades (keeps people out and preserves powder, even if it rips my jackets), so more open glades would be a mixed blessing to me.

    Some tree runs outside Eldora have already benefited from "unsanctioned maintenance" and I expect that to continue, since enforcement will never encounter people in deep forest with folding saws.

    Either way it is far from the apocalypse presented int the article, from a skiing point of view. Now if all the deadfall ignites in a wind-driven firestorm, it could get apocalyptic for a little while.

  11. #36
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    no matter what humans think about the AlGore boogieman.
    The earth has been in a natural warming trend since the little ice age. I can prove this to you with a simple google earth tour. Deal with it. As far as Al Gore goes, he's more than a messenger, he's going to be stealing my money.

    I can garauntee longer winters will not result from the Cap and Tax con job he is propagandizing for.




    Temperature can be inferred from the isotope ratios for carbon (carbon-12 and carbon-13C) and oxygen (oxygen-16 and oxygen-18) in the skeletons of sea foraminifers, in the bottom deposits in Sargasso Sea (Northern Atlantic). These indicate that in the last 3,000 years, the climate on Earth has been constantly changing, and the scope of changes in modern times does not differ from those of the past.

    Shown are the Medieval Optimum (1,000 years ago) the beginnings of the Holocenic Optimum (2,500 years ago), and also the Little Ice Age (ca. 500 years ago) from which we are still emerging. The Early Middle Ages also witnessed a strong climate cooling, which had an impact on Europe's economic and cultural decline in this period.
    "The skis just popped me up out of the snow and I went screaming down the hill on a high better than any heroin junkie." She Ra

  12. #37
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    Battle Of Wits With An Unarmed Man

    Tone, I won't turn this thread into a climate change argument.

    But your graphs, with no source given, are unconvincing. Every reputable climate scientist since Arhennius in the 1800s acknowledges other variables besides carbon dioxide affect global temperature.

    Nobody but crackpots and Flat-Earthers can deny the effects of carbon dioxide on radiative heat transfer. Arhennius measured these effects in his lab more than 100 years ago and any competent chemist could repeat them and get the same results.

    If you want to keep on with your AlGore boogieman nightmare, be my guest.
    Maybe after he steals your money he will steal your woman too!!

  13. #38
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    Quote Originally Posted by SheRa View Post
    young trees will win and the forest will rise again - should have been the entire theme of the article
    Twenty years from now, Colorado's aspen-leaf-viewing industry will be booming.
    Change is good. You go first.

  14. #39
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    I hate that Al Gore took on the GW debate. People get so caught up in the messenger instead of the message. Don't look at the extremes on either side. Yet look to the middle to find the answer. IMO, who cares what the hell AG says, the message which is to basically try to leave a smaller impact is a good one. To think that we as a species don't have an effect on the world around us if foolish. Don't focus on the messenger or the extreme folk on either side of the issue. Just focus on trying to be good stewards of the planet.

    Oh and pine beetle tree runs are $$$$
    ROLL TIDE ROLL

  15. #40
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    fire is the answer

    skiing through snag patches is dreamy

  16. #41
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    I did study Forestry and every tree has a disease or insect or a fungus that will kill it. I think tying everything to global warming is a real cop out could it be a factor yes. that seems to be the general consensuses in forestry now.

    I have spent a lot of time in beetle kill and fire killed stands and I can not tell you how important it is to keep an eye on snags and widow makers. If winds are really blowing I usually avoid them all together. What i do wonder about is the effects of loss of trees will have on keeping snow on the runs at resorts the wind is going to wreck havoc on resorts.

    I will be studying the relationship between increased beetle kill and snow snake populations in Colorado after ever storm this winter. I will post my results here.

  17. #42
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    Another thread brought to you by the idiots who post on TGR.

    OMG!!!! HAVEN'T YOU DUMBASSES THOUGHT THAT BEETLES ACTUALLY CAUSE GLOBAL WARMINZ!!!!!!!!! CUZ THEY'RE KILLING THE TREES BY THE MILLIONS???!!!!!!

    Shut the fuck up already.

    [nomedia="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ozI8TW4he8&feature=related"]YouTube - South Park - Global Warming[/nomedia]

  18. #43
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    Quote Originally Posted by Lone Star View Post
    fire is the answer
    [/thread]..............

  19. #44
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    Quote Originally Posted by TacocaT View Post
    I will be studying the relationship between increased beetle kill and snow snake populations in Colorado after ever storm this winter. I will post my results here.

  20. #45
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    People get so caught up in the messenger instead of the message. Don't look at the extremes on either side.
    Hey geniuses, don't you realize what the carbon trading scheme is and how you are going to pay for it?

    Al Gore is more than a messenger, he is a propagandist trying to get rich off this scheme.

    If you want to keep on with your AlGore boogieman nightmare, be my guest.
    Maybe after he steals your money he will steal your woman too!!
    Yeah, since you know everything, don't bother to further inform yourself. It goes way beyond Al Fucking Gore and the hundreds of millions he stands to make by convincing people like you his junk science is real.
    "The skis just popped me up out of the snow and I went screaming down the hill on a high better than any heroin junkie." She Ra

  21. #46
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    I love lamp
    ROLL TIDE ROLL

  22. #47
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    Quote Originally Posted by tone capone View Post
    Hey geniuses, don't you realize what the carbon trading scheme is and how you are going to pay for it?

    Al Gore is more than a messenger, he is a propagandist trying to get rich off this scheme.



    Yeah, since you know everything, don't bother to further inform yourself. It goes way beyond Al Fucking Gore and the hundreds of millions he stands to make by convincing people like you his junk science is real.
    Don't waste your time on the braindead zombies......

  23. #48
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    Quote Originally Posted by mitch_cumstein View Post
    Has anyone commenting in this thread actually studied forestry or NR? I'd like to hear an informed opinion.
    I'm no expert, but after 5 years of wildland firefighting, a Bachelors in environmental/natural resource management and a M.S. in enviro science, I'd consider myself at least informed.

    According to any legitimate literature or study I've read, the pine beetle infestations throughout the west are not attributable to global warming. Rather, it has more to do with the lack of a natural fire regime through the national (and other) forests. My own previous efforts (firefighting) in some cases perpetuated the problem. Without a natural fire regime, forest fuel densities increase and create an environment where native plant species are more susceptible to attack, and pests are more likely to thrive. The average fire return intervals in your average western lodgepole stand is very short, about 10 years. This means in a natural (not anthropogenically altered) stands, fire is expected to return and burn through an area once every 10 years.

    Lodgepole Pine regenerates by fire, their cones release the fire resistant seed only after being under extreme heat (fire). When natural occurring fires (lightning strikes) burn an area with a natural fuel density, those fires are usually low intensity and seldom catastrophic, as opposed to many of the fires we see now (as 99% of our National Forest fuel and fire regime has been altered by "management"). Those natural, low intensity fires clean up native stands and keep them rather healthy by keeping fuel density much lower. They also facilitate stand replacement by germinating new seed and clearing older disease vulnerable trees.

    In Oregon and Washington (as well as other places) pine beetles are infesting much more than lodgepole pine. Douglas fir, our dominant conifer, is also highly susceptible to the attack of the beetle. From the lifts on Mt. Bachelor in central Oregon, you can see vast acreages of beetle killed stands, which are spreading my hundreds of acres every year.

    I remember fighting fires in Glacier and Yellowstone in 2003, and the "jackstraw" there was amazing, the amount of dead, dry, volatile fuel lit the forest up like kerosine, "nuking" the forest in the fires path. With a natural fire regime, this wouldn't be your typical landscape and/or result.

    The obvious long-term solution to the control the persistence and spread of the pine-beetle is somewhat obvious, reintroduce fire to our forests. However, there remains multiple catch-22s with this approach. First, the proximity of many of these fires to the urban interface requires the 'control' of fires to limit the human exposure, and risk to property, which limits the natural benefits that they provide. Second, those infested stands (as mentioned in the article) vastly increase the amount of dead, down fuel which can cause catastrophic fires which can completely denude a stand any vegetation, sterilize soil, and cause many other environmental problems including massive erosion and susceptibility to invasion by other exotic non-native species.

    Thats at least what I've learned, in my studies and experiences... Climatic changes may have an impact, but its the forest 'management' itself that is to blame.

  24. #49
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    No mention of the word DROUGHT by the "experts" here.....

    hahahaaha

  25. #50
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    As Quikr12 says, much better than I, what is the cause of the proliferation of bark beetle, lack of forest fires. Just look in the Uintas and see how much of the timber is either red, or already dead.

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