When we moved into our palatial estate in Ramsey last year I was quickly informed by my brother-in-law of the presence of about fifty Box Elder trees on the property. As a man in the tree business he told us to expect the invasion of thousands of box elder bugs (Boisea Trivitatta) and that there’s not a whole lot I could do about it other than dealing with it. We moved in late March and sure enough on the first sunny days of spring I sighted the first box elder bug…And then the second…And then the five-thousandth…From that day on until the coming of fall it was a constant pitched battle between my spray hose, dish soap, and the box elder bugs. Day after day I went to battle, sometimes wiping thousands of them at a time off the sun side of my house. For a while it seemed overwhelming. But I persevered and drove them deep into the woods around the house. I retired my spray bottle for another year expecting to use it again in the coming year.
Winter turned to spring and now summer but for some unknown and bizarre reason the bugs have not returned. I still have the same number of trees and the days have turned to hot but nary a box elder bug has been seen. It’s clear that I’ve eradicated the entire species. Either that or they’re too intimidated by my shock and awe tactics that they’ve retreated to the Anoka border. I’ve searched the internet to see if the bugs are cyclical but can’t find any proof that they are. Since I’ve clearly eradicated the box elder species my friend Matt asked me last night why I don’t move onto Mosquitoes.
That may be a bit taller task.
Have you seen this bug?
Wait, hold the phone. I think I just saw one crawl by.
I couple of months ago while having a political conversation with my friend Matt I remember making the point that as gas prices go up interest in environmental matters will decrease among the general populace. If gas is less than $2.00 a gallon the majority of the public is just fine with banning offshore drilling. Now that gas is over $5 per gallon in California a Survey USA poll out this week shows that the majority (59%) of Californians are now in favor off offshore gas exploration. I’m sure there’s a smart economist somewhere who has a term for the forces at play here. The interesting contrast is global warming. With gas prices so high there is justifiably a movement to increase gas mileage and reduce the dependence on oil. The price of gas works to help the idea of global warming. Not only are we paying too much for gas but it’s affecting the environment, etc. Of course if gas prices were to suddenly fall back down to late 90’s $1.15 per gallon levels the support of global warming would probably decrease among the masses as well. It’s kind of a paradox.
Gas prices up—-> environmental awareness down
Gas prices down—-> interest in combating global warming down
Or to put it another way:
Gas prices up——> where can I buy a Hybrid?
Gas prices down——> can I trade-in that Prius for Escalade?
As many who read this on a daily basis know I travel to Iowa quite a bit on business. What’s happening to our friends down south of Albert Lea is absolutely unthinkable and tragic. I arrived in Dallas yesterday morning to see a picture from the Dallas Morning News that was unfathomable, houses in Cedar Rapids nearly completely covered with water. I have a lot of valued co-workers from Cedar Rapids and I can’t imagine what they’re going through right now. The same goes for Cedar Falls, Waterloo, Coralville and so many other areas. It’s unimaginable to think but 83 of the state’s 99 counties have been declared disaster areas by the governor. This morning I find out that the levee in Des Moines has now failed. Combine this with the tornadoes of this week and the unthinkable Parkersburg tornado and it’s been a tragic month in Iowa. It’s one thing to watch these disasters from a distance, but to know people affected by them really pulls at your heartstrings.
From the London Telegraph, on the amazing story of Irena Sendler who displayed incredible courage during her actions in helping Jewish children escape the Warsaw ghetto. Her incredible story could very well be made into a motion picture. The amazing thing? She lost the Nobel Prize to Al Gore last year. From the article:
Here, though, is the sentence that leapt off the page at me: “Last year she was nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, eventually won by Al Gore.” Al Gore! I mean, nothing against the old lardbutt – it’s nice to see ex-politicians doing something they believe in rather than giving themselves over wholly to the getting of personal wealth – but making a film is not the same thing as donning a yellow star and smuggling babies past enemy soldiers.
And in other global warming news, also from the Telegraph, we have the story of Sir Paul McCartney and his hyprid-Lexus limousine. To reward him for his work to help the environment Lexus created a special hybrid vehicle for McCartney. The only problem is they flew it to London– from Japan.
Carbon offsetting firm CO2balance.com said the plane journey would have caused a carbon footprint of 38,050kg, compared to 397kg for a three-week boat journey… Co2balance.com Director Mike Rigby said: “That is the equivalent of driving the car around the world six times.”
Hey may have to leave it in the garage for a while.
For the fourth time in a century and the first time since the dastardly winter of 1996 ice won’t be out on all Minnesota lakes in time for the Mother’s Day Weekend fishing opener. Other than a handful of sunny days its been a pretty chilly spring thus far. If Al Gore can blame Myanmar on global warming I’m going to use the non-spring in Minnesota as the coming of the Mini(Sota) Ice-Age. I have neither the scientific background nor the the time to prove but I’m sure there’s a scientist out there that can look at the famous “computer models” and spin the data to prove my theory.
For those revisionist folks here’s the famous Newsweek “global cooling” article from 1975. Back in 1975 the global cooling scare was going to be responsible for a lot of the same disasters as global warming. For example:
Decline in Food Production:
There are ominous signs that the Earth’s weather patterns have begun to change dramatically and that these changes may portend a drastic decline in food production – with serious political implications for just about every nation on Earth. The drop in food output could begin quite soon, perhaps only 10 years from now. The regions destined to feel its impact are the great wheat-producing lands of Canada and the U.S.S.R. in the North, along with a number of marginally self-sufficient tropical areas – parts of India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Indochina and Indonesia – where the growing season is dependent upon the rains brought by the monsoon.
Natural Disasters:
The evidence in support of these predictions has now begun to accumulate so massively that meteorologists are hard-pressed to keep up with it. In England, farmers have seen their growing season decline by about two weeks since 1950, with a resultant overall loss in grain production estimated at up to 100,000 tons annually. During the same time, the average temperature around the equator has risen by a fraction of a degree – a fraction that in some areas can mean drought and desolation. Last April, in the most devastating outbreak of tornadoes ever recorded, 148 twisters killed more than 300 people and caused half a billion dollars’ worth of damage in 13 U.S. states.
Sounds like the effect of global warming. So let me get this straight— the earth has to stay at exactly the same temperature or doom is coming?
But wait, there’s Dutch Scientists predicting global cooling again, due to solar activity.
It took Al Gore a day to blame the Myanmar typhoon on global warming. A week after John McCain was skewered for using the 35W bridge collapse for “political gain” by the DNC, Al Gore uses this disaster for political gain. Do you want to know the beauty of the global warming lobby? They can use any natural disaster that happens and conveniently blame it on global warming. I guess the 1959 Ise Bay Typhoon that hit Japan and killed over five thousand people must have been caused by global warming. Or the 1906 Hong Kong Typhoon that killed ten thousand. Or the 1934 Honshu (Japan) Typhoon that killed four thousand…you get the picture. It’s convenient to blame everything on global warming to advance an agenda when the science on whether the “warming” of the ocean can create more tropical storms is far from certain. Case in point the last three hurricane seasons that have fizzled in North America. Naturally when the number of storms hasn’t increased as predicted Gore now insists that the “intensity”of the storms will be larger.
Unlike the McCain case this is actually the case of a politician using a tragedy to exploit his agenda.
I know this article is from the NY Sun— but this is an issue that we’re going to see more and more in the coming months. The “run on rice” is an early indicator of potential global food supply issues. The Wall Street Journal yesterday advised people that food prices are going to continue to rise so simple economics means its time to start stocking up. As these prices increase people are going to turn more and more towards the drive to produce ethanol as a contributing factor. This will be a hot topic come the November election.
Recently a two professors of applied economics at the University of Minnesota penned an article in Foreign Affairs titled “How Biofuels Could Starve the Poor.” According to the authors:
“I don’t think anybody knows precisely how much ethanol contributes to the run-up in food prices, but the contribution is clearly substantial,” a professor of applied economics and law at the University of Minnesota, C. Ford Runge, said. A study by a Washington think tank, the International Food Policy Research Institute, indicated that between a quarter and a third of the recent hike in commodities prices is attributable to biofuels.
Mother Nature’s sick and cruel joke continues. As I sit at my in-laws house in northern Wisconsin this morning the temperature is 30 degrees and there’s a blizzard outside. Today is April 26. Today’s a day I don’t want to talk about global warming. Or La Nina. Or Climate Change. Or the Mini-Ice-Age. John Stossel does.
I’ve had it with La Nina. Where have you gone El Nino?
Here’s a picture from Bemidji (courtesy of the Star Tribune)
My five-year-old just woke up and looked outside and said, “It’s not spring any more, its winter. Winter is too long.” I agree son, I agree