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Numismatics

Are all pre-1965 US quarters made of 90% silver?

yes_statement

all "pre-1965" us "quarters" are made of "90"% "silver".. "pre-1965" us "quarters" are composed of "90"% "silver".. the "silver" content of all "pre-1965" us "quarters" is "90"%.

https://www.goldline.com/product-catalog/loose-silver-90-silver-coins/

Loose Silver: 90% Silver Coins | 10 percent copper – Goldline

Product Info Ninety-percent silver bags are often referred to as ‘junk silver’ though this term can be misleading. Ninety-percent silver generally refers to pre-1965 circulated silver dimes and quarters which were all comprised of 90 percent silver and 10 percent copper. These coins are generally sold in $1,000 bags which reflect their face value (i.e., the legal tender value of the coins.) People refer to the face value because, regardless of the denomination of the coins, $1,000 bags all contain the same amount of silver which is generally 715 troy ounces (the gross weight of these bags are approximately 800 troy ounces or 54.85 pounds.) These bags also come in half and quarter bags (i.e., $500 and $250 bags). Silver bags can be purchased in bags of coins composed of either 90 or 40 percent silver. 90 Percent Silver – 90 percent silver bags are probably acquired more often than 40 percent silver; they contain worn pre-1965 dimes and quarters in any combination. Prior to 1965, silver American coins were composed of 90 percent silver and 10 percent copper. $1,000 face value bags of 90 percent silver weigh about 54-55 pounds and contain a gross weight of 800 troy ounces. The pure silver content of these coins is approximately 715 troy ounces. Specifications Disclaimer Specifications are obtained from sources believed to be reliable. However, Goldline does not guarantee their accuracy. Product Info Ninety-percent silver bags are often referred to as ‘junk silver’ though this term can be misleading. Ninety-percent silver generally refers to pre-1965 circulated silver dimes and quarters which were all comprised of 90 percent silver and 10 percent copper. These coins are generally sold in $1,000 bags which reflect their face value (i.e., the legal tender value of the coins.) People refer to the face value because, regardless of the denomination of the coins, $1,000 bags all contain the same amount of silver which is generally 715 troy ounces (the gross weight of these bags are approximately 800 troy ounces or 54.85 pounds.) These bags also come in half and quarter bags (i.e., $500 and $250 bags). Silver bags can be purchased in bags of coins composed of either 90 or 40 percent silver. 90 Percent Silver – 90 percent silver bags are probably acquired more often than 40 percent silver; they contain worn pre-1965 dimes and quarters in any combination. Prior to 1965, silver American coins were composed of 90 percent silver and 10 percent copper. $1,000 face value bags of 90 percent silver weigh about 54-55 pounds and contain a gross weight of 800 troy ounces. The pure silver content of these coins is approximately 715 troy ounces. What Our Customers Are Saying About Us? Goldline does business with and offers its products and services only to individuals and entities located in the United States. This website is not intended to serve users who are residents outside the United States. Our dedicated, industry-leading Client Concierge is available to assist existing clients with liquidations, refunds, and any questions they may have. To reach the Client Concierge, please call 800-827-4653 or contact us via our Contact Us form. Goldline recommends reviewing its Account Agreement, State Addendum and risk disclosure booklet, Coin Facts for Investors and Collectors to Consider, prior to making your purchase. Precious metals and rare coins can increase or decrease in value. Past performance is not a guarantee of future results. We believe that precious metals are a long term investment, recognizing any specific holding period may be affected by current market conditions requiring a longer or shorter holding period. * Goldline is a paid subscriber to Trustpilot. This link explains how a Trustscore is calculated. Get Free Buyers Guide By checking this box to sign this form, you confirm that you have read our Privacy Policy and provide voluntary, affirmative consent to the use of your Personal Information (including Sensitive Personal Information used to provide our services and manage your accounts) as described in that policy, and agree that Goldline may contact you at the phone number and email above for marketing and other reasons, including possibly using automated technology and text messaging

Prior to 1965, silver American coins were composed of 90 percent silver and 10 percent copper. $1,000 face value bags of 90 percent silver weigh about 54-55 pounds and contain a gross weight of 800 troy ounces. The pure silver content of these coins is approximately 715 troy ounces. Specifications Disclaimer Specifications are obtained from sources believed to be reliable. However, Goldline does not guarantee their accuracy. Product Info Ninety-percent silver bags are often referred to as ‘junk silver’ though this term can be misleading. Ninety-percent silver generally refers to pre-1965 circulated silver dimes and quarters which were all comprised of 90 percent silver and 10 percent copper. These coins are generally sold in $1,000 bags which reflect their face value (i.e., the legal tender value of the coins.) People refer to the face value because, regardless of the denomination of the coins, $1,000 bags all contain the same amount of silver which is generally 715 troy ounces (the gross weight of these bags are approximately 800 troy ounces or 54.85 pounds.) These bags also come in half and quarter bags (i.e., $500 and $250 bags). Silver bags can be purchased in bags of coins composed of either 90 or 40 percent silver. 90 Percent Silver – 90 percent silver bags are probably acquired more often than 40 percent silver; they contain worn pre-1965 dimes and quarters in any combination. Prior to 1965, silver American coins were composed of 90 percent silver and 10 percent copper. $1,000 face value bags of 90 percent silver weigh about 54-55 pounds and contain a gross weight of 800 troy ounces. The pure silver content of these coins is approximately 715 troy ounces.

yes

Numismatics

Are all pre-1965 US quarters made of 90% silver?

yes_statement

all "pre-1965" us "quarters" are made of "90"% "silver".. "pre-1965" us "quarters" are composed of "90"% "silver".. the "silver" content of all "pre-1965" us "quarters" is "90"%.

https://www.herobullion.com/junk-90-silver-quarters/

Junk 90% Silver Quarters | $1 Face Value - Hero Bullion

One of the most popular ways to invest in silver is through purchasing pre-1965 US Mint silver coins. They’re an easy and efficient way to add weight to your collection. All quarters have a composition of 90% silver. Often termed “junk silver”, purchasing 90% silver quarters continues to be a popular method of acquiring pure silver at a low cost. An efficient way to add weight to your assets and diversity your portfolio, each order contains approximately .715 ounces of pure silver with a total face value of $1. All coins included in your purchase were struck by the U.S. Mint prior to 1965 and are composed of 90% silver and 10% copper. Quarters will arrive in multiples of four, packaged in a safe and resealable bag for your convenience. If you’re looking for an easy way to build your assets and increase your silver intake, our 90% Silver Quarters is a great place to get started. Silver Quarter Design Please note that we send a variety of different coins based on our current inventory. Options include Barber, Standing Liberty, pre-1965 Washington and modern proof quarters. What Are Silver Quarters Made of? All quarters are composed of 90% silver and 10% copper. The bullion included in your purchase was struck by the U.S. Mint prior to 1965 — before silver content was removed from circulation entirely. Silver Quarter Packaging Quarters will arrive in multiples of four ($1 face value increments), packaged in a resealable bag. Why Buy Junk 90% Silver Quarters? Silver continues to grow as a popular choice among both investors and collectors. With low premiums, high liquidity and efficient portability, you can be certain you are making a sound choice that will enhance your equity. Not only are you obtaining a tangible asset, but you are receiving a historic piece of bullion celebrating the American tradition. If you have any questions regarding the 90% Silver Quarters or any other products you are considering, please do not hesitate to reach out. We are here to help you feel at ease in your bullion endeavors. Precious Metal Silver Metal Content 0.7150 Troy Ounces Purity .900 Fine Denomination $0.25 Condition Circulated Diameter 24.3 mm Thickness 1.75 mm Edge Reeded How much do I pay for shipping? Shipping on all domestic orders is free starting at $149. At checkout, you may be presented with additional shipping options for an additional fee. How soon will my order ship? We make every effort to ship your order as soon as possible. Most orders will ship within 1-3 business days. During and around holidays and in times of increased demand, orders may take longer to process for shipping. If the instance that your order is delayed in shipping, a notice will be sent. Is my package insured while in transit? Yes. We fully insure each and every package while in transit. On the rare occasion that a loss occurs while in transit to you, our insurance coverage will engage. Can you deliver my order to a PO Box? On most occasions, yes. In some instances, size, weight or value limitations may prohibit delivery to a PO Box. In those cases, a street address must be provided. Will I have to sign for my package when it arrives? All orders $500 and over require signature upon delivery. If your order is less than $500, you may purchase a shipping option that requires signature delivery at checkout for an additional fee.

One of the most popular ways to invest in silver is through purchasing pre-1965 US Mint silver coins. They’re an easy and efficient way to add weight to your collection. All quarters have a composition of 90% silver. Often termed “junk silver”, purchasing 90% silver quarters continues to be a popular method of acquiring pure silver at a low cost. An efficient way to add weight to your assets and diversity your portfolio, each order contains approximately .715 ounces of pure silver with a total face value of $1. All coins included in your purchase were struck by the U.S. Mint prior to 1965 and are composed of 90% silver and 10% copper. Quarters will arrive in multiples of four, packaged in a safe and resealable bag for your convenience. If you’re looking for an easy way to build your assets and increase your silver intake, our 90% Silver Quarters is a great place to get started. Silver Quarter Design Please note that we send a variety of different coins based on our current inventory. Options include Barber, Standing Liberty, pre-1965 Washington and modern proof quarters. What Are Silver Quarters Made of? All quarters are composed of 90% silver and 10% copper. The bullion included in your purchase was struck by the U.S. Mint prior to 1965 — before silver content was removed from circulation entirely. Silver Quarter Packaging Quarters will arrive in multiples of four ($1 face value increments), packaged in a resealable bag. Why Buy Junk 90% Silver Quarters? Silver continues to grow as a popular choice among both investors and collectors. With low premiums, high liquidity and efficient portability, you can be certain you are making a sound choice that will enhance your equity. Not only are you obtaining a tangible asset, but you are receiving a historic piece of bullion celebrating the American tradition. If you have any questions regarding the 90% Silver Quarters or any other products you are considering, please do not hesitate to reach out.

yes

Numismatics

Are all pre-1965 US quarters made of 90% silver?

yes_statement

all "pre-1965" us "quarters" are made of "90"% "silver".. "pre-1965" us "quarters" are composed of "90"% "silver".. the "silver" content of all "pre-1965" us "quarters" is "90"%.

https://portcitycoinblog.com/silver-for-sale/how-to-calculate-junk-silver-value/

How To Calculate Junk Silver Value -

Before 1965, the United States minted dimes, quarters and half dollars made of 90% silver and 10% copper. Starting in 1965, dimes and quarters have been minted in a copper and nickel clad composition with no silver content (other than Kennedy half dollars that were minted with 40% silver from 1965-1970). Junk silver is different than most silver products in the market like silver bullion coins, rounds and bars that normally contain 99.9% silver and are minted in standard weights like 1/2 ounce, one ounce, five ounce, ten ounce and 100 ounce increments. This makes it easy to determine how much silver you are buying. For example, if you buy one five ounce silver bar and five one ounce American Silver Eagles, you can easily calculate that you are buying ten ounces of silver. While pre-1965 dimes quarters and half dollars are made of 90% silver, the amount of silver is not easy to calculate when you are buying junk silver because the amount of silver in each coin is not denominated in round numbers. Bullion dealers sell junk silver at a price per ounce over spot. In order to simplify pricing, dealers will often price junk silver sold by face value (as calculated off the spot price). Calculating the Value of Junk Silver The silver content for each of the dime, quarters and half dollars are the amounts contained in each coint at the time of mintage. During circulation of the coins, some of the silver content was inevitably lost due to constant handling. To compensate for this, dealers reduce the amount of silver in each dollar of face value from approximately .723 ounce to .715 ounces. Here are two examples that calculate the value of junk silver using .715 ounces of silver per each dollar of face value. If the spot price of silver is $15 an ounce, $1 dollar face value of silver dimes would contain about $10.73 worth of silver ($15 X .715= $10.725). Dealers will generally price their junk silver at the spot price of silver plus a fluctuating premium of say $1.00- $1.50 an ounce. If the spot price of silver is $15 and the premium is $1.00, the dealer will charge $11.73 per ounce of silver; if the premium charged is $1.50 an ounce the dealer will charge $12.23. If the spot price of silver is $20 an ounce, $1 dollar face value of silver dimes would contain about $14.30 worth of silver ($20 X .715= $14.30). Dealers will generally price their junk silver at the spot price of silver plus a fluctuating premium of say $1.00- $1.50 an ounce. If the spot price of silver is $20 and the premium is $1.00, the dealer will charge $15.30 per ounce of silver; if the premium charged is $1.50 an ounce the dealer will charge $15.80. Junk silver Roosevelt Dimes, Washington Quarters and Kennedy Half Dollars are easily recognizable as they have essentially the same design as dimes, quarters and half dollars in circulation today. As such, they are perfectly suited for barter should the need ever arise. Silver Dollars – The Morgan (1878-1921) and Peace (1921-1935) silver dollar coins are priced seperately as they contain different amounts of silver. These coins contain .77344 ounces of silver vs. approximately .7234 ounce of silver found in pre-1965 dimes, quarters and half dollar. Morgan and Peace dollars will qualify as “junk” silver when sold as “cull dollars” which means they have been heavily circulated or contain other imperfections. These beautiful coins, however, are not widely recognized among those who are not coin collectors and sell at a greater, yet affordable, premium to junk dimes, quarters and half dollars. Ask to see our inventory of Peace and Morgan Dollars. Junk silver coins are not purchased for their numismatic value but rather for their silver content. Purchasing junk silver however, allows the silver investor to learn about United States coinage by sifting through the various designs, dates and mint marks of purchased dimes, quarters, half dollars and dollars. Junk silver offers an affordable way to buy silver. Visit Port City Coin & Jewelry If you are in the New Hampshire Seacoast area, visit Port City Coin & Jewelry and ask about junk silver and our other services and specials. Or call 603-373-6185. Port City Coin & Jewelry Maintains an A+ BBB Rating Sell Your Jewelry To Us Port City Coin Professional Affiliations Live Gold and Silver Prices Shop Our ebay Store Port City Coin and Jewelry is a Numismatic Guaranty Corporation authorized dealer, a member of the American Numismatic Association and a member of the Professional Coin Grading Service. We are full-time coin and jewelry dealer that sells only genuine coins and jewelry. We offer a 7 day return policy on all jewelry unless stated NO return on listing detail. All non bullion coins 7 day return. Questions? Call (603) 373-6185

Before 1965, the United States minted dimes, quarters and half dollars made of 90% silver and 10% copper. Starting in 1965, dimes and quarters have been minted in a copper and nickel clad composition with no silver content (other than Kennedy half dollars that were minted with 40% silver from 1965-1970). Junk silver is different than most silver products in the market like silver bullion coins, rounds and bars that normally contain 99.9% silver and are minted in standard weights like 1/2 ounce, one ounce, five ounce, ten ounce and 100 ounce increments. This makes it easy to determine how much silver you are buying. For example, if you buy one five ounce silver bar and five one ounce American Silver Eagles, you can easily calculate that you are buying ten ounces of silver. While pre-1965 dimes quarters and half dollars are made of 90% silver, the amount of silver is not easy to calculate when you are buying junk silver because the amount of silver in each coin is not denominated in round numbers. Bullion dealers sell junk silver at a price per ounce over spot. In order to simplify pricing, dealers will often price junk silver sold by face value (as calculated off the spot price). Calculating the Value of Junk Silver The silver content for each of the dime, quarters and half dollars are the amounts contained in each coint at the time of mintage. During circulation of the coins, some of the silver content was inevitably lost due to constant handling. To compensate for this, dealers reduce the amount of silver in each dollar of face value from approximately .723 ounce to .715 ounces. Here are two examples that calculate the value of junk silver using .715 ounces of silver per each dollar of face value. If the spot price of silver is $15 an ounce, $1 dollar face value of silver dimes would contain about $10.73 worth of silver ($15 X .715= $10.725).

yes

Numismatics

Are all pre-1965 US quarters made of 90% silver?

yes_statement

all "pre-1965" us "quarters" are made of "90"% "silver".. "pre-1965" us "quarters" are composed of "90"% "silver".. the "silver" content of all "pre-1965" us "quarters" is "90"%.

https://www.marklawsonantiques.com/us-pre-1964-silver-coins/

Looking at Coins: Pre-1964 US Silver Coins - Mark Lawson Antiques

Looking at Coins: Pre-1964 US Silver Coins When helping clients settle an estate or prepare for an estate sale, the most common type of collectible coins we see are American silver dollars, half dollars, quarters. and dimes. The United States has been minting and issuing its own official coinage in gold, silver, copper, and nickel (along with various mixtures of nickel and copper) since 1793. From the 18th century until 1964, US silver coins were comprised of 90% pure silver alloyed with 10% other metals in order to make the coins more durable and less prone to wear. Silver and gold coins intended for circulation as currency are typically made this way because these metals in their pure state are very soft and wear very quickly – this is also why pure gold or silver jewelry is rarely made. There’s a wide range in value for US pre-1965 coins, but we can help you figure out what it is you have. In the United States, the dimes, quarters, and half dollars coins minted in 1964 and earlier are 90% silver. These coins include: Liberty Head (aka Barber), Winged Liberty Head (commonly called “Mercury”), and Roosevelt dimes 1964 and older Jefferson “Wartime” nickels These kinds of coins are sometimes called “junk silver” by coin collectors and dealers. They are typically common coins, minted in large quantities and easily found even today. However, there are some exceptions to these otherwise common coins. Most Morgan and Peace dollars, unless terribly worn or damaged, always have at least a small collectible or numismatic value above their silver value. There are also truly rare and collectible coins in these categories such as the 1916-D Mercury dime, the 1938-D Walking Liberty half dollar, and coins in high grades of uncirculated condition (as if they just came from the mint) which are very rare and prized by collectors. The value of common pre-1964 US silver coins changes as the price of silver ebbs and flows in the global market, and is also affected by the global industrial demand for silver. The value of US silver coins is mostly based on the silver content and is typically expressed as a value of the face value. For example, if the junk silver price is $10 for every $1 of face value, a dollar’s worth of 90% silver coins would be worth $10, a half dollar would be $5, a quarter $2.50, and a dime would be worth $1. The best word of advice is to always double check your coins before making a decision about what to do with them. A while ago, we had a client who brought in a World War II ammo case full of silver dimes from their parent’s basement, one of two boxes the parents had filled with dimes throughout their lives. Our client’s box ended up revealing $5,000-10,000 worth of 90% silver dimes, as calculated at the silver price of the day. The sister who inherited the other ammo case took it to a change machine and received $600-700 for the coins’ face value. Sadly, she had no recourse, and the true value of those silver coins was lost to the change machine. Do you have coins you would like to investigate selling? Contact us by email or call us at (518) 587-8787. Are you looking to identify a coin? Here’s a quick reference for the US 90% silver coins we see most often. Morgan Dollar – minted from 1878 to 1904, and then again in 1921. Named after its designer, George T. Morgan.Peace Dollar – minted from 1921 to 1928, and then in 1934 and 1935. Named for the legend ‘Peace’ on the reverse.Liberty Head or Barber Half Dollar – Minted from 1892 to 1915. Named after its designer, Charles E. Barber.Walking Liberty Half Dollar – Minted from 1916 to 1947. Designed by Adolph A. Weinman.Franklin Half Dollar – Minted from 1948 to 1963. Designed by John R. Sinnock.Kennedy Half Dollar – Minted in 90% silver only in 1964. Minted in 40% silver from 1965 to 1970.Liberty Head or Barber Quarter – Minted from 1892 to 1916. Named after its designer, Charles E. Barber.Standing Liberty Quarter – Minted from 1916 to 1930. Designed by Hermon Atkins MacNeil.Washington Quarter – Minted in 90% silver from 1932 to 1964. Designed by John Flanagan.Liberty Head or Barber Dime – Minted from 1892 to 1916. Named after its designer, Charles E. Barber.Mercury Dime – Minted from 1916 to 1945. Depicts the goddess Liberty, misidentified as Mercury due to her winged cap.Roosevelt Dime – Minted in 90% silver from 1946 to 1964. Released on January 30, 1946, which would have been Roosevelt’s 64th birthday.‘Wartime’ Jefferson Nickels – Minted in 35% silver from mid-1942 to 1945. Easily identified by a large mint mark (S, D, or P) over the Monticello dome.

Looking at Coins: Pre-1964 US Silver Coins When helping clients settle an estate or prepare for an estate sale, the most common type of collectible coins we see are American silver dollars, half dollars, quarters. and dimes. The United States has been minting and issuing its own official coinage in gold, silver, copper, and nickel (along with various mixtures of nickel and copper) since 1793. From the 18th century until 1964, US silver coins were comprised of 90% pure silver alloyed with 10% other metals in order to make the coins more durable and less prone to wear. Silver and gold coins intended for circulation as currency are typically made this way because these metals in their pure state are very soft and wear very quickly – this is also why pure gold or silver jewelry is rarely made. There’s a wide range in value for US pre-1965 coins, but we can help you figure out what it is you have. In the United States, the dimes, quarters, and half dollars coins minted in 1964 and earlier are 90% silver. These coins include: Liberty Head (aka Barber), Winged Liberty Head (commonly called “Mercury”), and Roosevelt dimes 1964 and older Jefferson “Wartime” nickels These kinds of coins are sometimes called “junk silver” by coin collectors and dealers. They are typically common coins, minted in large quantities and easily found even today. However, there are some exceptions to these otherwise common coins. Most Morgan and Peace dollars, unless terribly worn or damaged, always have at least a small collectible or numismatic value above their silver value. There are also truly rare and collectible coins in these categories such as the 1916-D Mercury dime, the 1938-D Walking Liberty half dollar, and coins in high grades of uncirculated condition (as if they just came from the mint) which are very rare and prized by collectors.

yes

Wilderness Exploration

Are all snakes able to swim?

yes_statement

all "snakes" are "able" to "swim".. every "snake" is capable of "swimming".

https://www.reuters.com/article/uk-factcheck-venomous-snake-swim/fact-check-you-cant-tell-a-venomous-snake-by-the-way-it-swims-idUSKCN24S21P

Fact check: You can't tell a venomous snake by the way it swims ...

Fact check: You can’t tell a venomous snake by the way it swims A widely shared post on social media makes the claim that venomous snakes tend to move on the surface of water, while common water snakes dive beneath the surface. The post alleges that this difference is generally a good indicator of whether a snake is dangerous or not. This claim contains a mixture of accurate and inaccurate information. Reuters Fact Check. REUTERS/Axel Schmidt The post shows a what appears to be a copperhead snake moving on the surface of water. It is visible here . Reuters contacted a few herpetologists, or reptile and amphibian experts, to address the veracity of this claim. John Maerz, Professor of Vertebrate Ecology at the University of Georgia, told Reuters that all snakes can swim, and most swim below the water, or partially submerged. “Snakes may swim under water when fleeing a predator or to hunt,” Maerz wrote, “and species like cottonmouths do eat fish and frogs just like water snakes.” In his book “Secrets of Snakes”, David Steen, Reptile and Amphibian Research Leader of the Fish and Wildlife Research Institute in St Petersburg, Florida, also writes that distinguishing between venomous and non-venomous snakes by the way they swim might not be a foolproof strategy. Steen points to the example of the diamond-backed rattlesnake, which is venomous and dangerous to humans. This rattlesnake is known to increase its buoyancy to cross water with most of its body staying dry. He notes that cottonmouth snakes, which are venomous and dangerous to humans, are also capable of doing this, despite often swimming underwater ( rb.gy/kics5e ). Harry Greene, Emeritus Professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Cornell University, told Reuters via email that he would not want to generalize for the more than 3,500 snake species worldwide, nor even for all the venomous snakes in the world. But sticking to the southeastern United States and focusing on the cottonmouth and its close relative the copperhead, “both of those species tend to float with full body on the surface”, Greene said, as do rattlesnakes. Greene told Reuters that non-venomous water snakes “generally swim and float at the surface with only their head (maybe also neck) above the water,” with the rest of their bodies at least at a slight angle below the surface. “I wouldn’t grab a snake or not [though] based just on that criterion!” Greene wrote. VERDICT Partly false. While some snakes behave in the way described in the post, experts do not recommend that as a definitive test of whether a snake is venomous or not. This article was produced by the Reuters Fact Check team. Read more about our work to fact-check social media posts here .

Fact check: You can’t tell a venomous snake by the way it swims A widely shared post on social media makes the claim that venomous snakes tend to move on the surface of water, while common water snakes dive beneath the surface. The post alleges that this difference is generally a good indicator of whether a snake is dangerous or not. This claim contains a mixture of accurate and inaccurate information. Reuters Fact Check. REUTERS/Axel Schmidt The post shows a what appears to be a copperhead snake moving on the surface of water. It is visible here . Reuters contacted a few herpetologists, or reptile and amphibian experts, to address the veracity of this claim. John Maerz, Professor of Vertebrate Ecology at the University of Georgia, told Reuters that all snakes can swim, and most swim below the water, or partially submerged. “Snakes may swim under water when fleeing a predator or to hunt,” Maerz wrote, “and species like cottonmouths do eat fish and frogs just like water snakes.” In his book “Secrets of Snakes”, David Steen, Reptile and Amphibian Research Leader of the Fish and Wildlife Research Institute in St Petersburg, Florida, also writes that distinguishing between venomous and non-venomous snakes by the way they swim might not be a foolproof strategy. Steen points to the example of the diamond-backed rattlesnake, which is venomous and dangerous to humans. This rattlesnake is known to increase its buoyancy to cross water with most of its body staying dry. He notes that cottonmouth snakes, which are venomous and dangerous to humans, are also capable of doing this, despite often swimming underwater ( rb.gy/kics5e ). Harry Greene, Emeritus Professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Cornell University, told Reuters via email that he would not want to generalize for the more than 3,500 snake species worldwide, nor even for all the venomous snakes in the world.

yes

Wilderness Exploration

Are all snakes able to swim?

yes_statement

all "snakes" are "able" to "swim".. every "snake" is capable of "swimming".

https://a-z-animals.com/blog/do-rattlesnakes-swim/

Snakes - Rattlesnakes - Do Rattlesnakes Swim?

Enter your email in the box below to get the most mind-blowing animal stories and videos delivered directly to your inbox every day. Thanks for subscribing! Imagine you’re taking a nice, relaxing dip in a cool lake on a hot day. You look over, and there’s a rattlesnake swimming towards you. What do you do? And why is there a snake in the water, rattlesnakes can’t swim, can they? That’s the question we’re here to answer, along with a few others. If you live in North America, particularly in the desert southwest regions of the United States and Mexico, then you’re probably familiar with rattlesnakes. There are 33 known species of rattlesnake, and they all have rattles. Some are deadlier than others, but, fortunately for us, none of them seek out humans as meals. That’s not to say that rattlesnakes aren’t dangerous, they are, and they should be treated with respect if encountered. Like many species of wild animal, rattlesnakes are capable of adapting to many different environments, but does that include lakes, rivers, or oceans? Here, we’ll learn more about rattlesnakes and where they live, then take a look at whether or not they sink, or swim. Then, we’ll take a deep dive and find out if rattlesnakes can bite while swimming, and whether or not they can swim in the ocean. After that, we’ll talk a little more about what you should do if you encounter a rattlesnake, and why they’re important to the natural ecosystems of the planet. 87,420 People Couldn't Ace This Quiz Think You Can? What is a Rattlesnake? Rattlesnakes grow from two to eight feet and are venomous with fangs at the front of their jaws. Rattlesnakes are a type of New World pit viper. They range in size from just two feet long to over eight feet long. Their typical prey includes mice, rats, prairie dogs, gophers, birds, rabbits, lizards, and even other snakes. They’re most active in the spring, summer, and fall months. Most species brumate throughout the winter in dens that may contain hundreds of other snakes. They’re recognizable by the rattles on the ends of their tails, their triangular heads, and the enormous pair of retractable fangs at the front of their mouth. Where Do Rattlesnakes Live? Rattlesnakes might be associated with the desert, but they’re actually found throughout North America, Central America, and the northern half of South America. They’re capable of surviving in deserts, grasslands, shrublands, forests, and even swamps. Rattlesnakes don’t do well in intense heat, or intense cold, so they aren’t found in alpine regions like mountains. This surprising range means that not only do rattlesnakes live all over, they also come into contact with water frequently. Can Rattlesnakes Swim? Rattlesnakes are not as aquatic as other snakes like cottonmouths, but can swim. It may seem strange, but rattlesnakes can, and do, swim. In fact, they’re good swimmers. Unlike anacondas, they don’t spend their lives in the water, but they’re more than capable of crossing a stream, or even a lake, to get to where they’re going. Because rattlesnakes are cold blooded, they’re not likely to swim in high, alpine lakes unless something forces them to take the plunge. Rattlesnakes swim to find food, pursue mates, or find a new place to live. They don’t swim to hunt, so fish don’t have to worry. Can Rattlesnakes Bite While Swimming? Rattlesnakes are pit vipers, they rely on their envemonating bite to immobilize and kill prey. Because they’re so highly specialized to bite, they can only bite from one specific position, the coil. Rattlesnakes that are stretched out long, like a ruler, can’t effectively bite. When they swim, they have to stretch out like this, and use all of their muscles to stay afloat. So, while rattlesnakes are capable of swimming, they’re not able to bite at the same time. With that being said, it’s best not to approach any snake you see in the water. Just because they’re not in the best position to bite doesn’t mean they won’t act to defend themselves if threatened. Do not attempt to handle, catch, touch, or pick up a waterborne rattlesnake. Do All Rattlesnakes Swim? Not only can all rattlesnakes swim, all snakes in general are capable of swimming. Even those that live in the driest deserts could swim if they needed to. Snake bodies are particularly well adapted for propelling themselves through the water. So, no matter what species of rattlesnake you’re looking at, remember that it can swim through the water just as easily as it can move over the land. Can Rattlesnakes Swim in the Ocean? Rattlesnakes have no problem swimming in saltwater. They can swim equally well in freshwater as well as the ocean. In fact, rattlesnakes often swim across salty waters in places like Florida in order to get from land mass to land mass. They may be good swimmers, but that doesn’t mean that rattlesnakes cross oceans; they generally swim only short distances, and only when necessary. What to Do if You Encounter a Rattlesnake in the Water Rattlesnakes are found across much of the United States and live in a variety of habitats. Let’s say you’re swimming in a lake, or even in shallow coastal waters, and you see a rattlesnake swimming by. What do you do? The answer depends on which way the snake is going. If it’s coming towards you, get out of its way. Remember, the snake isn’t hunting you, it’s just trying to get from point A to point B. Don’t try to touch it or interfere with it, even a swimming snake can still bite if it gets desperate. As long as you’re a safe distance away, sit back and relax, and enjoy the privilege of seeing something so special and rare. Rattlesnakes and the Environment Whether you see a rattlesnake swimming or slithering along the ground, it’s important to remember that it’s a dangerous wild animal, and should be treated with caution and respect. Unless they’re coming into your yard, or posing a direct threat to you, your children, or your pet, rattlesnakes should be left alone. They’re important parts of the ecosystem; rattlesnakes are responsible for keeping local rodent populations culled. Without them, small mammals like mice and rabbits would quickly overpopulate, eat everything in sight, then starve. Discover the "Monster" Snake 5X Bigger than an Anaconda Every day A-Z Animals sends out some of the most incredible facts in the world from our free newsletter. Want to discover the 10 most beautiful snakes in the world, a "snake island" where you're never more than 3 feet from danger, or a "monster" snake 5X larger than an anaconda? Then sign up right now and you'll start receiving our daily newsletter absolutely free. The Featured Image Brandi is a professional writer by day and a fiction writer by night. Her nonfiction work focuses on animals, nature, and conservation. She holds degrees in English and Anthropology, and spends her free time writing horror, scifi, and fantasy stories.

With that being said, it’s best not to approach any snake you see in the water. Just because they’re not in the best position to bite doesn’t mean they won’t act to defend themselves if threatened. Do not attempt to handle, catch, touch, or pick up a waterborne rattlesnake. Do All Rattlesnakes Swim? Not only can all rattlesnakes swim, all snakes in general are capable of swimming. Even those that live in the driest deserts could swim if they needed to. Snake bodies are particularly well adapted for propelling themselves through the water. So, no matter what species of rattlesnake you’re looking at, remember that it can swim through the water just as easily as it can move over the land. Can Rattlesnakes Swim in the Ocean? Rattlesnakes have no problem swimming in saltwater. They can swim equally well in freshwater as well as the ocean. In fact, rattlesnakes often swim across salty waters in places like Florida in order to get from land mass to land mass. They may be good swimmers, but that doesn’t mean that rattlesnakes cross oceans; they generally swim only short distances, and only when necessary. What to Do if You Encounter a Rattlesnake in the Water Rattlesnakes are found across much of the United States and live in a variety of habitats. Let’s say you’re swimming in a lake, or even in shallow coastal waters, and you see a rattlesnake swimming by. What do you do? The answer depends on which way the snake is going. If it’s coming towards you, get out of its way. Remember, the snake isn’t hunting you, it’s just trying to get from point A to point B. Don’t try to touch it or interfere with it, even a swimming snake can still bite if it gets desperate.

yes

Wilderness Exploration

Are all snakes able to swim?

yes_statement

all "snakes" are "able" to "swim".. every "snake" is capable of "swimming".

https://www.pawtracks.com/other-animals/snakes-swimming/

Some snakes can swim – here's how to tell if yours is one of them

Some snakes can swim – here’s how to tell if yours is one of them It’s true, they’re real. Whether your reaction is more excitement or terror, this idea is surely noteworthy. Snakes are known escape artists as it is, but with the ability to swim, they can go just about anywhere. In fact, there are several species of snakes who are known for their aquatic talents, but how do you know if your pet snake is one of them? Recommended Videos It’s not difficult to find out whether your snake, or any snake for that matter, is capable of swimming. There are certain physical features that make certain serpents more accustomed to the water than others, from the shape of the head to the thickness of their body. Read on to learn more about swimming snakes and what makes them so unique. What snakes can swim? If you’re a little freaked out by the thought of swimming snakes in the first place, this will not be good news for you: All snakes can swim. If you’re a snake owner, though, this might come as a cool surprise! You didn’t know that all snakes can swim, did you? The S-like motion that propels their bodies on land is the same that pushes them forward in the water, though some snake species are better known for their aquatic skills than others. Here’s the catch: Different species of snake swim in different ways. In the southeastern United States, for example, two very similar species can be told apart by the unique ways they swim. While there are other characteristics that differentiate the water snake from the water moccasin, also known as the cottonmouth, swimming is one of the more easily recognizable traits. The venomous cottonmouth snake tends to swim near the surface of the water, with its head lifted above the water — you can see these snakes “sitting up” this way on land, too. The water snake, on the other hand, will remain completely horizontal under the water, much deeper down than the cottonmouth. Of course, this is more of an observation than a rule of thumb, as all snakes can swim beneath the water, not just venomous ones. It’s thought that venomous snakes are more frequently at the surface of the water due to their increased buoyancy. While this hasn’t proven to be true, you will find a lot of information about this theory online. Even cottonmouths and other venomous snakes can swim with their body fully submerged, which can be confusing since it doesn’t either follow or dispute this “rule.” How to tell if your snake can swim Do you have a snake? Congratulations — you can now brag about how your pet can swim (the keyword here being can; whether a snake will swim is completely up to the species, the individual, and the situation). Nonaquatic snakes who are swimming may be hunting for their next meal or escaping from a predator, which are not situations your pet should be running into anytime soon (or at all). If you’re trying to identify whether your snake is a species of water snake, however, there are many more specific things to look for. Water snakes make great pets, too, so it’s not impossible that you have one of these cool serpents as your new scaly friend. You can find them at a lot of pet stores thanks to their relatively small size. Water snakes belong to the genus Nerodia, which contains nine species, all native to North America. You’ll be able to identify a water snake more easily if you have them while they’re young, since juvenile water snakes tend to lose a lot of their bright colors as they age. As adults, according to the National Wildlife Federation, northern water snakes have dark bands that cause them to be mistaken for the venomous cottonmouth in many parts of the U.S. University of Florida’s Johnson Lab created a handy chart to help naturegoers tell the difference between a cottonmouth and a water snake; these characteristics include neck size, head shape, and the presence of heat-sensing pits in the face. Water snakes will have a sleek, slender neck and head. Although some have more flattened head shapes, their heads will not be wider than their necks, unlike with cottonmouths and other pit vipers. Cottonmouths may have a wide or arrow-shaped head and a much thicker body than their nonvenomous neighbors. One key physical difference between these two species is the heat-sensing pit organs that cottonmouths have to help them sense their prey’s body heat when they can’t see in the dark. Because water snakes tend to snack on cold-blooded fish and reptiles — aka animals you will find near the water — they do not have a biological need for heat-sensing pits. Whether you have a water snake, another snake, or no snake at home, we hope you now know some interesting trivia about these talented swimming reptiles. Who knows? Maybe this new information will help you build an amazing snake habitat in your home. Given their many similarities to other, more dangerous, serpent species, it’s important to be educated about these truly cool but often misunderstood reptiles. Is your fish tank for bettas too small? Here’s are the do’s and don’ts of betta care Care tips to keep your new betta fish happy in the right size tank While the betta craze may have died down a little, you still see many of these beautiful blue fish in homes and in stores. It's true that they make great pets, even for a novice aquarist, since they don't require an overly extensive tank setup and often prefer to be alone. But just because they work well for a newbie doesn't mean you can dive in without any research. We're here with what you need to know about betta fish care and fish tanks for bettas. Here are the do's and don'ts for bettas. What do I need to know about taking care of my betta fish? Do research fish breeders It all starts with the betta egg, and even the mom and dad. Just like with a puppy, you want to ensure your fishy has had a good life from hatching. There are tons of ethical breeders out there, but you can find some shady ones, too. In general, you want to avoid stores that have them crammed into tiny containers and cycled in and out every day. Do your research about local pet fish stores in your area or check out some of the more reputable ones online. Wondering what to feed baby birds? Here are 5 things you should never offer them Don't add these foods to your baby bird's meal plan Even though baby birds look like little dinosaurs, they aren't quite as tough. Since they're not actually velociraptors, you can't throw just anything down their gullets. Chicks have very specific food needs that will change as they age and also vary from species to species. While it can be tricky to manage your brand-new birdie's diet, we're here to tell you what to feed a baby bird. When choosing your avian's menu, avoid these five foods that may harm the little critter. What can you feed a baby bird? In the wild, newborn birds eat basically what their mamas and papas do, only all chewed up. You probably shouldn't go through the regurgitation process, but you'll replicate this type of feeding in your home without the ick factor. The tiniest of birds eat formula when they live away from their parents. In addition to being their favorite food (well, actually their only food), this will help you bond with your pet. Can snakes swim? Here’s what you need to know about how these legless creatures move through water Yes, all snakes can swim — here's how they do it Love snakes or hate them, they're fascinating creatures. Unlike other reptiles, snakes don't have arms or legs. Yet, even without appendages, these slitherers can move across many different types of terrain, often very quickly. They can make their way up mountainsides and climb to the tops of trees. Some even leap and glide from branch to branch! But have you ever wondered, "Can snakes swim?" -- and which snakes can swim? Well, the answer, interestingly, is all of them.

Some snakes can swim – here’s how to tell if yours is one of them It’s true, they’re real. Whether your reaction is more excitement or terror, this idea is surely noteworthy. Snakes are known escape artists as it is, but with the ability to swim, they can go just about anywhere. In fact, there are several species of snakes who are known for their aquatic talents, but how do you know if your pet snake is one of them? Recommended Videos It’s not difficult to find out whether your snake, or any snake for that matter, is capable of swimming. There are certain physical features that make certain serpents more accustomed to the water than others, from the shape of the head to the thickness of their body. Read on to learn more about swimming snakes and what makes them so unique. What snakes can swim? If you’re a little freaked out by the thought of swimming snakes in the first place, this will not be good news for you: All snakes can swim. If you’re a snake owner, though, this might come as a cool surprise! You didn’t know that all snakes can swim, did you? The S-like motion that propels their bodies on land is the same that pushes them forward in the water, though some snake species are better known for their aquatic skills than others. Here’s the catch: Different species of snake swim in different ways. In the southeastern United States, for example, two very similar species can be told apart by the unique ways they swim. While there are other characteristics that differentiate the water snake from the water moccasin, also known as the cottonmouth, swimming is one of the more easily recognizable traits. The venomous cottonmouth snake tends to swim near the surface of the water, with its head lifted above the water — you can see these snakes “sitting up” this way on land, too. The water snake, on the other hand, will remain completely horizontal under the water, much deeper down than the cottonmouth. Of course, this is more of an observation than a rule of thumb, as all snakes can swim beneath the water, not just venomous ones.

yes

Wilderness Exploration

Are all snakes able to swim?

yes_statement

all "snakes" are "able" to "swim".. every "snake" is capable of "swimming".

https://www.animalfoodplanet.com/how-do-snakes-swim/

How Do Snakes Swim? Amazing!

How Do Snakes Swim? Snakes use lateral, wave-like motions to create an S shape while swimming. These motions begin at the top of the snake’s head and proceed down their body, with the tail acting as a propeller to propel them in the water. How Snakes Swim Before you can understand how a snake swims, you must understand how a snake moves. Most of us who work with snakes are familiar with their four types of movements. However, if you don’t spend a lot of time with snakes, if you were asked how a snake moves, you might be inclined to say it slithers. This isn’t incorrect. There is just a bit more to it than that. Every inch of a snake’s body has a muscle under it. Along with its scales, it moves across the terrain by using both the muscles and its scales working together. Rectilinear Method The snake moves ahead in a straight path while using this mode of movement. Slowly crawling ahead, the snake primarily utilizes the wide scales on its tummy to grasp at the ground and propel itself forward. Sidewinding It is most common for snakes to employ this sort of motion when they are on a surface that is difficult for their stomach scales to grasp, such as sand and mud. The snake jerks its neck forward and twists its body in the same manner as it moves its neck forward. To keep this movement going, the snake tosses its head forward another time while it pushes its body ahead. Concertina Method In confined places, it is possible to watch a snake moving by employing the concertina approach. It sounds remarkably like the way an inchworm moves, which is a good thing. In order to stabilize its rear end, the snake presses against the earth or an item for a period of time. With the remaining part of its body, it then pushes itself forward. Afterward, it stoops its head and kind of clings onto the earth uses its chin while scooching the rest of its body forward. Serpentine Method This is the type of movement that you would expect to see when you imagine a snake slithering along a surface. This movement has a wavelike motion to it. The snake will push off from a resting position from just about anything near it. Then it continues to use that momentum to keep moving ahead, oscillating its body, and pushing itself forward with its belly scales. Not All Snakes Are Great Swimmers While most snakes are capable of moving on land, this is not the case when it comes to traveling in, or across, bodies of water. Certain snakes, like sea snakes, have evolved to live in an aquatic habitat. These snakes are highly skilled swimmers. The swimming abilities of several freshwater snakes are superior to those of their mostly terrestrial relatives. Some snakes, such as the water moccasin, are extremely buoyant, making them ideal for swimming. They float on the water’s surface and raise their heads above the surface to observe their surroundings. Swimming near the surface of the water or just below the surface of the water is typical for other water snakes or any snake going for a swim. There are certain snakes that love spending most of their waking hours underwater. These snakes, known as sea snakes, are capable of remaining underwater for close to an hour. They have also evolved flattened tails that act as a paddle in the water. They are able to swim rapidly because of this adaptability. Those snakes who have evolved to live near or in the water have bodies that are a bit flatter, and some have tails that resemble paddles. This, of course, allows them to dart forward and move more quickly and effectively than land snakes. Likewise, certain sea snakes have been known to travel long distances, even from one island to another! As a result, snakes are not deterred by water. They can all swim employing the same four motions that drive them across land (and through forests and mountains), even without limbs! Even though some snakes skim through water and others plunge into it, they all manage to navigate through this difficult part of their habitat. A lot of snake owners use their bathtub – I’m not fond of the idea, so I purchased a plastic kiddy pool, and that works just as good. Can Snakes Drown Snakes have lungs, whether it’s one or two, but they do use them for breathing, so yes, snakes can drown. The same goes for sea snakes, who, despite being able to hold their breaths underwater, must resurface to breathe. Pet snakes can also drown. They have drowned in bathtubs while swimming, and even in water dishes. If you own pet snakes, never leave them alone in the water. Frequently Asked Questions about How Snakes Swim Do Poisonous Snakes Swim Atop the Water? You can find venomous snakes swimming on the water’s surface. Most of the serpents swimming on the water’s surface are considered poisonous. Do Swimming Pools Attract Snakes? Snakes are attracted to swimming pools. They enjoy a nice cool dip on a hot summer day as much as you do. In addition, if your yard has a lot of tall grass, it gives them a place to rest and even hunt. Conclusion Snakes are magnificent creatures, and they enjoy a swim just as much as you do. Keep a close eye on your pet snakes to keep them safe and keep a close eye out for them when in bodies of water. About Author Daniel Iseli This is Daniel, the researcher, and author behind the animal articles you have stumbled upon. Writing about animals is something I love and enjoy. I have always loved animals. In my childhood, I had cats and multiple greek turtles. My passion for animals obviously did not stop there, though! About Author Austin French Hello everybody! This is French, the author behind many of the animal articles you have just stumbled upon. Writing about critters of various sizes and shapes has been a wonderful experience so far! With a Bachelor’s of Science in Wildlife: Conservation and Management from Humboldt State University.

These snakes, known as sea snakes, are capable of remaining underwater for close to an hour. They have also evolved flattened tails that act as a paddle in the water. They are able to swim rapidly because of this adaptability. Those snakes who have evolved to live near or in the water have bodies that are a bit flatter, and some have tails that resemble paddles. This, of course, allows them to dart forward and move more quickly and effectively than land snakes. Likewise, certain sea snakes have been known to travel long distances, even from one island to another! As a result, snakes are not deterred by water. They can all swim employing the same four motions that drive them across land (and through forests and mountains), even without limbs! Even though some snakes skim through water and others plunge into it, they all manage to navigate through this difficult part of their habitat. A lot of snake owners use their bathtub – I’m not fond of the idea, so I purchased a plastic kiddy pool, and that works just as good. Can Snakes Drown Snakes have lungs, whether it’s one or two, but they do use them for breathing, so yes, snakes can drown. The same goes for sea snakes, who, despite being able to hold their breaths underwater, must resurface to breathe. Pet snakes can also drown. They have drowned in bathtubs while swimming, and even in water dishes. If you own pet snakes, never leave them alone in the water. Frequently Asked Questions about How Snakes Swim Do Poisonous Snakes Swim Atop the Water? You can find venomous snakes swimming on the water’s surface. Most of the serpents swimming on the water’s surface are considered poisonous. Do Swimming Pools Attract Snakes? Snakes are attracted to swimming pools. They enjoy a nice cool dip on a hot summer day as much as you do. In addition, if your yard has a lot of tall grass, it gives them a place to rest and even hunt.

yes

Wilderness Exploration

Are all snakes able to swim?

yes_statement

all "snakes" are "able" to "swim".. every "snake" is capable of "swimming".

https://www.expressnews.com/news/local/article/snake-expert-debunks-widely-shared-warning-of-11071582.php?cmpid=artem/lifestyle/travel-outdoors/article/google-search-debunks-canyon-lake-catfish-photo-11243049.php?cmpid=artem

Texas expert debunks viral Facebook post about venomous snakes ...

A viral social media tip about spotting venomous snakes in water has one Central Texas wildlife expert stumped. The image, which was posted by professional wildlife removal service The Snake Chaser on Facebook, claims that if a snake is swimming on top of water, it's likely venomous, having filled its lungs with air to be able to float. "If you encounter a snake on top of the water like the snake seen below [above], this is a good indicator of a venomous snake," reads the post. "Common water snakes swim with their bodies under the water so they can dive after fish." Matt Miklaw, a lead zookeeper at the Austin Zoo, told mySA.com the widely-shared meme fails to mention that all snakes can swim, and do so for different reasons. Miklaw, who specializes in snakes, said species swimming at the top of the water are non-aquatic, but could be venomous or non-venomous. He said any species of snake are "more than capable of diving under the water and will dive to get food or escape predation." "There really isn't any information to be had in terms of identifying a snake based on its position when swimming," he said. If swimmers do happen to see a snake taking a dip in the water, Miklaw suggests leaving it alone. "They aren't going to be aggressive in the water and the best thing to do is just slowly move away and let them go about their business," he said. Miklaw went on to reinforce the important role snakes fill in an ecosystem. "The important thing to remember is all snakes, venomous and nonvenomous, fill a very important ecological niche and help prevent all sorts of issues — including disease control — by keeping the rodent populations down. Space and respect is always the best advice when you stumble upon a snake." Non-venomous snakes who feel threatened will sometimes pretend to be venomous by flattening their head to look like a diamond. Other species will mimic rattlesnakes and shakes their tails in leaf debris. "So even those sort of rules for identifying species can be faulty," Miklaw said. Kelsey Bradshaw is a digital reporter for mySA. She was previously a reporting intern covering Texas politics and government from the Chronicle's Austin Bureau. She is a Texas State University graduate with degrees in journalism and business administration, and previously worked for the Austin American-Statesman, the San Antonio Express-News and the University Star.

A viral social media tip about spotting venomous snakes in water has one Central Texas wildlife expert stumped. The image, which was posted by professional wildlife removal service The Snake Chaser on Facebook, claims that if a snake is swimming on top of water, it's likely venomous, having filled its lungs with air to be able to float. "If you encounter a snake on top of the water like the snake seen below [above], this is a good indicator of a venomous snake," reads the post. "Common water snakes swim with their bodies under the water so they can dive after fish. " Matt Miklaw, a lead zookeeper at the Austin Zoo, told mySA.com the widely-shared meme fails to mention that all snakes can swim, and do so for different reasons. Miklaw, who specializes in snakes, said species swimming at the top of the water are non-aquatic, but could be venomous or non-venomous. He said any species of snake are "more than capable of diving under the water and will dive to get food or escape predation." "There really isn't any information to be had in terms of identifying a snake based on its position when swimming," he said. If swimmers do happen to see a snake taking a dip in the water, Miklaw suggests leaving it alone. "They aren't going to be aggressive in the water and the best thing to do is just slowly move away and let them go about their business," he said. Miklaw went on to reinforce the important role snakes fill in an ecosystem. "The important thing to remember is all snakes, venomous and nonvenomous, fill a very important ecological niche and help prevent all sorts of issues — including disease control — by keeping the rodent populations down. Space and respect is always the best advice when you stumble upon a snake. " Non-venomous snakes who feel threatened will sometimes pretend to be venomous by flattening their head to look like a diamond. Other species will mimic rattlesnakes and shakes their tails in leaf debris.

yes

Wilderness Exploration

Are all snakes able to swim?

yes_statement

all "snakes" are "able" to "swim".. every "snake" is capable of "swimming".

https://stjohnsriverecotours.com/index.php/blog/notesfromtheriver-cottonmouth

#NotesFromTheRiver - Cottonmouth!

#NotesFromTheRiver - Cottonmouth! When I was a kid, I once saw a movie (yes, movies did exist way back then!) set in a swampy area that was meant to be Florida, as only Hollywood could depict it. There was a dramatic scene wherein characters were trying to wade through waist-deep black water, and they were attacked--yes, attacked--by several water moccasins at once, and much shouting and snake biting and flinging away of serpents went on. I have no clue what the movie was, who starred in it, or anything else. I can, however, still picture that utterly ridiculous scene, which I knew to be utterly ridiculous even at that point in my life. Cottonmouths, or water moccasins, as they are also called, do not gang up on groups of people and rush toward them to attack. Nope. For one thing, like all venomous snakes, they do not like to waste their venom on animals they can't swallow. It's meant to be a way to subdue or kill prey, and is only used for defense when the snake decides it has no other choice. And a collective of snakes who aren't cornered or threatened are not going to swim toward animals way too big to eat and start biting them. That's just not how it works. It does, however, make for the kind of movie that helps instill a bitter hatred of all creatures scaly and legless. Particularly legless. After all, people are often willing to concede that some lizards are cute, and everyone loves a gecko, especially if they have Australian accents and sell auto insurance. But sadly, many, many people loathe and fear snakes, leading me to wonder if it really is the lack of legs that does it. I'm sincerely hoping that my #NotesFromTheRiver posts will eventually help some of you (and you know who you are) get past this extreme reaction to what are some of nature's most beautiful and interesting creatures. Today, we'll learn a bit about one of the more notorious of Florida's snakes, the cottonmouth, or water moccasin. And I chose the pictures above to open with, because they show the typical threat display of this much maligned snake, and that's where the term "cottonmouth" comes from. If you see this pale as cotton, gaping mouth in your path, back away. The snake is clearly saying "Don't tread on me," and it means it. Lots to tell you about this one, and I think I'll start with identification. For our purposes today, we will be focused on the Florida subspecies, Agkistrodon piscivorous conanti, a large, heavy-bodied snake, reaching lengths of 3 to 6 feet. The Florida cottonmouth is marked slightly differently from other cottonmouth subspecies, and happily for us, this makes it VERY easy to identify. There really is no reason to keep bashing every large, brownish snake swimming in or hanging around our lakes, rivers, and swamps. You can tell at a glance which is the snake you need to worry about. And 99% of the time, you don't need to go bashing that one, either. Just walk away, and you'll be fine. (It is a MYTH that moccasins will chase you. Again, they bite when they are cornered, stepped on, or picked up, as a defensive act, only. They will only move in your direction if you are between them, and the place they need to go. Leave them alone, and they'll give you the same courtesy. Really.) Juvenile Cottonmouth Now let's learn to identify the cottonmouth. Take a close look at the markings on this baby. Hmmm. I'm guessing you notice right away that the colorful pattern on this little guy does not in any way resemble the coloring of the two adult snakes pictured above. That's because moccasins start out all bright and beautiful, with varying degrees of reddish brown and tan banding, then gradually grow darker and plainer as they age. (BTW, in snake terminology, stripes run the length of the snake from head to tail. Bands encircle the snake from back to belly.) Since the coloration doesn't remain the same from young snakes to adults, we have to find another way to identify both the juveniles and the adult moccasins. And with our Florida subspecies, this is, as I said, very easy: It's all about the head of the snake. Young Cottonmouth This little guy is slightly older than the juvenile in the first picture. Look how much he has darkened up, already, and how indistinct his bands are becoming. He's even lost the bright yellow tail, too, which many baby snakes use as a colorful lure, when trying to catch dinner. Now focus on this guy's head. Notice the wide, dark brown cheek stripe running from his eye toward the back of the head. This is distinctive of all Florida cottonmouths, and is not seen on any other species of snake in the state, venomous or not. It is clearly visible in every phase of a cottonmouth's coloration, as well. In the water . . . . . . or out. Dark, nearly solid color body . . . . . . vivid juvenile coloration . . . . . . or anything in between, even from a distance. It's all in that wide, brown cheek stripe. Honest! Now let's take a look at the poor Brown Water Snake (Nerodia taxispilota). I say "poor" because this is a large, heavy bodied, brown snake that is forever being misidentified as a water moccasin, and beaten to smithereens by folks who ought to know better, but don't. (That won't be you, though, right? Because now you'll be able to see the difference, and besides, you would never go snake bashing for no reason, anyway. Would you?) Brown Water Snake (Nerodia taxispilota) Look closely at the snake above. It not only has a very distinct pattern of dark rectangles in staggered rows, which it retains from birth through adulthood, but check out that face. Here's a closer look. Check it out again. Harmless Brown Water Snake Do you see a wide, brown cheek stripe on this head? Nope. Therefore, this is not a cottonmouth, or water moccasin, or dangerous snake of any sort. Unless you grab it, in which case it will definitely bite the heck out of you with its tiny, sharp teeth. But then so will a squirrel, a bird, or any other wild critter that doesn't want you grabbing it. This snake is NOT venomous, and would really just like to be left alone. So one wonders why brown water snakes so often end up like this one: This person bashed a harmless brown water snake with his garden rake, because he thought it was a "deadly" water moccasin, and thus had to be destroyed. Folks, this isn't a good way for any snake to end up, but especially one as harmless as a brown water snake. I can clearly see the pattern in this photo, which I'll describe again below, and enough of the head to know exactly what this is. Or was. I realize not all of you will feel as sad as I do when I see things like this, but hopefully most of you understand there was no need for it. Mostly, there's no need for it, even when it IS a moccasin, but this poor snake was just hangin' out, hopin' to catch a fish or two. Almost always, the best course of action when you see a snake you can't identify is to admire it from a distance, and then just walk away. Here is another picture of the harmless brown water snake, showing its very distinctive pattern. Brown Water Snake in Typical Pose Along a Riverbank Notice the distinct dark brown rectangles marching down the center of the snake's back. They are offset along each side by another row of rectangles, placed "in between" the ones on top, or staggered, more or less. It doesn't matter if the snake is four feet long . . . . . . or just a wee, little guy. That pattern and coloration is exactly the same, and very obvious. (As is that lack of cheek stripe). Okay, that takes care of the easiest way to tell cottonmouths from any other snake in Florida, spotted on land or in the water. Time now for a few interesting moccasin related facts. This range map is divided up by moccasin subspecies, so you can see that moccasins in general, inhabit most of the southeastern United States. The red area is, of course, for our Florida cottonmouth subspecies. Cottonmouths eat a wide variety of prey animals, including fish, frogs, snakes, turtles, birds and their eggs, mice, rats, squirrels, and even young alligators. They are even known to eat carrion at times, being opportunists where their meals are concerned which is something quite rare among snakes. The one below has ended up in cottonmouth heaven. A shallow, muddy pond filled with baby catfish. Yum, yum. Oh, and by the way, you see what clearly stands out about this snake, don'tcha? Yep. That bold, brown cheek stripe. Moccasins, like most if not all pit vipers, bear live young. They can give birth to as many as 16 to 20 at a time, though it's usually less. The young are born fully equipped with venom sacs, and capable of delivering a very unpleasant bite right from the start. Leave the handling of all venomous snakes, no matter how small, to the pros. An interesting tidbit for you. Female cottonmouths can reproduce without the assistance of males. Yep. This is called parthenogenesis, and does happen. Imagine! I'm not going to go into all the technical details involved in this unusual process. I can only wonder why this would be necessary, and I suspect that like most animals, including human beings, it would not be the preferred method. But that's another topic, altogether. Cottonmouths Doin' the Dance of Love Now let's talk about those dreaded snakebites. Moccasin venom is primarily cytotoxic and hemotoxic in nature, though it is a complex mixture, like most snake venom. This means that a bite affects body tissue and blood. Tissue damage, or necrosis, can be severe enough to require amputation, and a bite is certainly something you want to avoid. While moccasin bites are more dangerous than those of copperheads, for instance, deaths are rare. But suffice it to say, being bitten by a cottonmouth is not a pleasant experience. Therefore, watch where you step and where you put your hands when you are in the swamps, woods, or other areas where snakes are likely to be. This makes common sense, anyway. Don't go poking your hands into holes or under logs. That's just asking for trouble. Moccasins are often spotted swimming, but contrary to what many people think, all snakes can and do swim at times. And several other species spend a great deal of their time in the water. Therefore, it's reasonable to think you might spot a cottonmouth in any body of water in Florida. I've read many times that moccasins tend to swim with their bodies on top of the water, and non-venomous snakes just hold their heads up. These next three photos seem to support this idea. Cottonmouth Swimming With Body Above Water Surface And another one. Non-venomous Banded Water Snake Swimming With Just Head Above Surface. So far, the books are right. Uh-oh! What's this? A photo of a beautiful and completely non-venomous yellow rat snake, taken by Doug Little, swimming with its body above the water, and thus proving a long held theory of mine: Snakes don't read books. A few more photos for you, because . . . cool! And that about wraps this up. Hope you've enjoyed these photos, and have learned a few new things, including how to recognize a Florida cottonmouth. And remember, when out and about, keep your eyes open. You never know what you might see--or what might see you! ~~~ Stay tuned for next week's post. Not sure what it will feature yet, but it's certain it will include some great photos. See you then! I know what you mean, but it IS a very effective way to stop people in their tracks, which works well for both the snake and the person. You do NOT want to step on this guy, because he will nail you, and that's a real bad thing. So all in all, a pretty effective warning, I think. And yes, little snakes are so cute. At least to me. Thanks for stopping by today, Mae! Always good to see you here. (Or anywhere! ) I know what you mean, but it IS a very effective way to stop people in their tracks, which works well for both the snake and the person. You do NOT want to step on this guy, because he will nail you, and that's a real bad thing. So all in all, a pretty effective warning, I think. And yes, little snakes are so cute. At least to me. Thanks for stopping by today, Mae! Always good to see you here. (Or anywhere! :) ) Even though I live in Pennsylvania, I stumbled across your article while researching snakes. Thank you for clearing up a lot of misconceptions. Very nice to read some plainspoken truth! And I have to say, I literally LOL'd when I read the part that "snakes don't read books" Even though I live in Pennsylvania, I stumbled across your article while researching snakes. Thank you for clearing up a lot of misconceptions. Very nice to read some plainspoken truth! And I have to say, I literally LOL'd when I read the part that "snakes don't read books" So glad you enjoyed the post, Ryan, and it's funny how those snakes refuse to read our books, isn't it? After all the trouble we go to to write them and include photos and everything! Why, I've heard they don't even read this blog! IN all seriousness ... well, as serious as I get, anyway ... I had a great time with this one. I do love my snakes, even more than I love birds, and that's a lot. So it was fun to share some ID tips and a few tidbits that I hope were interesting and informative to readers. Thanks so much for taking the time to let me know you enjoyed it! I'm hoping to pick up blogging again very soon. I suspect break time's about over. Hope to see you here again! So glad you enjoyed the post, Ryan, and it's funny how those snakes refuse to read our books, isn't it? After all the trouble we go to to write them and include photos and everything! Why, I've heard they don't even read this blog! :o IN all seriousness ... well, as serious as I get, anyway ... I had a great time with this one. I do love my snakes, even more than I love birds, and that's a lot. So it was fun to share some ID tips and a few tidbits that I hope were interesting and informative to readers. Thanks so much for taking the time to let me know you enjoyed it! I'm hoping to pick up blogging again very soon. I suspect break time's about over. Hope to see you here again! :)

While moccasin bites are more dangerous than those of copperheads, for instance, deaths are rare. But suffice it to say, being bitten by a cottonmouth is not a pleasant experience. Therefore, watch where you step and where you put your hands when you are in the swamps, woods, or other areas where snakes are likely to be. This makes common sense, anyway. Don't go poking your hands into holes or under logs. That's just asking for trouble. Moccasins are often spotted swimming, but contrary to what many people think, all snakes can and do swim at times. And several other species spend a great deal of their time in the water. Therefore, it's reasonable to think you might spot a cottonmouth in any body of water in Florida. I've read many times that moccasins tend to swim with their bodies on top of the water, and non-venomous snakes just hold their heads up. These next three photos seem to support this idea. Cottonmouth Swimming With Body Above Water Surface And another one. Non-venomous Banded Water Snake Swimming With Just Head Above Surface. So far, the books are right. Uh-oh! What's this? A photo of a beautiful and completely non-venomous yellow rat snake, taken by Doug Little, swimming with its body above the water, and thus proving a long held theory of mine: Snakes don't read books. A few more photos for you, because . . . cool! And that about wraps this up. Hope you've enjoyed these photos, and have learned a few new things, including how to recognize a Florida cottonmouth. And remember, when out and about, keep your eyes open. You never know what you might see--or what might see you! ~~~ Stay tuned for next week's post. Not sure what it will feature yet, but it's certain it will include some great photos. See you then! I know what you mean, but it IS a very effective way to stop people in their tracks, which works well for both the snake and the person.

yes

Wilderness Exploration

Are all snakes able to swim?

no_statement

not all "snakes" are "able" to "swim".. some "snakes" cannot "swim".

https://www.pawtracks.com/other-animals/how-do-snakes-swim/

Yes, all snakes can swim — here's how they do it

Can snakes swim? Here’s what you need to know about how these legless creatures move through water Yes, all snakes can swim — here's how they do it Love snakes or hate them, they’re fascinating creatures. Unlike other reptiles, snakes don’t have arms or legs. Yet, even without appendages, these slitherers can move across many different types of terrain, often very quickly. They can make their way up mountainsides and climb to the tops of trees. Some even leap and glide from branch to branch! But have you ever wondered, “Can snakes swim?” — and which snakes can swim? Well, the answer, interestingly, is all of them. Recommended Videos And no, swimming ability doesn’t depend on whether a snake is venomous or not. Some swim partially submerged with only their heads above the water, and others with practically their entire bodies gliding on the surface. In the article below, we’ll discuss exactly how and why some of these serpents go for a dive and others ride the waves. Snakes move in four ways To understand how snakes can swim, you need to know how they move at all. A snake’s entire body is lined with muscle underneath its scales, and it uses those muscles and scales in combination to progress across the landscape. Here are the four ways snakes move. Concertina method In tight spaces, one might observe a snake using the concertina method to propel himself forward. It’s a bit like how an inchworm moves, actually. First, the snake anchors the rear of its body by pressing against the ground or an object. It then pushes forward with the rest of its body. Then it drops its head and sort of hangs onto the ground with its chin while skootching the rest of its body forward. Rectilinear method In this method, the snake creeps forward in a straight line. It’s a slow crawl, and the snake basically uses the broad scales on its stomach to clutch the earth and push itself forward. Serpentine method This is the kind of movement that you normally think of when you picture a snake slithering across the ground — wavy. The snake pushes off from a resting state from just about anything next it. It then uses momentum to stay in motion, undulating its body and using its belly scales to push itself forward. Sidewinding Snakes primarily use this type of motion when they’re on a surface that’s hard for their stomach scales to grip, such as mud or sand. The snake will throw its head forward and wriggle its body in the same direction. As its body moves, the snake throws its head forward yet again, so its motion continues. How do snakes swim? The answer is that snakes use nearly the same motions in water as they do on land. When you see a snake essentially bodysurfing across the top of the water, it’s most often using the serpentine method discussed above. That’s true whether on a pond, a lake, or the sea The snake uses the surface tension of the water combined with its movement to stay afloat. When a snake undulates in the water, drawing what amounts to an “S” with its body, it applies force to the water behind it. That force propels the snake forward through the water. Not all snakes swim as well as others Although most snakes move quite well on land, the same cannot be said for moving in or across the water. Of course, certain snake species have adapted to an aquatic environment, such as sea snakes. These guys are expert swimmers. Certain freshwater snake species are also better swimmers than their mostly terrestrial counterparts. Snakes that have adapted to a life near or in water have bodies that are a little more flattened, and some even have tails that may remind you of a paddle. Of course, this helps them dart forward and move faster and more efficiently than land-based snakes. Additionally, some sea snakes are known to travel great distances, sometimes from island to island! So, water is no barrier to snakes. All of them can swim using the same four movements that propel them over land (and trees and mountains) even without limbs. Some snakes skim and some submerge to get through water, but all of them can navigate this challenging part of their environment. It was a few weeks after adding live rock to his saltwater aquarium that longtime aquarist Jeff Kurtz noticed rust-colored flecks on one of the rocks and the glass nearby. In a Tropical Fish Magazine article, Kurtz writes that at first he thought the flecks were just a form of coralline algae. Then he realized that they were all the same shape and moving. Flatworms had invaded his fish tank. Flatworms can become a problem in any home aquarium. They typically hitch a ride into the fish tank on new materials like plants and rocks and can also be attached to fish or invertebrates introduced to the tank. Rattiya Thongdu Types of flatworms seen in fish tanks Several different types of flatworms can be found in home aquariums. What you can learn about your guinea pig from watching their body language Believe it or not, our animals communicate with us almost constantly (even if we don't always understand). We may pick up on their barks, meows, chirps, and tweets after a while, but they also try to talk to us using body language. Your guinea pig will make a few noises that are worth learning, like his purr, whistle, and coo. However, you need to get used to his other methods of communication as well, which will often be his preferred ones. Take the time to learn his various behaviors -- everything from the delightful popcorning to the warning signs, like biting (that one is pretty obvious). Use this guide to guinea pig body language to help you decipher your sweet new pet. Popcorning We'd like to start with the happiest, and cutest, of guinea pig postures. As the name suggests, your piggy will often resemble a piece of popcorn by bouncing up and down repeatedly. You probably already guessed that this means your pet feels overwhelming happiness and excitement. You'll mostly see him do his joyful jump when he's young and has newly joined your family, but it might happen later in life as well. Backing away or freezing Likewise, you can probably surmise that these movements typically indicate your critter's nervousness or fear. When you first bring your new rodent home, it'll take a while for both of you to get used to each other. During that time, you should tread carefully and let him come to you rather than picking him up when he's frightened. Don't make any sudden movements if you see him freeze as that will just startle him further. Strutting and yawning Well, this one's tricky. It might look cute and funny, but shuffling side to side or showing his teeth actually means your guinea pig is going into fighting mode. Your animal won't usually do this to you but likely to another guinea to assert his dominance. Watch out! This could mean a scuffle is on the way and you need to be aware. Can snakes hear? Pet owners and reptile enthusiasts have asked this for a long time. It's been thought that these slithering creatures don't hear anything at all, in part because they don't seem to have ears and don't respond to noise the way humans do. But that doesn't mean they have no ability to recognize sounds. Instead, they hear and feel differently than us in a few key ways. This will be important to know so you can understand how your snake experiences the world around you and how she senses the things you do. Do snakes have ears? You'll notice that while your snake doesn't have ear flaps, she does still have two holes in her head just behind the eyes. Inside is a partial ear that allows her to register at least some sounds. However, she doesn't have eardrums, just bones that resonate and send information to her brain. That has a distinct impact on which noises she will pick up—very different ones than you'd recognize as a mammal with much more developed ears. How do snakes hear? Our outer ears help direct noise, and you'll see this in action if you watch your dog perk up or rotate their ears to better hear something. Your snake lacks this ability, so she needs to rely on other ways to pick up audio cues. In fact, snakes don't so much hear sound, but they feel it through vibrations. The lower jaw helps the snake receive these waves, and by placing her head on the ground, she can determine the direction of the waves. Therefore, snakes detect soundwaves that move through a solid material rather than the air (though recent research indicates they do hear a little bit through the air as well, just like mammals). Experts believe that detecting vibrations helps snakes catch prey by feeling where it's moving.

Can snakes swim? Here’s what you need to know about how these legless creatures move through water Yes, all snakes can swim — here's how they do it Love snakes or hate them, they’re fascinating creatures. Unlike other reptiles, snakes don’t have arms or legs. Yet, even without appendages, these slitherers can move across many different types of terrain, often very quickly. They can make their way up mountainsides and climb to the tops of trees. Some even leap and glide from branch to branch! But have you ever wondered, “Can snakes swim?” — and which snakes can swim? Well, the answer, interestingly, is all of them. Recommended Videos And no, swimming ability doesn’t depend on whether a snake is venomous or not. Some swim partially submerged with only their heads above the water, and others with practically their entire bodies gliding on the surface. In the article below, we’ll discuss exactly how and why some of these serpents go for a dive and others ride the waves. Snakes move in four ways To understand how snakes can swim, you need to know how they move at all. A snake’s entire body is lined with muscle underneath its scales, and it uses those muscles and scales in combination to progress across the landscape. Here are the four ways snakes move. Concertina method In tight spaces, one might observe a snake using the concertina method to propel himself forward. It’s a bit like how an inchworm moves, actually. First, the snake anchors the rear of its body by pressing against the ground or an object. It then pushes forward with the rest of its body. Then it drops its head and sort of hangs onto the ground with its chin while skootching the rest of its body forward. Rectilinear method In this method, the snake creeps forward in a straight line. It’s a slow crawl, and the snake basically uses the broad scales on its stomach to clutch the earth and push itself forward.

yes

Entomology

Are all termites harmful to buildings?

yes_statement

all "termites" are "harmful" to "buildings".. "termites" pose a threat to "buildings".

https://www.accuratepestsolutions.com/termites

A Guide To Termites In California | Accurate Termite & Pest Solutions

Termite Identification & Prevention What are termites? Termites are wood-destroying insects that live in large social colonies. These wood-destroying insects feed primarily on decaying plants, tree stumps, fallen trees, and similar items containing cellulose, such as the wood of homes and businesses. Termite colonies split into three main castes: soldiers, workers, and reproductives. Within the termite colony, worker termites make up the vast majority of its members. These workers forage for cellulose, a material most commonly found in wood, and once they find a steady source of cellulose, they will harvest it and store it in their guts, where it turns into simple molecules used to feed their colony. Are termites dangerous? Termites are considered dangerous pests, but not in the way that most other pests are deemed dangerous. They don't bite or sting and cannot transmit harmful diseases. Instead, termite threats comes from structural damages to homes, businesses, and other buildings. When termites invade homes, they invade the structural wood. Given enough time, this can lead to massive and irreparable damages like dipping ceilings, bubbling paint, and bowing walls. Why do I have a termite problem? Termites are drawn to properties due to the presence of cellulose in the form of fallen trees, stumps, leaf debris, woodpiles, fences, wooden outbuildings, or our homes themselves. When choosing where to establish their colonies, scouting termite workers or winged, reproductive termites called swarmers will search the properties they invade for adequate food sources. Different species of termites are drawn in by different things. Hence their name, drywood termites will search out dry, hardwood to feed on, which they find within homes in the form of floors, structural timbers, or furniture. Subterranean termites and dampwood termites, on the other hand, are drawn to sources of water-damaged and often rotting wood. However, no matter what type of wood they prefer to feed on, all of these termites pose a significant threat to your home. Where are termites commonly found? Termites can be found living in colonies or tunneling inside wooden structures. However, despite common belief, some termites don't live inside the homes and businesses they invade. Instead, subterranean termites typically build their colonies deep underground and forage outward for food. Drywood and dampwood termites, on the other hand, build their homes right within the wood they have infested; drywood termites in dry wood and dampwood termites in damp wood. How do I get rid of termites? If termites have built a colony in or around your home, your best and only option to get rid of them is by calling the professionals. Here at Accurate Termite & Pest Solutions, we offer termite elimination and prevention in the form of Sentricon®, a long-lasting and efficient baiting system used to eliminate all termites on your property and keep future termites from invading. If you have any questions about our services or would like to schedule your free inspection, reach out to us today! How can I prevent termites in the future? Because of the nature in which termites invade wood, achieving termite prevention without help from a professional is nearly impossible. If you have termites in or around your home, the easiest and most stress-free option you have is to contact us at Accurate Termite & Pest Solutions and get started with our termite control services today! Request Your Free Inspection Today Complete the form below to schedule your no obligation inspection. Full Name: * Phone Number: * Email Address: * I Am Interested In: Preferred Date: Zip Code: Comments: Office: Do not fill in this field. These guys know what there doing! Very reasonable prices, and prompt on the job. I would use them again and again. :)

Termite Identification & Prevention What are termites? Termites are wood-destroying insects that live in large social colonies. These wood-destroying insects feed primarily on decaying plants, tree stumps, fallen trees, and similar items containing cellulose, such as the wood of homes and businesses. Termite colonies split into three main castes: soldiers, workers, and reproductives. Within the termite colony, worker termites make up the vast majority of its members. These workers forage for cellulose, a material most commonly found in wood, and once they find a steady source of cellulose, they will harvest it and store it in their guts, where it turns into simple molecules used to feed their colony. Are termites dangerous? Termites are considered dangerous pests, but not in the way that most other pests are deemed dangerous. They don't bite or sting and cannot transmit harmful diseases. Instead, termite threats comes from structural damages to homes, businesses, and other buildings. When termites invade homes, they invade the structural wood. Given enough time, this can lead to massive and irreparable damages like dipping ceilings, bubbling paint, and bowing walls. Why do I have a termite problem? Termites are drawn to properties due to the presence of cellulose in the form of fallen trees, stumps, leaf debris, woodpiles, fences, wooden outbuildings, or our homes themselves. When choosing where to establish their colonies, scouting termite workers or winged, reproductive termites called swarmers will search the properties they invade for adequate food sources. Different species of termites are drawn in by different things. Hence their name, drywood termites will search out dry, hardwood to feed on, which they find within homes in the form of floors, structural timbers, or furniture. Subterranean termites and dampwood termites, on the other hand, are drawn to sources of water-damaged and often rotting wood. However, no matter what type of wood they prefer to feed on, all of these termites pose a significant threat to your home. Where are termites commonly found?

yes

Entomology

Are all termites harmful to buildings?

yes_statement

all "termites" are "harmful" to "buildings".. "termites" pose a threat to "buildings".

https://ww3.rics.org/uk/en/journals/built-environment-journal/why-termites-remain-a-risk-.html

Why termites remain a risk | Journals | RICS

Termites are vital to nutrient cycling and soil structure in forests, grasslands and other natural ecosystems. But they are also the world's most economically harmful urban pest, given they can severely damage timber in buildings. Termites live predominantly in tropical and subtropical regions. However, as a result of human activity and the warming climate they are increasingly found in more northerly latitudes. Subterranean termites are endemic in southern Europe and France. Indeed, France has a so-called termite law to ensure buildings are constructed to safeguard against the insects. Recent infestations in Paris and Hamburg strongly suggest that temperature is not the limiting factor for subterranean termites. Instead, humans seem to be an important vector for infestations outside the insects' common habitat. Termites are challenging to control and eradicate because their workings may extend deep into the ground. They may derive cellulose for food not only from building timbers but also other woody biomass, including old formwork and tree root systems. Identifying termites and infestations The species that can damage timber in buildings are subterranean and drywood termites. There are a number of key distinctions, as shown in Table 1. Generally consume wood across the grain, consuming both spring and summer growth Often form large or interconnected colonies comprising thousands or millions of worker termites Colonies are often small, typically comprising fewer than 250 workers, although multiple colonies can exist in the same piece of wood Termite species are difficult to identify. Doing so normally requires the soldiers to be present, as the head shape is different for each species, or the winged form of termites (alates), which have distinct wing structures and vein patterns. Figure 1 can help identify the different kinds. The three key signs of infestation include damaged timber, live termites and termite workings. Note that timber that appears fine on the outside could still be hollow as result of termite activity inside. Damage can be checked by sounding, which involves tapping the timber with a solid object such as the handle of a screwdriver. How can termites reach the UK? There are a variety of ways termites could arrive in the UK, likely enabled by humans. Drywood termites are most likely to be imported from areas of endemic infestation, such as the southern US, the Caribbean, Africa or Asia. They can come in potted plants and timber items such as furniture, musical instruments, boats, chests and ornaments. Drywood termite populations cannot sustain themselves outdoors in the UK, though, so they can be effectively treated indoors either by localised chemical (fumigant) treatment or by careful removal and controlled incineration of infested timber. Subterranean termites can be imported on any cellulose-based material from areas where they have become established. Such materials can include softwood logs, storage timbers, crates and pallets. Even if subterranean termites are not detected during customs inspections, they can only establish successful colonies in optimal conditions. These include remaining undisturbed in preferably sandy soils, access to a source of moisture, appropriate temperatures, and an adequate supply of cellulose-based food sources to sustain growing colonies. There are many species of Retriculitermes subterranean termites found in Europe. One of the more common is Reticulitermes flavipes whose biogeographic range is documented to be moving northward. The nearest area of endemic infestation to the UK is in France, and infestations in Paris continue to expand. However, the part of the UK nearest to France with the highest frequency of transport with continental Europe is the South East of England, and this has predominantly loamy or clay loam soils. The indigenous European species tend not to prefer such soils, reducing the likelihood that they will successfully establish themselves. Termite infestation in the UK Although termites are not endemic in the UK, the subterranean termite Reticulitermes grassei were initially discovered in a private property in Saunton, Devon in 1994. In 1998 they were found to be present in large numbers across at least two properties in an elliptical zone around 110m wide and 30m deep. The termites were thought to have arrived in Saunton in infested furniture timbers or crates several decades earlier. They are likely to have come from southwestern France or Spain where the species is endemic. The insects were subject to an intensive eradication and monitoring programme, carried out by BRE and managed by the government. To minimise the risk of them spreading beyond the area, affected properties were prohibited from removing soil, wood and woody garden waste. The baiting was combined with annual monitoring inspection visits, the last of which in May 2021 found no sign of termite activity. That meant more than ten years had elapsed without detecting any activity. The programme therefore concluded in October with the declaration that, in all likelihood, eradication has been successful. This remains the only established infestation of subterranean termites recorded in the UK. Developing termite risk maps Given globalised transport of goods and the changing climate, we must remain vigilant to possible termite infestations. BRE's CLICKdesign project is therefore developing a performance-based specification for wood used in construction to help facilitate awareness of the exposure challenges to wood in construction, including from biotic sources such as termites, and how to managing them. As part of this project, the French technology institute FCBA is developing termite risk maps for Europe, as well as considering the potential impacts of climate change on building risks. The fact that only a single established infestation has ever been detected in the UK reflects the rarity of successful subterranean termite colonies. However, we must remain alert. Although it is unlikely termites will be found in the UK without being transferred on timber or other cellulose materials, milder winters will likely create conditions more favourable for subterranean infestations. This risk increases with heat sources near or in the ground, such as underfloor heating systems in concrete slabs. It is exacerbated where such slabs are a base for timber framing. Professionals such as building surveyors, builders, timber merchants and those in horticulture can be vigilant over possible termite infestation, as can the public and gardeners. BRE's website can help raise awareness, and offers a pro forma for reporting possible infestations to the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities. This will help provide a rapid response should termite infestations occur again in the UK.

Termites are vital to nutrient cycling and soil structure in forests, grasslands and other natural ecosystems. But they are also the world's most economically harmful urban pest, given they can severely damage timber in buildings. Termites live predominantly in tropical and subtropical regions. However, as a result of human activity and the warming climate they are increasingly found in more northerly latitudes. Subterranean termites are endemic in southern Europe and France. Indeed, France has a so-called termite law to ensure buildings are constructed to safeguard against the insects. Recent infestations in Paris and Hamburg strongly suggest that temperature is not the limiting factor for subterranean termites. Instead, humans seem to be an important vector for infestations outside the insects' common habitat. Termites are challenging to control and eradicate because their workings may extend deep into the ground. They may derive cellulose for food not only from building timbers but also other woody biomass, including old formwork and tree root systems. Identifying termites and infestations The species that can damage timber in buildings are subterranean and drywood termites. There are a number of key distinctions, as shown in Table 1. Generally consume wood across the grain, consuming both spring and summer growth Often form large or interconnected colonies comprising thousands or millions of worker termites Colonies are often small, typically comprising fewer than 250 workers, although multiple colonies can exist in the same piece of wood Termite species are difficult to identify. Doing so normally requires the soldiers to be present, as the head shape is different for each species, or the winged form of termites (alates), which have distinct wing structures and vein patterns. Figure 1 can help identify the different kinds. The three key signs of infestation include damaged timber, live termites and termite workings. Note that timber that appears fine on the outside could still be hollow as result of termite activity inside. Damage can be checked by sounding, which involves tapping the timber with a solid object such as the handle of a screwdriver.

no

Entomology

Are all termites harmful to buildings?

yes_statement

all "termites" are "harmful" to "buildings".. "termites" pose a threat to "buildings".

https://burnspestelimination.com/blog/terrible-termites-five-hidden-health-dangers-of-wood-eating-pests/

Are Termites Dangerous to Humans? | Burns Pest Elimination

Terrible Termites: 5 Hidden Health Dangers of Wood-Eating Pests Homes in southwestern cities like Tucson and Phoenix are especially prone to termite infestations. A termite colony can devour all wooden structures in a home, including wood furniture, in three to five years. Although these bugs are highly destructive, their objective is not to hurt humans. Rather, they want a steady source of food. However, they can be harmful to humans as a byproduct of pursuing their goals. Here are five health hazards termites pose as they go about the business of eating your house. 1. Bites and Stings A soldier termite can bite or sting you if it feels threatened or is handled. A termite bite won’t kill you, but it can itch, swell, burn and feel very painful, especially if you are predisposed to allergic reactions. 2. Allergies and Asthma Termite nests release particles and dust that can be spread about the home via your heating and air conditioning systems. These airborne contaminants can be irritating to those with asthma or allergies. Termite saliva and droppings can also cause allergic reactions in sensitized individuals or those with compromised immune systems. 3. Contact Dermatitis Termite colonies generate pellets, commonly referred to as frass, that are wood-colored and look like sawdust. When frass touches the skin, it can cause contact dermatitis and other allergic reactions. 4. Mold Spores Mold can appear in homes where these bugs have caused wooden structures to decompose. Termites like damp, humid environments where mold tends to grow, and when termites crawl or chew through wood, they spread mold as they go. Mold is a fungus that generates spores. Spores can collect in your indoor air, and they can create health problems when inhaled. Mold spores can cause migraine headaches, weakness, cough, sore throat, burning eyes and a runny nose. Certain types of mold spores can cause fungal infections like histoplasmosis and conditions like candida and hives. When exposed to mold spores, those with asthma can develop an illness called bronchiopulmonary aspergilloma which can produce symptoms of cystic fibrosis. Molds can even release toxic compounds that cause neurological problems such as memory loss. 5. Do-It-Yourself Termite Treatment Trying to treat a termite infestation yourself is asking for trouble. Termite pesticides, if applied correctly, are not harmful to humans. However, they can be and often are harmful to humans in the hands of an amateur. Pest control experts use specialized termite treatments that wipe out colonies and keep the bugs from coming back. To avoid an infestation or to make sure that you don’t already have one, schedule a termite inspection for your Phoenix or Tucson home every year with a certified pest control company like Burns Pest Elimination.

Terrible Termites: 5 Hidden Health Dangers of Wood-Eating Pests Homes in southwestern cities like Tucson and Phoenix are especially prone to termite infestations. A termite colony can devour all wooden structures in a home, including wood furniture, in three to five years. Although these bugs are highly destructive, their objective is not to hurt humans. Rather, they want a steady source of food. However, they can be harmful to humans as a byproduct of pursuing their goals. Here are five health hazards termites pose as they go about the business of eating your house. 1. Bites and Stings A soldier termite can bite or sting you if it feels threatened or is handled. A termite bite won’t kill you, but it can itch, swell, burn and feel very painful, especially if you are predisposed to allergic reactions. 2. Allergies and Asthma Termite nests release particles and dust that can be spread about the home via your heating and air conditioning systems. These airborne contaminants can be irritating to those with asthma or allergies. Termite saliva and droppings can also cause allergic reactions in sensitized individuals or those with compromised immune systems. 3. Contact Dermatitis Termite colonies generate pellets, commonly referred to as frass, that are wood-colored and look like sawdust. When frass touches the skin, it can cause contact dermatitis and other allergic reactions. 4. Mold Spores Mold can appear in homes where these bugs have caused wooden structures to decompose. Termites like damp, humid environments where mold tends to grow, and when termites crawl or chew through wood, they spread mold as they go. Mold is a fungus that generates spores. Spores can collect in your indoor air, and they can create health problems when inhaled. Mold spores can cause migraine headaches, weakness, cough, sore throat, burning eyes and a runny nose. Certain types of mold spores can cause fungal infections like histoplasmosis and conditions like candida and hives.

yes

Entomology

Are all termites harmful to buildings?

yes_statement

all "termites" are "harmful" to "buildings".. "termites" pose a threat to "buildings".

https://advancedipm.com/pest-library/termites/

Termites – Commercial & Residential Pest Control Services ...

Pest Identification: Termites Advanced Integrated Pest Management’s Top-Notch Termite Control Termites consume large amounts of wood, which can become a major structural hazard over time. But their harmful habits go further than we might think. Termites invade buildings in large numbers – often without detection. If your home or business in California and Nevada is infested with termites, expect repair costs to soar the longer they’re able to stick around. Termites Are a Structural Threat Termites are known for their cellulose-based diet, which specifically includes wooden structures. Colonies can eat up to a pound of wood per day. Most termites are pale-colored and less than a half-inch in length, and they swarm at different times throughout the warm months (during which they mate, shed their wings, and set up new colonies). Once inside, they’re a year-round threat that’s difficult to detect, not to mention eradicate. Because they often infest buildings without our knowledge, termites are called “silent destroyers.” Despite the name, they emit a soft rattling or rustling sound, similar to scratching paper, as they work. While not always easy to spot, there are a few visible indicators of their presence, including hollowed-out wood and discarded wings. Three termite species are common in California and Nevada: Subterranean Termites: Subterranean termites are aptly named for their tendency to colonize underground. Known to gather up to 20 feet deep in the soil, they reach buildings through distinct mud tubes. They’re the most destructive termites because of their massive groups and propensity for quick reproduction. This species typically swarms in the spring, starting new colonies that inhabit secluded locations like patches of soil and building foundations. Drywood Termites: Although found above the ground, drywood termites are extremely hard to detect because they nest deep inside of wood. They infest all types of wood – specifically, wood that’s low in moisture content (hence their name). Items like furniture, as well as walls, ceilings, and floors, are at high risk. Their droppings, called frass, include remnants of the wood they eat. Frass is a common sign that drywood termites are present. Dampwood Termites: This species isn’t as much of a problem as the other two – and for good reason. The largest of the three, dampwood termites prefer wood that’s damp or rotten, and they require consistently high moisture levels. But because of our humid climate, they’re always a concern. Pay close attention to areas with condensation, leaky pipes, and fallen trees. Get Your Free Termite Control Quote Today The first step to getting rid of termites in your home or business is becoming aware of their presence. This may seem obvious, but because termites are good at working undetected, it’s not always easy. Watch out for warning signs and eliminate moist conditions. Beyond that, professional pest control is your best bet to deal with termites. Our technicians are trained to determine the extent of potential termite damage and the most effective way to stop them. At Advanced Integrated Pest Management, we tackle pests of all kinds, including wood-loving termites. With a focus on both eradication and prevention, we combat subterranean, drywood, and dampwood termites in California and Nevada. Avoid costly structural damage to your home or business – contact us today at 916-786-2404 to get help stopping your termite problem. Why Work With Us? "Service Before Self" Mentality Quality Assurance Inspectors Client Portal for Transparent Service Custom Pest Control Solutions Family Owned and Operated Since 1981 Hear from Happy Customers Reliable, Professional and Honest. I have been using Roseville Termite and Pest Control (Advanced Integrated Pest Management) for over 20 years.” Pamela P.Coldwell Banker We have had Advanced IPM as subcontractors for more than a decade. Advanced IPM is providing a good service, and also offers solution to prevent and eliminate any future infestations/pest issue. Teodora C.ISS Facility Services They are the best! They’ve always been there for our family, and they’ll be there for yours.” Roger and Debra L.Home Owner I look forward to a long relationship with Advanced. You guys do an amazing job and I am happy with the job Joey does for this property. I get nothing but compliments from the team members that Joey interacts with. Michael K.from Thunder Valley Resort I highly recommend Advanced Integrated Pest Management.They have taken care of infestations of rodents, ants, roaches, birds, bats and most recently bees.

Pest Identification: Termites Advanced Integrated Pest Management’s Top-Notch Termite Control Termites consume large amounts of wood, which can become a major structural hazard over time. But their harmful habits go further than we might think. Termites invade buildings in large numbers – often without detection. If your home or business in California and Nevada is infested with termites, expect repair costs to soar the longer they’re able to stick around. Termites Are a Structural Threat Termites are known for their cellulose-based diet, which specifically includes wooden structures. Colonies can eat up to a pound of wood per day. Most termites are pale-colored and less than a half-inch in length, and they swarm at different times throughout the warm months (during which they mate, shed their wings, and set up new colonies). Once inside, they’re a year-round threat that’s difficult to detect, not to mention eradicate. Because they often infest buildings without our knowledge, termites are called “silent destroyers.” Despite the name, they emit a soft rattling or rustling sound, similar to scratching paper, as they work. While not always easy to spot, there are a few visible indicators of their presence, including hollowed-out wood and discarded wings. Three termite species are common in California and Nevada: Subterranean Termites: Subterranean termites are aptly named for their tendency to colonize underground. Known to gather up to 20 feet deep in the soil, they reach buildings through distinct mud tubes. They’re the most destructive termites because of their massive groups and propensity for quick reproduction. This species typically swarms in the spring, starting new colonies that inhabit secluded locations like patches of soil and building foundations. Drywood Termites: Although found above the ground, drywood termites are extremely hard to detect because they nest deep inside of wood. They infest all types of wood – specifically, wood that’s low in moisture content (hence their name). Items like furniture, as well as walls, ceilings, and floors, are at high risk.

yes

Entomology

Are all termites harmful to buildings?

yes_statement

all "termites" are "harmful" to "buildings".. "termites" pose a threat to "buildings".

https://chinapreservationtutorial.library.cornell.edu/content/pest-control/

Pest Control

Pest Control Pests, such as insects and mice can cause enormous damage to library materials. Insects Insects pose a serious threat to collections of all types. The environment that is the most damaging to collections—high humidity, poor air circulation, poor housekeeping—is also the most beneficial to insects. If insect damage is evident in a library collection, a careful survey should be conducted using sticky traps to see what types of insects are living in the affected area. Although pesticides have been traditionally used to control pests, because of the toxicity of pesticides to humans and the potential to damage library collections, use of chemicals has been phased out in favor of Integrated Pest Management (IPM). IPM is a strategy to control pests by eliminating food and water sources for insects and other pest and preventing their access to the building. In other words, PM stresses controlling pests through prevention and good housekeeping. Controlled freezing and oxygen deprivation have been used as non-toxic means of extermination in cases where pests have gained a foothold. Make the building inhospitable from the outside The building itself can be made inhospitable to insects. The following sensible precautions can be taken to reduce and control insect populations: Do not plant shrubs or trees close to a building, and avoid flowering species. Remove vines, ivy, and other climbing plants from the walls or roof. Use wide gravel or paving surrounding the building, ensuring that there are adequate and effective drains to prevent water from entering the structure. Do not attach lights to buildings, as they will attract flying insects. Insects tend to be attracted by ultraviolet, so lights close to a building should have low ultraviolet output. Lights mounted away from the building should be the mercury-vapor type with a high ultraviolet output. All garbage and rubbish, including garden and library waste, should be kept in a vermin-proof container away from the building. Ensure that all roof drains and downspouts are kept clear of debris and in good condition. Bird and other animal nests should be removed from the building. Seal all unnecessary holes in the building, and seal and caulk around holes for electrical cables, water pipes, telephone connections, and waste pipes. Doors and windows should be tight fitting and kept closed at all times, and insect screening constructed of small mesh should cover every opening. When designing a new building, consider the installation of a revolving door. Making the building inhospitable from the inside You can also deter the entrance of insects by using solid, impermeable construction materials such as brick, stone, concrete, and steel. If possible, observe these additional steps: HVAC (Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning) systems create wet and moist areas, and central systems have condensate drains. HVAC systems should be located in a basement area rather than on the roof, and steps should be taken to ensure that there is no standing water and that condensate drains are always clear. Restrooms, janitors’ closets, and workrooms are sources of water and should be segregated from collection areas. Condensation on cold water pipes can be avoided by wrapping them with an insulation material. A quarantine room for the inspection of newly acquired material should be established as close to the goods entrance/loading dock as possible. If incoming materials appear to have some form of insect damage, they should be covered tightly with plastic sheeting and insect sticky traps should be placed under the plastic to check for possible infestation. Insects love corrugated cardboard as homes and a food source, so old, damaged boxes should be replaced with acid-free, lignin-free boxes. The building interior should be well maintained and kept clean, as free as possible of the dirt and dust that provide nutrients for insects. Water spills should be immediately mopped up, and care must be taken when washing windows and floors that excess water does not permeate the structure through cracks in the walls or floor. Keep food consumption and preparation areas away from collection areas—ideally in a separate building. It is preferable that food and drink not be consumed in reader and staff areas, although this is often difficult to control. Spills and food debris should be carefully removed and waste receptacles emptied regularly. Receptions and events involving food and drink should not be held in a reading room or adjacent to a collection area. Refrigerators and appliances that combine heat and moisture are popular habitats for insects. Areas under and around appliances should be regularly cleaned, and sticky traps placed if necessary. Inside fittings If insects have secured a foothold within the building, you can impede their mobility by securing inside doors, especially those leading to areas such as a kitchen or restroom. Consideration might be given to fitting these doors with a weather seal. Other steps to take: • Cracks in inner walls or the floor should be filled to prevent insects from entering and infesting cavity areas. • Exhibit cases and special storage cases should be fitted with gaskets to ensure tight-fitting seals. • Fittings, cases, and room corners should be regularly vacuumed and the vacuum bags checked for insects. Filled vacuum bags should be disposed of outside the building immediately after removal. Killing insects A freezer set at or below -20° C (-3° F) can be used to kill insects, which should be exposed for three to four days. Books should be placed in plastic bags and, on removal from the freezer, conditioned under a constant air current from a fan. Freezing is best for occasional infestations, not for routine treatment. A simple chest freezer can be used. Heat can also be used to kill insects in infested materials. Temperatures of 50°C (120°F) will dry out insect bodies. In tropical areas, infested books can be placed in a metal container wrapped in black plastic and left in direct sunlight for a few hours. Both heat and sunlight can damage collection materials, however. Because of the possible health risks, insecticides should be used with great care and with full knowledge of the effects on humans and library materials. Research is being conducted on safe and natural insect repellents, such as compounds made from Neem, which will help to render collections safe. Combined with freezing and heat treatment for small infestations, natural repellents can help to control insects while maintaining an environment safe for humans. Harmful insects There are numerous insect types that can be damaging to library and archive materials, and most are found all over the world. Only a few species can be described here, but the discussion can be extrapolated to cover others. Bed bugs Bed bugs do not attack books; rather, they use them for cover and transportation. Bed bugs in books put other patrons at risk for infestations in their own homes. Freezing may eliminate bed bugs, but the temperature must be -17 degrees C (0 degrees F) or lower and the materials frozen for at least 4 days. Cockroaches These insects seem to be found in every part of the world, and they are tenacious. There are 3,500 types of cockroaches, and they can be divided roughly into urban types, that live exclusively indoors, and outdoor types, that breed and survive outdoors in tropical regions, but which often move indoors when conditions are favorable. The four types associated with damage to library materials: the American cockroach, the Australian cockroach, the Oriental cockroach, and the German cockroach. All four species have large mouth parts and a fondness for starch, thus book cloth and paper are especially vulnerable. Cockroach damage can be recognized by multiple light patches on book cloth surfaces—sometimes down to the thread—and ragged edges on paper leaves. Cockroach droppings can also be detected in the feeding area in the form of pellets. The American cockroach(Periplaneta Americana) hides in dark areas during the day and emerges at night. This species regurgitates a sexual attractant in the form of a brown liquid (atar), often seen on library materials. Approximately 40 millimeters in length, it is reddish brown. It is largely an indoor insect, preferring moist, warm areas. The Australian cockroach(Periplaneta Australsiae), smaller than the American, has light or yellow markings on its thorax and wingtips. Commonly found in moist tropical areas, this insect can live inside. The Oriental cockroach(Blata Orientalis), also known as the water bug, is large and dark brown or black. It prefers cooler moist areas such as drains and inhabits the lower floors of buildings. Silverfish This prefers dark, moist, and moderate to warm conditions. Silverfish tend to graze on the surface of paper and seem to prefer coated paper. Paper that is slightly ragged and thinning at the edges is usually the work of silverfish. Silverfish are ubiquitous, and their small flat shape makes it easy for them to be concealed in cardboard boxes and other items brought into a library. Beetles There are more than a quarter million species of beetles. Some damage books directly by eating paper and binding materials, but it is their larvae that cause the most damage. One type, the dermestidae (hide and carpet beetle), has been known to damage leather bindings. The bacon or larder beetle (Dermestes lardarius) is roughly 7 to 9 millimeters in length. The rear of the body is pale with black spots, while the rest of the body dark brown. The larvae feed on leather bindings and, when fully fed, bore into the text blocks of books to construct a pupation chamber. The bread or biscuit beetle (Stegobium paniceum) is a small (2 millimeters) reddish brown insect with very small larvae. The larvae feed on starch materials, especially the rice or flour paste used on endsheets and book spines. A borehole of approximately 1 to 2 millimeters runs parallel to the height and width of the book. The cigarette beetle (Lasioderma serricorne) is a small, light-brown flying beetle that commonly infests books. The beetle’s larvae are one of the types popularly known as bookworms, with eggs laid on the spine of a book and along the edges. Immediately upon hatching, the larvae tunnel under the binding cover, especially down the spine area. The insect then proceeds to tunnel up to 10 centimeters into the paper text, where it pupates into an adult beetle. The adult leaves a round exit hole, as well as powdered paper on the shelf. One of this beetle’s favorite foods is dried flowers and spices; these should not be brought into the library. The larvae of the drugstore beetle (Stegobium paniceum) are also often referred to as bookworms. This beetle is found in moist storage areas, and the larvae can actually tunnel all the way through books, from one cover to the other. As with the cigarette beetle, piles of paper powder signal that this insect is active. Termites By far the most damaging of all insects are termites, abundant in tropical regions. The damage to all paper-based materials can be catastrophic, in that entire collections can be rendered useless by the severe nature of the attack, often before an infestation problem has been recognized. There are three main types of termites: drywood, dampwood, and subterranean. Termites eat all cellulose materials, including wood, paper, binding cloth, and binding board. Some protection from termites can be given by the building design (use of metal shielding over wooden foundations, painting any exposed wood), but the best remedy is cleanliness, prevention of moisture, and constant vigilance. Termite infestations can usually only be dealt with through the use of pesticides applied by a qualified operator. There has been some success with buried traps that attract subterranean termites. Rodents Rats and mice are the most common rodents librarians are likely to encounter. Rats are difficult to control because they are capable of gnawing through cinder block, lead and aluminum sheeting, wood, plastic, and sheetrock. The most common rats are the Norway rat (Rattus norvegicus) and the roof rat or black rat (Rattus rattus). The house mouse (Mus musculus) is very common and extremely difficult to eradicate entirely. Both rats and mice use paper to make their nests, and many fine books have lost chunks of text through their jagged gnawing. Rodents’ fecal matter and urine are especially damaging. It is generally better to trap rodents than to use a poison that will allow them to crawl into building crevices and die, for rodent carcasses are breeding grounds for insects that also damage library and archival materials. Keeping food and drink away from collections will help prevent rodent infestations.

The larvae of the drugstore beetle (Stegobium paniceum) are also often referred to as bookworms. This beetle is found in moist storage areas, and the larvae can actually tunnel all the way through books, from one cover to the other. As with the cigarette beetle, piles of paper powder signal that this insect is active. Termites By far the most damaging of all insects are termites, abundant in tropical regions. The damage to all paper-based materials can be catastrophic, in that entire collections can be rendered useless by the severe nature of the attack, often before an infestation problem has been recognized. There are three main types of termites: drywood, dampwood, and subterranean. Termites eat all cellulose materials, including wood, paper, binding cloth, and binding board. Some protection from termites can be given by the building design (use of metal shielding over wooden foundations, painting any exposed wood), but the best remedy is cleanliness, prevention of moisture, and constant vigilance. Termite infestations can usually only be dealt with through the use of pesticides applied by a qualified operator. There has been some success with buried traps that attract subterranean termites. Rodents Rats and mice are the most common rodents librarians are likely to encounter. Rats are difficult to control because they are capable of gnawing through cinder block, lead and aluminum sheeting, wood, plastic, and sheetrock. The most common rats are the Norway rat (Rattus norvegicus) and the roof rat or black rat (Rattus rattus). The house mouse (Mus musculus) is very common and extremely difficult to eradicate entirely. Both rats and mice use paper to make their nests, and many fine books have lost chunks of text through their jagged gnawing. Rodents’ fecal matter and urine are especially damaging.

yes

Entomology

Are all termites harmful to buildings?

no_statement

not all "termites" are "harmful" to "buildings".. some "termites" do not cause damage to "buildings".

https://mast-producing-trees.org/do-termites-have-blood-exploring-the-unique-biology-of-these-powerful-creatures/

Do Termites Have Blood? Exploring The Unique Biology Of These ...

Do Termites Have Blood? Exploring The Unique Biology Of These Powerful Creatures Termites are small insects that can cause serious damage to buildings, furniture, and other wooden structures. But do these little critters have blood like other insects and animals? This article will explore the fascinating biology behind termites and answer the question of whether they have blood or not. It will also examine the role blood plays in termite biology and how their unique bodies work. By the end, readers will have a better understanding of these small but powerful creatures and the important role they play in nature. Termite bites and sting wounds are not harmful to humans, but they can cause health problems. Termites, in addition to carrying diseases that are not harmful to humans, are also thought to be beneficial. Those who are exposed to termites in their homes may experience allergic reactions or even asthma attacks. A termite bite usually leaves only a small red bump. A termite bite usually causes a small red bump. It can swell on sensitive skin, but this is extremely rare. Although this skin may itch at times, this usually goes away after a few days, and the bump does not reappear for at least a week. termites, on the other hand, are the most hidden of all the creatures. termites typically don’t show up unless they do, so they can go for years or even decades undetected, eating away at the wood of the house. The flying ant is the most common insect to confuse for termites. The most common type of ant to fly around your house is the carpenter ant, but there are many other ants to be found. Moisture ants, black garden ants, and pavement ants are other potential dupes for termites. Do Termites Have Red Bodies? Image credit: prweb.com There are a number of drywood termites with red or brown bodies. The color of a dampwood termite is either yellow or tan. Despite their yellow color, termites with Formosan wings are similar in appearance and are distinguishable by their slightly hairy wings. As the nights draw in, the sky may appear to be a sea of thousands of winged ants and termites. They are especially common during the night in wooded areas and under cover, and they take off whenever they are in close proximity to streetlights, porch lights, or in backyards that are warm and humid. It may appear to some that termites can fly, but this is not the case. The only termites with wings are the alates, which are a small number of termites that can fly. These termites can fly for a short time in the air before discarding their wings and making their way to a termite colony. Identifying Termites By Colo Termites have a specific color that can be used to identify them. Termite swarmers from subtatarene are typically black, while drywood swarmers are red. An ant can be either red, black, or brown in color. A termite’s body is particularly distinguishable because it is a long, flat body with no small segments attached to it. It is not uncommon for baby termites, or nymphs, to be pale and have straight legs. The red head of a reproductive drywood termite is a red head, however, which may indicate that it is a reproductive drywood termite. These termites are twice as large as subterranean termites and can be found inside a nest, which protects their eggs, and can be found two to three times larger. When the eggs hatch, they appear to be miniature termites. In general, these nymphs are white or yellow in color. What Happens If A Termite Bites You? Image credit: besttermitekiller.com There are no serious consequences to a Termite bite, and it will not disrupt your daily routine. It usually feels like a little pinch or itch and may look like a tiny red bump. If the patient consumes a large amount of food, it will go away within a few days of onset. Termites, unlike other pests, can cause serious damage to buildings and homes. They can be a source of financial and material destruction, but their direct effects on human health are unknown. termites cost the United States more than $5 billion per year in home damage. While termites do not pose a direct threat to humans, they do cause damage to homes that were previously occupied by termites. It may be necessary to conduct further inspection to ensure that the pests have been eradicated as a result of this. If you take the necessary precautions, you can protect your home from termites and avoid costly repairs in the future. Do Termites Have Venom? Image credit: pusatnews.com Termites do not use venom in order to control their prey. There is no danger of being envenomed as a result of being bitten or scratched by one of these insects. Ants are the most powerful natural predators of termites, and they are the most effective killers of wood-eating insects. Termites’ larval larvae are devoured by ants, but their adult termites and eggs are also consumed. As a result, if you have an established colony of ants in your yard, you can rest assured that no termites will ever be discovered nearby. Ant bites are not the only type of insect that preys on termites; nematodes, arachnids, wasps, centipedes, cockroaches, crickets, and dragonflies are among other insects that do so as well. As an assassin bug, it is a voracious predator of termites, raiding their nests and injecting them with toxins before sucking them dry. As a result, ants are an excellent natural defense against termites, but they can also be preyed upon by other predators in order to keep their populations in check. Understanding the full range of termite predators can help to protect your home and landscape from damage caused by these insects. Are Termites Toxic To Humans? Termite bites and sting are not poisonous; however, they do cause some irritation. Termites are not commonly known to carry diseases that could cause harm to humans. Those living in homes that are infested with termites may experience allergic reactions as well as asthma attacks. Do Termites Touch Humans? Image credit: stampedepestcontrol.com Termites are not known to be toxic, so they are unlikely to infect humans with a disease, but they bite and sting if they come into contact with human skin. These creatures, on the whole, pose no physical threat to other insects, only if handled, starved, or threatened. Termites prefer moist environments, which is one of their primary sources of food. Sub subterranean termites and dampwood termites both thrive in humid environments, and they rely heavily on moisture to survive. Leaking pipes, poor drainage, and a lack of airflow all contribute to moisture issues, resulting in an ideal environment for termites. Termites prefer water-damaged wood, whereas subterranean termites cannot survive unless they have enough moisture to survive. Termites, despite their vulnerability to moisture, are not particularly intelligent, lack memory, a natural ability to learn, and are unable to solve problems easily. It is critical to take preventative measures to prevent moisture issues in homes in order to keep these pests under control. The proper maintenance of your plumbing and drainage systems, as well as proper ventilation, should be done to keep termites at bay. Can Termites Get Into Human Skin? Termite kings and soldiers, for example, can only puncturing human skin, but most human bites are not even felt. Termite colonies with larger mouths do not bite through human skin as well as termite colonies with smaller mouths. Can Termites Get You Sick? Termites, in addition to being non-pathogenic, have been shown to carry diseases that are not harmful to humans. Outside of the tristate area, you may be affected by termites if your home is infested, which can cause you to become ill or even have asthma attacks. What Color Are Termites Termites are typically white or cream-colored insects, although there are some species of termites that have a darker color. They have a soft, segmented body and six legs, and they are most commonly found in wood and other cellulose-based materials. While termites are generally white or colored, the color of their wings may vary from pale yellow to brown. Identifying Subterranean Termites: What To Look Fo Termites, also known as subterranean termites, can be found in almost every state except Alaska. This small insect can be found in a variety of colors, including creamy white, dark brown, and black. It measures about 1/8 inch long. Most of the time, they live in large colonies and can be found underground or aboveground in subterranean or aboveground habitats. Its thorax is wide and the body width from head to tail is the same, and it has a brown color that can also be white or black. Flying ants, moisture ants, black garden ants, and pavement ants are all mistaken for subterranean termites, creating confusion for homeowners attempting to identify and treat an infestations. If you suspect you have termites on your hands, you should be aware of what to look for, including the color, size, and habitat of the termites. Do Termites Fly Will termites fly? If so, how? A termite can fly, but not all of them. There are several termite species that can fly during their reproductive stages, but only a few have wings. Because the wings of termites fly in circles, they are called “alates” or “swarmers.” Termites and other pests thrive in damp environments, so you may want to inspect your home’s damp conditions. You can keep your home free of unwanted pests by taking preventative measures such as removing moisture and repairing leaks. Repairing leaks in faucets, water pipes, and air conditioning units is a good place to start, and keeping good drainage around the foundation to avoid standing water is a good place to start. Furthermore, it is critical to keep gutters and down spouts clean on a regular basis to prevent water from collecting and forming an ideal environment for termites and other pests. As a result, you will be less likely to get termites if you follow these steps. They can go away on their own, but preventative measures are always required to prevent them from returning. A termite treatment can help keep your home safe and provide long-term protection. Termites: An Imminent Threat To Home Structures Termite swarms should be of particular concern to you if they appear in large numbers around or inside your home. It’s possible that these pests have already dealt with a termite problem, or that they’re looking into a possible termite infestation. During a swarm of flying termites, winged male and female termites reproduce in large numbers to the tune of heavy rainfall and warm, humid weather. When flying termites are present, it is difficult to avoid the possibility of property damage. Termites, in addition to causing structural damage, can bend and blister wooden structures. termite colonies typically take three to six years to mature and produce their alates, so it is critical to act quickly to avoid damage. Are Termites Visible To The Human Eye Termites can be seen in the human eye, as far as I can tell. Termites are occasionally observed by the naked eye, particularly the larger swarmers that tend to come into contact with the colony’s defenses more frequently. One of the first symptoms of termite infestations is an invasion or invasion by pests or parasites. A parasitic termite can be found near openings such as windows and doors, according to Wikimedia, and it can be described as an insect that lays its wings near open doors and windows. Despite their destructive nature, termites are extremely fascinating creatures. In order to survive, they rely on more than just their eyes, using their antennae and other senses to detect changes in the environment around them. Termites can move around their environment quickly and easily because they can detect vibrations, change their humidity, and use their own unique pheromones to communicate with other termites. Termites have adapted to living in environments that are otherwise inhospitable due to their reliance on other senses. They thrive in environments where light is scarce, such as underground tunnels or deep forests. Other pests, on the other hand, rely on vision to move around and find food, whereas spiders have no such limitations. Termites, which cause billions of dollars in damage per year in the United States alone, can be quite fascinating, from their remarkable ability to live without sight to their ability to thrive under such harsh conditions. Despite their destructive nature, they thrive in environments with limited light, giving them an advantage over other pests. Their antennae and other senses allow them to detect changes in the environment and interact with other termites. Despite the fact that other pests are unable to reproduce in these areas, they have adapted to survive by relying on other senses. Despite the fact that these fascinating creatures frequently suffer from damage, it’s difficult to imagine how they can survive. Be Alert To Hidden Termite Infestations Even though you may not see the termites themselves, it is critical to be aware of the symptoms of a termite infestation. Termites may hide for months or even years in your home, gradually eating away at the walls and foundations. It is still critical to have your property inspected by a trained professional to ensure that any potential problems are identified. While these pests are not visible to the naked eye, it is still critical to have your property inspected by a trained professional. Termites have learned to hide from humans by burrowing into walls and other parts of the house. If you don’t see any of these winged insects, you don’t have to be concerned about them getting into your house. termites typically feed on wood and plant matter, so no matter what happens to them inside the body, they will not attack humans. How Many Legs Does A Termite Have Termites have six legs, two of which protrude from their thorax, and four more from their abdomens. It is not uncommon for people to mistake termites for ants at long distances. Termites, on the other hand, do not have three distinct body segments, as ants do. Do Termites Have Long Legs? Termites in subtatalene have pale, cream-colored bodies with a circumference of about 1/8 inch. They have six legs that are both short and pale, two small mandibles, and straight antenna bands on their legs. Termite Vs. Ant: How To Tell The Difference Termites are insect pests that can cause significant damage to structures and are an annoyance for many homeowners. It is common to mistake them for ants because they appear similar, but there are numerous differences between them. There are numerous reasons for that, including the number of legs they have. Termites have six legs in total, two of which protrude from their thorax and four from their abdomen. Ant bodies are distinguished by three distinct body segments, a head, a thorax, and a abdomen, as opposed to ants who have six legs. Termites’ antenna shapes are straight, whereas ants’ are elbowed. You must be able to identify the type of insect you are dealing with so that you can get rid of it. Knowing how many legs a termite has can help determine whether it is an ant or a termite, which aids in pest control. Cannibalistic Termites Cannibalistic termites are a species of termite found throughout the world in both tropical and temperate regions. These termites feed on their own species and have been known to consume their own eggs, larvae, and even adult workers. They are a species of social insects that live in colonies, where they feed on wood and other organic materials. Cannibalistic termites are considered a pest in many areas, as they can cause extensive damage to wooden structures and other materials. They can also spread disease if they come into contact with humans. To control these termites, homeowners may use baits, traps, and other chemical treatments. Natural wood is a good choice for termite protection because it is termite resistant. The use of heartwood-grade lumber as an insect repellent is one of the most effective methods for repelling these pests because it is typically preferred over other tree species such as redwoods, yellow cedars, Laotian teak, and cypress. Furthermore, if a termite is discovered in your home, it is highly likely to become a food source for small animals such as mongooses, aardvarks, anteaters, small mammals, reptiles, spiders, and even ants. With these natural predators on the picture, you can rest assured that your house is well-defended from these annoying pests. Real Threat Termites Termites are a real threat to any home or building, as they can cause extensive damage to wooden structures. Termites can cause weakening of support beams, as well as damage to walls and floors. They can also cause extensive damage to furniture and other items made of wood. To prevent termite damage, it is important to have regular inspections and to get rid of any existing colonies. If termites are not controlled, they can cause serious structural damage to buildings or homes over time. It is simple to eliminate termite infestations by exposing your termite to sunlight. Because it can be beneficial to humans, the sun can be harmful to termites. If you suspect a piece of furniture in your home is infested with termites, the best way to deal with it is to drag it outside and leave it to bake in the sun for a few hours. Using this method will allow you to eliminate termites without having to resort to harsh chemicals or expensive pest control. If termites have caused too much damage, a portion of the affected area may need to be demolished or rebuilt. Structural repairs will be required in such cases, as well as cosmetic repairs to resolve discoloration and other damage caused by termites to the roof, flooring, and paint. Having a good night’s sleep may be one of the most effective ways to prevent termites from destroying your home, but if this is too late, you may need to take more drastic measures. Getting Rid Of Termites: From Instant Contact To Long-term Prevention Termites can be a serious nuisance to homeowners and businesses, often causing thousands of dollars in damage. The eradication of termites is critical for both safety and security, but knowing how to kill them so quickly can be difficult. It is possible to kill termites by using the chemicals fipronil and hexaflumuron, two of the most effective pesticides. It is critical to remember, however, that these chemicals can be harmful and should only be used with caution. termite damage can be dangerous in addition to causing property damage. Termite feces can cause asthma and other respiratory problems in addition to typhus, gastroenteritis, dysentery, and polio, as can their saliva. Boric acid is the best solution for permanently destroying termites. It entails combining borax powder and water and spraying it on the damaged area. It can be used on cabinets and wood furniture after a few minutes to eliminate termites. It is possible to permanently eradicate termites if you use the right chemicals and care, but termites can be a serious problem for homeowners. Fipronil and hexaflumuron, in addition to instant contact killing and boric acid for long-term prevention, are both essential steps to take to ensure a safe and secure environment.

Furthermore, if a termite is discovered in your home, it is highly likely to become a food source for small animals such as mongooses, aardvarks, anteaters, small mammals, reptiles, spiders, and even ants. With these natural predators on the picture, you can rest assured that your house is well-defended from these annoying pests. Real Threat Termites Termites are a real threat to any home or building, as they can cause extensive damage to wooden structures. Termites can cause weakening of support beams, as well as damage to walls and floors. They can also cause extensive damage to furniture and other items made of wood. To prevent termite damage, it is important to have regular inspections and to get rid of any existing colonies. If termites are not controlled, they can cause serious structural damage to buildings or homes over time. It is simple to eliminate termite infestations by exposing your termite to sunlight. Because it can be beneficial to humans, the sun can be harmful to termites. If you suspect a piece of furniture in your home is infested with termites, the best way to deal with it is to drag it outside and leave it to bake in the sun for a few hours. Using this method will allow you to eliminate termites without having to resort to harsh chemicals or expensive pest control. If termites have caused too much damage, a portion of the affected area may need to be demolished or rebuilt. Structural repairs will be required in such cases, as well as cosmetic repairs to resolve discoloration and other damage caused by termites to the roof, flooring, and paint. Having a good night’s sleep may be one of the most effective ways to prevent termites from destroying your home, but if this is too late, you may need to take more drastic measures. Getting Rid Of Termites: From Instant Contact To Long-term Prevention Termites can be a serious nuisance to homeowners and businesses, often causing thousands of dollars in damage. The eradication of termites is critical for both safety and security, but knowing how to kill them so quickly can be difficult. It is possible to kill termites by using the chemicals fipronil and hexaflumuron,

yes

Pharmacology

Are antidepressants more effective than placebo?

yes_statement

"antidepressants" are more "effective" than "placebo".. "placebo" is less "effective" than "antidepressants".

https://time.com/5169013/antidepressants-more-effective-placebo-treating-depression/

Antidepressants Are More Effective Than Placebo in Treating ...

These Antidepressants Are Most Effective, Study Says Millions of people take antidepressants for depression. But there’s long been debate over just how effective the medications actually are. On Wednesday, a large new study provides evidence that antidepressants are more effective than placebo at treating acute depression in adults. The study, published in the journal The Lancet, looked at the published data from 522 randomized controlled trials testing 21 different types of antidepressants. The study authors also reached out to pharmaceutical companies and study authors for additional unpublished study data. All told, the data collection included 116,477 men and women, ages 18 and older, who had depression and who were treated for at least eight weeks. The researchers found that every type of antidepressant they studied was more effective at lessening symptoms of depression over time than placebo. They considered a drug “effective” if it reduced depression symptoms by 50% or more. The researchers expected to find that some antidepressants would prove to be better than placebo, but they were surprised that every drug was more effective, says lead study author Dr. Andrea Cipriani of the University of Oxford in the UK. “We were open to any result,” he says. “This is why we can say this is the final answer to the controversy.” Though researchers found that every drug was more effective than placebo, some were more effective than others. The most effective were Agomelatine (sold under several brand names, including Valdoxan, Melitor and Thymanax), amitriptyline (Elavil), escitalopram (Lexapro), mirtazapine (Remeron), paroxetine (Paxil), venlafaxine (Effexor XR) and vortioxetine (Trintellix). The least effective, the study authors concluded, appeared to be Fluoxetine (Prozac), fluvoxamine (Faverin), reboxetine (Edronax) and trazodone (Desyrel). The researchers also assessed acceptability of the drug, which they did by analyzing the proportion of people who dropped out of the study before eight weeks. The only drug that was shown to be less acceptable than placebo was clomipramine. While antidepressants are a very common form of depression treatment, they aren’t perfect. About a third of people with depression do not respond to treatment. When they do work, they can take four to eight weeks to kick in. But many people with depression are not even trying antidepressants or other treatments, like psychotherapy. A recent study of more than 240,000 people found that only about a third of those who were newly diagnosed with depression got treatment. “We need to increase the number of people who are getting treated effectively,” Cipriani says. “I’m not saying all patients with depression should be treated with antidepressants—they should all be offered effective treatments.” Most of the 522 studies analyzed were funded by pharmaceutical companies, and the researchers say that 9% were rated as having a high risk of bias. Cipriani says the study design and the inclusion of unpublished data in their analysis was meant to mitigate that potential bias. The researchers were also unable to tease apart differences among groups of people in the studies—for instance, how the drugs worked for people of different ages or gender. The dataset used in the report will be publicly available so other research groups can try to replicate the findings. “This is the largest and most robust study ever in antidepressants,” says Cipriani. “and we found good news that they work, and outweigh the side effects.”

These Antidepressants Are Most Effective, Study Says Millions of people take antidepressants for depression. But there’s long been debate over just how effective the medications actually are. On Wednesday, a large new study provides evidence that antidepressants are more effective than placebo at treating acute depression in adults. The study, published in the journal The Lancet, looked at the published data from 522 randomized controlled trials testing 21 different types of antidepressants. The study authors also reached out to pharmaceutical companies and study authors for additional unpublished study data. All told, the data collection included 116,477 men and women, ages 18 and older, who had depression and who were treated for at least eight weeks. The researchers found that every type of antidepressant they studied was more effective at lessening symptoms of depression over time than placebo. They considered a drug “effective” if it reduced depression symptoms by 50% or more. The researchers expected to find that some antidepressants would prove to be better than placebo, but they were surprised that every drug was more effective, says lead study author Dr. Andrea Cipriani of the University of Oxford in the UK. “We were open to any result,” he says. “This is why we can say this is the final answer to the controversy.” Though researchers found that every drug was more effective than placebo, some were more effective than others. The most effective were Agomelatine (sold under several brand names, including Valdoxan, Melitor and Thymanax), amitriptyline (Elavil), escitalopram (Lexapro), mirtazapine (Remeron), paroxetine (Paxil), venlafaxine (Effexor XR) and vortioxetine (Trintellix). The least effective, the study authors concluded, appeared to be Fluoxetine (Prozac), fluvoxamine (Faverin), reboxetine (Edronax) and trazodone (Desyrel).

yes

Pharmacology

Are antidepressants more effective than placebo?

yes_statement

"antidepressants" are more "effective" than "placebo".. "placebo" is less "effective" than "antidepressants".

https://www.madinamerica.com/2022/08/antidepressants-no-better-placebo-85-people/

Antidepressants No Better Than Placebo for About 85% of People

The question is what this minimal average difference means. There are two possibilities: Most people experience just a tiny bit more improvement on the drug (a 12-point improvement) than they would on a placebo (a 10-point improvement); or A small group of people experiences a larger effect from the drug, which is canceled out on average by the larger group of people who experience no effect. In a new study, researchers have now concluded that it is the latter—in clinical trials, about 15% of people experienced a large effect from the antidepressant drug that they would not have received from the placebo. The authors write: “The observed advantage of antidepressants over placebo is best understood as affecting a minority of patients as either an increase in the likelihood of a Large response or a decrease in the likelihood of a Minimal response.” The paper appeared in BMJ. It was led by Marc Stone at the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research. Also, it included famed Harvard placebo effect researcher Irving Kirsch, as well as researchers from Johns Hopkins and the Cleveland Clinic. The study was a participant-level analysis of the double-blind, placebo-controlled trials of antidepressants to treat depression submitted to the FDA. The data included 242 studies that were conducted between 1979 to 2016—a total of 73,388 participants. The researchers accounted for age, sex, and baseline severity of depression in their analysis. Consistent with the previous research, they found the usual, minimal, less-than-two-point difference between the drug and the placebo effect, on average, across all 73,388 participants. “The difference between drug and placebo was 1.75 points,” they write. (This is the average for adults. For children and adolescents, the average difference between drug and placebo was less than 1 point, at 0.71.) For both the drug and the placebo group, adults were more likely to get better if they were younger and had worse symptoms at the start of the trial. However, because this was an individual patient-level analysis, the researchers were also able to break down the statistics further. They found that those who took the drug were a little more likely to experience a large improvement than those in the placebo group. They write, “About 15% of participants have a substantial antidepressant effect beyond a placebo effect in clinical trials.” Essentially, the researchers suggest that there is a small group of people for whom the placebo response doesn’t really happen and for whom the antidepressant drugs reduce symptoms. More Information The drug and placebo groups both had extremely high rates of symptom improvement: 84.4% of the placebo group found their depression symptoms improved, while 88.5% of the drug group improved. However, in many cases, this “improvement” was small. More important is the number of people who experienced a large improvement. This improvement is more likely to be clinically relevant. The researchers found that those taking the drug were more likely to experience this level of improvement—24.5% of the antidepressant group experienced large improvement, versus 9.6% of the placebo group. Based on these numbers, there seems to be a small group—about 15% of people—who experience a large response to the drug who would not otherwise improve to this level. Unfortunately, the researchers found no way to predict who, exactly, is in this 15%. They write that if everyone with a depression diagnosis is given an antidepressant, about seven people need to be given the drug (and thus be exposed to the harmful effects with no benefit) before one person benefits. “Further research is needed to identify the subset of patients who are likely to require antidepressants for substantial improvement,” they write. “The potential for substantial benefit must be weighed against the risks associated with the use of antidepressants, as well as consideration of the risks associated with other treatments that have shown similar benefits.” Explanations for the Findings Despite some newer arguments that the placebo effect has been increasing over time—thus making new drugs look worse—the researchers found that the placebo effect has remained stable since the 1980s. “Depression symptoms” measured on common depression questionnaires include bodily responses like sleep and eating, and the drugs’ sedative and appetite effects could account for some of this improvement. Another explanation is that some people receive an enhanced placebo effect because they can tell, from the side effects, that they are in the active drug group (breaking the “blind” of the study). Clinical trials also usually hand-pick their participants, searching for those with no other conditions and who are not suicidal. This makes them very different from the individuals most often treated with the drugs in real life. Indeed, in a study this year, other researchers found that response to treatment is much lower in real life. For example, in a study where over a thousand people with depression were treated with antidepressant drugs—more than half on multiple drugs—as well as therapy and hospitalization, less than a quarter responded to treatment. In another paper, those same researchers also found that those with more severe depression, those with comorbid anxiety, and those who were suicidal were least likely to benefit from the drugs. Peter Simons was an academic researcher in psychology. Now, as a science writer, he tries to provide the layperson with a view into the sometimes inscrutable world of psychiatric research. As an editor for blogs and personal stories at Mad in America, he prizes the accounts of those with lived experience of the psychiatric system and shares alternatives to the biomedical model. 25 COMMENTS Actually a 15% response is not that bad when compared to the benefits of some other drugs. For example, statins, which are widely prescribed, will not extent lifespan or prevent cardiovascular disease for 98% of those without preexisting heart disease. Insulin given to those with type 2 diabetes will reduce blood sugar levels, but a major study showed marginal non statistically significant reductions in heart attacks, strokes, and maybe microvascular disease among those given insulin after 10 years of treatment. The point is Americans take numerous drugs whose benefits are minimal or nonexistent. Why this is the case is a good question. Yes, the antidepressant side effects can be bad. But the side effects of most drugs are far from benign. Insulin, for example causes weight gain, and excess weight, ironically, has been cited as a cause of type 2 diabetes. No matter what “clinical scale” is used – a down-stream perception, not anything objective – there is little meaningful insight that can be gleaned from this sort of evaluation. And of course, we have worked backwards an in circles, asserting etiologies for a vague disease entity based on (flawed) evaluations and then asserting their validity and necessity from the presumed etiology. (Oh right, it’s not “chemical imbalances” anymore, but other chemical imbalance stand-ins like “it’s all inflammation” or “it’s more than one chemical!”.) At the end of the day, the thing being targeted is mental state and perception and any attempt to deny that is delusion and misdirection. It doesn’t matter if there is or is not some day a discovery of a biological factor; there are always biological factors, depending on how silly we want to be, like having enough oxygen to be alive. If someone does not want chemical interference with their mind, their consciousness, then that has to be respected. And if they are fed misinformation or coerced into compliance with a treatment or narrative, then there is certainly no consent. It’s just violence. Period. All this business about clinical scales or “chemicals” and the rest of it is distracting from the crux of the issue. It’s invalid to say “here we (think) we observe a behavior or feeling, and so we say it is a disease defined as such” while also saying “if the thing of concern is explained by other means or is otherwise gone, the disease must remain (and be of the form we have asserted) because it is necessary to justify what we do”. There are many reasons a given clinical scale or individual or clinician might report one way or another for these reviews. Some of them can be controlled for and others cannot and still others will remain unknown. It’s especially difficult with this sort of thing because a person who is expecting a medical fix may see any psychological effect – which they would not see with a sugar pill or no pill – as “working”. It’s more difficult to have a simple placebo experiment. Broad meta reviews are worse still, since they will examine data that includes people “smiling and nodding” in order to be seen as compliant (probably more so for other diagnoses more likely to involve involuntary commitment) or clinicians “just saying what they’re doing is good and works” – I’ve seen that many times. I’ve heard psychiatrists blatantly say they’ll “just say things” in records or in court to get a desired order or “cover my rear”. And then we have iatrogenic effects, either from the drugs or from the confusion, confinement, loss of rights, and other general treatment and circumstances. Objectivity from an observer’s perspective is extremely difficult and just about always biased toward presumed or convenient or desired narratives. I’ve never seen any study or review pay more than lip service – if any consideration at all – to these problems. I’m not even saying no one should ever use these substances. But no one should ever have them imposed for any reason, especially not disingenuous excuses based on bogus science. But the problem for psychiatrists is two-fold: First, that means they have to admit things are more complicated and they don’t have the expertise to navigate their jobs without relying on the above; Second, they may be relegated to a seldom-employed therapeutic role, rather than the center of all things, harming job prospects. Overhanging everything is the prospect of damage to reputations or even liability for past actions. Most people don’t want to attack the foundations and institutions they are a part of and their own legitimacy. It’s Ironic because that defensiveness is what makes them illegitimate. There is probably a role for real psychiatrists and proper psychiatry, people like Joan Moncrieff, but instead those genuine figures are demonized. Seriously. As much as I generally want to say “you do you” and respect “personal truths” or the possibility that someone is ‘objectively’ deriving benefit… What percentage of people say booze or pot has are an objective biomedical treatment in some form? There may be some ways to contrive an argument, moreso for pot, but then there always is. Same goes for LSD or psybicilin, which have gotten a lot of attention lately. And still, more power to you. But in terms of a biomedical narrative, if all these things have a place or are interchangeable, the biomedical justification falls apart. It’s difficult to say, “you have a biomedical need for this” based on an assumed etiology in turn rooted in a narrative on efficacy (which is scientifically bogus, but…), but be unable to juxtapose that narrative with analogous but incompatible ones for totally unrelated psychoactive substances as well as psychotherapies, other modalities, or indeed nothing. The idea that ingesting substances to alter consciousness is neither new nor particularly scientific. Pretending that a response to a drug means anything about cause or constitutes “treatment” is the central sophistry used by psychiatry to “explain” its outrageous corrupt actions. I have NO trouble with people ingesting substances to alter their consciousness, and I’m sure in some cases something good can come out of it. I have BIG trouble with calling such ingestions “medical treatment” and charging people and governments ridiculous amounts of money to run an uncontrolled experiment on our brains. There’s actually really good research showing chemicals (vitamins, minerals, antioxidants) we consume in our daily diet are safer and more effective than prescription drugs. For example hop tea has been shown to work better than xanax. My personal revenge fantasy is to make psychiatry obsolete with food that can beat the drugs in clinical trials. Thanks for introducing me to the new idiom “you do you” which seems to want to hang out with “it is what it is”. As a quick aside you dont do you as much as probably hoped. So much is mimicry. mirroring, copying, conforming, following trends, fitting in… others do you is more honest much of the time. That’s one reason that ssri drug use is so popular. Others do you. So pop the pills and fall in line with the social norn. You refuse the drugs and accompanying narratives? Then we’ll properly get to work on doing you. We’ll other you as a conspiracy nut, antipsychiatry, antiscience. Anti-us! It’s true that any person doing drugs that alter consciousness can claim the ritual as personally beneficial. However, it gets said that the loner drug user is on a path to destruction. That it is healthier to drug with others. In bars, private members clubs, and crack dens. GPs tried to resist doing the dirty work of psychiatry but after the closure of the asylums and the movement of the mad back to society, there was first a demand from society that the mad were drugged, for health and safety and jason vorhees reasons, and then later bizarely from pressure groups comprised of the mad themselves. And so gradually over many decades GPs became relucantly and then feverishly frontline drug pushers. Ask any so-called healer how much ego boost they get from exploiting the placebo effect and most will lie and claim none. When reallythe placebo effect is the name of the game and the ego boost is the addicting sauce and it is most intense when others are doing you and you want it so bad you’re willing to see any face looking back at you in the mirror so long as it isn’t frowning. When I first resisted SSRIs the GPs were still cynical, openly, about psychiatry as a legitimate medicine and would at times steer lost souls away. So back then it was easier because smart and respectable and kind and honest GPs would back you up, even if only privately. Fast forward to now and everyone is frightened of career ending honesty, or more often, has fallen under the social spell of bullshit. Never forget that patient pressure played a big role in sewing up mouths against speaking openly and honestly about SSRIs. My doctor teased me unmercifully when I raved about my incredible improvement less than 2 weeks after starting Prozac, decades ago. “You’re just experiencing a placebo effect. It can’t work so soon”. Yeah. Freaking Hypomania. A couple weeks later, suddenly can’t stomach the dose. Eventually, after over 2 months of exhausting bliss. Crash like a long cocaine binge. I’m still triggered to score some. Like an addict. I know it’ll kill me. Getting by on mood stabilizers and Buspirone. Bipolar2 and induced mania is a hard way to go. I would guess this landmark study will not be welcome with the mainstream psychiatric establishment in the U.S. I would also suspect that there will be opposition papers published to discredit it in the near future. This study in unlikely, unfortunately, to change the praticice habits of providers anytime soon. Psychiatrists are not trained to find the 15% who are most likely to benefit by using the most important diagnostic validators, course (i.e. onset of symptoms and peridocity over time) and detailed family history including blood relatives who may not have been treated). These validators are not used in the DSM but are in other specialities. The absence of blood tests in the field is a long and sad story. There is no other medical speciality that has not come up with at least one new blood test in the past 40-50 years and often newer ones replace older ones. https://medicalmodelredux.com/ Excellent article….I believe now is the time to flood media with facts (again) regarding the specious messaging, self-defined expertise & presumed legitimacy of the dangerous Pharma/Psych industry. This is the first, thrilling time I have felt seismic movement in the fight…there’s a palpable ripple in the force field of conventional marketing, social, & the confluence of post-covid Gen Z curiosity towards options to addressing mental distress. Michael Jeffrey Jordan said “You either win or you learn”. Mr. Whitaker and so many other fighters are on the edge of winning. The industry’s startling “We never said ‘chemical-imbalance’ pushback is a pure gift. I didn’t think I’d live to see this. I wish Paula Caplan was here for it. Carpe omnia. It is possible that the 15% of responders may have recurrent severe depressive episodes consistent with the classic disease entity of Manic-Depressive Illness of which Bipolar is a smaller subset. MDI was always defined as recurrent depressive episodes with or without mania. MDI was confirmed in over 40 years of family studies but was not acknowledged by DSM-5. The 85% of non-responders may have chronic low grade depression, previously called “neurotic depresion” or mixed depressive symptoms with subsyndromal mania (i.e. mild mania) or mood temperaments of hyperthymia or cyclothymia for which antidepressants do not help. There is a historical opposition by the makers of DSM against research for biological markers. Psychology and Psychoanalysis are things we should not allow our government to license. No law against these, but not licensed by the government. And then there needs to be court supervision when these on done on minors. Otherwise the therapist / analyst becomes an accomplice of the parents. Peter, correct me if I am wrong here. I take it 15% of the drug treated had a greater reduction of depressive symptoms than those who were on placebo. However, did the investigators compare the top 15% of the antidepressant group (who experienced greater reduction of symptoms than the bottom 85% of the same group) with the top 15% of the placebo group who had greater symptom reduction than their placebo peers? It would also be good to know the distribution of symptom reduction in the antidepressant and placebo groups. To be a placebo effect needs a person to almost hypnotically have faith that what they are drinking or nibbling or glugging or quaffing or sipping IS miraculously going to be effective very quickly. Most placebo “cures” require that fudging of the ordinary truth. The ordinary truth seldom inspires a desperate person with the high hopes needed to keep existing if suicidal, a high hope needed by the placebo healing to work. Perhaps this innate understanding of how placebo upliftment is borne aloft on wings of almost shamanistic fantasy is why for so many years ordinary doctors sold antidepressants as more effective than they later turned out to be. A new breed of pill is coming that is more in alighnment with psychaedelic medicine. Will it also be pushed with placebo faith fervour? Inspiring hope in the hopeless person is a form of nectar in itself that healing types of people can become addicted to. Not necessarily doctors fall into this performance of a magician trick with a pill, but all of us do! It is innately human to want to clump together like chimps and caress the frightened chimp into feeling much better again. I blame nobody for having the human trait of yearning to heal the distressed with a goovy bright idea. It is instinctual. The problem arises when the addictive nectar filled idea of healing becomes so important to a healer that there grows a silencing of the wounded of that idea. Hi I’m reading a lot about SSRI and all the negative aspect, especially the long term use and the potential damages it cause to the brain. However I must admit that the 3 years I spent on Paxil were probably the best years of my life : relieved my social anxiety, started reading a lot, playing an instrument, making friends, etc… I was so well that I started to ask myself why do I need this pill anymore. Then tapered (too quickly) and experienced withdrawall, and finally went back to another ssri at a small dosage, which allowed me to live almost normally (but without being as good as on high dosage of Paxil). I was first prescripted paxil because of « chronic low mood », social anxiety, lot of overthinking that prevented me from moving forward in life. Always been like this since i can remember. Today I’m stuck between all the worrying things i read and my personnal experience of succesful AD use… in fact taking this pill every morning has because a major source of anxiety and questioning

The question is what this minimal average difference means. There are two possibilities: Most people experience just a tiny bit more improvement on the drug (a 12-point improvement) than they would on a placebo (a 10-point improvement); or A small group of people experiences a larger effect from the drug, which is canceled out on average by the larger group of people who experience no effect. In a new study, researchers have now concluded that it is the latter—in clinical trials, about 15% of people experienced a large effect from the antidepressant drug that they would not have received from the placebo. The authors write: “The observed advantage of antidepressants over placebo is best understood as affecting a minority of patients as either an increase in the likelihood of a Large response or a decrease in the likelihood of a Minimal response.” The paper appeared in BMJ. It was led by Marc Stone at the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research. Also, it included famed Harvard placebo effect researcher Irving Kirsch, as well as researchers from Johns Hopkins and the Cleveland Clinic. The study was a participant-level analysis of the double-blind, placebo-controlled trials of antidepressants to treat depression submitted to the FDA. The data included 242 studies that were conducted between 1979 to 2016—a total of 73,388 participants. The researchers accounted for age, sex, and baseline severity of depression in their analysis. Consistent with the previous research, they found the usual, minimal, less-than-two-point difference between the drug and the placebo effect, on average, across all 73,388 participants. “The difference between drug and placebo was 1.75 points,” they write. (This is the average for adults. For children and adolescents, the average difference between drug and placebo was less than 1 point, at 0.71.) For both the drug and the placebo group, adults were more likely to get better if they were younger and had worse symptoms at the start of the trial. However, because this was an individual patient-

yes

Pharmacology

Are antidepressants more effective than placebo?

yes_statement

"antidepressants" are more "effective" than "placebo".. "placebo" is less "effective" than "antidepressants".

https://qz.com/1212804/researchers-are-still-working-to-prove-that-antidepressants-are-more-effective-than-placebo

A new study says antidepressants are more effective than placebos ...

Researchers are still working to prove that antidepressants are more effective than placebo Antidepressants work for many – but researchers are still debating the scientific data. Image: Reuters/Lucy Nicholson By Olivia Goldhill PublishedFebruary 22, 2018 We may earn a commission from links on this page. Antidepressants have been approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (and comparable regulatory agencies in other countries) and prescribed by medical professionals for decades. Researchers, though, are still working to definitively establish that antidepressants are more effective than placebo. A paper published in Lancet today (Feb. 21) shows that, according to a meta-analysis of 522 trials, 21 commonly used antidepressants are all more effective than placebo. The meta-analysis includes data on 116,477 patients total, from double-blind, randomized controlled trials published between 1979 and 2016. The researchers found that antidepressants led to a greater reduction in depressive symptoms than placebo over the first eight weeks of treatment. Advertisement To the millions of people who benefit from antidepressants, these results may seem obvious. From a scientific perspective though, they’re highly contested. That this paper is considered groundbreaking enough to be published in a major medical journal speaks to the lack of clear data around antidepressants. And, though the meta-analysis is strong, this paper is unlikely to conclusively end the debate over the efficacy of antidepressants. Much of past evidence suggesting antidepressants are no more effective than placebo comes from the work of Irving Kirsch, associate director of the Program in Placebo Studies at Harvard Medical School. Crucially, Kirsch’s 2008 meta-analysis showing antidepressants are no more effective than placebo included data sent by pharmaceutical companies to the Food and Drug Administration to approve various antidepressants—which Kirsch obtained through the Freedom of Information Act. The FDA demands pharmaceutical companies provide data on all the clinical trials they sponsor—including unpublished trials. “This turned out to be very important,” wrote Kirsch in a 2014 paper. “Almost half of the clinical trials sponsored by the drug companies have not been published.” Scientists on both sides of the debate have published various meta-analyses claiming to conclusively show that antidepressants are or are not more effective than placebo—and neither accepts the other’s evidence. There have been findings that counter Kirsch’s work and show antidepressants are truly effective, which Kirsch in turn rejected through his own research. Accusations of bias on either side are unlikely to go away. Pharmaceutical companies funds the majority of studies on antidepressants, and they have a clear financial interest in the success of these drugs. Of the 522 trials in the newly published meta-analysis, 409 were funded by pharma companies. “Forty-six (9%) of 522 trials were rated as high risk of bias, 380 (73%) trials as moderate, and 96 (18%) as low,” note the authors. Advertisement Another challenge is the heterogeneous nature of depression patients, who respond differently to different antidepressants. “Some antidepressants were more effective than others, with agomelatine, amitriptyline, escitalopram, mirtazapine, paroxetine, venlafaxine, and vortioxetine proving most effective, and fluoxetine, fluvoxamine, reboxetine, and trazodone being the least effective,” write the authors of the newly-published Lancet paper. Of course, if one drug were always more effective than the others, then we wouldn’t need so many antidepressants—doctors could simply prescribe the best one to all patients. But different patients respond very differently to the same drug. This is likely in part due to the extremely broad medical definition of “depression”; many people are classified as having the same disorder, even if the underlying biological and social influences causing the illness vary considerably. “Some people really respond, some don’t respond at all, and everything in between,” Steve Hyman, director of the Stanley Center for psychiatric research at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, previously told Quartz. Finally, there’s the issue of long-term effectiveness. The latest meta-analysis only looks at eight weeks of treatment. There are several studies showing that though antidepressants produce strong results in the short-term, non-medication-based treatment options have better effects in the long-term. Advertisement Antidepressants became popular in part because so many people benefitted. For those whose symptoms diminish after taking the drugs, no study or meta-analyses should influence their decision to make use of such effective treatment. On a broader scale though, it’s concerning that research showing antidepressants are more effective than placebos is considered exciting new evidence after so many decades of widespread use of these drugs. Contemporary western psychiatry relies heavily on antidepressants to treat depression and presents it as the most scientific, enlightened approach to the illness. From a strictly scientific perspective, though, the evidence is pretty mixed.

Researchers are still working to prove that antidepressants are more effective than placebo Antidepressants work for many – but researchers are still debating the scientific data. Image: Reuters/Lucy Nicholson By Olivia Goldhill PublishedFebruary 22, 2018 We may earn a commission from links on this page. Antidepressants have been approved by the US Food and Drug Administration (and comparable regulatory agencies in other countries) and prescribed by medical professionals for decades. Researchers, though, are still working to definitively establish that antidepressants are more effective than placebo. A paper published in Lancet today (Feb. 21) shows that, according to a meta-analysis of 522 trials, 21 commonly used antidepressants are all more effective than placebo. The meta-analysis includes data on 116,477 patients total, from double-blind, randomized controlled trials published between 1979 and 2016. The researchers found that antidepressants led to a greater reduction in depressive symptoms than placebo over the first eight weeks of treatment. Advertisement To the millions of people who benefit from antidepressants, these results may seem obvious. From a scientific perspective though, they’re highly contested. That this paper is considered groundbreaking enough to be published in a major medical journal speaks to the lack of clear data around antidepressants. And, though the meta-analysis is strong, this paper is unlikely to conclusively end the debate over the efficacy of antidepressants. Much of past evidence suggesting antidepressants are no more effective than placebo comes from the work of Irving Kirsch, associate director of the Program in Placebo Studies at Harvard Medical School. Crucially, Kirsch’s 2008 meta-analysis showing antidepressants are no more effective than placebo included data sent by pharmaceutical companies to the Food and Drug Administration to approve various antidepressants—which Kirsch obtained through the Freedom of Information Act.

yes

Pharmacology

Are antidepressants more effective than placebo?

yes_statement

"antidepressants" are more "effective" than "placebo".. "placebo" is less "effective" than "antidepressants".

https://www.psych.ox.ac.uk/news/all-antidepressants-are-more-effective-than-placebo-at-treating-acute-depression-in-adults-concludes-study

'Antidepressants are more effective than placebo at treating acute ...

Cookies on this website We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you click 'Accept all cookies' we'll assume that you are happy to receive all cookies and you won't see this message again. If you click 'Reject all non-essential cookies' only necessary cookies providing core functionality such as security, network management, and accessibility will be enabled. Click 'Find out more' for information on how to change your cookie settings. 'Antidepressants are more effective than placebo at treating acute depression' Network meta-analysis led by Dr Andrea Cipriani of 522 trials includes the largest amount of unpublished data to date. A major study comparing 21 commonly used antidepressants concludes that all are more effective than placebo for the short-term treatment of acute depression in adults, with effectiveness ranging from small to moderate for different drugs. The international study, published in The Lancet, is a network meta-analysis of 522 double-blind, randomised controlled trials comprising a total of 116477 participants. The study includes the largest amount of unpublished data to date, and all the data from the study have been made freely available online. Our study brings together the best available evidence to inform and guide doctors and patients in their treatment decisions. We found that the most commonly used antidepressants are more effective than placebo, with some more effective than others. Our findings are relevant for adults experiencing a first or second episode of depression – the typical population seen in general practice. Antidepressants can be an effective tool to treat major depression, but this does not necessarily mean that antidepressants should always be the first line of treatment. Medication should always be considered alongside other options, such as psychological therapies, where these are available. Patients should be aware of the potential benefits from antidepressants and always speak to the doctors about the most suitable treatment for them individually. - Dr Andrea Cipriani, University of Oxford Department of Psychiatry An estimated 350 million have depression worldwide. The economic burden in the USA alone has been estimated to be more than US$210 billion. Pharmacological and non-pharmacological treatments are available but because of inadequate resources, antidepressants are used more frequently than psychological interventions. However, there is considerable debate about their effectiveness. As part of the study, the authors identified all double-blind, randomised controlled trials (RCTs) comparing antidepressants with placebo, or with another antidepressants (head-to-head trials) for the acute treatment (over 8 weeks) of major depression in adults aged 18 years or more. The authors then contacted pharmaceutical companies, original study authors, and regulatory agencies to supplement incomplete reports of the original papers, or provide data for unpublished studies. The primary outcomes were efficacy (number of patients who responded to treatment, i.e. who had a reduction in depressive symptoms of 50% or more on a validated rating scale over 8 weeks) and acceptability (proportion of patients who withdrew from the study for any reason by week 8). Overall, 522 double-blind RCTs done between 1979 and 2016 comparing 21 commonly used antidepressants or placebo were included in the meta-analysis, the largest ever in psychiatry. A total of 87052 participants had been randomly assigned to receive a drug, and 29425 to receive placebo. The majority of patients had moderate-to-severe depression. All 21 antidepressants were more effective than placebo, and only one drug (clomipramine) less acceptable than placebo. Some antidepressants were more effective than others, with agomelatine, amitriptyline, escitalopram, mirtazapine, paroxetine, venlafaxine, and vortioxetine proving most effective, and fluoxetine, fluvoxamine, reboxetine, and trazodone being the least effective. The majority of the most effective antidepressants are now off patent and available in generic form. Antidepressants also differed in terms of acceptability, with agomelatine, citalopram, escitalopram, fluoxetine, sertraline, and vortioxetine proving most tolerable, and amitriptyline, clomipramine, duloxetine, fluvoxamine, reboxetine, trazodone, and venlafaxine being the least tolerable. The authors note that the data included in the meta-analysis covers 8-weeks of treatment, so may not necessarily apply to longer term antidepressant use. The differences in efficacy and acceptability between different antidepressants were smaller when data from placebo-controlled trials were also considered. In order to ensure that the trials included in the meta-analysis were comparable, the authors excluded studies with patients who also had bipolar depression, symptoms of psychosis or treatment resistant depression, meaning that the findings may not apply to these patients. “Antidepressants are effective drugs, but, unfortunately, we know that about one third of patients with depression will not respond. With effectiveness ranging from small to moderate for available antidepressants, it’s clear there is still a need to improve treatments further,” adds Dr Cipriani. 409 (78%) of 522 trials were funded by pharmaceutical companies, and the authors retrieved unpublished information for 274 (52%) of the trials included in the meta-analysis. Overall, 46 (9%) trials were rated as high risk of bias, 380 (78%) as moderate, and 96 (18%) as low. The design of the network meta-analysis and inclusion of unpublished data is intended to reduce the impact of individual study bias as much as possible. Although this study included a significant amount of unpublished data, a certain amount could still not be retrieved. Antidepressants are routinely used worldwide yet there remains considerable debate about their effectiveness and tolerability. By bringing together published and unpublished data from over 500 double blind randomised controlled trials, this study represents the best currently available evidence base to guide the choice of pharmacological treatment for adults with acute depression. The large amount of data allowed more conclusive inferences and gave the opportunity also to explore potential biases.- Professor John Ioannidis, from the Departments of Medicine, Health Research and Policy, Biomedical Data Science, and Statistics, Stanford University, USA The authors note that they did not have access to individual-level data so were only able to analyse group differences. For instance, they could not look at the effectiveness or acceptability of antidepressants in relation to age, sex, severity of symptoms, duration of illness or other individual-level characteristics. The findings from this study contrast with a similar analysis in children and adolescents, which concluded that fluoxetine was probably the only antidepressant that might reduce depressive symptoms. The authors note that the difference may be because depression in young people is the result of different mechanisms or causes, and note that because of the smaller number of studies in young people there is great uncertainty around the risks and benefits of using any antidepressants for the treatment of depression in children and adolescents. Online BBC News – ‘Anti-depressants: Major study finds they work’ Scientists say they have settled one of medicine's biggest debates after a huge study found that anti-depressants work. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-43143889 BBC News – Health – ‘Whatever the medication is doing, it’s keeping me going’ As scientists release a study showing that anti-depressants work, some users of the medication share their experiences on how it has affected their lives. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-43154769

However, there is considerable debate about their effectiveness. As part of the study, the authors identified all double-blind, randomised controlled trials (RCTs) comparing antidepressants with placebo, or with another antidepressants (head-to-head trials) for the acute treatment (over 8 weeks) of major depression in adults aged 18 years or more. The authors then contacted pharmaceutical companies, original study authors, and regulatory agencies to supplement incomplete reports of the original papers, or provide data for unpublished studies. The primary outcomes were efficacy (number of patients who responded to treatment, i.e. who had a reduction in depressive symptoms of 50% or more on a validated rating scale over 8 weeks) and acceptability (proportion of patients who withdrew from the study for any reason by week 8). Overall, 522 double-blind RCTs done between 1979 and 2016 comparing 21 commonly used antidepressants or placebo were included in the meta-analysis, the largest ever in psychiatry. A total of 87052 participants had been randomly assigned to receive a drug, and 29425 to receive placebo. The majority of patients had moderate-to-severe depression. All 21 antidepressants were more effective than placebo, and only one drug (clomipramine) less acceptable than placebo. Some antidepressants were more effective than others, with agomelatine, amitriptyline, escitalopram, mirtazapine, paroxetine, venlafaxine, and vortioxetine proving most effective, and fluoxetine, fluvoxamine, reboxetine, and trazodone being the least effective. The majority of the most effective antidepressants are now off patent and available in generic form.

yes

Pharmacology

Are antidepressants more effective than placebo?

yes_statement

"antidepressants" are more "effective" than "placebo".. "placebo" is less "effective" than "antidepressants".

https://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2018-02-22-antidepressants-more-effective-treating-depression-placebo

Antidepressants more effective in treating depression than placebo ...

Antidepressants more effective in treating depression than placebo A major study comparing 21 commonly used antidepressants concludes that all are more effective than placebo for the short-term treatment of acute depression in adults, with effectiveness ranging from small to moderate for different drugs. The international study, published in The Lancet, is a network meta-analysis of 522 double-blind, randomised controlled trials comprising a total of 116477 participants. The study includes the largest amount of unpublished data to date, and all the data from the study have been made freely available online. An estimated 350 million have depression worldwide. The economic burden in the USA alone has been estimated to be more than US$210 billion. Pharmacological and non-pharmacological treatments are available but because of inadequate resources, antidepressants are used more frequently than psychological interventions. However, there is considerable debate about their effectiveness. As part of the study, the authors identified all double-blind, randomised controlled trials (RCTs) comparing antidepressants with placebo, or with another antidepressants (head-to-head trials) for the acute treatment (over 8 weeks) of major depression in adults aged 18 years or more. The authors then contacted pharmaceutical companies, original study authors, and regulatory agencies to supplement incomplete reports of the original papers, or provide data for unpublished studies. The primary outcomes were efficacy (number of patients who responded to treatment, i.e. who had a reduction in depressive symptoms of 50% or more on a validated rating scale over 8 weeks) and acceptability (proportion of patients who withdrew from the study for any reason by week 8). Overall, 522 double-blind RCTs done between 1979 and 2016 comparing 21 commonly used antidepressants or placebo were included in the meta-analysis, the largest ever in psychiatry. A total of 87052 participants had been randomly assigned to receive a drug, and 29425 to receive placebo. The majority of patients had moderate-to-severe depression. All 21 antidepressants were more effective than placebo, and only one drug (clomipramine) less acceptable than placebo. Some antidepressants were more effective than others, with agomelatine, amitriptyline, escitalopram, mirtazapine, paroxetine, venlafaxine, and vortioxetine proving most effective, and fluoxetine, fluvoxamine, reboxetine, and trazodone being the least effective. The majority of the most effective antidepressants are now off patent and available in generic form. Antidepressants also differed in terms of acceptability, with agomelatine, citalopram, escitalopram, fluoxetine, sertraline, and vortioxetine proving most tolerable, and amitriptyline, clomipramine, duloxetine, fluvoxamine, reboxetine, trazodone, and venlafaxine being the least tolerable. The authors note that the data included in the meta-analysis covers 8-weeks of treatment, so may not necessarily apply to longer term antidepressant use. The differences in efficacy and acceptability between different antidepressants were smaller when data from placebo-controlled trials were also considered. In order to ensure that the trials included in the meta-analysis were comparable, the authors excluded studies with patients who also had bipolar depression, symptoms of psychosis or treatment resistant depression, meaning that the findings may not apply to these patients. 'Our study brings together the best available evidence to inform and guide doctors and patients in their treatment decisions,' said Dr Andrea Cipriani of Oxford University's Department of Psychiatry. 'We found that the most commonly used antidepressants are more effective than placebo, with some more effective than others. Our findings are relevant for adults experiencing a first or second episode of depression – the typical population seen in general practice. 'Antidepressants can be an effective tool to treat major depression, but this does not necessarily mean that antidepressants should always be the first line of treatment. Medication should always be considered alongside other options, such as psychological therapies, where these are available. Patients should be aware of the potential benefits from antidepressants and always speak to the doctors about the most suitable treatment for them individually.' 409 (78%) of 522 trials were funded by pharmaceutical companies, and the authors retrieved unpublished information for 274 (52%) of the trials included in the meta-analysis. Overall, 46 (9%) trials were rated as high risk of bias, 380 (78%) as moderate, and 96 (18%) as low. The design of the network meta-analysis and inclusion of unpublished data is intended to reduce the impact of individual study bias as much as possible. Although this study included a significant amount of unpublished data, a certain amount could still not be retrieved. The authors note that they did not have access to individual-level data so were only able to analyse group differences. For instance, they could not look at the effectiveness or acceptability of antidepressants in relation to age, sex, severity of symptoms, duration of illness or other individual-level characteristics. The findings from this study contrast with a similar analysis in children and adolescents, which concluded that fluoxetine was probably the only antidepressant that might reduce depressive symptoms. The authors note that the difference may be because depression in young people is the result of different mechanisms or causes, and note that because of the smaller number of studies in young people there is great uncertainty around the risks and benefits of using any antidepressants for the treatment of depression in children and adolescents.

All 21 antidepressants were more effective than placebo, and only one drug (clomipramine) less acceptable than placebo. Some antidepressants were more effective than others, with agomelatine, amitriptyline, escitalopram, mirtazapine, paroxetine, venlafaxine, and vortioxetine proving most effective, and fluoxetine, fluvoxamine, reboxetine, and trazodone being the least effective. The majority of the most effective antidepressants are now off patent and available in generic form. Antidepressants also differed in terms of acceptability, with agomelatine, citalopram, escitalopram, fluoxetine, sertraline, and vortioxetine proving most tolerable, and amitriptyline, clomipramine, duloxetine, fluvoxamine, reboxetine, trazodone, and venlafaxine being the least tolerable. The authors note that the data included in the meta-analysis covers 8-weeks of treatment, so may not necessarily apply to longer term antidepressant use. The differences in efficacy and acceptability between different antidepressants were smaller when data from placebo-controlled trials were also considered. In order to ensure that the trials included in the meta-analysis were comparable, the authors excluded studies with patients who also had bipolar depression, symptoms of psychosis or treatment resistant depression, meaning that the findings may not apply to these patients. 'Our study brings together the best available evidence to inform and guide doctors and patients in their treatment decisions,' said Dr Andrea Cipriani of Oxford University's Department of Psychiatry. ' We found that the most commonly used antidepressants are more effective than placebo, with some more effective than others. Our findings are relevant for adults experiencing a first or second episode of depression – the typical population seen in general practice.

yes

Pharmacology

Are antidepressants more effective than placebo?

yes_statement

"antidepressants" are more "effective" than "placebo".. "placebo" is less "effective" than "antidepressants".

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29477251/

Comparative efficacy and acceptability of 21 antidepressant drugs ...

Abstract Background: Major depressive disorder is one of the most common, burdensome, and costly psychiatric disorders worldwide in adults. Pharmacological and non-pharmacological treatments are available; however, because of inadequate resources, antidepressants are used more frequently than psychological interventions. Prescription of these agents should be informed by the best available evidence. Therefore, we aimed to update and expand our previous work to compare and rank antidepressants for the acute treatment of adults with unipolar major depressive disorder. Methods: We did a systematic review and network meta-analysis. We searched Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, CINAHL, Embase, LILACS database, MEDLINE, MEDLINE In-Process, PsycINFO, the websites of regulatory agencies, and international registers for published and unpublished, double-blind, randomised controlled trials from their inception to Jan 8, 2016. We included placebo-controlled and head-to-head trials of 21 antidepressants used for the acute treatment of adults (≥18 years old and of both sexes) with major depressive disorder diagnosed according to standard operationalised criteria. We excluded quasi-randomised trials and trials that were incomplete or included 20% or more of participants with bipolar disorder, psychotic depression, or treatment-resistant depression; or patients with a serious concomitant medical illness. We extracted data following a predefined hierarchy. In network meta-analysis, we used group-level data. We assessed the studies' risk of bias in accordance to the Cochrane Handbook for Systematic Reviews of Interventions, and certainty of evidence using the Grading of Recommendations Assessment, Development and Evaluation framework. Primary outcomes were efficacy (response rate) and acceptability (treatment discontinuations due to any cause). We estimated summary odds ratios (ORs) using pairwise and network meta-analysis with random effects. This study is registered with PROSPERO, number CRD42012002291. Findings: We identified 28 552 citations and of these included 522 trials comprising 116 477 participants. In terms of efficacy, all antidepressants were more effective than placebo, with ORs ranging between 2·13 (95% credible interval [CrI] 1·89-2·41) for amitriptyline and 1·37 (1·16-1·63) for reboxetine. For acceptability, only agomelatine (OR 0·84, 95% CrI 0·72-0·97) and fluoxetine (0·88, 0·80-0·96) were associated with fewer dropouts than placebo, whereas clomipramine was worse than placebo (1·30, 1·01-1·68). When all trials were considered, differences in ORs between antidepressants ranged from 1·15 to 1·55 for efficacy and from 0·64 to 0·83 for acceptability, with wide CrIs on most of the comparative analyses. In head-to-head studies, agomelatine, amitriptyline, escitalopram, mirtazapine, paroxetine, venlafaxine, and vortioxetine were more effective than other antidepressants (range of ORs 1·19-1·96), whereas fluoxetine, fluvoxamine, reboxetine, and trazodone were the least efficacious drugs (0·51-0·84). For acceptability, agomelatine, citalopram, escitalopram, fluoxetine, sertraline, and vortioxetine were more tolerable than other antidepressants (range of ORs 0·43-0·77), whereas amitriptyline, clomipramine, duloxetine, fluvoxamine, reboxetine, trazodone, and venlafaxine had the highest dropout rates (1·30-2·32). 46 (9%) of 522 trials were rated as high risk of bias, 380 (73%) trials as moderate, and 96 (18%) as low; and the certainty of evidence was moderate to very low. Interpretation: All antidepressants were more efficacious than placebo in adults with major depressive disorder. Smaller differences between active drugs were found when placebo-controlled trials were included in the analysis, whereas there was more variability in efficacy and acceptability in head-to-head trials. These results should serve evidence-based practice and inform patients, physicians, guideline developers, and policy makers on the relative merits of the different antidepressants. Funding: National Institute for Health Research Oxford Health Biomedical Research Centre and the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science. Figures Study selection process RCTs=randomised controlled trials. *Industry websites, contact with authors, and trial registries. The total number of unpublished records is the total number of results for each drug and on each unpublished database source. †522 RCTs corresponded to 814 treatment groups. Network meta-analysis of eligible comparisons for efficacy (A) and acceptability (B) Width of the lines is proportional to the number of trials comparing every pair of treatments. Size of every circle is proportional to the number of randomly assigned participants (ie, sample size). Figure 3 Forest plots of network meta-analysis… Figure 3 Forest plots of network meta-analysis of all trials for efficacy (A) and acceptability… Figure 3 Forest plots of network meta-analysis of all trials for efficacy (A) and acceptability (B) Antidepressants were compared with placebo, which was the reference compound. OR=odds ratio. CrI=credible interval. Figure 4 Head-to-head comparisons for efficacy and… Figure 4 Head-to-head comparisons for efficacy and acceptability of the 21 antidepressants Drugs are reported… Figure 4 Head-to-head comparisons for efficacy and acceptability of the 21 antidepressants Drugs are reported in alphabetical order. Data are ORs (95% CrI) in the column-defining treatment compared with the row-defining treatment. For efficacy, ORs higher than 1 favour the column-defining treatment (ie, the first in alphabetical order). For acceptability, ORs lower than 1 favour the first drug in alphabetical order. To obtain ORs for comparisons in the opposite direction, reciprocals should be taken. Significant results are in bold and underscored. The certainty of the evidence (according to GRADE) was incorporated in this figure (appendix pp 231–65). OR=odds ratio. CrI=credible interval. Agom=agomelatine. Amit=amitriptyline. Bupr=bupropion. Cita=citalopram. Clom=clomipramine. Dulo=duloxetine. Esci=escitalopram. Fluo=fluoxetine. Fluv=fluvoxamine. Miln=milnacipran. Mirt=mirtazapine. Nefa=nefazodone. Paro=paroxetine. Rebo=reboxetine. Sert=sertraline. Traz=trazodone. Venl=venlafaxine. Vort=vortioxetine. *Moderate quality of evidence. †Low quality of evidence. ‡Very low quality of evidence. Figure 5 Two-dimensional graphs about efficacy and… Figure 5 Two-dimensional graphs about efficacy and acceptability in all studies (A) and head-to-head (B)… Figure 5 Two-dimensional graphs about efficacy and acceptability in all studies (A) and head-to-head (B) studies only Data are reported as ORs in comparison with reboxetine, which is the reference drug. Error bars are 95% CrIs. Individual drugs are represented by different coloured nodes. Desvenlafaxine, levomilnacipran, and vilazodone were not included in the head-to-head analysis because these three antidepressants had only placebo-controlled trials. ORs=odds ratios. 1=agomelatine. 2=amitriptyline. 3=bupropion. 4=citalopram. 5=clomipramine. 6=desvenlafaxine. 7=duloxetine. 8=escitalopram. 9=fluoxetine. 10=fluvoxamine. 11=levomilnacipran. 12=milnacipran. 13=mirtazapine. 14=nefazodone. 15=paroxetine. 16=reboxetine. 17=sertraline. 18=trazodone. 19=venlafaxine. 20=vilazodone. 21=vortioxetine. 22=placebo.

552 citations and of these included 522 trials comprising 116 477 participants. In terms of efficacy, all antidepressants were more effective than placebo, with ORs ranging between 2·13 (95% credible interval [CrI] 1·89-2·41) for amitriptyline and 1·37 (1·16-1·63) for reboxetine. For acceptability, only agomelatine (OR 0·84, 95% CrI 0·72-0·97) and fluoxetine (0·88, 0·80-0·96) were associated with fewer dropouts than placebo, whereas clomipramine was worse than placebo (1·30, 1·01-1·68). When all trials were considered, differences in ORs between antidepressants ranged from 1·15 to 1·55 for efficacy and from 0·64 to 0·83 for acceptability, with wide CrIs on most of the comparative analyses. In head-to-head studies, agomelatine, amitriptyline, escitalopram, mirtazapine, paroxetine, venlafaxine, and vortioxetine were more effective than other antidepressants (range of ORs 1·19-1·96), whereas fluoxetine, fluvoxamine, reboxetine, and trazodone were the least efficacious drugs (0·51-0·84). For acceptability, agomelatine, citalopram, escitalopram, fluoxetine, sertraline, and vortioxetine were more tolerable than other antidepressants (range of ORs 0·43-0·77), whereas amitriptyline, clomipramine, duloxetine, fluvoxamine, reboxetine, trazodone, and venlafaxine had the highest dropout rates (1·30-2·32).

yes

Pharmacology

Are antidepressants more effective than placebo?

yes_statement

"antidepressants" are more "effective" than "placebo".. "placebo" is less "effective" than "antidepressants".

https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyt.2019.00407

Placebo Effect in the Treatment of Depression and Anxiety - Frontiers

Placebo Effect in the Treatment of Depression and Anxiety The aim of this review is to evaluate the placebo effect in the treatment of anxiety and depression. Antidepressants are supposed to work by fixing a chemical imbalance, specifically, a lack of serotonin or norepinephrine in the brain. However, analyses of the published and the unpublished clinical trial data are consistent in showing that most (if not all) of the benefits of antidepressants in the treatment of depression and anxiety are due to the placebo response, and the difference in improvement between drug and placebo is not clinically meaningful and may be due to breaking blind by both patients and clinicians. Although this conclusion has been the subject of intense controversy, the current article indicates that the data from all of the published meta-analyses report the same results. This is also true of recent meta-analysis of all of the antidepressant data submitted to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) in the process of seeking drug approval. Also, contrary to previously published results, the new FDA analysis reveals that the placebo response has not increased over time. Other treatments (e.g., psychotherapy and physical exercise) produce the same benefits as antidepressants and do so without the side effects and health risks of the active drugs. Psychotherapy and placebo treatments also show a lower relapse rate than that reported for antidepressant medication. Introduction The aim of this review is to evaluate the placebo effect in the treatment of anxiety and depression. On February 19, 2012, Leslie Stahl opened a segment of the CBS news program 60 Minutes saying “The medical community is at war, battling over the scientific research and writings of a psychologist named Irving Kirsch. The fight is about antidepressants and Kirsch’s questioning of whether they work.” By that time, I had co-authored three meta-analyses and a book concerning the placebo effect in the treatment of depression (1–4). Two of these meta-analyses (2, 3) were conducted on the data sent to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) by the manufacturers of what at that time were the six most widely prescribed antidepressants—data that we obtained using the Freedom of Information Act. We found that although the people given antidepressants showed considerable improvement in the clinical trials submitted to the FDA by the manufacturers, so did the people given placebo, and the difference in outcome between drug and placebo was below the criterion for clinical meaningfulness used by the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE), the organization that sets treatment guidelines for the National Health Service in the United Kingdom. There is now a crisis concerning the lack of replicability of many studies in psychology and medicine (5, 6). I am pleased to report that the antidepressant meta-analyses we published have not contributed to this crisis. There are now at least nine subsequent meta-analyses aimed at replicating or discrediting our studies (7–16). Some of these were restricted to changes on the Hamilton Rating Scale for Depression (HAM-D), whereas others included data from a variety of scales. Some were conventional meta-analyses in which means and standard deviations were used to calculate effect sizes, whereas others were patient-level analyses. Although interpretations of the data varied from study to study, the results have been consistent across all of them. We had reported a mean drug-placebo difference of 1.80 points on the HAM-D and a standardized mean difference (SMD) of 0.32. The differences reported in the replications ranged from 1.62 to 2.56 HAM-D points, with SMD effect sizes ranging from 0.23 to 0.34. To put this into perspective, the NICE criteria for clinical significance of antidepressant-placebo differences are three points on the HAM-D or SMDs of at least 0.50, corresponding to what Cohen (17) proposed as a moderate effect size. Special attention is due to the preliminary results of a patient-level meta-analysis reported by Stone et al. (15). Marc Stone is the Deputy Director for Safety at the Division of Psychiatric Products of the FDA. He and his colleagues reported a patient-level analysis of the data from all randomized placebo-controlled trials of antidepressants in the treatment of Major Depressive Disorder that had been submitted to the FDA between 1979 and 2016. The similarity in outcome between what the Stone et al. data and those that my colleagues and I had reported in 2002 and 2008 is astounding. We had reported a drug response of 10.1 points on the HAM-D and a placebo response of 8.3 point—a drug-placebo difference of 1.8 points. In Stone et al.’s comprehensive analysis of the data from the 73,178 patients in the 228 trials submitted to the FDA, the drug response was 10.1 points, the placebo response was 8.3 points—yielding a drug-placebo difference of 1.80 points on the 17-item HAM-D, exactly what my colleagues and I reported in our analysis of the FDA data for the six antidepressants that we evaluated (2). Antidepressants are also used to treat anxiety disorders. Might they be more effective in treating anxiety than in treating depression? My colleagues and I have assessed that issue in a meta-analysis of the effects of paroxetine in treating anxiety disorders (18). We chose to limit our analysis to paroxetine so that we could assess a complete dataset of unpublished pre- and post-marketing trials, as well as those that had been published. As part of a 2004 lawsuit settlement, GlaxoSmithKline was required to post online the results of all clinical trials involving its drugs on its Clinical Trial Register (19). Examining these data, we found a drug-placebo effect size (SMD) of 0.27, similar to those reported for antidepressants in the treatment of depression. In a subsequent study, Roest et al. (20) analyzed data obtained from the FDA for premarketing trials of nine second-generation antidepressants in the treatment of anxiety disorders. They reported an SMD of 0.33, similar to that reported by Sugarman and colleagues for paroxetine (18) and to those reported in the meta-analyses of antidepressants in the treatment of depression cited above. Subsequently, Sugarman and colleagues (21) replicated the Roest et al. study and found an SMD of 0.34 across all antidepressants and all anxiety disorders, with individual effect sizes ranging from 0.26 to 0.39. Thus, antidepressants are no better in treating anxiety disorders than they are in treating depression. The impact of placebo factors in the treatment of anxiety can also be seen in a study by Faria et al. (22). Participants diagnosed with social anxiety disorder (SAD) were treated with an selective seratonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) (escitalopram). Approximately half of the patients were accurately informed that they were taking an SSRI. The others were told that they were being given an active placebo (i.e., a drug that produces side effects but has no therapeutic effect on the condition being treated). Telling patients that they were being treated by an active medication doubled its effectiveness on a continuous measure of anxiety and tripled the response rate. Critics have noted that the criteria proposed for clinical significance by NICE (3 points on the HAM-D or SMDs of at least 0.50) are arbitrary (23), and they are correct. The NICE criteria are as arbitrary as the criterion of p < .05 for statistical significance, the use of a 50% reduction in symptoms as a criterion of a clinical response, and the use of a HAM-D score below 8 as the criterion of remission. Given that the conventional cutoffs for statistical significance are arbitrary, as are those for assessing clinical “response” and “remission,” why would we expect the criteria for the clinical significance of drug-placebo differences to be any less arbitrary? Nevertheless, Joanna Moncrieff and I (24) have proposed empirically derived criteria for the clinical significance of antidepressant-placebo differences. We used published data from a large patient-level analysis (25) of the correspondence between changes on the HAM-D and the Clinical Global Impressions-Improvement (CGI-I) scale, a scale that rates improvement on a scale of 1 (very much improved) through 4 (no change) to 7 (very much worse). This analysis revealed that an improvement of three points on the HAM-D (SMD = 0.375) is equivalent to a clinician rating “no change” on the CGI-I. A CGI-I rating of “minimally improved” corresponds to a HAM-D difference of 7 points (SMD = 0.873), and a rating of “much improved” corresponds to a 14-point HAM-D difference (SMD = 1.75). None of the meta-analyses have reported drug-placebo differences that come close to reaching the criterion for CGI-I ratings of minimal improvement, even among the most severely depressed patients. Many depressed patients report substantial improvement after taking antidepressant medication, as do psychiatrists when describing their outcomes. How are we to reconcile this with the consistent finding that the differences between the response to antidepressants and placebos are vanishingly small? The answer is the placebo response. Although drug–placebo differences in outcome are equivalent to no difference at all, both drug and placebo responses can be substantial. The improvement of 8.3 points following placebo treatment and 10.1 points on the active drugs reported by Kirsch et al. (3) and Stone et al. (15) corresponds to CGI-I ratings between minimally improved and much improved. It is only the 1.8-point difference that corresponds to a CGI-I rating of no change. Thus, the clinically meaningful improvement seen following prescriptions of antidepressants is largely to the placebo response (i.e., the placebo effect, regression toward the mean, and spontaneous remission). The failure to find meaningful differences between antidepressants and placebos has been blamed on increasing placebo responses over the years (26), and some meta-analyses have shown increases in both the placebo response and the drug response over time [e.g., Ref. (27)]. However, the comprehensive analysis of all trials submitted to the FDA from 1979 to 2016 tells a different story (15). The placebo response was 8.3 HAM-D points in both 1979 and 2016, with little variation between those dates. There was a small decrease (0.8 points) in the drug–placebo difference over time, but this was due to a 0.8-point decrease in the drug response (from 10.7 points in 1979 to 9.9 points in 2016), rather than an increase in the placebo response. Placebo Effects versus Placebo Responses In 1965, Fisher and colleagues (28, pp. 57–58) noted that “a clinical response following treatment (drug response) is not synonymous with an effect which can be attributed to the treatment (drug effect).” In 1998, Kirsch and Sapirstein (4) extended this distinction to placebo responses and effects, and in 2018, a group of 29 internationally recognized placebo researchers published a “consensus statement,” in which they endorsed the view that “the placebo and nocebo response includes all health changes that result after administration of an inactive treatment (i.e., differences in symptoms before and after treatment), thus, including natural history and regression to the mean. The placebo and nocebo effect refers to the changes specifically attributable to placebo and nocebo mechanisms” (29, p. 206). The meta-analyses described above indicate a strong placebo response, but with one exception: they do not assess the placebo effect. In the one exception (4), Guy Sapirstein and I assessed the placebo effect by comparing the placebo response in drug trials to changes observed in no-treatment natural-history control conditions in psychotherapy studies. We found that 25% of the drug response was duplicated in the no-treatment groups, and 75% of the drug response was found in the placebo groups. Thus, the placebo effect was 50% of the drug response—double the drug effect and also double the response found in the no-treatment controls. It was a genuine placebo effect. A limitation of our study was that data in the no-treatment groups and data in the placebo groups came from different studies. That limitation has been overcome in a clinical trial reported by Leuchter and his colleagues (30). This was a three-arm study, in which depressed patients were randomized to either antidepressant plus supportive care, placebo plus supportive care, or supportive care alone. Mean HAM-D improvement was 10.05 points in the antidepressant group and 7.59 in the placebo group, but only 1.37 in the supportive care only group. As in the Kirsch and Sapirstein study, the response in the placebo group was mostly a genuine placebo effect and not simply due to spontaneous improvement or regression toward the mean. Is There a Drug Effect at All? Although the difference between antidepressant and placebo is not clinically meaningful, it is statistically significant. Can we interpret that small but statistically significant difference as a genuine drug? Although that cannot be ruled out, there is another possibility. Clinical trials in which patients and/or their doctors or other outcome raters are asked to judge whether the patient was given an active drug or a placebo are consistent in showing that those judgements are very accurate. This indicates that the trials are not really double-blind. Numerous studies have shown that when patients know they are getting a drug, they are more responsive to the drug than when they know they might be getting a placebo (31–35). This indicates a placebo effect component in the drug response. Similarly, the placebo response is reduced when people know they might be getting a placebo than when they are led to believe that they are getting the active drug (31, 36). Therefore, the small drug–placebo difference in outcome might be due to the increased response in the drug group and decreased responding in the placebo group produced by what participants are told about the trials. In 1986, Rabkin and her colleagues (1986) published a study in which doctors and their depressed patients who had been randomized to imipramine, phenelzine, or placebo were asked to guess the group to which the patients had been assigned. Overall, 78% of patients and 87% of the doctors accurately identified whether the patients had been given an active drug or a placebo. As shown in Figure 1, patients randomized to active drug groups were especially successful in breaking blind, whereas those receiving placebo seem to be merely guessing. In contrast, doctors showed high levels of accuracy in identifying group assignment for patients in the placebo groups as well as those in the drug groups. Furthermore, this pattern of results has been replicated successfully in subsequent studies (38–41), indicating that they are reliable. Rabkin et al. concluded that “in view of these findings we recommend that investigators routinely record and report doctor and patient opinions about treatment assignment in randomized trials, preferably both early in the trial and at the end” (p. 86). Unfortunately, this recommendation has been largely ignored. FIGURE 1 Figure 1 Accuracy of patient and doctor “guesses” as a function of actual treatment (37). Given these exceptionally high rates of breaking blind, the next question is whether this phenomenon is associated with the outcome of clinical trials. In 2013, Baethge and colleagues (42) reported the results of a meta-analysis addressing this issue. In 47 clinical trials of psychiatric disorders in which blinding was assessed, the correlation between patient accuracy and the drug–placebo effect size was .51 (p = .002) and that between rater accuracy and effect size was .55 (p = .067). Thus, the greater the likelihood of breaking blind, the greater the drug–placebo difference. However, there is an interpretive problem with respect to understanding the direction of causality in the data on accuracy of judgements of group assignment. In most of the studies in which blinding was assessed, the assessment was made near the end of the trial. Thus, it is possible that breaking blind is a consequence rather than a cause of drug–placebo differences. However, some of the data reported by Rabkin et al. (37) indicate that breaking blind is not solely a consequence of the patients’ responses to treatment. Figure 2 displays the accuracy of judgements separately for patients who responded to treatment and those who did not. Of particular interest is the ability of both patients and doctors to accurately guess group assignment of nonresponders in the drug group. Seventy-four percent of nonresponders who received an active drug judged themselves to be on the drug, as did 84% of their doctors. Furthermore, almost half of responders to placebo guessed they were on placebo. Although this would be expected by chance guessing, it indicates that the improvement experienced by these placebo responders did not lead them to think they were taking an active medication. Taken together, these data indicate that although response to treatment influences patients’ and doctors’ judgements of treatment assignment, it does not fully explain the accuracy of those judgements. FIGURE 2 Figure 2 Accuracy of patient and doctor “guesses” as a function of actual treatment and patient response (37). I and others (1, 43, 44) have hypothesized that the presence of side effects is responsible for breaking blind. As part of the informed consent processes, patients in clinical trials are told that they might receive a placebo. They are also told that the medication under investigation has side effects, and they are told exactly what the known side effects are. Now placebos can also generate side effects, a phenomenon known as the nocebo effect, but they do so to a much lesser degree than active medications (45). This difference in side effects might lead patients in clinical trials, as well as the clinicians who rate their improvement, to figure out to which group they have been randomized. To the extent that this occurs, the trial is not really double-blind. In this section, I describe data indicating that patients in clinical trials often do break blind and that breaking blind affects the outcomes of the trials. Studies have shown mixed results for the hypothesis and drug–placebo differences are associated with reported side effects (46–51). However, side effects may be only one of the cues leading participants in clinical trials to break blind. Joanna Moncrief (52) has hypothesized that people learn how to recognize the sometimes subtle changes produced by medications without necessarily reporting symptoms that would be listed as a side effect on the checklists used to assess them. Two studies conducted by Aimee Hunter and colleagues at UCLA provide indirect support for this hypothesis (53, 54). In each of these studies, depressed patients in clinical trials were grouped according to whether they had ever been on antidepressants before. As displayed in Figure 3, there were virtually no differences at all between drug and placebo among patients who had never been taken antidepressants before. In contrast, among those with prior experience, drug–placebo differences were both significant and substantially larger than those reported in other clinical trials, whereas the combined differences for antidepressant-experienced and antidepressant-naive participants are in the same range of other clinical trials. Taken together, the data from both studies strongly suggest that prescriptions for antidepressants should not be given to depressed people who have never taken them before. What Is to Be Done? How then shall we treat depression? One suggestion that has been made to me informally is to prescribe antidepressants as active placebos. An active placebo is a pharmacologically active substance that does not have specific activity for the condition being treated. Antidepressant medications have little or no pharmacological effects on depression or anxiety, but they do elicit a substantial placebo effect. Could we not use them as a means of capitalizing on the power of placebo? The problem with this suggestion is that treatment decisions need to be based on an assessment of risks, as well as benefits. The risks of antidepressant treatment include suicidal and violent aggressive behavior in adolescents and young adults; stroke, death from all causes, falls and fractures, and epileptic seizures in the elderly; and sexual dysfunction, withdrawal symptoms, diabetes, deep vein thrombosis, and gastrointestinal and intracranial bleeding in everyone else (55–62). One might argue that these risks might be worth taking for an effective treatment of severe depression, but are they worth risking for a treatment that has no benefit at all over placebo for first-time users? A second possibility would be to prescribe placebos. They are safe and effective, with relatively few nocebo side effects and no health risks. The problem with prescribing placebos rests with the commonly held assumption that to be effective in clinical practice, placebos have to be presented deceptively as active medications. This assumption has been reported to be false in recent clinical trials [reviewed in Ref. (63)]. In these studies, placebos were presented non-deceptively as placebos with no active ingredients. How could this ever work? The answer is that it was accompanied by a rationale in which it was explained that placebos have been found effective to the condition being treated, that it has been found to involve Pavlovian conditioning, and that it might therefore be effective in treating the person’s condition. This rationale has been found to be critical for the success of the open-label placebo (OLP) intervention (64). Additional OLP trials with larger samples, longer duration, and blinded assessors are warranted. Unfortunately, only one of the studies assessing OLPs involved the treatment of depression, and that one, although showing promising results, was only a small pilot (65). However, there are many other treatments that equal antidepressants in terms of degree of symptom reduction (66–69). These include psychotherapy, physical exercise, acupuncture, omega-3, homeopathy, tai chi, qigong, and yoga. We do not know the mechanisms of these alternative treatments, and their efficacy may be at least partly due to expectancy, but they are certainly safer than antidepressant medication. The long-term advantage of psychotherapy over medication has been shown in a number of studies [reviewed in Ref. (70)]. Whereas short-term outcomes were equivalent between the two treatments, long-term outcomes were significantly better for patients who had received psychotherapy than for those who had received medication. Additionally, the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) Treatment of Depression Collaborative Research Program reported relapse rates of 36% and 33% for cognitive behaviour therapy and interpersonal therapy, respectively, compared with a 50% relapse rate for antidepressant medication (71). However, the rate of relapse for patients who had recovered on placebo was 33%, the same as that for psychotherapy. There are two take-home messages from these data. First, it dispels the myth that placebo responses are short-lived. Second, it raises the questions of whether psychotherapy reduces relapse or medication increases it (72). Support for the hypothesis that antidepressant medication increases the risk of relapse comes from other studies comparing antidepressant and placebo treatment for depression and anxiety disorders. Consistent with the NIMH data, a 2011 meta-analysis reported a relapse rate of 25% for depressed patients successfully treated with placebo compared to relapse rates ranging from 42% to 57% among those treated with various antidepressants (73). A direct test of the effect of antidepressants and psychotherapy on the risk of relapse comes from a study on the treatment of panic disorder (74). The study compared the 6-month relapse rates for patients who had been treated with a tricyclic antidepressant (imipramine), cognitive behavior therapy (CBT), or the two combined. The results, displayed in Figure 4, indicate that the risk of relapse following imipramine was more than double that following CBT. However, the addition of the antidepressant to imipramine completely erased that benefit. Similarly, physical exercise as a treatment for depression has been shown to have a much lower relapse rate than SSRIs, but that benefit disappears when the two treatments are combined (75). FIGURE 4 Figure 4 Six-month relapse rates in panic disorder for patients who had been treated with imipramine or placebo, with or without CBT (74). These studies reveal another benefit of including placebos in clinical trials of medication. They can reveal situations in which the treatment does more harm than good for the condition being treated. For example, placebos have outperformed antipsychotic medication (haloperidol and risperidone) in the treatment of delirium in palliative care patients and aggression in intellectually disabled adults (76, 77). Similarly, placebo was significantly better than a combination of chondroitin and glucosamine in the treatment of knee osteoarthritis (78) and showed similar superiority in a trial of nutraceuticals in the treatment of depression (79). Given these data, I suggest that the following principles be used in treatment selection. When treatments are equally effective, recommend the safest. When they are equally safe, let the patient choose which he or she prefers. Before making this choice, however, patients should be accurately informed of the potential harms of antidepressant medication (e.g., increased risk of relapse, suicidality, gastrointestinal and intracranial bleeding, deep vein thrombosis, pulmonary embolism, diabetes, stroke, epilepsy, and death from all causes), as well as the finding that all of these treatments appear to be equally effective in the short term but that psychotherapy and physical exercise might be more effective than antidepressants in the long run. Author Contributions IK wrote the article. Conflict of Interest Statement The author declares that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest. The reviewer CB declared a shared affiliation, with no collaboration, with the author to the handling editor. 26. Stahl SM, Greenberg GD. Placebo response rate is ruining drug development in psychiatry: why is this happening and what can we do about it? Acta Psychiatr Scand (2019) 139(2):105–7. doi: 10.1111/acps.13000

As displayed in Figure 3, there were virtually no differences at all between drug and placebo among patients who had never been taken antidepressants before. In contrast, among those with prior experience, drug–placebo differences were both significant and substantially larger than those reported in other clinical trials, whereas the combined differences for antidepressant-experienced and antidepressant-naive participants are in the same range of other clinical trials. Taken together, the data from both studies strongly suggest that prescriptions for antidepressants should not be given to depressed people who have never taken them before. What Is to Be Done? How then shall we treat depression? One suggestion that has been made to me informally is to prescribe antidepressants as active placebos. An active placebo is a pharmacologically active substance that does not have specific activity for the condition being treated. Antidepressant medications have little or no pharmacological effects on depression or anxiety, but they do elicit a substantial placebo effect. Could we not use them as a means of capitalizing on the power of placebo? The problem with this suggestion is that treatment decisions need to be based on an assessment of risks, as well as benefits. The risks of antidepressant treatment include suicidal and violent aggressive behavior in adolescents and young adults; stroke, death from all causes, falls and fractures, and epileptic seizures in the elderly; and sexual dysfunction, withdrawal symptoms, diabetes, deep vein thrombosis, and gastrointestinal and intracranial bleeding in everyone else (55–62). One might argue that these risks might be worth taking for an effective treatment of severe depression, but are they worth risking for a treatment that has no benefit at all over placebo for first-time users? A second possibility would be to prescribe placebos. They are safe and effective, with relatively few nocebo side effects and no health risks.

no

Pharmacology

Are antidepressants more effective than placebo?

yes_statement

"antidepressants" are more "effective" than "placebo".. "placebo" is less "effective" than "antidepressants".

https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/antidepressants-do-they-work-or-dont-they/

Antidepressants: Do They "Work" or Don't They? - Scientific American

Antidepressants: Do They "Work" or Don't They? Question: Are antidepressants effective or ineffective? Answer: Yes! In my view, both these statements are true: Antidepressants do work. And antidepressants don’t work. Not to put too fine a Clintonian point on it, but determining whether antidepressants work depends on the definition of the word “work.” A controversial article just published in the prestigious Journal of the American Medical Association concluded that antidepressants are no more effective than placebos for most depressed patients. Jay Fournier and his colleagues at the University of Pennsylvania aggregated individual patient data from six high-quality clinical trials and found that the superiority of antidepressants over placebo is clinically significant only for patients who are very severely depressed. For patients with mild, moderate, and even severe depression, placebos work nearly as well as antidepressants. There have been at least four other review articles published in the last eight years that have come to similar conclusions about the limited clinical efficacy of antidepressants, and one of the study authors, psychologist Irving Kirsch, has recently published a book on the topic, provocatively entitled The Emperor’s New Drugs: Exploding the Antidepressant Myth. The recent review articles questioning the clinical efficacy of antidepressants run counter to the received wisdom in the psychiatric community that antidepressants are highly effective. Indeed, it wasn’t so long ago that psychiatrist Peter Kramer wrote in his best-selling book Listening to Prozac that this miracle drug made patients “better than well.” Prozac was a Rock Star. Its extraordinary success even led to a photograph of the green and white capsule on the cover of Newsweek Magazine in 1990. The essential facts about antidepressant efficacy are not in dispute. In double-blind, randomized controlled trials – meaning that patients are randomly assigned to receive either drug or placebo, and neither patient nor clinician knows who gets what – antidepressants show a small but statistically significant advantage over placebos. The debate is over the interpretation of these findings, and it revolves around the distinction between clinical significance and statistical significance. Statistical significance means that an effect is probably not due to chance and is therefore likely to be reliable. But statistical significance says nothing about the magnitude of the effect or its practical implications. Clinical significance indicates the degree to which an effect translates to a meaningful improvement in symptoms for patients. Although the superiority of antidepressants over placebos has been shown to be statistically significant, the observed differences are not clinically significant. In fact, the average difference between drug and placebo is approximately two points on a depression scale that ranges from 0 to 52. This difference does not exceed the commonly accepted standard for a minimally significant clinical improvement of a 3 point improvement on the depression scale. But what of the testimonials from patients and their doctors reporting dramatic relief of symptoms in response to antidepressants? Such reports really aren’t in conflict with the data from randomized controlled trials. In clinical trials, patients treated with antidepressants do show substantial improvement from baseline. However, the clinical trial data also show that patients treated with placebos improve about 75% as much as patients treated with antidepressants, suggesting that only a quarter of the improvement shown by patients treated with antidepressants is actually attributable to the specific effect of the drugs. The rest of the improvement is a placebo response. In clinical practice, of course, there is no placebo group, and therefore patients and their doctors are likely to attribute all symptom improvement to the medication. What seems clear from double-blind, randomized controlled trials is that antidepressants are, on average, only marginally superior to placebos. One might reasonably ask, however, whether there might be a sub-set of patients for whom antidepressants are highly effective. This is certainly possible, but to date no one has been able to reliably predict which subset of patients will respond best. Moreover, because average antidepressant efficacy is small and not clinically significant, if there is a sub-set of patients for whom antidepressants are highly effective, there must also be a sub-set of patients for whom antidepressants have no effect, or are even harmful. In addition, since pharmaceutical companies are now the major sponsors of drug trials, and they have an interest in maximizing the number of people for whom their medications can be prescribed, they have little interest in performing any trials whose aim would be to identify such sub-sets of patients. To do so would risk reducing their profits. Some have suggested that critics of antidepressant efficacy should keep quiet and not publicize their work. The reasoning is that if the effectiveness of antidepressants depends in large part on the faith of patients and their doctors, then publicizing the fact that antidepressants appear to have only minimal efficacy as compared to placebos will have the practical effect of harming patients. But this is putting our heads in the sand. The history of medicine is littered with treatments initially thought effective that we now know to be ineffective at best and actually harmful at worst (For example, bloodletting contributed to the death of George Washington). To ignore the evidence, is to return to a pre-scientific form of medicine. In the long run, this will not be beneficial to patients. So what’s the bottom line? In clinical practice, many people suffering from depression improve after taking antidepressants. But the evidence indicates that much of that improvement is a placebo response. Antidepressants do work in the sense that many patients in clinical practice show substantial improvement. However, if the standard is efficacy in comparison to placebo, the best available scientific evidence suggests that antidepressants do not work very well. Given their cost and side effects, the psychiatric community and the general public should not be satisfied with antidepressant medications that provide only a marginal benefit over placebo. Indeed, as early as 1994, Brown University School of Medicine psychiatrist Walter Brown suggested treating mild to moderately depressed patients with placebos for an initial 4-6 week period, and then switching to active medications if patients did not improve. To surmount ethical concerns, Brown proposed prescribing placebos openly by informing patients that clinical trials showed that many depressed patients improved after being treated with placebos, and asking whether they would like to try a placebo initially. It’s been sixteen years since Brown offered up his radical prescription for harnessing the placebo effect in the treatment of depression. Is it time to fill the prescription? ABOUT THE AUTHOR(S) Clinical psychologist John Kelley is an Assistant Professor of Psychology at Endicott College and an Instructor in the Psychiatry Department at Harvard Medical School whose research focuses on placebo effects in medicine and psychiatry. Scientific American is part of Springer Nature, which owns or has commercial relations with thousands of scientific publications (many of them can be found at www.springernature.com/us). Scientific American maintains a strict policy of editorial independence in reporting developments in science to our readers.

To do so would risk reducing their profits. Some have suggested that critics of antidepressant efficacy should keep quiet and not publicize their work. The reasoning is that if the effectiveness of antidepressants depends in large part on the faith of patients and their doctors, then publicizing the fact that antidepressants appear to have only minimal efficacy as compared to placebos will have the practical effect of harming patients. But this is putting our heads in the sand. The history of medicine is littered with treatments initially thought effective that we now know to be ineffective at best and actually harmful at worst (For example, bloodletting contributed to the death of George Washington). To ignore the evidence, is to return to a pre-scientific form of medicine. In the long run, this will not be beneficial to patients. So what’s the bottom line? In clinical practice, many people suffering from depression improve after taking antidepressants. But the evidence indicates that much of that improvement is a placebo response. Antidepressants do work in the sense that many patients in clinical practice show substantial improvement. However, if the standard is efficacy in comparison to placebo, the best available scientific evidence suggests that antidepressants do not work very well. Given their cost and side effects, the psychiatric community and the general public should not be satisfied with antidepressant medications that provide only a marginal benefit over placebo. Indeed, as early as 1994, Brown University School of Medicine psychiatrist Walter Brown suggested treating mild to moderately depressed patients with placebos for an initial 4-6 week period, and then switching to active medications if patients did not improve. To surmount ethical concerns, Brown proposed prescribing placebos openly by informing patients that clinical trials showed that many depressed patients improved after being treated with placebos, and asking whether they would like to try a placebo initially. It’s been sixteen years since Brown offered up his radical prescription for harnessing the placebo effect in the treatment of depression. Is it time to fill the prescription? ABOUT THE AUTHOR(S)

no

Pharmacology

Are antidepressants more effective than placebo?

yes_statement

"antidepressants" are more "effective" than "placebo".. "placebo" is less "effective" than "antidepressants".

https://www.aafp.org/pubs/afp/issues/2009/0201/ol2.html

Are Antidepressants Merely Providing a Placebo Effect? | AAFP

to the editor: We appreciated the recent review of pharmacologic management options for adult depression, which addressed many important issues that family physicians face. Depression is a major health issue associated with morbidity and loss of productivity. In 2007, antidepressants ranked as the top class of medications dispensed in the United States, with an estimated 232.7 million antidepressant prescriptions and an estimated sale of $11.9 billion.1 However, a recent meta-analysis suggests that selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) and serotonin norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors (SNRIs) may not be more effective than placebo.2 Selective publication of positive studies appears to have greatly overstated the benefits of these drugs.3 Although we have regularly witnessed apparent benefits of SSRIs and SNRIs in patients with depression, family physicians should also recognize the limitations of data regarding these drugs and call for further research and discussion. Could the dramatic responses to antidepressant medications be a placebo effect in which providers actively listen and patients feel understood, gain insight, believe in their treatment plan, feel motivated to change their lifestyle or social situation, or perhaps some combination?4 Should we reintroduce the N-of-1 trials, in which each patient is their own “study” comparing placebo with active medication over some period of time, in order to identify the small proportion of patients who may benefit from SSRIs or SNRIs? The majority of depression studies measure changes in depression scores that have uncertain clinical significance. Remission rates are rarely measured, and most studies are of short duration (often as little as 24 weeks of follow-up). We need to help researchers identify outcome measures that are more meaningful in the primary care setting. Perhaps physicians should prescribe SSRIs and SNRIs only after fully disclosing to their patients that the drugs may be acting through the placebo effect and sharing the known side effects.5,6 Clearly, more research is needed. We think it is time to find out if there are better ways to treat depression. in reply: We appreciate Dr. Grossman's input regarding the risk of hyponatremia with use of selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) and about the use of antidepressants during pregnancy and breast feeding. The complicated issue of managing depression during pregnancy and the postpartum period is a worthy topic for a separate review. The letter from Drs. Baghdady, Goo, and Mayer raises important concerns regarding the quality of evidence supporting the efficacy of antidepressants in patients with major depression. The number of studies on this topic is astounding. PubMed indexes 4,750 papers related to clinical trials of anti-depressive agents. However, antidepressant trials are typically industry-sponsored and short in duration. The issue of publication bias raises worrisome issues about drawing conclusions about efficacy and harms solely from published data. Although we disagree with the conclusion that antidepressants are no better than placebo, we do agree that large, well-designed, long-term studies are needed to fully elucidate when and how anti-depressants should be used. Email letter submissions to afplet@aafp.org. Letters should be fewer than 400 words and limited to six references, one table or figure, and three authors. Letters submitted for publication in AFP must not be submitted to any other publication. Letters may be edited to meet style and space requirements. Continue Reading More in AFP This content is owned by the AAFP. A person viewing it online may make one printout of the material and may use that printout only for his or her personal, non-commercial reference. This material may not otherwise be downloaded, copied, printed, stored, transmitted or reproduced in any medium, whether now known or later invented, except as authorized in writing by the AAFP. See permissions for copyright questions and/or permission requests.

Depression is a major health issue associated with morbidity and loss of productivity. In 2007, antidepressants ranked as the top class of medications dispensed in the United States, with an estimated 232.7 million antidepressant prescriptions and an estimated sale of $11.9 billion.1 However, a recent meta-analysis suggests that selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) and serotonin norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors (SNRIs) may not be more effective than placebo.2 Selective publication of positive studies appears to have greatly overstated the benefits of these drugs.3 Although we have regularly witnessed apparent benefits of SSRIs and SNRIs in patients with depression, family physicians should also recognize the limitations of data regarding these drugs and call for further research and discussion. Could the dramatic responses to antidepressant medications be a placebo effect in which providers actively listen and patients feel understood, gain insight, believe in their treatment plan, feel motivated to change their lifestyle or social situation, or perhaps some combination?4 Should we reintroduce the N-of-1 trials, in which each patient is their own “study” comparing placebo with active medication over some period of time, in order to identify the small proportion of patients who may benefit from SSRIs or SNRIs? The majority of depression studies measure changes in depression scores that have uncertain clinical significance. Remission rates are rarely measured, and most studies are of short duration (often as little as 24 weeks of follow-up). We need to help researchers identify outcome measures that are more meaningful in the primary care setting. Perhaps physicians should prescribe SSRIs and SNRIs only after fully disclosing to their patients that the drugs may be acting through the placebo effect and sharing the known side effects.5,6 Clearly, more research is needed. We think it is time to find out if there are better ways to treat depression.

no

Pharmacology

Are antidepressants more effective than placebo?

no_statement

"antidepressants" are not more "effective" than "placebo".. "placebo" is equally "effective" as "antidepressants".

https://www.thecrimson.com/column/demystifying-therapy/article/2023/2/15/suhaas-depressed-therapy-placebo/

Depressed? Ask Your Doctor if a Placebo is Right for You | Opinion ...

Depressed? Ask Your Doctor if a Placebo is Right for You Demystifying Therapy Suhaas M. Bhat ’23-’24 is a double concentrator in Social Studies and Physics in Mather House. His column, “Demystifying Therapy,” runs on alternate Wednesdays. Psychotherapy as we know it has been around for about a century, and has been continually refined since. So why do placebo treatments perform almost equally as well? What is it that actually makes therapy so effective at treating mental illness — and what could a placebo share in common? In the 1980s, the National Institute of Mental Health launched the Treatment of Depression Collaborative Research Program, a large-scale randomized control trial that eventually formed the scientific basis for the belief that therapy is effective. The study showed that interpersonal therapy and cognitive behavioral therapy worked equivalently well to antidepressants for reducing the symptoms of depression. In the following three decades, psychotherapy — especially short-term, manualized therapy of the kind tested in the study — has exploded in popularity as a front-line treatment for mental illness. Still, there’s more to the story. A closer look at the NIMH-TDCRP’s results reveals a curious phenomenon: The therapies and antidepressants barely outperform placebo treatment. On the 54 point Hamilton Depression Rating Scale, CBT does, on average, 1.2 points better than a sugar pill combined with weekly meetings with a psychiatrist. This is not to say that therapy didn’t work — in all treatment groups, depression symptoms were reduced from severe to mild. Rather, it is to say that there was nothing specifically effective about the psychotherapies: A sugar pill and weekly meetings with a psychiatrist to discuss the effects of the ‘treatment’ were also comparably effective. So why is a sugar pill performing on the level of state of the art therapy and antidepressants? The most plausible answer goes deeper than what pharmaceutical companies describe as “chemical imbalances in the brain.” The only explanation for the efficacy of the sugar pill lies beyond the pill — in the psychiatrist’s caring relationship with the patient. In meta-analysis after meta-analysis, almost every (vastly different) approach to psychotherapy is similarly effective at treating depression. This begs the question: Are there certain factors that all therapies have in common that make them effective? Most centrally, if the theory you choose doesn’t matter for outcomes, then what makes therapy work? Advertisement This phenomenon, known as the “dodo-bird verdict,” has stoked controversy in the field for almost a century. It dates back to the 1930s, when American psychologist Saul Rosenzweig mused that what might matter for the efficacy of therapy is not the philosophy, but the human relationship beneath it all. Arguably the foremost modern theorist of this phenomenon, Bruce Wampold, proposes that therapy is a special case of a “social healing practice,” and is thus a specific practice of the basic human act of taking care of each other. In this view, therapeutic efficacy is based on three key things: the real relationship between the therapist and the patient, the plausible explanation of symptoms, and the encouragement of health promoting actions. With a model like this, the sugar pill’s effects don’t seem so ridiculous. Though the patient is taking medication with virtually no active ingredients, they are still consistently meeting with a trusted psychiatrist, both parties expect and believe that the pills treat depression, and the psychiatrist continually encourages behavior that improves wellbeing. In the same way, because all therapies are built upon a real relationship, have reasonable narratives, and promote healthy behavior, their rates of success are bound to be similar. The consequences of this being true — and, in my view, it really seems to be the most plausible explanation — would have massive public health implications. It isn’t that therapy is no better than a placebo. It’s that relationships of care and support are the most fundamental component of psychological well-being, whether or not they’re embedded within a medical system. Our best hope of dealing with this era’s mental health crisis is through the realization that the things that make psychotherapy effective are not limited to psychotherapy at all. Mentoring, supporting, and taking care of each other is as old as human history, and though it’s not a pharmaceutical, it’s no placebo. Suhaas M. Bhat ’23-’24 is a double concentrator in Social Studies and Physics in Mather House. His column, “Demystifying Therapy,” runs on alternate Wednesdays.

Depressed? Ask Your Doctor if a Placebo is Right for You Demystifying Therapy Suhaas M. Bhat ’23-’24 is a double concentrator in Social Studies and Physics in Mather House. His column, “Demystifying Therapy,” runs on alternate Wednesdays. Psychotherapy as we know it has been around for about a century, and has been continually refined since. So why do placebo treatments perform almost equally as well? What is it that actually makes therapy so effective at treating mental illness — and what could a placebo share in common? In the 1980s, the National Institute of Mental Health launched the Treatment of Depression Collaborative Research Program, a large-scale randomized control trial that eventually formed the scientific basis for the belief that therapy is effective. The study showed that interpersonal therapy and cognitive behavioral therapy worked equivalently well to antidepressants for reducing the symptoms of depression. In the following three decades, psychotherapy — especially short-term, manualized therapy of the kind tested in the study — has exploded in popularity as a front-line treatment for mental illness. Still, there’s more to the story. A closer look at the NIMH-TDCRP’s results reveals a curious phenomenon: The therapies and antidepressants barely outperform placebo treatment. On the 54 point Hamilton Depression Rating Scale, CBT does, on average, 1.2 points better than a sugar pill combined with weekly meetings with a psychiatrist. This is not to say that therapy didn’t work — in all treatment groups, depression symptoms were reduced from severe to mild. Rather, it is to say that there was nothing specifically effective about the psychotherapies: A sugar pill and weekly meetings with a psychiatrist to discuss the effects of the ‘treatment’ were also comparably effective. So why is a sugar pill performing on the level of state of the art therapy and antidepressants? The most plausible answer goes deeper than what pharmaceutical companies describe as “chemical imbalances in the brain.”

no

Diabetology

Are artificial sweeteners safe for diabetics?

yes_statement

"artificial" "sweeteners" are "safe" for "diabetics".. "diabetics" can "safely" consume "artificial" "sweeteners".

https://www.mcgill.ca/oss/article/health-and-nutrition-you-asked/what-xylitol-doing-chewing-gum

What is xylitol doing in chewing gum? | Office for Science and ...

Giving the chewer a sweet experience without worrying about cavities. Hopefully it does this without precipitating a quick trip to the bathroom. Sugar, as we well know, is persona- non-grata as far as our teeth are concerned. Bacteria in our mouth find sugar to be a yummy snack and they happily ingest it. But like us, bacteria also poop. And when they consume sugar, they poop out acids that can corrode the tooth’s enamel and cause cavities to form. But chewing gum that isn’t sweet isn’t much fun. Artificial sweeteners like aspartame can be used to impart flavour, but xylitol is better. The bacteria responsible for cavities cannot metabolize xylitol and therefore cannot multiply at the same rate as when fed sugar. As a result, less enamel damaging acids are produced. Mind you, it does take a fair bit of xylitol, roughly 5-6 grams a day, to cut down on the population of streptococcus mutans, the prime bacterium responsible for cavities. That translates to chewing roughly 3- 5 pieces of xylitol-sweetened gum a day. In high doses, more than about 15 grams a day, xylitol can cause stomach problems, and at even higher doses, it can give you the runs. Obviously, the dose matters both in terms of benefit and risk. Since streptococci bacteria can be transferred to a baby through a mother’s kiss, xylitol sweetened gum is especially appropriate for new moms. Studies show that transmission of bacteria during the first two years of life can be reduced by as much as 80%! Xylitol’s safety has been thoroughly tested, including in pregnant and nursing women and aside from a laxative effect at doses way above what people actually consume, no effect has been noted. Xylitol has approximately the same sweetness as sugar, but only contributes about 2.4 calories per gram as opposed to sugar’s 4 calories per gram. Furthermore, xylitol does not need insulin to be metabolized, so it can be safely consumed by diabetics. A common question that comes up about xylitol is whether it is or isn’t an artificial sweetener. This usually arises because of concerns about “artificial sweeteners.” Essentially, the question is an inappropriate one because a compound’s safety profile is not determined by its origin. Whether xylitol is extracted from some berry, which it can be, or whether it is made by an industrial process from xylose, which it usually is, has no bearing on its properties. The reason it has been found to be safe is simply because it has been tested. Xylitol is xylitiol, no matter where it comes from. So, is it an artificial sweetener or not? I guess it is really both. It does occur in nature, you’ll find it in corn husks, fruits, berries, oats and various trees. But it isn’t practical to isolate it from these sources. On the other hand, xylose, a common carbohydrate can easily be produced from xylan, a type of fiber found in the cell walls of many plants. The pulp and paper industry is a ready source for xylan, which in turn can be converted to xylitol through a hydrogenation process. And then it’s ready to be added to gums, candies, toothpaste, pharmaceuticals and mouthwashes. But keep these away from dogs. They metabolize xylitol differently and at high doses can exhibit seriously low blood sugar and even liver damage.

That translates to chewing roughly 3- 5 pieces of xylitol-sweetened gum a day. In high doses, more than about 15 grams a day, xylitol can cause stomach problems, and at even higher doses, it can give you the runs. Obviously, the dose matters both in terms of benefit and risk. Since streptococci bacteria can be transferred to a baby through a mother’s kiss, xylitol sweetened gum is especially appropriate for new moms. Studies show that transmission of bacteria during the first two years of life can be reduced by as much as 80%! Xylitol’s safety has been thoroughly tested, including in pregnant and nursing women and aside from a laxative effect at doses way above what people actually consume, no effect has been noted. Xylitol has approximately the same sweetness as sugar, but only contributes about 2.4 calories per gram as opposed to sugar’s 4 calories per gram. Furthermore, xylitol does not need insulin to be metabolized, so it can be safely consumed by diabetics. A common question that comes up about xylitol is whether it is or isn’t an artificial sweetener. This usually arises because of concerns about “artificial sweeteners.” Essentially, the question is an inappropriate one because a compound’s safety profile is not determined by its origin. Whether xylitol is extracted from some berry, which it can be, or whether it is made by an industrial process from xylose, which it usually is, has no bearing on its properties. The reason it has been found to be safe is simply because it has been tested. Xylitol is xylitiol, no matter where it comes from. So, is it an artificial sweetener or not? I guess it is really both. It does occur in nature, you’ll find it in corn husks, fruits, berries, oats and various trees. But it isn’t practical to isolate it from these sources.

yes

Diabetology

Are artificial sweeteners safe for diabetics?

yes_statement

"artificial" "sweeteners" are "safe" for "diabetics".. "diabetics" can "safely" consume "artificial" "sweeteners".

https://wellversed.in/blogs/articles/https-www-ketofy-in-artificial-sweeteners-on-a-keto-diet-yay-or-nay

Artificial Sweeteners on a Keto Diet: Yay or Nay? – Wellversed

Artificial Sweeteners on a Keto Diet: Yay or Nay? Sugar is an essential part of our balanced diet. Yet, doctors from all over the world are talking about the negative aspects of consuming sugar. It is often termed as “slow poison”. Despite the information we have at our hand, we continue to include sugar in our diet. We have tried to stick to our diet regimes but we could not avoid sugar in our cheat meals. Sugar plays a major role in our dietary lifestyle. It is included in everything, from our favourite sweets to pastries, in our curries to enhance the flavour and in practically most foods we consume throughout the day. From our morning breakfast to lunch and dinner, we include an item or two of food which contains sugar that makes up a wholesome meal. Despite the sugar we consume, our body also naturally produces sugar in the form of glucose. Glucose plays a vital role in our body functioning. The sugar that we consume as part of our diet, including the glucose produced in our body, leads to major diseases that we commonly hear. From, the well-known diabetes to irregular levels of blood sugar, sugar does more harm to our body with the excess glucose stored in our body. The major factors of obesity to diabetes are all linked to common food, Sugar. So, how can we avoid sugar in our diet and continue to eat our favourite foods?! Artificial sweeteners have created all the new rage in the marketplace and are gradually replacing common sugar in our kitchen. The various artificial sweeteners can be included in our diet without any negative side-effects. InKeto Diet, we witness most people tend to have intense sugar cravings at the beginning of their diet. The sugar temptation is real. This is when artificial sweeteners are the most effective without throwing you off your Ketosis or affecting weight loss management. The Keto-friendly sweeteners are healthy, safe for your regular use and have a very low calorific value. Artificial Sweeteners produce the same kind of taste as that of Sugar. It can be used in the food we eat. Unlike processed sugar, it produces zero calories to ultra-low calories. Artificial Sweeteners are of different kinds: 1. Stevia Stevia is a natural sweetener, derived from the Stevia rebaudiana plant and acts as a Sugar substitute. It contains little to no calories or carbs and also helps in lowering the blood sugar levels. This plant-based sugar has a very high sweetening potential and it is completely free of calories. The use of stevia is marketed widely as the best alternative to natural sugar. Stevia Sugar can be considered medicinal as the consumption of stevia powder can reduce your blood pressure, lower the insulin level in diabetics patients and claims to fight inflammation. 2. Erythritol Erythritol is a type of sugar alcohol and contains 4 grams of carbs per teaspoon. It may help in lowering the blood sugar levels in your body. Erythritol can be substituted with sugar in both baking and cooking. It also acts as an antioxidant and it claims to improve the functions of the blood vessel suffering from diabetes. This sugar substitute does not affect your process of Ketosisand it is safe to say it is good for regular consumption. 3. Xylitol Another type of sugar alcohol commonly found in candies or mints. It contains just 3 calories per gram and 4 grams of carbs per teaspoon. Xylitol can be easily added to tea, coffee, shakes or smoothies for flavour. This naturally occurring substitute of sugar needs to be extracted from plants. It has essential medicinal properties which can cure a lot of health issues. Xylitol is mostly used as a sugar substitute because it has lower calories. It essentially does not cause the blood sugar level to rise and maintains the insulin level in our body. It also has antioxidant properties which can help to fight the free radicals. 4. Monk Fruit Sweetener Monk Fruit Sweetener is a natural sweetener and contains antioxidants like mogrosides which is responsible for the sweetness. It contains no calories and no carbs, making it a great option for a Ketogenic diet. This sugar substitute provides units of calories and it is allowed to be used for food andbeveragepurposes. It is safe to use and can be used as an alternative to sugar. People on a Ketogenic diet concerned about a possible sugar alternative can use this in their foods on an everyday basis. People suffering from diabetes can safely consume it. There are no side-effects whatsoever. The Artificial sweeteners help to balance our regular eating lifestyle without trying too hard to avoid natural sugar. It does not affect our insulin levels, increases our bad cholesterol and maintains the blood sugar level. Such sweeteners can also be exposed to high temperature for cooking without turning bitter or degrading the quality of food. It does not harm our net calorific value and contains zero tolow carbs. Much importance has been given in maintaining the level of glucose in a healthy Keto Diet without breaking the diet cycle. Our body should rely on our body fats to generate glucose, it is safe to avoid natural sugar and welcome sweeteners to allow you to feast while you are still on Diet. Artificial sweeteners can be used in our Keto Diet. Research has backed the use of other alternatives of sugar, it is safe to use and has no possible side-effects. Besides all the Keto sweeteners we looked into, erythritol is widely accepted in Keto products and Keto meals for everyday use. It is also easier to digest and can be used without any side-effects. The stevia powder can also be used according to your need. The sugar substitute is important to continue with our diet without the additional increase in calories and harmful effects of sugar. Transform your life with natural sweeteners to increase your healthspan without adding extra calories.

From, the well-known diabetes to irregular levels of blood sugar, sugar does more harm to our body with the excess glucose stored in our body. The major factors of obesity to diabetes are all linked to common food, Sugar. So, how can we avoid sugar in our diet and continue to eat our favourite foods?! Artificial sweeteners have created all the new rage in the marketplace and are gradually replacing common sugar in our kitchen. The various artificial sweeteners can be included in our diet without any negative side-effects. InKeto Diet, we witness most people tend to have intense sugar cravings at the beginning of their diet. The sugar temptation is real. This is when artificial sweeteners are the most effective without throwing you off your Ketosis or affecting weight loss management. The Keto-friendly sweeteners are healthy, safe for your regular use and have a very low calorific value. Artificial Sweeteners produce the same kind of taste as that of Sugar. It can be used in the food we eat. Unlike processed sugar, it produces zero calories to ultra-low calories. Artificial Sweeteners are of different kinds: 1. Stevia Stevia is a natural sweetener, derived from the Stevia rebaudiana plant and acts as a Sugar substitute. It contains little to no calories or carbs and also helps in lowering the blood sugar levels. This plant-based sugar has a very high sweetening potential and it is completely free of calories. The use of stevia is marketed widely as the best alternative to natural sugar. Stevia Sugar can be considered medicinal as the consumption of stevia powder can reduce your blood pressure, lower the insulin level in diabetics patients and claims to fight inflammation. 2. Erythritol Erythritol is a type of sugar alcohol and contains 4 grams of carbs per teaspoon. It may help in lowering the blood sugar levels in your body. Erythritol can be substituted with sugar in both baking and cooking.

yes

Diabetology

Are artificial sweeteners safe for diabetics?

yes_statement

"artificial" "sweeteners" are "safe" for "diabetics".. "diabetics" can "safely" consume "artificial" "sweeteners".

https://www.khaleejtimes.com/lifestyle/health/uae-doctors-agree-with-who-findings-that-aspartame-remains-safe-for-consumers-diabetics

UAE doctors agree with WHO findings that aspartame remains safe ...

UAE doctors are satisfied with the most recent finding by the World Health Organisation (WHO) that the artificial sweetener, aspartame – though a possible carcinogen – remains safe to consume at already-agreed levels, particularly for those who are diabetics. A carcinogen is a substance, organism or agent capable of causing cancer. Aspartame, discovered in 1965 by American chemist James Schlatter, is a popular artificial sweetener that is about 200 times sweeter than regular table sugar. It is used in zero-calorie or diet sodas, as well as an additive in chewing gum and breakfast cereals. On Friday, two groups linked to WHO declared aspartame remains safe to consume at already-agreed levels. Earlier, the International Agency for Research on Cancer based in Lyon, France, said aspartame was a "possible carcinogen” but there was limited evidence that proved the substance can cause cancer. The WHO and Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) Joint Committee on Food Additives (JECFA), meanwhile, said there was no convincing evidence of harm caused by aspartame. They recommended that people keep their consumption levels of aspartame below 40mg/kg a day. "Our results do not indicate that occasional consumption could pose a risk to most consumers," said Francesco Branca, WHO's head of nutrition. He said the WHO is not urging companies to remove aspartame from their products entirely, but is instead calling for moderation from manufacturers and consumers. What UAE doctors say Doctors in the UAE noted the WHO conclusion confirms that aspartame is safe. Dr Idrees Mubarik, specialist endocrinologist at Saudi German Hospital Dubai, told Khaleej Times: “Aspartame is a non-nutritive artificial sweetener that is around 200 times sweeter than sugar. That means a very small amount is needed to give foods and beverages a sweet flavour. Since it is non-nutritive, it obviously isn't associated with any abnormal increase in blood glucose unlike common table sugar. Dr Idrees Mubarik. “Approved daily intake for aspartame is 40mg/kg body weight per day, which is roughly equal to 75 servings, which obviously is way more than one takes in a day,” he added. Dr Mubarik also noted that the WHO report clearly mentioned that people with pre-existing diabetes can continue to use aspartame. “We can safely conclude that diabetic patients can continue to use aspartame as a substitute for sugar.” Diabetes is a highly prevalent global and regional health concern. In the UAE, around 30 per cent of the population are classified as diabetic or pre-diabetic according to health authorities. A report issued by the International Diabetes Federation (IDF) predicts that 1.17 million of the total population between ages 20 and 79 years old could have diabetes by 2030. Consume in moderation Dr Sarla Kumari, specialist physician diabetologist at Canadian Specialist Hospital Dubai, highlighted: “Aspartame is one of the most exhaustively studied ingredients in the human food supply, with more than 200 studies supporting its safety. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved its use in dry foods in 1981, in carbonated beverages in 1983 and as a general-purpose sweetener in 1996.” Dr Sarla Kumari. Dr Kumari added: “For some people with diabetes who are accustomed to sweetened food, artificial sweeteners – containing few or no calories – may be an acceptable substitute for nutritive sweeteners when consumed in moderation.” “Aspartame can be used in diabetic patients as a safe alternative to glucose. The American Cancer Society does not determine aspartame as a cancer risk agent. The European Food Safety Authority recommends a dose of less than 40mg/kg per day as safe for long term use,” added Dr Remesan, specialist internal medicine at NMC Specialty Hospital, Al Ain. “Some research on long-term, daily use of artificial sweeteners suggests a link to a higher risk of stroke, heart disease and death overall. But what other things people do, or healthy habits that people don't do may also be the cause of the higher risk,” she added. Dr Ahlam Bani Salameh. Like other doctors, Dr Salameh, noted: “If people are faced with the decision whether to take fizzy drinks with artificial sweeteners or with regular table sugar, a third option should be considered. And that is to drink water instead.” While the corporate Oppenheimer throws in the dilemmas that plagues decision-making and responsibility-taking, the holier-than-thou employer value proposition seduces the new kid in the block to a Barbie(aric) world

40mg/kg body weight per day, which is roughly equal to 75 servings, which obviously is way more than one takes in a day ,” he added. Dr Mubarik also noted that the WHO report clearly mentioned that people with pre-existing diabetes can continue to use aspartame. “We can safely conclude that diabetic patients can continue to use aspartame as a substitute for sugar.” Diabetes is a highly prevalent global and regional health concern. In the UAE, around 30 per cent of the population are classified as diabetic or pre-diabetic according to health authorities. A report issued by the International Diabetes Federation (IDF) predicts that 1.17 million of the total population between ages 20 and 79 years old could have diabetes by 2030. Consume in moderation Dr Sarla Kumari, specialist physician diabetologist at Canadian Specialist Hospital Dubai, highlighted: “Aspartame is one of the most exhaustively studied ingredients in the human food supply, with more than 200 studies supporting its safety. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved its use in dry foods in 1981, in carbonated beverages in 1983 and as a general-purpose sweetener in 1996.” Dr Sarla Kumari. Dr Kumari added: “For some people with diabetes who are accustomed to sweetened food, artificial sweeteners – containing few or no calories – may be an acceptable substitute for nutritive sweeteners when consumed in moderation.” “Aspartame can be used in diabetic patients as a safe alternative to glucose. The American Cancer Society does not determine aspartame as a cancer risk agent. The European Food Safety Authority recommends a dose of less than 40mg/kg per day as safe for long term use,” added Dr Remesan, specialist internal medicine at NMC Specialty Hospital, Al Ain. “Some research on long-term, daily use of artificial sweeteners suggests a link to a higher risk of stroke, heart disease and death overall.

yes

Diabetology

Are artificial sweeteners safe for diabetics?

yes_statement

"artificial" "sweeteners" are "safe" for "diabetics".. "diabetics" can "safely" consume "artificial" "sweeteners".

https://extension.usu.edu/nutrition/research/sweet-as-sucralose-the-pros-and-cons-of-artificial-sweeteners

Sweet As . . . Sucralose: The Pros and Cons of Artificial Sweeteners ...

Sweet As . . . Sucralose: The Pros and Cons of Artificial Sweeteners This article is a basic overview of artificial sweeteners, including what they are, why they are popular, and how they affect health. It is specifically intended for people with diabetes, individuals interested in lowering caloric intake, and other consumers wondering whether or not they should be worried about using artificial sweeteners. What Are Artificial Sweeteners? Artificial sweeteners are synthetic sugar substitutes that are much sweeter than table sugar (Mayo Clinic, 2015). While sugar has about 50 calories per tablespoon, many artificial sweeteners have zero calories. Six of the most popular artificial sweeteners approved by the Food and Drug Administration are saccharin (Sweet’N Low), acesulfame (Sweet One), aspartame (Equal, NutraSweet), neotame (Newtame), advantame (no brand name), and sucralose (Splenda). Acesulfame, aspartame, saccharin, and sucralose are several hundred times sweeter than sugar, while neotame is several thousand times sweeter than sugar and advantame is about twenty thousand times sweeter than sugar. As a result, you only need to use a very small amount to flavor your food (FDA, 2018). Takeaway: Artificial sweeteners are much sweeter than sugar but provide 0 or nearly 0 calories. What Foods Are They In? Many food companies use artificial sweeteners as low-calorie sugar substitutes in their products. If a food is labeled as “reduced sugar” or “diet,” this is a good indication that the product contains artificial sweeteners. If a product has artificial sweeteners, they will be listed in the ingredients section on the back of the package. Artificial sweeteners can be found in everything from English muffins to salad dressing (Cronin & Stone, 2014). In addition, artificial sweeteners are found in low-calorie drinks. Takeaway: You may consume artificial sweeteners every day, even if you don’t realize it. Why Would I Want to Use Artificial Sweeteners? Many artificial sweeteners don’t contain calories, so they can be used as a way for a person to cut calories without compromising taste (Gardner et al., 2012). The American Heart Association also released an advisory in 2018 stating that artificially sweetened beverages may be a good way for adults who usually drink sugar sweetened beverages to cut back on sugar and calories, however they encouraged water (plain, carbonated, and unsweetened flavored) as the best option (Johnson et al., 2018). Artificial sweeteners can be an important option for diabetics since they provide sweet taste without sugar, reducing the risk of high blood glucose compared to beverages or foods sweetened with sugar. However, some scientists disagree about the impact of artificial sweeteners on blood sugar (Brown, Banate, & Rother, 2010). For example, a systematic review published in 2010 in the International Journal of Pediatric Obesity referenced some studies that showed that artificial sweeteners negatively impact the health of people with diabetes, but it also pointed to others that did not show such effects. However, the American Diabetes Association asserted that artificial sweeteners are safe for people with diabetes to consume as long as they don’t eat more than the amounts recommended by the FDA (American Diabetes Association, 2008) and are following other recommendations about healthy eating. Takeaway: Artificial sweeteners can help you cut sugar and calories, and are safe sugar substitutes for adults with and without diabetes. Are They Safe to Eat? In 2009, the National Cancer Institute concluded that there is no clear evidence that artificial sweeteners cause cancer in humans (AND, 2012). Nevertheless, artificial sweeteners have been linked to other diseases. Several metaanalyses (research papers that analyze many previous studies to answer a question) found that people who drink excessive amounts of artificially sweetened drinks are more likely to have type 2 diabetes and hypertension (Azad et al., 2017; Greenwood et al., 2014; Gu & Tucker, 2017; Han & Powell, 2013; Imamura et al., 2015; Narain, Kwok, & Mamas, 2016). Another meta-analysis showed that artificial sweeteners may be associated with increased risk of being overweight and having heart problems (Azad et al., 2017). However, these meta-analyses did not show that artificial sweeteners cause these problems, but that they are associated with them. This may be because people who have elevated risk for these diseases start consuming more artificial sweeteners as a way to cut calories. Artificial sweeteners may impact your health by changing the bacteria that live in your gut. One study showed that using artificial sweeteners causes a direct change in the bacteria living in the intestine (Suez, Korem, Zilberman-Schapira, Segal, & Elinav, 2015). Another study suggested that artificial sweeteners can cause glucose intolerance (which can lead to diabetes) by changing which bacteria live in the gut (Suez et al., 2014). The American Heart Association also released an advisory in 2018 which advised against prolonged consumption of artificially sweetened beverages in children. This advisory further encouraged water (plain, carbonated, and unsweetened flavored) as the best beverage option (Johnson et al., 2018). Takeaway: Artificial sweeteners have not been found to cause cancer, but they are associated with other diseases. Artificial sweeteners can also change which bacteria live in the intestine, which may have a negative impact on health. Are They Effective for Weight Loss? ƒThe results have been mixed; there is evidence that ties artificial sweeteners both to weight loss and weight gain. Randomized controlled trials provide evidence that one thing causes another to happen (i.e., if using artificial sweeteners instead of sugar causes you to lose weight). One meta-analysis that looked at many randomized controlled trials showed that using artificial sweeteners had no significant effect on weight (Azad et al., 2017) while two others found that people who substituted artificial sweeteners for added sugar experienced a modest but significant weight loss (Miller & Perez, 2014; Rogers et al., 2016). Prospective studies follow people through time and illustrate if two things are likely to occur together, but do not show a causal relationship (i.e., they show if people that use artificial sweeteners tend to weigh more or less than people who don’t, but they do not show if the artificial sweeteners cause this). When we look at observational studies, we find that people who use artificial sweeteners tend to gain weight (Azad et al., 2017; Miller & Perez, 2014). While observational studies can tell us whether or not artificial sweeteners and weight gain tend to occur together (i.e., they show associations), randomized controlled trials are better at showing whether artificial sweeteners actually cause weight loss or weight gain. Takeaway: Although the evidence is somewhat mixed, randomized controlled trials indicate no effect or a small weight loss effect of substituting added sugars with artificial sweeteners. How Much Can I Safely Eat? The FDA recommends that a 132-pound person should not consume more than the equivalent of 30 cans of Diet Coke with Splenda, 24 cans of Diet Coke with aspartame, 23 single-serve packets of neotame, 14 cans of Tab with saccharin, or 7 cans of Pepsi One made with sucralose per day (FDA, 2018; Franz, 2010). Takeaway: The daily upper limits for artificial sweeteners established by the FDA are much higher than what the average person consumes in a day. In Conclusion Artificial sweeteners are low-calorie sugar substitutes that are found in many food products. Replacing foods containing added sugars with food and beverages that have artificial sweeteners is one way to cut back the amount of added sugars you consume. Although the evidence isn’t clear about their associations with type 2 diabetes and obesity, there is no evidence that suggests that artificial sweeteners cause cancer when consumed in amounts less than the Acceptable Daily Intake limits. The American Heart Association cautions against the prolonged consumption of artificially sweetened beverages in children. References Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics. (2012). Position of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics: Use of nutritive and nonnutritive sweeteners. Journal of the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics, 112(5), 739-758. Slow-cookers provide a convenient way for busy families to sit down to a home-cooked meal. But how do you know the food you’re making is safe? Most people understand that meats need to reach a specific temperature to eliminate the risk of food-related ill Smoothies come in a variety of forms with a seemingly endless range of ingredients. Almost anything can be blended into this delicious drink, which makes it an excellent vehicle for attaining adequate amounts of essential nutrients, water, and fiber. Furt

I Want to Use Artificial Sweeteners? Many artificial sweeteners don’t contain calories, so they can be used as a way for a person to cut calories without compromising taste (Gardner et al., 2012). The American Heart Association also released an advisory in 2018 stating that artificially sweetened beverages may be a good way for adults who usually drink sugar sweetened beverages to cut back on sugar and calories, however they encouraged water (plain, carbonated, and unsweetened flavored) as the best option (Johnson et al., 2018). Artificial sweeteners can be an important option for diabetics since they provide sweet taste without sugar, reducing the risk of high blood glucose compared to beverages or foods sweetened with sugar. However, some scientists disagree about the impact of artificial sweeteners on blood sugar (Brown, Banate, & Rother, 2010). For example, a systematic review published in 2010 in the International Journal of Pediatric Obesity referenced some studies that showed that artificial sweeteners negatively impact the health of people with diabetes, but it also pointed to others that did not show such effects. However, the American Diabetes Association asserted that artificial sweeteners are safe for people with diabetes to consume as long as they don’t eat more than the amounts recommended by the FDA (American Diabetes Association, 2008) and are following other recommendations about healthy eating. Takeaway: Artificial sweeteners can help you cut sugar and calories, and are safe sugar substitutes for adults with and without diabetes. Are They Safe to Eat? In 2009, the National Cancer Institute concluded that there is no clear evidence that artificial sweeteners cause cancer in humans (AND, 2012). Nevertheless, artificial sweeteners have been linked to other diseases.

yes

Diabetology

Are artificial sweeteners safe for diabetics?

yes_statement

"artificial" "sweeteners" are "safe" for "diabetics".. "diabetics" can "safely" consume "artificial" "sweeteners".

https://www.everydayhealth.com/diet-nutrition/can-artificial-sweeteners-help-with-weight-loss/

Can Artificial Sweeteners Help With Weight Loss?

Can Artificial Sweeteners Help With Weight Loss? Artificial sweeteners come in many forms (saccharin and sucralose are just two), sold under various brand names. When saccharin, the first artificial sweetener, was discovered in 1879, it was considered a boon for people with diabetes. That’s because it could sweeten foods without triggering a spike in blood sugar, as an organization devoted to saccharin’s research and history notes. Since that time, a torrent of artificial sweeteners has flooded the market, with promises about not only diabetes management but also weight loss. The idea, of course, is that artificial sweeteners’ lack of calories and carbs allows people to enjoy sweet flavors without a high metabolic price tag. (Sounds like the ultimate example of “have your cake and eat it too,” no?) Each has its own unique advantages and drawbacks, and numerous studies have examined the safety and efficacy of each for weight loss. Still, faux sweeteners have been plagued by a variety of accusations, including that they cause cancer and make you pack on excess pounds rather than shed them. Adding to the confusing conversation, in May 2023, the World Health Organization (WHO) issued guidance that nonsugar sweeteners should not be used for weight loss. Are you wondering whether reaching for a little pink or blue packet could really lead to weight loss? Here’s what science and the experts have to say. Research on Artificial Sweeteners and Weight Given the controversial interplay between artificial sweeteners and weight loss, it’s not surprising that studies on their relationship abound. Unfortunately, the conclusions aren’t clear-cut. Some research suggests that alternative sweeteners might help you trim down. A meta-analysis of 20 studies published in Obesity Reviews in July 2020 concluded that nonnutritive sweeteners led to significant reductions in weight and BMI. A separate meta-analysis, from the August 2022 issue of Diabetes Care, meanwhile, analyzed data from 14 cohorts involving more than 416,000 subjects. In five of the cohorts, low- and no-calorie sweetened beverages were associated with lower weight, and in three cohorts, artificially sweetened drinks substituted for sugar-sweetened ones were linked with lower weight and incidence of obesity. But the researchers emphasized that these conclusions were of “low to very low certainty,” because of limitations in consistency and precision in the studies. The WHO’s guidance advising against the use of nonsugar sweeteners for weight loss is based on a systematic review published in April 2022 conducted by the organization’s researchers, which determined that nonsugar sweeteners do not confer any lasting benefits for reducing body fat in adults or children. While this new guidance has sparked some heated discussion among health experts, some say it’s a helpful reminder not to pin weight loss hopes on a single ingredient. “In general, we know that you can’t simply replace one high-calorie food with one low-calorie food and expect weight loss,” says Caroline Thomason, RD, CDCES, who is based in northern Virginia. “In fact, it’s an accumulation of our habits and behaviors over time that contribute to our health.” Are Artificial Sweeteners Healthy? Regardless of whether artificial sweeteners lower the number on the scale, many people have concerns about their general safety. After all, they’re often synthetically produced and are a relatively new addition to our food supply. And, according to the WHO’s new research, long-term use of artificial sweeteners may increase the risk of worrisome health issues like type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease, as well as overall risk of death. That said, there’s a long history of evidence that nonsugar sweeteners are safe for purposes like promoting weight loss and managing diabetes. “In my opinion, we have a lot of evidence to support the use of nonnutritive sweeteners,” says Thomason. She also points out that many people in research studies already have high risks for cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and other chronic diseases. “Thus, the research shows an association between the development of these chronic diseases and their risk but cannot prove causation,” she says. While artificial sweeteners may fool your taste buds, your body knows the difference between real sugar and substitutes. “Our bodies process low- and no-calorie sweeteners differently than sugar. One result of sugar metabolism is calories. This is not the case with low- and no-calorie sweeteners,” explains Kris Sollid, RD, the senior director of nutrition communications with the International Food Information Council in Washington, DC. Some people may find this leaves them less satisfied. “Anecdotally, some people do state that they have an increased craving response for more sugar-sweetened foods when they consume nonnutritive sweeteners,” says Thomason. “Your mileage may vary: It’s important to consider how you personally respond to nonnutritive sweeteners and decide if they are important for you to include in your diet or not.” Again, artificial sweeteners have been extensively studied for safety, and generous upper limits are recommended by public health organizations. “The FDA has set an acceptable daily intake (ADI) for each sweetener,” says Justine Chan, RD, CDCES, the founder of Your Diabetes Dietitian in Toronto. “For example, the ADI for aspartame is 50 milligrams (mg) per kilogram (kg) of body weight each day. So if you weigh 68 kg, or 150 pounds (lb), you could safely have up to 3,400 mg of aspartame per day. Since there is roughly 200 mg of aspartame per can of diet soda, this would mean you’d need to drink up to 17 cans per day to reach your upper limit.” Despite these safety indicators, with the newly issued WHO guidelines, it’s possible that federal guidance on the use of nonsugar sweeteners for weight loss may eventually change. “At the time of this being released, I don’t think it’s necessarily going to have an impact on U.S. guidelines; however, time will tell as we develop more data and gather more research in this area,” Thomason says. There are groups who should be especially wary of artificial sweeteners. People with digestive disorders, for example, may need to be careful with certain options. “Individuals dealing with irritable bowel syndrome should avoid artificial sweeteners that contain sorbitol or erythritol, as they may aggravate the condition,” says Lisa Andrews of Sound Bites Nutrition in Cincinnati. She also recommends that people with the metabolic disorder phenylketonuria avoid aspartame. People with diabetes should consider working with a registered dietitian or other healthcare professional before diving into the world of artificial sweeteners. Chan says that there is limited research on the safety of some newer options, like neotame and thaumatin, with diabetes. Still, she emphasizes that, in general, nonnutritive sweeteners can be an excellent (and even healthy) choice for people with the condition. “For example, a zero-calorie, artificially sweetened drink can substitute for your favorite sugar-sweetened drink because of their similar flavor profiles,” she notes. “People with diabetes often enjoy very little of the food they eat because of all the dietary restrictions, so it can be a nice alternative to have. In this way, artificial sweeteners can increase satisfaction and help you to stick to your meal plan over the long term.” In general, it’s important to note that foods that use artificial sweeteners aren’t necessarily any healthier than those that are made with sugar. Many foods that incorporate these ingredients are highly processed or contain large amounts of saturated fat, sodium, and additives. Diligent label reading can help you determine a food’s overall nutritional picture. Should You Use Artificial Sweeteners When Trying to Lose Weight? With all the conflicting evidence swirling around artificial sweeteners and weight, it’s helpful to get expert insight into the matter. So, are these zero-calorie foods worth including in your diet if you’re looking to drop a pants size, according to dietitians and researchers? In a nutshell, yes; it’s possible nonsugar sweeteners will help you lose weight, but that doesn’t mean it’s smart to rely on them exclusively. You can think of them as one solution for gradually cutting back on overall sugar and calorie intake, which leads to less body fat over time. “There are many approaches to losing and maintaining body weight, and the common food thread among them is cutting back on total calorie consumption,” says Sollid. “Because low- and no-calorie sweeteners provide zero or negligible calories, they can be helpful in reducing the number of calories, especially calories from added sugars in beverages, that we consume.” If your weight loss journey involves a specific diet plan besides calorie-cutting — such as a Mediterranean diet, plant-based diet, or keto diet — you can choose to include artificial sweeteners in those, too. Because these products have few or zero calories and carbs, they won’t significantly interfere with counting macros or strategizing plant-forward meals. (Most artificial sweeteners are vegan.) Some diets, however, like Whole30, exclude the use of all sweeteners, including artificial ones. It’s up to you to determine your comfort level around including artificial sweeteners in your chosen diet plan. Andrews agrees that alternative sweeteners can have a place in a weight loss diet. “While some nonnutritive sweeteners could impact glycemic control or pose a risk for weight gain, I still prefer clients use them over traditional calorie-containing sweeteners if diabetes management or weight loss are their goals.” Just realize that reaching for a Diet Coke or a Sweet’N Low for your morning coffee isn’t a panacea for weight loss. “Artificial sweeteners are not a magic bullet, and consuming them does not guarantee weight loss or improved health,” says Sollid. “In addition to modifying what we eat and drink, successful weight loss and maintenance plans strive to simultaneously improve health and also encourage people to focus on things like regular exercise, sleep quality, and establishing and maintaining social support networks.”

Regardless of whether artificial sweeteners lower the number on the scale, many people have concerns about their general safety. After all, they’re often synthetically produced and are a relatively new addition to our food supply. And, according to the WHO’s new research, long-term use of artificial sweeteners may increase the risk of worrisome health issues like type 2 diabetes and cardiovascular disease, as well as overall risk of death. That said, there’s a long history of evidence that nonsugar sweeteners are safe for purposes like promoting weight loss and managing diabetes. “In my opinion, we have a lot of evidence to support the use of nonnutritive sweeteners,” says Thomason. She also points out that many people in research studies already have high risks for cardiovascular disease, diabetes, and other chronic diseases. “Thus, the research shows an association between the development of these chronic diseases and their risk but cannot prove causation,” she says. While artificial sweeteners may fool your taste buds, your body knows the difference between real sugar and substitutes. “Our bodies process low- and no-calorie sweeteners differently than sugar. One result of sugar metabolism is calories. This is not the case with low- and no-calorie sweeteners,” explains Kris Sollid, RD, the senior director of nutrition communications with the International Food Information Council in Washington, DC. Some people may find this leaves them less satisfied. “Anecdotally, some people do state that they have an increased craving response for more sugar-sweetened foods when they consume nonnutritive sweeteners,” says Thomason. “Your mileage may vary: It’s important to consider how you personally respond to nonnutritive sweeteners and decide if they are important for you to include in your diet or not.” Again, artificial sweeteners have been extensively studied for safety, and generous upper limits are recommended by public health organizations.

yes

Diabetology

Are artificial sweeteners safe for diabetics?

yes_statement

"artificial" "sweeteners" are "safe" for "diabetics".. "diabetics" can "safely" consume "artificial" "sweeteners".

https://spartanshield.org/37812/news/popular-keto-friendly-artificial-sweetener-linked-to-increased-risk-of-health-problems/

Popular 'keto-friendly' artificial sweetener linked to increased risk of ...

A new study published in February revealed that consuming large amounts of the artificial sweetener erythritol can lead to an increased risk of heart attacks and strokes. The sweetener, popularly used in keto products, is leading some to question the benefits of the modern “health awareness” culture. Artificial sweeteners are considered to be a healthier option than their original counterpart, sugar, which causes weight gain and obesity. Most sugar substitutes move harmlessly through the digestive tract, causing little damage to the body. However, erythritol is different. 10% of erythritol gets absorbed into the bloodstream, circulating around the body before being disposed of. This erythritol leads to a higher risk of blood clots by causing the platelets of the blood to coagulate and stick together. Once formed, a blood clot can travel all around the body, leading to a heart attack, stroke or various other significant health risks. This is particularly dangerous for diabetes patients who are already at a higher risk of blood clots due to their condition. Because their bodies can’t process sugar, many diabetics turn to artificial sweeteners, such as erythritol, to safely consume products such as baked goods, candy and ice cream. Not knowing about the risks of erythritol, many diabetics are putting themselves in danger, especially considering the pre existing risks of their condition. Erythritol is also consumed by people who follow a keto diet, which restricts carbs in order to produce short-term weight loss. People on the keto diet are encouraged to limit their carbs to 5% of their diet, while healthy fats take up a whopping 75%. By focusing on proteins and fats, people can send their body into ketosis, where their body starts consuming their excess fat. This diet has been used as an effective treatment for obesity for many years, helping obese and overweight people achieve a slimmer figure and healthier lifestyle. As a result, the keto diet is widely regarded as a partial solution to the long time American obesity epidemic. Senior Abby Mulvania believes that the keto diet can be dangerous, particularly given the emergence of this new study. “…it [diet culture] can cause people to have an unhealthy relationship with food. I’m trying to have a better mindset with food and how my body looks and I don’t want to risk my health to lose weight,” said Mulvania. While people on a keto diet are told to restrict their carbs, many still want to indulge in sweets. To fill this hole in the market, many companies have begun making prepackaged sweet treats that are keto diet friendly. Companies such as Halo Top, Slimfast and Think! make sugar-free treats for people who don’t consume sugar. However, most sugar-free products on the market contain some form of erythritol. Slimfast’s giant peanut butter cup contains two grams of erythritol per cup in its chocolate coating. Think! brand peanut butter chocolate keto bars contain seven grams of erythritol per bar, with erythritol listed as the second ingredient. One company—Swerve— makes a granulated sugar replacement that is almost pure erythritol. The worst offender of the erythritol craze is the brand Halo Top, which makes ice cream specifically targeted towards health conscious consumers. A pint of vanilla ice cream from the keto friendly line contains 25 grams of sugar alcohol, another name for erythritol. In both their keto-friendly and traditional vanilla pints, erythritol is listed as the third ingredient. Even more alarming is the amount of erythritol needed to thoroughly sweeten a product. Because erythritol only has 70% of the sweetness of sugar, manufacturers must add more of it to their products in order to achieve the desired sugary taste. The more erythritol a person consumes, the higher risk they are for health problems. Senior Julianne Binto believes that healthy alternatives such as erythritol can be just as dangerous as a regular diet. “Marketing diet products as healthier alternatives is dangerous because it can lead people to consume these products in much larger quantities than they normally would if they knew the true risks of the chemicals the products contain,” said Binto. Dr. Stanley Hazen, the director of the Center for Cardiovascular Diagnostics and Prevention at the Cleveland ClinicLerner Research Institute, revealed that eating just a small amount of erythritol a day can lead to major health risks. “Thirty grams was enough to make blood levels of erythritol go up a thousandfold,” Hazen said. “It remained elevated above the threshold necessary to trigger and heighten clotting risk for the following two to three days.” Just one pint of Halo Top ice cream or four Think! bars can lead to potentially catastrophic health risks. In response to the study, Robert Rankin, the director of the Calorie Control Council, released a statement to CNN. “…the results of this study are contrary to decades of scientific research showing reduced-calorie sweeteners like erythritol are safe, as evidenced by global regulatory permissions for their use in foods and beverages,” said Rankin. This study regarding erythritol has shined the light on the dangers of diet culture, especially when the public is made to believe that artificial substitutions are healthier for them than natural foods. Manufacturers must do the research on what chemicals are in the foods they eat, or else run the risk of serious health complications. Your donation will support the student journalists of Pleasant Valley High School in Bettendorf, Iowa. Your contribution will allow us to purchase needed equipment and cover our annual website hosting costs.

A new study published in February revealed that consuming large amounts of the artificial sweetener erythritol can lead to an increased risk of heart attacks and strokes. The sweetener, popularly used in keto products, is leading some to question the benefits of the modern “health awareness” culture. Artificial sweeteners are considered to be a healthier option than their original counterpart, sugar, which causes weight gain and obesity. Most sugar substitutes move harmlessly through the digestive tract, causing little damage to the body. However, erythritol is different. 10% of erythritol gets absorbed into the bloodstream, circulating around the body before being disposed of. This erythritol leads to a higher risk of blood clots by causing the platelets of the blood to coagulate and stick together. Once formed, a blood clot can travel all around the body, leading to a heart attack, stroke or various other significant health risks. This is particularly dangerous for diabetes patients who are already at a higher risk of blood clots due to their condition. Because their bodies can’t process sugar, many diabetics turn to artificial sweeteners, such as erythritol, to safely consume products such as baked goods, candy and ice cream. Not knowing about the risks of erythritol, many diabetics are putting themselves in danger, especially considering the pre existing risks of their condition. Erythritol is also consumed by people who follow a keto diet, which restricts carbs in order to produce short-term weight loss. People on the keto diet are encouraged to limit their carbs to 5% of their diet, while healthy fats take up a whopping 75%. By focusing on proteins and fats, people can send their body into ketosis, where their body starts consuming their excess fat. This diet has been used as an effective treatment for obesity for many years, helping obese and overweight people achieve a slimmer figure and healthier lifestyle. As a result, the keto diet is widely regarded as a partial solution to the long time American obesity epidemic.

no

Diabetology

Are artificial sweeteners safe for diabetics?

yes_statement

"artificial" "sweeteners" are "safe" for "diabetics".. "diabetics" can "safely" consume "artificial" "sweeteners".

https://rosschocolates.ca/the-scoop-on-natural-and-artificial-sweeteners/

The Scoop on Natural and Artificial Sweeteners - Ross Chocolates

The Scoop on Natural and Artificial Sweeteners Written by: Barb Kelly November 15, 2019 Most diabetics find controlling blood sugar levels a challenge. In many diabetics, even a little sugar in a mug of coffee or tea can cause a spike in blood sugar. Thankfully, today, there are several types of artificial sweeteners on the market that are made specifically for people who want to avoid spikes in blood sugar. Essential Facts About Sweeteners Because there are many types of sweeteners, diabetics need to read labels and choose wisely. Here are three facts about sweeteners that all diabetics should know: Sugars Sugars are simple carbohydrates available in many forms. This may include cane sugar (sucrose), brown sugar, honey, fructose, glucose, agave syrup, maltodextrins, fruit juices, corn syrup, dextrose, barley malt, and molasses. All of these not only raise blood sugars but also increase the calorie count of foods. Diabetics should avoid these or use them very sparingly. These sugars are found in many processed foods and the quantity is stated in the package nutrition label under Total Carbohydrates as Sugars. Sugar Alcohols Sugar alcohols are neither sugar nor alcohol. They occur in nature, but most used in food are created through manufacturing processes. There are many different types including mannitol, isomalt, sorbitol, maltitol, xylitol, and erythritol (see our blog, What Are Sugar Alcohols & Why Do We Use Them). They are found in many types of sugar-free gum, candies, desserts, syrups, and snacks. They are much lower in calories than regular sugars but – except for xylitol and erythritol – usually raise blood sugar levels mildly for a prolonged period. As well, sugar alcohols – again, except for erythritol – can cause gastrointestinal discomfort (bloating, gas, flatulence) in some people. Erythritol is the only sugar alcohol that neither raises blood sugar nor causes gastrointestinal discomfort. Safer than sugars for diabetics, sugar alcohols other than erythritol should not be consumed in large amounts because they will increase blood sugar levels for an extended period. Artificial Sweeteners Artificial sweeteners are sugar substitutes that are manufactured in laboratories.. While they are as sweet or sweeter than table sugar (sucrose), they contain very few or no calories. These sweeteners are often used to sweeten beverages or to enhance flavors of baked and processed foods. Most of these artificial sweeteners are not broken down by the body and are quickly flushed out, hence increased blood sugars are rare. Note that Splenda, although an artificial sweetener, can have cause blood sugars to rise when eaten in large quantities because it is made from dextrose, maltodextrin, and sucralose which are all carbohydrates. The concern about artificial sweeteners (Equal, Sweet’N Low, Sugar Twin, Splenda, Hermesetas, and others) is that we are not aware of all the effects they have on the human body. Every so often, you hear frightening findings from one study or another than makes you think twice about using artificial sweeteners. If you are a diabetic, you should use artificial sweeteners because laboratory tests show they do not raise blood sugars, but many people have concerns about other ways that aspartame, cyclamates, saccharin, and sucralose affect the body. Stevia At this time, stevia is the only known natural sweetener that does not increase blood sugars (see What is Stevia, Anyways?). It comes in granular and liquid forms and is widely available. Many believe stevia has an unpleasant aftertaste so companies who make stevia sweeteners or use it in food products often add a small amount of a sugar or sugar alcohols to cover the unpleasantness. Be sure to read labels carefully. Remember that even a small amount of a sugar or sugar alcohol can affect blood sugars. Choose stevia sweeteners that are pure stevia or in which the only other sweetener is erythritol. Types of Artificial Sweeteners Diabetics who want to avoid spikes in blood sugar should be familiar with the types of artificial sweeteners. The majority are low in calories and include the following: Aspartame (Equal, NutraSweet) can be used to add flavor to both warm and cold foods including beverages. However, at high temperatures like in hot coffee, the sweetness may be lost. Individuals who have phenylketonuria should avoid aspartame. Cyclamates (Sugar Twin, Sweet’N Low) can be used to flavor both cold and hot beverages. They are not used in food or beverage production. Saccharin (Hermesetas) has not been used in food or beverage production for many years due to health concerns. It is still available in tablet form for use in beverages in some locations (including Canada). Sucralose (Splenda) is widely used to hot and cold beverages, sprinkled on foods (such as fruit or cereals), and home-baked foods. Many processed foods and prepared desserts contain this sweetener. Acesulfame or Ace-K (Sweet One, Sunett) can be used in hot and cold foods but it is most commonly used in pre-made baked foods. It is 200 times sweeter than table sugar (sucrose). It is not available for purchase by general consumers. Neotame is a relatively new artificial sweetener that is a derivative of aspartame. It is 11,000 times sweeter than sucrose and, thus, can be used in very small amounts to sweeten foods. It is used by food producers and pharmaceutical companies. It is quickly broken down in the body. Because it is used in very low amounts, it does not affect blood sugars. Advantame is the newest artificial sweetener and is 22,000 times sweeter than sucrose. It, too, is a derivative of aspartame that is used commercially and not available to the general public. It is used in all types of foods including non-alcoholic and alcoholic beverages, desserts, candies, ice cream, pudding, jelly, syrups, chewing gum, and baked foods. Choosing A Sweetener The first thing to appreciate is that all the artificial sweeteners taste slightly different. Thus, personal preferences are key. Try as many as you can and don’t consume a sweetener that is not to your liking. Second, learn to read labels because some artificial sweeteners are only low in sugar while others are sugar-free. Also be careful because sometimes the product label will state sugar-free and will list alternatives to white and brown sugar but may include other sugars like agave syrup, maltodextrin, molasses, etc. or may have a non-erythritol sugar alcohol or alcohols added, all of which may affect blood sugars. Finally, if trying to lose weight, be wary of the calorie value of sweeteners. One teaspoon of white sugar is 20 calories so look for a sweetener that contains less than 10 calories per teaspoon (or tablet or packet). Always read labels when shopping. The more you understand about sweeteners, the better you will be able to make good decisions on your food choices and manage your diabetes. At the same time, eat a healthy diet, exercise regularly, and make a habit of monitoring your blood sugars regularly. The Following Table Is Provided Courtesy Of Diabetes Canada Health Canada has approved the following sweeteners as safe if taken in amounts up to the Acceptable Daily Intake (ADI). These sweeteners may also be used in medications. Please read the label. Ingredients may change. New products may be available. Sweetener Brand name Forms & Uses Other Things You Should Know… Acesulfame Potassium (Ace-K) n/a Not available for purchase as a single ingredient. Added to packaged foods and beverages only by food manufacturers. Safe in pregnancy.* ADI=15 mg/kg body weight per day. For example, a 50 kg (110 lb.) person could have 750 mg of Ace-K per day. One can of diet pop contains about 42 mg of Ace-K. Aspartame Equal® NutraSweet® Private Label brand Available in packets, tablets, or granulated form. Added to drinks, yogurts, cereals, low-calorie desserts, chewing gum, and many other foods. Flavor may change when heated. Safe in pregnancy.* ADI=40 mg/kg body weight per day. For example, a 50 kg (110 lb.) person can safely have 2000 mg of aspartame per day. One can of diet pop may contain up to 200 mg of aspartame. Cyclamate Sucaryl® Sugar Twin® Sweet’N Low® Private label brand Available in packets, tablets, liquid, and granulated form. Not allowed to be added to packaged foods and beverages. Flavour may change when heated. Safe in pregnancy* (Be cautious of exceeding the ADI) ADI=11 mg/kg body weight per day. For example, a 50 kg (110 lb.) person could have 550 mg of cyclamate per day. One packet of Sugar Twin® contains 264 mg of cyclamate. Saccharin Hermesetas® Available as tablets. Not allowed to be added to packaged foods and beverages. Available only in pharmacies Safe in pregnancy.* ADI=5 mg/kg body weight per day For example, a 50 kg (110 lb.) person can have 250 mg of saccharin per day. One tablet of Hermesetas® contains 12 mg of saccharin. Sucralose Splenda® Available in packets or granulated form. Added to packaged foods and beverages. Can be used for cooking and baking. Safe in pregnancy.* ADI=9 mg/kg body weight per day. For example, a 50 kg (110 lb.) person can have 450 mg of sucralose per day. One packet of Splenda® contains 12 mg of sucralose; one cup (250 mL) contains about 250 mg of sucralose.

Every so often, you hear frightening findings from one study or another than makes you think twice about using artificial sweeteners. If you are a diabetic, you should use artificial sweeteners because laboratory tests show they do not raise blood sugars, but many people have concerns about other ways that aspartame, cyclamates, saccharin, and sucralose affect the body. Stevia At this time, stevia is the only known natural sweetener that does not increase blood sugars (see What is Stevia, Anyways?). It comes in granular and liquid forms and is widely available. Many believe stevia has an unpleasant aftertaste so companies who make stevia sweeteners or use it in food products often add a small amount of a sugar or sugar alcohols to cover the unpleasantness. Be sure to read labels carefully. Remember that even a small amount of a sugar or sugar alcohol can affect blood sugars. Choose stevia sweeteners that are pure stevia or in which the only other sweetener is erythritol. Types of Artificial Sweeteners Diabetics who want to avoid spikes in blood sugar should be familiar with the types of artificial sweeteners. The majority are low in calories and include the following: Aspartame (Equal, NutraSweet) can be used to add flavor to both warm and cold foods including beverages. However, at high temperatures like in hot coffee, the sweetness may be lost. Individuals who have phenylketonuria should avoid aspartame. Cyclamates (Sugar Twin, Sweet’N Low) can be used to flavor both cold and hot beverages. They are not used in food or beverage production. Saccharin (Hermesetas) has not been used in food or beverage production for many years due to health concerns. It is still available in tablet form for use in beverages in some locations (including Canada). Sucralose (Splenda) is widely used to hot and cold beverages, sprinkled on foods (such as fruit or cereals), and home-baked foods.

yes

Diabetology

Are artificial sweeteners safe for diabetics?

yes_statement

"artificial" "sweeteners" are "safe" for "diabetics".. "diabetics" can "safely" consume "artificial" "sweeteners".

https://www.hindawi.com/journals/ijd/2012/625701/

Nonnutritive, Low Caloric Substitutes for Food Sugars: Clinical ...

Abstract Caries and obesity are two common conditions affecting children in the United States and other developed countries. Caries in the teeth of susceptible children have often been associated with frequent ingestion of fermentable sugars such as sucrose, fructose, glucose, and maltose. Increased calorie intake associated with sugars and carbohydrates, especially when associated with physical inactivity, has been implicated in childhood obesity. Fortunately, nonnutritive artificial alternatives and non-/low-caloric natural sugars have been developed as alternatives to fermentable sugars and have shown promise in partially addressing these health issues. Diet counseling is an important adjunct to oral health instruction. Although there are only five artificial sweeteners that have been approved as food additives by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA), there are additional five non-/low caloric sweeteners that have FDA GRAS (Generally Recognized as Safe) designation. Given the health impact of sugars and other carbohydrates, dental professionals should be aware of the nonnutritive non-/low caloric sweeteners available on the market and both their benefits and potential risks. Dental health professionals should also be proactive in helping identify patients at risk for obesity and provide counseling and referral when appropriate. 1. Introduction It is estimated that 16–42% of Americans have untreated dental caries [1]. Recently, the prevalence of overweight children and adults has also increased, and diet choices affect both development of caries and contribute to weight gain. Recent prevalence data estimate that overweight among children has more than tripled since 1970 and affects 32% of all children and adolescents [2–7]. Excess body fat is the product of ingesting too many calories and reduced physical activity [8]. Obesity is a complex issue and no one cause has been identified. But, the consumption of high-sugar, low-nutrient foods is of particular concern [9–11]. It is generally accepted that sugars and prepared starches in the diet are significant contributors to these two health issues [12–18]. Frequency of exposure to the teeth and food retention are important considerations when evaluating the caries potential of food products [14]. Sucrose, fructose, and maltose are sugars commonly used in beverages and food products and add about 4 calories per gram. Consumption in developed countries is reported to be 40–60 Kg/person/year [19]. Dentists and other oral health professionals have been active in counseling their patients regarding general health issues, such as monitoring blood pressure, smoking and alcohol cessation, and detection of child abuse/neglect. In addition, dentists have collaborated with medical colleagues in drafting guidelines for referring children with early childhood caries for definitive care, application of fluoride varnish and sedation. It has now been suggested that the oral health provider become an active participant in screening their patients, especially children, for signs of overweight/obesity and offer appropriate counseling/referral [12]. Other measurement tools, such as waist circumference, may be more accurate indicators of obesity, but the body mass index (BMI) is the most convenient screening means [20, 21]. This clinical tool measures body weight adjusted for height. Standardized BMI charts to determine BMI percentiles are available [22]. A “healthy weight” is described being below the 85th percentile. Industry and scientists have long searched for alternative sweeteners. The ideal product would have few or no calories, be noncarcinogenic or mutagenic, be economical to produce, and would not be heat degradable but would provide sweetness and have no unpleasant aftertaste. Obtaining these properties in a single product has been challenging. Numerous nonnutritive sweetening agents have been developed, but none have possessed all of the preferred properties. Patients and parents/care givers of children often ask oral health professionals about common dietary sugars and alternative sweeteners. The purpose of this paper is to provide the dental professional information that will be helpful in counseling these individuals on diet, caries prevention, and weight control [23]. 2. FDA Approved Nonnutritive Sweeteners as Additives Currently, the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) of the United States has evaluated the data and other information and approved under the conditions of its use only aspartame, acesulfame potassium, saccharin, sucralose, and neotame as noncaloric sweeteners as “food additives,” Figure 1. However, the FDA can also approve an agent under GRAS (Generally Recognized as Safe). For approval under GRAS, supporting data must have been provided and evaluated by qualified experts, and there is consensus that the substance is safe under the conditions of its intended use. 2.1. Saccharin Saccharin, first developed in 1878, is the oldest approved artificial sweetener. Initially granted GRAS status, saccharin is now approved as an additive to food and beverages. It is 300 times as sweet as sucrose by weight, non-cariogenic and noncaloric but can have a slightly bitter or metallic aftertaste. It is available as a tablet, powder, or liquid form and is widely used in food products including diet sodas, pharmaceuticals, and cosmetics. Saccharin has been approved for use in more than 100 countries world-wide. In high doses, saccharin has been found to be associated with an increase frequency of bladder cancer in a strain of male rats. However, a relationship between saccharin consumption and health risk in humans, at normal consumption amounts, has not been demonstrated and it is not considered to be a carcinogen [24]. 2.2. Aspartame Aspartame was initially approved by the FDA in 1981 for limited use as a table top sweetener and for use in breakfast cereals, gelatins, and puddings. But in 1983, approval was extended to a larger group of food agents, including carbonated beverages. In 1996, the FDA approved aspartame as a general purpose sweetener for use in all foods and beverages. Aspartame is the most widely utilized non-cariogenic artificial sweetener and is 160–220 times more sweet than sucrose [25]. It is often the manufacturer’s sweetener of choice in formulation of diet soft drinks, yogurt, puddings, gelatin, and snack foods. Prior to approval of aspartame by the FDA, a number of significant issues were raised by concerned individuals relative to aspartame’s potential undesirable effects with long term consumption on growth, glucose homeostasis, neurotoxic effects in animals, behavioral reactions, seizure susceptibility and liver functions but these concerns have been largely addressed [26–31]. Aspartame is claimed to be safe for type 2 diabetics but should be avoided by people with phenylketonuria as they cannot metabolize phenylalanine, a component of aspartame. 2.3. Acesulfame Potassium (Acesulfame K, Ace K) Acesulfame potassium, a calorie-free, non-cariogenic, nonnutritive artificial sweetener, was initially approved by the FDA in 1988 for use as a sweetener in dry food products. In 1994, yogurt, refrigerated desserts, syrups, and baked goods were added to the approved list, and in 2002 it was accepted as a general purpose sweetener. Acesulfame potassium is approximately 200 times sweeter than sucrose. More than thirty countries have approved the product to be used in foods, beverages, cosmetics, and pharmaceutical products. Like saccharin, acesulfame potassium, has a slightly bitter aftertaste and is often blended with other sweeteners to mask this property. Acesulfame potassium is stable at high cooking/baking temperatures, even under moderately acidic or basic conditions, which permits it to be used in baking or in products requiring a long shelf life. Although considered safe by the FDA for general consumption in food, there have been some concerns raised relative to dose-dependent cytogenetic toxicity [32, 33]. 2.4. Sucralose Sucralose is a nonnutritive, noncaloric trichlorinated derivative of sucrose. It was first accepted by the FDA as an eating table-top sweetener in 1998 and followed by acceptance as a general purpose sweetener in 1999. It is 600 times sweeter than sucrose but is not metabolized by the body. Sucralose is considered safe for use by diabetics and has been shown not to be metabolized into acids by oral microbiota. It is heat stable during cooking and baking and is widely used in many food products such carbonated and noncarbonated beverages, as a tea and coffee sweetener, and in baked goods, chewing gum and frozen desserts. To date no health issues have been established concerning the general dietary use of sucralose [34, 35]. 2.5. Neotame Neotame is a relatively recent approved noncaloric food product. It received FDA approval in 2002 for use as a general purpose sweetener in selected food products (except not in meat and poultry) and flavor enhancer. Neotame is an intense nonnutritive sweetener that is not fermentable by the oral microbiota and possesses a crisp, clean taste with no detectable aftertaste. It is reported to be greater than 7,000 times more potent than sucrose on a weight basis depending on the food product and how it is prepared [36, 37]. Neotame is a derivative of a dipeptide and has a similar chemical structure to aspartame. However, unlike aspartame, it is safe for consumption by people with phenylketonuria. It is also heat stable in baking applications and can be safely used by diabetics and pregnant women. Neotame is stable in carbonated soft drinks, powdered soft drinks, yellow cake, yogurt, and hot-packed still drinks [38]. 3.1. Sorbitol Sorbitol is a 6-carbon sugar alcohol that occurs naturally in many fruits and berries. Although rather expensive to manufacturer, sorbitol is often used as a “bulk” sweetener in a variety of food substances such as chewing gum, chocolates, cakes and cookies, toothpaste, and mouthwash. On a weight basis, sorbitol is only half as sweet as sucrose. It is generally considered non-cariogenic, but sorbitol can be fermented slowly into acid by S. mutans. Research has shown sorbitol to possess mild cariogenic potential when used over an extended period of time by patients with reduced salivary gland function, and it normally supports the formation of dental plaque and the growth of mutans streptococci [39]. Specific remineralization-enhancing effect of sorbitol has not been shown [40]. It remains debatable among some authorities whether sorbitol should be consumed by diabetics. Sorbitol is not easily digested or absorbed from the gastrointestinal tract, and diarrhea is a potential side effect if ingested in large quantities [41]. 3.2. Xylitol Xylitol, a five-carbon naturally occurring, nonfermentable, sugar alcohol, was first discovered in 1890 in birch and other hardwood tree chips, in wheat and oat straw in 1891, and later in various fruits and vegetables [42, 43]. It was approved by the FDA in 1986 for limited use. Xylitol is as sweet as sucrose and possesses a pleasant taste but is relatively expensive to manufacture. Although not as calorie heavy as sucrose, xylitol does possess a calorie burden when consumed and has some potential for increasing blood glucose. It is used primarily in mints, chewing gum, and toothpaste but is also available for table use. Studies have suggested that the regular use of xylitol containing chewing gum reduces the quantity of dental plaque, significantly reduced S. mutans levels, and increases saliva production [44, 45]. Reduction of caries incidence and remineralization of caries lesions have been reported in caries susceptible individuals when chewing gum containing xylitol was regularly used [46–50]. Xylitol has also been shown to inhibit cytokine expression by a lipopolysaccharide from one of the suspected periodontal pathogen bacteria, Porphyromonas gingivalis [51]. Thus, its regular use could possibly aid in preventing periodontal disease and gingival inflammation. Xylitol has been credited in lowering the risk of cariogenic bacteria transmission from mother to infant when compared to chlorhexadine and fluoride varnish treatments and reducing the incidence of ear infections among children at day-care centers [52–55]. However, excessive use of xylitol can aggravate symptoms of Crohn’s disease and irritable bowel syndrome resulting in diarrhea [56, 57]. 3.3. Erythritol Erythritol, a four-carbon sugar alcohol, has similar characteristics of sorbitol, mannitol, and xylitol. It is manufactured by a process that begins with fermenting glucose. But, it is only slightly more than half as sweet (70%) as sucrose and does not dissolve in water as well, but has significantly fewer calories by weight (0.2 calories per gram versus 4 calories per gram). Erythritol has been used in Japan since 1990 as a component of candies, soft drinks, chewing gum, jams, and yogurt. It was given GRAS recognition by the FDA in 1997. Erythritol is heat stable and can be used in baking and as a sweetener in low carbohydrate/calorie diets. It is almost completely absorbed by the small intestine (and excreted unchanged in the urine within 24 hours), has shown no toxic or carcinogenic effects, and is considered safe for consumption by diabetics. No long-term human caries trial on erythritol has been completed. However, the daily use of erythritol has been shown to reduce mutans streptococci levels in plaque and saliva [58]. Erythritol does not cause bloating, flatulence, or diarrhea at normal consumptions levels but may have a laxative effect in both children and adults if consumed in excess [59]. 3.4. Tagatose Tagatose, a low-calorie natural sugar, has all the good qualities of erythritol plus it has about the same (92%) sweetness as sucrose, performs better in cooking, and has been shown to actually improve blood sugar control in diabetics. It has about 1/3 the number of calories as sucrose by weight. It was granted GRAS status in 2001 and is used in a variety of drugs, foods such as chocolates, chewing gum, cakes, ice cream and frosted cereals, beverages, and dietary supplements. Tagatose has been shown to have benefits treating noninsulin-dependent type 2 diabetes as it attenuates the rise of serum glucose after oral glucose intake [60]. No significant adverse health effects have been associated with the ingestion of this product when consumed in reasonable amounts. Excessive consumption can lead to mild intestinal discomfort, flatulence, and diarrhea [61]. 3.5. Stevia Stevia, a heat stable sweetener with little or no aftertaste, is an extract from the herb Stevia rebaudiana Bertoni [62]. The extracted active ingredient is a white crystalline material. Its sweetness potency is many times greater (200–300) than sucrose. Stevia is calorie-free and non-cariogenic. The herb is native to Central and South America and has been used by the indigenous peoples of this area for centuries as a sweetener [63]. It has been used extensively in China, Brazil, and Japan, and to a lesser extent in Germany, Malaysia, and Israel, for many years as a sweetener in numerous food categories [64]. Originally banned by the FDA, the use of stevia was approved in 1995, as a dietary supplement but not as an additive. The argument to approve stevia as a food additive was heated, and it remained approved only as a food supplement for an extended period of time. However, in December 2008, the FDA responded favorably to GRAS status for the chemically refined derivative of stevia, the extract Rebaudioside A (Rebiana), to be used as a general purpose sweetener [65]. Rebiana is also available in combination with dextrose and as an extract from stevia leaves. Stevia has been shown to be safe for use by diabetics and has not been shown to be mutagenic [66, 67]. 4. Discussion New nonnutritive sweeteners have been introduced into human diets over the past few decades. Oral health care professionals are often called upon to provide knowledgeable advice regarding the importance of diet and the role of sugars and nonnutritive sweeteners in caries formation and weight control. As such, they must be familiar with alternatives to sugar and the types of food products that are available with substitute non-/low caloric, non-cariogenic sweetening agents. An excellent literature review of the caries incidence and remineralization properties of the sugar alcohols (xylitol, erythritol, sorbitol) has been written by Mäkinen [68]. Although nonnutritive sweeteners do not generally promote dental caries, a program to prevent dental decay and promote oral health must also include good oral hygiene habits, regular dental professional care, and exposure to fluoride [69, 70]. Whether the use of nonnutritive sweeteners has a positive impact on weight loss by consumers remains controversial [71–75]. It has been postulated that nonnutritive sweeteners encourage sugar craving and dependency because of their sweet nature, and flavor preference occurs with repeated exposures to sweet tasting foods and beverages [76]. Several studies have shown an increase in BMI with consumption of nonnutritive sweeteners [77, 78]. But, others have found the evidence less compelling and more equivocal [79–81]. Whether nonnutritive sweetener use has a role in the current obesity and diabetes epidemic, whether beneficial, neutral, or not remains undetermined. In addition, consumption of two or more servings of nonnutritive sweetened sodas has been associated with a 2-fold increased odds for kidney function decline in women as measured by the eGFR (estimated Glomerular Filtration Rate) [82]. However, it is well established that a reduction of fermentable sugars and carbohydrates in the diet coupled with good oral hygiene practices will reduce the incidence of dental decay. While it is difficult to totally avoid sugar in the diet, as it is often added to processed food to enhance the taste, reducing the amount and frequency of dietary exposure to sugar is an important adjunct in preventing caries and reducing calorie intake although not without some potential health concerns as previously described [83–85]. However, nonnutritive sweeteners offer an attractive alternative to sugar in caries prevention and a possible adjunct in weight control when used appropriately and in concert with a balanced diet and exercise [86]. The identification of safe, palatable, heat stable, non-/low-caloric, nonnutritive/non-cariogenic sweetener substitutes for the more dental decay promoting and calorie heavy sugars such as sucrose, glucose, fructose, and maltose continues to be actively pursued. In addition to annually updating the health history, dental professionals should determine annually the BMI percentile of their patients and refer those on unhealthy trajectories to their physician or a dietitian for additional counseling [20]. It also behooves the dental professional to stay attuned to current information relative to alternative sweetener products that exist or are being developed and approved for dietary consumption by the FDA and be prepared to be a source of counseling for their patients and families as they relate to reducing the incidence of caries and possible overweight [87, 88].

20 times more sweet than sucrose [25]. It is often the manufacturer’s sweetener of choice in formulation of diet soft drinks, yogurt, puddings, gelatin, and snack foods. Prior to approval of aspartame by the FDA, a number of significant issues were raised by concerned individuals relative to aspartame’s potential undesirable effects with long term consumption on growth, glucose homeostasis, neurotoxic effects in animals, behavioral reactions, seizure susceptibility and liver functions but these concerns have been largely addressed [26–31]. Aspartame is claimed to be safe for type 2 diabetics but should be avoided by people with phenylketonuria as they cannot metabolize phenylalanine, a component of aspartame. 2.3. Acesulfame Potassium (Acesulfame K, Ace K) Acesulfame potassium, a calorie-free, non-cariogenic, nonnutritive artificial sweetener, was initially approved by the FDA in 1988 for use as a sweetener in dry food products. In 1994, yogurt, refrigerated desserts, syrups, and baked goods were added to the approved list, and in 2002 it was accepted as a general purpose sweetener. Acesulfame potassium is approximately 200 times sweeter than sucrose. More than thirty countries have approved the product to be used in foods, beverages, cosmetics, and pharmaceutical products. Like saccharin, acesulfame potassium, has a slightly bitter aftertaste and is often blended with other sweeteners to mask this property. Acesulfame potassium is stable at high cooking/baking temperatures, even under moderately acidic or basic conditions, which permits it to be used in baking or in products requiring a long shelf life. Although considered safe by the FDA for general consumption in food, there have been some concerns raised relative to dose-dependent cytogenetic toxicity [32, 33]. 2.4. Sucralose Sucralose is a nonnutritive,

yes

Ornithology

Are birds descendants of T-Rex?

yes_statement

"birds" are "descendants" of t"-"rex.. t"-"rex is an ancestor of "birds".

https://www.quantamagazine.org/how-birds-evolved-from-dinosaurs-20150602/

How Dinosaurs Shrank and Became Birds | Quanta Magazine

Introduction Modern birds descended from a group of two-legged dinosaurs known as theropods, whose members include the towering Tyrannosaurus rex and the smaller velociraptors. The theropods most closely related to avians generally weighed between 100 and 500 pounds — giants compared to most modern birds — and they had large snouts, big teeth, and not much between the ears. A velociraptor, for example, had a skull like a coyote’s and a brain roughly the size of a pigeon’s. For decades, paleontologists’ only fossil link between birds and dinosaurs was archaeopteryx, a hybrid creature with feathered wings but with the teeth and long bony tail of a dinosaur. These animals appeared to have acquired their birdlike features — feathers, wings and flight — in just 10 million years, a mere flash in evolutionary time. “Archaeopteryx seemed to emerge fully fledged with the characteristics of modern birds,” said Michael Benton, a paleontologist at the University of Bristol in England. To explain this miraculous metamorphosis, scientists evoked a theory often referred to as “hopeful monsters.” According to this idea, major evolutionary leaps require large-scale genetic changes that are qualitatively different from the routine modifications within a species. Only such substantial alterations on a short timescale, the story went, could account for the sudden transformation from a 300-pound theropod to the sparrow-size prehistoric bird Iberomesornis. But it has become increasingly clear that the story of how dinosaurs begat birds is much more subtle. Discoveries have shown that bird-specific features like feathers began to emerge long before the evolution of birds, indicating that birds simply adapted a number of pre-existing features to a new use. And recent research suggests that a few simple changes — among them the adoption of a more babylike skull shape into adulthood — likely played essential roles in the final push to bird-hood. Not only are birds much smaller than their dinosaur ancestors, they closely resemble dinosaur embryos. Adaptations such as these may have paved the way for modern birds’ distinguishing features, namely their ability to fly and their remarkably agile beaks. The work demonstrates how huge evolutionary changes can result from a series of small evolutionary steps. A Phantom Leap In the 1990s, an influx of new dinosaur fossils from China revealed a feathery surprise. Though many of these fossils lacked wings, they had a panoply of plumage, from fuzzy bristles to fully articulated quills. The discovery of these new intermediary species, which filled in the spotty fossil record, triggered a change in how paleontologists conceived of the dinosaur-to-bird transition. Feathers, once thought unique to birds, must have evolved in dinosaurs long before birds developed. Sophisticated new analyses of these fossils, which track structural changes and map how the specimens are related to each other, support the idea that avian features evolved over long stretches of time. In research published in Current Biology last fall, Stephen Brusatte, a paleontologist at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland, and collaborators examined fossils from coelurosaurs, the subgroup of theropods that produced archaeopteryx and modern birds. They tracked changes in a number of skeletal properties over time and found that there was no great jump that distinguished birds from other coelurosaurs. “A bird didn’t just evolve from a T. rex overnight, but rather the classic features of birds evolved one by one; first bipedal locomotion, then feathers, then a wishbone, then more complex feathers that look like quill-pen feathers, then wings,” Brusatte said. “The end result is a relatively seamless transition between dinosaurs and birds, so much so that you can’t just draw an easy line between these two groups.” Yet once those avian features were in place, birds took off. Brusatte’s study of coelurosaurs found that once archaeopteryx and other ancient birds emerged, they began evolving much more rapidly than other dinosaurs. The hopeful monster theory had it almost exactly backwards: A burst of evolution didn’t produce birds. Rather, birds produced a burst of evolution. “It seems like birds had happened upon a very successful new body plan and new type of ecology — flying at small size — and this led to an evolutionary explosion,” Brusatte said. The Importance of Being Small Though most people might name feathers or wings as a key characteristic distinguishing birds from dinosaurs, the group’s small stature is also extremely important. New research suggests that bird ancestors shrank fast, indicating that the diminutive size was an important and advantageous trait, quite possibly an essential component in bird evolution. Like other bird features, diminishing body size likely began long before the birds themselves evolved. A study published in Science last year found that the miniaturization process began much earlier than scientists had expected. Some coelurosaurs started shrinking as far back as 200 million years ago — 50 million years before archaeopteryx emerged. At that time, most other dinosaur lineages were growing larger. “Miniaturization is unusual, especially among dinosaurs,” Benton said. That shrinkage sped up once bird ancestors grew wings and began experimenting with gliding flight. Last year, Benton’s team showed that this dinosaur lineage, known as paraves, was shrinking 160 times faster than other dinosaur lineages were growing. “Other dinosaurs were getting bigger and uglier while this line was quietly getting smaller and smaller,” Benton said. “We believe that marked an event of intense selection going on at that point.” The rapid miniaturization suggests that smaller birds must have had a strong advantage over larger ones. “Maybe this decrease was opening up new habitats, new ways of life, or even had something to do with changing physiology and growth,” Brusatte said. Benton speculates that the advantage of being pint-size might have emerged as bird ancestors moved to trees, a useful source of food and shelter. But whatever the reasons may be, small stature was likely a useful precursor to flight. Though larger animals can glide, true flight powered by beating wings requires a certain ratio of wing size to weight. Birds needed to become smaller before they could ever take to the air for more than a short glide. Baby Face In 2008, Arkhat Abzhanov, a biologist at Harvard University, was elbow deep in alligator eggs. Since alligators descend from a common ancestor with dinosaurs, they can provide a useful evolutionary comparison to birds. (Despite their appearance, birds are more closely related to alligators than lizards are.) Abzhanov was studying alligators’ vertebrae, but what struck him most was the birdlike shape of their heads; alligator embryos looked quite similar to chickens. Fossilized skulls of baby dinosaurs show the same pattern — they resemble adult birds. With those two observations in mind, Abzhanov had an idea. Perhaps birds evolved from dinosaurs by arresting their pattern of development early on in life. To test that theory, Abzhanov, along with Mark Norell, a paleontologist at the American Museum of Natural History in New York, Bhart-Anjan Bhullar, then a doctoral student in Abzhanov’s lab, and other colleagues, collected data on fossils from around the globe, including ancient birds, such as archaeopteryx, and fossilized eggs of developing dinosaurs that died in the nest. They tracked how the skull shape changed as dinosaurs morphed into birds. Over time, they discovered, the face collapsed and the eyes, brain and beak grew. “The first birds were almost identical to the late embryo from velociraptors,” Abzhanov said. “Modern birds became even more babylike and change even less from their embryonic form.” In short, birds resemble tiny, infantile dinosaurs that can reproduce. This process, known as paedomorphosis, is an efficient evolutionary route. “Rather than coming up with something new, it takes something you already have and extends it,” said Nipam Patel, a developmental biologist at the University of California, Berkeley. “We’re seeing more and more that evolution operates much more elegantly than we previously appreciated,” said Bhullar, who will start his own lab at Yale University in the fall. “The umpteen changes that go into the bird skull may all owe to paedomorphosis, to one set of molecular changes in the early embryo.” Why would paedomorphosis be important for the evolution of birds? It might have helped drive miniaturization or vice versa. Changes in size are often linked to changes in development, so selection for small size may have arrested the development of the adult form. “A neat way to cut short a developmental sequence is to stop growing at smaller size,” Benton said. A babylike skull in adults might also help explain birds’ increased brain size, since baby animals generally have larger heads relative to their bodies than adults do. “A great way to improve brain size is to retain child size into adulthood,” he said. (Indeed, paedomorphosis might underlie a number of major transitions in evolution, perhaps even the development of mammals and humans. Our large skulls relative to those of chimpanzees could be a case of paedomorphosis.) What’s more, paedomorphosis helped to make the skull a blank slate on which selection could create new structures. By erasing the snout, it may have paved the way for another of birds’ most important features: the beak. Birth of the Beak The problem with studying something that occurred deep in evolutionary time is that it’s impossible to know exactly what happened. Scientists can never precisely decipher how birds evolved from dinosaurs or which set of features was essential for that transformation. But with the intersection of three fields — evolution, genetics and developmental biology — they can now begin to explore how specific features might have come about. One of Abzhanov’s particular interests is the beak, a remarkable structure that birds use to find food, clean themselves, make nests, and care for their young. He theorizes that birds’ widespread success stems not just from their ability to fly, but from their amazing diversity of beaks. “Modern birds evolved a pair of fingers on the face,” he said. Armed with their insight into bird evolution, Abzhanov, Bhullar and collaborators have been able to dig into the genetic mechanisms that helped form the beak. In new research, published last month in Evolution, the researchers show that just a few small genetic tweaks can morph a bird face into one that resembles a dinosaur. In modern birds, two bones known as the premaxillary bones fuse to become the beak. That structure is quite distinct from that of dinosaurs, alligators, ancient birds and most other vertebrates, in which these two bones remain separate, shaping the snout. To figure out how that change might have arisen, the researchers mapped out the activity of two genes that are expressed in these bones in a spectrum of animals: alligators, chickens, mice, lizards, turtles and emus, a living species reminiscent of ancient birds. They found that the reptiles and mammals had two patches of activity, one on either side of the developing nasal cavity. Birds, on the hand, had a much larger single patch spanning the front of the face. The researchers reasoned that the alligator pattern could serve as a proxy for that of dinosaurs, given that they have similar snouts and premaxillary bones. The researchers then undid a bird-specific pattern of gene expression in chicken embryos using chemicals to block the genes in the middle of the face. (For ethical reasons, they did not allow the chickens to hatch.) The result: The treated embryos developed a more dinosaurlike face. “They basically grew a bird embryo back into something that looked more like the morphology of extinct dinosaurs,” said Timothy Rowe, a paleontologist at the University of Texas, Austin, who has previously collaborated with Abzhanov. The findings highlight how simple molecular tweaks can trigger major structural changes. Birds “use existing tools in a new way to create a whole new face,” Abzhanov said. “They didn’t evolve a new gene or pathway, they just changed control of an existing gene.” Like the studies of Brusatte and others, Abzhanov’s work challenges the hopeful monster theory, and it does so on a genetic scale. The creation of the beak didn’t require some special evolutionary jump or large-scale genetic changes. Rather, Abzhanov showed that the same forces that shape microevolution — minor alterations within species — also drive macroevolution, the evolution of whole new features and new groups of species. Specifically, small changes in how genes are regulated likely drove both the initial creation of the beak, which evolved over millions of years, and the diverse shape of bird beaks, which can change over just a few generations. “We show that simple regulatory changes can have a major impact,” Abzhanov said. Bhullar and Abzhanov plan to dig deeper into the question of how the beak and bird skull evolved, using the same approach to manipulate different features of skull and brain development. “We have just scratched surface of this work,” Bhullar said. Correction June 3, 2015: The original article stated that alligators descended from dinosaurs. In fact, alligators and dinosaurs share a common ancestor. The article has been revised to reflect this. Comment on this article Quanta Magazine moderates comments to facilitate an informed, substantive, civil conversation. Abusive, profane, self-promotional, misleading, incoherent or off-topic comments will be rejected. Moderators are staffed during regular business hours (New York time) and can only accept comments written in English.

Introduction Modern birds descended from a group of two-legged dinosaurs known as theropods, whose members include the towering Tyrannosaurus rex and the smaller velociraptors. The theropods most closely related to avians generally weighed between 100 and 500 pounds — giants compared to most modern birds — and they had large snouts, big teeth, and not much between the ears. A velociraptor, for example, had a skull like a coyote’s and a brain roughly the size of a pigeon’s. For decades, paleontologists’ only fossil link between birds and dinosaurs was archaeopteryx, a hybrid creature with feathered wings but with the teeth and long bony tail of a dinosaur. These animals appeared to have acquired their birdlike features — feathers, wings and flight — in just 10 million years, a mere flash in evolutionary time. “Archaeopteryx seemed to emerge fully fledged with the characteristics of modern birds,” said Michael Benton, a paleontologist at the University of Bristol in England. To explain this miraculous metamorphosis, scientists evoked a theory often referred to as “hopeful monsters.” According to this idea, major evolutionary leaps require large-scale genetic changes that are qualitatively different from the routine modifications within a species. Only such substantial alterations on a short timescale, the story went, could account for the sudden transformation from a 300-pound theropod to the sparrow-size prehistoric bird Iberomesornis. But it has become increasingly clear that the story of how dinosaurs begat birds is much more subtle. Discoveries have shown that bird-specific features like feathers began to emerge long before the evolution of birds, indicating that birds simply adapted a number of pre-existing features to a new use. And recent research suggests that a few simple changes — among them the adoption of a more babylike skull shape into adulthood — likely played essential roles in the final push to bird-hood. Not only are birds much smaller than their dinosaur ancestors, they closely resemble dinosaur embryos.

yes

Ornithology

Are birds descendants of T-Rex?

yes_statement

"birds" are "descendants" of t"-"rex.. t"-"rex is an ancestor of "birds".

https://earthbuddies.net/are-chickens-really-the-closest-descendants-of-t-rex/

Are Chickens Really The Closest Descendants Of T-Rex?

You are here: Home / The Species / Are Chickens Really The Closest Descendants Of T-Rex? Are Chickens Really The Closest Descendants Of T-Rex? Do you like chickens? Chickens have been consumed by human since ancient times. Even the breeding itself has been done since millions of years ago. You may see it as a mere food nowadays, but after you read this article, you may have more respect to the crispy wings on your table. Like other animals that walks on our earth nowadays, chickens are result of long evolution process of its ancestor. You may have heard about this, but indeed chickens are closely related to dinosaurs. Among other kind of birds, chickens, including turkeys, are the closest one. Although nowadays you see chickens are only eating seeds, their ancestor is one of the most feared predator at its time. A 68 million years old Tyrannosaurus Rex DNA was compared to DNA of 21 modern species of animals and from the analysis researchers found out that chickens are the closest one. Chickens Are Closer To Dinosaurs Than Alligators The analysis of DNA was done to the fossil of dinosaur also known as T-Rex which was found in 2003. The fossil itself was unique, because it contained a little bit of soft tissues like blood vessel, which allow the researchers to extract sufficient amount of DNA for the research. The scientists were also comparing the DNA of a Mastodon fossil to modern days animals and the result was amazing. They found that the proteins found in the T-Rex fossil were most similar to those of chickens, and the mastodon were most similar to modern day elephants. For a long time, actually scientists have predicted the correlation between birds and dinosaurs based on the shape of their bones. But that was all just a prediction without any further researches. And the research conducted in 2008 gave the real answer. “We determined that T rex, in fact, grouped with birds – ostrich and chicken – better than any other organism that we studied,” said Prof John Asara from Harvard to Telegraph. It determined avians’ relationships with non-avian dinosaur’s evolution. “We also show that it groups better with birds than modern reptiles, such as alligators and green anole lizards,” he continued. It means that although dinosaurs were reptiles, modern days reptiles are their more distant cousins rather than birds. NB : You can order an essay on a scientific or any other topic at the guys from studycrumb, they will be happy to help you write your work at the highest level. Chickens Can Be Reversed To Dinosaurs Again Following the research that found out the unpredictable close relationship between chickens and dinosaurs, another research was conducted. Bhart-Anjan Bhullar, who was a student in Arhat Abzhanov’s lab at Harvard, try to reverse back a chicken to its ancestor. Bhullar took sample from embryonic chickens and altered some of their genes. The result was amazing that by changing a few genes from the embryo, the test objects developed unusual similarities to dinosaurs. “Those chickens that were altered in that way, they grew up to have a snout that looked like a dinosaur snout,” said Bhullar as quoted from Inverse. Imagine if the research conducted further modification to more genes of the embryo, it may hatch as a dinosaur from the start. However, Bhullar didn’t intend to reverse engineer the evolution and create a dinosaur like in the movie Jurassic Park. But he predicted that such thing may happen in the future. ““This isn’t theoretical. I’m not talking half a century here, I’m talking decades. It’s going to happen.” Bhullar, which is now a professor in Yale, still do some research about the relationship about avian animals and dinosaurs. The most concern is the beak of those birds, which was developed from usual dinosaur snout. He said that it may predict what kind of animal to roam on our earth in the future. Didn’t The Dinosaurs Go Extinct? Yes, we all know that dinosaurs met the extinction when a giant asteroid hit the earth, but actually not all of those dinosaurs died out. But actually, some dinosaurs with smaller size didn’t die out and survived the Armageddon. Those dinosaurs are the ones who evolved to nowadays birds. The smaller size of their bodies required less food than those with bigger size. And it was also easier for them to find shelter from following disasters after the asteroid hit the earth. Maybe that was why they could survive and finally maintain their kinds until evolving to nowadays modern avian. As a prove, you can trace chicken’s genetic ancestry to find out the look of the ancestor of this animal. And if you can do it far enough, you will find that its look resembles the shape of the fossils of dinosaurs you can find in the museum. And actually, it is pretty much easier to trace the ancestor of vertebrates than other kind of animals, because evolution often only hit us gently but for a very long time. “The secrets of the history of living things are locked away still in its inheritance, and specifically in the genome,” said Bhullar. Thus, in a vertebrate’s DNA, it is most likely to still contain genetic information of its ancestors. Although the information is not going to be 100% complete, but a lot of the information from the ancestors stored from a long time ago will still be in the species’ DNA. “There are only certain variations in anatomy that vertebrates produce, and it’s probably because we’re so intricate, we’re so complex, that majorly screwing something up early on is not going to easily produce a viable living thing,” Bhullar explained. Dinosaur images in prehistoric environments are very attractive, have you considered designing or making a variety of dinosaur stickers yourself and documenting them, or making a variety of Custom die-cut stickers from CustomSticker.com to place in various dinosaur museums for kids to find and collect? Find stickers that teach kids about the dinosaurs that roamed the earth millions of years ago, and also can create their own guesswork of one-of-a-kind dinosaur figures to stimulate children’s imagination and creativity perfect gift for every child interested in paleontology! The Feathery Dinosaurs Another prove of chickens’ close relationship with T-Rex is the finding of one feathery kind of dinosaur. About 85 million years ago, a dinosaur named Archaeopteryx roamed the earth. Archaeopteryx is a close relative to T-Rex and velociraptors. The dinosaur had all the birds’ features, they had wings and feathers all over their bodies. The shape of their bodies and the structure of their brains even resembled the modern days birds’ bodies and brains. The only difference is they didn’t have beak, instead they had toothy snouts. Based on the study that Bhullar conducts in his spare time, he stated that that only difference was just unevolved part of body. Bhullar found that actually modern days birds’ beaks are actually overgrown adaptation of a pair of tiny bones at the front of the birds’ face. Adaptation to environment and the way the animal looked for food was responsible for eliminating the toothy snout. The jaw bones shrank and the ‘beak bones’ grew longer to replace the jaw bones, giving the birds’ their current appearances. Comments (8) Antonio Flores Rodríguez 1 birds are dinosaurs (because of cladistics) 2 all birds are equally related to the T. rex (or any other non avian dino) 3 the last common ancestor of all living birds (first bird from Neornithes) lived waaay before the K/T event (+120 ma) 4 T. rex was not an ancestor, just a relative of birds 5 It would be better to stop using the word “reptile” for prehistoric creatures, “Sauropsida” is better, because it can easily include traditional reptiles, non avian dinosaurs and birds. Nick Sue White Just curious why you said in the article that ” Although nowadays you see chickens are only eating seeds,” The feral chickens in my area are fierce predators who compete with each other when they see a gecko. They also think lizard eggs are a delicacy. Yum!

You are here: Home / The Species / Are Chickens Really The Closest Descendants Of T-Rex? Are Chickens Really The Closest Descendants Of T-Rex? Do you like chickens? Chickens have been consumed by human since ancient times. Even the breeding itself has been done since millions of years ago. You may see it as a mere food nowadays, but after you read this article, you may have more respect to the crispy wings on your table. Like other animals that walks on our earth nowadays, chickens are result of long evolution process of its ancestor. You may have heard about this, but indeed chickens are closely related to dinosaurs. Among other kind of birds, chickens, including turkeys, are the closest one. Although nowadays you see chickens are only eating seeds, their ancestor is one of the most feared predator at its time. A 68 million years old Tyrannosaurus Rex DNA was compared to DNA of 21 modern species of animals and from the analysis researchers found out that chickens are the closest one. Chickens Are Closer To Dinosaurs Than Alligators The analysis of DNA was done to the fossil of dinosaur also known as T-Rex which was found in 2003. The fossil itself was unique, because it contained a little bit of soft tissues like blood vessel, which allow the researchers to extract sufficient amount of DNA for the research. The scientists were also comparing the DNA of a Mastodon fossil to modern days animals and the result was amazing. They found that the proteins found in the T-Rex fossil were most similar to those of chickens, and the mastodon were most similar to modern day elephants. For a long time, actually scientists have predicted the correlation between birds and dinosaurs based on the shape of their bones. But that was all just a prediction without any further researches. And the research conducted in 2008 gave the real answer.

yes

Ornithology

Are birds descendants of T-Rex?

yes_statement

"birds" are "descendants" of t"-"rex.. t"-"rex is an ancestor of "birds".

https://www.cbc.ca/kids/articles/5-animals-with-prehistoric-ancestors

5 animals with prehistoric ancestors | Articles | CBC Kids

5 animals with prehistoric ancestors Even though dinosaurs died out millions of years ago, there are still some modern-day animals that have a connection to them. From birds to alligators, here are five species that count dinosaurs as relatives or neighbours! Chickens Believe or not, chickens are related to dinosaurs. (Pixabay) The Tyrannosaurus rex was one of the largest, most fearsome animals ever to exist. Surely, anything related to a T. rex must be absolutely terrifying, right? Well, not quite! It turns out the king of the dinosaurs actually shares a surprising amount of DNA with modern day chickens! In fact, birds are commonly thought to be the only animals around today that are direct descendants of dinosaurs. So next time you visit a farm, take a moment to think about it. All those squawking chickens are actually the closest living relatives of the most incredible predator the world has ever known! Crocodiles Dinosaurs were reptiles, just like alligators and crocodiles. (Pixabay) Although birds may be the only “modern" dinosaurs, there are plenty of animals around today that share some impressive connections with ancient animals. For example, dinosaurs are reptiles, a group that also includes turtles, crocodiles and snakes! Although they split off pretty early on, dinosaurs and these animals share common ancestors. Modern crocodiles and alligators are almost unchanged from their ancient ancestors of the Cretaceous period (about 145–66 million years ago). That means that animals that were almost identical to the ones you can see today existed alongside dinosaurs! Sea Turtles A large sea turtle out for a swim. (Pixabay) Like crocs and 'gators, sea turtles are reptiles too. Just like dinosaurs. In fact, they’re often called “cousins” of dinosaurs! They developed alongside dinosaurs, emerging as a distinct type of turtle about 110 million years ago. The seven species of sea turtle still around today all have ancient origins, but the most impressive turtle of all time is probably the Archelon. Living about 80 million years ago, the Archelon was over four metres long and was almost five metres wide from flipper to flipper. A grown man could easily fit inside its shell. Sharks Sharks have been around a long, long time. The earliest sharks first emerged around 450 million years ago, with modern sharks first appearing around 100 million years ago. Today’s sharks are descended from relatives that swam alongside dinosaurs in prehistoric times. In fact, the largest predator of all time was a shark called a Megalodon. It lived just after the dinosaurs, 23 million years ago, and only went extinct 2.6 million years ago. It could reach lengths of up to 20 metres and could weigh up to 103 metric tonnes! Crabs Careful! This crab seems a little... crabby. (Pixabay) Crabs first emerged in the Jurassic period (about 200–146 million years ago), but they flourished in the Cretaceous period, just before dinosaurs went extinct. One of the most interesting species of crab alive during this time was the Megaxantho Zogue, which was found in Mexico. Larger than the crabs of today, it was the first crab to evolve a claw that was specially developed to break the shells of prey. This was an important evolutionary step, and one that many crabs still have today!

5 animals with prehistoric ancestors Even though dinosaurs died out millions of years ago, there are still some modern-day animals that have a connection to them. From birds to alligators, here are five species that count dinosaurs as relatives or neighbours! Chickens Believe or not, chickens are related to dinosaurs. (Pixabay) The Tyrannosaurus rex was one of the largest, most fearsome animals ever to exist. Surely, anything related to a T. rex must be absolutely terrifying, right? Well, not quite! It turns out the king of the dinosaurs actually shares a surprising amount of DNA with modern day chickens! In fact, birds are commonly thought to be the only animals around today that are direct descendants of dinosaurs. So next time you visit a farm, take a moment to think about it. All those squawking chickens are actually the closest living relatives of the most incredible predator the world has ever known! Crocodiles Dinosaurs were reptiles, just like alligators and crocodiles. (Pixabay) Although birds may be the only “modern" dinosaurs, there are plenty of animals around today that share some impressive connections with ancient animals. For example, dinosaurs are reptiles, a group that also includes turtles, crocodiles and snakes! Although they split off pretty early on, dinosaurs and these animals share common ancestors. Modern crocodiles and alligators are almost unchanged from their ancient ancestors of the Cretaceous period (about 145–66 million years ago). That means that animals that were almost identical to the ones you can see today existed alongside dinosaurs! Sea Turtles A large sea turtle out for a swim. (Pixabay) Like crocs and 'gators, sea turtles are reptiles too. Just like dinosaurs. In fact, they’re often called “cousins” of dinosaurs! They developed alongside dinosaurs, emerging as a distinct type of turtle about 110 million years ago.

yes

Ornithology

Are birds descendants of T-Rex?

yes_statement

"birds" are "descendants" of t"-"rex.. t"-"rex is an ancestor of "birds".

https://www.nhm.ac.uk/discover/news/2018/may/scientists-have-traced-what-dinosaur-dna-could-have-looked-like.html

Scientists have traced what dinosaur DNA could have looked like ...

Accept cookies? We use cookies to give you the best online experience. We use them to improve our website and content, and to tailor our digital advertising on third-party platforms. You can change your preferences at any time. Scientists have traced what dinosaur DNA could have looked like Researchers have figured out how the genome of a dinosaur might have looked by studying turtles and birds. A team based at Kent University's School of Biosciences analysed the genomes of modern-day species, including a chicken, a zebra finch and a budgerigar. A genome is full the set of genetic material inside a cell, and it contains all the information needed to build and maintain an organism, whether it is a fish, plant, human or dinosaur. By comparing the chromosomes of turtles and birds (the living descendants of dinosaurs), the team worked out the likely genome of a common ancestor of those animals. It lived 260 million years ago (about 20 million years before dinosaurs first emerged). They then traced how chromosomes changed over evolutionary time from the common ancestor of turtles and birds to the present day. The results suggest that, had scientists had the opportunity to make a chromosome preparation from a theropod dinosaur like a T.rex, it might have looked very similar to that of a modern-day ostrich, duck or chicken. He says, 'Using these advanced genomic techniques we can reconstruct a plan for how the dinosaur genome was organised, shedding further, more detailed light on the biology of these amazing animals. 'Although this won’t allow us to resurrect a Diplodocus, or any other extinct dinosaur, it does show how many features that used to be considered unique to birds appeared much earlier in time, in their theropod ancestors, including at the genome level.' An illustration of Hypsilophodon by the artist Neave Parker, created in the 1960s. Parker's reconstructions were initially believed to be accurate. But as our scientific knowledge of the biology, morphology and behaviour of these dinosaurs has increased, their perceived appearance has changed. Dino DNA? Scientists don't have access to DNA from any extinct dinosaurs, but they can study that of living dinosaurs (birds) and their other more distant living relatives. Prof Darren Griffin, an expert on chromosomes at Kent's School of Biosciences, says, 'DNA is pretty stable but the longest you would expect it to last, even in the best of conditions, would be about a million years. T. rex hasn’t been seen wandering the earth for at least 66 million years. 'Even if you could get intact dino DNA then to recreate the precise conditions both in the cell, and in the egg, to generate an embryo of an animal that became extinct tens of million years ago would be next to impossible. 'In Kent and at the Royal Veterinary College, we used a combination of lab-based techniques and computer wizardry. We selected the genomes of certain birds, turtles and lizards and essentially did a triangulation exercise to infer the structure of long dead species.' Turtles aren’t closely related to dinosaurs, but studying them still provides an insight into the relationships between ancient animals. How is a turtle like a dinosaur? Birds have a lot of chromosomes compared to most other species and this is possibly one of the reasons why they are so diverse. This research suggests that the pattern of chromosomes seen in early dinosaurs, and the later theropods, is similar to that of most birds. We also know that turtles, crocodiles and birds also share a common reptile ancestor. Turtles diverged from archosaurs (birds and crocodiles) about 255 million years ago. Prof Barrett explains, 'Turtles aren’t closely related to dinosaurs, but they are one of the living groups of reptiles that can be used to study the relationships of dinosaurs and some of the features that they would have possessed. 'Birds are living dinosaurs, and crocodiles are their next nearest relatives, followed by turtles, lizards and snakes.' Dr Becky O'Connor, senior postdoctoral researcher and co-author of the paper, says, 'The technique used in this study allowed us to determine the genome structure of the turtle-bird ancestor. 'Turtles are one of the very few species that have similar looking chromosomes to birds. Until now, the tools required to compare their chromosomes were not available. In our study, we added fluorescent labels, called "DNA probes", to the chromosomes of birds and turtles so that we could locate the stretches of DNA that match in the two species. 'The process then involved tracing the changes that occurred from the bird-turtle ancestor. The evolutionary path examined the point when dinosaurs first emerged, through the theropod dinosaur line, and beyond several mass extinction events, including the most recent one 66 million years ago.' Don't miss a thing Receive email updates about our news, science, exhibitions, events, products, services and fundraising activities. We may occasionally include third-party content from our corporate partners and other museums. We will not share your personal details with these third parties. You must be over the age of 13. Privacy notice.

The results suggest that, had scientists had the opportunity to make a chromosome preparation from a theropod dinosaur like a T.rex, it might have looked very similar to that of a modern-day ostrich, duck or chicken. He says, 'Using these advanced genomic techniques we can reconstruct a plan for how the dinosaur genome was organised, shedding further, more detailed light on the biology of these amazing animals. 'Although this won’t allow us to resurrect a Diplodocus, or any other extinct dinosaur, it does show how many features that used to be considered unique to birds appeared much earlier in time, in their theropod ancestors, including at the genome level.' An illustration of Hypsilophodon by the artist Neave Parker, created in the 1960s.  Parker's reconstructions were initially believed to be accurate. But as our scientific knowledge of the biology, morphology and behaviour of these dinosaurs has increased, their perceived appearance has changed. Dino DNA? Scientists don't have access to DNA from any extinct dinosaurs, but they can study that of living dinosaurs (birds) and their other more distant living relatives. Prof Darren Griffin, an expert on chromosomes at Kent's School of Biosciences, says, 'DNA is pretty stable but the longest you would expect it to last, even in the best of conditions, would be about a million years.  T. rex hasn’t been seen wandering the earth for at least 66 million years.  'Even if you could get intact dino DNA then to recreate the precise conditions both in the cell, and in the egg, to generate an embryo of an animal that became extinct tens of million years ago would be next to impossible. 'In Kent and at the Royal Veterinary College, we used a combination of lab-based techniques and computer wizardry.

yes

Ornithology

Are birds descendants of T-Rex?

yes_statement

"birds" are "descendants" of t"-"rex.. t"-"rex is an ancestor of "birds".

https://hastingsaquarium.co.uk/blog/animal-stories/10-living-descendants-and-relatives-of-dinosaurs/

10 Living Descendants and Relatives of Dinosaurs - Hastings ...

10 Living Descendants and Relatives of Dinosaurs 70 million years ago, Tyrannosaurus rex was the scariest dinosaur around. Today, it’s extinct just like any other dinosaur, but there still are some animals roaming the Earth that are connected to those ancient species. From soaring birds to swimming crocs, we’ve found 10 living species that call dinosaurs their (great-great-great-great-great-great-great) grans and grandads. 1. Chickens Who are you calling chicken? Birds descended from a group of two-legged dinosaurs known as theropods, the members of which include the powerful predator Tyrannosaurus rex and the smaller Velociraptors. Hang on, the T-rex was one of the largest and most fearsome creatures to have ever exist, so all its relatives must be huge and terrifying too, right? Not quite! Fossil studies have found that the mighty T-rex actually shares quite a considerable amount of DNA with modern-day chickens and, by extension, all birds. Now you’ll never look at a humble pigeon the same way! 2. Crocodiles Chomp on this fun fact: many animals that you see today share some impressive connections with dinosaurs, including crocodiles – and you can really see the similarities in their rubbery skin, their fierce teeth, and their claws! Chickens may be the rightful descendants of dinosaurs, but we also know that crocodilians like crocodiles and alligators share common ancestors with dinosaurs too. In fact, crocs as we know them today are actually pretty similar to their ancient ancestors of the Cretaceous period (about 145-166 million years ago) – and to think that these creatures outlived the dinosaurs! 3. Sea Turtles Recent studies have shown that turtles belong in the group Archelosauria, along with relatives like birds, crocodiles, and – you guessed it – dinosaurs. Turtles evolved alongside dinosaurs, with sea turtles emerging as a distinct type about 110 million years ago. All living species of sea turtle have origins that can be traced back to ancient times; about 80 million years ago, a genus of extinct sea turtles called Archelon swam the oceans. Each one of these guys was over four metres long and measured at five metres wide from flipper to flipper – we’re shell-shocked! 4. Ostriches Ostriches are whacky-looking creatures at the best of times, but did you know that they’re very closely related to a species of dinosaur dating back to the late Cretaceous period? And, when you think about it, this makes sense – because ostriches do have something of a dinosaur look about them. Their overall size and shape are quite similar to that of a handful of dinosaur species, including the notorious velociraptor; even their talons are claw-like. This remarkable bird, now native to the plains of Africa, has survived a whole host of extinction events, having walked the Earth for over 66 million years. 5. Snakes When we think of dinosaurs, we imagine huge beasts roaming the Earth, but not every creature was so disproportionately large. Indeed, ground level was a hive of activity, with one of the most prevalent animals being one we’re very familiar with today: the snake. Snakes have been around for millions upon millions of years, somehow slithering their way out of umpteen mass extinctions. And scientists can prove this, with the discovery of several fossilised snakes revealing that they’ve been around for over 140 million years – that’s twice as old as Mr T-Rex. 6. Sharks Sharks may not look like your typical dinosaur, but these iconic creatures of the deep have been around longer than almost any other animal on the planet – over 450 million years to be exact. That means, the sharks we know and love today are descended from creatures that were around millions of years before dinosaurs were even a concept. It’s almost impossible to fathom. Of course, sharks haven’t always looked like they do now; nor were they always this size. Fossils show us that sharks used to be much bigger, with the largest known species, the megalodon, being around the size of a blue whale! 7. Crustaceans Crustaceans, such as crabs and lobsters, have shown some real staying power over the centuries, with several species known to have been around since the time of the dinosaurs. Indeed, many species of lobster predate dinosaurs by hundreds of millions of years, and they’re one of the earliest known species of filter-feeders on record. And, as with sharks, we know that modern crustaceans are much smaller than their great-great-great-great grandparents. Fossilised remains highlight some truly formidable specimens; we’re not sure we would have been as keen to take a dip during the time of the dinosaurs. 8. Bees Bees are one of the most important creatures to inhabit planet Earth, and they’ve done so successfully for a lot longer than you might expect. Research shows that bees emerged during the Cretaceous period (approximately 60 million years ago), so it’s almost certain they were buzzing from flower to flower when T-Rex roamed the wilderness. What we do understand about bees, however, is that they aren’t invulnerable to mass extinction events. Scientists believe their numbers were hit on several occasions throughout history, though none were as serious as the threat that they currently face through habitat loss. 9. Duck-Billed Platypuses It’s not much of a stretch of the imagination to believe that duck-billed platypuses were around during the time of the dinosaurs. These odd-looking creatures, native to eastern Australia, are a truly unique animal, whose only other related species are those found in fossilised remains dating back millions of years. We’re not sure how platypuses survived the mass extinction which took care of their forebears, but we’re sure happy to have them around. These unique critters are undeniably cute but sadly, their numbers are in decline – with a ‘Near Threatened’ status on the Conservation Index. 10. Tuatara Lizards All lizards and reptiles are closely related to dinosaurs, but none more so than tuatara lizards. The last surviving animal within the Sphenodontia family, these lizards, native only to New Zealand, were around when dinosaurs walked the Earth. Tuatara lizards certainly look primordial, with dark green scales, spiny backs and large, black eyes. These elusive chaps, which are classified as Vulnerable to Extinction, have been around for over 250 million years; it would be a shame to lose them now. We hope you’ve enjoyed discovering some of the animals which really did walk with dinosaurs. Nature lovers young and old can encounter incredible marine life at Blue Reef Aquarium Hastings. For information and tickets, visit the homepage or call our team today on 01424 718776.

10 Living Descendants and Relatives of Dinosaurs 70 million years ago, Tyrannosaurus rex was the scariest dinosaur around. Today, it’s extinct just like any other dinosaur, but there still are some animals roaming the Earth that are connected to those ancient species. From soaring birds to swimming crocs, we’ve found 10 living species that call dinosaurs their (great-great-great-great-great-great-great) grans and grandads. 1. Chickens Who are you calling chicken? Birds descended from a group of two-legged dinosaurs known as theropods, the members of which include the powerful predator Tyrannosaurus rex and the smaller Velociraptors. Hang on, the T-rex was one of the largest and most fearsome creatures to have ever exist, so all its relatives must be huge and terrifying too, right? Not quite! Fossil studies have found that the mighty T-rex actually shares quite a considerable amount of DNA with modern-day chickens and, by extension, all birds. Now you’ll never look at a humble pigeon the same way! 2. Crocodiles Chomp on this fun fact: many animals that you see today share some impressive connections with dinosaurs, including crocodiles – and you can really see the similarities in their rubbery skin, their fierce teeth, and their claws! Chickens may be the rightful descendants of dinosaurs, but we also know that crocodilians like crocodiles and alligators share common ancestors with dinosaurs too. In fact, crocs as we know them today are actually pretty similar to their ancient ancestors of the Cretaceous period (about 145-166 million years ago) – and to think that these creatures outlived the dinosaurs! 3. Sea Turtles Recent studies have shown that turtles belong in the group Archelosauria, along with relatives like birds, crocodiles, and – you guessed it – dinosaurs.

yes

Ornithology

Are birds descendants of T-Rex?

yes_statement

"birds" are "descendants" of t"-"rex.. t"-"rex is an ancestor of "birds".

https://theconversation.com/curious-kids-could-dinosaurs-evolve-back-into-existence-148623

Curious Kids: could dinosaurs evolve back into existence?

Author Disclosure statement Stephen Poropat does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment. Partners What an interesting question! Well, technically dinosaurs are still here in the form of birds. Just like you’re a direct descendant of your grandparents, birds are the only remaining direct descendants of dinosaurs. Tyrannosaurus rex belonged to a dinosaur group called theropods.Shutterstock But I suppose what you’re really asking is whether dinosaurs like Tyrannosaurus or Triceratops could ever exist again. Although that would be fascinating, the answer is almost definitely no. While there’s only one generation between you and your grandparents – that is, your parents – there are many millions of generations between today’s birds and their ancient dinosaurs ancestors. This is why today’s birds look, sound and behave so differently to the prehistoric beasts that once roamed Earth. Animals evolve to change, but can’t choose how To understand this, we have to understand “evolution”. This is a process that explains how every living thing (including humans) evolved from past living things over millions, or even billions, of years. Different animals evolve their own differences to help them survive in the world. For example, 66 million years ago, birds survived the catastrophic event that killed all other dinosaurs and marked the end of the Mesozoic era. Fossils suggest face-offs between T. rex and Triceratops were common.Shutterstock After this, a blanket of ash wrapped around the world, cooling it and blocking out the sunlight plants need to survive. Plant-eating animals would have struggled to stay alive. But birds did, perhaps because they were small even then. They likely ate seeds and insects and took shelter in small spaces. And being able to fly would have helped them explore far and wide for food and shelter. That said, if the conditions that came after the dinosaur extinction event returned today, no modern animal would evolve back into a dinosaur. This is because animals today have a very different evolutionary past to dinosaurs. They evolved to have features that help them survive in today’s world, rather than a prehistoric one. And these features limit the ways they can evolve in the future. Which came first, the chicken or the dinosaur? For an animal to be an actual “dinosaur”, it must belong to a group of animals known by scientists as Dinosauria. These all descended from a common ancestor shared by Triceratops and modern birds. Other than birds, Dinosauria doesn’t include any living creature. So for a dinosaur to re-evolve in the future, it would have to come from a bird. This animation helps paint a picture of how dinosaurs eventually evolved to become birds. (American Museum of Natural History/Youtube) Dinosauria’s extinct members included sauropods, stegosaurs, ankylosaurs, ornithopods, ceratopsians and non-bird theropods. Modern birds evolved from a small group of theropods. However, since so much time has passed, this link is limited. Specifically, birds have a very different collection of “genes”. These are the same built-in “rules” your parents passed down to you that decide, for example, what colour your eyes will be. The more generations that pass between an ancestor and their descendant, the more different their genes will be. Even if it could happen, what would this take? Think of how much a bird would need to change to look like Tyrannosaurus rex or Triceratops. A lot. Dinosaurs had long tails with bones all along them. Birds’ tails are stumpy and have been for more than 100 million years. It’s unlikely this would ever be reversed. While some types of birds have long tail feathers, such as falcons (above) and pheasants, on the inside their tails are short.Shutterstock Also, modern birds walk on their back legs only and (in most cases) have four toes and three “fingers” in their wings. Compare that with Triceratops, which walked on all four limbs, had five fingers on its front feet (the inner three of which were weight-bearing) and four toes on its back feet. It may not be impossible for birds to gain two more fingers to have five like Triceratops; some people with a condition called “polydactyly” have more than five fingers, but this is very rare. There aren’t really any situations where an extra finger (or one less) would be necessary for a bird’s survival. Thus, there’s little to no chance birds will evolve to change in this way. Most birds have four toes and three ‘fingers’ in their wings.Shutterstock Even if birds did eventually start to walk on all four limbs (legs and wings), they wouldn’t move the same way a Triceratops did because the purpose of a bird’s wings is very different to that of a Triceratops’s legs. Dinosaurs are history We know from fossil discoveries that Triceratops and Tyrannosaurus had scaly skin covering most of their bodies. Most modern birds have scaly feet, but none are scaly all over. Although Triceratops had a ‘beak’ this was very different to a bird’s beak.Stephen Poropat/American Museum of Natural History It’s hard to imagine what would force any bird to naturally replace its feathers with scales. Birds need feathers to fly, to save energy (by staying warm) and to put on special displays to attract mates. Triceratops did have a “beak” at the front of its mouth, but this evolved completely separately to the beaks of birds and had two extra bones — something no living animal has. What’s more, behind its beak and jaws, Triceratops had rows of teeth. While some birds such as geese have spiky beaks. No bird in the past 66 million years has ever had teeth. Considering these huge differences, it’s really unlikely birds will ever evolve to look more like their extinct dinosaur relatives. And no extinct dinosaur will ever come back to life either — except maybe in movies! Geese don’t have actual ‘teeth’, but they do have sharp points in their mouth to hold onto slippery things.Shutterstock

Author Disclosure statement Stephen Poropat does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment. Partners What an interesting question! Well, technically dinosaurs are still here in the form of birds. Just like you’re a direct descendant of your grandparents, birds are the only remaining direct descendants of dinosaurs. Tyrannosaurus rex belonged to a dinosaur group called theropods. Shutterstock But I suppose what you’re really asking is whether dinosaurs like Tyrannosaurus or Triceratops could ever exist again. Although that would be fascinating, the answer is almost definitely no. While there’s only one generation between you and your grandparents – that is, your parents – there are many millions of generations between today’s birds and their ancient dinosaurs ancestors. This is why today’s birds look, sound and behave so differently to the prehistoric beasts that once roamed Earth. Animals evolve to change, but can’t choose how To understand this, we have to understand “evolution”. This is a process that explains how every living thing (including humans) evolved from past living things over millions, or even billions, of years. Different animals evolve their own differences to help them survive in the world. For example, 66 million years ago, birds survived the catastrophic event that killed all other dinosaurs and marked the end of the Mesozoic era. Fossils suggest face-offs between T. rex and Triceratops were common. Shutterstock After this, a blanket of ash wrapped around the world, cooling it and blocking out the sunlight plants need to survive. Plant-eating animals would have struggled to stay alive. But birds did, perhaps because they were small even then. They likely ate seeds and insects and took shelter in small spaces. And being able to fly would have helped them explore far and wide for food and shelter. That said, if the conditions that came after the dinosaur extinction event returned today, no modern animal would evolve back into a dinosaur.

yes

Ornithology

Are birds descendants of T-Rex?

yes_statement

"birds" are "descendants" of t"-"rex.. t"-"rex is an ancestor of "birds".

https://www.audubon.org/news/how-birds-are-helping-scientists-reimagine-feathered-t-rex

How Birds Are Helping Scientists Reimagine a Feathered T. Rex ...

Type in your search and hit Enter on desktop or hit Go on mobile device T. rex: The Ultimate Predator, on view at the American Museum of Natural History, explores the entire tyrannosaur superfamily and reveals the most scientifically accurate representation of T. rex to date—feathers and all.Photo:AMNH/D. Finnin Birds Tell Us to Act on Climate Thunder and lightning boom and crackle overhead. Snapped cables dangle from what was a 10,000-volt electric fence. A massive dinosaur stalks out of the jungle, stomping through the now-useless barrier and revealing a mouthful of knife-sharp, banana-size teeth. It lets out a blood-curdling roar. Soon after, a man gets eaten off a toilet. This is how we meet Tyrannosaurus rex in the classic 1993 film Jurassic Park, based on Michael Crichton’s 1990 novel of the same name. With its highly realistic animatronics, the movie—and its four sequels—helped influence how generations of movie-goers thought T. rex really looked and behaved. But more than two decades later, it turns out we don't know this ancient predator as well as we thought. In the early 1990s, all paleontologists really understood about T. rex was “that it was big, it was carnivorous, and it had a small brain,” said Gregory Erickson, a paleobiologist at Florida State University, at a March 5 event to celebrate the opening of a new exhibit, T. rex: The Ultimate Predator, at the American Natural History Museum (AMNH) in New York City. Over the last 30 years, though, new fossils and techniques have allowed scientists to compare T. rex to their living relatives—modern birds in particular—to reimagine what this apex predator looked like, how its brain functioned, and even how it moved. The exhibit, which follows the evolution of the tyrannosaur family, reveals many of these new discoveries. Now we know that Crichton’s T. rex was missing its feathers—and so much more. Feathers The most noticeable update to the T. rex we all know and fear is its feathers, which scientists now believe stretched from the crown of its head down along its neck and back like a horse’s mane. Feathers also covered the tail, ending in a fluffy poof. Feathers are rare in the fossil record—the conditions have to be just right for softer parts like feathers or hair to survive normal decay—and scientists have never unearthed evidence of an actual T. rex feather. However, in 2004 Mark Norell, curator of paleontology and the new T. Rex exhibit at AMNH, and his colleagues in China discovered the imprint of ancient, hair-like feathers pressed into the rock alongside the bones of an early tyrannosaur species, Dilong paradoxus. All tyrannosaurs are theropods, a group of bipedal dinosaurs with hollow bones; modern birds evolved from small, flightless theropod dinosaurs. So, Norell’s logic goes, if tyrannosaur ancestors and modern theropod descendants both sported (and still do) feathers, it’s safe to assume that the species in between, including T. rex, had feathers as well. Norell draws a parallel to humans. Paleontologists have never discovered evidence of hair on early hominids like Australopithecus or Neanderthal. But because chimpanzees and modern Home sapiens (us) have hair, scientists are comfortable assuming that other species in that evolutionary lineage also had it. There's no way to know exactly what a T. Rex really looked like in feathers, but AMNH scientists extrapolated what we know about feather function in modern birds to make an educated guess. T. Rex hatchlings, for example, likely were the size of skinny turkeys and covered in fluffy, down-like feathers that kept the babies warm and camouflaged. A young T. rex would keep these feathers as it continued to grow, but by the time it reached full maturity, around 20 years old, the predator likely maintained display plumage only on its head and tail. Brains “Keep absolutely still,” Jurassic Park’s Alan Grant warns when T. rex emerges from the woods looking for a meal. “Its vision is based on movement.” Not so, Dr. Grant. As it turns out, a closer look at T. rex brains shows these creatures actually had excellent senses, including eyesight, and would have been extremely difficult to elude. Soft tissues, like brain, decay quickly and are very rarely preserved in the fossil record. However, these organs do leave an imprint on the bone that once encased them. Norell and his team made a cast of the inside of a T. rex skull and compared it to brain casts of the animal’s closest living relatives, birds and crocodiles. The shape of a T. rex brain fell somewhere between a crocodile and bird brain. Crocodile brains are linear in shape, with hindbrain, midbrain, and forebrain lined up in a row, front to back. Bird brains have more of an S-shape, with an elongated forebrain leading down into the mid- and hindbrain. Much like birds, T. rex had a partially elongated forebrain with room for a large optic lobe. “We believe they had very, very large visual processing centers,” Norell says. T. rex also had large eyes—about the size of oranges—positioned in the front of its face, which provided good depth perception for hunting, much like an avian raptor. The dinosaurs also probably had tetrachromatic vision (with four color receptors in their eyes instead of the three standard in humans) and could see into the ultraviolet spectrum, just like modern birds and reptiles, Norell says. What really surprised Norell and his colleagues was the size of the olfactory bulbs, responsible for the sense of smell. There's a debate in the scientific community about how well birds can smell. While some scientists are now saying birds do have a developed sense of smell, Norell and his colleagues weren't expecting to find evidence of that in the dinosaur brain. But the olfactory area of the T. rex brain was so large “that they may have been one of the few dinosaurs that had good senses of smell,” Norell says. Movement "Must go faster," urges mathematician Ian Malcolm as the T. rex reemerges from the woods and chases down the speeding Jurrasic Park Jeep, nearly snatching Malcolm from the back. While a T. rex might have been able to keep up with a vehicle at low speeds, an adult T. rex couldn’t run, says Norell. That's because these hefty beasts needed to keep one foot on the ground at all times. (Juvenile T. rex weighed less and could likely run considerably faster than the adults.) Compared to humans, though, these giants could still get around pretty quickly with their long strides. To figure out how fast an adult T. rex could move, scientists started with chickens. It turns out, chickens and T. rex have similar musculature, says Norell. (The main difference is that T. rex had a large, heavy tail, shifting its center of gravity backward.) Scientists projected chicken muscles onto a T. rex skeleton, using visible notches in the bones as a guide to where the muscle would have attached. From there, Norell and his team calculated the proportional size of each muscle on a T. rex body. Then, they developed a computer model and ran it over and over again to figure out how much force each muscle could exert. Norell and his team found that these dinosaurs could move between 10 and 25 miles per hour—similar to the upper reaches human abilities. Usain Bolt, regarded as the fastest man on earth, can sprint up to 23 mph in the 100-meter dash, while record-setting marathoner Dennis Kipruto Kimetto averaged over 12 mph in the 2014 Berlin Marathon. Whether a T. rex could keep up those speeds for 26 miles, however, is another story. Still, considering what we know now about the T rex., it's clear that this feathered beast was even smarter and more deadly than we thought—and, like many of the dinosaurs in the Jurassic Park movie series, very much in need of a makeover for the next, inevitable sequel. Reimagining the T. rex—with feathers, brains, and more—is the focus of the American Natural History Museum’s new “T. Rex: The Ultimate Predator” exhibit, which opened to the public on March 11 in New York City. How you can help, right now Get Audubon in Your Inbox Let us send you the latest in bird and conservation news. Email address Find Audubon Near You Visit your local Audubon center, join a chapter, or help save birds with your state program.

—and its four sequels—helped influence how generations of movie-goers thought T. rex really looked and behaved. But more than two decades later, it turns out we don't know this ancient predator as well as we thought. In the early 1990s, all paleontologists really understood about T. rex was “that it was big, it was carnivorous, and it had a small brain,” said Gregory Erickson, a paleobiologist at Florida State University, at a March 5 event to celebrate the opening of a new exhibit, T. rex: The Ultimate Predator, at the American Natural History Museum (AMNH) in New York City. Over the last 30 years, though, new fossils and techniques have allowed scientists to compare T. rex to their living relatives—modern birds in particular—to reimagine what this apex predator looked like, how its brain functioned, and even how it moved. The exhibit, which follows the evolution of the tyrannosaur family, reveals many of these new discoveries. Now we know that Crichton’s T. rex was missing its feathers—and so much more. Feathers The most noticeable update to the T. rex we all know and fear is its feathers, which scientists now believe stretched from the crown of its head down along its neck and back like a horse’s mane. Feathers also covered the tail, ending in a fluffy poof. Feathers are rare in the fossil record—the conditions have to be just right for softer parts like feathers or hair to survive normal decay—and scientists have never unearthed evidence of an actual T. rex feather. However, in 2004 Mark Norell, curator of paleontology and the new T. Rex exhibit at AMNH, and his colleagues in China discovered the imprint of ancient, hair-like feathers pressed into the rock alongside the bones of an early tyrannosaur species, Dilong paradoxus.

yes

Ornithology

Are birds descendants of T-Rex?

yes_statement

"birds" are "descendants" of t"-"rex.. t"-"rex is an ancestor of "birds".

https://www.allaboutbirds.org/news/earliest-beginnings-of-bird-evolution-brought-into-focus-with-new-dna-analysis/

Earliest Beginnings of Bird Evolution Brought Into Focus With New ...

Earliest Beginnings of Bird Evolution Brought Into Focus With New DNA Analysis The massive meteor strike that wiped out the dinosaurs 65 million years ago may have sparked a rapid evolution of bird species over just a few million years. The few bird lineages that survived the extinction bottleneck gave rise to stunning diversity, resulting in the more than 10,000 species alive today. “This question of understanding the deepest relationships in the bird family tree has plagued scientists for decades,” says Jacob Berv, a Cornell Lab of Ornithology graduate student and an author of the study. “Some people call it the most difficult problem in dinosaur systematics.” Birds are the only living descendants of dinosaurs. They evolved from a group called the theropod dinosaurs that included bipedal carnivores such as Tyrannosaurus rex and Velociraptor. “After the great dinosaur extinction, birds began to rapidly evolve new forms—and that’s the era that our study manages to reconstruct in great detail,” Berv says. “It’s revolutionizing our ability to understand avian evolution.” The researchers paid particular attention to a taxonomic group known as the Neoaves, which contains about 90% of all bird species—everything except game birds, waterfowl, tinamous, and flightless birds such as the Ostrich and kiwis. Within this group they found unexpected relationships. Virtually all landbirds diverged early on from a group that includes the vultures and hawks, raising the possibility that terrestrial birds evolved from raptor-like ancestors. The researchers also found that owls are closely related to toucans and hornbills, and that falcons are closely related to parrots and songbirds. The study also confirmed that the nocturnal nightjars are closely related to hummingbirds. And one species, the prehistoric-looking Hoatzin of South America, traces its lineage back nearly 64 million years. It’s the oldest bird lineage that leads to a single living species. The Hoatzin is a curious bird—it’s the only species that feeds by fermenting leaves in its crop and esophagus. Its relationship to other birds has been long debated by evolutionary biologists. “This is a very exciting time in evolutionary ornithology,” says coauthor Richard Prum of Yale University. “In just a few short years, we will complete the phylogeny of birds. There will always be a few branches to argue about, but the tree is taking shape rapidly.” Related Stories Compared to other recent studies that have attempted to clarify evolutionary relationships among bird families, the study authors analyzed genetic markers for a much larger number of species (198 birds, 2 alligators). The large species sampling was enabled by a new technique developed by authors Alan and Emily Lemmon, of Florida State University, that efficiently targeted a few hundred key locations on each species’ genome—DNA markers strategically chosen for their ability to reflect early evolutionary changes. The researchers turned to the fossil record to calibrate the timescale of birds’ evolution, by matching points on the evolutionary tree to similar forms in fossils whose ages were already known. This approach led to the finding that birds may have arisen only about 70–80 million years ago, more recently than has been reported in previous studies. “The closest relatives of modern birds suffered a major mass extinction at the end of the Cretaceous,” says Daniel Field, a study author and graduate student at Yale. “It seems that only a handful of modern avian lineages survived, and those survivors rapidly evolved into the incredible diversity of birds we see today.” The study also finds that it may have been extremely rare for early bird species to evolve transitions between terrestrial and aquatic lifestyles. Rather than multiple lineages evolving independently to live near water, the researchers conclude that nearly all waterbirds, including loons, grebes, penguins, pelicans, gulls, and others, share a single common ancestor, and that the switch between habitats may have happened only a few times in bird evolutionary history. “The fact that adapting to an aquatic environment appears to have been a rare occurrence in the history of bird life is consistent with the story from dinosaurs in general,” Field says. “It seems that birds may have inherited a strong preference for terrestrial habits from their dinosaurian ancestors.” “Bird enthusiasts will love to learn that cuckoos are closely related to bustards,” Prum adds, “and that the hummingbirds and swifts that are now active during the day actually evolved from nightjars, which are totally nocturnal. It appears that the ancestors of the highly colorful and visual-foraging hummingbirds were predominantly nocturnal for 10 million years.” So why does it matter which species evolved before or after another or whether one species is closely related to another? “Living birds have a very long and complex history,” explains Berv. “Any attempt to understand their biology at a broad scale requires an understanding of this deep historical context. It’s critical to every area of bird biology. How they act, where they live, what they look like, how they communicate—it’s all linked to how they evolved in relation to each other.” “The most exciting thing is that we can now study the mechanisms and patterns of avian evolution in greater detail,” agrees Prum. “We used genetic tools, but the study is about how the entire evolution of birds unfolded.”

Earliest Beginnings of Bird Evolution Brought Into Focus With New DNA Analysis The massive meteor strike that wiped out the dinosaurs 65 million years ago may have sparked a rapid evolution of bird species over just a few million years. The few bird lineages that survived the extinction bottleneck gave rise to stunning diversity, resulting in the more than 10,000 species alive today. “This question of understanding the deepest relationships in the bird family tree has plagued scientists for decades,” says Jacob Berv, a Cornell Lab of Ornithology graduate student and an author of the study. “Some people call it the most difficult problem in dinosaur systematics.” Birds are the only living descendants of dinosaurs. They evolved from a group called the theropod dinosaurs that included bipedal carnivores such as Tyrannosaurus rex and Velociraptor. “After the great dinosaur extinction, birds began to rapidly evolve new forms—and that’s the era that our study manages to reconstruct in great detail,” Berv says. “It’s revolutionizing our ability to understand avian evolution.” The researchers paid particular attention to a taxonomic group known as the Neoaves, which contains about 90% of all bird species—everything except game birds, waterfowl, tinamous, and flightless birds such as the Ostrich and kiwis. Within this group they found unexpected relationships. Virtually all landbirds diverged early on from a group that includes the vultures and hawks, raising the possibility that terrestrial birds evolved from raptor-like ancestors. The researchers also found that owls are closely related to toucans and hornbills, and that falcons are closely related to parrots and songbirds. The study also confirmed that the nocturnal nightjars are closely related to hummingbirds. And one species, the prehistoric-looking Hoatzin of South America, traces its lineage back nearly 64 million years. It’s the oldest bird lineage that leads to a single living species.

yes

Ornithology

Are birds descendants of T-Rex?

no_statement

"birds" are not "descendants" of t"-"rex.. t"-"rex is not the ancestor of "birds".

https://dinosaurfactsforkids.com/what-is-the-closest-living-relative-of-t-rex/

What Is The Closest Living Relative Of T-Rex - Dinosaur Facts For Kids

What Is The Closest Living Relative Of T-Rex The Tyrannosaurus Rex was one of the world’s fiercest animals and roamed the earth 65 million years ago. Luckily for us, the T-Rex went extinct millions of years ago, but their genetics did not. Several animals alive today share genetics with the T-Rex, with some having a closer family connection than others. One animal species, in particular, can be called the closest living relative of the T-Rex, and it might be surprising to find out who this animal is. Chickens are the closest living relatives of the T-Rex. Studies on ancient collagen sampled from a 68 million-year-old Tyrannosaurus leg bone revealed that the closest modern protein match was the chicken. The ostrich was a close second. These studies proved a link between birds and dinosaurs. Over the years, scientists have hypothesized that birds descend from dinosaurs due to their similar appearance, among other factors. Many factors are involved in deciding which living animal is the closest living relative of the T-Rex, and it would be best to look at them all to understand why scientists have named chicken the winner. Who Is T-Rex’s Closest Living Relative? For decades scientists have hypothesized that birds and dinosaurs are distant relations to one another, with many in the scientific field believing that birds are modern-day dinosaurs. A discovery in the early 2000s changed everything, allowing scientists to have tangible evidence of the link for the first time. A lucky find in 2003 resulted in scientists gaining access to some collagen from a 68 million-year-old T-Rex femur (leg bone). The extracted collagen was analyzed and compared to a database of living animals. The comparison results showed that the T-Rex’s closest living relative was the chicken, with the ostrich being a close second. Before the collagen discovery, some in the scientific world had already observed that the T-Rex and modern-day chickens shared a few similar characteristics. These characteristics included their scaly feet, sharp claws, the fact that they both walked on two feet, and that both animals had big heads with arched necks. Recent studies have also shown that some dinosaurs even sported feathers on their bodies. The results proved that modern-day birds were descendants of dinosaurs. There are over 11,000 species of birds worldwide, and all of these birds share a common ancestor with the T-Rex, making them closer relatives to the T-Rex than even alligators or other reptiles. Chickens and ostriches are two animals that are only distantly related but belong to the bird species. Although the studies showed that these two birds share the most protein and DNA similarities, you can consider all birds to be the actual closest living relatives of the T-Rex. How Does The T-Rex Fit In With The Evolution Of Birds? In the scientific world, it is a common conception that birds are technically reptiles. You may find this hard to believe, but birds share many similarities with reptiles. The scales on their feet, for one thing, and even their feathers. There is a close similarity between body tissue-producing scales and those making feathers. Birds also lay eggs, just like reptiles. Looking at the evolutionary tree, you will see that birds belong to the family clade Maniraptora. For some background information, a clade consists of a group of animals that share a common ancestor. All members of the Maniraptora clade share similar skeletal features, including their wrist and forelimb bone structures that they first used for grasping, which later evolved and modified into wings so that they could fly. The Maniraptora clade consists of a group of theropod dinosaurs: Aves, the birds; Troodontids, which many believe are relatively intelligent non-avian dinosaurs; Oviraptors; Dromaeosaurs, which comprised of raptors and includes dinosaurs such as the velociraptor; and Therizinosaurs, which were plant-eating theropods. One thing to remember when looking at an evolutionary tree and the members belonging to one of the groups on the tree is that these animals all share a common ancestry. This common ancestry means birds are not direct descendants of velociraptors or other groups of animals belonging to the Maniraptor clade. Instead, they all share a common ancestor. When we take this information back to our discussion of what is the closest relative of the T-Rex, we can now grasp that although chickens and ostriches are the closest living relatives of the T-Rex, they are not actually descendants of the T-Rex; instead, they all share a common ancestor. The Evolution Of The Earliest Birds Around 150 million years ago, birds split from the other group members of their clade. While birds flourished, the other non-avian dinosaurs went extinct during the mass extinction event approximately 65 million years ago. All birds are direct descendants of the Theropods, a group of bipedal or two-legged dinosaurs to which the T-Rex also belonged. In the beginning, Theropods were large animals with big teeth and snouts. Over time the avian branch of theropods adapted their pre-existing features to suit their needs, acquiring large enough feathers to fly, smaller skulls and bodies, and agile beaks, all of which paved the way for modern birds. Scientists have studied fossils stretching as far back as coelurosaurs, a subgroup of Theropods that produced dinosaurs such as archaeopteryx, to understand birds’ evolution. While the T-Rex and his buddies were giant, the ancestors of birds were shrinking. This more diminutive stature and ability to fly probably allowed them to survive the mass extinction event that killed off their dinosaur cousins. The survival of modern birds’ ancestors allowed them to increase in their new world devoid of other dinosaurs providing them with the space and time to evolve into modern birds. We have a huge selection or articles to answer the common and some less common questions about the Tyrannosaurus Rex here on the site and to make it easier to access we have them in the table below. Conclusion Studies on ancient collagen from a 68 million-year-old T-Rex femur show that the T-Rex’s closest living relatives are birds, with chickens and ostriches showing the most immediate family connection. These studies proved a common hypothesis that birds are living dinosaurs. The close connection between birds and the T-Rex does not mean that birds are direct descendants of the T-Rex, but instead that the two species share a common ancestor that split to produce the T-Rex line and the line that eventually evolved into modern birds. Hi, I am Roy Ford a General Studies and English Teacher who has taught all over the world. What started as a fossil collection became a great way to teach, motivate and inspire students of all ages and all over the world about dinosaurs and from that and children’s love of dinosaurs came the site dinosaur facts for kids, a resource for all ages. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. Search for: Search Welcome to Dinosaur Facts For Kids (and adults of course!) I am Marc, a teacher of General Studies and English who has been teaching my children and students in the most engaging way possible. One of these ways was to use the theme of Dinosaurs. this site hopes to share our knowledge and resources on the dangerous, deadly and delightful world of Dinosaurs. DinosaurFactsForKids.com is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com. We also participate in other affiliate programs which compensate us for referring traffic.

Scientists have studied fossils stretching as far back as coelurosaurs, a subgroup of Theropods that produced dinosaurs such as archaeopteryx, to understand birds’ evolution. While the T-Rex and his buddies were giant, the ancestors of birds were shrinking. This more diminutive stature and ability to fly probably allowed them to survive the mass extinction event that killed off their dinosaur cousins. The survival of modern birds’ ancestors allowed them to increase in their new world devoid of other dinosaurs providing them with the space and time to evolve into modern birds. We have a huge selection or articles to answer the common and some less common questions about the Tyrannosaurus Rex here on the site and to make it easier to access we have them in the table below. Conclusion Studies on ancient collagen from a 68 million-year-old T-Rex femur show that the T-Rex’s closest living relatives are birds, with chickens and ostriches showing the most immediate family connection. These studies proved a common hypothesis that birds are living dinosaurs. The close connection between birds and the T-Rex does not mean that birds are direct descendants of the T-Rex, but instead that the two species share a common ancestor that split to produce the T-Rex line and the line that eventually evolved into modern birds. Hi, I am Roy Ford a General Studies and English Teacher who has taught all over the world. What started as a fossil collection became a great way to teach, motivate and inspire students of all ages and all over the world about dinosaurs and from that and children’s love of dinosaurs came the site dinosaur facts for kids, a resource for all ages. Save my name, email, and website in this browser for the next time I comment. Search for: Search Welcome to Dinosaur Facts For Kids (and adults of course!) I am Marc, a teacher of General Studies and English who has been teaching my children and students in the most engaging way possible. One of these ways was to use the theme of Dinosaurs.

no

Ornithology

Are birds descendants of T-Rex?

no_statement

"birds" are not "descendants" of t"-"rex.. t"-"rex is not the ancestor of "birds".

https://ecologyforthemasses.com/2019/01/14/birds-are-reptiles/

Birds are Reptiles | Ecology for the Masses

Birds are Reptiles When one looks at birds like this puffin, it can be hard to reconcile its cute appearance with its place in the animal kingdom. The thing is, this adorable puffin has something in common with a rattlesnake, in that it’s a reptile (Image credit: Ray Hennessy, Unsplash licence, Image Cropped). You read that correctly, birds are reptiles. Now, I can hear you saying “but we learned that they are a different group of organisms, and that reptiles are just those scaly animals that have cold blood?” While reptiles don’t have cold blood per se, some of them DO have feathers. And can fly. In this post I hope to convince you of the fact that the puffin pictured above, and all of its avian relatives, belong with the snakes, lizards, crocodiles, and turtles in the reptile group. What ARE birds, anyway? One of my favorite web comics is that of the Tyrannosaurus rex transitioning slowly into a chicken. In the first panel, it towers over a group of humans, scaring them and basking in its monstrous, scaly glory. But then it starts to change, the massive predator begins to shrink and grow feathers, and it goes from being the “terrible king lizard” (actual meaning of Tyrannosaurus rex, despite it not being a lizard) to being too small and cute to be a threat. While this is humorous and the T. rex likely already had feathers, it calls attention to one of the scientific facts that I would wager a fair amount of the non-scientific public knows: birds are the modern-day descendants of dinosaurs. The cool thing about this is that birds are not only the descendants of dinosaurs, they ARE dinosaurs. Molecular data tells us that during the Triassic period (251-199 million years ago) the major groups of what are today considered reptiles evolved, and these are the relatives of a group that were the ancestors of crocodiles and dinosaurs. About 65 million years ago a massive extinction event wiped out all but one group of small, feathered dinosaurs (most dinosaurs were likely feathered, we know now). These dinosaurs eventually developed over time into what we now call birds. So, despite their shared evolutionary history and close relation to other reptiles like crocodiles (I challenge you to find someone who would say crocodiles aren’t reptiles), why are birds usually neglected when it comes to reptiles? Part of the problem may be the tendency that we as humans have to differentiate things based on how similar they are. Sure, birds lay eggs like a lot of other reptiles do, but they are also covered in feathers and most of them fly. How could these feathered, flying animals be the same kind of animals as the scaly, legless snakes? Part of the problem may lie with how dissimilar birds are, as a group, to their closest relatives, the crocodilians (alligators, crocodiles, caimans, etc.). Most birds are smaller than a human, have feathers covering most of their bodies, and plenty of them fly. Crocodilians, on the other hand, can’t fly, don’t have feathers, and lots of them are much larger than humans. To bring this point home using another group of animals, I will use humans and their closest primate relatives. Most people (religious fundamentalists aside) know that chimpanzees are the closest relatives to humans in the animal kingdom, but broadly speaking they look almost nothing like us. They walk on their hands and feet, have bristly hair covering the majority of their bodies, and move in the trees as easily as they do on the ground. We humans, however, tend to be relatively hairless (at least compared to the chimps), walk exclusively on our feet, and we have come to dominate the world in a way that no other species before us has. As a matter of fact, plenty of people wouldn’t name humans when talking about primates, despite the fact that we ARE primates. So, why the distinction? It may be a cultural hangover from the days where people considered themselves “special” or “chosen”, and thus above the “primitive” animals, but I think it has more to do with how different we are from them in both appearance and behavior. Despite these differences, we are primates just like our chimp cousins, and birds are reptiles. In the Literature This bias isn’t unique to the general public, we as scientists are also guilty of separating birds from their fellow reptile relatives. When researching this topic, I looked up papers to get a sense of how the scientific community discusses and refers to birds. I used the search terms “bird + reptile + phylogeny” to find papers showing the evolutionary history of the reptile group, and almost all of the relevant papers used terms like “birds and reptiles” or “birds and non-avian reptiles”. Why the distinction and separation? Part of the issue may lie with the classical system of classification, called the Linnaean system after Carolus Linnaeus, where animals are divided into groups based off of their physical similarity to one another. In this system, reptiles were organisms that could not regulate their own body temperature (ectothermic) and had scales, so birds did not fit into this group. It wasn’t until the 1940’s that the science of phylogeny, using studies of ancestral states and grouping organisms based off of how similar they are GENETICALLY, was able to show that birds, lizards, turtles, snakes, and crocodilians were all descended from the original reptile ancestor. A second possibility is that it is simply easier to separate birds from the “non-avian reptiles”. In my experience with the literature, most studies using birds are concerned with some aspect of a bird-exclusive trait (like flight or roosting in large colonies), and those using other reptiles like turtles are more concerned with some aspect of their non-avian biology, like how to overwinter as an ectothermic animal. So, unless a researcher is writing a paper on the evolutionary history of these organisms, why would you put them together? Where Does This Leave the Birds? So, why does any of this matter? Sure, in the end these arguments are just humans trying to put things into neat little boxes. We want to classify them and marvel at our ability to “solve” the evolutionary history of the tree of life. The birds don’t care what we call them (unless it’s an emu, they don’t take insults well). It is important, however, to use the proper terms when discussing science. We can’t fall back onto our preconceived notions of how things are when the evidence for the contrary is staring us right in the face. Also, when it comes down to it, birds being reptiles is pretty cool. Adam Hasik an evolutionary ecologist interested in the ecological and evolutionary dynamics of host-parasite interactions. You can read more about his research and the rest of the Ecology for the Masses writers here, see more of his work at Ecology for the Masses here, or follow him on Twitter here. Related 21 comments Hey Adam! I remember my lecturer giving us a talk about crocodilians. His team did an experiment where they captured crocodiles from one point in Northern Queensland and released them with trackers. They swam all the way around cape york to the exact place they were found. This ability was remarkably correlated to the navigational sense birds possess! I was very impressed :’) Really, because if you put a reptile in the conditions Penguins live they would die. Science is coming around far to slowly to changing their thinking and are looking foolish. This is a unique situation where media has changed are perception of dinosaurs rather than science making a Gestalt shift. Scientists are looking more foolish by their inaction when all they need to do is disect a bird and reptile and notice the differences. Birds have air sacks that reptiles don’t and they need to be labeled as their own branch. It is sad that little children aren’t even taught what category birds are because teachers don’t tell you penguins are reptiles they just don’t teach you about birds. Scientist get your act together and make a decision. Hey Christian. I’m not sure where you’re going with this, but just because an animal is different on the inside/outside doesn’t mean they can’t be closely related. The same goes for habitat. Swap a penguin and a golden eagle, both would likely die because they aren’t adapted to the others habitat. Birds are indeed their own branch, but that branch is within the larger group of reptiles. So Adam might be able to confirm this, but whilst mammals come under the clade Reptiliomorpha, they aren’t part of the class Reptilia. I’m also reasonably sure that the reptiles you’re referring to mammals as having descended from weren’t actual reptiles, but synapsids. So from a strictly cladistic point of view, I doubt mammals would be considered as reptiles. …and yet we acknowledge that people (or elephants, or pigs, or…) are sufficiently different from tuna to deserve their own classification, leaving the term “fish” only to the latter. Aren’t birds sufficiently different from lizards (e.g. being “hot” vs “cold” blooded animals) to merit the same treatment? Thank you. I only saw your response now. Now even within the mammal class, I’ve heard it said that marsupials are not “real mammals,” even though what else could they be? They have hair, drink milk as infants, etc. Less about science and more about wonder: Some archeologists and paleontologists speak of the “long echo,” the awe one feels when finding an artifact or fossil that links one to the distant past. Since I learned that birds are dinosaurs I sometimes get that feeling as I watch the crows in the the trees along the city streets, the sparrows at the bird feeder, or hear the owl in the yard in the wee hours of the night. It seems a bit confusing to use Linnaean taxonomy names (Class Avea and Class Reptilia) in the genetic classification. If it’s a new classification with a new approach, then please come up with new terms. Now some people may think Class Aves is now a subclass of Class Reptilia or something like this. Don’t you think that “Birds are reptiles” is mixing old names with new approach?

But then it starts to change, the massive predator begins to shrink and grow feathers, and it goes from being the “terrible king lizard” (actual meaning of Tyrannosaurus rex, despite it not being a lizard) to being too small and cute to be a threat. While this is humorous and the T. rex likely already had feathers, it calls attention to one of the scientific facts that I would wager a fair amount of the non-scientific public knows: birds are the modern-day descendants of dinosaurs. The cool thing about this is that birds are not only the descendants of dinosaurs, they ARE dinosaurs. Molecular data tells us that during the Triassic period (251-199 million years ago) the major groups of what are today considered reptiles evolved, and these are the relatives of a group that were the ancestors of crocodiles and dinosaurs. About 65 million years ago a massive extinction event wiped out all but one group of small, feathered dinosaurs (most dinosaurs were likely feathered, we know now). These dinosaurs eventually developed over time into what we now call birds. So, despite their shared evolutionary history and close relation to other reptiles like crocodiles (I challenge you to find someone who would say crocodiles aren’t reptiles), why are birds usually neglected when it comes to reptiles? Part of the problem may be the tendency that we as humans have to differentiate things based on how similar they are. Sure, birds lay eggs like a lot of other reptiles do, but they are also covered in feathers and most of them fly. How could these feathered, flying animals be the same kind of animals as the scaly, legless snakes? Part of the problem may lie with how dissimilar birds are, as a group, to their closest relatives, the crocodilians (alligators, crocodiles, caimans, etc.). Most birds are smaller than a human, have feathers covering most of their bodies, and plenty of them fly.

yes

Lepidopterology

Are butterflies actually a type of moth?

yes_statement

"butterflies" are a "type" of "moth".. moths and "butterflies" belong to the same family.

https://www.uky.edu/hort/butterflies/all-about-butterflies

All about butterflies | Department of Horticulture

Search Contact Us Department of Horticulture For questions about home gardening, landscaping or commercial horticulture production, please contact your county extension agent. Click here, then click on your county either on the map or from the list of counties below it. For general undergraduate student information, contact Dr. Rick Durham at (859) 257-3249, or rdurham@uky.edu. For undergraduate student information regarding the Sustainable Agriculture program, contact Dr. Krista Jacobsen at (859) 257-3921, or krista.jacobsen@uky.edu. For graduate student information, contact Dr. Mark Williams at (859) 257-1758, or mark.williams@uky.edu. Note: Words underlined in the text are defined in the "Butterfly words" or glossary section. What is a butterfly? Butterflies are the adult flying stage of certain insects belonging to an order or group called Lepidoptera. Moths also belong to this group. The word "Lepidoptera" means "scaly wings" in Greek. This name perfectly suits the insects in this group because their wings are covered with thousands of tiny scales overlapping in rows. The scales, which are arranged in colorful designs unique to each species, are what gives the butterfly its beauty. Like all other insects, butterflies have six legs and three main body parts: head, thorax (chest or mid section) and abdomen (tail end). They also have two antennae and an exoskeleton. Both butterflies and moths belong to the same insect group called Lepidoptera. In general, butterflies differ from moths in the following ways: (1) Butterflies usually have clubbed antennae but moths have fuzzy or feathery antennae. (2) Butterflies normally are active during the daytime while most moths are active at night. (3) When a butterfly rests, it will do so with its wings held upright over its body. Moths, on the other hand, rest with their wings spread out flat. Butterflies will, however, bask with their wings out-stretched. (4) Butterflies are generally more brightly colored than moths, however, this is not always the case. There are some very colorful moths. A life cycle is made up of the stages that a living organism goes through during its lifetime from beginning to end. A butterfly undergoes a process called complete metamorphosis during its life cycle. This means that the butterfly changes completely from its early larval stage, when it is a caterpillar, until the final stage, when it becomes a beautiful and graceful adult butterfly. The butterfly life cycle has four stages: egg, larva, pupa, and adult. The first stage of the butterfly life cycle is the egg or ovum. Butterfly eggs are tiny, vary in color and may be round, cylindrical or oval. The female butterfly attaches the eggs to leaves or stems of plants that will also serve as a suitable food source for the larvae when they hatch. The larva, or caterpillar, that hatches from the egg is the second stage in the life cycle. Caterpillars often, but not always, have several pairs of true legs, along with several pairs of false legs or prolegs. A caterpillar's primary activity is eating. They have a voracious appetite and eat almost constantly. As the caterpillar continues to eat, its body grows considerably. The tough outer skin or exoskeleton, however, does not grow or stretch along with the enlarging caterpillar. Instead, the old exoskeleton is shed in a process called molting and it is replaced by a new, larger exoskeleton. A caterpillar may go through as many as four to five molts before it becomes a pupa. The third stage is known as the pupa or chrysalis. The caterpillar attaches itself to a twig, a wall or some other support and the exoskeleton splits open to reveal the chrysalis. The chrysalis hangs down like a small sack until the transformation to butterfly is complete. The casual observer may think that because the pupa is motionless that very little is going on during this "resting stage." However, it is within the chrysalis shell that the caterpillar's structure is broken down and rearranged into the wings, body and legs of the adult butterfly. The pupa does not feed but instead gets its energy from the food eaten by the larval stage. Depending on the species, the pupal stage may last for just a few days or it may last for more than a year. Many butterfly species overwinter or hibernate as pupae. The fourth and final stage of the life cycle is the adult. Once the chrysalis casing splits, the butterfly emerges. It will eventually mate and lay eggs to begin the cycle all over again. Most adult butterflies will live only a week or two, while a few species may live as long as 18 months. Images in this section are of the life cycle of the black swallowtail on one of its host plants, fennel. Images are from Kentucky Cooperative Extension Service Publication FOR-98, Attracting Butterflies with Native Plants, by Thomas G. Barnes. Butterflies are complex creatures. Their day-to-day lives can be characterized by many activities. If you are observant you may see butterflies involved in many of the follow activities. To observe some activities, such as hybernation, may involve some detective work. To observe other activities such as basking, puddling, or migrating, you will need to be at the proper place at the proper time. Keep an activity log and see how many different butterflies you can spot involved in each activity. The information from the individual butterfly pages may give you some hints as to where (or on what plants) some of these activities are likely to occur. The larval or caterpillar stage and the adult butterfly have very different food preferences, largely due to the differences in their mouth parts. Both types of foods must be available in order for the butterfly to complete its life cycle. Caterpillars are very particular about what they eat, which is why the female butterfly lays her eggs only on certain plants. She instinctively knows what plants will serve as suitable food for the hungry caterpillars that hatch from her eggs. Caterpillars don't move much and may spend their entire lives on the same plant or even the same leaf! Their primary goal is to eat as much as they can so that they become large enough to pupate. Caterpillars have chewing mouth parts, called mandibles, which enable them to eat leaves and other plant parts. Some caterpillars are considered pests because of the damage they do to crops. Caterpillars do not need to drink additional water because they get all they need from the plants they eat. Adult butterflies are also selective about what they eat. Unlike caterpillars, butterflies can roam about and look for suitable food over a much broader territory. In most cases, adult butterflies are able to feed only on various liquids. They drink through a tube-like tongue called a proboscis. It uncoils to sip liquid food, and then coils up again into a spiral when the butterfly is not feeding. Most butterflies prefer flower nectar, but others may feed on the liquids found in rotting fruit, in ooze from trees, and in animal dung. Butterflies prefer to feed in sunny areas protected from wind. Butterflies are cold-blooded, meaning they cannot regulate their own body temperature. As a result, their body temperature changes with the temperature of their surroundings. If they get too cold, they are unable to fly and must warm up their muscles in order to resume flight. Butterflies can fly as long as the air is between 60°-108° F, although temperatures between 82°-100° F are best. If the temperature drops too low, they may seek a light colored rock, sand or a leaf in a sunny spot and bask. Butterflies bask with their wings spread out in order to soak up the sun's heat. When butterflies get too hot, they may head for shade or for cool areas like puddles. Some species will gather at shallow mud puddles or wet sandy areas, sipping the mineral-rich water. Generally more males than females puddle and it is believed that the salts and nutrients in the puddles are needed for successful mating. There are two methods that a male butterfly might use in order to search for a female mate. It might patrol or fly over a particular area where other butterflies are active. If it sees a possible mate, it will fly in for a closer look. Or, instead, it might perch on a tall plant in an area where females may be present. If it spots a likely mate, it will swoop in to investigate. In either case, if he finds a suitable female he will begin the mating ritual. If he finds another male instead, a fierce fight may ensue. A male butterfly has several methods of determining whether he has found a female of his own species. One way is by sight. The male will look for butterflies with wings that are the correct color and pattern. When a male sights a potential mate it will fly closer, often behind or above the female. Once closer, the male will release special chemicals, called pheromones, while it flutters its wings a bit more than usual. The male may also do a special "courtship dance" to attract the female. These "dances" consist of flight patterns that are peculiar to that species of butterfly. If the female is interested she may join the male's dance. They will then mate by joining together end to end at their abdomens. During the mating process, when their bodies are joined, the male passes sperm to the female. As the eggs later pass through the female's egg-laying tube, they are fertilized by the sperm. The male butterfly often dies soon after mating. After mating with a male, the female butterfly must go in search of a plant on which to lay her eggs. Because the caterpillars that will hatch from her eggs will be very particular about what they eat, she must be very particular in choosing a plant. She can recognize the right plant species by its leaf color and shape. Just to be sure, however, she may beat on the leaf with her feet. This scratches the leaf surface, causing a characteristic plant odor to be released. Once she is sure she has found the correct plant species, she will go about the business of egg-laying. While laying her eggs, they are fertilized with the sperm that has been stored in her body since mating. Some butterflies lay a single egg, while others may lay their eggs in clusters. A sticky substance produced by the female enables the eggs to stick where ever she lays them, either on the underside of a leaf or on a stem. Butterflies are cold-blooded and cannot withstand winter conditions in an active state. Butterflies may survive cold weather by hibernating in protected locations. They may use the peeling bark of trees, perennial plants, logs or old fences as their overwintering sites. They may hibernate at any stage (egg, larval, pupal or adult) but generally each species is dormant in only one stage. Another way that butterflies can escape cold weather is by migrating to a warmer region. Some migrating butterflies, such as the painted lady and cabbage butterfly, fly only a few hundred miles, while others, such as the monarch, travel thousands of miles. Monarchs are considered the long-distance champions of butterfly migration, traveling as many as 4000 miles round trip. They begin their flight before the autumn cold sets in, heading south from Canada and the northern United States. Monarchs migrate to the warmer climates of California, Florida and Mexico, making the trip in two months or less and feeding on nectar along the way. Once arriving at their southern destination, they will spend the winter resting for the return flight. Few of the original adults actually complete the trip home. Instead, the females mate and lay eggs along the way and their offspring finish this incredible journey. Butterflies and caterpillars are preyed upon by birds, spiders, lizards and various other animals. Largely defenseless against many of these hungry predators, Lepidoptera have developed a number of passive ways to protect themselves. One way is by making themselves inconspicuous through the use of camouflage. Caterpillars may be protectively colored or have structures that allow them to seemingly disappear into the background. For example, many caterpillars are green, making them difficult to detect because they blend in with the host leaf. Some larvae, particularly those in the Tropics, bear a resemblance to bird droppings, a disguise that makes them unappealing to would-be predators. The coloration and pattern of a butterfly's wings may enable it to blend into its surrounding. Some may look like dead leaves on a twig when they are at rest with their wings closed. The under wing markings of the comma and question mark butterflies help them to go unnoticed when hibernating in leaf litter. Chrysalis (noun - pronounced: KRIS-uh-liss) - the third stage of the butterfly life cycle, also called a pupa. Cocoon (noun) - the silken protective covering made by a moth larva before it becomes a pupa. Cold blooded (adjective) - having a body temperature that is about the same as the surrounding air because of the animal's inability to regulate its own internal body heat. On the other hand, warm blooded animals are able to regulate their own internal body heat and their bodies stay at a fairly constant temperature, regardless of their surroundings. Dormancy (noun) - a period of no activity when development is suspended, often occurring during unfavorable conditions. Also, dormant (verb). Egg (noun) - the first stage in a butterfly's life cycle. The larva or caterpillar hatches from a butterfly egg. Exoskeleton (noun) - a tough, external covering made of chitin, which supports the body and protects the internal organs. Head (noun) - the front body segment of an insect. The mouthparts, eyes and antennae are located here. Hibernation (noun) - also referred to as overwintering, the act of entering a time of dormancy or inactivity that lasts through a specific period of time (such as a season), enabling an animal to survive through severe weather. Butterflies that hibernate in the winter may do so at any stage of development, depending on the species. Most often, however, hibernation occurs during the pupal stage. Also, hibernate (verb). Instinct (noun) - a way of behaving that is natural to an animal from birth. The behavior is known without having been taught. Also, instinctively (adverb). Larva (noun, plural: larvae) - the worm-like second stage of the butterfly life cycle, also called a caterpillar. Life cycle (noun) - the phases or changes that an insect goes through from the egg stage until its death as an adult. Mating (verb) - the pairing of a female and male in order to breed and produce offspring. Metamorphosis (noun) - the marked changes in appearance and habit that occur during development, from the growing stage(s) to the mature, adult stage. Butterflies undergo "complete metamorphosis" and their appearance changes completely from the larval to adult stage. Insects which go through a "simple metamorphosis", such as a grasshopper, change only gradually in appearance during these stages. Migration (noun) - the mass movement of an animal species across many miles in order to escape unfavorable conditions. Some butterflies, such as the monarch, may migrate thousands of miles in order to avoid winter conditions. Other types of butterflies may only migrate a relatively short distance. Also, migrate (verb). Molt (verb) - to lose the old skin or exoskeleton. The insect grows a larger one to replace the one that is shed. Nectar (noun)- the sugary, sweet liquid produced by many flowers. Ovum (noun, plural: ova) - egg. Patrolling (verb) - flying over a specific area in search of a mate. Perching (verb) - landing on a tall plant or other object for the purpose of searching out a mate. Pheromone (noun) - a chemical given off by an animal and meant to cause a specific reaction in another of the same species. Butterflies give off pheromones in order to attract a mate. Proboscis (noun) - a straw-like, flexible tongue that uncoils when the butterfly sips liquid food and then coils up again into a spiral when the butterfly is not feeding. Puddling (verb) - sipping nutrient-rich water from puddles. Generally more males that females puddle and it is believed that the salts and nutrients in the puddles are needed for successful mating. Pupa (noun, pl. pupae) - the third stage of the butterfly life cycle, also called a chrysalis. Pupate (verb) - to turn into and exist as a pupa. Scales (noun) - tiny modified hairs which overlap on a butterfly wing. The scales give the butterfly wings their color and beauty. Stage (noun) - one of the distinct periods in an insect's life. Butterflies have four stages: egg, larva, pupa and adult. Thorax (noun) - the second segment in an insect's body, located in the mid-section. Butterfly wings and legs are attached to the thorax. Vein (noun) - the rib-like tubes that give support to insect wings. The veins are tubes mostly filled with air. WARNING: Some websites to which these materials provide links for the convenience of users are not managed by the University of Kentucky. The university does not review, control or take responsibility for the contents of those sites. Send mail to cgcass0@uky.edu with questions about this site. This site was last updated on August 10, 2023. Copyright 2023, University of Kentucky, College of Agriculture, Food and Environment. An Equal Opportunity University. Site design : Academic Web Pages

The word "Lepidoptera" means "scaly wings" in Greek. This name perfectly suits the insects in this group because their wings are covered with thousands of tiny scales overlapping in rows. The scales, which are arranged in colorful designs unique to each species, are what gives the butterfly its beauty. Like all other insects, butterflies have six legs and three main body parts: head, thorax (chest or mid section) and abdomen (tail end). They also have two antennae and an exoskeleton. Both butterflies and moths belong to the same insect group called Lepidoptera. In general, butterflies differ from moths in the following ways: (1) Butterflies usually have clubbed antennae but moths have fuzzy or feathery antennae. (2) Butterflies normally are active during the daytime while most moths are active at night. (3) When a butterfly rests, it will do so with its wings held upright over its body. Moths, on the other hand, rest with their wings spread out flat. Butterflies will, however, bask with their wings out-stretched. (4) Butterflies are generally more brightly colored than moths, however, this is not always the case. There are some very colorful moths. A life cycle is made up of the stages that a living organism goes through during its lifetime from beginning to end. A butterfly undergoes a process called complete metamorphosis during its life cycle. This means that the butterfly changes completely from its early larval stage, when it is a caterpillar, until the final stage, when it becomes a beautiful and graceful adult butterfly. The butterfly life cycle has four stages: egg, larva, pupa, and adult. The first stage of the butterfly life cycle is the egg or ovum. Butterfly eggs are tiny, vary in color and may be round, cylindrical or oval. The female butterfly attaches the eggs to leaves or stems of plants that will also serve as a suitable food source for the larvae when they hatch. The larva, or caterpillar,

no

Lepidopterology

Are butterflies actually a type of moth?

yes_statement

"butterflies" are a "type" of "moth".. moths and "butterflies" belong to the same family.

https://www.moth-prevention.com/blogs/the-art-of-prevention/difference-between-moth-and-butterfly

How Can You Tell The Difference Between a Butterfly and a Moth?

How Can You Tell The Difference Between a Butterfly and a Moth? Butterflies and moths are both fascinating creatures. However, telling the difference between a butterfly and a moth can sometimes be challenging. After all, these insects share many similarities. So, what actually makes one different from the other? Is a butterfly a moth? While technically, butterflies and moths are both in the same species classification of insects, they do, in fact, have many distinguishable differences. In this in-depth guide, we will go over the difference between the butterfly and the moth. We will also discuss their varieties, features, and more. That way, you will easily be able to tell these fluttering insects apart. Additionally, we'll discuss which types of moths you should watch out for in the home. That way, you can discern a harmless butterfly vs a moth that will lay eggs in your closet. Let’s get to it! What's the difference between a moth and a butterfly? Moths and butterflies are both flying insects in the order Lepidoptera. You can usually tell them apart simply by looking at them. Butterflies tend to fold their wings vertically up over their backs, come in bright colors, and are most active in the daytime. Alternatively, moths often fold their wings horizontally, showcase neutral color tones, and are most active at night. With that being said, these clues won’t always help you figure out whether you are looking at a moth or a butterfly. For instance, factors like antennae dissimilarities, habitat preferences, behavior patterns, and even clues like migrational tendencies can be used to help you make a clear distinction between these insects. Read on as we explore the topic of moth and butterfly differences in-depth! What are some butterfly and moth similarities? Want to be able to accurately tell the difference between a butterfly or moth in your home or garden? To determine the type of insect in front of you, it can be helpful to know what traits these creatures share. Here’s a helpful list of the characteristics butterflies and moths have in common! Moths and Butterflies Can Both Have Scales and Hairs Both moths and butterflies have scales that cover their bodies and wings. These scales sometimes also resemble small hairs to insulate their bodies. This means that butterflies and moths can both be fuzzy and they can both shed “dust” when touched. Both Flying Insects Belong to the Order Lepidoptera Butterflies and moths also both belong to the order Lepidoptera. This word comes from the Greek language, where “lepis” means "scale" and “ptera” means "wing". Therefore, both of these insects can fly, and they both are classified very similarly on the species chart due to their scaly wings. Dietary Parallels Butterflies and moths also both share similar dietary preferences. In the caterpillar or larval stage, butterflies and moths both feed on a variety of plant-based materials. Moreover, in the adult stage, many types of moths and butterflies can both feed on nectar. However, depending on the subspecies, butterfly and moth diets can be very different, which we will go over in a moment. The exception being a small handful of pest type moths such as the Clothes Moth and the Pantry Moth which don’t have mouths but their larvae definitely make up for it! . Clothes Moth Larvae will eat animal based protein in your woolens, silks, fur and textiles whereas the Pantry Moth Larvae will feast on any exposed grains, dried goods and even chocolate! To summarize butterfly and moth similarities, they both can have scales and small hairs, they both belong to the same Latin classification order, and they both often share similar diets. Now for the differences between these insects! What are the most noticeable butterfly and moth differences? It’s pretty easy to see that both moths and butterflies possess many differences. Bearing that in mind, it is fairly easy to tell butterflies and moths apart just by looking at them. Here are their main differences: Different Wing Positions Butterflies and moths have different wing positions when resting and in flight. At rest, butterflies tend to fold their wings closed. Alternatively, when moths rest, they fold their wings down over their bodies. Anatomical Dissimilarities Moths can be distinguished from butterflies by their frenulums. A frenulum is a wing coupling device that joins the forewings and the hindwings together in unison during flight. Butterflies do not have frenulums. Habitual Discrepancies Butterflies primarily fly during the daytime, meaning that they are diurnal. However, moths generally fly and are active at night, making them predominantly nocturnal. With that being said, the buck moth may be active during the day. There are also a few crepuscular butterfly subspecies that are active at dawn or dusk. Cocoon Differences Butterflies make a chrysalis while moths make a cocoon. The cocoon of the moth is often wrapped in a silky or sticky covering or casing. However, the chrysalis of a butterfly is usually hard and smooth with no sticky cover. Size and Color Differentials Butterflies and moths differ in their colors and patterns and sizes. Butterflies are often vibrantly colored with large wings. This is because many types of butterflies are mildly poisonous if eaten by birds, mammals, or reptiles. In nature, displaying bright colors like yellow, orange, and red are often ways for prey animals to signal their toxicity to predators. Butterflies can come in all colors including red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, pink, and everything in between. On the other hand, moths are generally not poisonous when eaten by predators. For this reason, moths are often consumed by mammals, amphibians, reptiles, and birds. To protect themselves, moths tend to be smaller and rely on camouflage to evade these kinds of predators. Moths most often come in varying shades of gray, brown, black, tan, beige, or white. Although there are a few large and colorful ones. Butterfly vs Moth Checklist When trying to figure out if an insect in the order Lepidoptera is a moth or butterfly, look at the following features. Are moths or butterflies dangerous? Moths and butterflies are not especially dangerous to humans. Butterflies are most dangerous when in the caterpillar stage. A few species of caterpillars contain toxic substances. Moths, on the other hand, are rarely ever toxic at any stage. Bearing that in mind, certain pestilent moth species (such as Clothes Moths) can cause serious damage to property. Pantry Moths are also pests and can consume and destroy stored dry goods. Preventing Pest Moths in the Home Without Harming Butterflies or Other Beneficial Insects Butterflies are often welcomed near homes and gardens because they are such great pollinators. Moreover, some types of moths, such as the Luna Moth, Hawk Moth, and Hummingbird Moth, can also be great pollinators and garden companions. With that being said, pestilent moths, like the Clothes Moth, or the Pantry Moth, are not welcomed in homes or gardens. So, how can you keep the bad moths away without harming the beneficial moths or the butterflies? Natural and Safe Remedies to Deter Pestilent Moths There are actually a few helpful natural remedies that you can use to keep harmful insects away without bothering the beneficial ones. First, it is good to understand the habits of beneficial insects like butterflies. Butterflies won’t enter your home on purpose. If a butterfly gets into your house, chances are it is there completely by accident. The same goes for almost all pollinating garden moth species. However, some pestilent moths can (and will) get into human residences intentionally. For example, Clothes Moths like to lay eggs in dark places within people’s homes. They seek areas with abundant food sources for their larvae, which eat silk, wool, leather, feathers, and an array of other natural keratin fibers. Similarly, Pantry Moths enjoy laying eggs in pantry and cupboard locations. Pantry Moths will enter homes and seek out quiet spots with abundant sources of dried grains, flours, and cereals for their larvae to eat. As such, you can deter pestilent moths by hanging repellent herbal sachets filled with lavender, thyme, rosemary, cloves, and mint. You can also install cedar shelving, which will disrupt the pheromones of female pest moths looking to mate or lay eggs. MothPrevention Clothes and Carpet Moth Traps and Pantry Moth Traps are non-toxic and are produced using powerful pheromones which attract the active adult male moths. These traps are dedicated to catching pestilent moth types and help break their breeding cycles. While these natural moth repellents will keep pestilent moths away, they generally do not bother butterflies or garden moths in the slightest. This is for many reasons, the main one being that these garden pollinators don’t want to get into your house in the first place. FAQs on the Differences Between Moths and Butterflies Now that you know a little bit more about the main difference between moths and butterflies, let's go over some frequently asked questions about these insects. Is a moth considered a butterfly? Some moths and butterflies do look very similar. Also, they both belong to the same family of insects known as Lepidoptera. However, moths and butterflies are not the same things. Butterflies usually rest with their wings and an upright, closed position. However, moths rest with their wings folded flat, covering their bodies. Are moths and butterflies the same insect? Even though moths and butterflies belong to the same insect family, they are not the same kinds of insects. Both moths and butterflies are in the category Lepidoptera, within which there are over 180,000 different species of both moths and butterflies! In addition to this, many subspecies exist to further diverge each type of insect. Butterflies and moths have many physical and behavioral differences as well. One of the biggest behavioral differences between butterflies and moths is that butterflies are most active during the day whereas moths are most active at night. What is the easiest way to attract butterflies but not moths to a garden? Butterflies love flowers! So, if you want to attract lots of butterflies to your garden, be sure to plant plenty of open-bloom hybrid and old-fashioned nectar-rich flowers. Yellow, pink, and purple varieties tend to attract the most butterflies. And don't worry, harmful and pestilent moths are not attracted to flowers. In fact, many of the problematic moth species (like Clothes Moths and Pantry Moths) are actually deterred by herbs and flowers. Consider planting mint, lavender, and thyme to keep the harmful moths away while still attracting the beneficial ones. About MothPrevention® MothPrevention® speak to customers every day about their clothes moth issues - clothes moths are a species that are ever increasing and that can cause significant damage to clothes, carpets and other home textiles. To date, we’ve helped over 150,000 customers deal with their moth problems. We have developed professional grade solutions including proprietary pheromones, not available from anybody else in the USA, and engineered in Germany to the highest production standards.

Some moths and butterflies do look very similar. Also, they both belong to the same family of insects known as Lepidoptera. However, moths and butterflies are not the same things. Butterflies usually rest with their wings and an upright, closed position. However, moths rest with their wings folded flat, covering their bodies. Are moths and butterflies the same insect? Even though moths and butterflies belong to the same insect family, they are not the same kinds of insects. Both moths and butterflies are in the category Lepidoptera, within which there are over 180,000 different species of both moths and butterflies! In addition to this, many subspecies exist to further diverge each type of insect. Butterflies and moths have many physical and behavioral differences as well. One of the biggest behavioral differences between butterflies and moths is that butterflies are most active during the day whereas moths are most active at night. What is the easiest way to attract butterflies but not moths to a garden? Butterflies love flowers! So, if you want to attract lots of butterflies to your garden, be sure to plant plenty of open-bloom hybrid and old-fashioned nectar-rich flowers. Yellow, pink, and purple varieties tend to attract the most butterflies. And don't worry, harmful and pestilent moths are not attracted to flowers. In fact, many of the problematic moth species (like Clothes Moths and Pantry Moths) are actually deterred by herbs and flowers. Consider planting mint, lavender, and thyme to keep the harmful moths away while still attracting the beneficial ones. About MothPrevention® MothPrevention® speak to customers every day about their clothes moth issues - clothes moths are a species

no

Lepidopterology

Are butterflies actually a type of moth?

yes_statement

"butterflies" are a "type" of "moth".. moths and "butterflies" belong to the same family.

https://adoptandshop.org/what-family-is-a-moth/

What Family Is A Moth | Adopt And Shop

What Family Is A Moth What is a family? A family is a group of people who are related to each other. Families can be small or large, and they can be made up of people who are related by blood, marriage, or adoption. Moths are a type of insect that belongs to the order Lepidoptera. There are more than 160,000 species of moth, and they can be found all over the world. Moths are nocturnal creatures, and they are attracted to light. Most moths are harmless, but some species can cause damage to crops or buildings. The larvae of some moths are considered to be pests, as they can eat through cloth and other materials. North Dakota moths are classified into five different types. A list of all family names, common names, diagnoses, diversity, checklist numbers, biology, and a list of the family’s members is included. The checklist number of a species is one of several numbers that are assigned in Hodges et al. There is a family checklist in 1983. The history of biology includes information about life as a whole. Further reading reveals that moths can be identified using a list of references. North American moths have been identified. The Northern Prairie Wildlife Research Center can be found in Jamestown, North Dakota. In 1903, Classey Ltd. was founded by E.W. Holland and Jacob were two brothers. It’s a book about moths. Paul Kannowski, Paul B., and William C. Wilson. This Entomofauna was discovered in the vicinity of Leland Olds’ electric power station. There is a plant in North Dakota that processes coal. Miller, Jeffrey C., and Paul C. Hammond (2000): The Prospects and Challenges of the Future. These forest creatures can be found throughout the Pacific Northwest. The Forest Service FHM-NC-06-95 contains 80 pages. Are Butterflies Part Of The Moth Family? Source: gr-assets.com The moths and butterflies belong to the same insect family as the larvae. This category contains a total of over 180,000 species. After each stage of a four-stage life cycle, it is time for a moth or butterfly to emerge. The Caterpillar shed a final layer of skin as it grew. A butterfly is thought to have evolved from moths, which were originally diurnal insects. The moon appears to attract many moths, which are enticed by its artificial lighting. According to a study, light pollution reduces the amount of light visible from city moths, making them less likely to fly to light. It is more sensitive to violet and ultraviolet light than red light, but not as sensitive. Wings of moths and butterflies differ in color and function. Certain moths‘ scales have noise-cancelling properties, allowing them to hide from bats. A frenulum, or hook-like structure between wings, is another important feature of moths. When flying, it is believed that the wings have a single surface on which they act. The ability to detect the odor and hear better is one of the advantages of moths over humans. Previously, it was assumed that bats evolved the hearing ability due to their echolocation method of hunting, which involves sending out sound waves and detecting differences in how they wave and echo. The Different But Similar Lives Of Butterflies And Moths Neither the butterfly nor the moths are members of the same species, which is why they are known as Lepidoptera. They belong to the Hesperiidae family of butterflies, while moths belong to the Lycaenidae family of moths. This indicates that the two species have different evolutionary histories and are most likely to have evolved on their own. There is also a distinction between a butterfly and a moths. The wings of butterflies are brightly colored and easy to see, whereas the wings of moths are hidden within the bodies of butterflies. Despite these differences, there are many similarities between butterflies and moths. Both species fly by using their wings to move around when exposed to light. Both predators feed on insects and can lay eggs, as do they. Despite the fact that butterflies and moths may appear to be different, they are closely related. The species share many ancestors with each other, making them members of the same family. Is A Moth A Butterfly? There is some debate over whether moths are butterflies or a separate category of insect, as they share many characteristics. Both moths and butterflies have wings and undergo metamorphosis, for example. However, moths are generally nocturnal, while butterflies are diurnal. Additionally, moths tend to have duller colors and wings that are more fringed than those of butterflies. Scales that cover their bodies and wings are among the many distinguishing characteristics of butterflies and moths. At the end of a butterfly’s antennae, there is a bulb that is shaped like a club. A frenulum is an insect wing-coupling device. If you are bold enough to stand out from the crowd, daring enough to take risks, this is a fitting symbol for you. In addition, it shows how important it is to face challenges with strength and courage. The death’s-head hawk-moth is also known as the hawk-moth because of its dark thorax markings. Some believe that the marks left by a raven on a dead body represent the hawk-moth’s natural food source. As a result, the hawk-moth is a symbol of strength, determination, and bravery. The fruit is a symbol of death as well as a symbol of life. The Battle Of The Butterflies And Moths A butterfly’s wings are typically larger and brighter than those of a moths, and its patterns are typically more colorful. Moth Family Identification There are over 11,000 species of moths in the world, making them one of the largest groups of insects. Though they come in a variety of shapes, sizes, and colors, most moths share some common features that can be used for identification. For example, all moths have scaly wings, and many have a coating of powdery dust (called scales) that gives them a dull appearance. Some moths also have prominent “eye spots” on their wings, which may startle predators. Most moths are nocturnal, meaning they are active at night. The type of moth you see in your closet is most likely a clothing moth. Clothes moths lay their eggs on clothing and other natural fabrics to provide a secure place to lay their eggs. Do you have the kind that eats holes in your favorite clothing or leave a minefield in your stored food products? If it clings to a wall of your pantry, it is most likely an Indian meal moth. A clothes moth’s head is fluffy and tan, and it has a solid tan color. In the end, it will not make a difference whether you have one or both in your home. You can rely on American Pest to take care of it.

The Different But Similar Lives Of Butterflies And Moths Neither the butterfly nor the moths are members of the same species, which is why they are known as Lepidoptera. They belong to the Hesperiidae family of butterflies, while moths belong to the Lycaenidae family of moths. This indicates that the two species have different evolutionary histories and are most likely to have evolved on their own. There is also a distinction between a butterfly and a moths. The wings of butterflies are brightly colored and easy to see, whereas the wings of moths are hidden within the bodies of butterflies. Despite these differences, there are many similarities between butterflies and moths. Both species fly by using their wings to move around when exposed to light. Both predators feed on insects and can lay eggs, as do they. Despite the fact that butterflies and moths may appear to be different, they are closely related. The species share many ancestors with each other, making them members of the same family. Is A Moth A Butterfly? There is some debate over whether moths are butterflies or a separate category of insect, as they share many characteristics. Both moths and butterflies have wings and undergo metamorphosis, for example. However, moths are generally nocturnal, while butterflies are diurnal. Additionally, moths tend to have duller colors and wings that are more fringed than those of butterflies. Scales that cover their bodies and wings are among the many distinguishing characteristics of butterflies and moths. At the end of a butterfly’s antennae, there is a bulb that is shaped like a club. A frenulum is an insect wing-coupling device. If you are bold enough to stand out from the crowd, daring enough to take risks, this is a fitting symbol for you. In addition, it shows how important it is to face challenges with strength and courage. The death’s-head hawk-moth is also known as the hawk-moth because of its dark thorax markings.

no

Lepidopterology

Are butterflies actually a type of moth?

yes_statement

"butterflies" are a "type" of "moth".. moths and "butterflies" belong to the same family.

https://www.cambridgebutterfly.com/all-about-butterflies/

All About Butterflies - Cambridge Butterfly Conservatory

All About Butterflies HAVE A BUTTERFLY QUESTION? What is a butterfly? Unlike many other insects, butterflies are widely embraced and celebrated for their beauty and charisma. In addition to their cultural significance and aesthetic charm, they make a very valuable contribution to ecosystems worldwide and are important study animals for ecology, evolution, and conservation biology. All butterflies and moths are insects (Class: Insecta). Insects are the most abundant and diverse group of animals, making up over 58% of the world’s known biodiversity. They can be found living on land, in the air, and underwater – thriving almost everywhere except for the open ocean. Insects are an important part of our ecosystems, and we still have much to learn about them! Butterflies and moths belong to the insect Order Lepidoptera, which is a word that comes from the Greek words for “scale” and “wing.” This is because all the patterns and colours on the wings and bodies of butterflies and moths are made up of tiny coloured scales. Along with their distinctive coiled proboscis (mouthpart) and big showy wings, these features make butterflies and moths different from all other insects. The order Lepidoptera contains an estimated 150,000 described species (mostly moths) and there are an estimated 18,000 described butterfly species found globally. The earliest known butterfly fossils date to the mid Eocene epoch, between 40–50 million years ago. Where do butterflies live? All butterflies are terrestrial, meaning they live on land. Although most known species are tropical, butterflies can be found living throughout the world – from the tropics on the equator to northern regions above the arctic circle, and from sea level to mountain tops over 6000 metres tall! Butterflies can be found in nearly all types of habitat, including desert, wetlands, grassland, forest, and alpine. Some butterflies in the family Lycaenidae spend part of their lives underground! Their caterpillars are tended by ants in exchange for providing the ants with sweet honeydew. A butterfly’s habitat depends on its species. There are many species, such as the Karner Blue (Lycaeides melissa samuelis), left, that have very specific habitat requirements and can’t live anywhere else. The Karner Blue butterfly depends on a rare ecosystem called an Oak Savannah for its habitat, and since most of Ontario’s Oak Savannahs were destroyed, this species no longer lives in Ontario and is now extirpated (locally extinct) from Canada. Alternatively, butterflies such as the Cabbage White are very adaptable and can be found in many different habitats and on many different continents. Parts of a Butterfly All insects, including butterflies, share a common overall body design. A butterfly’s body is divided into three main sections, the head, the thorax, and the abdomen. Each body section has very different functions, and all are needed for the butterfly to live. Head A butterfly’s head is full of extremely important organs that allow the butterfly to sense what is around it and to feed. On the head, you will find: Antennae (singular: Antenna) Attached at the top of the head. Antennae are sensory organs used to pick up chemicals in the air, which may be anything from the smell of flowers to the scent of a potential mate. They also help with balance and in detecting motion. Think of them as the butterfly’s version of a nose. Compound Eyes Unlike human eyes, which each have one lens, each of a butterfly’s compound eyes is made up of many smaller “eyes” called ommatidia, which each have their own lens. The butterfly’s brain stitches the information from all of these tiny eyes into a picture of the world around it. Butterflies likely don’t see the crisp, clear images that we see as humans, but they make up for it in other ways! Since the ommatidia in their compound eyes are all pointed in slightly different directions, butterflies can see forwards, backwards, above and below themselves all at the same time. As well, butterfly eyes can see ultraviolet light, which humans cannot. This comes in handy, since some flowers and even other butterflies have special markings on them that can only be seen in ultraviolet light. Proboscis The proboscis is the butterfly’s mouthpart. It is used like a straw to suck up liquids such as flower nectar, water, fruit juices, leaking tree sap, animal sweat, or other things depending on the species. When in use, the proboscis looks like a small wire coming out from under the front of the head. When not in use, it coils up tightly like a spring under the front of the head. Butterflies are only able to sip on liquids with their proboscis and are unable to pierce or break skin. Thorax A butterfly’s thorax is a powerhouse that has everything a butterfly needs to move and fly around its environment. On the thorax, you will find: Six Legs These are attached to the underside of the thorax. Each segmented leg has 5 sections, but the 3 that are easy to see are the femur, tibia, and tarsus. Think of the femur as the “thigh”, the tibia as the “shin”, and the tarsus as the “foot”. A butterfly’s legs have the same function as our own, helping them to climb and walk. However, did you know that a butterfly’s foot also helps it to taste? Special sensors on each tarsus pick up chemicals from the surfaces they walk on, which helps the butterfly to sense tasty liquids or identify host plants for their caterpillars. This is one reason to avoid picking up butterflies when possible – the creams and chemicals we put on our hands can be hard on their feet! Why do some butterflies look like they only have 4 legs? Some butterflies, including very common species like the Monarch, appear to have only 4 legs. This is not because they have lost two legs. These butterflies come from the family Nymphalidae, or the brush-footed butterflies. All brush-footed butterflies do have 6 legs, but the first pair of legs is very reduced, and are tucked against the thorax and hidden in the body’s fuzz. You will only see these legs if you can carefully pry them away from the body with tweezers. These reduced legs have lost their function in this family of butterflies, and are not used for walking. Four Wings Although it may appear at first glance that butterflies only have two wings, if you have a closer look it becomes obvious that each side of the body has a forewing and a hindwing. The wings are covered with coloured scales, which are basically tiny flattened hairs that give colour to the wings. Butterfly scales are so small that without a microscope they just look like coloured dust, and they are delicate enough that they will brush right off the wing if they are rubbed. Scales are unique to butterflies and moths, and they come in three varieties: pigmented, diffractive, and androconia. Pigmented scales get their colours from pigment chemicals they contain, which absorb some light and reflect the rest. Over time, pigment scales can fade, because eventually the pigment chemicals break down. This is why some butterflies fade when kept in collections that are exposed to light. Diffractive scales get their colours by diffracting light, a similar effect to using a prism to split white light into a rainbow. Diffractive scales give off brilliant metallic and iridescent colours, and do not fade over time because they have no pigment chemicals to break down. Androconia scales are scales that produce pheromones instead of colour. Pheromones are chemicals that butterflies release into the air to communicate with other butterflies of the same species, and are usually involved in helping butterflies find a mate. A butterfly’s wings are used for flight, but also have many other functions. Patterns on the wings can help camouflage the butterfly, warn predators that a butterfly is poisonous, surprise or distract predators with flashy displays, and help a butterfly attract and communicate with other butterflies of its species. In the case of poisonous butterflies like the Monarch, the wings are also an excellent place for storing toxins (though you would have to eat them to get sick). Abdomen A butterfly’s abdomen may not look like much on the outside, but inside it holds vital organs that the butterfly needs to survive. Digestive Tract Most of a butterfly’s digestive tract is housed inside the abdomen. This is where the butterfly processes foods and wastes. Spiracles These are tiny holes found along the sides of the abdomen that let air travel into tracheal tubes in the butterfly’s respiratory system, allowing it to breathe. Unlike us, a butterfly’s mouthparts are not involved in breathing! Although spiracles may also found on other parts of the body, most of them are located on the abdomen. Reproductive Organs All of the important male and female organs involved in reproduction are found in the abdomen, located towards the tip. The abdomen is also where the eggs develop and remain until a female butterfly lays them. It is worthwhile to note that there is no such thing as a stinging butterfly. Butterflies have no stinging organs or venom in their abdomens, or anywhere else in their bodies. So don’t worry about having a butterfly land on you – they are completely harmless, and you should consider yourself lucky! Butterfly vs. Moth How are Butterflies Related to Moths? Butterflies and moths are very closely-related insect groups that make up the Order Lepidoptera. They all use tiny coloured scales to colour and pattern their bodies and wings, and have very similar body plans and life cycles. It is easiest to understand how butterflies and moths are related if you first forget the word “butterfly” altogether! Imagine the Order Lepidoptera as the “Order of Moths”. This is fairly close to reality, since moths make up nearly all species in the Lepidoptera – butterflies are essentially just a very specialized group of day-flying moths, and they make up only a tiny part of the Lepidoptera! Now imagine that this “Order of Moths” was broken up into different groups of related moths that shared common features – like gall moths, ghost moths, leafroller moths, owlet moths, snout moths, geometer moths, big moths, small moths, fat moths, thin moths – you get the idea. Then imagine that one of these groups (just one of them!) contained “moths” that were usually brightly coloured, usually day-flying, had clubbed antennae, and pupated in a chrysalis. What would you call this group? The answer is: butterflies! Conversely, the word “moth” just refers to everything that is not a butterfly. As you can see, moths and butterflies are very closely connected, more so than most people realize. In fact, if butterflies had just been discovered today, scientists would very likely call them moths too, and the word “butterfly” would never even exist! So, what is the difference? How do you tell them apart? How Do You Tell Moths and Butterflies Apart? The most reliable way to tell butterflies apart from moths is to look at their antennae. The antennae, or feelers, are found on the head just above the eyes. Generally, butterfly antennae (left) are ‘clubbed’, meaning that they are long and thin in the middle but end in a thicker lump, kind of like a golf club. The antennae are not fuzzy or feathery, but look more like wire. Butterflies hold their antennae out and forward, where they are easy to see. In contrast, moth antennae (left) tend to be thicker in the middle and get thinner towards the ends, appearing to taper to a point. Moth antennae are feather-like, covered in projections or teeth that make them look like a feather or comb. For some moths this is very obvious, but for others the feathery parts are very short and hard to see. Unlike butterflies, some moths tuck their antennae alongside their bodies when they are resting, but many hold their antennae out like butterflies do. There are various general “rules” listed below for telling moths and butterflies apart, but be warned – there are many exceptions to some of these “rules,” and they are not as reliable as looking at the antennae! The Eight Spotted Forester (Alypia octomaculata) (left) is colourful, has wire-like antennae, and flies during the day – but it is actually a moth! Butterflies: Butterflies tend to be colourful Butterflies tend to be diurnal (active during the day), where the daylight makes their colours showy Butterflies tend to pupate in a hard chrysalis Butterflies tend to rest with their wings closed and directly over their backs (unless they are sunning) Butterflies tend to have thinner bodies which are not overly fuzzy. Moths Moths tend to be drably coloured, often in browns, greys, and pale colours Moths tend to be nocturnal (active during the night), where low light levels mean that only pale colours show up well Moths tend to pupate inside a cocoon, which they spin out of silk and sometimes nearby materials like leaves Moths tend to rest with their wings open or flat against their backs Moths tend to have fatter, stockier bodies, and are often noticeably fuzzy

It is worthwhile to note that there is no such thing as a stinging butterfly. Butterflies have no stinging organs or venom in their abdomens, or anywhere else in their bodies. So don’t worry about having a butterfly land on you – they are completely harmless, and you should consider yourself lucky! Butterfly vs. Moth How are Butterflies Related to Moths? Butterflies and moths are very closely-related insect groups that make up the Order Lepidoptera. They all use tiny coloured scales to colour and pattern their bodies and wings, and have very similar body plans and life cycles. It is easiest to understand how butterflies and moths are related if you first forget the word “butterfly” altogether! Imagine the Order Lepidoptera as the “Order of Moths”. This is fairly close to reality, since moths make up nearly all species in the Lepidoptera – butterflies are essentially just a very specialized group of day-flying moths, and they make up only a tiny part of the Lepidoptera! Now imagine that this “Order of Moths” was broken up into different groups of related moths that shared common features – like gall moths, ghost moths, leafroller moths, owlet moths, snout moths, geometer moths, big moths, small moths, fat moths, thin moths – you get the idea. Then imagine that one of these groups (just one of them!) contained “moths” that were usually brightly coloured, usually day-flying, had clubbed antennae, and pupated in a chrysalis. What would you call this group? The answer is: butterflies! Conversely, the word “moth” just refers to everything that is not a butterfly. As you can see, moths and butterflies are very closely connected, more so than most people realize. In fact, if butterflies had just been discovered today, scientists would very likely call them moths too, and the word “butterfly” would never even exist! So, what is the difference? How do you tell them apart?

yes

Lepidopterology

Are butterflies actually a type of moth?

yes_statement

"butterflies" are a "type" of "moth".. moths and "butterflies" belong to the same family.

https://www.familyhandyman.com/article/butterfly-vs-moth/

Butterfly vs. Moth: Which Is the Better Pollinator?

Butterfly vs. Moth: Which Is the Better Pollinator? From flamboyant flower-hopping fritillaries to reclusive giant luna moths, we compare these two pollinators for our gardens and beyond. Getty Images (2) Think quick and name a type of butterfly. Monarch, swallowtail, painted lady, blue and hairstreak probably come to mind. Now name a type of moth. Stumped? That might be because butterflies, and especially planting for butterflies, captivates our attention. I mean, who ever heard of a moth garden? But there are actually 160,000 known species of moths vs. 17,500 species of butterflies. Both frequent our gardens and pollinate our plants. But who takes home the gold as the better pollinator? Let’s find out. What’s the Difference Between a Butterfly and a Moth? Butterflies and moths belong to a diverse group of insects known as Lepidoptera, Latin for “scaly wing.” They have similar lifecycles, progressing from egg to caterpillar to pupae before metamorphosing into winged adults. “Butterflies are essentially moths that have specialized in being active during the day, so they’re more likely to be flying around your flowers while the sun is out than moths,” says Shiran Hershcovich, lepidopterist manager at Butterfly Pavilion in Westminster, Colorado. This evolution only recently came to light, helping explain why butterflies are generally more brightly colored than moths. “That shift to feeding on the nectar of daytime flowering plants allowed these insects to shed their earth tones in favor of the riot of colors they’re known for today, which often act to attract mates or warn predators that they’re poisonous,” says Shubber Ali, CEO of Garden for Wildlife. Other differences between butterflies and moths include: Moths tend toward feathery or fuzzy antennae. Butterfly antennae are always thin and clubbed or hooked at the end, and never fuzzy. Moths can spin a silk cocoon to protect their pupae. Butterflies form a chrysalis. Butterflies fold their wings vertically above their backs, while moths hold theirs like a tent. Of course, there are exceptions to some of these distinctions. Take hummingbird moths, which, like butterflies, are active during the day and sport showy hues. Butterfly Pollinators: Pros and Cons Butterflies certainly win in the bringing-humans-joy category, because we’re more likely to see them around in our gardens during the day. Beyond that, butterflies are generalists as nectar seekers, so they visit lots of flowers in a short amount of time. On the other hand, their larvae (caterpillars) chew on plants as they grow, making them seem destructive. “But in reality, these plants are their host plants and are meant to be eaten,” says Ali. “Although damage to the plant can appear harmful, many of these plants recover quickly.” Moth Pollinators: Pros and Cons Moths win in the diversity category. With nearly 10 moth species for each butterfly species, some moths have become key specialists, pollinating plants that few others can. Example: The yucca moth and the yucca plant. “No other animal can pollinate this plant,” says Hershcovich. “They’re in a symbiotic relationship, which means that they both depend on each other for survival.” But from our human perception, moths are drab and often viewed as pests. Similar to butterflies, moth caterpillars can also destroy crops — fruit, vegetables, even tobacco. “On the other hand, these caterpillars are also very effective at controlling weedy plants,” says Ali. Is a Butterfly or a Moth the Better Pollinator? No one actually knows. Most studies have focused on pollinators active during the day, like butterflies and bees, so there’s not a lot of direct scientific evidence comparing moths with butterflies. But a recent study from the University of Sussex concluded moths might be more efficient pollinators than bees. “This is partly because moths have a much shorter time to pollinate at night, so they pollinate faster than daytime flying insects,” says Ali. But more importantly, Hershcovich and Ali say it’s a misconception to think one pollinator can rule above the others. Butterflies and moths are essential pollinators, and a healthy ecosystem requires an abundance and diversity of each. Plus, caterpillars from both are integral to the food web. Many birds require hundreds of caterpillars a day to feed their young. Are Other Insects Better Pollinators Than Butterflies and Moths? Yes, and not just bees. “The unsung heroes of pollination are flies, beetles and wasps,” says Ali. “Hoverflies are very efficient and important pollinators and are unknown to the general public.” But butterflies and moths are still pollination stars. Some even visit flowers that bees don’t, sometimes in higher numbers. So again, the key to a successful garden and ecosystem is diversity. “Plants and insects have evolved together, and many plants have special anatomical features or scents that align with a specific insect species,” says Ali. Combined, pollinators are essential for the survival of the world as we know it. “They assist with plant reproduction, and in turn those plants give us food and oxygen,” Hershcovich says. “If we were to lose any of these pieces, our plants would suffer and in turn survival of life as we know it turns precarious.” A freelance writer and indie film producer, Karuna Eberl covers the outdoors and nature side of DIY, exploring wildlife, green living, travel and gardening for Family Handyman. She also writes FH’s Eleven Percent column, about dynamic women in the construction workforce. Some of her other credits include the March cover of Readers Digest, National Parks, National Geographic Channel and Atlas Obscura. Karuna and her husband are also on the final stretch of renovating an abandoned house in a near-ghost town in rural Colorado. When they’re not working, you can find them hiking and traveling the backroads, camping in their self-converted van.

Butterfly vs. Moth: Which Is the Better Pollinator? From flamboyant flower-hopping fritillaries to reclusive giant luna moths, we compare these two pollinators for our gardens and beyond. Getty Images (2) Think quick and name a type of butterfly. Monarch, swallowtail, painted lady, blue and hairstreak probably come to mind. Now name a type of moth. Stumped? That might be because butterflies, and especially planting for butterflies, captivates our attention. I mean, who ever heard of a moth garden? But there are actually 160,000 known species of moths vs. 17,500 species of butterflies. Both frequent our gardens and pollinate our plants. But who takes home the gold as the better pollinator? Let’s find out. What’s the Difference Between a Butterfly and a Moth? Butterflies and moths belong to a diverse group of insects known as Lepidoptera, Latin for “scaly wing.” They have similar lifecycles, progressing from egg to caterpillar to pupae before metamorphosing into winged adults. “Butterflies are essentially moths that have specialized in being active during the day, so they’re more likely to be flying around your flowers while the sun is out than moths,” says Shiran Hershcovich, lepidopterist manager at Butterfly Pavilion in Westminster, Colorado. This evolution only recently came to light, helping explain why butterflies are generally more brightly colored than moths. “That shift to feeding on the nectar of daytime flowering plants allowed these insects to shed their earth tones in favor of the riot of colors they’re known for today, which often act to attract mates or warn predators that they’re poisonous,” says Shubber Ali, CEO of Garden for Wildlife. Other differences between butterflies and moths include: Moths tend toward feathery or fuzzy antennae.

yes

Lepidopterology

Are butterflies actually a type of moth?

yes_statement

"butterflies" are a "type" of "moth".. moths and "butterflies" belong to the same family.

https://mdc.mo.gov/discover-nature/field-guide/butterflies-skippers

Butterflies and Skippers | Missouri Department of Conservation

In North America, the Lepidoptera — the insect order comprising all the moths and butterflies — contains more than 30 superfamilies. All of them are various types of moths, except for one: superfamily Papilionoidea, which comprises the butterflies and skippers. Like moths, they have tiny, overlapping scales on their wings. These seem like dust when they rub off onto your fingers. The scales can be brightly colored, or they can be drab. About 700 species of butterflies (including the skippers) occur in North America north of Mexico. Most of us have a general idea of what a butterfly looks like, but to be certain, note the following characteristics: Antennae, in butterflies, are filaments tipped with a club. In the skipper family of butterflies, the antennae tips are also hooked. (Meanwhile, moths’ antennae are filaments with no club tip, or else they are shaped like feathers.) The typical wing position, when perched, is either straight out to the sides (“wings open”), or the wings are held together, straight up over the body. (There are exceptions, but moths typically fold their wings over their body like a tent, or hold them flat but swept back at an angle to the body, looking triangular from above.) During metamorphosis, the chrysalis of butterflies is usually attached to a plant or other object, and it is not enclosed in a cocoon. (Some species may use silk to fold a leaf together, then enter metamorphosis in the tentlike shelter.) (Moth pupae are often wrapped in a silk cocoon, frequently are positioned in leaf litter, and the cocoons often incorporate bits of leaves, twigs, etc.) When does it fly? Butterflies are usually active during daylight hours. Some species are most active at dusk and dawn. (Most moths are nocturnal, but there are exceptions.) Butterflies often have relatively thinner bodies than moths, though members of the skipper family of butterflies have thicker, mothlike bodies. The larvae (caterpillars) of butterflies are rarely considered destructive pests, although there are exceptions. (The larvae of several kinds of moths are agricultural and other pests.) Coloration varies greatly, but many butterflies are more colorful than average moths. (There are plenty of exceptions, however!) For in-depth identification, it can help to learn the names of a butterfly’s body parts, including the various regions of the wings (dorsal and ventral, as well as basal, median, postmedian, submarginal, marginal, costal, apical, subapical, and so on). Missouri’s Butterfly Families There have been different ways of grouping the butterflies into families. The overview of Missouri’s butterflies, below, follows one system currently in use. Skippers (family Hesperiidae) Small to medium butterflies, fairly drab colored or orangish, usually with relatively large eyes, short antennae with hooked tips, and chunky body. They are named for their skipping flight. Missouri’s skippers can be divided into two groups: spread-wing skippers and grass skippers. Spread-wing skippers typically rest with wings flat and spread to the side; this group includes the silver-spotted skipper; the cloudywing, duskywing, and sootywing species; and the common checkered-skipper — plus others. Grass skippers typically rest with hindwings held flat, parallel to the ground, and forewings positioned upright in a V shape — they look like tiny fighter jets. Missouri’s grass skippers include the Delaware, least, Peck’s, fiery, tawny-edged, and sachem skippers, and several more. Swallowtails (family Papilionidae) Medium to large butterflies, often showy and brightly colored, most with tails on the hindwings. Many are black with blue, yellow, and red markings, or are white or yellow with wide black stripes. Identification usually involves details of stripes and spots. Swallowtail larvae have a Y-shaped organ that protrudes from behind the head when the larva is disturbed. It emits a foul odor that can deter enemies. The chrysalis is suspended by a silken loop around the thorax and by a spot of silk at the tip of the abdomen. Whites, Sulphurs, and Yellows (family Pieridae) Small to medium butterflies that are mainly white, yellow, or orange, often with dark patterns such as a black border. They usually rest with wings closed, so only the underside of the wings is visible. Identification involves overall color plus lines, spots, and mottling on wings. Caterpillar host plants are usually in the mustard and cabbage family, although for sulphurs it’s usually the bean and pea family. Among the whites, Missouri species include the checkered white, cabbage white, Olympia white, and falcate orangetip. Among the sulphurs, Missouri has the clouded, cloudless, orange, and dainty sulphurs, the southern dogface, the sleepy orange, the little and Mexican yellows, and more. Blues, Coppers, Hairstreaks, and Harvesters (family Lycaenidae) Usually small butterflies, usually blue or gray, often with banded antennae. Identification usually involves spots or lines on the underside of wings, and presence or absence of tails. Larvae are sluglike (short and rather flattened). Many species gather in large numbers at puddles. Blues can be tiny with reflective blue on the upperside. Coppers are similar but with reflective copper color. Hairstreaks are usually gray or tan but have ornate (“hair”) streaks on the underside and have slender antenna-like tails on the hindwings. The one harvester species on our continent is a small orangish butterfly whose caterpillars prey on woolly aphids. Brush-Footed Butterflies (family Nymphalidae) Small, medium, and large butterflies; a large, colorful, and diverse group. In many species, the main upperside color is orange, brown, or black. In this family of butterflies, the first pair of legs are small, brushlike, and held against the body, so they perch and walk only with their back two pairs of legs, making them appear four-legged. Identifying species within this group usually involves noticing jagged or smooth wing margins, eyespots, dark patterning, and presence of white or silver spots on the underside. Many familiar butterflies are in this family: the monarch, fritillaries, checkerspots, crescents, anglewings (commas, question mark), leafwings, mourning cloak, buckeye, red admiral, ladies, red-spotted purple, viceroy, American snout, the emperors, and satyrs and wood-nymphs. In the past, the subfamilies of this large family have been treated as separate families. Metalmarks (family Riodinidae) Small butterflies, usually bright rusty-brown, with numerous small metallic spots on the wings. Their eyes are blue green. Larvae are covered with dense fuzzy hairs. Not well represented in Missouri; the northern metalmark and swamp metalmark both usually occur only in the Ozarks. Adults fly low to the ground and often rest on the undersides of leaves, wings spread flat. Where To Find Statewide. Different butterflies occur in different habitats, which usually correspond to the locations of their larval food plants. Habitat and Conservation Where do you find butterflies? Nearly anywhere, but here are some hints: Butterflies typically fly near their host plants — the specific types of plants a species must lay eggs on, because their caterpillars can only eat that certain type of plant. Cabbage butterflies, for instance, lay eggs on cabbage and other members of the mustard family. Look for males perching or patrolling near the host plants, awaiting females to fly near. Butterflies are often seen at nectaring or puddling sites: amid flowers, where they obtain nectar, or on mud, wet sand, or other damp ground where they obtain moisture and nutrients. Many butterflies visit rotting fruit, tree trunks where sap is oozing out, animal dung, or carrion for moisture and nutrients, too. Butterfly conservation involves the same issues as many other animals, chiefly centering around habitat disruption and loss. While many butterflies can live on a wide variety of plant hosts, others can only survive on very particular plant species, which occur in specific native habitats, such as high-quality tallgrass prairie. Another factor is the number of broods: some butterflies lay eggs all spring, summer, and fall, while other species never produce more than a single brood each year. Also, as with other insects, butterflies can be killed by indiscriminate use of pesticides. Another issue involves migratory butterflies, such as the monarch, whose survival depends on having appropriate food plants and nectar sources in all the places they must travel through. Food If you really get into butterflies and skippers, then you will end up learning basic plant identification. Different butterfly species have their own host plants, which the caterpillars must eat in order to survive. A famous example is the monarch, which lays eggs on milkweeds, and the caterpillars eat the milkweed leaves and flowers. Butterfly guidebooks usually include comments on caterpillar host plants. Many species have their larval food plants built into the name, such as the hackberry emperor and spicebush swallowtail. Some other host plant associations include: The larvae of various fritillary species eat violets. The Phaon crescent’s larvae eat northern fog fruit. The red admiral’s larvae eat various types of nettles. The host plants for satyrs, pearly-eyes, and wood-nymphs are usually different kinds of grasses. The zebra swallowtail’s larvae eat pawpaw leaves. As adults, many butterflies don’t live very long. Nearly all their growth occurs when they are caterpillars. The adults, therefore, generally only need moisture and nutrients to keep them going: nectar, rotting fruit, or tree sap, for sugar and energy; salts and other minerals from mud puddles, damp stream banks, animal dung, and carrion. Different species focus on different nutrition sources. Some butterflies do not visit flowers. Status Several Missouri butterflies and skippers are listed as Species of Conservation Concern, including the regal and Diana fritillaries, northern and swamp metalmarks, Appalachian eyed brown, Ozark woodland swallowtail, Linda’s roadside skipper, Duke’s skipper, and Ottoe skipper. Habitat loss, degradation, and fragmentation are the primary issues. Life Cycle Life Cycle Butterflies, like beetles, bees, and flies, undergo complete metamorphosis: after a series of wormlike juvenile (larval) stages, they enter an inactive phase called a pupa, then emerge as sexually mature, winged adults. (Other insects, such as grasshoppers and true bugs, have juvenile stages that look more or less like the adult form, only smaller and minus the wings — their life cycle is called incomplete metamorphosis.) Butterflies begin life as eggs that are typically laid on or near the host plant. The larvae (caterpillars) hatch from the eggs and begin eating and growing. As they grow, caterpillars repeatedly molt into larger exoskeletons (“skins”). Each stage is called an instar. Most butterfly caterpillars have four or five instars, and sometimes these can look different with each molt. The final juvenile stage is the pupa, which in butterflies is called a chrysalis. The chrysalis hangs from the tip by a silk pad, with hooks at the tip of the abdomen gripping the silk. Swallowtails, whites, and sulphurs also spin a silken sling that surrounds the chrysalis for additional support. Skippers often spin silk onto a leaf, causing it to fold over, then the pupa is attached inside this little shelter. The chrysalis of many butterfly species starts off green, then turns brown, especially if this is the stage in which they overwinter. Different butterfly species overwinter at different points in the life cycle: some overwinter as eggs, some at different points in the caterpillar development, and some as the chrysalis. A few overwinter in sheltered places as mature, winged adults. Human Connections People love butterflies. They’re beautiful, and they delight us in ways other insects do not. They figure into poetry, song, literature, art, philosophy, religion, and more. If you love butterflies, there are many ways to increase your enjoyment: Butterfly gardening: Plant native species that are eaten by butterfly caterpillars, and plant flowers that provide nectar for butterflies. Butterfly watching: it’s a real thing, and a lot like bird watching; plenty of information is online. Rearing caterpillars: you’ll need to set up your enclosure carefully and make sure the larvae have appropriate moisture and the correct food plants. You can find instructions online. Kids love this activity! Butterfly photography is challenging and rewarding. It becomes a sort of sport. Collecting butterflies: decades ago, this was more popular, but many people today are not so interested in capturing, killing, and pinning specimens, and recording the many detailed field notes that make the collections scientifically meaningful. Still, many serious amateurs do this. Butterfly organizations: there are several you can join, increasing your knowledge while having fun with friends. “Citizen science” opportunities: participate in groups like Monarch Watch, a tagging program that helps scientists better understand monarch populations and habitats. Another program, at Iowa State University, encourages people to report sightings of red admirals and painted ladies, which, like the monarch, are also migratory. Certain butterfly species that overwinter as adults may benefit from “butterfly houses,” which have narrow vertical openings where butterflies can take shelter. Finally, learn about conservation issues and play a role in helping Missouri’s native habitats and species. Ecosystem Connections Many butterflies play important roles as flower pollinators, but most of the feeding in a butterfly’s life is done in the caterpillar stage. Nearly all butterfly caterpillars are herbivores, eating leaves, stems, flowers, fruits, and other parts of plants. Butterflies play an important role early in the food chain, converting nutrients from plants into their own bodies, which then become food for other animals. Usually, only a small fraction of butterfly eggs survive to become adult butterflies. A wide variety of predators are ready to consume a butterfly during all stages of its life — egg, caterpillar, chrysalis, and adult. Butterfly predators include spiders, predaceous insects, fish, amphibians, reptiles, mammals, and birds. Butterflies are also eaten by parasitoids. Parasitoid insects are usually wasps or flies that lay their eggs on (or in) butterfly eggs or caterpillars; the parasitoid larvae hatch and eat the caterpillar from within. Elaborate camouflage, and deceptive eyespots, false antennae, and warning colors are ways that butterflies deter or deflect their predators. Several types of butterflies eat toxic plants as caterpillars and therefore become toxic themselves. These species typically have distinctive bright colors, which predators — sickened once or twice — learn to avoid. Monarchs, which eat milkweeds, are an example. Then, other species, which may not be toxic at all, can have colors that mimic the toxic species, and gain some protection from “educated” predators. Warning systems can develop in which a number of toxic, distasteful, or perfectly edible species develop the same warning coloration. For example, several swallowtails in Missouri mimic the black coloration of the acrid-tasting pipevine swallowtail. Title Media Gallery Image Caption Regal fritillaries take nectar from butterfly weed and other milkweeds in native tallgrass prairies. Butterflies, skippers, and moths belong to an insect order called the Lepidoptera — the "scale-winged" insects. These living jewels have tiny, overlapping scales that cover their wings like shingles. The scales, whether muted or colorful, seem dusty if they rub off on your fingers. Many butterflies and moths are associated with particular types of food plants, which their caterpillars must eat in order to survive.

In North America, the Lepidoptera — the insect order comprising all the moths and butterflies — contains more than 30 superfamilies. All of them are various types of moths, except for one: superfamily Papilionoidea, which comprises the butterflies and skippers. Like moths, they have tiny, overlapping scales on their wings. These seem like dust when they rub off onto your fingers. The scales can be brightly colored, or they can be drab. About 700 species of butterflies (including the skippers) occur in North America north of Mexico. Most of us have a general idea of what a butterfly looks like, but to be certain, note the following characteristics: Antennae, in butterflies, are filaments tipped with a club. In the skipper family of butterflies, the antennae tips are also hooked. (Meanwhile, moths’ antennae are filaments with no club tip, or else they are shaped like feathers.) The typical wing position, when perched, is either straight out to the sides (“wings open”), or the wings are held together, straight up over the body. (There are exceptions, but moths typically fold their wings over their body like a tent, or hold them flat but swept back at an angle to the body, looking triangular from above.) During metamorphosis, the chrysalis of butterflies is usually attached to a plant or other object, and it is not enclosed in a cocoon. (Some species may use silk to fold a leaf together, then enter metamorphosis in the tentlike shelter.) (Moth pupae are often wrapped in a silk cocoon, frequently are positioned in leaf litter, and the cocoons often incorporate bits of leaves, twigs, etc.) When does it fly? Butterflies are usually active during daylight hours. Some species are most active at dusk and dawn. (Most moths are nocturnal, but there are exceptions.) Butterflies often have relatively thinner bodies than moths, though members of the skipper family of butterflies have thicker, mothlike bodies.

no

Lepidopterology

Are butterflies actually a type of moth?

no_statement

"butterflies" are not a "type" of "moth".. moths and "butterflies" are different species.

https://kids.mongabay.com/are-butterflies-a-type-of-moth/

Are butterflies a type of moth? – Mongabay Kids

Have you ever wondered about the differences between butterflies and moths? We have! Butterfly: Moth: Are butterflies a type of moth? Yes! The answer is that all butterflies are specialized moths. Every species of moth and butterfly is a member of the insect group Lepidoptera – another way to say that is that all moths and butterflies are lepidopterans. Scientists have created an evolutionary treeof the Lepidoptera showing how all of the species are related to each other. An evolutionary tree is also called a phylogenetic tree or a phylogeny. The Lepidoptera phylogeny shows that butterflies form one unified group within all of the species of moths. This means that butterflies are really moths too. So how can you tell a butterfly apart from other types of moths? There are several things that distinguish the butterflies from the other moth groups. Here are a few: 1. Time of activity A main difference between butterflies and other moths is the time of day when they are active. An active butterfly could be flying, eating, or otherwise keeping busy. Butterflies are usually diurnal (active during the day) and the other moth groups are usually nocturnal (active at night). There are exceptions to this general rule. 2. Antennae Butterflies’ antennae are shaped like clubs (clubbed). Butterfly antennae have a long narrow shaft with a wider bulb at the end. The antennae of moths are not clubbed. Moth antennae are feathery-shaped or saw-edged and they taper (become narrower) at the end. 3. Wing position Butterflies hold their wings together (vertically above their bodies) when resting. Moths hold their wings horizontally (at their sides) when resting. 4. Pupa All lepidopterans go through 4 stages in their life cycle: egg, larva (caterpillar), pupa, adult. A butterfly pupa is called a chrysalis. A chrysalis is hardened shell that protects the butterfly as it transforms into an adult. Moths pupate too. A cocoon is a silk casing that a moth spins around itself before it pupates. The pupa pupa forms inside the cocoon. Not all species of moths make cocoons, though. This video is a good summary of what you’ve just learned: Credit: Peggy Notebaert Nature Museum Wow! Did you know? There are approximately 180,000 species of Lepidoptera known to science. Approximately 10% of those species are butterflies. The rest are other kinds of moths. Lepidopterans are one of the largest groups of animals on Earth! People discover new species of lepidopterans every year. Because many moths are active at night, lepidopterists (scientists who study lepidopterans) have to stay up late and use special ways of observing these amazing animals! Become a moth-er! If you’d like to help discover new moth species, you can join a mothing event! Mothing is a fun activity that involves spotting and identifying as many moths as you can. Visit nationalmothweek.org for more information about events in your area. We also recommend the Seek app by iNaturalist. This fun and interactive app is a great way to learn to identify butterflies and other lepidopterans in your neighborhood. Explore nature with a parent, friend or classmate!

Have you ever wondered about the differences between butterflies and moths? We have! Butterfly: Moth: Are butterflies a type of moth? Yes! The answer is that all butterflies are specialized moths. Every species of moth and butterfly is a member of the insect group Lepidoptera – another way to say that is that all moths and butterflies are lepidopterans. Scientists have created an evolutionary treeof the Lepidoptera showing how all of the species are related to each other. An evolutionary tree is also called a phylogenetic tree or a phylogeny. The Lepidoptera phylogeny shows that butterflies form one unified group within all of the species of moths. This means that butterflies are really moths too. So how can you tell a butterfly apart from other types of moths? There are several things that distinguish the butterflies from the other moth groups. Here are a few: 1. Time of activity A main difference between butterflies and other moths is the time of day when they are active. An active butterfly could be flying, eating, or otherwise keeping busy. Butterflies are usually diurnal (active during the day) and the other moth groups are usually nocturnal (active at night). There are exceptions to this general rule. 2. Antennae Butterflies’ antennae are shaped like clubs (clubbed). Butterfly antennae have a long narrow shaft with a wider bulb at the end. The antennae of moths are not clubbed. Moth antennae are feathery-shaped or saw-edged and they taper (become narrower) at the end. 3. Wing position Butterflies hold their wings together (vertically above their bodies) when resting. Moths hold their wings horizontally (at their sides) when resting. 4. Pupa All lepidopterans go through 4 stages in their life cycle: egg, larva (caterpillar), pupa, adult. A butterfly pupa is called a chrysalis.

yes

Lepidopterology

Are butterflies actually a type of moth?

no_statement

"butterflies" are not a "type" of "moth".. moths and "butterflies" are different species.

http://naturalhistory.si.edu/education/teaching-resources/life-science/butterflies-and-beyond

Butterflies and Beyond | Smithsonian National Museum of Natural ...

Search Butterflies and Beyond Breadcrumb A Sara Longwing (Heliconius sara) butterfly, seen in the Butterfly Pavilion at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History. Heliconius butterflies stand out for their fluttery flight. They feed not only on flower nectar, but also on pollen. Ranging from South to North America, Heliconius butterflies have been studied by entomologists for centuries because they are abundant and diverse. Photo 2009-12276-s by Adrian James Testa, Smithsonian. Beyond their Beauty From the beauty of brilliant colors and intricate patterns to the phenomenal migrations of monarchs, butterflies are the subject of wonder and admiration. But that’s not all. The Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of Natural History houses a remarkable collection of about 35 million insect specimens including 3 million Lepidoptera (butterflies and moths) that are used for education and research. Scientists, educators, animal keepers, and volunteers collaborate to share knowledge and show the importance of these and other insects. The live Butterfly Pavilion in the Butterflies + Plants: Partners in Evolution exhibition is a place where visitors can have interactive experiences with tropical butterflies and develop a better understanding of the roles butterflies play in the natural world. Short Lifespans The topic of lifespan comes up more than any other in the Butterfly Pavilion. All butterflies and moths have a larval stage and then undergo metamorphosis, emerging from pupa after transforming into adults. Their adult forms are radically different from the larvae. With a short adult lifespan (just 3-4 weeks), they are specialized for feeding and reproducing in a hurry. Butterflies mate and the females oviposit (lay eggs), which passes on their genes to the next generation. This process has been at work for the last 48 million years for butterflies and 170 million years for moths. Even Shorter Lifespans Some species of moths called giant silk moths (Saturniidae family), such as the luna moth (Actias luna), atlas moth (Attacus atlas), and African moon moth (Argema mimosae), live only 4 or 5 days as adults. They don’t have any working mouthparts and cannot eat. Reproduction is their main focus- to successfully produce offspring. However, giant silk moths have a long caterpillar (larval) stage. For example, the atlas moth can live up to 12 weeks as a caterpillar and grow to 3.5 inches long, whereas most butterfly caterpillars average only 10 days and 2 inches before pupating. Regardless, larvae consume a lot of species-specific plant leaves during this stage. Atlas moths prefer the leaves of citrus trees and other evergreen, including cinnamon. Moth vs. Butterfly Moths and butterflies are in the order Lepidoptera, deriving from the Greek words for “scale” and “wing.” The approximately 135,000 moth species and almost 20,000 butterfly species worldwide all have tiny scales on their wings. Butterflies evolved from moths, so it may be easier to think of butterflies as specialized day-flying moths. Moths typically have feathery antennae that taper from a wider base to a pointed end, whereas butterflies have wiry antennae with a knob-like or truncated end. Since moths are primarily nocturnal insects, these feathered chemical receptors help them navigate and find mates at night. Butterflies Can’t do it Alone Moths and butterflies rely on plants throughout their lives. Butterflies lay their eggs on specific host plants, such as milkweed for the monarch. When the caterpillars hatch, they thrive on the host plant's leaves, growing and growing until the caterpillar forms its cocoon or chrysalis, which is often attached to the plant. When the new butterfly emerges as an adult, it travels from plant to plant to feed on flower nectar. As they collect nectar, their bodies trap pollen, which is passed on to other flowers they visit. The butterflies get the nectar they need, and the plants are pollinated, an excellent partnership. The coevolution of butterflies and plants in a feeding-pollination relationship has been going on for millions of years. Butterflies in Agriculture At the Natural History Museum, butterflies are the subject of research on pollination and biological control that is critical to agriculture. Entomologists affiliated with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, such as Dr. M. Alma Solis, conduct research to understand how populations of Lepidoptera are associated with agricultural fields. Experience their work by following a butterfly in a farm field or garden to see how many plants it visits and record its activity. Butterfly Collections The collections in the Department of Entomology at Smithsonian are used for research, such as on evolutionary relationships and ecology. A current focus is documenting the Lepidoptera of South America, “the richest and most poorly known fauna in the world.” For example, Dr. Don Harvey uses the museum collections to sort out the relationships of species from Central and South America. In the last decade, he has found three new species from Panama and Columbia and five new species from Ecuador. Advances in techniques to analyze DNA have allowed Smithsonian entomologists to deepen their study of Lepidoptera. While wing shape and other visible characteristics of butterflies may be indicators of their relatedness, DNA evidence can be used to examine ancestry. Dr. Don Davis is a collaborator on the Lepidoptera Project, part of Assembling the Tree of Life (ATOL). Using DNA sequencing, the project aims to construct a tree of evolutionary relationships (a phylogeny) for the Lepidoptera. Combined with examination of fossils, Don’s work will contribute to help understand when different lineages of Lepidoptera emerged in evolutionary time. Butterfly Conservation The more aware we are of butterflies and moths and their habitats and needs, the better chance they have for survival. Data collected on butterfly populations helps define their conservation status and necessary conservation actions. For example, Smithsonian’s Dr. Scott Miller conducts research on tropical biodiversity. He considers how populations of butterflies and other tropical species respond to impacts such deforestation, invasive species, and climate change. These impacts, coupled with others such pesticide use, are affecting populations of butterflies. The number of monarchs making their annual, phenomenal migrations has declined over the past decade. How You Can Help Scientists and educators at the Museum hope that visitors take not only an interest in these fascinating and beautiful creatures, but also an active role in their conservation. Grow your own butterfly garden by planting host and nectar plants in your backyard or schoolyard (milkweed, spicebush, sweet gum, depending on your climate zone). Identify trees around your area (use field guides or the Leafsnap app) to determine whether they may be hosts to giant silk moths. Consider joining monarch tagging projects or joining entomological and conservation societies and organizations. Enjoy getting more involved in your Lepidoptera community!

00 butterfly species worldwide all have tiny scales on their wings. Butterflies evolved from moths, so it may be easier to think of butterflies as specialized day-flying moths. Moths typically have feathery antennae that taper from a wider base to a pointed end, whereas butterflies have wiry antennae with a knob-like or truncated end. Since moths are primarily nocturnal insects, these feathered chemical receptors help them navigate and find mates at night. Butterflies Can’t do it Alone Moths and butterflies rely on plants throughout their lives. Butterflies lay their eggs on specific host plants, such as milkweed for the monarch. When the caterpillars hatch, they thrive on the host plant's leaves, growing and growing until the caterpillar forms its cocoon or chrysalis, which is often attached to the plant. When the new butterfly emerges as an adult, it travels from plant to plant to feed on flower nectar. As they collect nectar, their bodies trap pollen, which is passed on to other flowers they visit. The butterflies get the nectar they need, and the plants are pollinated, an excellent partnership. The coevolution of butterflies and plants in a feeding-pollination relationship has been going on for millions of years. Butterflies in Agriculture At the Natural History Museum, butterflies are the subject of research on pollination and biological control that is critical to agriculture. Entomologists affiliated with the U.S. Department of Agriculture, such as Dr. M. Alma Solis, conduct research to understand how populations of Lepidoptera are associated with agricultural fields. Experience their work by following a butterfly in a farm field or garden to see how many plants it visits and record its activity. Butterfly Collections The collections in the Department of Entomology at Smithsonian are used for research, such as on evolutionary relationships and ecology. A current focus is documenting the Lepidoptera of South America, “the richest and most poorly known fauna in the world.”

yes

Lepidopterology

Are butterflies actually a type of moth?

no_statement

"butterflies" are not a "type" of "moth".. moths and "butterflies" are different species.

https://meadowia.com/difference-moth-and-butterfly/

Difference Between a Moth and a Butterfly - Explained

Difference Between a Moth and a Butterfly – Explained Moths and butterflies are both Lepidoptera and therefore have many similar features. It is hard to find clear defining features that separate them, but moths tend to have feather-like antennae, while butterflies have club-shaped antennae. Contents Are moths a type of butterfly? As humans, we like to be able to divide up and categorise the world. This helps us to understand the very complex environment that surrounds up, and make decisions based on what we’ve discovered. However, when it comes to nature, things aren’t always as clear-cut as we would like to make them. While we like to say that all birds can fly and all fish can’t, there are many birds that don’t, and some fish that give it a good go. The differentiation between moths and butterflies is similar to this. Both moths and butterflies are Lepidoptera, meaning they share many similar characteristics, such as their scale-covered wings, chemical detecting antennae and a lifecycle that involves going through a full metamorphosis. While we wouldn’t say that moths are a type of butterfly, there are a great deal more of them than there are butterflies, with over 160,000 moth species globally, and only around 18,000 butterflies. If anything, we would have to say butterflies are a type of moth. Differences between moths and butterflies There are a number of rules of thumb you can use to help you divide moths and butterflies, however, few of them are completely reliable when it comes to consistently dividing up the two groups, as there are often exceptions to the rule. Characteristic Moths Butterflies Antennae Typically feathery or filamentous Generally clubbed or knobbed Body Shape Thick and plump Slender and streamlined Wing Position Rest with wings open, flat, or folded Rest with wings closed, held upright Wing Patterns Dull and cryptic colors Bright and vibrant patterns and colors Flight Behavior Typically fly at night Primarily active during the day Resting Habits Rest on vertical surfaces Rest on horizontal surfaces Table 1: Physical Differences Stage Moths Butterflies Pupae Appearance Usually enclosed in a silk cocoon Encased in a chrysalis Pupation Duration Generally longer pupal stage Usually shorter pupal stage Larval Habitats Wide range of habitats and food plants Specific host plants for each species Adult Lifespan Typically shorter lifespan Generally longer lifespan Mating Behavior Males usually locate females by scent Males actively pursue females in flight Reproductive Rate Often higher reproductive capacity Typically lower reproductive capacity Table 2: Life Cycle Differences Aspect Moths Butterflies Species Diversity Greater number of moth species Fewer species of butterflies Habitat Range Found in a wide range of habitats Tend to prefer specific ecosystems Pollination Role Primarily nocturnal pollinators Diurnal pollinators Food Preferences Some feed on nectar and pollen Generally feed on nectar Economic Impact Some species considered pests Often celebrated for their beauty Cultural Symbolism Less commonly associated with symbolism Symbolic significance in many cultures Table 3: Ecological Differences Active times There is a common misconception that all moths fly at night and all butterflies fly in the daytime. While the vast majority of moths do fly at night, there are also a large number of species that fly in the day or are crepuscular, meaning they fly at dawn and dusk. In the UK, for example, there are more day-flying moth species than there are butterfly species. The cinnabar moth, for example, is often mistaken for a butterfly as not only does it fly during the day, but it is brightly coloured with brilliant scarlet reds complimenting its general black colouring. However, while there are many moths that do fly during the day, there are few butterflies that fly at night. The owl butterfly is one exception. While it does not fly in the middle of the night, it is most active at dusk, resting during the day. Its large eyespots give it its name, and make it appear like the face of an owl if disturbed. Antennae One of the most reliable ways to tell moth and butterfly species apart is their antenna. Antennae are appendages that sit on the heads of insect species. They are highly important sensory organs, able to detect a wide range of chemicals, as well as helping the insect to touch objects, communicate through moving their antennae, and even sense other climatic conditions such as temperature and humidity. Butterflies and moths use their antennae to pick up chemicals, which can tell them where food can be found, where mates are located and even if predators are nearby. Antennae size and shape vary a great deal between different species, however, in general moths possess plumose antennae, meaning their form is feathery. Larger, more plumose antennae tend to be found more within the males, with females usually having smaller and simpler versions. Butterflies by comparison tend to have club-shaped antennae, meaning they are long and thin with a small bobble on the end. The reason for this marked difference may be that most moth species are active at night, and so can rely less on their sight to locate what they need, and therefore may need their sense of smell/taste more. There are some exceptions to the rule, however, such as the six-spot Burnet moth, which has club-shaped antennae. This may be because it is a day-flying moth. Body shape This is another tricky one, as again it isn’t always reliable. In general, moths have bigger, chunkier bodies covered in larger amounts of hair. Without their wings, they would look more like a fluffy little mammal than an insect. Butterflies are also usually covered in hair, but generally not as much as their moth cousins. These bodies also tend to be more slender and delicate. It may be that as moths are active at night, they need larger bodies to retain heat and keep active. Resting wing shape Resting wing shape is also an interesting one. Usually, butterflies like to rest with their wings pressed together, pointing upwards above their bodies. Moths on the other hand have their wings open, horizontal to their bodies. However, to confuse matters, butterflies can often be seen basking. Basking is a method these heat dependent insects use to warm up in the sun so they can heat up their flight muscles. And again, not all species comply to the rules even when resting. Skipper butterflies look rather like little paper aeroplanes when at rest, something halfway between what we would expect of a butterfly and a moth. Some moth species also play by their own rules, like the geometrid moth species, such as the yellow thorn moth. These again hold their wings out more at 45 degrees. Cocoons Both moths and butterflies go through complete metamorphosis. This means that they change completely from their larval forms into their adult ones. In order to complete their metamorphosis, they change into a pupa or chrysalis. While we tend to think of the chrysalis as something the butterfly or moth enters into, it is actually the exoskeleton of the insect, not a separate casing. The majority of species use silk in their metamorphosis in some way. This may be to attach themselves to a branch, or to the underside of a leaf, but this is usually just in the form of a few strands. We only tend to apply the word ‘cocoon’ when the silk is spun into an almost complete structure around the pupa. A cocoon can help to hide the pupa, or keep it warm, or even shelter it from damage. The most famous cocoon spinner is the silk moth caterpillar, whose cocoon has been harvested for thousands of years to weave silk. While not all moth species spin cocoons, the vast majority do, while butterflies do not. Frenulum To get even more technical, moths have something called a frenulum, which butterflies lack. Both butterflies and moths have four wings, however, moths have essentially altered their anatomy so they effectively only have two wings. This is because the frenulum, or wing coupling, joins the front and back wings together, so they must move as one. This changes the way in which they fly and may make flying more energy efficient while sacrificing some of their manoeuvrability. This may be less of a sacrifice to the many moth species that fly at night, whereas day-flying butterflies may need to worry more about escaping from the many predators who can easily spot them fluttering about. Moth and butterflies: A force for good When you get down to it, there isn’t a great deal of difference between moths and butterflies. In fact, the biggest difference probably exists in our minds. Culturally, we are much more in favour of butterflies than moths. We praise butterflies for their beauty and grace, while we are far more likely to think of moths as frightening and peculiar. Yet both are important pollinators, and species we should want to see more of. Even when it comes to beauty, there are many stunning looking moths, such as the pink and green elephant hawkmoth, or the delicate green luna moth. There may even be many moths that we praise as butterflies, due to their day-flying habits. This moth snobbery is an unfortunate repercussion of our wish to divide up the natural world, and often even label some elements as good and others as bad. Perhaps one day we will be able to measure moths and butterflies more equally and realise they aren’t so different after all About Katie Piercy Katie Piercy, a conservation industry veteran with a diverse career, has worked in various environments and with different animals for over a decade. In the UK, she reared and released corncrake chicks, chased hen harriers, and restored peatland. She has also gained international experience, counting macaws in Peru, surveying freshwater springs in Germany, and raising kiwi chicks in New Zealand. Meadows have always captivated her, and she has often provided advice and assistance in managing these habitats. From surveying snake's head fritillary in Wiltshire to monitoring butterfly species in Norfolk, Katie's dedication extends even to her own front garden, where she has created a mini meadow to support wild bees and other pollinators.

While we wouldn’t say that moths are a type of butterfly, there are a great deal more of them than there are butterflies, with over 160,000 moth species globally, and only around 18,000 butterflies. If anything, we would have to say butterflies are a type of moth. Differences between moths and butterflies There are a number of rules of thumb you can use to help you divide moths and butterflies, however, few of them are completely reliable when it comes to consistently dividing up the two groups, as there are often exceptions to the rule.

yes

Horticulture

Are coffee grounds effective as a slug and snail deterrent?

yes_statement

"coffee" "grounds" are "effective" as a "slug" and "snail" "deterrent".. using "coffee" "grounds" can "effectively" deter "slugs" and "snails".

https://homesteadandchill.com/organic-slug-snail-control/

Organic Slug & Snail Control: 10 Ways to Stop Snails or Slugs ...

Organic Slug & Snail Control: 10 Ways to Stop Snails or Slugs They’re sneaky and they’re slimy, they make your plants look grimy, you want them to die timely… the slug ‘n snail family! Can you tell that Halloween is right around the corner? Well, just like ghosts and goblins, snails and slugs do their best work at night – and can cause gardeners quite the fright! If you see shiny mucus trails, decapitated seedlings, and munch holes in leaves, it sounds like you have a scary snail problem. Yet the good news is, it’s fairly easy to stop snails and slugs in an organic manner. No need to get supernatural! Read along to learn 10 ways to organically control snails and slugs in your garden. While it may not be possible to eliminate their presence entirely, there are plenty of preventative measures, traps, barriers, and organic products that can help to manage their populations enough to keep your plants looking fresh and slime-free. Spoiler alert: a couple of common snail control myths will also be exposed! Don’t worry – despite my silly opening, these snail control tips will work any time of year. About Snails and Slugs Slugs and snails are common and frustrating garden pests. They are especially prevalent in climates with ample moisture or humidity, and exhibit peak activity during the wet seasons of the year. Yet even in the driest months, a well-irrigated garden provides snails and slugs prime habitat! During the daytime, snails and slugs take cover in dense shrubs, leaf piles, under logs, or other damp and dark locations. They can also survive freezing conditions if they hide well enough. At night, they emerge and feed! Snails and slugs are part of the Mollusk family of animals – alongside clams, octopus, scallops, oysters, squid, and chitons. The primary difference between slugs and snails is the hard exterior shell that snails don for protection. Slugs and snails are further classified as ‘gastropods’, which literally means stomach and foot. That description couldn’t be more fitting, seeing that these garden pests slide along on a muscular foot while munching on everything in their path! In addition to being ferocious eaters, snails and slugs rapidly reproduce. If their populations are left unchecked, they can cause serious destruction to your garden. Disclosure: This post may contain affiliate links to products for your convenience, such as to items on Amazon. Homestead and Chill gains a small commission from purchases made through those links, at no additional cost to you. Plants Snails and Slugs Are Attracted To Snails and slugs aren’t picky eaters. They feed on both fresh and decaying matter, and will go after pretty much any tender herbaceous plant in the garden they can find. However, lettuce, cabbage, young seedlings, strawberries, beans, zucchini, cucumber, pepper plants, basil, and other leafy greens seem to be snail favorites. Many flowers and ornamental plants are also highly attractive to snails and slugs, including marigolds, larkspur, dahlia, hostas, zinnia, sunflowers, succulents, and more. Soft new sprouts or leaves that are in contact with the soil or mulch layer are especially easy targets, though snails and slugs slither up into taller plants to graze on tender new growth as well. What don’t they like? In general, snails and slugs avoid tough, prickly, bitter, and/or highly aromatic plants such as rosemary, catmint, and lavender. Apparently, they’re also not big fans of ferns, geraniums, columbine, hydrangeas, euphorbia, yucca, wormwood, begonias, or Japanese anemone. If you struggle with slug and snail control in your ornamental garden, choosing less desirable plants could be an easy solution! How Snails and Slugs Damage Plants The first telltale sign that you have snails in your garden is the silvery, slimy trail of mucus they leave behind. As they feed on plants, snails and slugs chew large holes in leaves. The holes are typically irregular in shape, and may appear in the middle of leaves or around the edges. In large established plants, snail damage to the outer leaves is unsightly – but the plant can usually bounce back. However, if snails and slugs eat the centermost part of the plant where new growth is formed (also known as the terminal bud), it could halt plant growth completely. Young tender sprouts and seedlings are especially at risk, and may be consumed in their entirety in one night! In high enough numbers, snails and slugs can take out a whole bed of just-sprouted or freshly-planted seedlings. Unfortunately, that is the kind of damage you can’t bounce back from… That is why it is especially important to keep the snail or slug population under control in your garden, and to have tools and techniques to manage them ready and waiting come planting time! A cabbage plant with notable slug or snail damage. Yikes. 10 WAYS TO STOP OR GET RID OF SNAILS AND SLUGS 1) Reduce Slug and Snail Habitat We used to have tons of snails in our garden! They lived in a large swath of ice plant that lined the side of our driveway and bordered our front yard, just about 10 feet away from our raised garden beds. Every night, they’d venture out from the ice plant towards our garden in droves. We eventually removed the ice plant to expand the front yard (it was invasive and messy anyways!) and our snail problem went away. Now, this option clearly won’t be feasible for every situation. But if there are thick bushes or other snail hotspots right next to your garden space, consider taking measures to thin them out. Remember, snails love to hide in damp, dark places during the day. Your choice in mulch can even make a difference. For example, a deep fluffy bed of straw or leaves are more snail-friendly than a layer of compost or fine bark mulch. Eliminating those types of micro-environments in close proximity to your tender edibles may help get rid of snails and slugs. 2) Create a Distraction An alternative to reducing habitat is to create a designated ‘sacrificial bed’ for slugs and snails. Plant some of their favorite things all together in one area (listed above), away from the plants you hope to protect. What you do thereafter is up to you. You could let them run wild in ‘their’ new area, but keep in mind they will only increase in number. Or, the sacrificial space could be used as a trap – and then you can employ the other slug and snail control methods listed below in a concentrated area. 3) Use Drip Irrigation Reduce overhead watering and sprinkler watering, and switch to drip irrigation where possible. The less water available or pooled on the surface of plants and soil, the better! Drip irrigation delivers water directly to the soil level, or even under a layer of mulch. Even better, try to use drip irrigation to water closer to sunrise – rather than in the evening when snails and slugs are most active. Like number one above, this tip reduces desirable habitat for slugs and snails. Not to mention, drip irrigation is more efficient and sustainable than overhead watering anyway! Clearly, this organic snail control method won’t make as much of an impact in areas that receive regular rain year round. But in climates with extended dry periods like ours, it can make a big difference! Come to think of it, right around the time we removed the ice plant from our driveway area, we also removed the very last of our front lawn and converted the traditional sprinklers to drip. No more snails! When we removed our lawn, we retrofitted all the traditional overhead sprinkler heads with pressure-reduced drip manifolds. Each of the 9 little brown tubes distributes water (below the bark mulch) via drip emitters to the surrounding planting area. 4) Manual Collection at Night Manual collection or hand-picking is a very simple, effective, and organic way to get rid of snails or slugs. On a damp evening or after watering, head outside with a flashlight or headlamp an hour or two after dark. Take a look around the plants or areas you usually see evidence of snail damage. Chances are, you should be able to find many – dozens even! Collect the snails or slugs and put them in a bucket or trash bag. Then, you can either relocate them elsewhere or dispose of them. It’s up to you. One way to kill snails and slugs during manual collection is to drop them into a bucket of hot soapy water. Or, a container with salt – which will also kill them. With plain cool water, they will simply crawl back out. Play it safe and wear gloves to collect snails and slugs. Some species carry parasites and pathogens that are harmful to humans. We used to keep collected snails in a bucket with a lid overnight and then feed them to our chickens the next day. I have since learned that snails, slugs, grubs and earthworms can carry roundworm and gapeworm parasites that are harmful to chickens. Our girls eat plenty of insects and worms as they naturally forage in our backyard, but I no longer collect those things to feed them in large numbers. Back when we had a snail problem in our garden. We knew something was eating these mustard greens, and thought maybe there was a snail or two around… Imagine our shock (and delight, to be able to collect them!) when we ventured out with a flashlight and found dozens of them feasting on our garden one damp night. 5) Beer Traps Did you know that snails and slugs love beer? Actually, it is the yeast they’re attracted to – and can smell it from a good distance away! The best news is, they’re cheap drunks and prefer basic inexpensive beer over the quality craft beers we prefer to drink here. Something like Budweiser or Coors should work great. Truth be told, setting up beer traps may be one of the easiest ways to get rid of snails in large numbers all at once! To create a slug and snail beer trap, simply fill a wide shallow container with an inch or two of beer and set it out in a high snail traffic area. You could use saved tuna or cat food cans, though if you’re trying to control a large snail or slug population, a bigger container may be best. For instance, a pie tin, old sandwich-size tupperware container, or similar. Specialized snail trap containers are also available to buy and fill! Some gardeners say to bury the container slightly, so that the rim is level with the soil. Others say simply set it out on top of the soil (near your plants) and let them crawl in. Try both and see what works in your garden! For the best results, put out a few traps in different locations. Once the slugs and snails enter, they should be trapped and drown in the beer. Empty and refill the snail beer traps every day or two as needed. Creating a small beer trap, which we were using to catch pill bugs at the time. You may want to use a larger container for snails and slugs. A specialized reusable snail trap, filled with beer and then buried slightly. They can crawl right in, but the little roof helps prevent them from escaping back out. I have heard from fellow gardening friends these work very well! (Available on Amazon). 6) Cloches & Collars You can use different types of physical barriers to prevent snails and slugs from accessing your plants, including cloches and collars. Cloches are small domes that go over individual plants, which can block garden pests as well as protect them from frost. These are ideal to guard small seedlings against slugs and snails, especially since the pests cannot crawl up and over them. You can purchase pre-made cloches, or make DIY cloches from used plastic 2-liter bottles or milk jugs. Keep in mind that plastic cloches can create extra heat and condensation inside (like a mini greenhouse) so avoid using them on hot days. Like cloches, collars can buffer access to individual plants from pests cruising along the soil surface. Collars can be made from plastic bottles (cut into rings), by cutting out the bottom of used yogurt or cottage cheese containers, or any other material you can fashion into a raised circle around the base of the plant. Snails and slugs typically choose the path of least resistance and therefore can be deterred when they come across a collar. But because collars are open on top, there is a chance they may simply crawl right up and over. Collars that have a bigger lip or rim create an additional obstacle, and are usually more effective. You can also line the rim of a collar with vaseline or copper tape for further snail control and protection, explained more below! A DIY cardboard collar. When dug a couple inches into the soil, collars can also effectively protect against cutworms and many other soil-dwelling pests (though determined snails may crawl over them). Image courtesy of the University of Florida. 7) Copper Tape Slugs and snails do not like to crawl across copper. When they do, it creates a biochemical reaction that feels unpleasant for them (like an electrical shock), so they’re usually deterred and turn around. Therefore, wrapping copper tape around the base of plants, the edges of pots, raised beds, and protective collars, or even around the trunk of a tree may prevent slug and snail access. Thin strips of copper won’t be effective since they can quickly scoot and stretch across it. Wide strips of copper (like this one!) are the most effective for slug and snail control. 8) Diatomaceous Earth Diatomaceous earth, also known as DE, is made from ancient fossilized phytoplankton – called diatoms. To humans and pets, it feels like a soft silky powder (though is hazardous when inhaled) and is commonly used in food, cosmetics, and filtration systems. Yet when it comes in contact with small garden pests, the tiny diatoms act like miniature shards of glass and cause lacerations. Those little cuts eventually lead to death by desiccation – or becoming dried out. DE doesn’t work against all garden pests though. It is most effective at killing small insects with an exoskeleton – such as earwigs, mites, ants, millipedes, cockroaches, crickets, centipedes, and pill bugs. Truth be told, I have read conflicting things about how effective DE is at killing slugs or snails. Their thick mucus covering likely provides a decent layer of protection; DE doesn’t kill earthworms for this same reason. But experiments show that they definitely prefer to not crawl over it, and will avoid it when encountered! Accordingly, dusting a wide ring of food-grade DEon the soil surface around plants or the perimeter of a garden bed may effectively deter slugs and snails. DE works best when it is dry, as it is rendered temporarily ineffective when wet. A sprinkle of DE around one of our garden beds. At the time, we were using it to control a robust pillbug population that was nibbling on our greens and emerging seedlings. Yet DE may effectively stop slugs and snails in their tracks too! 9) Encourage Natural Predators Snails and slugs have many natural predators, including chickens, ducks, geese, mice, opossums, raccoons, toads, hedgehogs, ground beetles, snakes, turtles, and birds. Encouraging a diversity of native wildlife in your yard can often help keep pest populations naturally in balance, from pest insects to snails! Heck, if you have a known opossum presence, you could even try setting out some snails you’ve collected for them to dine on. Opossums also eat rodents, so they’re good friends to have around the garden. To learn more about creating a wildlife-friendly yard, check out this article all about it: “How to Turn Your Yard into a Certified Wildlife Habitat” 10) Sluggo ‘Sluggo‘ is a man-made product used to kill snails and slugs. It is OMRI-listed, meaning it is considered safe and acceptable to use in edible organic gardens. Sluggo’s primary active ingredient is iron-phosphate, which is reportedly safe to use around kids, pets and wildlife. According to the National Pesticide Information Center, studies show that beetles and earthworms are not negatively affected by iron phosphate, even in concentrations twice the allowable limits. Bee exposure is unlikely due to the way it is applied. Organic or not, I suggest trying the other slug and snail control methods on this list before reaching for something synthetic. If you do opt to use Sluggo, simply sprinkle the small white pellets around problem areas – focusing on concentrated hiding places, such as under shrubs, or the areas they must cross to get to your garden. Slugs and snails are drawn to it, consume it, and then lose their appetite and stop eating altogether. It is best to apply Sluggo when the weather forecast is free of rain for a few days, as it begins to degrade once it becomes saturated. As the pellets break down, the iron doubles as a fertilizer for your garden. Myth: Crushed eggshells or coffee grounds for snail control You may have heard that sprinkling crushed eggshells or coffee grounds in a ring around the base of plants (or the perimeter of a garden bed) will prevent snails and slugs from crossing over to your plants. The theory is that they don’t like to crawl over sharp, pokey things. After hearing mixed reviews on how well this works, I decided to dig deeper. I found this experiment that showed snails and slugs don’t mind coffee grounds much at all, and also this myth-buster post about snails and eggshells. In fact, calcium is an essential part of a snails diet (to maintain their hard shell) so they may actually be attracted to the calcium-based eggshells! So, it looks like coffee grounds or crushed eggshells will likely NOT adequately protect your plants from hungry, determined snails. Or, have you had success with this organic snail control trick? Let us know in the comments below! Happy snail hunting and collecting! And that sums up 10 organic slug and snail control methods to try. Well, what do you think? Did you pick up on a few new tips? I hope so! Are there any slug and snail control techniques that work for you, that I failed to mention? Let us know, or feel free to ask questions in the comments below. With a little careful thought and diligence, I have faith you can protect your plants from these hungry garden pests. As always, remember that an organic garden is never a “perfect” one – and that is more than okay! Thank you for reading, and best of luck. 10 Comments Cori I use galvinized tanks for my garden because slugs will not go up them. But then you can never buy starters from anyone else. I unfortunately did and they had slug eggs in them so I had to do the night collection! Ugh! Here in the NW the slugs are many. The beer traps never worked and copper strips have to be super wide or they would travel across. DE only works if it doesn’t rain, hello I’m in the NW haha. Galvenized tanks or legs on a raised bed was the answer for me! Aaron (Mr. DeannaCat) Joni Great snail article! Will try anything as we have a lot of snails here in Los Osos. One thing I’ve used with success is wool pellets. Little pellets made of wool that you spread around the perimeter. As you water the pellets felt and become a mat of sorts that slugs & snails don’t want to cross. It’s kind of expensive but it works! Tracee I actually HAVE had luck with eggshells as a slug deterrent. I have slug issues in 3 of my raised beds, and I sprinkle a circle of crushed eggshells a couple inches away from the base of the plant. I keep the shells fairly large – crushing them small doesn’t seem to be as effective. re: Snail and Slug Control – I accidentally found this method which I find most helpful. Put a piece of clean wood, unpainted and not treated, (a 2×4 works well) on the ground in the garden bed. The snails/slugs will latch onto the underside of the board within several hours or overnight (depending on when you leave the board there). Pick up the board and either scrap it into the trash can or bag, drop the board on something hard (too yucky for me), or dispose of with your favorite method. DeannaCat CJ If you ever saw the movie the “Biggest little farm” then you know it was the ducks who finally got control over the out of control snails, ducks love snails! Any gardeners who haven’t seen the film, I suggest watching it! it’s one of my all time favorites 🙂 Angela ‘The biggest little farm’ s become my favourite movie too, the triumph of nature is a wonderful thing. Also love the quote from a famous permaculture expert “You don’t have a snail problem, you have a duck deficiency!” Christina I’m always so impressed with your willingness to use science and research when you post things. I noticed this article looking for something else and immediately wondered if the good ol’ eggshell remedy everyone on social media talks about was going to make an appearance. So happy to see it under the “myth” title. Keep up the great work! Slugs (and cabbage butterflies) are the bane of my existence in my Western Washington garden. Lol Stay in Connected & Learn CREATOR & PLANT LADY Hey! I'm Deanna, aka DeannaCat. My goal is to help and inspire others to lead more healthy, sustainable lives by sharing tips to make gardening and homesteading easy and enjoyable ~ so you can learn and grow along! Read more... Disclosure Some of the links on this site are affiliate links, such as Amazon links. We make a small commission from purchases made through those links, at no extra cost to you. We only share products we know and believe in. Any purchases made through affiliate links are greatly appreciated as they support our work here, and enable us to continue to create and share with you!

Slugs and snails are drawn to it, consume it, and then lose their appetite and stop eating altogether. It is best to apply Sluggo when the weather forecast is free of rain for a few days, as it begins to degrade once it becomes saturated. As the pellets break down, the iron doubles as a fertilizer for your garden. Myth: Crushed eggshells or coffee grounds for snail control You may have heard that sprinkling crushed eggshells or coffee grounds in a ring around the base of plants (or the perimeter of a garden bed) will prevent snails and slugs from crossing over to your plants. The theory is that they don’t like to crawl over sharp, pokey things. After hearing mixed reviews on how well this works, I decided to dig deeper. I found this experiment that showed snails and slugs don’t mind coffee grounds much at all, and also this myth-buster post about snails and eggshells. In fact, calcium is an essential part of a snails diet (to maintain their hard shell) so they may actually be attracted to the calcium-based eggshells! So, it looks like coffee grounds or crushed eggshells will likely NOT adequately protect your plants from hungry, determined snails. Or, have you had success with this organic snail control trick? Let us know in the comments below! Happy snail hunting and collecting! And that sums up 10 organic slug and snail control methods to try. Well, what do you think? Did you pick up on a few new tips? I hope so! Are there any slug and snail control techniques that work for you, that I failed to mention? Let us know, or feel free to ask questions in the comments below. With a little careful thought and diligence, I have faith you can protect your plants from these hungry garden pests. As always, remember that an organic garden is never a “perfect” one – and that is more than okay! Thank you for reading, and best of luck.

no

Horticulture

Are coffee grounds effective as a slug and snail deterrent?

yes_statement

"coffee" "grounds" are "effective" as a "slug" and "snail" "deterrent".. using "coffee" "grounds" can "effectively" deter "slugs" and "snails".

https://greenhouseemporium.com/greenhouse-gardening-organic-pest-control-slugs-and-snails/

Slug on stems with text: How to Get Rid of Slugs and Snails in a ...

How To Get Rid of Slugs and Snails in a Greenhouse Table of Contents DisclaimerThis page may include affiliate links to Amazon and other partners. Affiliate advertising programs are designed to provide a means for sites to earn fees by advertising and linking to products. Finding slugs and snails in your greenhouse can be frustrating, especially since one of the advantages of greenhouse gardening is protection from the elements and pests. Unfortunately, it can be hard to keep slugs or snails out of greenhouses completely. Even more challenging is getting rid of them, especially if you’re growing tasty plants and want to use safe and natural methods of control. The best way to get rid of slugs and snails in a greenhouse is by creating a natural barrier with diatomaceous earth and organizing your greenhouse to make it a less desirable space. You can also use slug and snail deterrents such as seaweed mulch, sand, parasitic nematodes, and pest-repellent herbs. Ultimately, understanding slug and snail behavior will help you find the best method or combination of methods to get rid of them for good. Continue reading to learn how to keep your greenhouse free of slugs and snails! What’s the difference between slugs and snails? Unlike other common greenhouse pests, slugs and snails are invertebrate mollusks, not insects. Their soft bodies are primarily composed of water, so they thrive in moist conditions. But what sets them apart from one another? Slug Snail Slugs are shell-less gastropods that usually live underground and can quickly munch their way through a garden. The term generally refers to terrestrial slugs, though marine gastropods are sometimes referred to as sea slugs. Snails on the other hand refer to gastropods that have coiled shells, large enough to cover the animals when they retract inside. Slugs and snails excrete two types of mucus, one covering their body and one that allows them to move around. The mucus they produce beneath them to help them move around offers a reasonable degree of protection as they move around. This slippery mucus also doesn’t taste very good, offering them some defense from predators such as birds. How to tell if you have slugs or snails in your greenhouse It’s important to know if slugs and snails have made their way into your greenhouse. Not only are greenhouses generally warm and humid, but they’re free of birds and other natural predators of slugs and snails. If allowed to reproduce, these gastropods can multiply quickly and wreak havoc on your plants with their voracious appetites! To find out if you have slugs or snails lurking in your greenhouse, check under logs or planters (or other dark, moist spaces). They’re most active at night so you can also grab a flashlight and inspect your plants for these pests when it’s dark. Catching them red-handed isn’t easy, so you can also check your plants’ leaves for damage. Slugs and snails typically chew rounded holes in tender leaves. You can also look for their signature slime trails. What types of plants do slugs and snails love? Both slugs and snails love tender plants, and while nearly all foliage is appealing, they especially love leafy plants such as lettuce, cabbage, peas, and radishes. They’ll also go after fruit, including strawberries, zucchini, or cucumbers, so make sure to pick ripe fruit as soon as possible! Most seedlings have reasonably tender foliage, so these are probably the most vulnerable targets and require additional protection. Slugs and snails are also known to feed on certain organic matter such as compost and decaying plant matter, which can become a concern if your plants aren’t receiving enough nutrients. Six ways to get rid of slugs and snails in your greenhouse If you’ve identified the presence of slugs and snails in your greenhouse, it’s important to act as soon as possible! Below we’ve included our top natural slug and snail repellents. For best results in keeping your greenhouse free of these hungry pests, make sure to combine multiple methods! While these methods should help keep slugs and snails at bay, it’s important to physically remove any that you find in your greenhouse. You can drop them in a bucket of soapy water, or simply relocate them far away from your greenhouse. Now here are our top 6 methods for getting rid of slugs and snails: 1. Greenhouse organization Greenhouses can be an ideal environment for slugs and snails, so you must take measures to keep your space as tidy and dry as possible. Eliminate breeding ground opportunities so that even if a few manage to get in, they’ll have a hard time multiplying. Keep your greenhouse floor free of garbage, plant litter, or any unnecessary planks or planters where slugs and snails can hide. Plants that are close together can increase moisture levels and create clusters of dense foliage where slugs and snails can easily hide. Make sure to leave plenty of space between plants, giving the pests fewer places to hide. If your greenhouse has a door, try to keep it closed whenever possible. Seal any cracks or holes that you find in your greenhouse to further reduce the chances of slugs and snails getting inside! Finally, avoid watering your plants at night in order to reduce damp conditions at a time when slugs and snails are most active. 2. Diatomaceous earth Diatomaceous earth (DE) can be an effective deterrent for slugs and snails. Diatomaceous earth is very dry, so slugs and snails would rather not get it on themselves. You can simply create a barrier of DE around your plants or beds to protect them from slugs and snails. One of the drawbacks of Diatomaceous Earth is that it is no longer effective when wet. While your greenhouse is reasonably protected from rain, be sure to monitor and reapply if the barrier becomes wet. Our recommendation for Diatomaceous Earth We are using HARRIS Diatomaceous Earth – Crawling Insect Killer in our house & garden. 3. Sand Sand can also be an effective deterrent for slugs and snails. Dry, gritty sand, similar to Diatomaceous Earth, is unappealing for snails and slugs. Sprinkle a thick barrier of sand 3-4 inches away from the plants you’d like to protect. As with DE, make sure to reapply if conditions become wet. 4. Plant deterrents For an easy and attractive solution, you can try planting aromatics that are known to naturally repel pests including slugs and snails. Planting these near your particularly attractive soft tissue plants may help steer away the slugs and snails. As a bonus, you get a few extra delicious herbs growing in your greenhouse to enjoy! Mint (make sure to keep your mint in a container to prevent it from spreading) Rosemary 5. Parasitic nematodes Phasmarhabditis hermaphrodita is a parasitic nematode that specifically targets slugs and snails. While they are safe for use around your greenhouse plants and even pets, they will attack slugs and snails and use them as a host to reproduce. The targeted slug or snail will die after a few weeks of infection, during which time its feeding is drastically reduced. These nematodes thrive in moist soil and are sensitive to temperature extremes, but this is more of a concern when applied outdoors. You can find parasitic nematodes at your local garden center or even online. 6. Seaweed mulch Using seaweed as a mulch can be a great slug and snail deterrent. It differs from other garden mulches because it is salty which can dry out slugs and snails. Seaweed also has an iodine odor that repels a number of pests. A great bonus to using seaweed mulch is that it makes an excellent nutrient-dense compost! Slug and snail deterrents that are less effective There are many different methods that gardeners use to try to get rid of slugs and snails. However, not all of them will keep your greenhouse free of slugs and snails. Of course, we won’t stop you trying these methods, but make sure to combine them with at least one of the above methods to effectively keep your greenhouse free of those pesky slugs and snails! Mulch Adding a layer of mulch to your garden can help keep the top layer around your plants dry. Because slugs and snails prefer to move around on moist surfaces, some people think of mulch as an effective repellent. However, as soon as the mulch becomes moist, slugs and snails have no problem climbing across it. The layer of mucus that they use to get around also protects them from the sharp edges of bark or wood chips. You can try increasing the effectiveness of this method by watering in the morning, making it so the mulch is dry again by nighttime. Eggshells and coffee grounds Many insist that adding a barrier of crushed eggshells or coffee grounds around your plants is an effective slug or snail deterrent. However, slugs and snails are protected from the sharp edges of these materials by their slimy mucus. At the same time, eggshells and coffee grounds are a good addition to your garden soil, so you can test this theory for yourself with no harm. Beer traps If you’ve never heard of using beer traps for slugs and snails, it’s the practice of digging a small hole in the ground and placing a cup of beer inside. The theory is that slugs and snails are highly attracted to the yeast in beer, fall inside the cup and drown. Many gardeners have reason to believe that beer traps do work because you’ll likely find a few slugs in those traps in the morning. Unfortunately, the number of slugs attracted to the beer in the first place doesn’t compare with the amount that falls into the trap. Some people have set cameras up to test this theory and find hundreds of slugs attracted to the beer, but only a couple that actually fall into the cup. When it comes to keeping your greenhouse free of slugs and snails, it’s much more effective to make your space less desirable in the first place instead of trying to trap them. Have you had any success getting slugs and snails out of your greenhouse? Tell us your slug story below, we’d love to hear your tips! Jesse James Jesse James, a former Army veteran, now shares his passion for gardening through engaging articles on Greenhouse Emporium. Leveraging his experience and love for nature, Jesse provides practical advice and inspires others on their gardening journey.

However, as soon as the mulch becomes moist, slugs and snails have no problem climbing across it. The layer of mucus that they use to get around also protects them from the sharp edges of bark or wood chips. You can try increasing the effectiveness of this method by watering in the morning, making it so the mulch is dry again by nighttime. Eggshells and coffee grounds Many insist that adding a barrier of crushed eggshells or coffee grounds around your plants is an effective slug or snail deterrent. However, slugs and snails are protected from the sharp edges of these materials by their slimy mucus. At the same time, eggshells and coffee grounds are a good addition to your garden soil, so you can test this theory for yourself with no harm. Beer traps If you’ve never heard of using beer traps for slugs and snails, it’s the practice of digging a small hole in the ground and placing a cup of beer inside. The theory is that slugs and snails are highly attracted to the yeast in beer, fall inside the cup and drown. Many gardeners have reason to believe that beer traps do work because you’ll likely find a few slugs in those traps in the morning. Unfortunately, the number of slugs attracted to the beer in the first place doesn’t compare with the amount that falls into the trap. Some people have set cameras up to test this theory and find hundreds of slugs attracted to the beer, but only a couple that actually fall into the cup. When it comes to keeping your greenhouse free of slugs and snails, it’s much more effective to make your space less desirable in the first place instead of trying to trap them. Have you had any success getting slugs and snails out of your greenhouse? Tell us your slug story below, we’d love to hear your tips! Jesse James Jesse James, a former Army veteran, now shares his passion for gardening through engaging articles on Greenhouse Emporium.

no

Horticulture

Are coffee grounds effective as a slug and snail deterrent?

yes_statement

"coffee" "grounds" are "effective" as a "slug" and "snail" "deterrent".. using "coffee" "grounds" can "effectively" deter "slugs" and "snails".

https://www.green-feathers.com/blogs/news/hedgehog-safe-slug-repellant

Hedgehog-Friendly Ways to Stop Slugs In Your Garden

Hedgehog-Friendly Ways to Stop Slugs In Your Garden In order to protect our hedgehogs here in the UK, it’s important to take care when it comes to the attempt of getting rid of slugs and snails in your garden. Slug-busting methods can be dangerous and even life-threatening to hedgehogs. Slug pellets are poisonous to hedgehogs and hedgehogs may eat them or slug and snails poisoned by pellets. What people often don't realise is that in reality hedgehogs love eating slugs and snails and are in themselves a natural form of pest control in your garden. They are slug slurping machines! But how do you keep the population of slugs and snails down without poisoning hedgehogs that you are trying to attract into your garden? With that in mind, here are some safe gardening practices to get rid of slugs but to keep other wildlife safe in the process. Create a Beer Trap Who doesn’t love a pint of beer on a warm summer’s day? Slugs do too! When protecting other wildlife, the creation of a beer trap can definitely help to attract slugs and deter them from touching your plants. It doesn’t matter what type of beer you provide, even if it’s the cheap and cheerful stuff. All you’ll need to do in order to create the trap is to fill a margarine tub or a large yogurt pot with beer. It needs to be deep enough in order to drown the slug completely. You can sink the container into the ground so that only the rim is at or above the soil level. It’s a quick and effective way of getting rid of slugs and as much as it is an unhappy ending for the slug, it’s a great way to go, right? Make sure to check on it every so often to ensure it’s working effectively. Use Coffee Grounds Coffee grounds serve more of a purpose than just simply being disposed of. It’s worth spreading any coffee grounds leftover from your morning coffees, around the base of your plants. This is helpful in protecting them from slugs and snails in general. A lot of gardeners use these methods and even if you don’t have coffee grounds yourself, you’d just need to head over to a local coffee house or shop and ask for a couple of kilograms worth, depending on how big your garden is of course. So if you have some leftover coffee ground from a cafetière or available coffee grounds of any kind, it’s worth putting it down around your plants to see how effective it is at keeping the slugs away. Egg Shells Egg shells are something you’d throw out either way and they’re often reused in school settings. However, they can also be used as a protective barrier to put around your plants or areas where you don’t want the slugs to go. Create a barrier ring with the halves and vary how you lay them down so that you can see which methods work best when it comes to stopping the slugs. With eggs, you’re going to likely need quite a few available, so an alternative would be to use sea shells if you live by the coast or a beach. There’s also plenty of places that sell seashells online if needs be. Both options are an effective way of keeping the slugs at bay. Both are effective but may be a bit of an eyesore when it comes to appearances. Copper Tape With copper tape, it’s something that slugs do not like crossing over and therefore, like the eggs and coffee ground, it acts as a barrier, preventing them from entering. It’s worth placing the copper tape around the pot in a ring formation and that way, the slugs won’t be able to get at the pot to climb up and into where the plant is. There’s also copper integrated mats that you can buy too and which you can place your plant pots on top of. This is an effective way of helping prevent slugs from getting access to the plant and again, it’s a safe type of material to use when it comes to other forms of wildlife too, so it’s certainly worth trying. Plant Slug Repellent Plants In order to keep the slugs away, you might want to think about those plants that are repellents for slugs but also those that act as an attractive plant that you can use to ambush and capture any slugs that go towards it. Garlic, Chamomile and chives are three types of plants that will help keep slugs away and they can be planted alongside those other plants you want to protect or used to make an extract which you can drop around the areas needed. A lot of gardeners love using garlic as a natural slug deterrent. For those looking to attract slugs to remove them yourself, it’s work using law chamomile seedlings. They are apparently quite the attraction for slugs and once they reach them, you can simply remove them and dispose of them as you’d like. It’s also not going to be as much of an eye-sore as perhaps the egg shells would be as they’d blend in with the rest of the plants that you have. Nature-friendly slug pellets And finally, slug pellets can often be toxic and they are the worst thing to have in your garden when you’re trying to protect the hedgehogs and other wildlife. With that said though, organic slug pellets are a good option because they contain a different ingredient called iron phosphate, rather than metaldehyde. It’s a great solution to provide a somewhat similar effect but without harming other wildlife. They are great for organic gardening and are used actively amongst many gardeners. However, it’s worth being cautious where possible and they are known to cause some illnesses for dogs after they ingest it. It’s worth heeding caution and being careful of where you put the pellets, especially if you have pets and even children. These organic, nature-friendly slug pellets can certainly be a good choice for someone looking for an alternative pellet to use. Keeping your garden safe for other wildlife like hedgehogs are important and it just goes to show that there are plenty of natural ways in which you can stop slugs from coming into your garden and munching down on your plants. Use these tips to keep your garden free from slugs. It doesn’t always need to be a case of using chemicals to remove these pests from your outdoor space. Team Green Feathers Between watching wonderful videos and images of nesting and fledging feathered families, buzzing bees, boisterous badgers, or huddling hedgehogs, we are working hard on designing and building the best products for you to enjoy watching nature and help protect the animals during their hopefully happy life. UK's First WiFi Bird Box Camera Meet the UK's first WiFi Bird Box Camera, with which you can directly watch nesting birds on your smartphone, tablet and computer in HD! Simply connect up the power, mount the camera in your nest box and connect it to your WiFi network.

So if you have some leftover coffee ground from a cafetière or available coffee grounds of any kind, it’s worth putting it down around your plants to see how effective it is at keeping the slugs away. Egg Shells Egg shells are something you’d throw out either way and they’re often reused in school settings. However, they can also be used as a protective barrier to put around your plants or areas where you don’t want the slugs to go. Create a barrier ring with the halves and vary how you lay them down so that you can see which methods work best when it comes to stopping the slugs. With eggs, you’re going to likely need quite a few available, so an alternative would be to use sea shells if you live by the coast or a beach. There’s also plenty of places that sell seashells online if needs be. Both options are an effective way of keeping the slugs at bay. Both are effective but may be a bit of an eyesore when it comes to appearances. Copper Tape With copper tape, it’s something that slugs do not like crossing over and therefore, like the eggs and coffee ground, it acts as a barrier, preventing them from entering. It’s worth placing the copper tape around the pot in a ring formation and that way, the slugs won’t be able to get at the pot to climb up and into where the plant is. There’s also copper integrated mats that you can buy too and which you can place your plant pots on top of. This is an effective way of helping prevent slugs from getting access to the plant and again, it’s a safe type of material to use when it comes to other forms of wildlife too, so it’s certainly worth trying. Plant Slug Repellent Plants

yes

Horticulture

Are coffee grounds effective as a slug and snail deterrent?

yes_statement

"coffee" "grounds" are "effective" as a "slug" and "snail" "deterrent".. using "coffee" "grounds" can "effectively" deter "slugs" and "snails".

https://savvygardening.com/how-to-get-rid-of-slugs-in-the-garden-organically/

How to Get Rid of Slugs in the Garden Organically

How to get rid of slugs in the garden: 8 organic control methods Slugs are one of the most common garden pests, though unlike most other leaf-munching critters you find in your garden, they aren’t insects. Instead, slugs are land-dwelling mollusks that are more closely related to clams than beetles or caterpillars. Facing a slug infestation is serious business, filled with slime trails, damaged leaves, and missing seedlings. Figuring out how to get rid of slugs in the garden without turning to harsh synthetic chemical slug baits, is a task ripe with old wives’ tales and useless homemade remedies. But, the truth is that effective organic slug control is both manageable and affordable, when you’re armed with the following tips and information. Why is figuring out how to get rid of slugs in the garden so challenging? Let’s start with the obvious: slugs have a major ick factor. They’re slimy and pretty darned disgusting. Most species are decomposers who feed on decaying plant and animal wastes. But, there are a handful of slug species that prefer to feed on living plant material, making them the bane of many gardeners. If you’re here to figure out how to get rid of slugs in the garden, these are definitely the species you’re dealing with. Not all species of slugs eat garden plants, but those that do can cause significant damage. Unlike snails, slugs don’t carry a shell on their backs. Instead, they have a small, saddle-like plate called a mantle. Because they lack the protection of a shell, slugs tend to feed primarily at night or on rainy days, when they’re protected from the sun. During the day, they tend to hide under rocks or in other dark, moist locations. Garden slug control can be difficult because many times the problem is misdiagnosed and the damage is blamed on another garden pest. Since slugs feed primarily at night, gardeners tend to notice the damaged plants, but they can’t find the culprit when they search the garden during the day. So, the cause of the damage becomes a mystery and the gardener might choose to spray the plant with a general insecticide in an attempt to kill the bug, which is useless, of course, against a mollusk like a slug. Slug damage is often blamed on other, more visible garden pests. Aside from frequent misdiagnoses, getting rid of slugs in the garden can be problematic because good old hand-picking is both disgusting and super-challenging. Unless you’re a night owl who loves roaming the garden with a flashlight and picking up slime-covered mollusks and dropping them into a bucket of soapy water, hand-picking slugs is no fun on so many levels. It’s easy to see why so many gardeners opt for skipping it all together. If you really want to know how to get rid of slugs in the garden, you first have to learn how to properly identify the damage they cause. Then, you have to understand how to target the slimy buggers effectively and efficiently based on how they feed as well as how they breed. What does slug damage look like? Slugs are notorious for decimating young seedlings and many different tender-leaved plants. Here are some sure-fire signs that a garden slug control program is called for: • If you come out to the garden in the morning and nothing remains of your seedlings but leaf mid-ribs and stumps, slugs are a likely culprit. • Perfect, round holes in tomatoes, strawberries, and other soft fruits can also indicate a need to learn how to get rid of slugs in the garden. • Ragged holes in leaf edges and centers is another sign of slugs. • Slime trails on plants, walls, rocks, or mulch are another tell-tale sign of slug troubles. Chewed off seedlings with nothing but their mid-ribs remaining are a sign of slug troubles. How do slugs feed and breed? (I know, I know…. TMI) Slug mouths are lined with tiny, grater-like teeth that shred leaf tissue before digesting it. This type of feeding creates holes with jagged edges, rather than the smooth-edged holes often left behind by leaf-chewing beetles or caterpillars. Slugs move on an excreted mucus trail that serves to both protect their body from desiccation and message other slugs about their presence (apparently slime trails can help you find a mate…). Most slug species are hermaphroditic, which means they have both male and female reproductive parts. Thankfully, slugs aren’t capable of fertilizing themselves, so they have to find a partner to breed (imagine all the little baby slugs there would be if slugs could fertilize themselves… yikes!). Slug mating is actually really fascinating; leopard slugs in particular. It involves a pair of glowing blue reproductive organs and a nocturnal tryst while hanging mid-air on a thread of slime. And, no, I’m not joking. Each slug is capable of laying hundreds of eggs over the course of its lifetime, though the eggs are laid in clutches of about 30. The eggs are laid in moist soil, under mulch or rocks, or beneath leaf detritus. They’ll sit dormant if the weather is too hot, too dry, or too cold, waiting for just the right moment to hatch. If you live in a rainy region, such as the Pacific Northwest, you’re all too aware of why learning how to get rid of slugs in the garden is so important. Now that you understand a bit more about these garden pests, it’s time to look at some ways to keep slugs out of the garden naturally. Slugs can often be found climbing up the sides of buildings and walls. How to get rid of slugs in the garden: 8 organic methods 1. Prevent slug damage with cultural practices. This first strategy doesn’t involve products, traps, or barriers. Instead, it involves the actions you take in the garden. Slug prevention techniques involve things like: • Avoid using loose mulches where slugs are prevalent. Skip straw, hay, and shredded wood mulches and opt for compost or leaf mold instead. • Avoid watering the garden late in the day. Since slugs (and their eggs) thrive in wet conditions, always water in the morning so the garden dries by nightfall. • Switch from overhead irrigation to drip irrigation which targets water at the root zone and keeps plant foliage dry. • Plant resistant plants. Slugs dislike plants with heavily fragranced foliage, like many common herbs. They also dislike plants with fuzzy or furry foliage. • Slugs are a favorite food of many different predators. Encourage birds, snakes, lizards, toads, frogs, ground beetles, and other natural predators to make a home in your garden. Building a “beetle bump” is one of the most effective ways to control slugs naturally (find out how to build one in this article). Snakes are exceptional predators of garden slugs. Encourage them in your garden. 2. Stop using pesticides on your lawn. Firefly larvae are one of the most prevalent predators of newly hatched slugs, and putting synthetic pesticides on your lawn doesn’t just kill the “bad” bugs, it also kills beneficial insects, such as fireflies, that live in the lawn and help you control pests like slugs. Instead, switch to organic lawn care techniques and let these good bugs help you control slugs naturally. 3. How to get rid of slugs in the garden by trapping them. This is one of my favorite tricks for how to get rid of slugs in the garden, especially the vegetable garden. Lay 2×4’s between crop rows at dusk and then the following afternoon, when the slugs take shelter beneath them to avoid the sun, flip over the boards and collect the slugs or cut them in half with a sharp scissors. You can also easily trap them underneath inverted watermelon rinds placed throughout the garden. 4. Use wool to control slugs. If you want to know how to get rid of slugs in the garden, you shouldn’t ignore the power of wool pellets. It’s been discovered that slugs are just as bothered by itchy, rough wool as humans are. They don’t like climbing over the coarse texture. Slug Gone pellets are made from natural wool that’s been compressed and formed into pellets. The pellets are spread around the base of susceptible plants and then watered. The pellets quickly expand, forming a thick mat of wool that slugs refuse to climb over. It lasts for a very long time and can even help suppress weeds. 5. How to get rid of slugs in the garden with copper. The metal copper reacts with slug slime to cause a mild electric shock and send the slug packing. You can purchase copper tape here and surround susceptible plants with a ring of copper. This is an easy technique if you just want to protect a few hostas, but it’s more challenging for larger garden areas. However, one easy way to keep slugs out of raised beds is to make a copper collar around the outer edge of the whole bed by stapling or nailing a strip of copper tape or copper strips around the top of the bed’s frame. This also works for containers where the copper tape can be placed just inside the upper rim of the pot. There’s also a copper mesh called Slug Shield (available here) that can be used in a similar manner and is reusable. It’s a bit easier to wrap around a single plant stem than copper tape or strips. Garden slugs can be kept out of raised beds with copper strips, tape, or mesh. 6. Set up a slug fence. Believe it or not, you can make an electric fence for slugs. Yep, that’s right. Here are plans to make a tiny electric slug fence to place around raised beds and protect the plants from slugs. It runs on a 9 volt battery and zaps the slugs when they come in contact with the fence. It won’t hurt humans or pets and is a great way to protect a raised bed or other small garden. 7. Set up a slug bar. You know I had to mention everyone’s favorite/least favorite slug control: beer-baited traps. Yes, no list of tips on how to get rid of slugs in the garden is complete without a mention of beer traps. Plastic traps like these or these are baited with beer (non-alcoholic works best). The yeast in the beer attracts slugs who then fall in and drown. It works, but it’s also incredibly gross. In order to prevent a festering pile of slug corpse-infused beer, be sure to empty and re-bait the traps daily. 8. Use an organic slug bait. When figuring out how to get rid of slugs in the garden, organic slug baits are a must. However, be smart about this method because not all slug baits are the same. Many traditional slug baits used to control slugs in the garden are poisonous to pets and other wildlife in addition to slugs. Do not use slug baits that contain methiocarb or metaldehyde as their active ingredient. Metaldehyde is extremely toxic to mammals (just a teaspoon or two can kill a small dog) and methiocarb isn’t much safer. Instead, turn to organic baits for garden slug control. Look for an active ingredient of iron phosphate. These slug control products are safe for use on even certified organic farms. Brand names include Sluggo, Slug Magic, and Garden Safe Slug and Snail Bait. Sprinkle the bait on the soil surface around affected plants. The slugs eat the bait and immediately stop feeding. They’ll die within a few days. These baits can even be used in the vegetable garden around food crops, unlike traditional slug baits. A few more tips on how to get rid of slugs in the garden In addition to these “power 8” ways to get rid of slugs in the garden naturally, there are a few other tricks you can try, though their effectiveness is debatable. • Diatomaceous earth has long been touted as a great slug control. It’s a fine powder that is very sharp microscopically and the edges easily cut through slug skin and desiccate them as they crawl over it. The trouble is that as soon as diatomaceous earth gets wet, it’s rendered useless. I don’t know many gardeners who have time to make a circle of dust around every plant and then replenish it after every rain or heavy dew. • A hearty sprinkle of salt, placed directly on a slug’s body, may desiccate it enough to lead to its death, but there’s a good chance the slug will simply shed its slime layer along with the salt and carry on as usual. I’ve seen it happen so many times that I put aside my salt shaker long ago. • And lastly, sharp-edged items, such as sweet gum seed pods, crushed eggshells, and dried coffee grounds have all been touted as great slug deterrents. I respectfully disagree and so do several studies. The final word on how to get rid of slugs in the garden If slugs consistently cause you troubles and you’re constantly asking yourself how to get rid of slugs in the garden, then it’s time to take action and maintain a good organic control program from the start of the growing season all the way through the end by using as many of the techniques described above as possilbe. Doing so keeps the slug population in check and significantly decreases the amount of damage they cause. Have you battled slugs in your garden? We’d love to hear your success stories in the comment section below. Reader Interactions Comments so true–DE and sharp objects just make a mess, but they dont control slugs. beer traps are effective, but after battling slugs for a few months now, i am resorting to the organic traps/bait. also, salt can be harmful to plants, so that’s another reason not to use it. Well, I respectfully disagree with your disagreement about sweet gum balls being a deterrent. They are so plentiful here in Pittsburgh, easy to apply and last all season. Nothing worked to protect my hostas, annuals and herbs until I started using these jagged miracle balls. And once the plants start to grow and fill in, you don’t notice them. Is there some other reason you don’t favor sweet gum balls? I do encircle my beds with coffee grounds and use Sluggo regularly (ha, ha we raised our daughter in the Pacific NW and taught her to ‘feed the slugs’) but recently have added a few more tricks: recycle hard clear plastic cups by making slug collars sinking them around vulnerable plants and making many cuts at the top creating something very pokey; check for lists of plants and their vulnerabilities to slug and snail damage. Here on Hawaii Island esp on the east side, slugs and those 3-4 inch African snails may carry the parasite that causes rat lung disease and we must carefully wash all produce to avoid ingestion. The best practice is to pick them up with chop sticks and toss them in a closed container full of very salty water thus minimizing spread of the parasite. I live in Edmonton, Alberta Canada. And have had the opportunity to have planting space in a pop-up garden across from my apartment building at the Lynwood Community League. So the practise you mention using chopsticks and putting the pest in a ziplock full of salty water is for slugs? I’m gonna try the beer traps, but really appreciate you intel. Thank you I think I got a bit lucky this year. When harvesting parsnips in late March, and then prepping beds in April I found clutches of eggs. Problem is much less thus far. It would be good to add a picture of what they look like. I had read this article previously, and when I first found them I wasn’t sure what they were until I googled it. Slug eggs are tiny, about the size of a coloured plastic pinhead and coloured similar to a plastic milk jug. You’ll find them under leaves, between bricks or anywhere that’s protected in the spring. I take them by the spoonful and put them in the garbage so they don’t spread. Still, I’ve got issues! I put out crumbled corn chips or cookie crumbs on the patio close by the garden. The first night , I picked up 40, second night maybe 20 and down to only 5 a day. Soon I will be slug free. I thew them in a creek that runs behind my house. Yes they drowned. My early morning chore is to go into the garden to their favorite plants like daffodils and lupine and my new vegetable starts and and chop the slugs with my garden scissors. I also use cheap beer in low bowls. Does not have to be anything fancy. Thanks a million!!! This is what I was looking for. A fully automated slug remover. I recently bought an old cottage with land that’s more like a nature reserve than farmland, totally infested with slugs. I do a couple of nightly checks on my crops (still very small, only moved in a few weeks ago) and kill dozens every run cutting them up with a stick. Just back from one… lost many plants before I realised how manyt they are and how much they feed. I tend to find most late evening, at dusk. Can’t start wiring 4 acres. I love reading all these remedies!! These slugs are driving me mad, but since putting beer out in saucers, it has helped so much. Hearing about crumbled corn chips, I might add this to my attempts at getting rid of them . I garden in a very humid environment near to ocean on Cape Cod, and slugs have been ruining my leafy greens and seedlings for years. I used to use Sluggo, but am concerned about EDTA as an ingredient, which is toxic to mammals and birds. My problem is compounded by the fact I am infested with earwigs as well, and it is difficult to know who’s to blame most of the time as the damage is similar (excluding the slime trail). I’ve had marginal luck with DE, and am frankly quite tired of putting it out and watering around it. I’ve had better luck with beer traps In tuna cans, and there is an admitted satisfaction of seeing all those dead drunken slugs in the am. I don’t even need to clean out the traps because (this is your cue to stop reading!) my resident possum sucks down the whole slimy, festering, alcoholic mess on a regular basis. What a treat. It rained last night and the slugfest this morning was too tempting to leave to the traps, so I hunted with tweezers and cup of beer until I no longer spotted a sober living slug. No question, hunting is the quickest solution. I happened to have a spray bottle of 70% isopropyl alcohol in hand recently when crossing the deck and spotted slugs. I gave them a quick experimental squirt and that seemed to work as well, although I’d estimate only about half of the time. I’m guessing the survivors deployed that gross slime-shedding defense mechanism, leaving a blob of slime behind as they made their escape. In the veggie bed, I was so frustrated that I started planting my greens in elevated planters like window boxes and large ice buckets on legs. I also thought to put solo cup collars around my few surviving bean seedlings, and that worked perfectly. So between elevated planters, the beer traps, and the cup collars, I’m making it work and preserving a small part of my sanity. The beer traps and collars seem to work very well in the earwigs too, which is good because hunting earwigs is where I need to draw the line. Today I found another pest eating the flowers in my pots. It was some kind of yellow caterpiller, I think it had a black stripe or two. It was less than an inch long, I never saw one of these before, but the flowers are half eaten in all of my pots that stand on the cement steps of my walkway. They may have been in my flowers when I bought them to be in all of them. No Nurseries open this year, so big box stores got my business in this corona summer. Living in Nova Scotia gave the slugs in my large garden a refreshing cool down and dewy moisture every night. Once I realized I had a very big problem with slugs I tried a variety of organic methods with limited success to keep the numbers down. But it was two slugs chewing on a poor worm that gave me an insight that helped my plants. I poked both of the slugs with a nail. When I came back to that spot about an hour later, the worm was gone and there were other slugs that had arrived for a slug food fest. I didn’t realize slugs would eat other slugs. So from then on I would go out at dusk armed with a sharp little knife, poking every slug I could find, and knowing that some of my plants might be left alone that night. From time to time I felt badly about this method, but in truth most of the other methods are not pleasant either. And I never forgot seeing that poor worm writhing around and unable to escape. I’m in Australia and currently have a massive slug problem and so do my neighbours. I’ve been going out every other morning when it’s wet with dew, with the pooper scooper picking them up off the lawn – they seem to gather on dandelion flowers. I’ve collected over 700 over the last few weeks! I’m going to resort to dishes of beer near my vegetables. I figure I will eventually make an impact on their numbers if I keep collecting and drowning them! My husband built raised planter boxes to deter the slugs but it didn’t stop them at all. I put a generous line of cornmeal around the bottom edges of the boxes, around plants I want to protect and make strategically placed piles that slugs will flock to. They seem to love the taste of cornmeal and I’ve seen them change directions and head towards a newly placed pile. It distracts them from my plants while I try to reduce their numbers. Cornmeal is safe and inexpensive and will last quite a few days but you do have to reapply after a heavy rain. I bought a bag of iron phosphate slug bait. It didn’t seem to have much effect. Later I couldn’t find the bag. Next year I bought another bag, with similarly little effect. I found the first bag hidden under a shelf – empty! I went to grab my second bag but it was already empty too. Apparently safe for mammals. Mice had eaten it all. Probably ate what I sprinkled out on the ground, too, explaining why it didn’t do much about the slugs. My big problem is snails. Within a week of planting my peppers, the leaves were almost bare. At first, I, and the 2 year old that I watch, would 1st thing in the morning go on a snail hunt which she absolutely loved. She’s the best darn snail finder EVER! But now I’ve begun using the Garden Safe slug and snail bait which works fairly well. We still enjoy going on our snail hunts but don’t find half the number of snails that we used to. Then on to her helping me find all the dog poop. She loves it! It makes her feel very important when she finds something : D This website uses cookies to improve your experience. By clicking accept you give us permission to set cookies. AcceptRead More Privacy & Cookies Policy Privacy Overview This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. 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• A hearty sprinkle of salt, placed directly on a slug’s body, may desiccate it enough to lead to its death, but there’s a good chance the slug will simply shed its slime layer along with the salt and carry on as usual. I’ve seen it happen so many times that I put aside my salt shaker long ago. • And lastly, sharp-edged items, such as sweet gum seed pods, crushed eggshells, and dried coffee grounds have all been touted as great slug deterrents. I respectfully disagree and so do several studies. The final word on how to get rid of slugs in the garden If slugs consistently cause you troubles and you’re constantly asking yourself how to get rid of slugs in the garden, then it’s time to take action and maintain a good organic control program from the start of the growing season all the way through the end by using as many of the techniques described above as possilbe. Doing so keeps the slug population in check and significantly decreases the amount of damage they cause. Have you battled slugs in your garden? We’d love to hear your success stories in the comment section below. Reader Interactions Comments so true–DE and sharp objects just make a mess, but they dont control slugs. beer traps are effective, but after battling slugs for a few months now, i am resorting to the organic traps/bait. also, salt can be harmful to plants, so that’s another reason not to use it. Well, I respectfully disagree with your disagreement about sweet gum balls being a deterrent. They are so plentiful here in Pittsburgh, easy to apply and last all season. Nothing worked to protect my hostas, annuals and herbs until I started using these jagged miracle balls. And once the plants start to grow and fill in, you don’t notice them. Is there some other reason you don’t favor sweet gum balls?

no

Horticulture

Are coffee grounds effective as a slug and snail deterrent?

yes_statement

"coffee" "grounds" are "effective" as a "slug" and "snail" "deterrent".. using "coffee" "grounds" can "effectively" deter "slugs" and "snails".

https://backyard-farmer.com/how-to-get-rid-of-slugs-naturally/

How to get rid of slugs naturally - The Backyard Farmer

How to get rid of slugs naturally Getting rid of slugs naturally and without the use of pesticides or chemicals is not as difficult as you might think. There is more than just one way to keep slugs at bay and stop them destroying your favorite plant, be it a vegetable or flower. Use companion planting, techniques utilising plants slugs and snails do not like Why killing snails and slugs wont solve your problem The other thing to realize is that killing 1, 2 or 100 slugs will not solve your problem, more will come back if you do not either deter them completely or remove to source of their interest. Killing a slug or snail with salt or vinegar is not ethical or effective. Thanks for reading and we hope you learn something you can use from this article. If you want to give back to us here at backyard-farmer.com, just click on an advert 🙂 Thanks! Salt So how am I supposed to get rid of them effectively & ethically? One way I’ve found a way to balance the need to ‘kill’ slugs and snails is to allow nature to do it for me. By attracting or introducing natural predators to the scene we can both remove the problem and feed something positive in return, whether its a family of native song birds or chickens! Two ways to allow nature to defend your crops are: #1 Raise or keep some poultry in your garden space like chickens or guinea fowl By far the most effective way to keep all sorts of pests down in your garden or outdoor space is to raise some poultry, at the Backyard Farm we have 2 chickens who’s role is to scavenge the garden for pests like slugs, snails and beetles that may damage our crops. Chickens are great slug hunters This allows for maximum control over your garden space, allowing your poultry to scavenge where necessary turning those fat tasty slugs into eggs! It also keeps them off your growing produce. Rearing poultry also tends to attract other forms of slug eating wildlife into your garden or outside space. In our experience at the Backyard Farm many of the song birds and some corvids will take advantage of the chicken feed when the hens are elsewhere in the garden. This is another great advantage to keeping poultry, even if its just 2 hens like we do here. This method is also pet friendly #2 Attract wild animals like birds to your garden to feast on the slugs If you don not have the time, space or inclination to keep poultry then another full proof & nature friendly way of keeping slugs at bay is to attract natural wildlife. Black crow Wild animals that feed on slugs include: Birds Hedgehogs Toads Frogs Ground beetles Hedgehog What birds eat slugs in the UK Robins Song Thrushes & other song birds Ducks Corvids like crows and magpies Hawks & owls Red breast robin Attracting any of these will help keep the population of slugs down in your outside space. It is a good idea to attract at least one nocturnal predator as slugs are also nocturnal. This is not essential but it will help in the long run, hedgehogs are the easiest to attract in most areas of the UK. Song birds will also make light work of a large amount of slugs in the early hours of the morning. Attracting a variety of these is a great way to help reduce snail and slug populations. How to get rid of a slug infestation in the garden Locate where they are hiding Then make the area inhospitable for slugs and snails Dry out the area by introducing airflow, removing damp objects or fixing the cause of the extra moisture. Slug infestations in the garden are a little easier to deal with, places that harbor these pests can often be remedied or removed with less stress or hassle than inside a structure like a house. To get rid of the slug infestation you need to do some detective work and find them. Infestation of slugs If you have a concreted, patio or another from of stone flooring then you can use the same trick as you use indoors. Follow the trails left by slugs or snails using a torch, their trails will reflect the light and allow you to follow them. The chances are you have been led to something like a rockery or pile of old wood in a damp corner, gastropods need moisture to survive so anywhere with a high moisture content will likely have a family of slugs in there. Eliminating where the slugs are living and breeding is the only sure way to be rid of your problem all together, killing them one by one is a tedious and pointless exercise. If you do not want to remove the object causing an issue then you can still employ one of the two methods mentioned above. Slug proof raised beds Raised beds will likely contain some tasty treats for a gastropod a one point or another during the season & keeping them off a growing area is essential! Along with some of the above methods keeping the population of slugs and snails down, you can add another line of defense! Bramble canes & egg shells as slug defense Egg shells Brambles grow wild and free across great swathes of Britain, these plants are covered in thorns. These thorns are great at deterring slugs and snails by causing great discomfort to them if they try to cross a bramble cane. Find some bramble canes in a hedge row and cut them to round 30cm in length, lay these along the base of your raised beds or planters. For the ultimate slug defense, sure up the bramble canes with crushed eggshell. This works in the same way as the canes causing gastropods great discomfort when trying to traverse over them to a tasty snack. Bramble defence Add into the mix some lavender and there is very little chance any snail or slug is going to make it to your vegetable patch. Lavender is a fantastic deterrent and companion plant. It deters slugs, snails and many other natural predators to your vegetable patch. How to get rid of slugs in the house and porch If you have a slug problem in your house or porch there is likely an underlying reason. Damp or a food source will keep slugs coming back or even settling in you house, porch or patio. The first thing to do is identify the source, where are the slugs coming from. Porch Once you know where they are coming from, you want to know why slugs are coming in? If the slugs are making their way into your house at night, you need to know what they are coming for. If you leave any food sources out at night then store them correctly, if you have damp then this will need to be addressed to help deter the slugs. Last but not least you need to see how and where they are getting in, once you have identified this you need to close or reseal these access areas. How to find where slugs or snails are getting in? The quickest method to identify a slugs and other gastropods points of entry is by following the silvery residue left in their wake. By following this trail we can follow it to where they are getting in. To do this you will only need a torch, using the light from your torch, look for reflections from the slime trails left by gastropods. Tilt and manoeuvre the light to cover every angle, once you find a trail follow it until you either find a slug or snail, or until you find their point of entry. Slug trail Once found, close off the entry point so it is slug proof, due to their shells snails are less likely to have made it into your house unless you have left a window or door open. If you follow the above methods you will stop the slugs coming in, removing the need to kill them slowly with salt or vinegar. What attracts slugs to the house? Common things that attract slugs into your home are: Pet food Food scraps Spilt drinks or food stuffs Damp (they need moisture to survive and favour damp conditions) Easy access, block off easy points of entry How to get rid of slugs indoors By keeping what slugs like properly stored and kitchen sides clean, with all points of entry sealed off you really should not have any slugs left. If you do then you may have a bigger problem than just a few scrounging gastropods. Slugs can become a problem where damp is involved. If you have a reoccurring slug or snail problem then you may have a serious damp problem somewhere in the house. Slug eating leftovers Slug infestations in the house should be dealt with or consulted about with a pest control specialist and builder. Does salt kill slugs & snails? Yes, salt kills slugs and snails… slowly and painfully! Salt kills gastropods by dehydrating them slowly from the outside in. This is not effective or ethical and should be avoided. Does vinegar kill slugs? Yes, vinegar kills slugs and snails… like salt, slowly and painfully! Only this time it is the equivalent to being doused in acid, again it is not effective or ethical and should be avoided. How to get rid of snails & slugs with coffee Coffee grounds are a great deterrent when it comes to slugs and snails. They do not like the smell given off by used ground coffee and they will saunter off to find an easier, less smelly meal! Cover the base of your plants and growing beds with your used coffee grounds to help deter these pesky critters! Ground coffee Do coffee grounds deter slugs and snails? Coffee grounds as a fertilizer Another fantastic benefit when adding used coffee grinds to your soil as a deterrent to slugs is that it is also a great fertilizer! It really is killing 2 birds at once, coffee grinds add nitrogen directly to your soil very quickly (not immediately). It also adds more organic material to your soil which will in turn improve drainage, aeration to the soil and roots along with water retention. Worms will also be drawn to the coffee grounds helping turn over the soil and grounds together. Is there a difference between using used and unused coffee grounds in the garden? Yes! Unused coffee grounds lower PH and make soil more acidic than used/washed coffee grounds. For its purpose as a slug deterrent we will be using used coffee grounds. How do I get rid of slugs without harming my dog Slugs can cause problems for dogs, lung worm can be contracted from slugs and snails if a dog ingests them or a toy that has had them crawl all over it. Any of the methods we’ve used here today are relatively dog friendly it is important to note that a small dog ingesting coffee grounds could be potentially fatal. If you have a dog and want to use any of the above techniques we would advise protecting your growing area from your pets. Prevention is the best way to stop any pet accidentally eating something toxic, or your hard won produce! slug on moss Using a combination of some of the above you can eliminate the destruction caused by slugs without using harmful chemicals that could harm wildlife or even your own pets! The slug & snail – a rundown The slug and snail are an insidious foe, and as any battle tactician will know the best way to defeat your enemy is to understand your enemy. So here we are going to go through the basic biology of a slug and snail in an effort to understand how best to stop them. Anatomy of a slug Slug anatomy Anatomy of a snail Snail anatomy Gastropod: a mollusk of the large class ‘Gastropoda’ such as a snail, slug, or whelk. The snail and slugs weak spot The soft squidgy bodies of slugs and snails is one of their main weaknesses, it can be used in a variety of ways to help stop the little blighters munching your crops! Now this said, slugs and snails can be a pest BUT this does not mean they should not be treated with some humanity. Snail on grass If you are going to ‘dispatch’ of the problem, then it needs to be done in as quick and painless way that is possible. Salt and vinegar are both very slow and painful ways to die, it is the equivalent to being covered in acid or having so much salt inside you that you dehydrate to death, not nice! Salt & vinegar techniques are slow and brutal ways in which to kill a slug or snail!

Slug eating leftovers Slug infestations in the house should be dealt with or consulted about with a pest control specialist and builder. Does salt kill slugs & snails? Yes, salt kills slugs and snails… slowly and painfully! Salt kills gastropods by dehydrating them slowly from the outside in. This is not effective or ethical and should be avoided. Does vinegar kill slugs? Yes, vinegar kills slugs and snails… like salt, slowly and painfully! Only this time it is the equivalent to being doused in acid, again it is not effective or ethical and should be avoided. How to get rid of snails & slugs with coffee Coffee grounds are a great deterrent when it comes to slugs and snails. They do not like the smell given off by used ground coffee and they will saunter off to find an easier, less smelly meal! Cover the base of your plants and growing beds with your used coffee grounds to help deter these pesky critters! Ground coffee Do coffee grounds deter slugs and snails? Coffee grounds as a fertilizer Another fantastic benefit when adding used coffee grinds to your soil as a deterrent to slugs is that it is also a great fertilizer! It really is killing 2 birds at once, coffee grinds add nitrogen directly to your soil very quickly (not immediately). It also adds more organic material to your soil which will in turn improve drainage, aeration to the soil and roots along with water retention. Worms will also be drawn to the coffee grounds helping turn over the soil and grounds together. Is there a difference between using used and unused coffee grounds in the garden? Yes! Unused coffee grounds lower PH and make soil more acidic than used/washed coffee grounds. For its purpose as a slug deterrent we will be using used coffee grounds. How do I get rid of slugs without harming my dog Slugs can cause problems for dogs, lung worm can be contracted from slugs and snails if a dog ingests them or a toy that has had them crawl all over it.

yes

Horticulture

Are coffee grounds effective as a slug and snail deterrent?

yes_statement

"coffee" "grounds" are "effective" as a "slug" and "snail" "deterrent".. using "coffee" "grounds" can "effectively" deter "slugs" and "snails".

https://dianfarmer.com/get-rid-of-slugs-snails-garden/

How To Get Rid Of Slugs And Snails In The Garden

How To Get Rid Of Slugs And Snails In The Garden Slugs and snails may seem harmless with their slow and slimy demeanor, but they can wreak havoc on your garden. These common garden pests can devour leaves, flowers, and tender seedlings, leaving behind a trail of damage. If left unchecked, they can decimate your plants and get in the way of a flourishing garden. today, we’ll explore effective methods to get rid of slugs and snails and safeguard your garden from their destructive presence. These mollusks have a voracious appetite and feed on a wide range of vegetation, including leaves, flowers, stems, and fruits. How To Get Rid Of Slugs And Snails In The Garden We need to start by learning more about our enemy, that always helps us to understand what they’re doing and how to stop them Let’s get started: Understanding Slugs and Snails Before we delve into the techniques for controlling slugs and snails, it’s essential to understand their behavior and characteristics. Slugs and snails are gastropods that thrive in damp environments. They’re most active during cool, humid weather and primarily night, seeking shelter during the day to avoid heat that can dry them out. Slugs and snails possess a strong appetite for a wide range of plants, making them a common nuisance for gardeners. By understanding the behavior and preferences of slugs and snails, you can implement targeted strategies to eliminate them from your garden. Methods: Start by making your garden a less desirable place to be for slugs and snails. Clear away garden debris, fallen leaves, and hiding spots to minimize their shelter. Regularly weed and thin out dense vegetation to reduce their hiding places. Creating a dry and airy environment by spacing out plants and improving drainage can discourage these pests. Physical Barriers: Add physical barriers to prevent slugs and snails from getting to your plants. Copper tape or strips around pots, raised beds, or individual plants create an electrical charge for them which sends them away from your plants. You can also create a barrier using diatomaceous earth, crushed eggshells, or coarse sand, which creates an abrasive surface they don’t want to crawl over. I keep our eggshells and run them through the Ninja blender and then keep them in an old plastic bottle with holes in the lid (like a parmesan cheese bottle or Ranch powder bottle)so I can sprinkle them anywhere I need to. Placing copper tape or strips around vulnerable areas can act as a deterrent. Beer Traps: Beer traps are a popular and effective method for luring them and killing them. Bury a shallow dish or jar in the ground making sure the rim is level with the soil surface. Fill the container with beer, which attracts the pests. Slugs and snails will be drawn to the beer, fall in, and drown. Empty and refill the traps regularly for continued success. Beer traps are a popular and effective method for controlling snails and slugs in the garden. Natural Predators: Encourage natural predators of slugs and snails to thrive in your garden. Frogs, toads, birds, and certain beneficial insects like ground beetles and nematodes feed on these pests. Create habitats for these predators by adding bird feeders, water features, and native plants that attract beneficial insects. Avoid using chemical pesticides that may harm these natural predators. Companion Planting: For example, plants with rough or hairy leaves like sage, rosemary, and thyme are less appealing to slugs and snails. This can create a natural deterrent. Plant snail and slug-resistant species or varieties alongside vulnerable plants Organic Controls: Use organic measures to deter and repel slugs and snails. Spread diatomaceous earth (or eggshells as mentioned above) or coffee grounds around vulnerable plants, creating a barrier that is abrasive or repellent to them. Their slimy bodies don’t want dry scratchy things on them so they avoid those. Apply a layer of organic mulch, such as wood chips or straw, which can create an obstacle for their movement and limit moisture retention, making the environment less favorable for them.

I keep our eggshells and run them through the Ninja blender and then keep them in an old plastic bottle with holes in the lid (like a parmesan cheese bottle or Ranch powder bottle)so I can sprinkle them anywhere I need to. Placing copper tape or strips around vulnerable areas can act as a deterrent. Beer Traps: Beer traps are a popular and effective method for luring them and killing them. Bury a shallow dish or jar in the ground making sure the rim is level with the soil surface. Fill the container with beer, which attracts the pests. Slugs and snails will be drawn to the beer, fall in, and drown. Empty and refill the traps regularly for continued success. Beer traps are a popular and effective method for controlling snails and slugs in the garden. Natural Predators: Encourage natural predators of slugs and snails to thrive in your garden. Frogs, toads, birds, and certain beneficial insects like ground beetles and nematodes feed on these pests. Create habitats for these predators by adding bird feeders, water features, and native plants that attract beneficial insects. Avoid using chemical pesticides that may harm these natural predators. Companion Planting: For example, plants with rough or hairy leaves like sage, rosemary, and thyme are less appealing to slugs and snails. This can create a natural deterrent. Plant snail and slug-resistant species or varieties alongside vulnerable plants Organic Controls: Use organic measures to deter and repel slugs and snails. Spread diatomaceous earth (or eggshells as mentioned above) or coffee grounds around vulnerable plants, creating a barrier that is abrasive or repellent to them. Their slimy bodies don’t want dry scratchy things on them so they avoid those.

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Horticulture

Are coffee grounds effective as a slug and snail deterrent?

yes_statement

"coffee" "grounds" are "effective" as a "slug" and "snail" "deterrent".. using "coffee" "grounds" can "effectively" deter "slugs" and "snails".

https://thesegreenfingers.com/are-snails-good-for-plants/

Are Snails Good For Plants? - These Green Fingers

Are Snails Good For Plants? Posted on Published: September 2, 2022 - Last updated: February 2, 2023 We’ve looked at quite a few garden pests recently, and today I wanted to cover snails. Mostly because the wet winter months are taking place and with it come the usual high numbers of slugs and snails. When I am back in the UK visiting family, I see the snail situation from two sides: My dad, who cannot stand to have any around, and removes any snails that he finds from the garden My sister in law, who loves her garden but is more animal lover than garden lover and so allows snails free reign I myself lie in the middle – if the snail in view is not in an area that I consider problematic, I’ll leave it be, and if it is, I’m sorry to say but they get picked up and thrown overboard. So, with my personal feelings out the way, let’s dig into more actual facts about snails and whether they’re actually any good for your garden plants! Are Snails Considered A Pest? Despite what Spongebob Squarepants’ pet snail Gary would have you believe, snails are considered an invasive species and can cause havoc to any garden. Talk to any gardener about pests, and they will most likely place snails near or at the top of that undesirable list. So yes, snails are considered a garden pest. Signs that these slow-moving creatures have invaded your garden include chew holes in leaves and flowers along with a dried up slimy trail. In addition, snails become active and feed during the night, so you might struggle to see the snails scoffing up your garden during the day. The most common variety of snails you will encounter will typically be the Garden snail or Roman snail. When you see telltale signs of snails, it is best to take the necessary steps before they cause significant damage to your plants. Do Snails Do Anything Good For My Garden? While snails are categorized as pests, they bring some positives to the table as long as they stay within the confines of a specific parameter. For example, snails can help clean up garden debris like dead leaves, flowers and plant material. However, garden snails generally prefer to chew on dead leaves as much as possible – yes, it turns out that snails are picky eaters! Additionally, the snail’s feces is rich in nitrogen and minerals, which can act as a natural fertilizer for the soil. Now, this is all well and good if snails stay at ground level, but sadly, they rarely do. Once the banquet of dead leaves is finished, the snails in your garden will have no choice but to climb upwards, towards those tasty green and healthy leaves – and they are excellent climbers. Are Snails Good For My Plants? As we have already touched upon previously, snails can be pretty good for your garden in general… The question is whether you are willing to risk the pros and cons of leaving snails to have free roam of your garden space. Now, snails can speed up the removal of dead plant matter in your garden while enhancing soil fertilization. Having a natural production of nitrogen-rich fertilizer will undeniably improve your plants’ growth, which is what garden snails can provide. As well as being a natural fertilizer factory, snails can also benefit your garden. Since garden snails are regarded as relatively high on the garden food chain, they can keep lower-tier pests in check. Some gardeners also like the aesthetics that snails bring to their gardens. First, however, it would be best to remember how ravenous these slow-mo critters can be. If left unchecked, snails can devour the entire plant from root to flower in record time. They may be slow, but they are speedy eaters and will take every opportunity presented to them to fill their insatiable appetites. Should I Kill Snails That I Find In My Garden? Well, this is controversial! Some gardeners will say that yes, you definitely should, and others will cry shame on you and implore you to allow the snails free roam. While you may be tempted to take advantage of some of the snail’s evident positive contributions to the garden – free fertilizer! – the risks in keeping them really do outweigh the benefits. The damage that snails can inflict on your garden can be devastating to the point that they can ruin plants and trees within the vicinity. So, if you’re not au fait with killing your snails – I’m not! – there are other ways to deal with them included below. How Do I Get Rid Of Snails In My Potted Plants? We have highlighted the dangers of letting snails run (or crawl) rampant in your garden, but the threat is considerably heightened in a potted or container garden. This is because potted plants tend to be more delicate than vegetation planted directly on the earth. As such, if a snail manages to crawl into your potted plants and find a hiding place, it can easily wreck your crops in a matter of days without you realizing it until it is too late. Ask me how I know this. Go on… Fortunately, there are several ways to eliminate snails from your potted plants and they are also deterrents to prevent future infestations. For example, placing snail-deterring plants like ferns and hydrangeas can effectively keep most snails out of reach from your prized plants. Other methods of keeping snails from your garden include: Using chemicals such as pesticides Installing snail traps Using homemade snail-killing solutions Food-grade diatomaceous earth I suggest using pesticides as the last option, as they might harm your plants and house pets as well as the snails. Recommended Snail-Exterminating Method: Vinegar The safest method I can recommend is simply spraying vinegar on every snail you find in your garden. Vinegar is fatal to snails and can kill them quickly with just a couple of sprays from the bottle. Just be careful not to spray the snail if it is munching a plant. Instead, lift off the snail (I always use gloves, because euuw!) and then give it a spray. You can start with a diluted solution of vinegar and water but you may be less effective than a straight up vinegar spray. Recommended Snail-Deterring Method: Salt And Coffee Ground Another alternative you can try is spreading snail repellents around your garden, particularly surrounding your prized and vulnerable plants. A common deterrent is to place a generous amount of salt or coffee grounds on the ground, as snails tend to recoil from touching these two. I recommend going with coffee grounds, though, as salt might cause an imbalance in the soil’s nutrients which can cause adverse effects on specific plants. That and, well, have you ever seen what happens to a slug when you accidentally (as a child of course) cover it in salt? Not cool! Other Snail-Deterrent Methods You Can Try There are other ways to keep snails at bay but these are not as effective as the methods above! Eggshells An alternative to coffee grounds, albeit less effective, is using crushed eggshells. Take a bunch of crushed eggshells and spread them around your potted plants and pots. The sharp edges of the shells are said to make the snails think twice, but my Dad will tell you differently! Homemade Snail Trap You can also place homemade traps around your garden if you think snails have infiltrated your property. One of the most effective snail traps is using a jar and beer as bait. The scent of beer is enticing to snails, so pour a small amount into a jar and bury it halfway underground beside pots you believe snails have damaged. When I was younger my dad used to make homebrew beer, and it came in cans of thick treacle syrup stuff. Once emptied, the cans became great for snail traps, though I will have to check in with him on whether they were actually effective! Using Snail-Deterring Plants Planting snail-resistant plants can also help reduce the risk of snail infestation. Think about planting the following floras while using other snail deterrent methods for the best results: Lavender Garlic Chive Sage Rosemary Geranium Introducing Natural Snail Predators Finally, you could also introduce some natural predators that are partial to a bit of snail for their dinner. Yes snails are indeed quite high on the garden food chain, but they are not the top predators. You can opt to raise farm animals such as chickens and ducks as these love to eat snails. Introducing frogs (yes, you’ll need a small pond, but hey-ho!), snail-eating beetles, or enticing birds into your garden can also keep the snail population in your garden closer to zero. And introducing these other animals into the ecosystem of your garden means keeping their population in check too, especially frogs and beetles. Just note that your lovely pet cat is unlikely to be very helpful as a predator if they spot a lethargic snail meandering along your roof top garden. Mine simply watches them with a sleep half open eye, content that they move too slow to cause any real damage to anything or anyone! Now that the nights are drawing in faster and the rain is more abundant, I’ll be making sure to check the plants I have left in my flower pots thoroughly each day this winter. My local snails can get their meals from my neighbors this winter! Do you use any of the above tips for managing the snail population of your garden? Perhaps you have suggestions for other readers? Let me know in the comments!

A common deterrent is to place a generous amount of salt or coffee grounds on the ground, as snails tend to recoil from touching these two. I recommend going with coffee grounds, though, as salt might cause an imbalance in the soil’s nutrients which can cause adverse effects on specific plants. That and, well, have you ever seen what happens to a slug when you accidentally (as a child of course) cover it in salt? Not cool! Other Snail-Deterrent Methods You Can Try There are other ways to keep snails at bay but these are not as effective as the methods above! Eggshells An alternative to coffee grounds, albeit less effective, is using crushed eggshells. Take a bunch of crushed eggshells and spread them around your potted plants and pots. The sharp edges of the shells are said to make the snails think twice, but my Dad will tell you differently! Homemade Snail Trap You can also place homemade traps around your garden if you think snails have infiltrated your property. One of the most effective snail traps is using a jar and beer as bait. The scent of beer is enticing to snails, so pour a small amount into a jar and bury it halfway underground beside pots you believe snails have damaged. When I was younger my dad used to make homebrew beer, and it came in cans of thick treacle syrup stuff. Once emptied, the cans became great for snail traps, though I will have to check in with him on whether they were actually effective! Using Snail-Deterring Plants Planting snail-resistant plants can also help reduce the risk of snail infestation. Think about planting the following floras while using other snail deterrent methods for the best results: Lavender Garlic Chive Sage Rosemary Geranium Introducing Natural Snail Predators Finally, you could also introduce some natural predators that are partial to a bit of snail for their dinner.

yes

Horticulture

Are coffee grounds effective as a slug and snail deterrent?

yes_statement

"coffee" "grounds" are "effective" as a "slug" and "snail" "deterrent".. using "coffee" "grounds" can "effectively" deter "slugs" and "snails".

https://gardeniaorganic.com/homemade-snail-killer-effective-coffee-grounds-solution/

Homemade Snail Killer: Effective Coffee Grounds Solution ...

Homemade Snail Killer: Effective Coffee Grounds Solution As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. It supports the website. So, Thank you. ❤️ If snails are attacking your plants or vegetable patch. Then you may be looking for a natural way to keep them away or even kill them. These slimy creatures are notorious for eating away at our precious flowers, fruits, and vegetables. Like many others, I have searched for ways to protect my garden from snails without turning to harsh chemicals. Fortunately, I’ve discovered that there are several homemade snail killers that are not only effective, but also safe for the environment and our plants. These natural remedies offer an affordable and eco-friendly solution to protecting our garden from these voracious creatures. So, without further ado, let me share with you some of the best homemade snail killers I have come across. Why Homemade Snail Killers? As a gardener, I always look for ways to protect my plants while keeping the environment safe. I’ve found that homemade snail killers offer a more natural and environmentally friendly option for controlling these pests. report this ad By using homemade solutions, I can ensure my garden remains free from harmful chemicals that can damage soil, beneficial insects, and even my own health. Moreover, making my own snail killer allows me to save money on commercial pesticides. I love finding low-cost, DIY alternatives to store-bought products, and homemade snail killers are definitely a cost-effective solution.It’s not just snails that can be chased away with natural methods. Plus, many of the ingredients used in these methods can easily be found in my kitchen, making it practical and convenient. report this ad Another great advantage of using homemade snail killers is that they are safe for pets and children. I always worry about using hazardous chemicals around my family, but with natural remedies like vinegar, coffee, or beer, I can have peace of mind knowing my loved ones and pets are safe from harm. My preference for homemade snail killers comes from the variety of methods available, each targeting snails in different ways. For example, I can use beer traps to lure snails, apply garlic spray to repel them or sprinkle crushed eggshells around my plants as a deterrent. This flexibility allows me to experiment with different techniques and find the most effective solution for my garden. Using homemade snail killers also helps me play an active role in preserving and maintaining air quality. Instead of relying on chemical pesticides that can contribute to air pollution, I choose natural alternatives that have a lower impact on the environment. Eco-Friendly Homemade Snail Killers As someone who loves gardening, I’m always on the lookout for eco-friendly solutions to common problems. One issue that frequently arises is the presence of snails and slugs in the garden. In this section, I’ll share some of my favorite homemade snail killers that are both effective and kind to the environment. Beer Traps I’ve found beer traps to be one of the easiest and most effective solutions for getting rid of snails. Just grab a small container, like a plastic cup or a deep plate, and bury it halfway in the ground. Next, fill it with beer — they can’t resist the smell. Due to the sides of the container, the snails will eventually get trapped in the beer and drown. This method is great because it utilizes a common household item and is safe for the environment. Just remember to clean out the trap regularly and refill it with fresh beer. Diatomaceous Earth Diatomaceous earth is a fantastic eco-friendly option for battling snails and slugs. Made from the fossilized remains of tiny aquatic organisms called diatoms, it acts as a natural abrasive. Sprinkle diatomaceous earth around the garden, creating a barrier around the plants you want to protect. When snails or slugs come into contact with the powder, it damages their slimy coating, ultimately resulting in dehydration and death. Be aware, though, that diatomaceous earth can be harmful to helpful insects, so use it sparingly and cautiously. Eggshells Another method I like is using crushed eggshells as a natural snail repellent. Not only is this a great way to reuse kitchen waste, but it’s also effective and safe for the environment. After you’ve crushed the eggshells, sprinkle them around your plants to create a sharp barrier that snails won’t want to cross. The eggshells will not only deter snails and slugs but will also add valuable nutrients to the soil as they break down. Coffee Grounds A surprising but effective method and my favorite for keeping snails at bay is to use coffee grounds. Sprinkle used coffee grounds around your plants, and the caffeine will repel snails and slugs. The coffee grounds will also help fertilize the soil, providing additional benefits to your garden. To ensure the effectiveness of this method, make sure to replace the grounds every week or so. This video show a great test to see if slugs travelled over coffee grounds or choose the easier option. 19 times out of 20 they avoided the coffee grounds at all costs. Chemical-Free Barrier Methods As someone who enjoys gardening, I understand the importance of protecting my plants from snails and slugs. In this section, let me share with you some chemical-free barrier methods, which include using copper tape and mesh, as well as vaseline and salt. Copper Tape and Mesh My personal favorite is using copper materials, as this metal has proven effective in deterring snails and slugs from accessing my precious plants. Why? Because copper creates an electric shock for the gastropods when they come into contact with it. What I usually do is place a strip of copper tape around the rim of my pots, or attach a piece of copper mesh around the base of my plants. These copper barriers effectively repel snails and slugs, ensuring a pest-free environment for my plants to thrive. Vaseline and Salt Another chemical-free barrier method I’ve used is applying vaseline (petroleum jelly) on the edges of my plant pots. Since snails and slugs don’t like the sticky texture of vaseline, this prevents them from climbing into my pots. When dealing with a mild infestation, I also use salt as a snail killer. A simple trick is sprinkling some salt around the plants. But be cautious: excessive salt use can damage plants. In my experience, pairing salt with vaseline creates an effective double-barrier against snails and slugs. Protecting my plants from snails and slugs is essential for maintaining their health and beauty, and chemical-free barrier methods are an eco-friendly way to do so. I hope these tips help you create a thriving garden, just like mine! Natural Predators As I’ve explored various methods to control snail populations, I’ve discovered that inviting their natural predators into my garden is an effective and eco-friendly approach. Some of the key players in keeping snails at bay include birds and hedgehogs, decollate snails, and nematodes. Birds and Hedgehogs Welcoming birds and hedgehogs into my garden has proven helpful in controlling snail populations. These creatures enjoy snails as part of their diet and can significantly reduce the number of pests munching on my plants. I’ve found that providing shelter, such as birdhouses and hedgehog homes, along with fresh water sources, helps attract these helpful critters to my garden. Additionally, keeping the garden chemical-free ensures a safe environment for them to thrive (Gardening Know How). Decollate Snails Another interesting predator I’ve considered for snail control is the decollate snail. These carnivorous snails feed on the smaller, plant-eating snails that damage our gardens. Introducing decollate snails can be an effective way to naturally reduce the population of garden snails. However, it’s important to research and ensure you are introducing decollate snails to an environment where they won’t cause problems in terms of plant safety or local ecology. Nematodes One lesser known option for controlling snails is the introduction of beneficial nematodes. These microscopic organisms can effectively reduce snail numbers by attacking and killing the eggs and juveniles. Nematodes are sometimes commercially available and can be added to the soil in moist, shaded areas of the garden where snails are most likely to gather. They pose no threat to plants, animals, or humans, making them an excellent choice for eco-friendly snail control (VerminKill). In conclusion, using snails’ natural predators to keep their populations in check is not only effective but also safe for both my garden and the surrounding ecosystem. It’s essential to choose the right predator for your specific situation and ensure that you maintain a healthy environment for them to thrive. Preventive Measures In this section, I’ll discuss a few preventive measures that can help reduce the need for homemade snail killers. By implementing these practices in your garden, you can reduce the chances of snail and slug infestations. Clearing Debris One effective way to prevent snails and slugs from invading your garden is to clear any debris that may provide them with hiding spots. I personally make sure to remove fallen leaves, excess mulch, and other decaying organic matter. This not only keeps the garden looking neat, but also makes it harder for snails and slugs to find a suitable habitat. Tips Bulletin suggests using wood pellets to repel slugs, which can be spread around the garden to deter these pests while also helping to keep the area clear of debris. Proper Watering I’ve found that proper watering techniques can go a long way in preventing snail and slug issues. By watering my plants early in the morning, I give the soil time to dry out during the day, making it less hospitable for snails and slugs, which prefer moist environments. It’s also essential to avoid overwatering, as soggy soil can attract these pests. Choosing Resistant Plant Types To minimize the likelihood of snail and slug infestations, I opt for plant types that are less susceptible to attack. For example, plants with thicker leaves or strong scents can be less appealing to these pests. Additionally, incorporating natural snail repellents like coffee grounds or copper tape around the base of susceptible plants can provide an extra layer of protection. By implementing these preventive measures, I can significantly reduce the number of snails and slugs in my garden, making it less necessary to rely on homemade snail killers. Remember, the key is to create an environment that’s less attractive to these pests, and maintaining a clean, well-watered, and thoughtfully planted garden can go a long way in achieving that goal. Conclusion In my experience, using homemade snail killers has proven to be an effective and eco-friendly way to manage these garden pests. I even found that some methods, like the ammonia recipe, not only help eliminate snails but also provided my plants with a nitrogen boost. This, in turn, promoted healthier growth, making my garden more resilient against future infestations. Overall, I believe that trying out different homemade solutions is a great way to discover what works best for your particular garden situation. By experimenting with various options, I’ve been able to maintain a thriving and snail-free garden environment while reducing my reliance on potentially harmful chemicals.

Not only is this a great way to reuse kitchen waste, but it’s also effective and safe for the environment. After you’ve crushed the eggshells, sprinkle them around your plants to create a sharp barrier that snails won’t want to cross. The eggshells will not only deter snails and slugs but will also add valuable nutrients to the soil as they break down. Coffee Grounds A surprising but effective method and my favorite for keeping snails at bay is to use coffee grounds. Sprinkle used coffee grounds around your plants, and the caffeine will repel snails and slugs. The coffee grounds will also help fertilize the soil, providing additional benefits to your garden. To ensure the effectiveness of this method, make sure to replace the grounds every week or so. This video show a great test to see if slugs travelled over coffee grounds or choose the easier option. 19 times out of 20 they avoided the coffee grounds at all costs. Chemical-Free Barrier Methods As someone who enjoys gardening , I understand the importance of protecting my plants from snails and slugs. In this section, let me share with you some chemical-free barrier methods, which include using copper tape and mesh, as well as vaseline and salt. Copper Tape and Mesh My personal favorite is using copper materials, as this metal has proven effective in deterring snails and slugs from accessing my precious plants. Why? Because copper creates an electric shock for the gastropods when they come into contact with it. What I usually do is place a strip of copper tape around the rim of my pots, or attach a piece of copper mesh around the base of my plants. These copper barriers effectively repel snails and slugs, ensuring a pest-free environment for my plants to thrive. Vaseline and Salt Another chemical-free barrier method I’ve used is applying vaseline (petroleum jelly) on the edges of my plant pots.

yes

Horticulture

Are coffee grounds effective as a slug and snail deterrent?

yes_statement

"coffee" "grounds" are "effective" as a "slug" and "snail" "deterrent".. using "coffee" "grounds" can "effectively" deter "slugs" and "snails".

https://www.gardeningchores.com/get-rid-of-slugs-in-the-garden-organically/

How to Get Rid of Slugs & Snails in the Garden and Stop Them ...

How to Get Rid of Slugs And Snails in the Garden and Stop Them From Eating Your Plants Slugs and, in a lesser evil, snails are considered a nightmare by many gardeners: they are slimy, strange looking, and emerge in the dark of night to devour newly planted seedlings, very tender leaves and ravaging your young shoots. Because slugs are nocturnal, it can be hard to pinpoint them as the culprit when garden damage is discovered, but once the mystery is solved, growers often turn to poisonous traps or baits to deal with these unusual creatures. I invite you to reconsider. Slugs are actually fascinating, gentle animals, and are also an important food source for other creatures that are beneficial to a garden ecosystem. While poisons do work, there are many other methods to getting rid of slugs in the garden while preserving biodiversity in your garden. In this post, we will explore the numerous slug and snails control tips for dealing with garden slugs, including garden management, slug deterrents, humane trapping, encouraging slug predators, and, if necessary, poisonous traps and baits. But before we dig into that, let’s get to know slugs and their life cycle, and understand how to recognize them and their damage in the garden. What Are Slugs? Slugs are a common garden pest that can damage established plants and destroy seedlings overnight. While they may frustrate gardeners and devastate crops if left unchecked, beyond these negatives, slugs are captivating creatures. Let’s take a moment to understand and appreciate them–and then discuss how to get them out of the garden. A common misperception is that slugs are a kind of insect or worm, but neither is true. Slugs are actually a soft-bodied, land-living mollusk, which makes them related to clams, mussels, scallops, octopi, and squid. Slugs are also closely related to snails, and all of the strategies outlined here to combat slugs in the garden will work on snails, too. Slugs are hermaphroditic. This means that each individual slug possesses both male and female sex organs, so every slug has the power to lay eggs (that’s good news for slugs, bad news for gardeners). Slugs mate with each other, but self-fertilization is possible. Slugs are also nocturnal creatures. They feed and are active at night and disappear during the day, which can make it difficult to pinpoint when slugs are the cause of garden damage, unless you know what clues to look for. Slugs have an important role to play in the food chain, as well. They provide sustenance for many creatures–birds, insects, reptiles, and amphibians, and a few mammals–many of which are good for the garden. The complete removal of slugs would upset this careful balance, so the goal doesn’t need to be total eradication, but relocation or reduction of the population–enough that you can garden in peace. The Slug Life Cycle The average lifespan of a garden slug is one to two years. They are able to survive cold winters by burrowing underground. Slugs can lay up to 300 eggs per year, typically in clutches of 10-50 eggs, depending on the species. The time it takes for a slug to reach reproductive age varies by species, but most garden slugs mature in 5-6 months. Slugs hatched in the spring will mature over the summer and lay eggs in the fall, which will hatch in the spring. However, slugs can lay eggs any time of year if the conditions are right, and the time it takes for eggs to hatch is determined by the temperature and moisture levels in the environment. Should the weather become too cold or dry for the eggs before they hatch, they can remain dormant for years until conditions improve. Because slugs lay eggs throughout the year, there may be overlapping generations of slugs, and slugs of all life stages, in the garden at any time. How to Identify Slug or Snail Damage On Plants Slugs are typically brown, grey, or orangish in color, and most are between 1-3 inches long. They can be found during the day hiding out in moist, protected areas of the garden, such as in wood chip piles. During the night, when they are active, they can be found openly feeding in the garden. Because slugs are only active at night, learning to correctly identify slug damage through clues that are available during the day is key. Slug damage is often mistaken for insect damage, leading gardeners to apply insecticides and other strategies that are ineffective against slugs, and potentially damaging to beneficial insects. Slugs tend to target certain plants, so look for evidence of their presence on and around some of their favorite foods: tender lettuces, seedlings, cabbages, kale, strawberries, and hostas. Here are four signs of slug damage to look out for: 1:The Mucus Trail If you suspect slugs in the garden, a telltale sign to look for is the slimy, shiny mucus trail they leave in their wake. This mucus trail is what helps them move, so you’ll find it wherever they’ve been, if you look carefully and it hasn’t been disturbed: on the soil surface, the leaves of plants, and any object in the garden. Morning is the best time to look for a mucus trail. 2:Round, Irregular Holes Slug damage itself is very specific. Because slugs have thousands of grater-like teeth, when they eat, they leave round holes with irregular edges. These holes can be in the middle or edge of leaves, or even on fruits such as strawberries or tomatoes. 3:Disappearing Seedlings Young seedlings are particularly vulnerable to slugs, because a slug (or several) can devour an entire seedling in one night. If your seedlings disappear, or if the leaves are gone and nothing but the stem and midribs remain, this is indicative of slug damage. 4:Underground Damage Slugs spend a great deal of time underground, where they can cause damage to root systems, tubers, and seeds. If a significant amount of your seeds fail to germinate, or your potatoes are chewed up, slugs may be the cause. 4 Ways to Get Rid of Slugs in Your Garden Naturally If you’ve identified slugs (or slug damage) in your garden, then it’s time to act. There are five main strategies for dealing with slugs in the garden: preventative garden management, slug deterrents, trapping, encouraging predators, and killing slugs. Let’s look at each strategy in detail. Garden Management to Prevent Slug Infestations If slugs don’t find your garden appealing, they will go elsewhere to live and reproduce. Try the following methods to prevent slugs from setting up shop in your garden: 1:Use Fine Mulch Slugs love burrowing under bulky mulches like large wood chips, hay, and straw. These mulches create a moist environment with lots of protected places to hide, sleep, and lay eggs. Switching over to a fine mulch such as finely shredded bark, compost, or leaf mold will discourage slugs. Oak leaf mold is particularly effective because oak leaves are thought to repel slugs. 2:Keep Your Garden Tidy Eliminating these hiding places by keeping your garden tidy and clean will help discourage slugs from spending time there. 3:Plant a Diversity of Crops Slugs prefer a buffet of their favorite foods, and one study of slug behavior noted that slugs ate 40 percent less in an environment with a wide diversity of plants. Apparently, they did not enjoy having to constantly switch their diet. Having a wide range of crops in a small area may discourage them in your garden, too. 4:Encourage Worms in Your Garden The same study found that the presence of worms decreased slug damage by 60 percent, possibly because the worms helped plants protect themselves from slugs by increasing the amount of nitrogen containing toxins in their leaves. Regardless, an abundance of worms in your garden is a good thing. You can create your own vermiculture bin and regularly add worms from the bin to your soil, but good garden practices such as creating healthy soil with significant amounts of organic matter will attract worms to your garden, too. 5:Convert to a Drip Irrigation System Drip irrigation precisely targets plants and their root systems. A drip system will reduce overall moisture in your garden while still sufficiently watering your plants, making your beds less hospitable to moisture-loving slugs. In addition, drip irrigation is far more efficient and will save both time and water compared to manual overhead watering. Even if you don’t switch over to a drip irrigation system, taking care not to overwater will help prevent a slug infestation by reducing wet areas. Just make sure not to go too far by underwatering your garden instead. 6:Water in the Morning Regardless of the watering system you use, water in the morning. This will give excess moisture in your garden an opportunity to dry out by nightfall, again making your garden less of a desirable habitat for slugs. Beyond some basic changes in garden management, there are a number of ways to make your garden less enticing to slugs, and make your plants harder to reach. The following methods will stop slugs and snails from eating your plants: 1:Use Garden Cloches As A Protection Against Snails And Slugs Cloches are a great way to protect seedlings from being devoured by slugs. Cloches are small, inverted containers made of glass or plastic that protect seedlings from pests, including snails and slugs. Inexpensive plastic cloches can be purchased online or at your local garden center. It’s also easy to make your own: Use an empty water bottle, milk jug, or similar container. Cut the bottom off the container and place your DIY cloche over your seedling. Be sure to remove the cap of the container; this vents the cloche, allowing excess heat to escape. 2: Use Cardboard Collar To Protect Your Plants To protect larger plants from slugs and snails that won’t fit under a cloche, use a cardboard collar instead. Simply take a piece of cardboard about 6-8 inches high, bend it into a circle or square that fits around the base of your plant, and attach the edges. Press the collar an inch or two into the soil to secure it in place. The collar will make it more difficult for a slug to reach your plants. 3:Use Sheep’s Wool Pellets Against Slugs and Snails Wool pellets (sold under the brand name “Slug Gone”), are another effective barrier against garden slugs. The pellets are made from 100% waste wool condensed into a pellet form. To use, simply arrange the pellets around the base of the plants you want to protect, then water in. The water will cause the pellets to expand and felt together into a layer of wool that slugs will not want to cross. Their skin will be irritated by the scratchy texture of the fibers, and the wool itself will draw precious moisture from their bodies. 4:Make Slug And Snail Barrier With Copper Tape When slugs touch copper, they experience a slight electrical shock. In most instances, this shock is enough to get them to turn around–away from your plants. You can apply copper tape in a border on the soil around specific plants. It’s also effective when attached to the edge of a raised bed, where it will protect the entire bed. 5: Install Miniature Electric Fence credit: WHELDOT / imgur In the same way as copper tape, a miniature “electric fence” around your raised bed will stop slugs in their tracks. You can make an electric fence to deter slugs with lengths of galvanized steel wire (18 to 22 gauge) and a single 9 volt battery and battery connector. Staple the wire around the length of the outer sides of your raised beds, using two lengths of parallel wire spaced ¾” apart. Attach to the connector and battering, enclosing both in a plastic box in order to protect them from the elements. The 9 volt battery will be intense enough to discourage slugs but not kill them. 6: Apply Diatomaceous Earth Diatomaceous earth (DE), when sprinkled in a thin but solid layer on the soil, will slow down and discourage slugs, but it’s not the most reliable method for deterring them (it’s also a myth that it kills them). DE does kill insects, both pests and pollinators, so if you do choose to use it, it’s best to apply it in the evening, when bees aren’t active, or to avoid it entirely during the flowering stage. Although DE isn’t the most effective slug deterrent, it does have some effect, and you may already have some on hand from other projects. 7:Keep Slugs Away With Repellent Plants Slugs gravitate toward certain plants, namely lettuce, and are repelled by others. They are turned away by highly fragrant plants, such as rosemary, lavender, or mint. They also dislike plants with fuzzy or furry foliage such as geraniums. Plant these in your garden, near slugs’ favorite foods if possible, to ward off slugs. 8:Create a Slug Garden This method is more of a distraction than a deterrent, but it is still effective. Keep slugs and snails out of your garden by attracting them to a space away from the vegetable garden that they will love even more. This is an area that you can sacrifice to the slugs, allowing them free reign, or you can choose to use this area as a trap, making it easier to relocate or kill the slugs. To make a slug garden, create a space that is well-watered and moist, with the kinds of mulches they favor (large wood chips, hay, straw), and that contain their preferred crops, such as tender lettuces. You can also add logs, planks of wood, and other places for them to hide. How to Humanely Collect or Trap Slugs While good garden management and deterrents are effective, if you have a large slug infestation in your garden and are seeing a lot of slug damage, you may want to take your efforts a step further and decrease the slug population by collecting or trapping them. Be sure to wear gloves when handling slugs as they can carry pathogens. Once you’ve gathered a large number of slugs, you can relocate them somewhere far from your garden. You don’t need to drive them anywhere; research has shown that a relocation of just 65 feet is far enough away to prevent slugs from returning to your garden. Or, if you choose to, you can kill the slugs by placing them in a bucket of hot soapy water (the water must be hot for this to work). If you have poultry, your birds will enjoy slugs as a nutritious treat, but don’t feed them too many at once. Slugs carry parasites such as roundworm and gapeworm that can make your flock ill. Collecting slugs by hand is the easiest, most direct way to cut down the slug population in your garden. After night has fallen, grab a headlamp or flashlight and a bucket and head out to the garden. You’ll be able to see the slugs in action, wreaking havoc on your garden, and easily pick them right off your plants. While slugs are nocturnal, you don’t have to be a night owl to catch them. If you don’t want to stay up late to collect them by hand, you can make a trap instead: an irresistible place for them to rest during the day, where you can collect them with ease. Unlike some slug traps, these methods are humane and will not kill the slugs. Dig a small hole (about 6” deep and wide) and cover the hole with a board. Or, simply lay a large board or thick sheet of damp cardboard directly on the ground. Slugs will be attracted to these areas as a great place to rest during the day, at which point you can turn over the boards, scrape the slugs into a bucket, and relocate. Encourage Slug Predators in the Garden As mentioned earlier, slugs hold a vital place in the food chain. You can naturally lower the slug population by encouraging the presence of slug predators, many of which are beneficial to your garden. Here are some common slug predators and how to encourage their presence in your garden: 1:Amphibians and Reptiles Snakes, frogs, toads, and salamanders–all these creatures and more will prey on slugs. They love to hunker down in the same moist, sheltered environments that attract slugs: under thick mulches, old boards, and mossy logs. An added benefit to humane slug traps or a dedicated slug garden is that these spaces will also attract their predators. 2:Ground Beetles There are over 2,000 species of ground beetle. Like slugs, ground beetles are active at night and prey on many pests–especially slugs! You can encourage the presence of ground beetles in your garden by building a “beetle bank,” an ideal habitat for them. Ground beetles love raised, grassy areas where they can escape from moisture and enjoy protection from the tall grass. Create a beetle bank by making a berm or mound of soil about 18” high and two to four feet wide. Plant with several species of native bunchgrass and continue to water until the grasses are established. An added benefit is that the bank will attract and house other beneficial insect species, too! 3:Birds Birds will feast on young slugs, which are often prevalent in early spring. Attract birds to your garden during this time of year with bird feeders, suet cakes, and birdbaths. 4:Nematodes Nematodes are microscopic worms naturally found in soil, but you can easily increase their population. Nematodes are available online or at your local garden center, and can simply be mixed with water and added to your soil. For best results, dose your garden with nematodes three consecutive times (spring/fall/spring or fall/spring/fall) and then follow up with one more application 18 months later. Nematodes don’t eat slugs directly, but instead kill and feed off of their eggs. You may not find a significant difference in the slug population during the first year of nematode application, but expect to see a big drop in the second year. 5:Fireflies Firefly larvae feast on slugs, snails, and worms. Refraining from the use of insecticides in your garden will support the firefly population, along with that of other beneficial insects. Fireflies are also attracted to tall grasses, water features, and wood piles. How to Kill Garden Slugs And Snails Finally, let’s discuss methods for killing slugs. If all else fails, you may need to resort to these trapping or poisoning methods in order to save your garden. 1:Use Beer As A Slug Trap Slugs are attracted to the yeast in beer, so beer traps are an effective method against them. They will crawl into the trap and drown, or be killed by the ethanol in the beer. To make a beer trap, all you need is a small container (like a plastic cup) and a cheap beer. Bury the cup in the soil until the rim is just above soil level, and fill with several inches of beer. These traps will quickly become a disgusting mess of beer and dead snails, so be sure to refresh the traps every day or so until the infestation is under control. Note: You may have heard that cornmeal traps will also kill slugs, due to the cornmeal rapidly expanding inside their bodies and causing their stomachs to explode. This is a myth, and cornmeal traps are not an effective treatment for slugs. So stick to the beer! 2:Iron Phosphate Pellets Iron phosphate pellets, sold under the brand name “Sluggo,” will kill and control snails and slugs. Sprinkle a teaspoon of Sluggo bait over one square yard of ground around the plants you’d like to protect. After ingesting the pellets, slugs will stop feeding and die within 3-6 days. Sluggo is working even if you don’t see dead slugs; slugs will usually retreat to a dark, secluded area to die. Iron phosphate is a naturally occurring substance, and any uneaten pellets will break down and be absorbed by the soil. Sluggo is approved for use in organic agriculture and is considered safe to use. But even organic farmers have restrictions on how they can use Sluggo. They must be using other, non-chemical methods to reduce and discourage slugs and decrease the need for bait before applying Sluggo. It’s best to emulate these organic farmers and use Sluggo after you’ve employed other methods. Sluggo isn’t without risk. It can sicken mammals, such as dogs, who cannot excrete the extra iron ingested from Sluggo. However, if you follow the application directions, using only a small amount and spreading it thoroughly, a dog is unlikely to be able to eat enough Sluggo to get sick. If you do use Sluggo, make sure to use the original Sluggo product, instead of newer variations such as Sluggo Plus or Iron Fist. The original Sluggo contains one active ingredient: iron phosphate. Later products such as Sluggo Plus contain spinosad, a toxin that kills many insects including the roving beetle, which helps control snails and slugs. Some slug poisons also contain sodium ferric EDTA, a chemical which drastically reduces the earthworm population and has increased risk to pets and other mammals. 3:Poisons to Avoid Avoid any slug poisons that contain either metaldehyde or methiocarb. These ingredients are both toxic to mammals, even in small amounts, and are not safe for pets. Ammonia or alcohol sprays are sometimes recommended as slug poisons, but these sprays also risk burning your plants and harming insects that come into contact with them. Since sprays also require direct contact with slugs, they aren’t any easier than collection or trapping methods, so there’s really no advantage to them. Slug Deterrent Methods That Are Myths? Two common myths about slugs is that they can be discouraged by coffee grounds or ground eggshells. Neither of these is an effective slug deterrent, so save them both for the compost pile. Final Thoughts As you can see, even though slugs can cause quite a bit of damage in the garden, there are a multitude of ways to deal with them effectively–and humanely, if you prefer. By employing any or several of the strategies outlined above, your garden will be protected from slugs and you’ll be enjoying an unblemished harvest once again. Amber Noyes was born and raised in a suburban California town, San Mateo. She holds a master's degree in horticulture from the University of California as well as a BS in Biology from the University of San Francisco. With experience working on an organic farm, water conservation research, farmers' markets, and plant nursery, she understands what makes plants thrive and how we can better understand the connection between microclimate and plant health. When she’s not on the land, Amber loves informing people of new ideas/things related to gardening, especially organic gardening, houseplants, and growing plants in a small space. 1 thought on “How to Get Rid of Slugs And Snails in the Garden and Stop Them From Eating Your Plants” Slugs are not good for gardens. People should regularly check for the presence of slugs and remove them from yards as quickly as possible. These creatures like wet and cool areas, so pay special attention to those places. One should take note of any slimy trails as well.

It can sicken mammals, such as dogs, who cannot excrete the extra iron ingested from Sluggo. However, if you follow the application directions, using only a small amount and spreading it thoroughly, a dog is unlikely to be able to eat enough Sluggo to get sick. If you do use Sluggo, make sure to use the original Sluggo product, instead of newer variations such as Sluggo Plus or Iron Fist. The original Sluggo contains one active ingredient: iron phosphate. Later products such as Sluggo Plus contain spinosad, a toxin that kills many insects including the roving beetle, which helps control snails and slugs. Some slug poisons also contain sodium ferric EDTA, a chemical which drastically reduces the earthworm population and has increased risk to pets and other mammals. 3:Poisons to Avoid Avoid any slug poisons that contain either metaldehyde or methiocarb. These ingredients are both toxic to mammals, even in small amounts, and are not safe for pets. Ammonia or alcohol sprays are sometimes recommended as slug poisons, but these sprays also risk burning your plants and harming insects that come into contact with them. Since sprays also require direct contact with slugs, they aren’t any easier than collection or trapping methods, so there’s really no advantage to them. Slug Deterrent Methods That Are Myths? Two common myths about slugs is that they can be discouraged by coffee grounds or ground eggshells. Neither of these is an effective slug deterrent, so save them both for the compost pile. Final Thoughts As you can see, even though slugs can cause quite a bit of damage in the garden, there are a multitude of ways to deal with them effectively–and humanely, if you prefer. By employing any or several of the strategies outlined above, your garden will be protected from slugs and you’ll be enjoying an unblemished harvest once again. Amber Noyes was born and raised in a suburban California town, San Mateo.

no

Ethology

Are cows more dangerous than sharks?

yes_statement

"cows" are more "dangerous" than "sharks".. "sharks" are less "dangerous" than "cows".

https://abcnews.go.com/Health/shark-versus-cow-deadlier/story?id=24931705

Shark Versus Cow: Which Is Deadlier? - ABC News

Shark Versus Cow: Which Is Deadlier? August 11, 2014&#151; -- intro: Despite their terrifying reputation as cold-blooded killing machines, once sharks get a taste of human flesh, they rarely come back for a second bite, according to the Discovery Channel, which is in the midst of its annual Shark Week. In fact, sharks kill only about four people a year worldwide and only one in the U.S., according to the nonprofit organization Oceana. Sharks aren't even close to being the most deadly animal on Earth. Here are five creatures that are -- perhaps surprisingly -- more likely to lead to your demise than a shark. quicklist:1category: title: Hipposurl:text: They reach up to 15 feet in length and weigh up to three and a half tons. They can sprint up to 20 miles an hour and their 20-inch teeth never stop growing. And, according to the Bill Gates Foundation, Hippopotamus kill up to 500 people a year. Of course, there aren't any reports of death by Hippo on urban streets. Most hippo deaths take place in the wilds of Africa, with one study verifying an average of 30 people a year are killed by hippos in the country of Mozambique alone. In Africa, crocs and elephants are the only land animals more deadly.media:24931166 quicklist:2category:title: Cowsurl:text: Cows may look docile but they kill more than five times the number of people that sharks do. Using statistics from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, one research study reported an average of 22 deaths a year by bovines, typically due to stomping or goring. The study noted that horses are also pretty lethal, causing up to 20 deaths per year. Agricultural workers are among the groups at greatest risk of "death by mammal," a category that also lists cats, pigs and raccoons as the cause of death.media:24931485 quicklist:3category: title: Dogsurl:text: Man's best friend is high up on the list of killer critters. CDC statistics show nearly 4.5 million Americans are bitten by dogs each year. Half of dog bite victims are children. Though only about 40 canine bites a year are fatal according to the group dogsbite.org, the CDC reports that nearly 27,000 people require reconstructive surgery yearly as the result of a dog bite. For the record, dogsbite.org identifies pit bulls as the most dangerous dog breed, claiming they account for over 60 percent of reported attacks. Rottweilers, American bull dogs and huskies round out the list of top canine chompers. media:24931315 quicklist:4category:title: Snails url:text:They aren't large and their top speed is only about three feet per hour, but the United States Agency for International Development lists snails as one of the top killers on the planet. More accurately, certain fresh water snails carry parasitic worms that in turn carry a deadly disease known as schistosomiasis. When humans come into contact with water where these snails live they can become infected and die of organ failure. In sub-Saharan Africa, schistosomiasis is the second leading cause of death after malaria, with more than 200,000 deaths per year reported.media:24931024 quicklist:5category: title: Antsurl:text: Death by teeny tiny ant is becoming more common and is almost certainly more common than death by shark -- though reliable statistics of ant deaths are hard to come by. We do know that insect stings send more than 500,000 Americans to emergency rooms every year, according to the American College of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology, and more than 40 people die annually from insect sting anaphylaxis. A recent study listed 280 species of ants throughout the world capable of causing fatalities in humans. The red fire ant, species that has invaded the southeastern part of the U.S. from Asia, stings an estimated 14 million people annually, according to entomological studies done at Texas A&M University. Up to six percent of the population has a severe reaction to their stings and a number of deaths have recently reported. Last year, a woman in Georgia died shortly after being attacked by a swarm of red fire ants. media:24931216

Shark Versus Cow: Which Is Deadlier? August 11, 2014&#151; -- intro: Despite their terrifying reputation as cold-blooded killing machines, once sharks get a taste of human flesh, they rarely come back for a second bite, according to the Discovery Channel, which is in the midst of its annual Shark Week. In fact, sharks kill only about four people a year worldwide and only one in the U.S., according to the nonprofit organization Oceana. Sharks aren't even close to being the most deadly animal on Earth. Here are five creatures that are -- perhaps surprisingly -- more likely to lead to your demise than a shark. quicklist:1category: title: Hipposurl:text: They reach up to 15 feet in length and weigh up to three and a half tons. They can sprint up to 20 miles an hour and their 20-inch teeth never stop growing. And, according to the Bill Gates Foundation, Hippopotamus kill up to 500 people a year. Of course, there aren't any reports of death by Hippo on urban streets. Most hippo deaths take place in the wilds of Africa, with one study verifying an average of 30 people a year are killed by hippos in the country of Mozambique alone. In Africa, crocs and elephants are the only land animals more deadly.media:24931166 quicklist:2category:title: Cowsurl:text: Cows may look docile but they kill more than five times the number of people that sharks do. Using statistics from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, one research study reported an average of 22 deaths a year by bovines, typically due to stomping or goring. The study noted that horses are also pretty lethal, causing up to 20 deaths per year.

yes

Ethology

Are cows more dangerous than sharks?

yes_statement

"cows" are more "dangerous" than "sharks".. "sharks" are less "dangerous" than "cows".

https://www.diveninjaexpeditions.com/more-dangerous-sharks-1/

So What's More Dangerous Than Sharks? #1

So What’s More Dangerous Than Sharks? #1 Sharks are the alleged bad boys of the ocean – supposedly they just keep chomping down on humans! But, here we take a closer look at the facts, and explore some more everyday things that turn out to be much more dangerous than sharks! Undeserved Reputation Sharks definitely get a bad rap, with a totally undeserved reputation as mindless people killers. Lots of people, heavily influenced by popular culture and media coverage, would be deathly afraid of getting into the water if there’s even a chance that sharks will be around. Is this at all justified? Let’s take a look at the facts. According to the International Shark Attack File, sharks only accounted for 5 human deaths in 2019, which is in line with the annual global average of 4 fatalities per year. Hmm… maybe not such a fearsome people killer after all? For some lighthearted comparisons, let’s take a look at some things that are more dangerous than sharks! Coconuts Coconuts falling from trees and hitting people can cause injuries to the back, neck, head, and yes, they can be fatal. Stories of deaths by coconuts date back to the 1770s – so this is not an urban legend that was just invented! In fact, falling coconuts cause 150 deaths worldwide a year – waaay more than sharks. But, we’re still very attracted to the image of gently swaying coconut trees by the beach – definitely associated with the perfect holiday getaway, and seemingly forgiven for being a mindless people killer! Cows 2019 was a literally killer year for cows, with 8 fatalities in the UK alone. Docilely grazing cows are part of the idealised view of the Great British Countryside. But cattle can get aggressive, particularly when they feel that they or their calves are threatened. Globally, cows cause 20 deaths per year – 5 times more than sharks! It’s something to think about – a domesticated herbivore kills more people than the ocean’s most terrifying predator. Selfies Ah, the mobile phone camera has a lot to answer for! The ubiquitous selfie, for that perfect Instagram or Facebook post – hides a people killer with a much higher hit rate than sharks! Globally, about 40 people a year die from selfie related incidents. I think I would be happy to support a selfie cull in the interest of public safety! Interestingly, the mean age of death by selfie is 23 years old, with male deaths outnumbering females about three to one. Beds Yes, rather than a somewhere super comfy to snuggle up and snooze, or build a pillow ford, beds can be accused of evilly plotting our demise! On average, 450 Americans are killed by falling out of bed every year. They definitely got out of the wrong side of bed! Beds are hundreds of times more dangerous than sharks, but I still think I’d quite happily snuggle up to both a bed and a shark! Covid-19 And the award for most dangerous people killer goes to…. definitely not sharks! Up front and centre for all of us right now is the scarily huge death toll from Covid-19 – 440,000 to date, and still rising. And yet, people who wouldn’t dream of getting into the water with a little white tip reef shark will happily insist on their rights to go out to socialise and work with a pandemic raging. If only all the time, energy and money going into “shark attack prevention” could be diverted to disease research, I think the world would be a safer and happier place.

So What’s More Dangerous Than Sharks? #1 Sharks are the alleged bad boys of the ocean – supposedly they just keep chomping down on humans! But, here we take a closer look at the facts, and explore some more everyday things that turn out to be much more dangerous than sharks! Undeserved Reputation Sharks definitely get a bad rap, with a totally undeserved reputation as mindless people killers. Lots of people, heavily influenced by popular culture and media coverage, would be deathly afraid of getting into the water if there’s even a chance that sharks will be around. Is this at all justified? Let’s take a look at the facts. According to the International Shark Attack File, sharks only accounted for 5 human deaths in 2019, which is in line with the annual global average of 4 fatalities per year. Hmm… maybe not such a fearsome people killer after all? For some lighthearted comparisons, let’s take a look at some things that are more dangerous than sharks! Coconuts Coconuts falling from trees and hitting people can cause injuries to the back, neck, head, and yes, they can be fatal. Stories of deaths by coconuts date back to the 1770s – so this is not an urban legend that was just invented! In fact, falling coconuts cause 150 deaths worldwide a year – waaay more than sharks. But, we’re still very attracted to the image of gently swaying coconut trees by the beach – definitely associated with the perfect holiday getaway, and seemingly forgiven for being a mindless people killer! Cows 2019 was a literally killer year for cows, with 8 fatalities in the UK alone. Docilely grazing cows are part of the idealised view of the Great British Countryside. But cattle can get aggressive, particularly when they feel that they or their calves are threatened. Globally, cows cause 20 deaths per year – 5 times more than sharks!

yes

Ethology

Are cows more dangerous than sharks?

yes_statement

"cows" are more "dangerous" than "sharks".. "sharks" are less "dangerous" than "cows".

https://www.wildlifexteam.com/about/blog/cows-are-20x-deadlier-than-sharks.html

Cows are 20x Deadlier Than Sharks : Wildlife X Team

Find a Location Near You Wildlife X Team® Cows are 20x Deadlier Than Sharks We usually look at cows as docile creatures who stand around grazing until we use them for their milk or meat. But did you know that cows kill a whopping 20 people per year in the United States alone? By comparison, sharks kill only one person per year in the U.S. The average cow weighs over 1400 pounds. When they get scared, they will not hesitate to charge on you, often teaming up in a group to do so. Of course we see bulls as dangerous due to their horns and bulky, aggressive nature, but female cows actually tend to be more violent. A heifer’s maternal instincts take over when they are afraid that their calves are in danger, so the females are actually more likely to attack humans than bulls. You can also download the audio-only podcast by clicking the download button above. How to Tell if a Cow Is Charging at You Cows may approach you themselves even when they are not threatened. If you run away in these cases, this could encourage them to run after you. This is a bad idea, because cows can run up to 25 miles per hour. For reference, the average person can only run 5-6 miles per hour. Usain Bolt, the fastest man alive, could just barely outrun a cow at his record of 27.8 mph. If a cow is running toward you, you can tell if it’s dangerous based on which way their head is pointing. A charging cow will point its head down as if pointing horns at you, while a harmless cow will point its head upward. Sharks vs. Cows - Who Is More Dangerous? Sharks are cold-blooded killing machines… but they don’t attack humans nearly as often as cows do. Usually, they only attack humans when they mistake a surfer for a sea turtle. Sharks will eat anything, but they always prefer marine life. There have been recent increases in the number of shark attacks in the U.S., partially due to overfishing depleting sharks’ main food source. Another reason is warming waters in certain regions due to El Niño and other climate change patterns. But overall, the numbers are still low. Animals That Are More Deadly Than Sharks Hippopotamuses kill up to 500 people per year in Africa alone. Dog bites kill up to 50 people per year in the United States. And more than 40 people die annually from infections and anaphylaxis caused by ant bites. Squirrel problems are rampant nationally. Squirrels can cause extensive damage in and around homes, including soiling floors and walls. Squirrels don't stand a chance against Wildlife X Team®'s trained professional staff. Removing and relocating bats is best left to professionals, as bats will bite and scratch if threatened. If you see signs of bats on your property or want to know how to get rid of bats from your attic and chimney, please call Wildlife X Team® at (817) 431-3007. Although armadillos have no reason to get into houses, there is a lot of damage armadillos can cause. Their diet consists mostly of grubs and insects, but when they burrow, it can affect the very structure of buildings. Call Wildlife X Team® today! Whether you are facing a snake infestation on your property or just notice a single snake, call (817) 431-3007 at Wildlife X Team® today. Most snakes are harmless, some are venomous, and we can remove all kinds of snakes safely and quickly. Birds can add a lot of enjoyment to the outdoor experience, but sometimes they cause trouble. If you're having an issue with problem birds like pigeons, starlings, or sparrows, give Wildlife X Team® a call at (817) 431-3007. Coyotes, a relative of the canine, are known for terrorizing livestock, and even household pets. Coyotes are often active at night, and homeowners often report the howling cries of these medium-sized creatures. Beaver damage is primarily to landscapes like riverbeds and lakesides. If you discover beaver damage in your property, call Wildlife X Team® at (817) 431-3007 to help relocate beavers and repair any damages caused by these flat-tailed critters. Nocturnal creatures, bobcats will take down any prey necessary, especially livestock. Bobcats are territorial and will often return to the property they have claimed as their own, especially if there is a steady food source. Chipmunks can be annoying and clever creatures, but they're no match for Wildlife X Team®. We offer chipmunk removal, and chipmunk damage repair services, plus we know how to keep chipmunks from coming back! Fox landscape damage and feeding behaviors can affect homeowners' safety, so it's important to not approach a fox if you see one in the wild or on your property. Wildlife X Team® offers fox removal, fox trapping, and fox prevention. Call today! Termite infestations are common inside homes and on properties, so if you are dealing with insects, call Wildlife X Team® at (817) 431-3007 today to get rid of your termite problem fast and effectively!

Find a Location Near You Wildlife X Team® Cows are 20x Deadlier Than Sharks We usually look at cows as docile creatures who stand around grazing until we use them for their milk or meat. But did you know that cows kill a whopping 20 people per year in the United States alone? By comparison, sharks kill only one person per year in the U.S. The average cow weighs over 1400 pounds. When they get scared, they will not hesitate to charge on you, often teaming up in a group to do so. Of course we see bulls as dangerous due to their horns and bulky, aggressive nature, but female cows actually tend to be more violent. A heifer’s maternal instincts take over when they are afraid that their calves are in danger, so the females are actually more likely to attack humans than bulls. You can also download the audio-only podcast by clicking the download button above. How to Tell if a Cow Is Charging at You Cows may approach you themselves even when they are not threatened. If you run away in these cases, this could encourage them to run after you. This is a bad idea, because cows can run up to 25 miles per hour. For reference, the average person can only run 5-6 miles per hour. Usain Bolt, the fastest man alive, could just barely outrun a cow at his record of 27.8 mph. If a cow is running toward you, you can tell if it’s dangerous based on which way their head is pointing. A charging cow will point its head down as if pointing horns at you, while a harmless cow will point its head upward. Sharks vs. Cows - Who Is More Dangerous? Sharks are cold-blooded killing machines… but they don’t attack humans nearly as often as cows do. Usually, they only attack humans when they mistake a surfer for a sea turtle. Sharks will eat anything, but they always prefer marine life. There have been recent increases in the number of shark attacks in the U.S., partially due to overfishing depleting sharks’ main food source.

yes

Ethology

Are cows more dangerous than sharks?

yes_statement

"cows" are more "dangerous" than "sharks".. "sharks" are less "dangerous" than "cows".

https://worldanimalfoundation.org/advocate/how-many-people-killed-by-cows/

How Many People Are Killed By Cows Each Year- Deadly Truth

How Many People Are Killed by Cows Each Year August 4, 2023 0 Comments WorldAnimalFoundation.org is reader-supported. When you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission. Learn More There are many ways to die, and while people are killed by cars, illnesses, or an allergic reaction, and the black widow and snake bites, you’ve probably never imagined that humans can be killed by cows too! Yip, cows are one of the deadliest animals. While cows don’t usually have a poisoned bite, they can pack a serious kick, and with their enormous weight, they can easily trample humans “under-hoof” and cause more human deaths. How Many People Are Killed by Cows Each Year Cows kill several people each year in the US alone, and the total number may be quite a bit higher in the rest of the world, where children suffer kicking by cows or die in deliberate attacks, making cows some of the deadliest animals in the US. In the US, Almost 20 to 22 People Are Killed by Cows Each Year (CDC) From 2003-2008, 20 to 22 people were killed by cows, as originally published by the CDC. The most frequent cause of death was blunt force trauma to the chest from being kicked or when a cow trampled someone. Most of these victims were farmworkers who were fatally injured during their daily interactions with the farm animals. These people were killed by cows that attacked them, ramming them to the ground or goring them with horns. What caught my attention is that these instances of cow attacks investigated by the CDC were only in four states of the US: Kansas, Missouri, Iowa, and Nebraska. So how many people are killed by cows each year in the rest of the US? Bulls Are Responsible for Killing 10 to 22 People Annually (CDC) Of the attacks, 10 of the 21 cow attacks were by bulls. Previously, these bulls or most cows were aggressive before the attacks, indicating a natural tendency toward being violent. Oddly, of the 22 attacks that resulted in death, one “attack” was by a cow when the farm worker accidentally injected himself with antibiotics instead of the cow. Cows (Females) Are Responsible for 6 Deaths Each Year (Gizmodo) The six deaths were reportedly deliberate attacks by cows that intentionally stormed at people who entered their pastures, such as cyclists and joggers. Interestingly, cows can form a mob mentality, attacking people in groups. Cows may group together, and when they feel pressured or threatened, they may storm at the person in their pasture, trampling that person or rolling them on the ground. Broken ribs from being stepped on and thrown in the air and a punctured lung are the most common injuries, but head trauma and blunt force trauma to the chest are also frequently found in human deaths caused by cattle attacks. In UK, Approximately 4 to 5 People Get Killed by Accidents Involving Cattle Each Year (HSE) In the UK, 4 to 5 people are killed annually in farming communities due to the nature of their work and inadequate equipment or safety standards. (HSE) The numbers may be higher because of poor reporting of such cow attack incidents. In 2015 in Britain, Cows Were Officially Declared the Most Dangerous Large Animal (Independent) An independent agricultural body has found that the most dangerous large animal in the UK is the cow. (Independent) From 2000-2015, 74 people were killed by cows, while 70% of these deaths were by bulls and newly calved cows. So don’t mess with mommy or daddy cow. Do Cows Attack People? While dear old Daisy, your family milking cow, may have the heart of a saint, she may also hide a demon in her sleeve if she’s placed in the wrong place and wrong situation at the wrong time. Cows can attack people and intentionally kill them. From 2015 to 2016, and 2019 to 2020, There Were 142 Reported Cow Incidents in the US (HSE) During the five years from 2015 to 2020, the Health and Safety Executive investigated 142 cow attack-related incidents in the US. Most of these incidents involved farm workers and animal health specialists who were attacked in the course of their daily tasks. 4 People From General Public Died in These Attacks (HSE) Yet, of the 142 cases investigated, four members of the general public died because of cow attacks. Most times, people chose to walk through pastures where bulls were kept or where cows had just calved and were in their most aggressive state. 65 Cow-Related Non-Fatal Incidents Were Also Reported From 2015 to 2016, and 2019 to 2020 (HSE) The HSE also investigated 65 cow attacks that were non-fatal. While these victims were not killed, some suffered severe injuries from being trampled, kicked, and gored by cows. Those who escaped physical injury will suffer the horror of being chased by a determined cow for the rest of their lives – the stuff of nightmares. 75% of These Cow Attacks Are Intentional, and One-Third of the Attacks Attributed to Previous Aggressive Behavior (CDC) The CDC reports that 16 of the 23 fatalities between 2003-2008, the cows attacked on purpose, striking the victim with the intent to harm (totaling about three-quarters of cow attacks). Another 5 deaths were caused by cows incidentally pushing the victims against gates or stationary objects, such as railings in factory farms. Secondary Incidents May Include Human Beings Being Crushed Between Cow and a Fence (CDC) Another 5 deaths were caused by cows accidentally pushing the victims against gates or stationary objects, such as railings in factory farms. In UK, Farm Workers Are the Major Victims of Cow Attacks and Pedestrians Are Victims of a Quarter (24%) of Attacks (Daily Mail) While farm workers face cow attacks as part of their job, when you’re working through the countryside and a cow suddenly attacks and even kills you, it’s not normal! The Daily Mail reports that 32 victims were pedestrians or the average person walking through the UK countryside when cows attacked them over the last five years (2018-2022). How Do Cows Kill People? I can’t help that my mind strikes a blank when I’m asked how cows kill people. There is so much out there about cows being slaughtered by people as part of the meat industry, but the idea that cows actually attack and kill people still overwhelms me. So how do they do it? What is the cause of death on your death certificate—Death by a cow? I dug deeper to find out. Stats Show Cows Kill People Either by Kicking or Trampling (Heifer International) Cows are part of the reason why I’d never want to run a cattle farm. In fact, agricultural industries like factory farms, where cattle are reared and sent to slaughter, are some of the most dangerous places of work in the world. (Heifer International) The Major Reason Behind Death by a Cow Attack Is Trauma Either To Head or Chest (CDC) A cow packs one helluva kick, and sustaining a blow from their hooves can split your head like a melon, causing instant death or massive cranial trauma. Most of these blunt-force traumas result from cow aggression, making cattle some of the most dangerous animals on earth. When I compare killings by cows versus sharks, interestingly, cows kill more people annually. In fact, sharks kill 5-20 people a year, while cows kill at least 20 people a year. Circumstances Associated With Deaths by Cow Attacks: Let’s face it; cows can be really dangerous. Working with cattle carries a massive risk, which is why the CDC conducted its investigation into cattle attack-related deaths in four US states from 2003-2008. The aim of the report was to find ways to ensure better safety for stockmen and other workers in the cattle industry and prevent further deaths by cattle attacks. There were some interesting findings in the research, which have contributed to better cattle management practices. Specifically, the CDC found that: Working With Cattle in Enclosed Area: 33% Ranchers often have family members helping with the management of cattle to do tasks like branding, vaccinating, and castrating the cows. These activities often happen in enclosed areas like cattle chutes, pens, and barns where there is limited room to move out of the way when a cow kicks or runs at the workers in anger, causing more deaths. The CDC reported on a sad incident where an 8-year-old boy was crushed in a cattle chute while helping his father castrate a bull. While not strictly speaking an attack by the cow, it did cause the boy’s death. Moving or Herding Cattle: 24% When moving farm animals from pasture to pasture, it may seem like a great adventure to go out and find cows. Sadly, this is also one of the most dangerous activities as cattle easily stampede as a herd, which turns several thousand pounds of flesh into a deadly missile, resulting in more deaths. Research from the CDC reports that 9 deaths were related to bulls attacking herdsmen while they moved cows from one area to another. Loading: 14% When it’s time to take cattle to market, it involves another dangerous activity—loading the cows. The CDC reports on 2 deaths that happened while loading a bull into a trailer and also a death sustained while loading calves, where the steel gate fell onto the worker when the calves bunched against it. Feeding: 14% Feeding cows also comes with risks, and while cows can be peaceful, they are highly territorial. Two deaths were of elderly farmers who were feeding cattle. One farmer was crushed against a barn wall while feeding cows, while another was attacked by a bull from behind. Do Cows Kill More Than Sharks? While you may think that shark attacks should be one of the top three animals that kill people in attacks, there are several animals that kill more people in unprovoked attacks than dear old Jaws. On an Average, Sharks Kill 5 People Annually, in Comparison to Cows Which Kill 22 People (Discovery) Cows and bees kill more people than sharks do in sudden and unprovoked attacks each year. (Discovery) In Florida, you are 21 times more likely to die from a tornado than a shark attack (CNN). However, you are also more likely to get killed by an angry cow while out on a stroll. Where sharks kill about five people annually, cows are known to kill as many as 22 people each year. But if you really want to tempt fate—visit Africa and travel by river. Hippopotamus attacks are responsible for a total number of 3,000 deaths every year, while Africa’s killer bees kill many people due to an allergic reaction from stings. (Huff Post) One of the Studies on Human Fatalities Conducted From 2008 to 2015 Revealed Cows and Horses Are Responsible for 90% of the Fatal Farm Injuries (Wemjournal) When working at farms, the animals you care for can also be the cause of your death. A shocking 90% of all farm animal-caused deaths of farm workers were attributed to cows and horses. This definitely takes being a farm worker off the plate for anyone who’s faint-hearted. (Wemjournal) How to Protect Yourself from Cow Attacks Working with cattle means you need to be responsible and aware of your surroundings. Most cow-related deaths were caused by cows that launched surprise attacks from behind, catching farm workers off guard and trampling or goring them to death. Knowing how to protect yourself from cow attacks when you work in the agricultural sector is essential. Here’s what to do: Never crowd the enclosed spaces with more cattle than you and your fellow workers can handle. It’s a good idea to rope the cattle, even calves, so there is some way to control them. Have one worker on the lookout to shout a warning if a cow or bull decides to attack. The presence of cattle dogs and a rider on a horse with a bullwhip can help provide a distraction so you can get clear of an attack. Cruel factory farming practices endanger not only the animals but also the workers, so ensure there is enough space to move clear of an angry cow. Never enter a cow pen alone, even if it’s only one cow in there. Don’t allow uninformed or physically challenged people to work cattle, and this includes children. But what about casual strollers who get attacked in the countryside? What can you do to avoid getting attacked or surviving an attack by a cow if you are out on foot or on your bicycle? Here are some tips: Keep clear of gates and stay safe by avoiding close proximity to cattle pastures or enclosures. Be aware: Cows aren’t photo opportunities. Don’t tease cattle through fences or shout at them. If cattle approach you, remain calm and avoid making sudden moves. Running usually provokes them more unless they are already attacking you—in which case, RUN! Never take a shortcut through agricultural land if you don’t know for sure there are no loose cows about. A female cow with her calf is very likely to attack you if you invade her space. FAQ’s What Are the Chances of Getting Killed by a Cow? Your chance of getting killed by a cow is 1 in 112 million, which may not sound like bad odds. In fact, you are more likely to be struck by lightning than killed by a cow. Yet, there is a significant increase in cattle attacks on pedestrians in the US and the UK in recent years, making cattle attacks a worry—especially if you consider how many cows are in the world! What Animal Kills the Most Humans in the United States? Are you afraid of being killed by an animal in the US, then fear death by mosquitoes more than death by shark attacks, cow attacks, or even dog attacks. That’s right; the tiny mosquito nuisance causes more deaths than any other animal in the US. How Many Cows Are Killed Each Year? While cows kill 22 people per year, people kill 36 million cows every year for slaughter and leather processing. How Many Cows Are Slaughtered Each Year? Cows are mostly slaughtered for their meat and leather, but the total is 36 million cows killed each year. What Is the ‘Summer of the Cow’? Cows are often let out to pasture in summer, which is when herding cattle herds are most often seen. In some areas, this is known as the summer of the cow. Do Cows Bite? While a cow is dangerous in some ways, you have nothing to fear from a cow bite, as this can’t happen. Cows don’t have teeth on their top jaws, making a bite impossible. However, if you stick your hand deep enough in their mouth, they can do serious damage with their rows of molars. Wrap Up I am still amazed that so many cows attack and kill people each year, but I have to wonder about the circumstances surrounding each cow attack. Cows are mostly peaceful animals, but when stressed or forced into enclosures, they can and will protect themselves. Talitha Van Niekerk Talitha is a full-time writer and content creator. She has a passion for animals of all shapes and sizes. Talitha has made it her life’s work to help educate pet owners to build better animal-human bonds so they can enjoy the same unconditional love her five horses, seven dogs, two cats, and an ever-growing flock of chickens shower her with daily. As a writer, Talitha draws on her years as a riding facility yard manager, her own experience, and thorough research to create the best and most accurate information to guide her readers. She loves reading feedback from happy readers who have benefited from her articles and helping pet owners is why she writes. After more than ten years as a teacher, she still wants to educate and inform people so they can make better decisions for their pets. Her happy place is at her computer with her dogs snuggled around her toes, a cat on her lap, or in the saddle.

Research from the CDC reports that 9 deaths were related to bulls attacking herdsmen while they moved cows from one area to another. Loading: 14% When it’s time to take cattle to market, it involves another dangerous activity—loading the cows. The CDC reports on 2 deaths that happened while loading a bull into a trailer and also a death sustained while loading calves, where the steel gate fell onto the worker when the calves bunched against it. Feeding: 14% Feeding cows also comes with risks, and while cows can be peaceful, they are highly territorial. Two deaths were of elderly farmers who were feeding cattle. One farmer was crushed against a barn wall while feeding cows, while another was attacked by a bull from behind. Do Cows Kill More Than Sharks? While you may think that shark attacks should be one of the top three animals that kill people in attacks, there are several animals that kill more people in unprovoked attacks than dear old Jaws. On an Average, Sharks Kill 5 People Annually, in Comparison to Cows Which Kill 22 People (Discovery) Cows and bees kill more people than sharks do in sudden and unprovoked attacks each year. (Discovery) In Florida, you are 21 times more likely to die from a tornado than a shark attack (CNN). However, you are also more likely to get killed by an angry cow while out on a stroll. Where sharks kill about five people annually, cows are known to kill as many as 22 people each year. But if you really want to tempt fate—visit Africa and travel by river. Hippopotamus attacks are responsible for a total number of 3,000 deaths every year, while Africa’s killer bees kill many people due to an allergic reaction from stings.

yes

Ethology

Are cows more dangerous than sharks?

yes_statement

"cows" are more "dangerous" than "sharks".. "sharks" are less "dangerous" than "cows".

https://www.escapistmagazine.com/8-animals-that-are-more-dangerous-than-sharks/

8 Animals That Are More Dangerous Than Sharks - The Escapist

8 Animals That Are More Dangerous Than Sharks With Shark Week in full swing we thought that we would give you eight animals that kill more humans than those deadly sharks. So get ready to have a whole new set of phobias by the end of this gallery, because even animals you wouldn’t expect kill more than these aquatic marauders. The mosquito is behind over one million deaths per year, mostly in Africa. Mosquitoes don’t actually do the killing, it’s the responsibility of the deadly viruses that they carry. So next time you’re outside and you see a mosquito just know that you’re watching a mass murderer. Hippopotamus’ may look like cute, slow moving creatures, but you’d be wrong. These deadly beasts are the cause of 2,900 deaths in Africa alone. Their teeth and jaws make them quite deadly, the force of their bite is more than enough to end your life. If you ever encounter one of these in the wild be prepared to get the hell out of there. Bees are already threatening, what with their painful sting, but just a reminder that these are 53 times more deadly than sharks. Bees kill, on average, 53 people per year in the U.S. alone. Just one more reason to fear leaving the house in the morning. Man’s best friend is also getting in on the action. Dogs are responsible for about thirty-four deaths per year in America alone. Most of this is on the owners that raise the dogs to be vicious, on their own dogs tend to not automatically be that evil. Ants may be small and seemingly harmless, but in reality their quite deadly. Ants are the cause of 30 deaths each year, which makes them considerably more deadly than those man eating sharks. The next time you see a line of ants make sure that you aren’t at the end of that line. Dogs and bees make sense to be on this list, at least they are actual predators. But did you know that cows kill up to 20 people a year in the United States. Compare that to the average of one death per year attributed to sharks, this makes cows one of the deadliest creatures around. This isn’t even counting all of the deaths that can be credited to heart disease that can come from a diet of too much red meat. This shouldn’t come as a surprise to anyone but, rattlesnakes are pretty damned deadly. They just so happen to be deadlier than sharks, they’re the cause of about five deaths per year in the U.S.. So avoid them as usual, I mean they’re obviously deadly, at least with cows it’s a surprise but rattlesnakes are just plain evil already.

8 Animals That Are More Dangerous Than Sharks With Shark Week in full swing we thought that we would give you eight animals that kill more humans than those deadly sharks. So get ready to have a whole new set of phobias by the end of this gallery, because even animals you wouldn’t expect kill more than these aquatic marauders. The mosquito is behind over one million deaths per year, mostly in Africa. Mosquitoes don’t actually do the killing, it’s the responsibility of the deadly viruses that they carry. So next time you’re outside and you see a mosquito just know that you’re watching a mass murderer. Hippopotamus’ may look like cute, slow moving creatures, but you’d be wrong. These deadly beasts are the cause of 2,900 deaths in Africa alone. Their teeth and jaws make them quite deadly, the force of their bite is more than enough to end your life. If you ever encounter one of these in the wild be prepared to get the hell out of there. Bees are already threatening, what with their painful sting, but just a reminder that these are 53 times more deadly than sharks. Bees kill, on average, 53 people per year in the U.S. alone. Just one more reason to fear leaving the house in the morning. Man’s best friend is also getting in on the action. Dogs are responsible for about thirty-four deaths per year in America alone. Most of this is on the owners that raise the dogs to be vicious, on their own dogs tend to not automatically be that evil. Ants may be small and seemingly harmless, but in reality their quite deadly. Ants are the cause of 30 deaths each year, which makes them considerably more deadly than those man eating sharks. The next time you see a line of ants make sure that you aren’t at the end of that line. Dogs and bees make sense to be on this list, at least they are actual predators. But did you know that cows kill up to 20 people a year in the United States. Compare that to the average of one death per year attributed to sharks,

yes

Paleoclimatology

Are current carbon dioxide levels unprecedented in Earth's history?

yes_statement

"current" "carbon" "dioxide" "levels" are "unprecedented" in earth's "history".. earth's "history" has never experienced "carbon" "dioxide" "levels" like the "current" ones.

https://www.epa.gov/climate-indicators/climate-change-indicators-atmospheric-concentrations-greenhouse-gases

Climate Change Indicators: Atmospheric Concentrations of ...

This indicator describes how the levels of major greenhouse gases in the atmosphere have changed over time. Figure 1. Global Atmospheric Concentrations of Carbon Dioxide Over Time This figure shows concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere from hundreds of thousands of years ago through 2021, measured in parts per million (ppm). The data come from a variety of historical ice core studies and recent air monitoring sites around the world. Each line represents a different data source. This figure shows concentrations of methane in the atmosphere from hundreds of thousands of years ago through 2021, measured in parts per billion (ppb). The data come from a variety of historical ice core studies and recent air monitoring sites around the world. Each line represents a different data source. Figure 3. Global Atmospheric Concentrations of Nitrous Oxide Over Time This figure shows concentrations of nitrous oxide in the atmosphere from hundreds of thousands of years ago through 2021, measured in parts per billion (ppb). The data come from a variety of historical ice core studies and recent air monitoring sites around the world. Each line represents a different data source. This figure shows concentrations of several halogenated gases (which contain fluorine, chlorine, or bromine) in the atmosphere, measured in parts per trillion (ppt). The data come from monitoring sites around the world. Note that the scale increases by factors of 10. This is because the concentrations of different halogenated gases can vary by a few orders of magnitude. The numbers following the name of each gas (e.g., HCFC-22) are used to denote specific types of those particular gases. This figure shows the average amount of ozone in the Earth’s atmosphere each year, based on satellite measurements. The total represents the “thickness” or density of ozone throughout all layers of the Earth’s atmosphere, which is called total column ozone and measured in Dobson units. Higher numbers indicate more ozone. For most years, Figure 5 shows how this ozone is divided between the troposphere (the part of the atmosphere closest to the ground) and the stratosphere. From 1994 to 1996, only the total is available, due to limited satellite coverage. Key Points Global atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and certain manufactured greenhouse gases have all risen significantly over the last few hundred years (see Figures 1, 2, 3, and 4). Historical measurements show that the current global atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide are unprecedented compared with the past 800,000 years (see Figures 1, 2, and 3). Carbon dioxide concentrations have increased substantially since the beginning of the industrial era, rising from an annual average of 280 ppm in the late 1700s to 414 ppm in 2021 (average of five sites in Figure 1)—a 48 percent increase. Almost all of this increase is due to human activities.1 The concentration of methane in the atmosphere has more than doubled since preindustrial times, reaching over 1,800 ppb in recent years (see the range of measurements for 2020 and 2021 in Figure 2). This increase is predominantly due to agriculture and fossil fuel use.2 Over the past 800,000 years, concentrations of nitrous oxide in the atmosphere rarely exceeded 280 ppb. Levels have risen since the 1920s, however, reaching a new high of 334 ppb in 2021 (average of four sites in Figure 3). This increase is primarily due to agriculture.3 Concentrations of many of the halogenated gases shown in Figure 4 were essentially zero a few decades ago but have increased rapidly as they have been incorporated into industrial products and processes. Some of these chemicals have been or are currently being phased out of use because they are ozone-depleting substances, meaning they also cause harm to the Earth’s protective ozone layer. As a result, concentrations of many major ozone-depleting gases have begun to stabilize or decline (see Figure 4, left panel). Concentrations of other halogenated gases have continued to rise, however, especially where the gases have emerged as substitutes for ozone-depleting chemicals (see Figure 4, right panel). Overall, the total amount of ozone in the atmosphere decreased by more than 4 percent between 1979 and 2020 (see Figure 5). All of the decrease happened in the stratosphere, with most of the decrease occurring between 1979 and 1994. Changes in stratospheric ozone reflect the effect of ozone-depleting substances. These chemicals have been released into the air for many years, but recently, international efforts have reduced emissions and phased out their use. Globally, the amount of ozone in the troposphere increased by about 12 percent between 1979 and 2020 (see Figure 5). ​ Water Vapor as a Greenhouse Gas Water vapor is the most abundant greenhouse gas in the atmosphere. Human activities have only a small direct influence on atmospheric concentrations of water vapor, primarily through irrigation and deforestation, so it is not included in this indicator.4 The surface warming caused by human production of other greenhouse gases, however, leads to an increase in atmospheric water vapor because warmer temperatures make it easier for water to evaporate and stay in the air in vapor form. This creates a positive “feedback loop” in which warming leads to more warming. Background Since the Industrial Revolution began in the 1700s, people have added a substantial amount of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere by burning fossil fuels, cutting down forests, and conducting other activities (see the U.S. and Global Greenhouse Gas Emissions indicators). When greenhouse gases are emitted into the atmosphere, many remain there for long time periods ranging from a decade to many millennia. Over time, these gases are removed from the atmosphere by chemical reactions or by emissions sinks, such as the oceans and vegetation, which absorb greenhouse gases from the atmosphere. As a result of human activities, however, these gases are entering the atmosphere more quickly than they are being removed, and thus their concentrations are increasing. Carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and certain manufactured gases called halogenated gases (gases that contain chlorine, fluorine, or bromine) become well mixed throughout the global atmosphere because of their relatively long lifetimes and because of transport by winds. Concentrations of these greenhouse gases are measured in parts per million (ppm), parts per billion (ppb), or parts per trillion (ppt) by volume. In other words, a concentration of 1 ppb for a given gas means there is one molecule of that gas in every 1 billion molecules of air. Some halogenated gases are considered major greenhouse gases due to their very high global warming potentials and long atmospheric lifetimes even if they only exist at a few ppt (see table). This indicator looks at global average levels of ozone in both the stratosphere and troposphere. For trends in ground-level ozone concentrations within the United States, see EPA’s National Air Quality Trends Report at: www.epa.gov/air-trends. Ozone is also a greenhouse gas, but it differs from other greenhouse gases in several ways. The effects of ozone depend on its altitude, or where the gas is located vertically in the atmosphere. Most ozone naturally exists in the layer of the atmosphere called the stratosphere, which ranges from approximately 6 to 30 miles above the Earth’s surface. Ozone in the stratosphere has a slight net warming effect on the planet, but it is good for life on Earth because it absorbs harmful ultraviolet radiation from the sun, preventing it from reaching the Earth’s surface. In the troposphere—the layer of the atmosphere near ground level—ozone is an air pollutant that is harmful to breathe, a main ingredient of urban smog, and an important greenhouse gas that contributes to climate change (see the Climate Forcing indicator). Unlike the other major greenhouse gases, tropospheric ozone only lasts for days to weeks, so levels often vary by location and by season. About the Indicator This indicator describes concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. It focuses on the major greenhouse gases that result from human activities. For carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and halogenated gases, recent measurements come from monitoring stations around the world, while measurements of older air come from air bubbles trapped in layers of ice from Antarctica and Greenland. By determining the age of the ice layers and the concentrations of gases trapped inside, scientists can learn what the atmosphere was like thousands of years ago. This indicator also shows data from satellite instruments that measure ozone density in the troposphere, the stratosphere, and the “total column,” or all layers of the atmosphere. These satellite data are routinely compared with ground-based instruments to confirm their accuracy. Ozone data have been averaged worldwide for each year to smooth out the regional and seasonal variations. About the Data Indicator Notes This indicator includes several of the most important halogenated gases, but some others are not shown. Many other halogenated gases are also greenhouse gases, but Figure 4 is limited to a set of common examples that represent most of the major types of these gases. The indicator also does not address certain other pollutants that can affect climate by either reflecting or absorbing energy. For example, sulfate particles can reflect sunlight away from the Earth, while black carbon aerosols (soot) absorb energy. Data for nitrogen trifluoride (Figure 4) reflect modeled averages based on measurements made in the Northern Hemisphere and some locations in the Southern Hemisphere, to represent global average concentrations over time. The global averages for ozone only cover the area between 50°N and 50°S latitude (77 percent of the Earth’s surface), because at higher latitudes the lack of sunlight in winter creates data gaps and the angle of incoming sunlight during the rest of the year reduces the accuracy of the satellite measuring technique. Data Sources Global atmospheric concentration measurements for carbon dioxide (Figure 1), methane (Figure 2), and nitrous oxide (Figure 3) come from a variety of monitoring programs and studies published in peer-reviewed literature. Global atmospheric concentration data for selected halogenated gases (Figure 4) were compiled by the Advanced Global Atmospheric Gases Experiment and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. A similar figure with many of these gases appears in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s Fifth Assessment Report.14 Satellite measurements of ozone were processed by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration and validated using ground-based measurements collected by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Key Points Global atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and certain manufactured greenhouse gases have all risen significantly over the last few hundred years (see Figures 1, 2, 3, and 4). Historical measurements show that the current global atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide, methane, and nitrous oxide are unprecedented compared with the past 800,000 years (see Figures 1, 2, and 3). Carbon dioxide concentrations have increased substantially since the beginning of the industrial era, rising from an annual average of 280 ppm in the late 1700s to 414 ppm in 2021 (average of five sites in Figure 1)—a 48 percent increase. Almost all of this increase is due to human activities.1 The concentration of methane in the atmosphere has more than doubled since preindustrial times, reaching over 1,800 ppb in recent years (see the range of measurements for 2020 and 2021 in Figure 2). This increase is predominantly due to agriculture and fossil fuel use.2 Over the past 800,000 years, concentrations of nitrous oxide in the atmosphere rarely exceeded 280 ppb. Levels have risen since the 1920s, however, reaching a new high of 334 ppb in 2021 (average of four sites in Figure 3). This increase is primarily due to agriculture.3 Concentrations of many of the halogenated gases shown in Figure 4 were essentially zero a few decades ago but have increased rapidly as they have been incorporated into industrial products and processes. Some of these chemicals have been or are currently being phased out of use because they are ozone-depleting substances, meaning they also cause harm to the Earth’s protective ozone layer. As a result, concentrations of many major ozone-depleting gases have begun to stabilize or decline (see Figure 4, left panel).

yes

Paleoclimatology

Are current carbon dioxide levels unprecedented in Earth's history?

yes_statement

"current" "carbon" "dioxide" "levels" are "unprecedented" in earth's "history".. earth's "history" has never experienced "carbon" "dioxide" "levels" like the "current" ones.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7157458/

Environmental Impact: Concept, Consequences, Measurement - PMC

Share RESOURCES As a library, NLM provides access to scientific literature. Inclusion in an NLM database does not imply endorsement of, or agreement with, the contents by NLM or the National Institutes of Health. Learn more: PMC Disclaimer | PMC Copyright Notice Since January 2020 Elsevier has created a COVID-19 resource centre with free information in English and Mandarin on the novel coronavirus COVID-19. The COVID-19 resource centre is hosted on Elsevier Connect, the company's public news and information website. Elsevier hereby grants permission to make all its COVID-19-related research that is available on the COVID-19 resource centre - including this research content - immediately available in PubMed Central and other publicly funded repositories, such as the WHO COVID database with rights for unrestricted research re-use and analyses in any form or by any means with acknowledgement of the original source. These permissions are granted for free by Elsevier for as long as the COVID-19 resource centre remains active. Abstract Environments on Earth are always changing, and living systems evolve within them. For most of their history, human beings did the same. But in the last two centuries, humans have become the planet’s dominant species, changing and often degrading Earth’s environments and living systems, including human cultures, in unprecedented ways. Contemporary worldviews that have severed ancient connections between people and the environments that shaped us – plus our consumption and population growth – deepened this degradation. Understanding, measuring, and managing today’s human environmental impacts – the most important consequence of which is the impoverishment of living systems – is humanity’s greatest challenge for the 21st century. Glossary Wholeness of a living system, including the capacity to sustain the full range of organisms and processes having evolved in a region. Biosphere The totality of life on Earth, the parts of the world where life exists. Biota Living organisms. Biotic impoverishment Systematic reduction in Earth’s capacity to support life. Ecosystem engineers Organisms that shape their environment, including organisms that create or modify the environments of other organisms. Environment Surroundings; the complex of physical, chemical, and biotic factors acting upon a living system and influencing its form, function, and survival; the biophysical realities that govern everything on Earth. Health A flourishing condition, well-being; capacity for self-renewal. Impact A forceful contact; a major effect of one thing on another. One Species’ Impact All organisms change their environment as they live, grow, and reproduce. Over millennia, organisms evolve to contend with changes in their environment. Those that do not adapt go extinct. Those that survive are molded by natural selection as the environment changes. Even unusual or seemingly catastrophic events, like volcanic eruptions, are an integral part of the ecological contexts to which organisms adapt over long time spans. Some organisms, like beavers and elephants, change their surroundings so much that they have been called ecosystem engineers. Beaver dams alter the flow of rivers, increase dissolved oxygen in downstream waters, create wetlands, and modify streamside zones. African elephants convert wooded savanna to open grassland by toppling trees as they browse. In evolutionary terms, changes like these brought about by living things, including ecosystem engineers, have been slow and incremental. Ecosystem engineers and their effects have long been part of evolving ecological systems. People, in contrast, have become ecosystem engineers on a whole new scale in time and space. Human effects since the Industrial Revolution – including many that may be invisible to a casual observer – are recent and outside the evolutionary experience of most organisms. Moreover, such effects unfold faster and on a scale far greater than any effects of past ecosystem engineers. As a result, over the past two centuries – barely more than two human lifetimes – humans have disrupted living and nonliving systems everywhere. Understanding the nature and consequences of humans’ environmental impacts – and managing these impacts to protect the well-being of human society and other life on Earth – is humanity’s greatest challenge. Human Environmental Impact Through Time The human evolutionary line began in Africa about 7 million years ago (Ma). It took some 5 or 6 million years (My) for protohumans to spread from Africa to Asia and then to Europe. These early humans, like other primates, made their living by seeking food and shelter from their environment, gathering plant foods, and hunting easy-to-kill prey. Sometimes they also experienced threats from their environment, including accidents, droughts, vector-borne diseases, and attacks from predators. At this stage, with relatively low population densities and limited technologies, humans were not ecosystem engineers. By some 50,000 years ago, however, humans had learned to use fire and to cook their food; they had developed complex tools, weapons, and language and created art. On local scales, these modern humans were very much ecosystem engineers. Sometimes their enhanced abilities to make a living outstripped their local environment’s capacity to provide that living, and they disrupted local ecological systems. On several continents, for example, humans hunted large mammals to the point where many, such as the marsupial lion of Australia, went extinct. As humans became more efficient at exploiting their local environments, they spread farther. By 13,000 years ago, modern humans had spread to all continents and many islands across the globe. Then, about 10,000 years ago, people began to domesticate plants and animals. Instead of searching for food, they began to produce food. Food production changed the course of human and environmental history. Domestication of plants and animals enabled people to adopt a sedentary lifestyle. As detailed by geographer and ecologist Diamond, 1997, Diamond, 2002, populations grew as agriculture developed, because larger sedentary populations both demanded and enabled more food production. Local ecological disruptions became more numerous and widespread and more intense. With animal domestication, contagious diseases of pets and livestock adapted to new, human hosts. Diseases spread more quickly in crowded conditions; inadequate sanitation compounded the effects. From agriculture, civilization followed and, with it, cities, writing, advanced technology, and political empires. In just 10,000 years, these developments led to some 7.5 billion people on Earth, industrial societies, and a global economy founded on complicated technologies and fossil fuels. Humans have emerged as ecosystem engineers on a global scale. The ecological disruptions we cause are no longer just local or regional but global, and we have become the principal threat to the environment. Yet despite today’s advanced technologies, people depend as much on their environments as other organisms do. History, not just ecology, has been very clear on this point. From the Old Kingdom of Egypt more than 4000 years ago to the culture that created the huge stone monoliths on Easter Island between AD 1000 and 1550 to the 1930s Dust Bowl on the Great Plains of North America, civilizations or ways of life have prospered and failed by using and (mostly unwittingly) abusing natural resources. In Old Kingdom Egypt, the resource was the valley of the Nile, richly fertilized with sediment at each river flooding, laced with canals and side streams, blessed with a luxuriant delta. Agriculture flourished and populations swelled, until unusually severe droughts brought on the civilization’s collapse. On Easter Island, the resource was trees, which gave Polynesians colonizing the island the means to build shelter, canoes for fishing the open waters around the island, and log rollers for moving the ceremonial stone monuments the island is famous for. Deforestation not only eliminated the people’s source of wood, but also further deprived the already poor soil of nutrients and made it impossible to sustain the agriculture that had sustained the island’s civilization. On the dry Great Plains of North America, settlers were convinced that rain would follow the plow, and so they plowed homestead after homestead, only to watch their homesteads’ soils literally blow away in the wind. In these cases and many others, human civilizations damaged their environments, and their actions also worsened the effects on their civilizations of climatic or other natural cycles. In each case, short-term success compromised a culture’s long-term stability: The culture of Old Kingdom Egypt enabled its people to prosper on the Nile’s natural bounty, but prolonged, unprecedented drought brought starvation and political disorder. Easter Islanders thrived and populated the island until its resources were exhausted. Dust Bowl farmers lived out their culture’s view of dominating and exploiting land to the fullest. The inevitable outcome in all three cases was a catastrophe for the immediate environment and the people it supported – not only because the people were unprepared to cope with dramatic natural changes in their environments but because their own actions magnified the disastrous effects of those changes. In the 21st century, humans are ecosystem engineers on a planetwide scale, threatening the life-sustaining capacity of all of Earth’s environmental “spheres”: Atmosphere: the thin envelope of gases encircling the planet. Living systems modify the atmosphere, its temperature, and the amount of water it contains by continually generating oxygen and consuming carbon dioxide through photosynthesis and by affecting the amount and forms of other gases. People release toxic chemicals into the air and alter the climate by raising the atmospheric concentration of greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide and methane, through industrialized agriculture; deforestation; and the burning of fossil fuels in motor vehicles, ships, trains, planes, and power plants. • Hydrosphere: Earth’s atmospheric water vapor; its liquid surface and underground water; its mountain snow and glaciers; and its polar ice caps, oceanic icebergs, and terrestrial permafrost. Living systems alter the water cycle by modifying the Earth’s temperature and the amount of water plants send into the atmosphere through a process called evapotranspiration. People build dams, irrigation canals, drinking-water delivery systems, and wastewater treatment plants. They use water to generate electricity; they mine groundwater from dwindling underground aquifers for farming as well as drinking; they alter the flows of surface waters for everything from transportation to flood control; they drain wetlands to gain land area and abate waterborne diseases; they even inject vast quantities of water underground to extract natural gas, contaminating groundwater and triggering earthquakes. Moreover, modern humans’ effects on global climate are disrupting the entire planetary water cycle. • Biosphere: the totality of life on Earth, the parts of the world where life exists. Life emerged on Earth 3.9 billion years ago and has sustained itself through changes in form, diversity, and detail since then. No planet yet discovered supports complex life as we know it on Earth. As predators, people have decimated or eliminated wild animal populations worldwide. As domesticators of animals and plants, people have massively reshaped landscapes by cutting forests, burning and plowing grasslands, building cities, desertifying vast areas, and overharvesting fish and shellfish. Human actions have precipitated a spasm of extinctions that today rivals five previous mass extinctions set off by astronomical or geological forces, each of which eliminated more than 70% of species then existing. People themselves may be thought of as a sphere within the greater biosphere: the ethnosphere, or the sum total of all thoughts and intuitions, myths and beliefs, ideas and inspirations brought into being by the human imagination since the dawn of consciousness. Observes anthropologist Davis (2009, p. 2), who coined and defined the term in 2002, just as the greater biosphere is being severely eroded, so too is the ethnosphere, and at a much faster pace. Today, the scientific consensus is that, for the first time in Earth’s history, one species – Homo sapiens – rivals astronomical and geological forces in its impact on life on Earth. Welcome to the Anthropocene. Biotic Impoverishment The first step in dealing with the present impact of human activity is to correctly identify the nature of humanity’s relationship with the environment and how human actions affect that relationship. Many people still see the environment as something people must overcome, or they regard environmental needs as something that ought to be balanced against human needs (eg, jobs vs. the environment). Most people still regard the environment as a provider of commodities or a receptacle for waste. When asked to name humanity’s primary environmental problems, people typically think of running out of nonrenewable raw materials and energy or about water and air pollution. Environmental research and development institutions focus on ways technology can help solve each problem, such as fuel cells to supply clean, potentially renewable energy or scrubbers to curb smokestack pollution. Even when people worry about biodiversity loss, they are concerned primarily with stopping the extinction of species, rather than with understanding the underlying losses leading up to species extinctions or the broader biological crisis that extinctions signal. These perspectives miss a crucial point: the reason pollution, energy use, extinction, and dozens of other human impacts matter is their impact on life. Ecosystems, particularly their living components, have always provided the capital to fuel human economies. When populations were small, humans making a living from nature’s wealth caused no more disruption than other species. But with upward of 7.5 billion people occupying or using resources from every place on Earth, humans are overwhelming the ability of other life-forms to make a living and depleting the planet’s natural wealth. One species is compromising Earth’s ability to support the living systems that evolved on the planet over millions of years. The systematic reduction in Earth’s capacity to support life – which Woodwell (1990) termed biotic impoverishment – is thus the most important human-caused environmental impact. At best, the ethics of this impact are questionable; at worst, it is jeopardizing our own survival. The connection between biotic impoverishment and extinction is intuitively obvious. By overharvesting fish, overcutting forests, overgrazing grasslands, or paving over land for cities, we are clearly killing other organisms outright or eliminating their habitats, thereby driving species to extinction and impoverishing the diversity of life. But biotic impoverishment takes many forms besides extinction. It encompasses three categories of human impacts on the biosphere: (1) indirect depletion of living systems through alterations in physical and chemical environments, (2) direct depletion of nonhuman life, and (3) direct degradation of human life (Table 1 ; Karr and Chu, 1995). Identifying and understanding the biological significance of our actions – their effects on living systems, including our own social and economic systems – are the keys to developing effective ways to manage our impacts. Table 1 The many faces of biotic impoverishmenta Table 1 Indirect depletion of living systems through alterations in physical and chemical environments 1. Degradation of water (redirected flows, depletion of surface and groundwater, wetland drainage, organic enrichment, destruction and alteration of aquatic biota) Indirect Biotic Depletion People affect virtually all the physical and chemical systems life depends on: water, soils, air, and the biogeochemical cycles linking them. Some human-driven physical and chemical changes have no repercussions on the biota; others do, becoming agents of biotic impoverishment. Degradation of water People probably spend more energy, money, and time trying to control the movement and availability of water than to manage any other natural resource. In the process, we contaminate water, move water across and out of natural basins, deplete surface and groundwater; modify the timing and amount of flow in rivers, straighten or build dikes to constrain rivers, and alter natural flood patterns. We change the amount, timing, and chemistry of fresh water reaching coastal regions, and we dry up wetlands, lakes, and inland seas. Our demands are outrunning supplies of this nonrenewable resource, and the scale of our transformations risks altering the planetary water cycle. Physical alterations of the Earth’s waters, combined with massive industrial, agricultural, and residential pollution, have taken a heavy toll on aquatic life. By 2015 almost one-fifth of the world’s coral reefs had been destroyed, more than a third were under threat, and less than half were relatively healthy. Globally, the number of oceanic dead zones, where little or no dissolved oxygen exists, tripled during the last 30 years of the 20th century. The biota of freshwater systems has fared no better. A 4-year survey of the freshwater fishes inhabiting Malaysian rivers in the late 1980s found only 46% of 266 known Malaysian species. Some 40% of North America’s freshwater fishes are at risk of extinction; two-thirds of freshwater mussels and crayfishes and one-third of amphibians that depend on aquatic habitats in the United States are rare or imperiled. Humans use at least 54% of the Earth’s accessible water runoff, a figure that is likely to grow to 70% by 2025. By then, more than a third of the world’s population could suffer shortages of fresh water for drinking and irrigation. Groundwater aquifers in many of the world’s most important crop-producing regions are being drained faster than they can be replenished: a study published in 2010 found that the rate of groundwater depletion worldwide had more than doubled from 1960 to 2000. Natural flood regimes, as in the Nile River basin, no longer spread nutrient-rich silt across floodplains to nourish agriculture. Indeed, the High Dam at Aswan traps so much silt behind it that the Nile delta, essential to Egypt’s present-day economy, is sinking into the Mediterranean. Whole inland seas, such as the Aral Sea in Uzbekistan, are drying up because the streams feeding them contain so little water. In addition to eliminating habitat for resident organisms, the sea’s drying is bringing diseases to surrounding human populations. Indeed, diseases caused by waterborne pathogens are making a comeback even in industrialized nations. In the past five or six decades, the number of large dams on the world’s rivers grew more than seven times, to more than 40,000 today. The mammoth Three Gorges Dam across China’s Yangtze River, completed in 2006, created a 660-km-long serpentine lake behind it. The dam displaced more than 1 million people and may force the relocation of another 4 million from the reservoir region, which, at 58,000 km2, is larger than Switzerland. The dam has greatly altered ecosystems on the Yangtze’s middle reaches, compounding perils already faced by prized and endemic fishes and aquatic mammals. The sheer weight of the water and silt behind the concrete dam raises the risk of landslides and strains the region’s geological structure, while water released from the dam eats away at downstream banks and scours the bottom. And by slowing the flow of the Yangtze and nearby tributaries, the dam blocks the river’s ability to flush out and detoxify pollutants from upstream industries. Soil depletion Hardly just dirt, soil is a living system that makes it possible for raw elements from air, water, and bedrock to be physically and chemically assembled, disassembled, and reassembled with the aid of living macro- and microorganisms into life above ground. Accumulated over thousands of years, soil cannot be renewed in any time frame useful to humans alive today, or even to their great-grandchildren. Humans degrade soils when they compact it, erode it, disrupt its organic and inorganic structure, raise its salinity, and cause desertification. Urbanization, logging, mining, overgrazing, alterations in soil moisture, air pollution, fires, chemical pollution, and leaching out of minerals all damage or destroy soils. Thanks to removal of vegetative cover, mining, agriculture, and other activities, the world’s topsoils are eroded by wind and water ten to hundreds of times faster than they are renewed (at roughly 10 t ha−1 year−1). Soils constitute the foundation of human agriculture, yet agriculture, including livestock raising, is the worst culprit in degrading soils. Agricultural practices have eroded or degraded more than 40% of present cropland. Over the last half century, some 24,000 villages in northern and western China have been overrun by the drifting sands of desertification. Besides topsoil erosion, the damage includes salting and saturation of poorly managed irrigated lands; compaction by heavy machinery and the hooves of livestock; and pollution from excessive fertilizers, animal wastes, and pesticides. Living, dead, and decomposing organic matter is the key to soil structure and fertility. Soil depleted of organic matter is less permeable to water and air and thus less able to support either aboveground plants or soil organisms. The linkages between soil’s inorganic components and the soil biota – naturalist Wilson’s (1987) “little things that run the world” – are what give soil its life-sustaining capacity. Echoing Wilson, Montgomery and Biklé (2016, p. 88) make it abundantly clear in The Hidden Half of Nature that “soil fertility springs from biology – all of the interactions between fungi, plants, and other soil organisms,” most of them invisible. Clear-cut logging, for example, which destroys the soil biota – especially the close associations among fungi and plant roots – unleashes a whole series of impoverishing biotic effects both below and above ground. Chemical contamination In 1962, Rachel Carson’s landmark book Silent Spring alerted the world to the pervasiveness of synthetic chemicals produced since World War II. As many as 100,000 synthetic chemicals are in use today. True to one company’s slogan, many of these have brought “better living through chemistry,” providing new fabrics and lighter manufacturing materials, antibiotics, and life-saving drugs. But industrial nations have carelessly pumped chemicals into every medium. Chemicals – as varied as pesticides, heavy metals, prescription drugs flowing out of sewage plants, and cancer-causing by-products of countless manufacturing processes – now lace the world’s water, soil, and air and the bodies of all living things, including people. Chemicals directly poison organisms; they accumulate in physical surroundings and are passed through and, in many cases, concentrated within portions of the food web. Chemicals cause cancer, interfere with hormonal systems, provoke asthma, and impair the functioning of immune systems. They have intergenerational effects, such as intellectual impairment in children whose mothers have eaten contaminated fish. What’s more, over half a century of pesticide and antibiotic overuse has bred resistance to these chemicals among insects, plants, and microbes, giving rise to new and reemerging illnesses. Many chemicals travel oceanic and atmospheric currents to sites far from their source. Sulfur emissions from the US Midwest, for example, fall to earth again as acid rain in Europe, killing forests and so acidifying streams and lakes that they, too, effectively die. China’s burning of soft coal sends air pollution all the way to northwestern North America; the heavy haze hanging over China’s chief farming regions may be cutting agricultural production by a third. Chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), once widely used as refrigerants, have damaged the atmospheric ozone layer, which moderates how much ultraviolet radiation reaches the Earth, and opened ozone holes over the Arctic and Antarctic. Even more alarming is an unprecedented acidification of the oceans that has only recently attracted the attention of major scientific research consortiums. Acid added to the world ocean by human activity has lowered the ocean’s pH; it is lower now than it has been in 20 My, which translates into a 30% increase in sea-surface acidity since industrialization began. The future of marine life looks bleak in an ocean acidifying at this speed and intensity. As the concentration of hydrogen ions rises, calcium carbonate begins to dissolve out of the shells or skeletons of organisms such as tropical corals, microscopic foraminifera, and mollusks. Further, as hydrogen ions combine with the calcium carbonate building blocks the organisms need, it becomes harder for them to extract this compound from the water and build shells in the first place. Although many of the most obviously deadly chemicals were banned in the 1970s, they continue to impoverish the biota. Polychlorinated biphenyls – stable, nonflammable compounds once used in electrical transformers and many other industrial and household applications – remain in the environment for long periods, cycling among air, water, and soils and persisting in the food web. They are found, far from their sources, in polar bears and arctic villagers; they are implicated in reproductive disorders, particularly in such animals as marine mammals, whose long lives, thick fat layers where chemicals concentrate, and position as top predators make them especially vulnerable. The agricultural pesticide DDT, sprayed with abandon in the 1940s and 1950s, even directly on children, had severely thinned wild birds’ eggshells by the time it was banned in the United States. Populations of birds such as the brown pelican and bald eagle had dropped precipitously by the 1970s, although they have recovered enough for the species to be taken off the US endangered species list (the bald eagle in 2007 and the brown pelican in 2009). Reproduction of central California populations of the California condor, in contrast, continues to be threatened by DDT breakdown products, which, decades after the pesticide was banned, are still found in the sea lion carcasses the birds sometimes feed on. Carson’s book revealed the real danger of chemical pollutants: they have not simply perturbed the chemistry of water, soil, and air but harmed the biota as well. The list of chemicals’ effects on living things is so long that chemical pollution equals humans’ environmental impact in most people’s minds, but it is only one form of biotic impoverishment. Altered biogeochemical cycles All the substances found in living things – such as water, carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus, and sulfur – cycle through ecosystems in biogeochemical cycles. Human activities modify or have the potential to modify all these cycles. Sometimes the results stem from changing the amount or the precise chemistry of the cycled substance; in other cases, humans change biogeochemical cycles by changing the biota itself. Freshwater use, dams, and other engineering ventures affect the amount and rate of river flow to the oceans and increase evaporation rates, directly affecting the water cycle and indirectly impoverishing aquatic life. Direct human modifications of living systems also alter the water cycle. In South Africa, European settlers supplemented the treeless native scrub, or fynbos, with trees like pines and Australian acacias from similar Mediterranean climates. But because these trees are larger and thirstier than the native scrub, regional water tables have fallen sharply. Human activity has disrupted the global nitrogen cycle by greatly increasing the amount of nitrogen fixed from the atmosphere (combined into compounds usable by living things). The increase comes mostly from deliberate addition of nitrogen to soils as fertilizer but also as a by-product of the burning of fossil fuels. Agriculture, livestock raising, and residential yard maintenance chronically add tons of excess nutrients, including nitrogen and phosphorus, to soils and water. The additions are often invisible; their biological impacts are often dramatic. Increased nutrients in coastal waters, for example, trigger blooms of toxic dinoflagellates – the algae that cause red tides, fish kills, and tumors and other diseases in varied sea creatures. When huge blooms of algae die, they fall to the seafloor, where their decomposition robs the water of oxygen so that fishes and other marine organisms can no longer live there. With nitrogen concentrations in the Mississippi River two to three times as high as they were 50-plus years ago, a gigantic dead zone forms in the Gulf of Mexico every summer. In summer 2010 this dead zone covered 20,000 km2, and every year thereafter it has been more than twice the target size set by the scientists who have studied this phenomenon for the past 30 years. The burning of fossil fuels is transforming the carbon cycle, primarily by raising the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide. With other greenhouse gases, such as methane and oxides of nitrogen, carbon dioxide helps keep Earth’s surface at a livable temperature and drives plant photosynthesis. But since the Industrial Revolution, atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations have risen nearly 40% and are now disrupting the planet’s climate. In addition, the effects of catastrophic oil spills like the one that followed the April 2010 explosion of the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig in the Gulf of Mexico – and the effects of the chemicals used to disperse the resulting plumes of oil – have reverberated for decades. Global climate change In its 2014 report, written and reviewed by more than 3800 scientists from the world’s 195 countries, the typically cautious Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) (2014) stated, “Warming of the climate system is unequivocal.” Reflecting worldwide scientific consensus, the report says, “Human influence on the climate system is clear,” and recent human-caused “emissions of greenhouse gases are the highest in history” (p. 2). “The atmosphere and ocean have warmed, the amounts of snow and ice have diminished, and sea level has risen.” Atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases are the highest they have been “in at least the last 800,000 years,” and their effects are “extremely likely to have been the dominant cause of observed global warming” (p. 4). The 20th century in the Northern Hemisphere was the warmest of the past millennium. All but 1 of the first 15 years of the 21st century were globally the warmest in history, and 2015 was the hottest year ever recorded. Higher concentrations of greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide, and higher global temperatures set in motion a whole series of effects. Where other nutrients are not limiting, rising carbon dioxide concentrations may enhance plant photosynthesis and growth. With higher temperatures, spring arrives one or more weeks earlier in the Northern Hemisphere. Rising temperatures are shifting the ranges of many plants and animals – both wild and domestic – potentially rearranging the composition and distribution of the world’s biomes, as well as those of agricultural systems. The resulting displacements will have far-reaching implications not only for the displaced plants and animals but also for the goods and services people depend on from these living systems. In addition, as shown in a study by Gleckler et al. (2016), the amount of heat energy absorbed by the oceans since 1865 – a total of about 300 ZJ, or 300×1021 J – doubled in just the 18 years from 1997 to 2015. Moreover, polar glaciers and ice sheets are receding. The Arctic has been warming twice as fast as the rest of the planet, and arctic sea ice melted at a near-record pace in 2010. With the sun heating newly open waters, winter refreezing takes longer, and the resulting thinner ice melts more easily the following summer. Rising global sea levels already threaten low-lying island nations. Large-scale circulation of global air masses is also changing and, with it, large-scale cycles in ocean currents, including the periodic warming and cooling in the tropical Pacific Ocean known as El Niño and La Niña, respectively. All these shifts are affecting the distribution, timing, and amount of rain and snow, making the weather seem more unpredictable than ever. Unusually warm or cold winters, massive hurricanes like those that devastated the US Gulf Coast in 2005, severe droughts and flooding, and weather-related damage to human life and property are all predicted to increase with global climate change. In fact, according to a 2015 report from the Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters (affiliated with the World Health Organization), the frequency of climate-related events from 2000 to 2014 increased by 44% in comparison with the two decades from 1994 through 2013, even while the frequency of geophysical disasters remained broadly constant. Worldwide damage due to natural disasters from 1994 through 2013 – of which more than two-thirds stemmed from floods, storms, and other climate-related events – totaled at least $2.6 trillion. Direct Depletion of Nonhuman Life From their beginnings as hunter-gatherers, humans have become highly efficient, machine-aided ecosystem engineers and predators. We transform the land so it produces what we need or want; we harvest the oceans in addition to reaping our own fields; we cover the land, even agricultural land, with sprawling cities. All these activities directly affect the ability of other life-forms to survive and reproduce. We deplete nonhuman life by eliminating some forms and favoring others; the result is a loss of genetic, population, species, and higher-order taxonomic diversity. We are irreversibly homogenizing life on Earth, in effect exercising an unnatural selection that is erasing the diversity generated by millions of years of evolution by natural selection. One species is now determining which other species will survive, reproduce, and thereby contribute the raw material for future evolution. Overharvest of renewable resources In the 1930s, so many sardines were harvested from the waters off Monterey’s Cannery Row in California that the population collapsed, taking other sea creatures and people’s livelihoods with it. After rebounding somewhat in the first decade of the 2000s, the species has still not recovered fully. According to the US National Marine Fisheries Service, nearly 80% of commercially valuable fishes of known status were overfished or fished to their full potential by 1993. Atlantic commercial fish species at their lowest levels in history include tuna, marlin, cod, and swordfish. Overfishing not only depletes target species but restructures entire marine food webs. Marine mammals, including whales, seals, sea lions, manatees, and sea otters, were so badly depleted by human hunters that one species, Steller’s sea cow, went extinct; many other species almost disappeared. In the 19th century, Russian fur traders wiped out sea otters along the central California coast. With the otters gone, their principal prey, purple sea urchins, overran the offshore forests of giant kelp, decimating the kelp fronds and the habitat they provided for countless other marine creatures, including commercially harvested fishes. Thanks to five decades of protection, marine mammal populations were slowly recovering – only to face food shortages as regional marine food webs unravel because of fishing, changing oceanic conditions, and contamination. Timber harvest has stripped land of vegetation, from the Amazonian rainforest to mountainsides on all continents, diminishing and fragmenting habitat for innumerable forest and stream organisms, eroding soils, worsening floods, and contributing significantly to global carbon dioxide emissions. In the Northern Hemisphere, 10% or less remains of old-growth temperate rainforests. The uniform stands of trees usually replanted after logging do not replace the diversity lost with native forest, any more than monocultures of corn replace the diversity within native tallgrass prairies. Habitat fragmentation and destruction A great deal of human ecosystem engineering not only alters or damages the habitats of other living things but also often destroys those habitats. Satellite-mounted remote-sensing instruments have revealed transformations of terrestrial landscapes on a scale unimaginable in centuries past. Together, cropland and pastures occupy 40% of Earth’s land surface. Estimates of the share of land wholly transformed or degraded by humans hover around 50%. Our roads, farms, cities, feedlots, and ranches either fragment or destroy the habitats of most large carnivorous mammals. Mining and oil drilling damage soil, remove vegetation, and pollute freshwater and marine areas. Grazing compacts soil and sends silt and manure into streams, where they harm stream life. Landscapes that have not been entirely converted to human use have been cut into fragments. In Song of the Dodo, writer Quammen (1996) likens our actions to starting with a fine Persian carpet and then slicing it neatly into 36 equal pieces; even if we had the same square footage, we would not have 36 nice Persian rugs – only ragged, nonfunctional fragments. And in fact, we do not even have the original square footage because we have destroyed an enormous fraction of it. Such habitat destruction is not limited to terrestrial environments. Human channelization of rivers may remove whole segments of riverbed. In the Kissimmee River of the US state of Florida, for example, channelization in the 1960s transformed 165 km of free-flowing river into 90 km of canal, effectively removing 35 km of river channel and drastically altering the orphaned river meanders left behind. Wetlands worldwide continue to disappear, drained to create shoreline communities for people and filled to increase cropland. The lower 48 United States lost 53% of their wetlands between the 1700s and mid-1980s. Such losses destroy major fish and shellfish nurseries, natural flood and pollution control, and habitat for countless plants and animals. The mosaic of habitats in, on, or near the seafloor – home to 98% of all marine species – is also being decimated. Like clear-cutting of an old-growth forest, the use of large, heavy trawls dragged along the sea bottom to catch groundfish and other species flattens and simplifies complex, structured habitats such as gravels, coral reefs, crevices, and boulders and drastically reduces biodiversity. Studies reported on by the National Research Council of the US National Academy of Sciences have shown that a single tow can injure or destroy upward of two-thirds of certain bottom-dwelling species, which may still not have recovered after a year or more of no trawling. Habitat fragmentation and destruction, whether on land or in freshwater and marine environments, may lead directly to extinction or isolate organisms in ways that make them extremely vulnerable to natural disturbances, climate change, or further human disturbance. Biotic homogenization “The one process ongoing…that will take millions of years to correct,” Wilson (1994, p. 355) admonishes us, “is the loss of genetic and species diversity by the destruction of natural habitats. This is the folly our descendants are least likely to forgive us.” Both deliberately and inadvertently, humans are rearranging Earth’s living components, reducing diversity and homogenizing biotas around the world. The present continuing loss of genetic diversity, of populations, and of species vastly exceeds background rates. At the same time, our global economy is transporting species worldwide at unprecedented scales. The globe is now experiencing its sixth mass extinction, the largest since the dinosaurs vanished 65 Ma; present extinction rates are thought to be on the order of 100–1000 times those before people dominated Earth. According to the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (2005), a 5-year project begun in 2001 to assess the world’s ecosystems, an estimated 10–15% of the world’s species will be committed to extinction by 2035. Approximately 20% of all vertebrates, including 33% of sharks and rays, are at risk of extinction. At least one of every eight plant species is also threatened with extinction. Although mammals and birds typically receive the most attention, massive extinctions of plants, which form the basis of the biosphere’s food webs, undermine life-support foundations. Mutualistic relationships between animals and plants, particularly evident in tropical forests, mean that extinctions in one group have cascading effects in other groups. Plants reliant on animals for pollination or seed dispersal, for example, are themselves threatened by the extinction of animal species they depend on. Not surprisingly, some scientists view extinction as the worst biological tragedy, but extinction is just another symptom of global biotic impoverishment. Ever since they began to spread over the globe, people have transported other organisms with them, sometimes for food, sometimes for esthetic reasons, and most often accidentally. With the mobility of modern societies and today’s especially speedy globalization of trade, the introduction of alien species has reached epidemic proportions, causing some scientists to label it biological pollution. Aliens are everywhere: in North America, zebra mussels and tamarisks, or saltcedar; in the Mediterranean Sea, the Red Sea sea jelly and the common aquarium alga Caulerpa taxifolia; and in the Black Sea, Leidy’s comb jelly of northeastern America, to name just a few. The costs of such invasions, in both economic and ecological terms, are high. In the United States, for example, annual economic losses due to damage by invasive species or the costs of controlling them exceed $137 billion per year – $40 billion more than the nation’s losses from weather-related damage in 2005, when massive Hurricane Katrina devastated the Gulf Coast. Usually, aliens thrive and spread at the expense of native species, often causing extinctions. On many islands, more than half the plant species are not native, and in many continental areas the figure reaches 20% or more. Introduced species are fast catching up with habitat fragmentation and destruction as the major engines of ecological deterioration. In addition, people have been modifying their crop plants and domesticated animals for 10,000 years or so – selecting seeds or individuals and breeding and cross-breeding them. The goal was something better, bigger, tastier, hardier, or all of the above. Success was sometimes elusive, but crop and livestock homogenization resulted, as did a loss of biodiversity among plant and animal foods. Of the myriad strains of potatoes domesticated by South American cultures, for example, only one was accepted and cultivated when potatoes first reached Europe. The new crop made it possible to feed more people from an equivalent area of land and initially staved off malnutrition. But the strain succumbed to a fungal potato blight in the 1800s. Had more than one strain been cultivated, the tragic Irish potato famines might have been averted. Today, as Sethi (2015) notes in Bread, Wine, Chocolate, we not only run the risk of losing the diversity enabling crops and livestock to resist pests, drought, disease, and inexorable changes in their environment, but we also risk losing the foods we love. Genetic engineering Although people have been breeding organisms for thousands of years, in the last few decades of the 20th century, they began to manipulate genes directly. Using tools of molecular biotechnology, scientists have cloned sheep and cows from adult body cells. New gene-editing technologies, called gene drives, have opened the potential to transform or eliminate entire species in the wild. US farmers routinely plant their fields with corn whose genetic material incorporates a bacterial gene resistant to certain pathogens. More than 40 genetically altered crops have been approved for sale to US farmers since 1992, with genes borrowed from bacteria, viruses, and insects. The United States accounts for nearly two-thirds of biotechnology crops planted globally. Worldwide in 2013, 174 million hectares in 24 countries on six continents were planted with genetically modified crops, as compared with 1.7 million hectares in 6 countries in 1996 – a 100-fold areal expansion in less than two decades. Biotechnologists focus on the potential of this new-millennium green revolution to feed the growing world population, which has added more than 1 billion people in the past decade alone. But other scientists worry about unknown human and ecological health risks. These concerns have stirred deep scientific and public debate, especially in Europe, akin to the debate over pesticides in Rachel Carson’s time. One worrisome practice is plant genetic engineers’ technique of attaching the genes they want to introduce into plants to an antibiotic-resistant gene. They can then easily select plants that have acquired the desired genes by treating them with the antibiotic, which kills any nonresistant plants. Critics worry that the antibiotic-resistant genes could spread to human pathogens and worsen an already growing antibiotic-resistance problem. Another concern arises from allergies humans might have or develop in response to genetically modified foods. Although supporters of genetic engineering believe that genetically altered crops pose few ecological risks, ecologists have raised a variety of concerns. Studies in the late 1990s indicated that pollen from genetically engineered Bt corn can kill monarch butterfly caterpillars. Bt is a strain of bacterium that has been used since the 1980s as a pesticidal spray; its genes have also been inserted directly into corn and other crops. Ecologists have long worried that genetically engineered plants could escape from fields and crossbreed with wild relatives. Studies in radishes, sorghum, canola, and sunflowers found that genes from an engineered plant could jump to wild relatives through interbreeding. The fear is that a gene conferring insect or herbicide resistance might spread through wild plants, creating invasive superweeds that could potentially lower crop yields and further disturb natural ecosystems. In fact, herbicide-resistant turf grass tested in Oregon in 2006 did escape and spread; transgenic canola has also been appearing throughout the US state of North Dakota, which has tens of thousands of hectares in conventional and genetically modified canola. According to the scientists who discovered the transgenic escapees growing in North Dakota – far from any canola field – the plants are likely to be cross-pollinating in the wild and swapping introduced genes; the plants’ novel gene combinations indicate that the transgenic traits are stable and evolving outside of cultivation. Genetically engineered crops do confer some economic and environmental benefits: for farmers, higher yields, lower costs, savings in management time, and gains in flexibility; for the environment, indirect benefits from using fewer pesticides and herbicides. But it is still an open question whether such benefits outweigh potential ecological risks or whether the public will embrace having genetically modified foods as dietary staples. Direct Degradation of Human Life Human biotic impacts are not confined to other species; human cultures themselves have suffered from the widening circles of indirect and direct effects people have imposed on the rest of nature. Over the past hundred years, human technology has worked both ways with regard to public health, for example. Wonder drugs controlled common pathogens at the same time that natural selection strengthened those pathogens’ ability to resist the drugs. Reservoirs in the tropics made water supplies more reliable for people but also created ideal environments for human parasites. Industrialization exposed society to a remarkable array of toxic substances. Although man’s inhumanity to man has been both fact and subject of discourse for thousands of years, the discussions have mostly been removed from any environmental context. Few people today regard social ills as environmental impacts or humans as part of a biota. But diminished societal well-being – whether manifest in high death rates or poor quality of life – shares many of its roots with diminished nonhuman life as a form of biotic impoverishment. Emerging and reemerging diseases The intersection of the environment and human health is the core of the discipline known as environmental health. Among the environmental challenges to public health are direct effects of toxic chemicals; occupational health threats, including exposures to hazardous materials on the job; sanitation; and disposal of hazardous wastes. Exploitation of nonrenewable natural resources – including coal mining, petroleum extraction and refining, and rock quarrying or other mining operations – often chronically impairs workers’ health and shortens their lives. Farmworkers around the world suffer long-term ills from high exposures to pesticides and herbicides. Partly because of increased air pollution, asthma rates are rising, especially in big cities. Synthetic volatile solvents are used in products from shoes to semiconductors, producing lung diseases and toxic wastes. Nuclear weapons production starting in World War II, and associated contamination, have been linked to a variety of illnesses, including syndromes neither recognized nor understood at the time and whose causes were not diagnosed until decades afterward. The grayish metal beryllium, for example, was used in weapons production and was found decades later to scar the lungs of workers and people living near toxic waste sites. Disease has challenged people throughout history. Infectious diseases – a significant fraction of which originated in wildlife or domestic animals – have played an especially significant role in human evolution and cultural development over the past 10,000 years. “Diseases represent evolution in progress,” explains Diamond (1997), as microbes adapt from one host to another, one transmission vector to another. Quammen (2012, p. 20), writing in Spillover, puts it this way: “Infectious disease is a kind of natural mortar binding one creature to another…within the elaborate biophysical edifices we call ecosystems.” Advances in 20th-century medicine, particularly immunization and sanitation, brought major successes in eradicating infectious diseases such as smallpox, polio, and many waterborne illnesses. But toward the century’s end, emerging and reemerging afflictions were again reaching pandemic proportions. Infectious diseases thought to be on the wane – including tuberculosis, malaria, cholera, diphtheria, leptospirosis, encephalitis, and dengue fever – began a resurgence. Even more troubling, seemingly new plagues – Ebola virus, hantavirus, HIV/AIDS, West Nile virus, the tick-borne bacterium causing Lyme disease, and the viruses behind chikungunya and Zika virus disease – are also spreading. Several of these come from wild animal hosts and pass to humans as people encroach further upon previously undisturbed regions. Quammen (2012) examines a number of such zoonoses – diseases arising when a pathogen leaps from a nonhuman animal to a person and sickens or kills that person – and highlights the complex connections between biodiversity and new zoonotic diseases. Biodiversity loss often increases disease transmission, as in Lyme disease and West Nile fever, but diverse ecosystems also serve as sources of pathogens. Overall, however, a number of studies since 2000 indicate that preserving intact ecosystems and their endemic biodiversity tends to hold down infection rates. Human migrations – including their modern incarnation through air travel – also accelerate pathogen traffic and launch global pandemics, such as the 2003 outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome and the 2009 swine flu outbreak caused by the H1N1 virus. Even something as simple and apparently benign as lighting can become an indirect agent of disease. Artificial lighting, especially in the tropics, for example, can alter human and insect behavior in ways that speed transmission of insect-borne diseases, such as Chagas’s disease, malaria, and leishmaniasis. In addition, especially in highly developed countries, diseases attributable to affluence, overconsumption, and stress are taking a toll. Over the 20th century in the United States, observe Montgomery and Biklé (2016, p. 189), chronic diseases that lack an infectious agent “overtook infectious diseases as the leading cause of death.” Heart disease is the States’ number one cause of death; overnutrition, obesity, and diabetes stemming from sedentary habits, particularly among children, are chronic and rising. One estimate put the share of US children considered overweight or obese at one in three. This rise in obesity rates has been stunningly rapid. As recently as 1980, just 15% of adults were obese; by 2008, 34% were obese. Two-thirds of Americans are now considered either overweight or obese. Even more startling, a new trend – unique to the United States – has emerged over the past decade. Economists Case and Deaton (2015) found rising death rates among poorly educated middle-aged white males from suicide, drug and alcohol poisoning, and liver diseases. Still, note Montgomery and Biklé, of an estimated 1030 microbes on Earth, only a few are human pathogens. In contrast, some 1 million kinds of nonpathogenic microbes live in and on our bodies, collectively forming humanity’s microbiome. Varied microbial communities inhabit every person’s skin, eyes, mouth, intestines, and so on. These communities differ as much from one another as a tropical forest differs from a desert. Our microbial allies help regulate our major physiological systems, including the immune system. Recent genetic research, which identifies specific microbes and helps reveal the roles they play, has implicated disturbances of the human microbiome in diseases ranging from infection by the bacterium Clostridium difficile to autoimmune ills such as Crohn’s disease. Perturbations of intestinal microbial communities may even influence obesity. Loss of cultural diversity Although not conventionally regarded as elements of biodiversity, human languages, customs, agricultural systems, technologies, and political systems have evolved out of specific regional environments. Like other organisms’ adaptive traits and behaviors, these elements of human culture constitute unique natural histories adapted, as are other natural histories, to the biogeographical context in which they arose. Yet modern technology, transportation, and trade have pushed the world into a globalized culture, thereby reducing human biological and cultural diversity. Linguists, for example, are predicting that at least half of the 7000 languages spoken today will become extinct in the 21st century. With the spread of Euro-American culture, unique indigenous human cultures, with their knowledge of local medicines and geographically specialized economies, are disappearing even more rapidly than the natural systems that nurtured them. This loss of human biodiversity is as much a cause for concern as the loss of nonhuman biodiversity. Reduced quality of life The effects of environmental degradation on human quality of life are another symptom of biotic impoverishment. Food availability, which depends on environmental conditions, is a basic determinant of quality of life. Yet according to the World Health Organization, nearly half the world’s population suffers from one of two forms of poor nutrition: undernutrition or overnutrition. A big belly is now a symptom shared by malnourished children, who lack calories and protein, and overweight residents of the developed world, who suffer clogged arteries and heart disease from eating too much. Independent of race or economic class, declining quality of life in today’s world is manifest in symptoms such as cancers in the United States caused by environmental contaminants and the high disease rates in the former Soviet Bloc after decades of unregulated pollution. Even with explicit legal requirements that industries release information on their toxic emissions, many people throughout the world still lack both the information and the decision-making power that would give them any control over the quality of their lives. Aggrieved about the degraded environment and resulting quality of life in his homeland, Ogoni activist Ken Saro-Wiwa issued a statement shortly before he was executed by the Nigerian government in 1995, saying, “The environment is man’s first right. Without a safe environment, man cannot exist to claim other rights, be they political, social, or economic.” Kenyan Maathai (2009, p. 249), 2004 winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, has also written, “[I]f we destroy it, we will undermine our own ways of life and ultimately kill ourselves. This is why the environment needs to be at the center of domestic and international policy and practice. If it is not, we don’t stand a chance of alleviating poverty in any significant way.” Having ignored this kind of advice for decades, nations are seeing a new kind of refugee attempting to escape environmental degradation and desperate living conditions; the number of international environmental refugees exceeded the number of political refugees around the world for the first time in 1999. Environmental refugees flee homelands devastated by flooding from dam building, extraction of mineral resources, desertification, and unjust policies of national and international institutions. Such degradation preempts many fundamental human rights, including the rights to health, livelihood, culture, privacy, and property. People have long recognized that human activities that degrade environmental conditions threaten not only the entire biosphere but also human quality of life. As early as 4500 years ago in Mesopotamia and South Asia, writings revealed an awareness of biodiversity, of natural order among living things, and of consequences of disrupting the biosphere. Throughout history, even as civilization grew increasingly divorced from its natural underpinnings, writers, thinkers, activists, and people from all walks of life have continued to see and extol the benefits of nature to humans’ quality of life. Contemporary society still has the chance to relearn how important the environment is to quality of life. It is encouraging that the United Steelworkers of America in 1990 released a report recognizing that protecting steelworker jobs could not be done by ignoring environmental problems and that the destruction of the environment may pose the greatest threat to their children’s future. It is also encouraging that in 2007 the Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to a political figure and a group of scientists for their work on climate change. Environmental injustice Making a living from nature’s wealth has consistently opened gaps between haves and have-nots, between those who bear the brunt of environmental damage to their homeplaces and those who do not, and between the rights of people alive now and those of future generations; these disparities too are part of biotic impoverishment. Inequitable access to “man’s first right” – a healthy local environment – has come to be known as environmental injustice. Environmental injustices, such as institutional racism, occur in industrial and nonindustrial nations. Injustice can be overt, as when land-use planners site landfills, incinerators, and hazardous waste facilities in minority communities, or when environmental agencies levy fines for hazardous waste violations that are lower in minority communities than in white communities. Less overt, but no less unjust is the harm done to one community when unsound environmental practices benefit another. Clear-cut logging in the highlands of northwestern North America, for example, benefits logging communities while damaging the livelihoods of lowland fishing communities subjected to debris flows, sedimentation, and downstream flooding. Institutional racism and environmental injustice are usually acknowledged only after the fact, if at all. For example, in the US city of Flint, Michigan, the 2010 population was more than 60% black and Latino, and the 2014 median household income was 16% less than for the state as a whole. To save money, the struggling city in 2014 switched its water source from Lake Huron to the Flint River. But instead of saving money, the corrosive new water source leached lead out of the city’s aging water pipes. Despite increasing evidence of serious health effects after the switch – including potentially lifelong brain damage among the city’s children – Michigan’s governor and other state officials for months assured citizens the water was safe. In a report issued in March 2016, an independent panel appointed by the governor stated that the facts “lead us to the inescapable conclusion that this is a case of environmental injustice” and that “Flint residents, who are majority black or African-American and among the most impoverished of any metropolitan area in the United States, did not enjoy the same degree of protection from environmental and health hazards as that provided to other communities.” The plight of the working poor and disparities between rich and poor are themselves examples of biotic impoverishment within human society. According to the United Nations Research Institute for Social Development, in 1994 the collective wealth of the world’s 358 billionaires equaled the combined income of the poorest 2.4 billion people. In 2010, Forbes Magazine put the number of billionaires at 1011, with a total worth of $3.6 trillion. By 2015, the number of billionaires had climbed to 1826, and their total worth had practically doubled, to $7.05 trillion – more than twice the gross domestic product (GDP) of Germany, Europe’s most prosperous country. In the United States during the last decade of the 20th century, the incomes of poor and middle-class families stagnated or fell, despite a booming stock market. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities and the Economic Policy Institute reported that between 1988 and 1998, earnings of the poorest fifth of American families rose less than 1%, while earnings of the richest fifth jumped 15%. By the middle of the second decade of the 21st century, the disparity in wealth among Americans had become the widest among industrialized nations, with the wealthiest 3% of the population holding 54% of the wealth. The wealthiest Americans continue to prosper, even during and after the global recession of 2008, while the less well-off keep losing ground. But perhaps the grossest example of human and environmental domination leading to continued injustice is the creation of a so-called third world to supply raw materials and labor to the dominant European civilization after 1500 and the resulting schism between today’s developed and developing nations. Developing regions throughout the world held tremendous stores of natural wealth, some of it – like petroleum – having obvious monetary value in the dominant economies and some having a value invisible to those economies – like vast intact ecosystems. A 2010 United Nations study carried out under the Economics of Ecosystems and Biodiversity Initiative estimated that even today, Earth’s ecosystems account for roughly half to 90% of the source of livelihoods for rural and forest-dwelling peoples; the study calls this value the GDP of the poor. Dominant European civilizations unabashedly exploited this natural wealth and colonized or enslaved the people in whose homelands the wealth was found. But the dominant civilizations also exported their ways of thinking and their economic models to the developing world, not only colonizing places but also effecting what Maathai called a colonization of the mind. Although dominant 21st-century society tends to dismiss ancient wisdom as irrelevant in the modern world, perhaps the cruelest impoverishment of all is the cultural and spiritual deracination experienced by exploited peoples worldwide. Exploitation of poor nations and their citizens by richer, consumer countries – and in many cases by the same governments that fought for independence from the colonists while adopting the colonists’ attitudes and economic models – persists today in agriculture, wild materials harvesting, and textile and other manufacturing sweatshops. In the mid-1990s, industrial countries consumed 86% of the globe’s aluminum, 81% of its paper, 80% of its iron and steel, 75% of its energy, and 61% of its meat; they are thus responsible for most of the environmental degradation associated with producing these goods. Most of the actual degradation, however, still takes place in developing nations. As a result, continuing environmental and social injustice, perpetrated by outsiders and insiders alike, pervades developing nations. Such impoverishment can take the form of wrenching physical dislocation like the massive displacements enforced by China’s Three Gorges Dam. It can appear as environmental devastation of homelands and murder of the people who fought to keep their lands, as in the Nigerian government–backed exploitation of Ogoniland’s oil reserves by the Shell Petroleum Development Corporation. After Saro-Wiwa’s execution, the Ogoni were left, without a voice, to deal with a scarred and oil-polluted landscape. Poverty still plagues women and children, despite great advances in the welfare of both groups over the past century. Children from impoverished communities, even in affluent nations, suffer from the lethargy and impaired physical and intellectual development known as failure to thrive. Poverty forces many children to work the land or in industrial sweatshops; lack of education prevents them from attaining their intellectual potential. This impoverishment in the lives of women and children is as much a symptom of biotic impoverishment as are deforestation, invasive alien organisms, or species extinctions. Little by little, community-based conservation and development initiatives are being mounted by local citizens to combat this impoverishment: Witness Maathai’s Green Belt Movement, which began with tree planting to restore community landscapes and offer livelihoods for residents, and the rise of ecotourism and microlending (small loans made to individuals, especially women, to start independent businesses) as ways to bring monetary benefits directly to local people without further damaging their environments. Ultimately, one could see all efforts to protect the ethnosphere and biosphere as a fight for the rights of future generations to an environment that can support them. Political instability Only during the last two decades of the 20th century did environmental issues find a place on international diplomatic agendas, as scholars began calling attention to – and governments began to see – irreversible connections between environmental degradation and national security. British scholar Myers (1993), noting that environmental problems were likely to become predominant causes of conflict in the decades ahead, was one of the first to define a new concept of environmental security. National security threatened by unprecedented environmental changes irrespective of political boundaries will require unprecedented responses altogether different from military actions, he warned. Nations cannot deploy their armies to hold back advancing deserts, rising seas, or the greenhouse effect. Increasingly, governments have begun to acknowledge such threats. In just one recent example, US diplomatic, defense, and intelligence agencies have repeatedly cited climate change as an urgent and growing threat to national security. Canadian scholar Homer-Dixon (1999) showed that environmental scarcities – whether created by ecological constraints or sociopolitical factors including growing populations, depletion of renewable resources such as fish or timber, and environmental injustice perpetrated by one segment of a population on another – were fast becoming a permanent, independent cause of civil strife and ethnic violence. He found that such scarcity was helping to drive societies into a self-reinforcing spiral of dysfunction and violence, including terrorism. Environmental and economic injustices worldwide leave no country immune to this type of threat. Typically, diplomacy has stalled in conflicts over natural resources: arguments over water rights have more than once held up Israeli-Palestinian peace agreements; fights over fish erupted between Canada and the United States, Spain, and Portugal. In contrast, in adopting the Montreal Protocol on Substances That Deplete the Ozone Layer in 1987, governments, nongovernmental organizations, and industry successfully worked together to safeguard part of the environmental commons. The treaty requires signatory nations to decrease their use of CFCs and other ozone-destroying chemicals and has been, according to former United Nations secretary general Kofi Annan, perhaps the most successful international agreement to date. Cumulative effects If scientists have learned anything about the factors leading to biotic impoverishment, they have learned that the factors’ cumulative effects can take on surprising dimensions. As scholars like Fagan (1999) and Diamond (2005) have detailed, the multiple stresses of global climatic cycles such as El Niño, natural events like droughts or floods, resource depletion, and social upheaval have shaped the fates of civilizations. Societies as far-flung as ancient Egypt, Peru, the American Southwest, and Easter Island prospered and collapsed because of unwise management of their environments. The city of Ubar, built on desert sands in what is now southern Oman, vanished into the sinkhole created by drawing too much water out of its great well. In modern Sahelian Africa, a combination of well digging and improved medical care and sanitation led to a threefold population increase. The combined effects of higher population density and a sedentary way of life exceeded local areas’ capacity to sustain people and their livestock, especially in the face of high taxes levied by colonial governments. As a result, impoverished societies took the place of nomadic cultures that had evolved and thrived within the desert’s realities. During the first decades of the 21st century, numerous natural disasters befell nations around the world: wildfires in Australia, Bolivia, Canada, Russia, and the United States; flooding in the British Isles, China, India, Romania, and West Africa; devastating hurricanes and typhoons in the Caribbean, Philippines, Taiwan, and southeastern United States; catastrophic landslides and floods in China, Guatemala, Pakistan, and Portugal; and destructive earthquakes in Chile, China, Haiti, Indonesia, Japan, and Pakistan. Neither the rains nor the earthquakes were caused by human activity, but the cumulative effects of human land uses and management practices – from dikes separating the Mississippi from its floodplain to deforestation in Haiti – made the losses of human life and property much worse than they might have been otherwise. Root Causes of Human Impact The ultimate cause of humans’ massive environmental impact is our individual and collective reproductive and consumptive behavior, which has given us spectacular success as a species. But the very things that have enabled people to thrive in nearly every environment have magnified our impacts on those environments, and the technological and political steps we take to mitigate our impacts often aggravate them. Too many of us simply take too much from the natural world and ask it to absorb too much waste. Fragmented Worldviews, Fragmented Worlds For most of human history, people remained tied to their natural surroundings. Even as agriculture, writing, and technology advanced, barriers of geography, language, and culture kept people a diverse lot, each group depending on mostly local and regional knowledge about where and when to find resources necessary for survival. Their worldviews, and resulting economies, reflected this dependency. For example, in northwestern North America starting about 3000 years ago, a native economy centered on the abundance of Pacific salmon. At its core was the concept of the gift and a belief system that treated all parts of the Earth – animate and inanimate – as equal members of a community. In this and other ancient gift economies, a gift was not a possession that could be owned; rather, it had to be passed on, creating a cycle of obligatory returns. Individuals or tribes gained prestige through the size of their gifts, not the amount of wealth they accumulated. This system coevolved with the migratory habits of the salmon, which moved en masse upriver to spawn each year. Because the Indians viewed salmon and themselves as equals in a shared community, killing salmon represented a gift of food from salmon to people. Fishers were obligated to treat salmon with respect or risk losing this vital gift. The exchange of gifts between salmon and humans – food for respectful treatment – minimized waste and overharvest and ensured a continuous supply of food. Further, the perennial trading of gifts among the people effectively redistributed the wealth brought each year by fluctuating populations of migrating fish, leveling out the boom-and-bust cycles that usually accompany reliance on an uncertain resource. In modern times, the gift economy, along with the egalitarian worldview that accompanied it, has been eclipsed by a redistributive economy tied not to an exchange of gifts with nature but to the exploitation of nature and to technologies enhancing that exploitation. Instead of viewing natural resources as joint members in a shared community, people came to view them as commodities. Natural resources fell under the heading of “land” in an economic trinity comprising three factors of production: land, labor, and capital. Land and resources, including crops, were seen as expendable or easily substitutable forms of capital whose value was determined solely by their value in the human marketplace. In 1776 Adam Smith published his famous Inquiry Into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations, in which he argued that society is merely the sum of its individuals, that social good is the sum of individual wants, and that the market (a so-called invisible hand) automatically guides individual behavior to common good. Crucial to his theories were division of labor and the idea that all factors of production were freely mobile. His mechanistic views created an economic rationale for no longer regarding individuals as members of a community linked by ethical, social, and ecological bonds. About the same time, fueling and fueled by the beginnings of the Industrial Revolution, the study of the natural world was morphing into modern physics, chemistry, geology, and biology. Before the mid-19th century, those who studied the natural world – early 19th-century German biogeographer Baron Alexander von Humboldt and his disciple Charles Darwin among them – took an integrated view of science and nature, including people. Both scientists regarded understanding the complex interdependencies among living things as the noblest and most important result of scientific inquiry. But this integrated natural philosophy was soon supplanted by more atomistic views, which fit better with industrialization. Mass production of new machines relied on division of labor and interchangeable parts. Like automobiles on an assembly line, natural phenomena were broken down into their supposed component parts in a reductionism that has dominated science ever since. Rushing to gain in-depth, specialized knowledge, science and society lost sight of the need to tie this knowledge together. Disciplinary specialization replaced integrative scholarship. Neoclassical economics, which arose around 1870, ushered in the economic worldview that rules today. A good’s value was no longer tied to the labor required to make it but derived instead from its scarcity. A good’s price was determined only by the interaction of supply and demand. As part of “land,” natural resources therefore became part of the human economy, rather than the material foundation making the human economy possible. Because of its doctrine of infinite substitutability, neoclassical economics rejects any limits on growth; forgotten are classical economic thinkers and contemporaries of von Humboldt, including Thomas Malthus and John Stuart Mill, who saw limits to growth of the human population and material well-being. Consequently, the 19th and 20th centuries saw the rise to dominance of economic indicators that fostered the economic invisibility of nature – misleading society about the relevance of Earth’s living systems to human well-being. Among the worst indicators are gross national product (GNP) and its cousin, GDP. GNP measures the value of goods and services generated by a nation’s citizens or companies, regardless of their location around the globe. GDP, in contrast, measures the value of goods and services produced within a country’s borders, regardless of who or what generates those goods and services. In effect, both GNP and GDP measure money changing hands, no matter what the money pays for; they make no distinction between what is desirable and undesirable, between costs and benefits. Both indicators ignore important aspects of the economy like unpaid work or nonmonetary contributions to human fulfillment – parenting, volunteering, checking books out of the library. Worse, the indicators also omit social and environmental costs, such as pollution, illness, or resource depletion; they only add and do not subtract. GDP math adds in the value of paid daycare or a hospital stay and ignores the value of unpaid parenting or care given at home by family or friends. It adds in the value of timber sold but fails to subtract the losses in biodiversity, watershed protection, or climate regulation when a forest is cut. Over the past few decades, efforts have been made to create less blinkered economic indicators. Social scientists Herman Daly and John Cobb in 1989 developed an index of sustainable economic welfare, which adjusts the United States’ GNP by adding in environmental good things and subtracting environmental bad things. Public expenditures on education, for example, are weighted as “goods,” while costs of pollution cleanup, depletion of natural resources, and treating environment-related illnesses are counted as “bads.” Unlike the soaring GDP of recent decades, this index of sustainable economic welfare remained nearly unchanged over the same period. Still other work aims to reveal nature’s worth in monetary terms by assigning dollar values to ecological goods and services. A 1997 study by ecologist David Pimentel and colleagues calculated separate values for specific biological services, such as soil formation, crop breeding, or pollination. By summing these figures, these researchers estimated the total economic benefits of biodiversity for the United States at $319 billion – 5% of US GDP at the time – and for the world at $2928 billion. A 2000 analysis by Pimentel and colleagues reported that the approximately 50,000 nonnative species in the United States cause major environmental damage and reparation costs amounting to $137 billion a year. As part of the United Nations International Year of Biodiversity in 2010, several studies translated the value of the world’s ecosystems into dollar values. One report estimated the worth of crucial ecosystem services delivered to humans by living systems at $21 trillion to $72 trillion per year – comparable to a world gross national income of $58 trillion in 2008. Another study reported that as many as 500 million people worldwide depend on coral reefs – valued between $30 billion and $172 billion a year – for fisheries, tourism, and protection from ocean storms and high waves, services threatened by warmer and more acidic seas. Although a monetary approach does not create a comprehensive indicator of environmental condition, it certainly points out that ecological values ignored by the global economy are enormous. Consequently, several countries and a growing number of global financial institutions, such as the World Bank, have begun to include natural capital in their economic accounting systems. More than 30 countries have begun natural capital accounting using a standard methodology adopted by the UN Statistical Commission in 2012, and many financial institutions around the world have pledged to consider natural capital in private-sector accounting and decision making. Too Many Consuming Too Much From the appearance of H. sapiens about 200,000 years ago, it took the human population until 1804 to reach its first billion, 123 years to double to 2 billion, and 33 years to achieve 3 billion. Human population doubled again from 3 billion to 6 billion in about 40 years – before most post–World War II baby boomers reached retirement age. Even with fertility rates declining in developed countries, China, and some developing countries where women are gaining education and economic power, and with pandemics like AIDS claiming more lives, the US Census Bureau predicts that world population will reach 9 billion by 2044. People appropriate about 40% of global plant production, 54% of Earth’s freshwater runoff, and enough of the ocean’s bounty to have depleted 63% of assessed marine fish stocks. In energy terms, one person’s food consumption amounts to 2500–3000 cal a day, about the same as that of a common dolphin. But with all the other energy and materials humans use, global per capita energy and material consumption has soared even faster than population growth over the past 50 years. Now, instead of coevolving with a natural economy, global society is consuming the foundations of that economy, impoverishing Earth’s living systems and undermining the foundations of its own existence (Fig. 1 ; Karr, 2008). Relationships among the natural, social, and economic systems on Earth. Human economies may be thought of as icing atop a two-layer cake. The economic icing is eroding the human social and natural layers beneath it, threatening the foundation and sustainability of all three systems. Measuring Environmental Impacts For most of the 20th century, environmental measurements, or indicators, tracked primarily two classes of information: counts of activities directed at environmental protection and the supply of products to people. Regulatory agencies are typically preoccupied with legislation, permitting, or enforcement, such as the numbers of environmental laws passed, permits issued, enforcement actions taken, or treatment plants constructed. Resource protection agencies concentrate on resource harvest and allocation. Water managers, for example, measure water quantity; they allocate water to domestic, industrial, and agricultural uses but seldom make it a priority to reserve supplies for sustaining aquatic life, to protect scenic and recreational values, or simply to maintain the water cycle. Foresters, farmers, and fishers count board-feet of timber, bushels of grain, and tons of fish harvested. Governmental and nongovernmental organizations charged with protecting biological resources keep counts of threatened and endangered species. As in the parable of the three blind men and the elephant – each of whom thinks the elephant looks like the one body part he can touch – these or similar indicators measure only one aspect of environmental quality. Counting bureaucratic achievements focuses on activities rather than on information about real ecological status and trends. Measurements of resource supply keep track of commodity production, not necessarily a system’s capacity to continue supplying that commodity. And measuring only what we remove from natural systems – as if we were taking out the interest on a savings account – overlooks the fact that we are usually depleting principal as well. Even biologists’ counts of threatened and endangered species, which would seem to measure biotic impoverishment directly, still focus narrowly on biological parts, not ecological wholes. Enumerating threatened and endangered species is just like counting any other commodity. It brings our attention to a system already in trouble, perhaps too late. And it subtly reinforces our view that we know which parts of the biota are most important. Society needs to rethink its use of available environmental indicators, and it needs to develop new indicators that represent current conditions and trends in the systems humans depend on (Table 2 ). It particularly needs objective measures more directly tied to the condition, or health, of the environment so that people can judge whether their activities are compromising that condition. Table 2 Plausible indicators of environmental qualitya Table 2 Indirect depletion of living systems through alterations in physical and chemical environments Overharvest of renewable resources such as fish and timber: tons of fish harvested; for a given anadromous fish population, number of adult fish returning to rivers to spawn; hatchery fish released and recovered; board-feet of timber harvested; forest regrowth rates; quantity of standing timber; ecological footprints 2. Habitat fragmentation and destruction: area of remaining grassland, wetland, and other habitats; landscape connectivity; rates of habitat destruction 3. Biotic homogenization: number of extinct, threatened, and endangered taxonomic groups; spread of nonnative species; local or regional diversity; diversity among cultivated crops and livestock; damage and reparation costs due to invasions or extinctions; major relocations in species distributions Emerging and reemerging diseases: death or infection rates caused by diseases, including diseases of affluence; geographic spread of diseases; recovery rates; frequency and spread of resistance to antibiotics and other drugs 2. Loss of cultural diversity: incidence of ethnic and cultural cleansings, extinction of cultures, death of languages 3. Reduced quality of life: population size and growth; starvation, malnutrition, and obesity rates; infant mortality rates; teen pregnancy rates; literacy rates; suicide rates and other measures of stress; length of work week; child or other forced labor; changes in death rates or average life spans aThese indicators have been or could be used to monitor status and trends in environmental quality in ways that capture the many faces of biotic impoverishment. Such measures should be quantitative, yet easy to understand and communicate; they should be cost-effective and applicable in many circumstances. Unlike narrow criteria tracking only administrative, commodity, or endangered species numbers, they should give reliable signals about status and trends in ecological systems. Ideally, effective indicators should describe the present condition of a place, aid in diagnosing the underlying causes of that condition, and make predictions about future trends. They should reveal not only risks from present activities but also potential benefits from alternative management decisions. Most important, these indicators should, either singly or in combination, give information explicitly about living systems. Measurements of physical or chemical factors can sometimes act as surrogates for direct biological measurements, but only when the connection between those measures and living systems is clearly understood. Too often we make assumptions that turn out to be wrong and fail to protect living systems – for example, when water managers assume that chemically clean water equals a healthy aquatic biota. Without a full spectrum of indicators – and without coupling them to direct measures of biological condition – only a partial view of the degree of biotic impoverishment can emerge. General Sustainability Indexes As environmental concerns have become more urgent – and governmental and nongovernmental organizations have struggled to define and implement the concept of sustainable development – the effort has grown to create indicator systems that explicitly direct the public’s and policymakers’ attention to the value of living things. Moving well past solely economic indexes like GDP, several indexes have been developed to integrate ecological, social, and economic well-being. The index of environmental trends for nine industrialized countries, developed by the nonprofit National Center for Economic and Security Alternatives, incorporated ratings of air, land, and water quality; chemical and waste generation; and energy use since 1970. By its 1995 rankings, environmental quality in the United States had gone down by 22% since 1970, while Denmark had declined by 11%. In 2000, world leaders, supported by the United Nations Development Programme, defined a set of eight millennium development goals to be attained by 2015, which combine poverty, education, employment, and environmental sustainability. They include human rights and health goals – such as universal primary education, gender equality, and combating AIDS and other diseases – as well as goals to promote environmental sustainability. Since the program began, the agency reported in 2015, global poverty has been halved, with fewer than 850 million people – but 40% of the population in sub-Saharan Africa – still living in extreme poverty. By 2015, about 91% of the world’s population had access to improved drinking water sources (piped or not coming from unprotected wells, springs, or surface water), and remarkable progress had been made in fighting malaria and tuberculosis and in reducing the proportion of slum dwellers in the metropolises of the developing world. But environmental sustainability remains under severe threat, as global carbon emissions escalate, forests are felled, and fish stocks are overexploited. Nonhuman species are hurtling toward extinction faster than ever, and health and education among poor people, and gender equality everywhere, still lag. The environmental performance index was developed and first released in 2006 by Yale and Columbia universities to complement the United Nations’ millennium development goals. It ranks how well countries do in protecting human health from environmental harm and in protecting ecosystems. The 2016 index ranks 180 countries on more than 20 performance indicators in 9 categories reflecting the twin goals of environmental health and ecosystem vitality. Environmental health is measured by such indicators as child mortality, air quality, and access to drinking water and sanitation; ecosystem vitality by metrics including trends in carbon emissions, protection of varied biotic systems, and wastewater treatment, among others. Top-performing nations for 2016 included Finland, Sweden, and Slovenia. The United States ranked 26th, having risen from 61st in 2010 but still well below much of Europe and Singapore. Ecological Footprints A resource-accounting approach pioneered in the 1990s by geographers Wackernagel and Rees (1996) translates humans’ impact on nature, particularly resource consumption, into an ecological footprint. This accounting estimates the area required by a city, town, nation, or other human community to produce consumed resources and absorb generated wastes; it then compares the physical area occupied by that city or country with the area required to meet its needs. The 29 largest cities of Baltic Europe, for example, appropriate areas of forest, agricultural, marine, and wetland ecosystems that are at least 565–1130 times larger than the areas of the cities themselves. According to the Global Footprint Network, national ecological footprints in 2010 ranged from a high of 10.7 ha per person for the United Arab Emirates to 0.4 ha per person for Timor-Leste and 0.6 for Afghanistan and Bangladesh. The United States’ ecological footprint – 8.0 ha per person – tied for fourth among 152 nations with populations of at least 1 million. One hundred four of these nations operate under ecological deficits; that is, their consumption exceeds the biological capacity of their lands and waters to furnish needed resources and absorb their wastes. At their present rates of consumption, these nations are therefore overexploiting either their own resources or those of other nations. By ecological footprint accounting, raising 7.5 billion people on Earth to living standards – and thus ecological footprints – equal to those in the United States would require at least three more planets than the only one we have. Clearly, humans are consuming more resources, and discarding more waste, than Earth’s living systems can produce or absorb in a given time period. This gap is the global sustainability gap that lies before us. Measuring the State of Living Systems Most environmental indexes and accounting systems are still human centered; they do not measure the condition of the biota itself. We may know that biodiversity’s services are worth huge sums of money and that our hometown’s ecological footprint is much bigger than the town’s physical footprint, but how do we know whether specific activities damage living systems or that other activities benefit them? How do we know if aggregate human activity is diminishing life on Earth? To answer this question, we need measures that directly assess the condition of the biota. Biological assessment directly measures the attributes of living systems to determine the condition of a specific landscape. The very presence of thriving living systems – sea otters and kelp forests off the central California coast; salmon, orcas, and herring in Pacific Northwest waters; monk seals in the Mediterranean Sea – says that the conditions those organisms need to survive are also present. A biota is thus the most direct and integrative indicator of local, regional, or global biological condition. Biological assessments give us a way to evaluate whether monetary valuations, sustainability indexes, and ecological footprints are telling the truth about human impact on the biota. Biological assessments permit a new level of integration because living systems, including human cultures, register the accumulated effects of all forms of degradation caused by human actions. Direct, comprehensive biological monitoring and assessment began in the last decades of the 20th century, when Karr, 1981, Karr, 2006 devised the index of biological integrity (IBI) to assess the health of streams in the US Midwest. Over the next three decades, indexes built on IBI’s principles were developed for other regions and other environments, including lakes, wetlands, coastal marine habitats, and terrestrial areas. IBI combines several indicators into a multimetric index, an approach it shares with economic indexes like the consumer price index or the index of leading economic indicators. Instead of prices of diverse consumer goods, however, IBI measures attributes of the flora and fauna living at a place. To date, the principles underpinning IBI have helped scientists, resource managers, and citizen volunteers understand, protect, and restore living systems in at least 70 countries worldwide. The most widely used indexes for assessing rivers examine fishes and benthic (bottom-dwelling) invertebrates. These groups are abundant and easily sampled, and the species living in a water body represent a diversity of anatomical, ecological, and behavioral adaptations. As humans alter watersheds and waters, changes occur in taxonomic richness (biodiversity), species composition (which species are present), individual health, and feeding and reproductive relationships. The specific measurements for streams and rivers (Table 3 ) are sensitive to a broad range of human effects in waterways, such as sedimentation, nutrient enrichment, toxic chemicals, physical habitat destruction, and altered flows. The resulting index thus combines, and reflects, responses to human activities from a whole biological community – its parts, such as species, and its processes, such as food web dynamics. Table 3 Biological attributes in two indexes of biological integrity for streams and rivers Sampling the inhabitants of a stream tells us much about that stream and its landscape. Biological diversity is higher upstream of wastewater treatment plants than downstream, for example, whereas year-to-year variation at the same location is low (Fig. 2 ). Biological sampling also reveals differences between urban and rural streams. For instance, samples of invertebrates from one of the best streams in rural King County, in the US state of Washington, contain 27 kinds, or taxa, of invertebrates; similar samples from an urban stream in the city of Seattle contain only 7. The rural stream has 18 taxa of mayflies, stoneflies, and caddisflies; the urban stream, only 2 or 3. When these and other metrics are combined in an index based on invertebrates, the resulting benthic IBI (B-IBI) numerically ranks the condition, or health, of a stream (Table 4 ). (a) Biodiversity is higher at sites upstream of wastewater treatment outfalls than downstream. At Tickle Creek near Portland, Oregon (United States), taxa richness differed little between years but differed dramatically between sites upstream of a wastewater outfall and sites downstream. (b) Taxa richness also differed between two creeks with wastewater outfalls (Tickle and North Fork Deep) and one creek without an outfall (Foster). All three streams flowed through watersheds with similar land uses. A benthic IBI can also be used to compare sites in different regions. Areas in Wyoming’s Grand Teton National Park where human visitors are rare have near-maximum B-IBIs. Streams with moderate recreation taking place in their watersheds have B-IBIs that are not significantly lower than those without human presence, but places where recreation is heavy are clearly damaged. Urban streams in the nearby town of Jackson are even more degraded but not as bad as urban streams in Seattle. Nation-specific biological assessments also can be and are being done. The US Environmental Protection Agency, for example, in 2006 performed a nationwide survey of stream condition using an IBI-like multimetric index. The survey found that 28% of US stream miles were in good condition in comparison with least-disturbed reference sites in their regions, 25% were in fair condition, and 42% were in poor condition (5% were not assessed). The agency has been expanding this effort to include other water resource types, including coastal waters, coral reefs, lakes, large rivers, and wetlands. Since 2000, the Heinz Center (2008) has published two editions of its report on the state of US ecosystems, which seeks to capture a view of the large-scale patterns, conditions, and trends across the United States. The center defined and compiled a select set of indicators – specific variables tracking ecosystem extent and pattern, chemical and physical characteristics, biological components, and goods and services derived from the natural world – for six key ecosystems: coasts and oceans, farmlands, forests, fresh waters, grasslands and shrublands, and urban and suburban landscapes. Among the many conclusions of the 2008 report were that the acreage burned every year by wildfires was increasing; nonnative fishes had invaded nearly every watershed in the lower 48 states; and chemical contaminants were found in virtually all streams and most groundwater wells, often at levels above those set to protect human health or wildlife. On the plus side, ecosystems were increasing their storage of carbon, soil quality was improving, and crop yields had grown significantly. The massive international UN Millennium Ecosystem Assessment remains the gold standard for synthesizing ecological conditions at a variety of scales. From 2001 through 2005, the project examined the full range of global ecosystems – from those relatively undisturbed, such as natural forests, to landscapes with mixed patterns of human use to ecosystems intensively managed and modified by humans, such as agricultural land and urban areas – and communicated its findings in terms of the consequences of ecosystem change for human well-being. The resulting set of reports drew attention to the many kinds of services people rely on from ecosystems, specifically, supporting services, such as photosynthesis, soil formation, and waste absorption; regulating services, such as climate and flood control and maintenance of water quality; provisioning services, such as food, wood, and nature’s pharmacopoeia; and cultural services from scientific to spiritual. In addition, the reports explicitly tied the status of diverse ecosystems and their service-providing capacity to human needs as varied as food and health, personal safety and security, and social cohesion. Even while recognizing that the human species is buffered against ecological changes by culture and technology, the reports highlighted our fundamental dependence on the flow of ecosystem services and our direct responsibility for the many faces of biotic impoverishment. Among other findings, the assessment found that 60% of the services coming from ecosystems are being degraded, to the detriment of efforts to stem poverty, hunger, and disease among the poor everywhere. Declines are not limited to coral reefs and tropical forests, which have been on the public’s radar for some time; they are pervasive in grasslands, deserts, mountains, and other landscapes as well. A leading cause of declines in renewable natural resources is government subsidies that offer incentives to overharvest. The degradation of ecosystem services could grow worse during the first half of the 21st century, blocking achievement of the United Nations’ eight millennium development goals. The core message embodied in ecological, especially biological, assessments is that preventing harmful environmental impacts goes beyond narrow protection of clean water or clear skies, even beyond protecting single desired species. Certain species may be valuable for commerce or sport, but these species do not exist in isolation. We cannot predict which organisms are vital for the survival of commercial species or species we want for other reasons. Failing to protect all organisms – from microbes and fungi to plants, invertebrates, and vertebrates – ignores the key contributions of these groups to healthy biotic communities. No matter how important a particular species is to people, it cannot persist outside the biological context that sustains it. Direct biological assessment objectively measures this context. Recognizing and Managing Environmental Impacts Every animal is alert to dangers in its environment. A microscopic protist gliding through water responds to light, temperature, and chemicals in its path, turning away at the first sign of something noxious. A bird looking for food must decide when to pursue prey and when not, because pursuit might expose it to predators. The bird might risk pursuit when hungry but not when it has young to protect. Animals that assess risks properly and adjust their behavior are more likely to survive; in nature, flawed risk assessment often means death or end of a genetic line. People, too, are natural risk assessors. Each person chooses whether to smoke or drink, fly or go by train, drive a car or ride a motorcycle and at what speeds. Each decision is the result of a partially objective, partially subjective internal calculus that weighs benefits and risks against one another. Risk is a combination of two factors: the numerical probability that an adverse event will occur and the consequences of the adverse event. People may not always have the right signals about these two factors, however, and may base their risk calculus on the wrong clues. City dwellers in the United States generally feel that it is safer to drive home on a Saturday night than to fly in an airplane, for example. Even though the numerical odds of an accident are much higher on the highway than in the air, people fear more the consequences of an airplane falling out of the sky. Society also strives to reduce its collective exposure to risks. Governments routinely use military power to defend their sovereignty and, albeit more reluctantly, regulatory power to reduce workplace risks and risks associated with consumer products like cars. But people and their governments have been much less successful in defining and reducing a broad range of ecological risks, largely because they have denied that the threats are real. Policies and plans generated by economists, technologists, engineers, and even ecologists typically assume that lost and damaged components of living systems are unimportant or can be repaired or replaced. Widespread ecological degradation has resulted directly from the failure of modern society to properly assess the ecological risks it faces. Like the fate of Old Kingdom Egypt or Easter Island, our civilization’s future depends on our ability to recognize this deficiency and correct it. Risk assessment as formally practiced by various government agencies began as a way to evaluate the effects of toxic substances on human health, usually the effects of single substances, such as pollutants or drugs, from single sources, such as a chemical plant. During the 1990s, the focus widened to encompass mixtures of substances and also ecological risks. For example, ecological risk assessment by the US Environmental Protection Agency (1998) started by asking five questions: Is there a problem? What is the nature of the problem? What are the exposure and ecological effects? (A hazard to which no one or nothing is exposed is not considered to pose any risk.) How can we summarize and explain the problem to affected parties, both at-risk populations and those whose activities would be curtailed? How can we manage the risks? Even though these were good questions, ecological risk management has made no visible headway in stemming biotic impoverishment. Its central failing comes from an inability to correctly answer the second question, What is the nature of the problem? Our present political, social, and economic systems simply do not give us the right signals about what is at risk. None of society’s most familiar indicators – whether GDP or number of threatened and endangered species – measure the consequences, or risks, of losing living systems. If biotic impoverishment is the problem, then it only makes sense to direct environmental policy toward protecting the integrity of biotic systems. Integrity implies a wholeness or unimpaired condition. In present biological usage, integrity refers to the condition at sites with little or no influence from human activity; the organisms there are the products of natural evolutionary and biogeographic processes in the absence of people. Tying the concept of integrity to an evolutionary framework lays down a benchmark against which to evaluate sites that people have altered. Directing policy toward protecting biological integrity – as called for in the United States’ Clean Water Act, Canada’s National Park Act, and the European Union’s Water Framework Directive, among others – does not, however, mean that people must cease all activity that interferes with some “pristine” Earthly biota. The demands of feeding, clothing, and housing billions of people mean that few places on Earth will maintain a biota with evolutionary and biogeographic integrity. Rather, because people depend on living systems, it is in our interest to manage our activities so they do not compromise a place’s capacity to support those activities in the future; that capacity can be called ecological health. Ecological health describes the preferred state of sites heavily used for human purposes: cities, croplands, tree farms, water bodies stocked for fish, and the like. At these places, it is impractical to set a goal of integrity in an evolutionary sense, but we should avoid practices that damage these places or places elsewhere to the point that we can no longer receive the intended benefits indefinitely. For example, agricultural practices that leave behind saline soils, depress regional water tables, and erode fertile topsoil faster than it can be renewed destroy the land’s biological capacity for agriculture. Moreover, they can degrade places downstream and downwind – locally, regionally, and across an ocean or continent. Such practices are unhealthy in both ecological and economic terms. Biological integrity as a policy goal redirects our focus away from maximizing goods and services for the human economy and toward ways to manage our economy within the bounds set by the natural economy. It begins to turn our attention away from questions such as, How much stress can landscapes and ecosystems absorb? to ones such as, How can responsible human actions protect and restore ecosystems? In contrast to risk assessment, striving to protect biological integrity would lead us away from technological fixes for environmental problems and toward practices that prevent ecological degradation and encourage ecological restoration. Leopold (1949, pp. 224–225), in A Sand County Almanac, was the first to invoke the concept of integrity in an ecological sense: “A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.” Managing for biological integrity requires the kind of ethical commitment inherent in Leopold’s words. We are called to restrain consumerism and limit population size, to embrace less-selfish attitudes toward land stewardship, and to understand that the biosphere matters. Instead of calling on human technical and spiritual wellsprings to manage resources, we have to call on them for managing human affairs. We have to set goals and craft indicators, as the United Nations and others are doing. These goals and indicators must conform to the biophysical realities at work in the world and acknowledge humans’ propensity to put narrow self-interest above all else. We have to find and use appropriate measurements for all the factors contributing to biotic impoverishment, be they climate change, overharvesting, agriculture, or environmental injustice. Measurement of environmental impact founded on the evolutionary idea of integrity means directly assessing biotic condition and comparing that condition with what might be expected in a place with little or no human influence. We can then make an informed choice: continue with activities that degrade biotic condition or create alternatives that do not harm living systems. Modern institutions are capable of recognizing ecological threats and responding to them in time, as they did with the Montreal Protocol. A decade after the agreement’s adoption, satellite measurements in the stratosphere indicated that ozone-depleting pollutants were in fact declining. Given this success, some policy experts have hoped the ozone treaty can also help slow global warming. Specifically, negotiators at the 2015 annual meeting of signatory parties agreed to develop an amendment to the Montreal Protocol. The amendment’s goal is to phase out the production and use of industrial chemicals called hydrofluorocarbons, which have thousands of times the global warming potential of carbon dioxide. Even though the ozone treaty was not designed to fight climate change, policymakers say that it can and should be used to achieve broader environmental objectives. In another hopeful move, the world’s 195 nations signed in Paris in December 2015 the most ambitious climate accord to date. The agreement commits them to taking concrete measures to cut carbon emissions and pursue efforts to limit global temperature increase to 1.5°C above preindustrial levels. Developed countries are to bear the brunt of mobilizing the financing to put such measures in place. The accord is widely viewed as a landmark, although the commitments are largely voluntary, and the results remain to be seen. Reuniting the Fragments Early in the 20th century, two sciences of “home maintenance” began to flourish: the young science of ecology (from the Greek oikos, meaning home) and a maturing neoclassical economics (also from oikos). Ecology arose to document and understand the interactions between organisms and their living and nonliving surroundings – in essence, how organisms make a living in the natural economy. In fact, Ernst Haeckel, who coined the term in the 1860s, defined ecology in an 1870 article as the body of knowledge concerning the economy of nature. Neoclassical economics, in contrast, reinforced humans’ self-appointed dominion over nature’s wealth. It brought unparalleled gains in societal welfare in some places, but it also divorced the human economy from the natural one on which it stands (see Fig. 1). In his Short History of Progress, Wright (2004, p. 8) recounts tales of “progress traps” that humanity has fallen into; each time history repeats itself, he reminds us, the price goes up. By now it is clear to economists and ecologists alike that human progress has reached scales unprecedented in the history of life. We have altered Earth’s physical and chemical environments, changed the planet’s water and nutrient cycles, and perturbed its climate. We have unleashed the greatest mass extinction in 65 My and distorted the structure and function of nonhuman and human communities worldwide. In trying to make our own living, we have jeopardized Earth’s capacity to sustain other species and our own species as well. We are losing life on Earth – the bio in biosphere. Confronted with these unprecedented losses, we need to understand – not deny – the ecological consequences of what we do. We urgently need a new craft of home maintenance, one that sees the human species’ role as ecosystem engineer for what it has become – the global agent of change. Despite uncertainty, we need to act to prevent environmental harm and to reconnect human with natural economies. By using indicators that measure what matters for sustaining living systems, we can make nature visible again and shed new light on the value of the ancient heritage we share with the larger biosphere. We can reunite the fragments of our worldview and re-create ethical, social, and ecological bonds that were put aside two centuries ago in the name of progress. And we can reengineer our own social, political, and economic institutions instead of ecosystems. This we must do – now – before we impoverish the biosphere and risk our own survival for all time. Biographies • Ellen W. Chu is an ecologist and science editor in Port Townsend, WA, United States. She taught scientific writing at MIT, was editor-in-chief of Bioscience, and worked for the University of Washington and the US Government Accountability Office on natural resource and health policy. • James R. Karr is an ecologist and professor emeritus, University of Washington, Seattle, WA, United States. He also taught at Purdue, Illinois, and Virginia Tech and was deputy director of the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute in Panama. His work has centered on tropical ecology, ornithology, water resource ecology, and environmental policy.

Global climate change In its 2014 report, written and reviewed by more than 3800 scientists from the world’s 195 countries, the typically cautious Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) (2014) stated, “Warming of the climate system is unequivocal.” Reflecting worldwide scientific consensus, the report says, “Human influence on the climate system is clear,” and recent human-caused “emissions of greenhouse gases are the highest in history” (p. 2). “The atmosphere and ocean have warmed, the amounts of snow and ice have diminished, and sea level has risen.” Atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases are the highest they have been “in at least the last 800,000 years,” and their effects are “extremely likely to have been the dominant cause of observed global warming” (p. 4). The 20th century in the Northern Hemisphere was the warmest of the past millennium. All but 1 of the first 15 years of the 21st century were globally the warmest in history, and 2015 was the hottest year ever recorded. Higher concentrations of greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide, and higher global temperatures set in motion a whole series of effects. Where other nutrients are not limiting, rising carbon dioxide concentrations may enhance plant photosynthesis and growth. With higher temperatures, spring arrives one or more weeks earlier in the Northern Hemisphere. Rising temperatures are shifting the ranges of many plants and animals – both wild and domestic – potentially rearranging the composition and distribution of the world’s biomes, as well as those of agricultural systems. The resulting displacements will have far-reaching implications not only for the displaced plants and animals but also for the goods and services people depend on from these living systems.

yes

Paleoclimatology

Are current carbon dioxide levels unprecedented in Earth's history?

yes_statement

"current" "carbon" "dioxide" "levels" are "unprecedented" in earth's "history".. earth's "history" has never experienced "carbon" "dioxide" "levels" like the "current" ones.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/trevornace/2019/11/30/carbon-dioxide-reaches-highest-recorded-levels-in-human-history/

Carbon Dioxide Reaches Highest Recorded Levels In Human History

Yale’s Environment 360 reports that “based on current emissions, scientists estimate CO2 levels could hit 500 ppm in as little as 30 years,” well within many people’s lifetime. Wasn’t CO2 higher in Earth’s History? Earth has experienced carbon dioxide levels much higher than current levels, which was discovered by the same climate scientists who now warn of the dangers associated with current greenhouse gas emissions. Carbon dioxide has been as high as 4,000 ppm during the Cambrian, about 500 million years ago and as low as 180 ppm in the Quaternary glaciation (the most recent “ice age” on Earth). So, why are scientists concerned with the current levels of CO2? Miami sits just 6.5 feet above sea level. Education Images/Universal Images Group via Getty Images If Earth has seen an order of magnitude higher carbon dioxide levels than present, why are we to worry? Generally speaking, there are two reasons why humans should be concerned over the recent unprecedented rise in carbon dioxide levels. We’ve seen CO2 levels rise faster in the past century than ever before in natural history. The annual increase in CO2 levels is increasing about 100 times faster than recorded during natural increases in Earth’s history. Humans have largely built our world around Earth’s current climate state and a widespread change in climate will inevitably lead to hardship, economic loss, and death. Uncharted territory makes people nervous Louis Sass, a physical scientist with the United States Geological Survey, uses a tape to measure ... [+] the depth from where he is taking core samples from the Wolverine Glacier on September 06, 2019 near Primrose, Alaska. Mr. Sass and his team are studying the measurements of glacier surface mass balance which includes seasonal measurements of winter snow accumulation and summer snow and ice ablation. The USGS has has been studying the Wolverine glacier since 1966 and the studies show that the worlds warming climate has resulted in sustained glacial mass loss as melting outpaced the accumulation of new snow and ice. As the glaciers melt, scientists are also trying to understand how that will impact different parts of the environment from the food chain to the level of the waters in the worlds oceans. (Photo by Joe Raedle/Getty Images) Getty Images Imagine you’re driving west across the country with no map, no GPS, no smartphone and in the middle of the night. Humans are at their best when we’re able to predict the outcomes of our actions, however, the current rate of CO2 rise leaves scientists worried as there is no blueprint or map of where we’re headed in the coming decades. We are “driving blind” into an unknown climate future. Geologists and climate scientists can look at ice cores, tree rings, ocean sediment, etc. to reconstruct what our climate looked like in the past. However, there are no records of CO2 rising at the current rate, meaning that while we generally know we’re driving west (in the above analogy), we have no idea what we will encounter on our way. “We suggest that such a ‘no-analogue’ state represents a fundamental challenge in constraining future climate projections,” says Richard E. Zeebe from the University of Hawaii at Manoa in a Nature paper. What happens when an environment changes around a static human environment? Houseboats sit in the drought lowered waters of Oroville Lake, near Oroville, Calif. ASSOCIATED PRESS The other key concern is that humans have built our world expecting a largely static environment. Our infrastructure, agriculture, areas of concentrated populations, and energy systems are all built to serve humans in a relatively static environment. What do we do when an entire geographic region sees decades-long drought where rain was once present? Do those people migrate to new areas, do cities shrink, do we engineer our environment to redirect water? Well, it’s already happening. What do we do when cities become increasingly inundated with ocean water from rising sea levels? As tides and storms increasingly flood coastal cities do we build walls or do we abandon infrastructure near the coast and build more inland? Well, it’s already happening. What do we do when mosquitoes migrate farther north then they have ever been able to live? How does that change epidemiology and the spread of diseases throughout the world? Well, it’s already happening. There are countless examples where climate change can throw a wrench in how we operate our daily lives. That is why scientists are concerned and increasingly sounding the alarm for where we are currently headed. Reducing carbon dioxide emissions can slow and halt these changes, but it’s yet to be seen how quickly humans will proactively change in the face of a looming climate crisis.

Yale’s Environment 360 reports that “based on current emissions, scientists estimate CO2 levels could hit 500 ppm in as little as 30 years,” well within many people’s lifetime. Wasn’t CO2 higher in Earth’s History? Earth has experienced carbon dioxide levels much higher than current levels, which was discovered by the same climate scientists who now warn of the dangers associated with current greenhouse gas emissions. Carbon dioxide has been as high as 4,000 ppm during the Cambrian, about 500 million years ago and as low as 180 ppm in the Quaternary glaciation (the most recent “ice age” on Earth). So, why are scientists concerned with the current levels of CO2? Miami sits just 6.5 feet above sea level. Education Images/Universal Images Group via Getty Images If Earth has seen an order of magnitude higher carbon dioxide levels than present, why are we to worry? Generally speaking, there are two reasons why humans should be concerned over the recent unprecedented rise in carbon dioxide levels. We’ve seen CO2 levels rise faster in the past century than ever before in natural history. The annual increase in CO2 levels is increasing about 100 times faster than recorded during natural increases in Earth’s history. Humans have largely built our world around Earth’s current climate state and a widespread change in climate will inevitably lead to hardship, economic loss, and death. Uncharted territory makes people nervous Louis Sass, a physical scientist with the United States Geological Survey, uses a tape to measure ... [+] the depth from where he is taking core samples from the Wolverine Glacier on September 06, 2019 near Primrose, Alaska. Mr. Sass and his team are studying the measurements of glacier surface mass balance which includes seasonal measurements of winter snow accumulation and summer snow and ice ablation.

no

Paleoclimatology

Are current carbon dioxide levels unprecedented in Earth's history?

yes_statement

"current" "carbon" "dioxide" "levels" are "unprecedented" in earth's "history".. earth's "history" has never experienced "carbon" "dioxide" "levels" like the "current" ones.

https://news.climate.columbia.edu/2017/04/04/how-we-know-climate-change-is-not-natural/

How We Know Today's Climate Change Is Not Natural

How We Know Today's Climate Change Is Not Natural Last week, the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology, chaired by climate contrarian Lamar Smith, R-Texas, held a hearing on climate science. The hearing featured three scientists who are dubious about the conclusions of the majority of climate scientists, and climate scientist Michael Mann, best known for his “hockey stick graph” of temperatures over the last thousand years illustrating the impact of humans on global warming. This week, Scott Pruitt, Environmental Protection Agency administrator, who had said that human activity was not the primary contributor to global warming, acknowledged that it plays a role—but stressed the need to figure out exactly how much of one. Despite the many climate “skeptics” in key positions of power today, 97 percent of working climate scientists agree that the warming of Earth’s climate over the last 100 years is mainly due to human activity that has increased the amount of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Why are they so sure? Earth’s climate has changed naturally over the past 650,000 years, moving in and out of ice ages and warm periods. Changes in climate occur because of alterations in Earth’s energy balance, which result from some kind of external factor or “forcing”—an environmental factor that influences the climate. The ice ages and shifting climate were caused by a combination of changes in solar output, Earth’s orbit, ocean circulation, albedo (the reflectivity of the Earth’s surface) and makeup of the atmosphere (the amounts of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases such as water vapor, methane, nitrous oxide and ozone that are present). Ice core from West Antarctic Photo: Oregon State University Scientists can track these earlier natural changes in climate by examining ice cores drilled from Greenland and Antarctica, which provide evidence about conditions as far back as 800,000 years ago. The ice cores have shown that rising CO2 levels and rising temperatures are closely linked. Scientists also study tree rings, glaciers, pollen remains, ocean sediments, and changes in the Earth’s orbit around the sun to get a picture of Earth’s climate going back hundreds of thousands of years or more. Today, CO2 levels are 40 percent higher than they were before the Industrial Revolution began; they have risen from 280 parts per million in the 18th century to over 400 ppm in 2015 and are on track to reach 410 ppm this spring. In addition, there is much more methane (a greenhouse gas 84 times more potent than CO2 in the short term) in the atmosphere than at any time in the past 800,000 years—two and a half times as much as before the Industrial Revolution. While some methane is emitted naturally from wetlands, sediments, volcanoes and wildfires, the majority of methane emissions come from oil and gas production, livestock farming and landfills. Warming of the North Pole and thinning ice Photo: WasifMalik Global temperatures have risen an average of 1.4˚ F since 1880. Sea ice in the Arctic has thinned and decreased in the last few decades; the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets are decreasing in mass. The North and South Poles are warming faster than anywhere else on Earth. Glaciers are retreating on mountains all over the world. Spring snow cover in the Northern Hemisphere has decreased over the last 50 years. Southern California heat wave. Photo: Ann Frye The number of record-breaking hot temperatures in the U.S. is on the rise. Oceans are the warmest they have been in a half-century; the top layer is warming about 0.2˚F per decade. The oceans are also 30 percent more acidic than they were at the start of the Industrial Revolution because they are absorbing more CO2. Global sea levels rose an average of 6.7 inches in the last century, and in the last 10 years, have risen almost twice as fast. Here is how scientists know that the climate change we are experiencing is mainly due to human activity and not a result of natural phenomenon. “We have a very, very clear understanding that the amount of heat in the ocean is increasing—the ocean heat content is going up by a lot,” said Schmidt. “That implies that there must be an external change in the radiation budget of the earth—more energy has to be going in than leaving. “There are a number of ways that can happen, but each of them has a different fingerprint. If the sun were brighter, we would see warming all the way up through the atmosphere from the surface to the stratosphere to the mesosphere. We don’t see this. We see instead warming at the surface, cooling in the stratosphere, cooling in the mesosphere. And that’s a signature of greenhouse gas forcing, it’s not a signature of solar forcing. So we know it’s not solar.” Moreover, according to the World Radiation Center, the sun’s radiation has not increased since at least 1978 (when satellite monitoring began) though global temperatures over the last 30 years have continued to rise. In addition, the lower atmosphere (troposphere), which is absorbing the CO2 and expanding as it gets warmer, is pushing the boundary between the troposphere and the stratosphere upwards. If the sun’s radiation were the main factor responsible for Earth’s warming, both atmosphere layers would likely be warming and this would not occur. Scientists also can distinguish between CO2 molecules that are emitted naturally by plants and animals and those that result from the burning of fossil fuels. Carbon molecules from different sources have different numbers of neutrons in their nuclei; these different versions of molecules are called isotopes. Carbon isotopes derived from burning fossil fuels and deforestation are lighter than those from other sources. Scientists measuring carbon in the atmosphere can see that lighter carbon molecules are increasing, corresponding to the rise in fossil fuel emissions. Peter de Menocal, dean of science at Columbia University and founding director of Columbia’s Center for Climate and Life, studies deep-sea sediments to understand past climate change. Ocean sediment cores from the West Atlantic “Ocean sediments provide a longer term baseline [tens of millions of years] that allows you to compare the past with the present, giving you an idea of how variable ocean temperatures have been before we had thermometers,” said de Menocal. “Over the last 2,000 years, there have been natural climate variations, but they were not especially large…the Medieval Warm period around 1,000 years ago, and the little ice age which was three separate cooling periods lasting a few decades each, beginning around 1300 to around the 1850s. It’s the warming after the 1850s that’s been really remarkable and unique over the last couple of millennia—you can see that in the sediment cores.” Photo: unlu1 Evidence from ocean sediments, ice cores, tree rings, sedimentary rocks and coral reefs show that the current warming is occurring 10 times faster than it did in the past when Earth emerged from the ice ages, at a rate unprecedented in the last 1,300 years. To understand this rapid change in climate, scientists look at data sets and climate models to try to reproduce the changes that have already been observed. When scientists input only natural phenomena such as the sun’s intensity, changes in the Earth’s orbit and ocean circulation, the models cannot reproduce the changes that have occurred so far. “We have independent evidence that says when you put in greenhouse gases, you get the changes that we see,” said Schmidt. “If you don’t put in greenhouse gases, you don’t. And if you put in all the other things people think about—the changes in the earth’s orbit, the ocean circulation changes, El Niño, land use changes, air pollution, smog, ozone depletion—all of those things, none of them actually produce the changes that we see in multiple data sets across multiple areas of the system, all of which have been independently replicated.” In other words, only when the emissions from human activity are included, are the models and data sets able to accurately reproduce the warming in the ocean and the atmosphere that is occurring. “Today, almost 100 percent [plus or minus 20 percent] of the unusual warmth that we’ve experienced in the last decade is due to greenhouse gas emissions,” said de Menocal. Record shattering heat in 2015 Photo: NASA Findings from NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies show clearly how much natural and manmade factors contribute to global warming. Climate deniers offer a variety of bases for their skepticism without providing scientific evidence. The most effective thing that the climate denier community has done, however, is to spread the notion of uncertainty about climate change, and use it as an excuse not to take any action. “It’s been a very effective tactic,” said de Menocal, “in part because the scientific community spends a tremendous amount of effort quantifying that uncertainty. And so we make it plain as day that there are things we’re certain about, and things we’re uncertain about. There are places of debate that exist in the community. That’s the scientific process. … The deniers are not selling a new way of looking at the problem, they’re selling doubt, and it’s very easy to manufacture doubt.” “They are in total denial of the evidence that there is,” said Schmidt. “When I challenge them to produce evidence for their attributions, all I get is crickets. There’s no actual quantitative evidence that demonstrates anything. … Show me the data, show me your analysis.” “There are lot of things that we’re absolutely certain about,” said de Menocal. “We’re absolutely certain carbon dioxide is rising in the atmosphere. We’re absolutely certain it’s warming the planet and we’re absolutely certain that it’s acidifying the oceans.” Related Posts I agree to help cultivate an open and respectful discussion. I understand rude and/or profane comments, and comments that spread misinformation, will be automatically deleted. Name* Email* Website I agree to help cultivate an open and respectful discussion. I understand rude and/or profane comments, and comments that spread misinformation, will be automatically deleted. Name* Email* Website 127 Comments Oldest Newest Inline Feedbacks View all comments John Barltrop 6 years ago I am quite surprised that members of “the flat earth society” have not made any comment on this article……..as yet. Thank you for the informative article, that clearly shows, that Climate Change, which our “spaceship” earth is undergoing is not natural………in fact far from it. As pointed out the proof is a scientific fact………and is certainly backed up, for example, by NASA’s “Operation Ice Bridge” and other scientific bodies and scientists involved in their specific areas of expertise. This is an old post now but the findings were current then. Firstly the figures in this article are correct and climate change is accelerating unnaturally, I do not deny this as possibly now more than ever human intervention is changing natural circumstances. This said there have been massive swings in tempretature in the planets history which is evidenced in the core samples mentioned in this article and many more since also. This means that swings will come and go in the planets future, we may survive and other animals to but we can’t save it all, the earths biosphere has and always will be in a state of flux, surviving the knock on effects of this change should be our main focus not trying to recreate a moment in the earths history which is arrogant and short sited. To stand still is to lose inertia. It’s not nice and probably not even humane but China understand this. Some can be saved, others pave the way that is the only truth in existence. If we look to deeply at carbon emissions we will lose focus in other more important survival projects as public perception breeds state spending in the West. We as 1st world citizens need to lobby for many solutions for many problems not get stuck dogmatically chasing a goal of futility. I hope this helps anyone reading to gain a little perspective on the issue, change is needed but protection is better than prevention when dealing with the inevitability of change on this amazing very rare extremely valuable planet that is our home. Yes, this is an old post…But, as always, they forget to mention the fact that a single volcanic eruption produces more CO2 than man has produced since the start of the industrial age. When they can figure out how to stop them from happening, well, I rest my case. Michelle, you are missing the point. Assuming the amount of CO2 is increasing, the question is whether that is the cause of “global warming.” This article, like all discussion on this issue, fails to explain this. And if what Darren is saying is correct, then it seems to go against such a conclusion without explaining why the CO2 from fossil fuels is more prone to cause “global warming” than CO2 from other sources. If you look at historical CO2 levels over millions of years our CO2 levels are 100’s times less, they decreased naturally through two processes, lessening volcanic activity and forests, we are too focused on blame and human CO2 production alone than the fact that FORESTs are our savior, we need a more balanced approach, promotion of increasing Earths forests, decreasing human CO2 creation and monitoring of natural processes. The evidence does not support Man is 100% responsible for global warming but it does support a theory that it PREVENTED a cycle of extreme cooling, an ice age. Agree with you. The island I live on has had 30 percent of its old growth cut down in 25 years yet the government is ok with this because much of the land is replanted with seedlings. Seriously how long does it take for the ecosystems to came back that were previously established in the old growth forests? I witness the trees being cut down on the island I live on while the permafrost melts. Well the data since late 2016 shows a decrease in global temperature so there’s that pesky fact. And this article completely disregards climate forcing, specifically particle forcing which is the canary in the coal mine. Nothing man has done has prevented an ice age, indeed it appears to be right on track as evidenced by our current low activity solar cycle 25. I believe it’s still snowing in Brazil as I type this in August 2021. Next two decades will show us how fast the cosmos can send us back to the dark ages. With our extremely weak end magnetic field it’s now a matter of when the CME hits and not if, then all that green energy nonsense will be mere yard art. 2016-Hottest year on record 2020-2nd hottest year on record 2019-3rd hottest year on record Exactly what data are you referring to since all of that data was available in August 2021. Clearly your pesky fact is pesky fiction. Also winter-time in Brazil is June thru Sept because they are in the Southern Hemisphere, so snow would likely occur in August, their winter. But I’m sure you already knew that since you seem to have all the answers even if they are FALSE and MISLEADING. We are a major factor in the destruction of our forest.. Maybe it is not 100% us but the vast majority. Fighting and blaming isn’t the point here though as much as finding good alternatives and solutions A molecule of CO2 does what a molecule of CO2 does regardless of from where it came. The article above explains that the increase comes from our activity. The physics of how radiant energy interacts with gas molecules is a large branch of research well beyond the scope of this article. Starting with Foote and Tyndall back in the 1850s, we have come to understand pretty well how this works. The same science that makes heat seeking missiles possible can be used to calculate the greenhouse effect of CO2. There really isn’t any doubt that more CO2 causes the planet to warm, but explaining why is too large for one article. Michelle, if you read that part, the claim is that the man-made CO2 is lighter, which means that on a per-particle/molecule basis, man-made C02 contributes LESS to the green house effect than a heavier natural particle. Aharon, you seem to be conflating “lighter” with “less IR absorption.” I cannot find any articles expressing that carbon molecules of different density (higher or lower number of isotopes) absorb and re-emit infrared radiation differently. If you can find evidence of this, I’d sincerely love to see it. If not, then you cannot correctly assume that the lighter, man-made CO2 contributes less to the greenhouse gas effect. Isotopic effects related to CO2 are miniscule. Unless one uses high-resolution IR equipment, the absorption of radiation and subsequent emission are non-issues. Whether CO2 is man-made or natural makes no difference on the warming effects. Note also that carbon dioxide is only one greenhouse gas. Other gases, such as CFCs, nitrous oxide, and methane have substantially more profound impacts on warming. These gases are related to synthetic fertilizers and refrigerants, as well as fossil fuels. How they do they conclude that co2 and climate is linked when the graph of oxygen isotopes in greenland actually shows that 99% of the climate was at 280ppm co2 and yet the climate fluctuated more during low co2. This does not make any sense to an objective onlooker. The co2 being 280ppm during massively fluctuating times actually concludes that co2 and climate are not linked. Simply not true, According to the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), the world’s volcanoes, both on land and undersea, generate about 200 million tons of carbon dioxide (CO2) annually, while our automotive and industrial activities cause some 24 billion tons of CO2 emissions every year worldwide.with all do respect you should check your knowledge before you spread rumors. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/earthtalks-volcanoes-or-humans/ Dear Ben, Apart from the fact – agreed by IPCC – that humankind and all its accoutriments, industry, livestock and transport etc.etc. amounts to only 3% of global CO2 Emmissions, there is something more serious about the science that people should understand. They don’t because the information has not been permitted to be told to you. First remember that the Man-made Global Warming theory depends upon it being the case that the Greenhouse Effect (GE) is a thermally powerful phenomenon which is being increased in that thermal power by the addition of Human CO2 emmissions. One problem that we have to know about first is that there is no empirical evidence for the thermal power of the GE, but whilst it is not normal to accept a theory as truth without empirical verification there are mitigating circumstances here according to IPCC. Both sides of the argument agree that in the absence of our atmosphere the temperature of the Earth would be 33C lower than it is today, which difference is known as the Atmospheric Thermal Enhancement (ATE). Concerning this, IPCC say that since there can be no other explanation for the ATE it proves the potency of the GE and if it was indeed fair to say that there could be no other cause then there should be every support for the IPCC position. The trouble is that there is a definite empirically verifiable – not guesswork based – cause for the ATE. When a gas – any gas – comes under pressure it warms. We know this, oddly enough, because we used to go “ouch~” as children after a bit when we pumped our bike tyres up – this is your unsuspecting knowledge of this characteristic of gas being heated by compression. Our Atmosphere is under a pressure of 1 ton per sq ft so the warming effect is comfortably able to account for the ATE which meanstonishingly – that there is nothing for the GE to account for. Accordingly the there is no thermal consequence to the GE so neither is there for our contribution to it. Hold your breath and count to ten. In my discussion with him a scientist from the Scott Polar Institute conceded that compression does indeed warm gas, but proved unable to advise me of any calculation for it that allowed for any remaining potency in the GE. It means that all temperature variation that we experience is indeed as a result of the constantly changing net insolation. Barley was harvested in Greenland 1000 years ago. The pottiness of this anthropogenic theory; thus revealed: has nevertheless take over global opinion to an extreme extent by spooking us and leaving us to believe what seems safest. I realise that this will come as a shock, so please remember to be strictly scientific in your rebuttal if you think lone exists. If not; as I suspect you will discover: then its time to stand up against bullies who take advantage of our fear and trust to get personal power over us. The real problem is the assumption that increases in the Earth’s temperature and the effects caused are a bad thing. Rising sea levels will mean millions of people will be forced to move inland. This is always claimed to be a bad thing. Yet people will adapt by building roads, bridges and new homes. New places to work and shop. It will mean a boom in jobs such as the world has not seen since after WWII. Longer growing seasons, perhaps enough to get 2 crops in per year where now only one is possible. We alwats seem to focus on the bad that might happen, never the good. tell that to the species going extinct or the poor people homeless and hungry. Wow, must be nice to be privileged and protected by affluence, for now. Eventually, of course, this will affect you too and then your position and opinion will change as our climate has and will continue to do so. Denial on the part of so many is our real problem and it is what keeps us from acting in time. Interesting, I never heard this theory and it make a lot of sense to me. Did I understand correctly: you mean that compression creates temperature, so irradiation and type of gas has nothing to do with GE. I have a question. If this is true, why is that global temperature does change? It changes in the thousand of years scale and in the decades scale. If it was just the pressure, how we explain these changes. We use other factors like cloud coverage, irradiation, albedo and those things. But, then, also infrared capture (that is GE) can have a role. So aren’t we at square one again? You don’t have a case. If the effect of the total amount of CO2 continuing to rise means extinction for many species, possibly including humans, and volcanoes can’t be stopped; logic has it that it’s that much more crucial that the humans stop contributing to the total amount in any way they can. You seem to be suggesting, quite logically, that humanity, like all other dominant life-forms of previous eras, is doomed to eventual extinction. I agree it is irrational hubris to think otherwise. If that is indeed the case, perhaps we should put more effort into making human lives less miserable, while we’re still here. The idea that the way to do this is to simply help humans make more money is demonstrably false. The most effective way to do this is to improve health and wellbeing. The latter has more to do with how we treat each other and how we educate people to cope emotionally with adversity and pain. Just curious. What is your data source? How do you know climate change is accelerating yet your average meteorologist can’t predict the weather beyond 5 days? Climate is a bit more complex than core samples. Man landed on the moon 52 years ago, yet we are masters of the universe? Hardly. The Earth is 95% uninhabited and has had cycles of both extreme heat and cold far in excess of what you’re discussing. Palms at the pole? Iceball Earth? Both happened. I disagree that we know what Earth’s climate is or will be, and I see a lot of hysteria from people parroting the latest on climate change without citing sources or defining “normal.” A kindred spirit. Good for you. I’m receptive to anything that has a coherent rationale supported by sound argument from reliable data. The Hockey Stick has none of that. In the absence of compelling evidence to the contrary, the null hypothesis tells us to expect things to continue much as they have. The world will gently warm. Sea levels will slowly rise. Carbon will continue on its upward trajectory. The earth will continue to get greener and more hospitable to life. Biomass will increase. The past three decades have been just about what you would expect from our experience over the last few centuries, with the exception of CO2 concentration. The last three decades have unfolded as I expected they would. They have very much not unfolded as predicted by the Hockey Stick. Extrapolating that curve forward gives a ridiculous value for the present day. Unbelievably, despite the fact that empirical data everybody can see flatly contradicts it, people raising the climate alarm swear the Hockey Stick is still true. This sorry episode in the history of science can’t end quick enough for me. How can you look at the constant forest fires in the pacific north west and Australia and rising ocean temps contributing to the death of the coral reefs the shrinking of glaciers all over the world and think were entering an age that is more hospitable to life? It may be natural for temperatures to rise but it is happening at an unnatural rate and that is clearly linked to man made CO2 emissions The Hockey Stick doesn’t predict anything. It’s a graph of the past indicating trend lines in temperature. What that means in actual consequences we won’t know for sure until we are in the middle of it. But there is a 10 – 20yr lag from cause to effect, meaning the next decade is already cooked in based on what already occurred the prior 10 years. Could this be why it’s not as it seems to you? It seems to me that by 2050 it will be undeniable. Now since the earth is a dynamic system, and living organisms are opportunistic, those that utilize C02 could somehow thrive and snap us back into a cooling period or massive volcanic activity could do that as well. But those seem highly unlikely. We’ll have to wait and see, but by then it could be too late. It’s true what you say, but issues have to be dealt with in some order and climate is the first thing and it’s a unifying issue. Planet /people before profit must be included on the list and that together with Climate Change will start to solve most issues and good first steps. What else really matters? At one time in history the best available knowledge was that the Earth was flat so please do not attempt to ridicule people with that term.The 97 % consensus is meaningless. Only 100 % agreement becomes best available knowledge. There will never be 100% agreement because there are inevitably people that are greedy enough to lie about the science bc some thinktank tied to the oil industry is paying them the big bucks to say what keeps them making the greatest amount of profit. We know this to be true because you’ll see such and such climate denier and sometimes you can follow the money trail to politicians or oil industrialists that benefit from climate denial. That’s the problem with wanting it to be unanimous. If there is an expectation of all scientists being rational and reasonable, when an industry that makes tons of money is involved, it is naive as anything, because human greed will always factor in. Anytime $$$ is involved in a situation, you will find a soulless shill that only cares about their thirty pieces of silver. Therefore, you have to expect hold outs and need to judge by the /majority/. Were the majority response to be 60/50 or 50/50 it is far less of a sure thing. Even 70%, we would need to work more just to make sure it wasn’t founded on bad science. 97% more than accounts for the truth, and the 3% reasonably accounts for both the incompetents and those who only care about their self-interest. To ignore human greed, to expect everyone in a situation to be noble and truthful and purely rationable, is to be completely naive about human nature. It’s a /child’s/ view of the world to think you won’t find some people in every situation that care only about self-interest. 97% is also a much higher threshold than many things we hold to be concrete enough to act on in science and medicine. For instance, in medicine, with psych meds, they barely know why some of them even work. Our knowledge of neuroscience is still a work in progress. But enough people agree on working theories, and have tested meds enough to know that withholding them from people who they can benefit until there is 100% understanding and consensus is impractical. If you have /most/ of the picture and a large majority agree on it, and some of it is testable, it’s worth taking action on. In the case of climate change, there’s also just the general practicality of moving to renewable sources of energy when we know even more unequivocally that fossil fuels are finite resources because of the way they were created, and that we’re better off moving to new energy sources for other reasons anyway. The resistance to renewables when 97% of climate scientists agree, but /also/ we’re going to eventually run out of fossil fuels (it’s more practical to transition many decades ahead of shortages to avoid strain on infrastructure), /and/ renewables lead to cheaper energy bills for the average consumer? Is ridiculous. In a situation where there are /many/ reasons it’d be practical to make the change sooner rather than later, even if climate change /was/ a hoax or bad science, we need to think about WHO benefits from stalling it? The fossil fuel industry and the politicians whose election funds they donate to. Full stop. A 97% consensus would be phenomenal, statistically speaking. Anything over 95% confidence in statistics is gold standard. Achieving 100% would be futile and a waste of time to convince the other 3%. But it could be fun. Reply Bernard J. 6 years ago Bloomberg has a series of global temperature graphics that nicely illustrates the relative contributions of the various forcings: It’s not been updated to cover the last two years, unfortunately, but the human component is clear to see. Reply Kurlis 6 years ago “Earth’s climate has changed naturally over the past 650,000 years, moving in and out of ice ages and warm periods. Changes in climate occur because of alterations in Earth’s energy balance, which result from some kind of external factor or “forcing”—an environmental factor that influences the climate.” Some kind of external factor? This doesn’t sound definitive. Reply Macro 5 years ago @Kurlis I don’t think this article is trying to be definitive about natural causes of climate change in the past. The rest of that paragraph does go on to list them, but they’re not the main focus. The author is just making the point that we know quite a lot about them now, so we understand that their role in the present climate change is fairly small. By far the greatest part of what we are experiencing now is human-induced. Reply Suyeon 5 years ago Thank you for your amazing article 🙂 Reply Peccatori 4 years ago I just can’t bring myself to trust people this much. Science is always right…until they discover something new and realize they were wrong the whole time. It took 200 years to graduate from Newton’s Law to Einstein. Everyone used to believe that the world was flat…. and they were wrong. Just one or two incorrect interpretations, lead the whole theory off course. I do not know. I guess the science community better hurry up and figure out how to create affordable sustainable energy and figure out how to create animals that won’t poop or we’ll all be dead in a few years. Funny though, such a push to ‘civilize’ the uncivilized. Only to figure out that civilization kills us all. Crap, wrong…again. In the 1960’s, ALL scientific experts claimed the hole in the ozone layer was going to destroy the earth and make it inhabitable for humans due to increased temperatures and higher UV ratings making the earth into a hot house. For years it was sprouted as fact and people were encouraged to stop using spray cans and they stopped using CFC’s. It was front page news for a few years and FACT until they discovered the hole in the ozone layer can never increase. All of a sudden, all was quiet! But, the hysteria was real and scientific experts convinced EVERYONE it was fact because they were the experts. I’m not saying scientists are wrong but the exact same thing happened in the 60’s as is happening now except now we have the internet and kids who have a louder voice. The amount of ozone loss was testable. You realize you can measure ozone, right? They were wrong about it being as dire as all that, but they were right about the heightened risk of cancer and cataracts and the hole was capable of shrinking, and general ozone levels were able to be increased by ceasing CFC. Ceasing CFC use didn’t harm the world at all, it was just an inconvenience and it was worth it for a lower skin cancer and cataract risk. I see people citing “Well no one talks about that anymore!” The reason people stopped talking about it was also that it was pretty much fixed through worldwide effort. Except now we have glaciers melting at accelerating rates; species migrating to new latitudes to get away from unsurvivable temperatures; plants blooming in January – February, and uncoordinated timing of food supply for birds and insects; and mangroves endangered by encroaching salt water. No one talks about it now because the problem was solved. It was a real danger; unless you want to live indoors your whole life. Well, we got a taste of it during Covid so we know how that went. But this shows when humanity is united and agrees to changing behavior, we can solve our problems. True! Science can always be wrong. But it gets less and less wrong all the time, and, even if it can be wrong, it’s still the most reliable source we have. We can never have fully, definitely correct answers, so we can only cling to our best estimations. It’s reasonable to be untrusting of science, but there’s nothing we can trust more. Reply Tommy 4 years ago Newton’s law is not incorrect, it just cannot cover things Newton cannot observer at his times, or simply beyond his comprehension. It does not mean it’s wrong under his model. In other word, Newton’s theory explain how the stuff(gravity) is working. Einstein’s theory helps to understand, why the stuff (gravity again).. is working. The article stated that created models that simulate the current earth climate, and find that man-made, or man emissioned carbon contribute to the current warmer climate, and the result can be duplicated. It means in the current model is correct under these conditions, and that green house gas is the main contributor to the global warming. Except if you actually look at the models and their history do realize how dubious they are. The models constantly have to be reduced lower because they overestimate the amount of warming that will occur. Plus, these same models often don’t reproduce the correct historical data and have to be manipulated in order to get them to produce the correct historical data. Reply Chris Knorr 4 years ago “Today, almost 100 percent [plus or minus 20 percent] of the unusual warmth that we’ve experienced in the last decade is due to greenhouse gas emissions,” said de Menocal. …smh Reply Timmy 4 years ago I’m still waiting to read the part that proves it’s not natural. Aren’t these the same climate scientists that were warning me that we were headed for an ice age when I was 12? Sarah, None of the charts you attached show that it was not warmer 8,000 years ago and 3800 years ago. So maybe the Wikipedia chart is correct about the temperatures back then? So if it was warmer 3800 years ago why is it a bad thing for temperatures to rise today. Insurance rates demonstrate that some people will need to move away from the coast, but perhaps more land will be available further North for agriculture and living. Why is that a bad thing? I’m not sure many people deny global warming, I think that what I’ve heard to suggest that global warming is a bad thing has not been convincing. It’s a bad thing because the rate of change that is occurring. If this gradually increased over 1000 – 2000yrs as is natural, then most living systems could easily adapt. But this will occur in a matter of 100 – 200yrs. The change on paper is black and white. But the living consequences will be pain,suffering, frustration, and grief. It will be really difficult from keeping the world from plunging into chaos. On thing to keep in mind is that there is a 10-20yr lag from cause to effect. Meaning the previous 10yr actual determines the next 10yr effects. By 2050 it should be undeniable the direction this is going. Did you know the impact of unnatural climate change do and will differ in both magnitude and rate of change depending on the continent, country, and region. Hence the impact and affects does not only mean global warming,but severe and more frequent hurricanes, cyclones, typhoons, droughts, floods, rain and snow, increase in ocean levels and acidification, melting of the poles, changes in ecosystems,desertification, extinction of non-human animals species, increase in disease,starvation and even death for humans. Hi Timmy! I understand that, when looking at this picture, it’s easy to feel sceptical. However, the picture of the magazine issue from 1977 is actually fake – the cover is actually from a 2007 issue, and the title has been photoshopped – it was actually “The Global Warming Survival Guide”, NOT “how to survive the coming ice age”. This meme is very misleading and it can influence whether people have trust in the facts provided by climate scientists, so it’s unfortunate that it’s been falsely spread on social media. The information is here: https://www.apnews.com/afs:Content:5755221200 There might have been a few scientists predicting global cooling but most were predicting global warming. Here is an excerpt from an article at the link that follows. “A survey of peer reviewed scientific papers from 1965 to 1979 show that few papers predicted global cooling (7 in total). Significantly more papers (42 in total) predicted global warming (Peterson 2008). The large majority of climate research in the 1970s predicted the Earth would warm as a consequence of CO2.” The most curious fact about these volte faces – perhaps – is that they leave us wondering why we haven’t learned – as a matter of intellectual discipline at the very least – to use a multi-millennial term for the basis of our evidence collection, being the scale appropriate to the judgement of climatic trends bearing in mind that in the end we need to fairly establish what become most likely behaviours in the manner and progression of glacial and interglacial trends. The reason for this is that it’s the only way to cope with short term excursions. Without this longer more balanced term to go by any opportunist can extrapolate from his most helpful short term trend to put the fear of God (so to speak) into an unknowing public so to manufacture fear and so dependence and then conformity. IPCC take the period 1750 to now – 270 years – as if it were the proof ne plus ultra of where we must be going given CO2 inputs. The other side take a thousand years pointing to a Mediaeval Warm period that was warmer than today without our CO2 and an argument then develops about whether there really was such a period whereas if we look at epoch level we see this which shows cooling since the Holocene 7.500 years ago which is the interglacial peak so far. If we then look at the previous inter glacial periods we should see something not unlike this each time. The temperature rockets up from the glacial depths to reach a maximum after which it wriggles along in a series of warming and cooling peaks and troughs with each warm period failing to surpass the previous peak and each cooling getting lower than the previous one. It means we are cooling when you take such a climatically meaningful span as the basis for evaluation. When we do plummet – something which always happened before – what is going to happen to farmland and crops for instance. I won’t go any further than that, not wishing to provoke fear, but thought. The clincher is – though – that the argument that we are stuck in a man-made warming crisis depends firstly upon it being the case that the Greenhouse Effect (GE) accounts for the Atmospheric Thermal Enhancement (ATE) of 33C, which IPCC claim in itself as proof as they say there can be no other explanation for the way the atmosphere adds warmth to the planet than the GE. Right there before us we see the biggest banana skin in modern scientific history – or I would argue ever – being stepped upon by the bearers of our finest scientific minds because there is indeed another explanation; an obvious one and one which overthrows that claim (for which there has never been a scintilla of empirical evidence incidentally) and that is gravity. Any and every body of gas warms when compressed – because there are then fewer cubic metres to accommodate the heat energy, meaning more heat energy per cubic metre leading to the ATE bearing in mind that gravity leads to a pressure of 1 ton per square foot. That this fact – requiring only pre-college physics – has been missed is catastrophic for the reputation of science and scientists all over the world and something serious must be done to stop its hijacking by politicians. It means the variation in temperature – as ever before – is entirely due to the cycles and alterations in continuous progress leading to fluctuations in net insolation and therefore temperature etc.. We need scientists to release the public mind from the psychological bondage of myth which is its purpose. Penelope, isn’t it crazy how people just believe anything with out looking into weather it’s real or not, I feel this one the big reason so many people deny this because they see something with no scientific backing and run with it According to the natural climate cycle we are suppose to be in a mini-ice age right about now; but that didn’t happen and has scientists alarmed. That is why climate scientists are studying global warming and its causes. So far the evidence is that it’s the result of human activity because nothing else accounts for it. The article discusses parts of this. We are suppose to be in a mini-ice age, but unexpectedly global temperatures are increasing. So climate scientists studied the causes. Of course this included studying natural causes as they needed to understand what was happening. Did you read the part about how sun activity was ruled out of consideration? Reply Charles Jack 4 years ago The average lay person like myself can only listen to both sides and rightly conclude that one side is wrong. I’m going to go out on a limb here and say that the wise choice would be with those whos business is scientifically studying and analizing climatology. Seems that if they have it all wrong, we’re still OK. If the deniers are proven to be off base (wrong), we’ll only be left with the small comfort of saying “I told you so.” Reply Scott Simpson 4 years ago The question I have always had is how accurate are the measurements. Just during my lifetime I have seen tremendous advancements in technology. Then I read how data has to be adjusted to account for these changes. So my big concern is the margin of error in these estimates because we are not taking about huge variations. 1.4 degrees increase since 1880. If the margin of error is .5 degrees then the fluctuation could be 1 degree and we are only talking about 1.4 degrees. Same with sea level rises. How is that measured and does it take into account erosion and shifting sands and shifting tectonic plates. What if fhe earths core is warming and that is causing the oceans to warm thereby emitting more CO2. Just alot of questions. No doubt we need to limit all pollution to try to protect the environment but this doom and gloom scare tactics dont work on me. Reply Randomer47 4 years ago Ok i get that it is accelerated 10x by human factors but surely all this is confirms thats it is natural??? The real question is why does nobody seem to be planning for the consequences of this climate change especially as the deadline to respond has been shortened by 10x This includes planning evacuations of low lying countries or building giant flood walls, attempting to combat desertification in any way possible and other areas of possible future disasters Instead all the focus is on slowing down something that as far as i can tell is inevitable Reply Leon 4 years ago “97 percent of working climate scientists ” Hahaha… Did you find out how they get this number ??? If you take the time to find out how they get this number you will not use it anymore…If you are a serious person . The ad hominem references to “deniers” likewise contribute to the credibility of the article. Reply Climate change IS normal. 4 years ago I’m still waiting for the human forced ice age we were supposedly going to go through… guess what? Climate change IS natural. No scientist in the world can deny that. That must have forgotten history and the age of the first mammals. Guess what? They adapted and evolved. Which is NORMAL. Anyone who believes this garbage is misinformed. Yes we all read the article. What the article said is that the scientist forced the outcome in their models by inserting what they deemed to be the cause. Not that it was the cause but that it made the model react to show it was the cause. Now riddle me this: why is nothing being done to preserve our forests which keep the earth’s atmosphere in balance? Why is everyone concentrating on fossil fuels like oil and gas? It’s natural, yes. The article phrased this incorrectly. The unnatural part is the speed at which human influence is causing it to happen. You could still call this natural, since humans are themselves a part of nature, but it could still cause an extinction event, and even a natural extinction event is a bad thing. Reply Robert 3 years ago Very simple answer. You dont. And you cant, because you can not set up the required controlled experiment. The rebuttal to this simple fact is usually centered around “but the models”. But models are just that and ade subject to gigo. Now, that said, I personally believe that human activity IS a significant factor is our planet’s warming trend. But this hypothesis can not be proven. And concensus just means that the vast majority agree, not that they are correct. Reply Randy 3 years ago Why do all of your studies not show the past 100yr human interference in global warming, that is as long as there’s been fossil fuels all your science evidence has been before, no proof for the past 100yrs. There is no science that proves it’s from fossil fuel, so scientists of the world better be more convincing or the world of humans will not get involved. Reply Randy 3 years ago Something else that isn’t making Spence is the glaciers melting is uncovering artifacts from humans before fossil fuels, so that is telling us that before fossil fuels we were going into an ice age………the wooly mammoth found was before the last ice age……the ice cores show 15 ice ages 10,000yrs apart, 100yrs ago we were Suppost to go into an ice age, what stopped it??? Al Gore showed the CO2 gragh of the ice ages, the CO2 is higher now than ever before and there is no ice age……..? CO2 traps heat and warms the earth’s atmosphere, this forces global warming. Plants that use CO2 help cool the earth. If enough plants utilize CO2 faster than it being produced, the earth will stay moderately cool. Reply randal 3 years ago my questions out of interest as I have an enquiring mind what if the earth was moving closer to the sun? or what if the earth is tilting on its axis or what if the universe is expanding or what if the Sun is getting stronger Very interesting & most telling as to why, no one has answered these relevant Questions, involving Climate concerns beyond CO2 Hype. What if the Earth is moving closer to the Sun? Technically we are moving away (fractionally on semimajor elliptical) plus it has begun to move cycle from a warm to a cooling cycle. What if the Earth is tilting on its axis? Planet Earth is certainly tilting on its axis,, it also is changing its position at the Poles more shift recent decades., effects; Climate Vortex Winds. .. What if the Universe is Expanding? It has been expanding since the Big Bang as they say. Orbit of Planets around the Sun is elliptical causing long cycles of Heating & Cooling. What if the Sun is getting stronger? Whilst over the long term ; the Sun becomes hotter & brighter. The Sun also goes through short term phases of activity ; we are entering a low. Alignment of Planets is another factor. Earth is moving away from the Sun in its elliptical Cycle plus the Sun is entering a Cooling Phase. If everyone died today what would happen? China, India etc. are the highest polluters in the world who will never enact policies to lower emissions and will probably attract even more businesses who want lower running costs, hence increase their pollution output. Considering these countries will most likely increase their pollution levels, why is NOTHING being done to rectify this problem and drastically address the worst perpetrators which would be the most effective step when the situation is so dire and immediate! It’s like plugging a small hole while it’s gushing water up the pipe and drowning us and everything in its path. Reply Travis Thams 3 years ago The ice core samples did not prove that CO2 caused warming. The Ice core samples simply demonstrated that when temperatures were warmer there was higher concentrations of atmospheric CO2. The data does not conclude a casual relationship between CO2 and temperatures. In fact, there is much stronger evidence that higher concentrations of atmospheric CO2 is an effect of higher atmospheric temperatures. Reply Bov 3 years ago Half fill a bucket with ice and top up with water to top. When the ice melts the bucket does not overflow. They quote NASA but if you go to NASA’S own web page and look you will see that the article is decreasing but the Antarctic ice cap is increasing by more than the artic is decreasing. Excuse me. But how can you account for all “natural” factors in any model if you don’t start from the assumption that you already know what the anthropogenic factors are? How can you scientifically justify calculating the anthropogenic influence on climate change by subtracting the natural influence on climate change from the total measured climate change, when the natural influence in itself is derived from subtracting the anthropogenic influence on climate change from the total measured climate change in the first place? Isn’t this a) circular logic and b) horrible science, since the outcome of the research is already taken for granted as an essential part of the foundation of the same research? Not to poke fun at this logical inconsistency, but how is this different from me making up an arbitrary number concerning a solar factor to climate change, then calculating the non-solar factors to climate change by subtracting my made up solar influence value from the total, and then claiming that I can measurably prove solar climate change by subtracting my natural factor value from the total measured climate change value? How is this even a remotely credible methodology? Reply Paolelladj@gmail.com 3 years ago How is shallow ocean data collected? Mainly temperatures Reply Ben 3 years ago We don’t second guess experts in other fields of science yet, somehow people have the arrogance to question the vast majority of scientists who give us this important information. Maybe if I bet all my money that a stranger can beat Lebron James one-on-one I’ll get a jackpot, but who would do that even though it’s technically possible? Scott Pruitt proves that regardless of politics he can’t agree to the truth. Sir Karl Popper used the concept of “falsifiability” in science. So for example it’s possible to measure the mass of a proton accurately and to continue to repeat the experiment to verify the result.It is not possible however to falsify a prediction using a computer model than the temperature of the earth will increase by 1.5 or 2 degrees by the year 2100. So climate science which relies heavily on computer models doesn’t have the same rigour as say particle physics. It doesn’t mean the predictions are wrong just that there is greater uncertainty in their validity. Say they are wrong? What’s the problem with changing our general consumption of resources to be less wasteful (when we’re burning through other resources), to make a change to renewables sooner rather than later when fossil fuels are a finite resource we’ll eventually come into conflict over worldwide, when we need to reserve fossil fuels for plastics until we can find replacements for all the variations in plastics as well, and to have cheaper energy sources? Say we’re overcautious and move to renewables. Silica sand for fiberglass or carbon for carbon fiber turbines are hugely plentiful resources even if the mining process fucks up the land. (Fracking also fucks up the land so we may as well do it for cheaper energy resources). People forget it’s not JUST about climate, it’s also about consumption and population, and many of the choices done in an abundance of caution for climate change also help mitigate problems from those as well. So we may as well do them. There are many benefits to warmer climate. 4000 years ago when the temperature was warmer than it is today, areas that are now desert had plenty of water and could be used for agriculture. My biggest problem is the government using deceit to collect taxes on global warming fears. Reply Jon 2 years ago I am curious. If greenhouse gases truly warm the Earth, why is Mars, with a thinner, mostly CO2 atmosphere, warmer than Earth’s poles or parts of the US on many days? Can any of you describe how Earth will never be like Venus? I noticed that “the Earth has warmed 1.4 degrees Celsius in recent history. Why use 1880 or later? Why not cite temperature averages during the age of the dinosaurs, or prior? Earth was far hotter and more humid with palms at the poles or completely ice-covered at various times in its past. NOAA uses 120 years of data to prove climate change, I saw a reference to 650,000 years of climate data on this site, but the Earth is 4 billion years old. We need more data and understanding to prove the climate change hypothesis. If we can’t predict the local weather in 5-10 days, then how could we expect to predict climate change on an infinitely grander scale going back billions of years? That strikes me as overly ambitious. Please, someone, tell me what normal temperatures are, Don’t just tell me, show me the entire climate history of Earth and prove that changes aren’t consistent with past variations of temperatures during Earth’s history. I am not a Flat Earther, but I do question. Reply steven clarkson 2 years ago This article states that ice cores over the last 800,000 years show a link between co2 and temperature. 99.9% of the ice core actually shows the earth at 280ppm at massively fluctuating climates. How do they conclude that? If a person believes that climate change is bad, why would they promote electric cars. Electric cars use electricity made from coal and batteries are an environmental concern. . If climate change is bad why not promote the use of hydrogen as a fuel for cars. Hydrogen is safe, cheaper than gasoline and non polluting. If a person believes that climate change is bad why promote wind energy and solar energy which cannot replace coal. Why not promote nuclear energy which is safe, does not create carbon, is abundant and can replace coal? I question the motives of those who promote electric cars, solar energy and wind energy without promoting the use of hydrogen and nuclear power. Reply dan 2 years ago The Hawaiians used to sacrifice a virgin to make the volcano god happy. The aztec priests used to say we need to sacrifice someone to make the rain come. Today they say we need spend billions in grants and federal spending that could be used elsewhere so that we can research climate change. Im not saying climate change doesnt exist, because it has been changing since the beginning of earth. But I am still not convinced that humans have any serious impact on climate change that we should worry about. I am more concerned about plastic in the ocean than climate change or maybe in a 100 years If climate change increased the temperature 1 degree maybe I could grow some bannana trees in my southern californian backyard. Or maybe in 1000 years the temperature will increase 10 degrees but by that time elon musks great great great great great great great grandson invents the magical farting zero emission zero footprint flying car. My point being here is that why should we care? From the perspective of the human existence on earth in a 1000 years plus we will probably have to find new settlements in space anyways like the lack of food and resources on earth and new improvements in technology anything is possible. From a perspective of the next few decades, I think we have bigger problems. I can’t tell you why you should care about climate change, but I can tell you why plenty of people do: Because climate change is already costing us hundreds of billions of dollars in damages from natural disasters, and because human lives are at stake. We can dream about escaping to other planets, but the reality is that fixing those planets to fit our needs would be harder than fixing the planet we already have. We know what the problems are, we know what the solutions are, and now all we need is to be brave enough to implement them. I think it is true that the greatest loss of life from a natural disaster if the US occured in Galveston in 1900. It is estimated 12000 people were killed. I would not speculate on the cause of the hurricane. And how do we know that climate change is causing the natural disasters? And where would I find verification for hundreds of Billions. What about the money saved from decreased heating bills? Since 1990 the amount of foliage has greatly increased. I would be interested in seeing a study examining the beneficial affects to the rain forests. Food production has dramatically increased since 1990 because of the warmer growing season. If the adverse affects are so extensive why aren’t politicians clamoring for increased nuclear and hydrogen power? The politicians like to collect carbon taxes, but why do they do something that causes real benefits? repairing billions of dollars worth of damage keeps people busy that would otherwise just do other useless stuff instead of creating wealth furthermore 9While I am at it) we have many problems on this earth at least as large as Climate Change and none of them are on the big list of Mitigation ie rising Rates of Suicides rising rates from Drug overdoses many Nations spending trillions preparing for more Wars many Nations at War when are we going to deal with alml that? It’s been said that only fools believe that changing the climate is possible by giving money to the government! Reply charlene 2 years ago Well I’m no scientist but why is the southern hemisphere on their map cold while the rest of the world is hot? Doesn’t our atmosphere encircle the whole earth??? Reply Kym Stewart 2 years ago Measure the increase in carbon emitted from undersea and above-ground-level volcanoes. Volcanic activity is increasing due to changes in the universal activity that has always driven the changes to our environment. Mankind’s impact is minuscule compared to the volcanic release of carbon that is often not calculated honestly and can skew any report in favour of the organisation funding the research. Do the volume comparisons. Scientists would not ever work again if they failed to deliver the result their financiers required. They can always find another desperate scientist with a mortgage to corrupt. By the way, it is not that we don’t want any action as you falsely claim it is an action that improves life and, not an action that helps the Globalist banker control commodities prices that we aspire to take. The alternative industry creates more pollution and toxic waste from short term batteries and panels, carbon blades and other filthy short life overpriced materials pushed by your ridiculous ideology. Be honest and think it thru without your bias. Short life throw away toxic battery car Reply don cameron 2 years ago My first question is, if we keep having year after year heat records, how come the last record minimum artic ice was almost 10 years ago? Like Ice in your drink the warmer it gets the less ice we have. My second question is if this is the warmest temperatures in thousands of years, why are the retreating glaciers exposing human remains, roman coins and “Viking highways”? These artifacts suggest it was warmer in recent times and a colder recent climate covered them over. We are told that we will all be driving electric vehicles soon……I think this is utter rubbish, where will all the chargers be, people in high rise blocks, terrace housing.What happens when a 4 hour tailback occurs in winter and the 6 mile of traffic begin to run out of juice. Electric Cars are a Money Spinner in my opinion. We are told that we all will be using a new type of Heating in our houses, how will people afford this? I think we should get our priorities right and tackle things we can solve, such as ridding of plastic. In the UK/world banning fireworks(no mention of this in UK, but surely it would be part of “Our Bit”). any problem ever can only be cured by fixing the Root Cause the Root Cause of the p roblem is the Planet is over populated with half of the present population on earth we would not have a worry at all but nobody wants to even discuss that for fear of beeing stoned because we need more consumers and nobody has an idea how our world could be without more of everything tomorrow and more of everything willonly bring more troubles fossil fuels Plastics clothing food and on and on and yes your point is well taken but I said the root cause ( not Having Babies) just too many is the problem in my humble opinion Fossi fuels have been burn by Humans since Day one but now we have Billions doing it and I have to admit I like burning Fossill Fuels Campfires Woodstoves and Fast Cars too look at all the wars and the Fossil fuels consumed there too many people rubbing each other the wrong way Referring to those who are skeptical about the cause of climate change as “Climate deniers” reveals your confirmation bias. Demonizing those who have a different opinion than yours does not give your opinion much credence. Dave , that is true ; the denigrating attitude by labeling “Climate Deniers” questions the credibility of those saying it and exposes those, that can’t logically argue or prove CO2 Warming. The next form of propaganda tactics is that Climate Change is “decided” & that 97% of ALL Scientists say it is man made..? Even if that were true,, that does NOT indicate they are referencing CO2 as the causation driver for any such change.! The Scientific Method, apparently does not apply to the CO2 hypothesis as most jump the steps and contrive model conclusions for outcomes. Not only is CO2 a fractional gas, its radiant absorption is so minuscule that it is UNPROVEN beyond the Lab.! CO2 is unlikely to produce sufficient heat differential in the atmosphere, to be a key driver in the green house effect among the many factors. CC maybe anthropogenic ; but unlikely CO2. No one in Science should be absolute, either way.! Today , we need CO2 to be above 400 ppm because “plant growth” is very dependent upon photosynthesis whereby CO2 is a prerequisite. Fortunately , CO2 has increased with the population and Farmers have been able to produce “greater yields” on rate of growth. It is also a fact that many regions of the world, would fail to harvest within Season, if we were back to 280 ppm today. “Life on Earth” ; depends on enough CO2. Almost all Predictions from Professors to the IPCC, involving Warming “doom & gloom” have “failed spectacularly” to materialize only to see excuses, postponements & change of focus. The Oceans have not risen and the harbors are not flooding. Corrupted models and misinformation is standard ; whereby any disaster is a Climate Change event.Cooling is also happening globally, ( yet ignored by the IPCC ) there’s two sides to this blind sided faith. CC no longer represents the Scientific Method. “Oceans have not risen”? Miami and Charleston flood from the tide on sunny days for a while now. Mangroves are endangered by salt water encroaching for a while now. A Virginia military base mentioned needing to re-build, because flooding airstrips wouldn’t be usable, about twenty years ago. Reply CHRISTOPHER ANTHONY BRYSON 11 months ago What about the historical timeline of the Earth. CO2 levels have been as high as 7000ppm with no human presence at all. Why do climate scientists NEVER show the entire timeline of CO2 records? Only showing the last 1000 or 2000 years and zooming in on the chart looks really scary, but when you zoom out to hundreds of millions of years, why is it that global temps and co2 is much much higher, but never shown or mentioned? You’re right there were warmer periods in the far geologic past. It’s the climate stability that supports a species survival. Why did the dinosaurs collapse? A change occurred so fast they couldn’t adapt. And any life depending on their survival went with them. And now, it’s the rapid change of avg temperature that is alarming (not the temperature itself). These changes will cause disruption, lead to chaos, and potentially civilization as we know it may be in jeopardy. If you don’t mind a Mad max world, then maybe none of this will matter. Or we can prepare in some way so that we don’t resort to panic when havoc ensues. Reply Garry Bradley 8 months ago Excuse my ignorance, if this is the warmest the oceans have been for half a century, what caused them to start cooling 49 years ago? Reply Trish Sample 8 months ago I’m not a scientist by any means. From what I understand we are pretty much screwed. One reason is we for some reason can’t get our heads out of our asses and see what is right in front of us…our planet is dying. We messed up. Too selfish to stop and actually fix our mistakes we just keep taking and taking. It’s a pathetic and frankly unknown legacy we leave our children. 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CO2 is unlikely to produce sufficient heat differential in the atmosphere, to be a key driver in the green house effect among the many factors. CC maybe anthropogenic ; but unlikely CO2. No one in Science should be absolute, either way.! Today , we need CO2 to be above 400 ppm because “plant growth” is very dependent upon photosynthesis whereby CO2 is a prerequisite. Fortunately , CO2 has increased with the population and Farmers have been able to produce “greater yields” on rate of growth. It is also a fact that many regions of the world, would fail to harvest within Season, if we were back to 280 ppm today. “Life on Earth” ; depends on enough CO2. Almost all Predictions from Professors to the IPCC, involving Warming “doom & gloom” have “failed spectacularly” to materialize only to see excuses, postponements & change of focus. The Oceans have not risen and the harbors are not flooding. Corrupted models and misinformation is standard ; whereby any disaster is a Climate Change event. Cooling is also happening globally, ( yet ignored by the IPCC ) there’s two sides to this blind sided faith. CC no longer represents the Scientific Method. “Oceans have not risen”? Miami and Charleston flood from the tide on sunny days for a while now. Mangroves are endangered by salt water encroaching for a while now. A Virginia military base mentioned needing to re-build, because flooding airstrips wouldn’t be usable, about twenty years ago. Reply CHRISTOPHER ANTHONY BRYSON 11 months ago What about the historical timeline of the Earth. CO2 levels have been as high as 7000ppm with no human presence at all.

no

Paleoclimatology

Are current carbon dioxide levels unprecedented in Earth's history?

yes_statement

"current" "carbon" "dioxide" "levels" are "unprecedented" in earth's "history".. earth's "history" has never experienced "carbon" "dioxide" "levels" like the "current" ones.

https://ocean.si.edu/ocean-life/invertebrates/ocean-acidification

Ocean Acidification | Smithsonian Ocean

Ocean acidification is sometimes called “climate change’s equally evil twin,” and for good reason: it's a significant and harmful consequence of excess carbon dioxide in the atmosphere that we don't see or feel because its effects are happening underwater. At least one-quarter of the carbon dioxide (CO2) released by burning coal, oil and gas doesn't stay in the air, but instead dissolves into the ocean. Since the beginning of the industrial era, the ocean has absorbed some 525 billion tons of CO2 from the atmosphere, presently around 22 million tons per day. At first, scientists thought that this might be a good thing because it leaves less carbon dioxide in the air to warm the planet. But in the past decade, they’ve realized that this slowed warming has come at the cost of changing the ocean’s chemistry. When carbon dioxide dissolves in seawater, the water becomes more acidic and the ocean’s pH (a measure of how acidic or basic the ocean is) drops. Even though the ocean is immense, enough carbon dioxide can have a major impact. In the past 200 years alone, ocean water has become 30 percent more acidic—faster than any known change in ocean chemistry in the last 50 million years. Scientists formerly didn’t worry about this process because they always assumed that rivers carried enough dissolved chemicals from rocks to the ocean to keep the ocean’s pH stable. (Scientists call this stabilizing effect “buffering.”) But so much carbon dioxide is dissolving into the ocean so quickly that this natural buffering hasn’t been able to keep up, resulting in relatively rapidly dropping pH in surface waters. As those surface layers gradually mix into deep water, the entire ocean is affected. Such a relatively quick change in ocean chemistry doesn’t give marine life, which evolved over millions of years in an ocean with a generally stable pH, much time to adapt. In fact, the shells of some animals are already dissolving in the more acidic seawater, and that’s just one way that acidification may affect ocean life. Overall, it's expected to have dramatic and mostly negative impacts on ocean ecosystems—although some species (especially those that live in estuaries) are finding ways to adapt to the changing conditions. However, while the chemistry is predictable, the details of the biological impacts are not. Although scientists have been tracking ocean pH for more than 30 years, biological studies really only started in 2003, when the rapid shift caught their attention and the term "ocean acidification" was first coined. What we do know is that things are going to look different, and we can't predict in any detail how they will look. Some organisms will survive or even thrive under the more acidic conditions while others will struggle to adapt, and may even go extinct. Beyond lost biodiversity, acidification will affect fisheries and aquaculture, threatening food security for millions of people, as well as tourism and other sea-related economies. Acidification Chemistry At its core, the issue of ocean acidification is simple chemistry. There are two important things to remember about what happens when carbon dioxide dissolves in seawater. First, the pH of seawater water gets lower as it becomes more acidic. Second, this process binds up carbonate ions and makes them less abundant—ions that corals, oysters, mussels, and many other shelled organisms need to build shells and skeletons. A More Acidic Ocean This graph shows rising levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere, rising CO2 levels in the ocean, and decreasing pH in the water off the coast of Hawaii. (NOAA PMEL Carbon Program (Link)) Carbon dioxide is naturally in the air: plants need it to grow, and animals exhale it when they breathe. But, thanks to people burning fuels, there is now more carbon dioxide in the atmosphere than anytime in the past 15 million years. Most of this CO2 collects in the atmosphere and, because it absorbs heat from the sun, creates a blanket around the planet, warming its temperature. But some 30 percent of this CO2 dissolves into seawater, where it doesn't remain as floating CO2 molecules. A series of chemical changes break down the CO2 molecules and recombine them with others. When water (H2O) and CO2 mix, they combine to form carbonic acid (H2CO3). Carbonic acid is weak compared to some of the well-known acids that break down solids, such as hydrochloric acid (the main ingredient in gastric acid, which digests food in your stomach) and sulfuric acid (the main ingredient in car batteries, which can burn your skin with just a drop). The weaker carbonic acid may not act as quickly, but it works the same way as all acids: it releases hydrogen ions (H+), which bond with other molecules in the area. Seawater that has more hydrogen ions is more acidic by definition, and it also has a lower pH. In fact, the definitions of acidification terms—acidity, H+, pH —are interlinked: acidity describes how many H+ ions are in a solution; an acid is a substance that releases H+ ions; and pH is the scale used to measure the concentration of H+ ions. Smithsonian Institution The lower the pH, the more acidic the solution. The pH scale goes from extremely basic at 14 (lye has a pH of 13) to extremely acidic at 1 (lemon juice has a pH of 2), with a pH of 7 being neutral (neither acidic or basic). The ocean itself is not actually acidic in the sense of having a pH less than 7, and it won’t become acidic even with all the CO2 that is dissolving into the ocean. But the changes in the direction of increasing acidity are still dramatic. So far, ocean pH has dropped from 8.2 to 8.1 since the industrial revolution, and is expected by fall another 0.3 to 0.4 pH units by the end of the century. A drop in pH of 0.1 might not seem like a lot, but the pH scale, like the Richter scale for measuring earthquakes, is logarithmic. For example, pH 4 is ten times more acidic than pH 5 and 100 times (10 times 10) more acidic than pH 6. If we continue to add carbon dioxide at current rates, seawater pH may drop another 120 percent by the end of this century, to 7.8 or 7.7, creating an ocean more acidic than any seen for the past 20 million years or more. Why Acidity Matters The acidic waters from the CO2 seeps can dissolve shells and also make it harder for shells to grow in the first place.(Laetitia Plaisance) Many chemical reactions, including those that are essential for life, are sensitive to small changes in pH. In humans, for example, normal blood pH ranges between 7.35 and 7.45. A drop in blood pH of 0.2-0.3 can cause seizures, comas, and even death. Similarly, a small change in the pH of seawater can have harmful effects on marine life, impacting chemical communication, reproduction, and growth. The building of skeletons in marine creatures is particularly sensitive to acidity. One of the molecules that hydrogen ions bond with is carbonate (CO3-2), a key component of calcium carbonate (CaCO3) shells. To make calcium carbonate, shell-building marine animals such as corals and oysters combine a calcium ion (Ca+2) with carbonate (CO3-2) from surrounding seawater, releasing carbon dioxide and water in the process. Like calcium ions, hydrogen ions tend to bond with carbonate—but they have a greater attraction to carbonate than calcium. When a hydrogen bonds with carbonate, a bicarbonate ion (HCO3-) is formed. Shell-building organisms can't extract the carbonate ion they need from bicarbonate, preventing them from using that carbonate to grow new shell. In this way, the hydrogen essentially binds up the carbonate ions, making it harder for shelled animals to build their homes. Even if animals are able to build skeletons in more acidic water, they may have to spend more energy to do so, taking away resources from other activities like reproduction. If there are too many hydrogen ions around and not enough molecules for them to bond with, they can even begin breaking existing calcium carbonate molecules apart—dissolving shells that already exist. This is just one process that extra hydrogen ions—caused by dissolving carbon dioxide—may interfere with in the ocean. Organisms in the water, thus, have to learn to survive as the water around them has an increasing concentration of carbonate-hogging hydrogen ions. Impacts on Ocean Life The pH of the ocean fluctuates within limits as a result of natural processes, and ocean organisms are well-adapted to survive the changes that they normally experience. Some marine species may be able to adapt to more extreme changes—but many will suffer, and there will likely be extinctions. We can't know this for sure, but during the last great acidification event 55 million years ago, there were mass extinctions in some species including deep sea invertebrates. A more acidic ocean won’t destroy all marine life in the sea, but the rise in seawater acidity of 30 percent that we have already seen is already affecting some ocean organisms. Coral Reefs Branching corals, because of their more fragile structure, struggle to live in acidified waters around natural carbon dioxide seeps, a model for a more acidic future ocean.(Laetitia Plaisance) Reef-building corals craft their own homes from calcium carbonate, forming complex reefs that house the coral animals themselves and provide habitat for many other organisms. Acidification may limit coral growth by corroding pre-existing coral skeletons while simultaneously slowing the growth of new ones, and the weaker reefs that result will be more vulnerable to erosion. This erosion will come not only from storm waves, but also from animals that drill into or eat coral. A recent study predicts that by roughly 2080 ocean conditions will be so acidic that even otherwise healthy coral reefs will be eroding more quickly than they can rebuild. Acidification may also impact corals before they even begin constructing their homes. The eggs and larvae of only a few coral species have been studied, and more acidic water didn’t hurt their development while they were still in the plankton. However, larvae in acidic water had more trouble finding a good place to settle, preventing them from reaching adulthood. How much trouble corals run into will vary by species. Some types of coral can use bicarbonate instead of carbonate ions to build their skeletons, which gives them more options in an acidifying ocean. Some can survive without a skeleton and return to normal skeleton-building activities once the water returns to a more comfortable pH. Others can handle a wider pH range. Nonetheless, in the next century we will see the common types of coral found in reefs shifting—though we can't be entirely certain what that change will look like. On reefs in Papua New Guinea that are affected by natural carbon dioxide seeps, big boulder colonies have taken over and the delicately branching forms have disappeared, probably because their thin branches are more susceptible to dissolving. This change is also likely to affect the many thousands of organisms that live among the coral, including those that people fish and eat, in unpredictable ways. In addition, acidification gets piled on top of all the other stresses that reefs have been suffering from, such as warming water (which causes another threat to reefs known as coral bleaching), pollution, and overfishing. Oysters, Mussels, Urchins and Starfish Generally, shelled animals—including mussels, clams, urchins and starfish—are going to have trouble building their shells in more acidic water, just like the corals. Mussels and oysters are expected to grow less shell by 25 percent and 10 percent respectively by the end of the century. Urchins and starfish aren’t as well studied, but they build their shell-like parts from high-magnesium calcite, a type of calcium carbonate that dissolves even more quickly than the aragonite form of calcium carbonate that corals use. This means a weaker shell for these organisms, increasing the chance of being crushed or eaten. Some of the major impacts on these organisms go beyond adult shell-building, however. Mussels’ byssal threads, with which they famously cling to rocks in the pounding surf, can’t hold on as well in acidic water. Meanwhile, oyster larvae fail to even begin growing their shells. In their first 48 hours of life, oyster larvae undergo a massive growth spurt, building their shells quickly so they can start feeding. But the more acidic seawater eats away at their shells before they can form; this has already caused massive oyster die-offs in the U.S. Pacific Northwest. This massive failure isn’t universal, however: studies have found that crustaceans (such as lobsters, crabs, and shrimp) grow even stronger shells under higher acidity. This may be because their shells are constructed differently. Additionally, some species may have already adapted to higher acidity or have the ability to do so, such as purple sea urchins. (Although a new study found that larval urchins have trouble digesting their food under raised acidity.) Of course, the loss of these organisms would have much larger effects in the food chain, as they are food and habitat for many other animals. Benjamin Drummond + Sara Steele Zooplankton This pair of sea butterflies (Limacina helicina) flutter not far from the ocean's surface in the Arctic. (Courtesy of Alexander Semenov, Flickr) There are two major types of zooplankton (tiny drifting animals) that build shells made of calcium carbonate: foraminifera and pteropods. They may be small, but they are big players in the food webs of the ocean, as almost all larger life eats zooplankton or other animals that eat zooplankton. They are also critical to the carbon cycle—how carbon (as carbon dioxide and calcium carbonate) moves between air, land and sea. Oceans contain the greatest amount of actively cycled carbon in the world and are also very important in storing carbon. When shelled zooplankton (as well as shelled phytoplankton) die and sink to the seafloor, they carry their calcium carbonate shells with them, which are deposited as rock or sediment and stored for the foreseeable future. This is an important way that carbon dioxide is removed from the atmosphere, slowing the rise in temperature caused by the greenhouse effect. These tiny organisms reproduce so quickly that they may be able to adapt to acidity better than large, slow-reproducing animals. However, experiments in the lab and at carbon dioxide seeps (where pH is naturally low) have found that foraminifera do not handle higher acidity very well, as their shells dissolve rapidly. One study even predicts that foraminifera from tropical areas will be extinct by the end of the century. The shells of pteropods are already dissolving in the Southern Ocean, where more acidic water from the deep sea rises to the surface, hastening the effects of acidification caused by human-derived carbon dioxide. Like corals, these sea snails are particularly susceptible because their shells are made of aragonite, a delicate form of calcium carbonate that is 50 percent more soluble in seawater. One big unknown is whether acidification will affect jellyfish populations. In this case, the fear is that they will survive unharmed. Jellyfish compete with fish and other predators for food—mainly smaller zooplankton—and they also eat young fish themselves. If jellyfish thrive under warm and more acidic conditions while most other organisms suffer, it’s possible that jellies will dominate some ecosystems (a problem already seen in parts of the ocean). Plants and Algae Neptune grass (Posidonia oceanica) is a slow-growing and long-lived seagrass native to the Mediterranean.(Gaynor Rosier/Marine Photobank) Plants and many algae may thrive under acidic conditions. These organisms make their energy from combining sunlight and carbon dioxide—so more carbon dioxide in the water doesn't hurt them, but helps. Seagrasses form shallow-water ecosystems along coasts that serve as nurseries for many larger fish, and can be home to thousands of different organisms. Under more acidic lab conditions, they were able to reproduce better, grow taller, and grow deeper roots—all good things. However, they are in decline for a number of other reasons—especially pollution flowing into coastal seawater—and it's unlikely that this boost from acidification will compensate entirely for losses caused by these other stresses. Some species of algae grow better under more acidic conditions with the boost in carbon dioxide. But coralline algae, which build calcium carbonate skeletons and help cement coral reefs, do not fare so well. Most coralline algae species build shells from the high-magnesium calcite form of calcium carbonate, which is more soluble than the aragonite or regular calcite forms. One study found that, in acidifying conditions, coralline algae covered 92 percent less area, making space for other types of non-calcifying algae, which can smother and damage coral reefs. This is doubly bad because many coral larvae prefer to settle onto coralline algae when they are ready to leave the plankton stage and start life on a coral reef. One major group of phytoplankton (single celled algae that float and grow in surface waters), the coccolithophores, grows shells. Early studies found that, like other shelled animals, their shells weakened, making them susceptible to damage. But a longer-term study let a common coccolithophore (Emiliania huxleyi) reproduce for 700 generations, taking about 12 full months, in the warmer and more acidic conditions expected to become reality in 100 years. The population was able to adapt, growing strong shells. It could be that they just needed more time to adapt, or that adaptation varies species by species or even population by population. Fish While fish don't have shells, they will still feel the effects of acidification. Because the surrounding water has a lower pH, a fish's cells often come into balance with the seawater by taking in carbonic acid. This changes the pH of the fish's blood, a condition called acidosis. Although the fish is then in harmony with its environment, many of the chemical reactions that take place in its body can be altered. Just a small change in pH can make a huge difference in survival. In humans, for instance, a drop in blood pH of 0.2-0.3 can cause seizures, comas, and even death. Likewise, a fish is also sensitive to pH and has to put its body into overdrive to bring its chemistry back to normal. To do so, it will burn extra energy to excrete the excess acid out of its blood through its gills, kidneys and intestines. It might not seem like this would use a lot of energy, but even a slight increase reduces the energy a fish has to take care of other tasks, such as digesting food, swimming rapidly to escape predators or catch food, and reproducing. It can also slow fishes growth. Even slightly more acidic water may also affects fishes' minds. While clownfish can normally hear and avoid noisy predators, in more acidic water, they do not flee threatening noise. Clownfish also stray farther from home and have trouble "smelling" their way back. This may happen because acidification, which changes the pH of a fish's body and brain, could alter how the brain processes information. Additionally, cobia (a kind of popular game fish) grow larger otoliths—small ear bones that affect hearing and balance—in more acidic water, which could affect their ability to navigate and avoid prey. While there is still a lot to learn, these findings suggest that we may see unpredictable changes in animal behavior under acidification. The ability to adapt to higher acidity will vary from fish species to fish species, and what qualities will help or hurt a given fish species is unknown. A shift in dominant fish species could have major impacts on the food web and on human fisheries. Studying Acidification In the Past An archaeologist arranges a deep-sea core from off the coast of Britain. (Wessex Archaeology, Flickr) Geologists study the potential effects of acidification by digging into Earth’s past when ocean carbon dioxide and temperature were similar to conditions found today. One way is to study cores, soil and rock samples taken from the surface to deep in the Earth’s crust, with layers that go back 65 million years. The chemical composition of fossils in cores from the deep ocean show that it’s been 35 million years since the Earth last experienced today’s high levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide. But to predict the future—what the Earth might look like at the end of the century—geologists have to look back another 20 million years. Some 55.8 million years ago, massive amounts of carbon dioxide were released into the atmosphere, and temperatures rose by about 9°F (5°C), a period known as the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum. Scientists don’t yet know why this happened, but there are several possibilities: intense volcanic activity, breakdown of ocean sediments, or widespread fires that burned forests, peat, and coal. Like today, the pH of the deep ocean dropped quickly as carbon dioxide rapidly rose, causing a sudden “dissolution event” in which so much of the shelled sea life disappeared that the sediment changed from primarily white calcium carbonate “chalk” to red-brown mud. Looking even farther back—about 300 million years—geologists see a number of changes that share many of the characteristics of today’s human-driven ocean acidification, including the near-disappearance of coral reefs. However, no past event perfectly mimics the conditions we’re seeing today. The main difference is that, today, CO2 levels are rising at an unprecedented rate—even faster than during the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum. In the Lab GEOMAR scientist Armin Form works at his lab during a long-term experiment on the effects of lower pH, higher temperatures and "food stress" on the cold-water coral Lophelia pertusa.(Solvin Zankl) Another way to study how marine organisms in today’s ocean might respond to more acidic seawater is to perform controlled laboratory experiments. Researchers will often place organisms in tanks of water with different pH levels to see how they fare and whether they adapt to the conditions. They’re not just looking for shell-building ability; researchers also study their behavior, energy use, immune response and reproductive success. They also look at different life stages of the same species because sometimes an adult will easily adapt, but young larvae will not—or vice versa. Studying the effects of acidification with other stressors such as warming and pollution, is also important, since acidification is not the only way that humans are changing the oceans. In the wild, however, those algae, plants, and animals are not living in isolation: they’re part of communities of many organisms. So some researchers have looked at the effects of acidification on the interactions between species in the lab, often between prey and predator. Results can be complex. In more acidic seawater, a snail called the common periwinkle (Littorina littorea) builds a weaker shell and avoids crab predators—but in the process, may also spend less time looking for food. Boring sponges drill into coral skeletons and scallop shells more quickly. And the late-stage larvae of black-finned clownfish lose their ability to smell the difference between predators and non-predators, even becoming attracted to predators. Although the current rate of ocean acidification is higher than during past (natural) events, it’s still not happening all at once. So short-term studies of acidification’s effects might not uncover the potential for some populations or species to acclimate to or adapt to decreasing ocean pH. For example, the deepwater coral Lophelia pertusa shows a significant decline in its ability to maintain its calcium-carbonate skeleton during the first week of exposure to decreased pH. But after six months in acidified seawater, the coral had adjusted to the new conditions and returned to a normal growth rate. Natural Variation Off the coast of Papua New Guinea, CO2 bubbles out of volcanic vents in the reef. The excess carbon dioxide dissolves into the surrounding seawater, making water more acidic—as we would expect to see in the future due to the burning of fossil fuels.(Laetitia Plaisance) There are places scattered throughout the ocean where cool CO2-rich water bubbles from volcanic vents, lowering the pH in surrounding waters. Scientists study these unusual communities for clues to what an acidified ocean will look like. Researchers working off the Italian coast compared the ability of 79 species of bottom-dwelling invertebrates to settle in areas at different distances from CO2 vents. For most species, including worms, mollusks, and crustaceans, the closer to the vent (and the more acidic the water), the fewer the number of individuals that were able to colonize or survive. Algae and animals that need abundant calcium-carbonate, like reef-building corals, snails, barnacles, sea urchins, and coralline algae, were absent or much less abundant in acidified water, which were dominated by dense stands of sea grass and brown algae. Only one species, the polychaete worm Syllis prolifers, was more abundant in lower pH water. The effects of carbon dioxide seeps on a coral reef in Papua New Guinea were also dramatic, with large boulder corals replacing complex branching forms and, in some places, with sand, rubble and algae beds replacing corals entirely. All of these studies provide strong evidence that an acidified ocean will look quite different from today’s ocean. Some species will soldier on while others will decrease or go extinct—and altogether the ocean’s various habitats will no longer provide the diversity we depend on. One challenge of studying acidification in the lab is that you can only really look at a couple species at a time. To study whole ecosystems—including the many other environmental effects beyond acidification, including warming, pollution, and overfishing—scientists need to do it in the field. The biggest field experiment underway studying acidification is the Biological Impacts of Ocean Acidification (BIOACID) project. Scientists from five European countries built ten mesocosms—essentially giant test tubes 60-feet deep that hold almost 15,000 gallons of water—and placed them in the Swedish Gullmar Fjord. After letting plankton and other tiny organisms drift or swim in, the researchers sealed the test tubes and decreased the pH to 7.8, the expected acidity for 2100, in half of them. Now they are waiting to see how the organisms will react, and whether they're able to adapt. If this experiment, one of the first of its kind, is successful, it can be repeated in different ocean areas around the world. Looking to the Future If the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere stabilizes, eventually buffering (or neutralizing) will occur and pH will return to normal. This is why there are periods in the past with much higher levels of carbon dioxide but no evidence of ocean acidification: the rate of carbon dioxide increase was slower, so the ocean had time to buffer and adapt. But this time, pH is dropping too quickly. Buffering will take thousands of years, which is way too long a period of time for the ocean organisms affected now and in the near future. So far, the signs of acidification visible to humans are few. But they will only increase as more carbon dioxide dissolves into seawater over time. What can we do to stop it? Cut Carbon Emissions When we use fossil fuels to power our cars, homes, and businesses, we put heat-trapping carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.(Sarah Leen/National Geographic Society) In 2013, carbon dioxide in the atmosphere passed 400 parts per million (ppm)—higher than at any time in the last one million years (and maybe even 25 million years). The "safe" level of carbon dioxide is around 350 ppm, a milestone we passed in 1988. Without ocean absorption, atmospheric carbon dioxide would be even higher—closer to 475 ppm. The most realistic way to lower this number—or to keep it from getting astronomically higher—would be to reduce our carbon emissions by burning less fossil fuels and finding more carbon sinks, such as regrowing mangroves, seagrass beds, and marshes, known as blue carbon. If we did, over hundreds of thousands of years, carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and ocean would stabilize again. Even if we stopped emitting all carbon right now, ocean acidification would not end immediately. This is because there is a lag between changing our emissions and when we start to feel the effects. It's kind of like making a short stop while driving a car: even if you slam the brakes, the car will still move for tens or hundreds of feet before coming to a halt. The same thing happens with emissions, but instead of stopping a moving vehicle, the climate will continue to change, the atmosphere will continue to warm and the ocean will continue to acidify. Carbon dioxide typically lasts in the atmosphere for hundreds of years; in the ocean, this effect is amplified further as more acidic ocean waters mix with deep water over a cycle that also lasts hundreds of years. Geoengineering The bright, brilliant swirls of blue and green seen from space are a phytoplankton bloom in the Barents Sea. (NASA Goddard Space Flight Center) It's possible that we will develop technologies that can help us reduce atmospheric carbon dioxide or the acidity of the ocean more quickly or without needing to cut carbon emissions very drastically. Because such solutions would require us to deliberately manipulate planetary systems and the biosphere (whether through the atmosphere, ocean, or other natural systems), such solutions are grouped under the title "geoengineering." The main effect of increasing carbon dioxide that weighs on people's minds is the warming of the planet. Some geoengineering proposals address this through various ways of reflecting sunlight—and thus excess heat—back into space from the atmosphere. This could be done by releasing particles into the high atmosphere, which act like tiny, reflecting mirrors, or even by putting giant reflecting mirrors in orbit! However, this solution does nothing to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, and this carbon dioxide would continue to dissolve into the ocean and cause acidification. Another idea is to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere by growing more of the organisms that use it up: phytoplankton. Adding iron or other fertilizers to the ocean could cause man-made phytoplankton blooms. This phytoplankton would then absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, and then, after death, sink down and trap it in the deep sea. However, it's unknown how this would affect marine food webs that depend on phytoplankton, or whether this would just cause the deep sea to become more acidic itself. What You Can Do A beach clean-up in Malaysia brings young people together to care for their coastline.(Liew Shan Sern/Marine Photobank) Even though the ocean may seem far away from your front door, there are things you can do in your life and in your home that can help to slow ocean acidification and carbon dioxide emissions. The best thing you can do is to try and lower how much carbon dioxide you use every day. Try to reduce your energy use at home by recycling, turning off unused lights, walking or biking short distances instead of driving, using public transportation, and supporting clean energy, such as solar, wind, and geothermal power. Even the simple act of checking your tire pressure (or asking your parents to check theirs) can lower gas consumption and reduce your carbon footprint. (Calculate your carbon footprint here.) One of the most important things you can do is to tell your friends and family about ocean acidification. Because scientists only noticed what a big problem it is fairly recently, a lot of people still don't know it is happening. So talk about it! Educate your classmates, coworkers and friends about how acidification will affect the amazing ocean animals that provide food, income, and beauty to billions of people around the world.

But to predict the future—what the Earth might look like at the end of the century—geologists have to look back another 20 million years. Some 55.8 million years ago, massive amounts of carbon dioxide were released into the atmosphere, and temperatures rose by about 9°F (5°C), a period known as the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum. Scientists don’t yet know why this happened, but there are several possibilities: intense volcanic activity, breakdown of ocean sediments, or widespread fires that burned forests, peat, and coal. Like today, the pH of the deep ocean dropped quickly as carbon dioxide rapidly rose, causing a sudden “dissolution event” in which so much of the shelled sea life disappeared that the sediment changed from primarily white calcium carbonate “chalk” to red-brown mud. Looking even farther back—about 300 million years—geologists see a number of changes that share many of the characteristics of today’s human-driven ocean acidification, including the near-disappearance of coral reefs. However, no past event perfectly mimics the conditions we’re seeing today. The main difference is that, today, CO2 levels are rising at an unprecedented rate—even faster than during the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum. In the Lab GEOMAR scientist Armin Form works at his lab during a long-term experiment on the effects of lower pH, higher temperatures and "food stress" on the cold-water coral Lophelia pertusa.(Solvin Zankl) Another way to study how marine organisms in today’s ocean might respond to more acidic seawater is to perform controlled laboratory experiments. Researchers will often place organisms in tanks of water with different pH levels to see how they fare and whether they adapt to the conditions. They’re not just looking for shell-building ability; researchers also study their behavior, energy use, immune response and reproductive success.

yes

Paleoclimatology

Are current carbon dioxide levels unprecedented in Earth's history?

yes_statement

"current" "carbon" "dioxide" "levels" are "unprecedented" in earth's "history".. earth's "history" has never experienced "carbon" "dioxide" "levels" like the "current" ones.

https://ourworldindata.org/co2-and-greenhouse-gas-emissions

CO₂ and Greenhouse Gas Emissions - Our World in Data

You can download our complete Our World in Data CO2 and Greenhouse Gas Emissions database. CO2 and Greenhouse Gas Emissions Country Profiles How are emissions changing in each country? Is your country making progress on reducing emissions? We built 207 country profiles which allow you to explore the statistics for every country in the world. Each profile includes interactive visualizations, explanations of the presented metrics, and the details on the sources of the data. Why do greenhouse gas emissions matter? Global average temperatures have increased by more than 1℃ since pre-industrial times Human emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases – are a primary driver of climate change – and present one of the world’s most pressing challenges.1 This link between global temperatures and greenhouse gas concentrations – especially CO2 – has been true throughout Earth’s history.2 To set the scene, let’s look at how the planet has warmed. In the chart, we see the global average temperature relative to the average of the period between 1961 and 1990. The red line represents the average annual temperature trend through time, with upper and lower confidence intervals shown in light grey. We see that over the last few decades, global temperatures have risen sharply — to approximately 0.7℃ higher than our 1961-1990 baseline. When extended back to 1850, we see that temperatures then were a further 0.4℃ colder than they were in our baseline. Overall, this would amount to an average temperature rise of 1.1℃. Because there are small year-to-year fluctuations in temperature, the specific temperature increase depends on what year we assume to be ‘pre-industrial’ and the end year we’re measuring from. But overall, this temperature rise is in the range of 1 to 1.2℃.3 Greenhouse gas emissions from human activities are the main driver of this warming How much of the warming since 1850 can be attributed to human emissions? Almost all of it. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) states clearly in its AR5 assessment report4: “Anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions have increased since the pre-industrial era, driven largely by economic and population growth, and are now higher than ever. This has led to atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide that are unprecedented in at least the last 800,000 years. Their effects, together with those of other anthropogenic drivers, have been detected throughout the climate system and are extremely likely to have been the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid-20th century.“ Aerosols have played a slight cooling role in global climate, and natural variability has played a very minor role. This article from the Carbon Brief, with interactive graphics showing the relative contributions of different forcings on the climate, explains this very well. A changing climate has a range of potential ecological, physical, and health impacts, including extreme weather events (such as floods, droughts, storms, and heatwaves); sea-level rise; altered crop growth; and disrupted water systems. The most extensive source of analysis on the potential impacts of climatic change can be found in the 5th Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report.5 In some regions, warming has – and will continue to be – much greater than the global average Local temperatures in 2019 relative to the average temperature in 1951-1980.6 When we think about the problem of global warming, a temperature rise of 1℃ can seem small and insignificant. Not only is it true that 1℃ of rapid warming itself can have significant impacts on climate and natural systems, but also that this 1℃ figure masks the large variations in warming across the world. In the map shown – taken from the Berkeley Earth global temperature report – we see the global distribution of temperature changes in 2019 relative to the period 1951 – 1980.7 This period from 1951 to 1980 is similar to the period global average time series shown in the section above. There are a couple of key points that stand out. Firstly, the global average temperature rise is usually given as the combined temperature change across both land and the sea surface. But it’s important to note that land areas change temperature, both warming and cooling much more than oceanic areas.8 Overall, global average temperatures over land have increased around twice as much as the ocean. Compared to the 1951 – 1980 average, temperatures over land increased by 1.32 ± 0.04 °C. Whereas, the ocean surface temperature (excluding areas of sea ice) increased by only 0.59 ± 0.06 °C. Since the Northern Hemisphere has more land mass, this also means that the change in average temperature north of the equator has been higher than in the south. Secondly, from the map shown, we see that in some regions the temperature change has been much more extreme. At very high latitudes – especially near the Poles – warming has been upwards of 3°C, and in some cases exceeding 5°C. These are, unfortunately, often the regions that could experience the largest impacts such as sea ice, permafrost, and glacial melt. Monitoring the average global temperature change is important, but we should also be aware of how differently this warming is distributed across the world. In some regions, warming is much more extreme. Atmospheric concentrations of CO2 continue to rise To slow down – with the eventual aim of halting – rising global temperatures, we need to stabilize concentrations of CO2 and other greenhouse gases in Earth’s atmosphere.9 This link between global temperatures and greenhouse gas concentrations – especially CO2 – has been true throughout Earth’s history.10 It’s important to note that there is a ‘lag’ between atmospheric concentrations and final temperature rise – this means that when we do finally manage to stabilize atmospheric concentrations, temperatures will continue to slowly rise for years to decades.11,12 In the chart here we see global average concentrations of CO2 in the atmosphere over the past 800,000 years. Over this period we see consistent fluctuations in CO2 concentrations; these periods of rising and falling CO2 coincide with the onset of ice ages (low CO2) and interglacials (high CO2).13 These periodic fluctuations are caused by changes in the Earth’s orbit around the sun – called Milankovitch cycles. Over this long period, atmospheric concentrations of CO2 did not exceed 300 parts per million (ppm). This changed with the Industrial Revolution and the rise of human emissions of CO2 from burning fossil fuels. We see a rapid rise in global CO2 concentrations over the past few centuries, and in recent decades in particular. For the first time in over 800,000 years, concentrations did not only rise above 300ppm but are now well over 400ppm. It’s not only the level of change CO2 in the atmosphere that matters, but also the rate that this has changed. Historical changes in CO2 concentrations tended to occur over centuries or even thousands of years. It took us a matter of decades to achieve even larger changes. This gives species, planetary systems, and ecosystems much less time to adapt. Current policies to reduce, or at least slow down growth, in CO2 and other greenhouse gas emissions will have some impact on reducing future warming. As we see in the chart shown here, current implemented climate and energy policies would reduce warming relative to a world with no climate policies in place. This chart maps out future greenhouse gas emissions scenarios under a range of assumptions: if no climate policies were implemented; if current policies continued; if all countries achieved their current future pledges for emissions reductions; and necessary pathways which are compatible with limiting warming to 1.5°C or 2°C of warming this century.14 If countries achieved their current ‘Pledges’ (also shown on the chart), this would be an even further improvement. In this regard, the world is making some progress. But if our aim is to limit warming to “well below 2°C” – as is laid out in the Paris Agreement – we are clearly far off track. Robbie Andrew, a senior researcher at the Center for International Climate Research (CICERO), mapped out the global emissions reduction scenarios necessary to limit global average warming to 1.5°C and 2°C. Based on the IPCC’s Special Report on 1.5°C and Michael Raupach’s work, published in NatureClimate Change, these mitigation curves show that urgent and rapid reductions in emissions would be needed to achieve either target.15,16,17 And the longer we delay a peak in emissions, the more drastic these reductions would need to be. We may be making slow progress relative to a world without any climate policies, but we are still far from the rates of progress we’d need to achieve international targets. Which countries have set net-zero emissions targets? Whilst current climate policies fall well short of what’s needed to keep temperatures below 1.5°C or 2°C, countries have set more ambitious targets to reach net-zero emissions. These interactive maps show the status of net-zero emissions targets across the world. This is based on the latest data from the Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit’s Net Zero Scorecard.18 The target year to reach net zero varies by country – you can see the target year for each country by hovering over it on the map. Note that the inclusion criteria may vary from country to country. For example, some countries may include international aviation and shipping in their net-zero commitment, while others do not. Or, some may allow for carbon offsets while others will not accept them. You can dig deeper into the specifics of each country’s criteria here. Can we make progress in reducing emissions? Some countries reduced emissions whilst increasing GDP – even when we take into account outsourced production There is a strong link between CO2 emissions, prosperity, and standards of living – we look at this in much more detail, with the data, on our page on Emissions Drivers. Therefore, if we’re to ask the question: “Have any countries demonstrated that we can make progress in reducing emissions?”, they would have to achieve both: High standards of living; Low levels of emissions, or at least large reductions in emissions to maintain that standard of living. There are many countries that meet one criterion: rich countries that have high standards of living, but also high levels of emissions; and poor countries that have low levels of emissions but poor standards of living. But, some countries have shown signs of progress. A number of countries have shown in recent years that it is possible to increase GDP whilst also reducing emissions. We see this in the chart which shows the change in GDP and annual CO2 emissions. Both production- and consumption-based CO2 emissions are shown – consumption-based emissions are corrected for traded goods and services, so we can see whether emissions reductions were only achieved by “offshoring” production to other countries. A number of countries – such as the USA, UK, France, Spain, Italy, and many others – have managed to reduce emissions (even when we correct for trade) whilst increasing GDP. The more important question is “Can we make progress fast enough?” So we can see numerous examples of countries, with high standards of living, which have been successful in reducing emissions. This is a clear signal that it is possible to make progress. But the key question here is probably less: “can we make progress?”, but rather “can we make progress fast enough?”. As we explored earlier in this article, the world is currently far off-track from our 2°C target. If this is our definition of “fast enough” then we have little historical evidence to suggest that most, or even some, countries can reduce emissions (whilst maintaining high living standards) at the speed needed to achieve this. We can make progress, but it’s currently too slow. We need a large-scale acceleration of these efforts across the world. How do we make progress in reducing emissions? To make progress in reducing greenhouse gas emissions, there are two fundamental areas we need to focus on: energy(this encapsulates electricity, heat, transport, and industrial activities) and food and agriculture (which includes agriculture and land use change, since agriculture dominates global land use). Below we’ve listed some of the key actions we need to make progress in each area. At a very basic level they can be summarised by two core concepts: improving efficiency (using less energy to produce a given output; and using less land, fertilizer, and other inputs for food production, and reducing food waste); and transitioning to low-carbon alternatives (in energy, this means shifting to renewables and nuclear; for food, this means substituting carbon-intensive products for those with a lower carbon footprint). Develop low-cost low-carbon energy and battery technologies. To do this quickly, and allow lower-income countries to avoid high-carbon development pathways, low-carbon energy needs to be cost-effective and the default choice. How can we reduce emissions from food production and agriculture? Reduce meat and dairy consumption, especially in higher-income countries. Shift dietary patterns towards lower-carbon food products. This includes eating less meat and dairy generally but also substituting high-impact meats (e.g. beef and lamb) for chicken, fish, or eggs. Innovation in meat substitutes could also play a large role here. → Read our articleon the carbon footprint of meat and dairy versus alternative foods. →Explore our workon meat and dairy production. Promote lower-carbon meat and dairy production. We are not going to cut out meat and dairy products completely any time soon (and doing so is unnecessary – large reductions would be sufficient). This makes the promotion of lower-carbon production methods essential. → Read our articleon the large differences in carbon footprint for specific meat and dairy products. Improve crop yields. Sustainable intensification of agriculture allows us to grow more food on less land. This could help to prevent deforestation from agricultural expansion, and frees up land for replanting, or giving back to natural ecosystems. → Explore our work on crop yields. Reduce food waste. Around one-third of food emissions come from food that is lost in supply chains or wasted by consumers. Improving harvesting techniques, refrigeration, transport, and packaging in supply chains; and reducing consumer waste can reduce emissions significantly. → Read our article on GHG emissions from food waste. In this chart – using the “Change region” button you can also view these changes by hemisphere (North and South), as well as the tropics (defined as 30 degrees above and below the equator). This shows us that the temperature increase in the North Hemisphere is higher, at closer to 1.4℃ since 1850, and less in the Southern Hemisphere (closer to 0.8℃). Evidence suggests that this distribution is strongly related to ocean circulation patterns (notably the North Atlantic Oscillation) which have resulted in greater warming in the northern hemisphere. Cite this work Our articles and data visualizations rely on work from many different people and organizations. When citing this topic page, please also cite the underlying data sources. This topic page can be cited as: Reuse this work freely All visualizations, data, and code produced by Our World in Data are completely open access under the Creative Commons BY license. You have the permission to use, distribute, and reproduce these in any medium, provided the source and authors are credited. The data produced by third parties and made available by Our World in Data is subject to the license terms from the original third-party authors. We will always indicate the original source of the data in our documentation, so you should always check the license of any such third-party data before use and redistribution. Licenses: All visualizations, data, and articles produced by Our World in Data are open access under the Creative Commons BY license. You have permission to use, distribute, and reproduce these in any medium, provided the source and authors are credited. All the software and code that we write is open source and made available via GitHub under the permissive MIT license. All other material, including data produced by third parties and made available by Our World in Data, is subject to the license terms from the original third-party authors.

We see that over the last few decades, global temperatures have risen sharply — to approximately 0.7℃ higher than our 1961-1990 baseline. When extended back to 1850, we see that temperatures then were a further 0.4℃ colder than they were in our baseline. Overall, this would amount to an average temperature rise of 1.1℃. Because there are small year-to-year fluctuations in temperature, the specific temperature increase depends on what year we assume to be ‘pre-industrial’ and the end year we’re measuring from. But overall, this temperature rise is in the range of 1 to 1.2℃.3 Greenhouse gas emissions from human activities are the main driver of this warming How much of the warming since 1850 can be attributed to human emissions? Almost all of it. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) states clearly in its AR5 assessment report4: “Anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions have increased since the pre-industrial era, driven largely by economic and population growth, and are now higher than ever. This has led to atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide that are unprecedented in at least the last 800,000 years. Their effects, together with those of other anthropogenic drivers, have been detected throughout the climate system and are extremely likely to have been the dominant cause of the observed warming since the mid-20th century. “ Aerosols have played a slight cooling role in global climate, and natural variability has played a very minor role. This article from the Carbon Brief, with interactive graphics showing the relative contributions of different forcings on the climate, explains this very well. A changing climate has a range of potential ecological, physical, and health impacts, including extreme weather events (such as floods, droughts, storms, and heatwaves); sea-level rise; altered crop growth; and disrupted water systems.

yes

Paleoclimatology

Are current carbon dioxide levels unprecedented in Earth's history?

yes_statement

"current" "carbon" "dioxide" "levels" are "unprecedented" in earth's "history".. earth's "history" has never experienced "carbon" "dioxide" "levels" like the "current" ones.

https://www.nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/greenhouse-effect/

Greenhouse Effect

Resource Resource Greenhouse Effect Greenhouse Effect Global warming describes the current rise in the average temperature of Earth’s air and oceans. Global warming is often described as the most recent example of climate change. Grades 9 - 12+ Subjects Earth Science, Meteorology, Geography ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ Loading ... Global warming describes the current rise in the average temperature of Earth’s air and oceans. Global warming is often described as the most recent example of climate change. Earth’s climate has changed many times. Our planet has gone through multipleice ages, in which ice sheets and glaciers covered large portions of Earth. It has also gone through warm periods when temperatures were higher than they are today. Past changes in Earth’s temperature happened very slowly, over hundreds of thousands of years. However, the recent warming trend is happening much faster than it ever has. Natural cycles of warming and cooling are not enough to explain the amount of warming we have experienced in such a short time—only human activities can account for it. Scientists worry that the climate is changing faster than some living things can adapt to it. In 1988, the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environment Programmeestablished a committee of climatologists, meteorologists, geographers, and other scientists from around the world. This Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) includes thousands of scientists who review the most up-to-date research available related to global warming and climate change. The IPCC evaluates the risk of climate change caused by human activities. According to the IPCC’s most recent report (in 2007), Earth’s average surface temperatures have risen about 0.74 degrees Celsius (1.33 degrees Fahrenheit) during the past 100 years. The increase is greater in northern latitudes. The IPCC also found that land regions are warming faster than oceans. The IPCC states that most of the temperature increase since the mid-20th century is likely due to human activities. The Greenhouse Effect Human activities contribute to global warming by increasing the greenhouse effect. The greenhouse effect happens when certain gases—known as greenhouse gases—collect in Earth’s atmosphere. These gases, which occur naturally in the atmosphere, include carbon dioxide, methane, nitrogen oxide, and fluorinated gases sometimes known as chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs). Greenhouse gases let the sun’s light shine onto Earth’s surface, but they trap the heat that reflects back up into the atmosphere. In this way, they act like the insulating glass walls of a greenhouse. The greenhouse effect keeps Earth’s climate comfortable. Without it, surface temperatures would be cooler by about 33 degrees Celsius (60 degrees Fahrenheit), and many life forms would freeze. Since the Industrial Revolution in the late 1700s and early 1800s, people have been releasing large quantities of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. That amount has skyrocketed in the past century. Greenhouse gas emissions increased 70 percent between 1970 and 2004. Emissions of carbon dioxide, the most important greenhouse gas, rose by about 80 percent during that time. The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere today far exceeds the natural range seen over the last 650,000 years. Most of the carbon dioxide that people put into the atmosphere comes from burning fossil fuels such as oil, coal, and natural gas. Cars, trucks, trains, and planes all burn fossil fuels. Many electric power plants also burn fossil fuels. Another way people release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere is by cutting down forests. This happens for two reasons. Decaying plant material, including trees, releases tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Living trees absorb carbon dioxide. By diminishing the number of trees to absorb carbon dioxide, the gas remains in the atmosphere. Most methane in the atmosphere comes from livestockfarming, landfills, and fossil fuel production such as coal mining and natural gas processing. Nitrous oxide comes from agricultural technology and fossil fuel burning. Fluorinated gases include chlorofluorocarbons, hydrochlorofluorocarbons, and hydrofluorocarbons. These greenhouse gases are used in aerosol cans and refrigeration. All of these human activities add greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, trapping more heat than usual and contributing to global warming. Effects of Global Warming Even slight rises in average global temperatures can have huge effects. Perhaps the biggest, most obvious effect is that glaciers and ice caps melt faster than usual. The meltwater drains into the oceans, causing sea levels to rise and oceans to become less salty. Ice sheets and glaciers advance and retreat naturally. As Earth’s temperature has changed, the ice sheets have grown and shrunk, and sea levels have fallen and risen. Ancientcorals found on land in Florida, Bermuda, and the Bahamas show that the sea level must have been five to six meters (16-20 feet) higher 130,000 years ago than it is today. Earth doesn’t need to become oven-hot to melt the glaciers. Northern summers were just three to five degrees Celsius (five to nine degrees Fahrenheit) warmer during the time of those ancient fossils than they are today. However, the speed at which global warming is taking place is unprecedented. The effects are unknown. Glaciers and ice caps cover about 10 percent of the world’s landmass today. They hold about 75 percent of the world’s fresh water. If all of this ice melted, sea levels would rise by about 70 meters (230 feet). The IPCC reported that the global sea level rose about 1.8 millimeters (0.07 inches) per year from 1961 to 1993, and 3.1 millimeters (0.12 inches) per year since 1993. Rising sea levels could flood coastal communities, displacing millions of people in areas such as Bangladesh, the Netherlands, and the U.S. state of Florida. Forced migration would impact not only those areas, but the regions to which the “climate refugees” flee. Millions more people in countries like Bolivia, Peru, and India depend on glacial meltwater for drinking, irrigation, and hydroelectric power. Rapid loss of these glaciers would devastate those countries. Glacial melt has already raised the global sea level slightly. However, scientists are discovering ways the sea level could increase even faster. For example, the melting of the Chacaltaya Glacier in Bolivia has exposed dark rocks beneath it. The rocks absorb heat from the sun, speeding up the melting process. Many scientists use the term “climate change” instead of “global warming.” This is because greenhouse gas emissions affect more than just temperature. Another effect involves changes in precipitation like rain and snow. Patterns in precipitation may change or become more extreme. Over the course of the 20th century, precipitation increased in eastern parts of North and South America, northern Europe, and northern and central Asia. However, it has decreased in parts of Africa, the Mediterranean, and parts of southern Asia. Future Changes Nobody can look into a crystal ball and predict the future with certainty. However, scientists can make estimates about future population growth, greenhouse gas emissions, and other factors that affect climate. They can enter those estimates into computer models to find out the most likely effects of global warming. The IPCC predicts that greenhouse gas emissions will continue to increase over the next few decades. As a result, they predict the average global temperature will increase by about 0.2 degrees Celsius (0.36 degrees Fahrenheit) per decade. Even if we reduce greenhouse gas and aerosol emissions to their 2000 levels, we can still expect a warming of about 0.1 degree Celsius (0.18 degrees Fahrenheit) per decade. The panel also predicts global warming will contribute to some serious changes in water supplies around the world. By the middle of the 21st century, the IPCC predicts, river runoff and water availability will most likely increase at high latitudes and in some tropical areas. However, many dry regions in the mid-latitudes and tropics will experience a decrease in water resources. As a result, millions of people may be exposed to water shortages. Water shortages decrease the amount of water available for drinking, electricity, and hygiene. Shortages also reduce water used for irrigation. Agricultural output would slow and food prices would climb. Consistent years of drought in the Great Plains of the United States and Canada would have this effect. IPCC data also suggest that the frequency of heat waves and extreme precipitation will increase. Weather patterns such as storms and tropical cyclones will become more intense. Storms themselves may be stronger, more frequent, and longer-lasting. They would be followed by stronger storm surges, the immediate rise in sea level following storms. Storm surges are particularly damaging to coastal areas because their effects (flooding, erosion, damage to buildings and crops) are lasting. What We Can Do Reducing our greenhouse gas emissions is a critical step in slowing the global warming trend. Many governments around the world are working toward this goal. The biggest effort so far has been the Kyoto Protocol, which was adopted in 1997 and went into effect in 2005. By the end of 2009, 187 countries had signed and ratified the agreement. Under the protocol, 37 industrialized countries and the European Union have committed to reducing their greenhouse gas emissions. There are several ways that governments, industries, and individuals can reduce greenhouse gases. We can improve energy efficiency in homes and businesses. We can improve the fuel efficiency of cars and other vehicles. We can also support development of alternative energy sources, such as solar power and biofuels, that don’t involve burning fossil fuels. Some scientists are working to capture carbon dioxide and store it underground, rather than let it go into the atmosphere. This process is called carbon sequestration. Trees and other plants absorb carbon dioxide as they grow. Protecting existing forests and planting new ones can help balance greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Changes in farming practices could also reduce greenhouse gas emissions. For example, farms use large amounts of nitrogen-based fertilizers, which increase nitrogen oxide emissions from the soil. Reducing the use of these fertilizers would reduce the amount of this greenhouse gas in the atmosphere. The way farmers handle animal manure can also have an effect on global warming. When manure is stored as liquid or slurry in ponds or tanks, it releases methane. When it dries as a solid, however, it does not. Reducing greenhouse gas emissions is vitally important. However, the global temperature has already changed and will most likely continue to change for years to come. The IPCC suggests that people explore ways to adapt to global warming as well as try to slow or stop it. Some of the suggestions for adapting include: Expanding water supplies through rain catchment, conservation, reuse, and desalination. Adjusting crop locations, variety, and planting dates. Building seawalls and storm surge barriers and creating marshes and wetlands as buffers against rising sea levels. Barking up the Wrong Tree Spruce bark beetles in the U.S. state of Alaska have had a population boom thanks to 20 years of warmer-than-average summers. The insects have managed to chew their way through 1.6 million hectares (four million acres) of spruce trees. Fast Fact Disappearing Penguins Emperor penguins (Aptenodytes forsteri) made a showbiz splash in the 2005 film March of the Penguins. Sadly, their encore might include a disappearing act. In the 1970s, an abnormally long warm spell caused these Antarctic birds' population to drop by 50 percent. Some scientists worry that continued global warming will push the creatures to extinction by changing their habitat and food supply. Fast Fact Shell Shock A sudden increase in the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere does more than change Earth's temperature. A lot of the carbon dioxide in the air dissolves into seawater. There, it forms carbonic acid in a process called ocean acidification. Ocean acidification is making it hard for some sea creatures to build shells and skeletal structures. This could alter the ecological balance in the oceans and cause problems for fishing and tourism industries. Worksheets & Handouts Credits Media Credits The audio, illustrations, photos, and videos are credited beneath the media asset, except for promotional images, which generally link to another page that contains the media credit. The Rights Holder for media is the person or group credited. Writers Hilary Costa Erin Sprout Santani Teng Melissa McDaniel Jeff Hunt Diane Boudreau Tara Ramroop Kim Rutledge Hilary Hall Illustrators Mary Crooks, National Geographic Society Tim Gunther Editors Jeannie Evers, Emdash Editing, Emdash Editing Kara West Educator Reviewer Nancy Wynne Producer National Geographic Society other Last Updated December 13, 2022 User Permissions For information on user permissions, please read our Terms of Service. If you have questions about licensing content on this page, please contact ngimagecollection@natgeo.com for more information and to obtain a license. 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The IPCC states that most of the temperature increase since the mid-20th century is likely due to human activities. The Greenhouse Effect Human activities contribute to global warming by increasing the greenhouse effect. The greenhouse effect happens when certain gases—known as greenhouse gases—collect in Earth’s atmosphere. These gases, which occur naturally in the atmosphere, include carbon dioxide, methane, nitrogen oxide, and fluorinated gases sometimes known as chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs). Greenhouse gases let the sun’s light shine onto Earth’s surface, but they trap the heat that reflects back up into the atmosphere. In this way, they act like the insulating glass walls of a greenhouse. The greenhouse effect keeps Earth’s climate comfortable. Without it, surface temperatures would be cooler by about 33 degrees Celsius (60 degrees Fahrenheit), and many life forms would freeze. Since the Industrial Revolution in the late 1700s and early 1800s, people have been releasing large quantities of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. That amount has skyrocketed in the past century. Greenhouse gas emissions increased 70 percent between 1970 and 2004. Emissions of carbon dioxide, the most important greenhouse gas, rose by about 80 percent during that time. The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere today far exceeds the natural range seen over the last 650,000 years. Most of the carbon dioxide that people put into the atmosphere comes from burning fossil fuels such as oil, coal, and natural gas. Cars, trucks, trains, and planes all burn fossil fuels. Many electric power plants also burn fossil fuels. Another way people release carbon dioxide into the atmosphere is by cutting down forests. This happens for two reasons. Decaying plant material, including trees, releases tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. Living trees absorb carbon dioxide. By diminishing the number of trees to absorb carbon dioxide, the gas remains in the atmosphere.

yes

Paleoclimatology

Are current carbon dioxide levels unprecedented in Earth's history?

no_statement

"current" "carbon" "dioxide" "levels" are not "unprecedented" in earth's "history".. earth's "history" has seen "carbon" "dioxide" "levels" similar to the "current" ones.

https://scripps.ucsd.edu/research/climate-change-resources/carbon-dioxide-and-climate-change

FAQ: Carbon Dioxide and Climate Change | Scripps Institution of ...

Breadcrumb FAQ: Carbon Dioxide and Climate Change What is carbon dioxide and how is it connected to climate change? Carbon dioxide (CO2) is a colorless, odorless greenhouse gas produced by numerous natural processes and by human activities such as the burning of fossil fuels and cement manufacturing. It is called a greenhouse gas because —like the glass structure of a greenhouse — carbon dioxide molecules trap heat in the atmosphere. Carbon dioxide accounts for two-thirds of the global warming currently caused by human activities, with other compounds such as methane, nitrous oxide, halocarbons, and other gases emitted by human activities accounting for the rest. Carbon dioxide and other natural greenhouse agents help maintain temperatures within a range that allows life on Earth to flourish. Human activities, however, have pumped carbon dioxide into the atmosphere at a pace perhaps never seen before in Earth’s history. Researchers liken the excess CO2 to adding additional blankets on a cold night. Though the CO2 itself does not provide heat, it increases the atmosphere’s ability to trap heat that would otherwise be released into space. About half of the excess carbon emitted by human activities every year stays in the atmosphere. The other half is removed from the atmosphere by terrestrial ecosystems and the ocean. Without these two repositories called “carbon sinks” by scientists, carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere would be rising even faster. Excess CO2 can remain in the atmosphere for a long time – decades to centuries. Hence it is called a "long-lived greenhouse gas.” How do we know that CO2 is increasing in the atmosphere? Prior to the 20th century, CO2 levels had not exceeded 300 parts per million (ppm) at any point in the past 800,000 years. High-precision measurements of atmospheric CO2 made by the Scripps CO2 Program and other organizations showed that average global concentrations in May 2020 were about 100 ppm, or 33 percent, higher than the first direct atmospheric measurements made in the 1950s. Records from Mauna Loa in Hawaii and the South Pole begun in the 1950s show nearly the same rate of rise over time, demonstrating that the rise is global in extent (see plot). What is the Keeling Curve? The Mauna Loa carbon dioxide (CO2) record, also known as the “Keeling Curve,” is the world’s longest unbroken record of atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations. This record, from the NOAA-operated Mauna Loa Observatory, near the top of Mauna Loa on the island of Hawaii, shows that carbon dioxide has been increasing steadily from values around 315 parts per million (ppm) when Scripps researcher Charles D. Keeling began measurements in 1958, to nearly 420 ppm today. Charles D. Keeling in his laboratory. Scientists make CO2 measurements in remote locations to obtain air that is representative of a large volume of Earth’s atmosphere and relatively free from local influences that could skew readings. Global concentrations of CO2 are currently approaching 420 parts per million. The continued rise in CO2 indicates the likelihood that levels will rise far beyond 420 ppm before they stabilize. If the pace of the last decade continues, carbon dioxide will reach 450 ppm as soon as 2035. Carbon dioxide is the most significant human-made greenhouse gas, produced mainly by the burning of fossil fuels such as coal, oil and natural gas. The pace of rise depends strongly on how much fossil fuel is used globally. Is the Current Rise in CO2 Definitely Caused by Human Activities? The rise in CO2 is unambiguously caused by human activity, principally burning fossil fuels. Because fossil fuels are millions of years old, their carbon is chemically different than that produced by current natural processes such as decomposition or respiration. By analyzing atmospheric carbon, scientists can directly measure the unique chemical signature of fossil fuels and so understand their role in increasing CO2. Atmospheric CO2 has almost certainly been higher than present in Earth’s distant past, many millions of years ago. Even though the levels of CO2 in the air may not be unprecedented, the pace of its increase most likely is. Few if any natural processes can release fossil carbon into the atmosphere as fast as we humans are doing now by extracting and burning fossil fuels. How are CO2 data collected and processed? Scripps Oceanography scientists take air samples at NOAA’s Mauna Loa Observatory and at other stations all over the world. Automated equipment draws air samples at Mauna Loa but at many locations, researchers collect the air using glass flasks that are evacuated, meaning they have no gases in them at all. People take the flasks to locations where they can get clean samples of air, open the flask valves, and let air rush in before sealing them again. Flasks are shipped back to a lab at Scripps Oceanography, where they are attached to analysis equipment and the amount of carbon dioxide in the sample is measured. The carbon dioxide in the samples is then separated from the rest of the air and captured in glass tubes. Researchers then measure the isotopic composition of the carbon dioxide contained in the samples, which helps them determine how strongly the sample was influenced by natural sources or from human sources such as vehicle exhaust. For the Mauna Loa record that makes up the Keeling Curve, scientists report the monthly average of CO2 levels. Finer details of the recent record, including hourly, daily, and weekly averages, are available on the Scripps CO2 Group website. With an elevation of 3,397 meters (11,145 feet) over the Pacific Ocean, the Mauna Loa Observatory is typically bathed in air that is representative of a large volume of the Earth’s atmosphere. There is no vegetation at the barren site and the effects of a nearby volcano are usually small. To provide a record that is characteristic of the free atmosphere over the Pacific Ocean, it is necessary to screen the data to avoid the influences of vegetation that grows at lower elevations or other island effects. The daily values reported by the Scripps CO2 Group are therefore not simple averages of hourly data, but averages of “baseline data,” hourly data from which temporary local effects have been removed. The overall rise in CO2 is also seen from sites around the world (NOAA/ESRL Global Monitoring Division). Almost all of these measurements have been made by high precision infrared gas analyzers which are calibrated using internationally agreed-upon protocols. Why Does Atmospheric CO2 Peak in May at Mauna Loa? The Mauna Loa record has a sawtooth shape, peaking in May, and hitting a minimum around Oct 1st each year. This cycle is mostly caused by the forests of North America and Eurasia. From May through September, photosynthesis draws CO2 out of the air, fueling the growth of leaves, stems, tree trunks, and roots. In the fall and winter, when plants are dormant, the decomposition of old plant tissues releases carbon dioxide back to the atmosphere, driving CO2 upwards. May is the turning point between all the decomposition throughout the winter months and the burst of photosynthesis that occurs with the return of leaves to the trees in spring. CO2 measurements all over the northern hemisphere reflect this pattern of peak CO2 in late spring. Isn't the Mauna Loa record influenced by CO2 emitted by the volcano? If one looks at the minute-by-minute data from Mauna Loa, one finds rare occasions when the CO2 is elevated from emissions from vents known as fumaroles upwind on the mountain. The fumaroles are emitting constantly, so the timing of the events depends on wind direction and not changes in volcanic activity. These events impact only a tiny fraction of the data and are easily distinguished from the rest of the record. The reported version of the Mauna Loa record has been “filtered” to remove these events, as well as other certain local effects.

What is the Keeling Curve? The Mauna Loa carbon dioxide (CO2) record, also known as the “Keeling Curve,” is the world’s longest unbroken record of atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations. This record, from the NOAA-operated Mauna Loa Observatory, near the top of Mauna Loa on the island of Hawaii, shows that carbon dioxide has been increasing steadily from values around 315 parts per million (ppm) when Scripps researcher Charles D. Keeling began measurements in 1958, to nearly 420 ppm today. Charles D. Keeling in his laboratory. Scientists make CO2 measurements in remote locations to obtain air that is representative of a large volume of Earth’s atmosphere and relatively free from local influences that could skew readings. Global concentrations of CO2 are currently approaching 420 parts per million. The continued rise in CO2 indicates the likelihood that levels will rise far beyond 420 ppm before they stabilize. If the pace of the last decade continues, carbon dioxide will reach 450 ppm as soon as 2035. Carbon dioxide is the most significant human-made greenhouse gas, produced mainly by the burning of fossil fuels such as coal, oil and natural gas. The pace of rise depends strongly on how much fossil fuel is used globally. Is the Current Rise in CO2 Definitely Caused by Human Activities? The rise in CO2 is unambiguously caused by human activity, principally burning fossil fuels. Because fossil fuels are millions of years old, their carbon is chemically different than that produced by current natural processes such as decomposition or respiration. By analyzing atmospheric carbon, scientists can directly measure the unique chemical signature of fossil fuels and so understand their role in increasing CO2. Atmospheric CO2 has almost certainly been higher than present in Earth’s distant past, many millions of years ago.

no

Product Design

Are curved TV screens better for viewing?

yes_statement

"curved" tv "screens" provide a "better" "viewing" experience.. "viewing" is enhanced with "curved" tv "screens".

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7004357/

Curved TVs improved watching experience when display curvature ...

Share RESOURCES As a library, NLM provides access to scientific literature. Inclusion in an NLM database does not imply endorsement of, or agreement with, the contents by NLM or the National Institutes of Health. Learn more: PMC Disclaimer | PMC Copyright Notice This is an open access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited. Display curvature radius, viewing distance, and lateral viewing position can influence TV watching experience as these factors affect the display field of view and viewing angles across the screen. For a given display size, if the display curvature radius approaches the viewing distance, the display field of view increases, while the variation in the viewing distances and viewing angles is less across the screen. Herein, the viewing angle refers to the angle between a horizontal line of sight and a normal line at a fixation point on the display surface. If the viewing distance decreases (if a viewer sits closer to the display), the display field of view increases. If the viewing position is more off-center, the viewing distance and viewing angle vary more across the screen and increase with respect to the center of display surface. A wider display field of view increases presence as a wider screen image occupies the viewer’s visual field to a greater degree [32]. Providing less varying viewing distances across the screen can reduce visual discomfort by reducing accommodation-vergence activities required for clear vision, whereas potential visual fatigue due to a prolonged visual task at similar focal distances [33] appears to be diminished by the aforementioned benefit [7]. Less varying viewing angles across the screen can enhance image quality, as it reduces the perceived distortion of an image displayed at the edge of the display [9]. A wider viewing angle can negatively affect image quality and visual comfort because the perceived image distortion increases with increasing viewing angles [34]. Thus, the display curvature radius, viewing distance, and lateral viewing position can affect TV watching experience and ultimately user satisfaction. Similarly, lateral deviations in viewing position (or increases in viewing angle) can affect TV watching experience. Although images viewed at an angle experience trapezoidal distortions [47], non-central viewing positions are sometimes inevitable, especially in multi-viewer conditions. Typical viewing angles in such conditions range between ±60° [48] with a mean viewing angle of 23.3° [49]. Indeed, 73% of South Korean households in 2015 [50] and 70% of US households in 2012 [51] had more than one member, indicating watching TV together is common in most households. However, the degree to which viewing angle (or lateral viewing position) affects TV watching experience remains largely unknown. Thus far, many TV watching experience elements have been considered: presence [16, 19], visual comfort [24, 26], image quality [17, 28], satisfaction [26], visual fatigue [26, 29], motion sickness [16, 57], image distortion [21], and emotional reactions [28]. The spatial presence felt by a display user can act as a predictor for user satisfaction [58]. Image quality and video quality, as the main elements of quality of experience [41, 42], also accounts for user satisfaction [59] and customer satisfaction [60]. A previous study on the development of an engagement scale for TV watching proposed a conceptual model that explains the effect of media and content characteristics on presence and the effect of presence on post-satisfaction [61]. However, no widely known study has considered major TV watching experience elements simultaneously. Moreover, it is largely unknown as to which TV watching experience elements can effectively explain user satisfaction associated with TV watching. Thus, this study aimed to generate ergonomic guidelines for three major media form factors (display curvature radius, viewing distance, and lateral viewing position) to improve the overall TV watching experience and particular TV watching experience elements. These three media form factors and seven major TV watching experience elements (spatial presence, engagement, ecological validity, negative effects, visual comfort, image quality, and user satisfaction) were considered to examine 1) the main and interactive effects of these three media form factors on each TV watching experience element and 2) the relative importance of each TV watching experience element in explaining user satisfaction (Fig 1). Hypothetical model for causal relationships between media form/content factors and TV watching experience, and between other TV watching experience elements and user satisfaction. Materials and methods Design and subjects This study recruited 56 college students (Table 1), selected based on the following criteria: 1) normal or corrected–to–normal visual acuity ≥ 0.8 (20/25 in Snellen notation) for both eyes [62] determined using the Han Chun Suk visual acuity chart [63], 2) non-color deficiency determined using the Ishihara color blindness test [64], 3) no vision-related illnesses in the last six months, and 4) non-glasses or contact lens wearers. The study protocol was approved by the Ulsan National Institute of Science and Technology (UNIST) Institutional Review Board (IRB). All the participants provided written informed consent, which the local IRB approved, and were compensated for their time. Experimental settings and procedures Laboratory experiments were conducted with external lights blocked using black curtains and black cloth covering the TV stand and walls to minimize color and light reflection. Each experimental TV mock-up consisted of projection film (EXZEN, Korea) attached to the front surface of a 55" (1218 mm × 685 mm; 16:9 aspect ratio) custom Styrofoam panel, and was placed on a stand (320 mm high) elevating the display center 648 mm from the floor. The gain of the projection films attached to the curved screen surfaces was 1.0. Display size is defined as the length of a straight or curved diagonal along the screen surface. Each particular combination of display curvature radius and lateral viewing position changed the actual viewing distance, viewing angle, and display field of view (Table 2), and provided on-screen images from different perspectives (Fig 2). Each Styrofoam panel had a particular display curvature radius (2.3 m (2300R), 4 m (4000R), 6 m (6000R), and flat). A 5.1 channel speaker system (BR-5100T2, Britz, Korea) with one subwoofer on the left of the stand, one speaker on the right, and one speaker in each of the room corners was used. Video images were projected on each projection film by using a beam projector (EB-4950WU, Epson) with a wide ultra-extended graphics array (WUXGA; 1920 × 1200) resolution and a temporal frequency of 60 Hz. To correct the distortion of the image projected on the flat and curved screens, a 9(W) × 9(H) rectangular grid was displayed on the screen surface. Then, grid intersections were positioned to reference points by using Desktop Warpalizer® (UniVisual Technologies, Sweden). Seven random pairs of individuals were assigned to one display curvature radius. Two viewers were seated together in the randomly selected paired lateral viewing positions on a sofa (width × depth × height: 250 × 60 × 45 cm). A total of five pairs of right-side lateral viewing positions were considered, assuming viewers sat with lateral symmetry (Fig 3). With one exception (P5-P1), two viewers sat 70 cm apart [65]. The first viewing distance for the current paired viewers was the second viewing distance for the previous paired viewers. Independent variables Three independent variables were investigated. The display curvature radius varied between subjects at four levels: 2300R (providing a 30° ‘effective’ field of view [71] at a 4 m viewing distance), 4000R and 6000R (adopted in commercialized TV models: UN55JU7550F, Samsung, Korea; and 105UC9, LG, Korea), and flat (the control treatment). All participants used two viewing distances [2.3 m and 4 m, respectively equivalent to 1.9 display width (W) or 3.4 display height (H) and 3.3 W or 5.8 H] and five lateral viewing positions [P1 (centered in front of the TV), P2 (35 cm to the right of P1), P3 (70 cm off-center), P4 (105 cm off-center), and P5 (140 cm off-center)]. A wide range of viewing distances, 2–14 W and 0.8–7 H, have been used in previous studies, which will be reviewed later in the study (see Table 5). Five pairs of lateral viewing positions (P1-P3, P2-P4, P3-P5, P4-P2, and P5-P1) were used in random order, with the second individual 70 cm to the right of the first in all configurations but P4-P2, and P5-P1 (Fig 3). Table 5 TV viewing distances used in the current study vs. those from the literature. Dependent variables Seven dependent variables were used to assess TV watching experience: spatial presence, engagement, ecological validity, negative effects, visual comfort, image quality, and user satisfaction. Spatial presence is defined as “a binary experience, during which perceived self-location and, in most cases, perceived action possibilities are connected to a mediated spatial environment, and mental capacities are bound by the mediated environment instead of reality [72].” Engagement is defined as “a measure of a user’s involvement and interest in the content of the displayed environment, and their general enjoyment of the media experience [73].” Ecological validity is defined as “a tendency to perceive the mediated environment as lifelike and real [73].” Negative effects describe adverse physiological reactions, including dizziness, nausea, headache, and eyestrain [73]. The first four variables are sub-concepts of presence [73], and were assessed using 13 items selected from the Independent Television Commission-Sense of Presence Inventory (ITC-SOPI): three regarding spatial presence (Q7, 9, 18), three regarding engagement (Q2, 8, 16), three regarding ecological validity (Q5, 11, 27), and four regarding negative effects (Q14, 21, 26, 37). Each item was rated on a 5-point Likert scale (0: strongly disagree, 1: disagree, 2: neutral, 3: agree, 4: strongly agree), and the mean item values of each sub-concept were used in statistical analyses. Visual comfort, image quality, and user satisfaction were respectively rated on a 100 mm visual analogue scale (VAS) (0: Very uncomfortable, 100: Very comfortable), a 5-point scale (bad, poor, fair, good, and excellent), and a 100 mm VAS (0: Very dissatisfied, 100: Very satisfied). Statistical analysis A three-way mixed factorial analysis of variance (ANOVA; [74]) was used to examine the main and interaction effects of display curvature radius (four-level between-subjects variable), viewing distance (two-level within-subjects variable), and lateral viewing position (five-level within-subjects variable) on each of the seven dependent variables described in the previous subsection. When an effect was observed to be significant, the Tukey’s honestly significant difference (HSD) test was conducted [75]. For the Likert scale and image quality data, the distances between any two adjacent points along the rating scale were assumed to be equal, and all these data were treated as interval-like. The effect size was interpreted as low, medium, or high when the partial η2 was 0.01, 0.06, or 0.14, respectively [76, 77]. A stepwise multiple linear regression analysis was performed to examine the degree to which user satisfaction variability (satisfaction associated with watching TV) was accounted for by the other six TV watching experience elements. A p-value of 0.1 (for each predictor to enter or leave the model) was applied as a threshold during the construction of the stepwise multiple linear regression model [78, 79]. All statistical analyses were performed using JMP™ (v12, SAS Institute Inc., NC, USA), with a significance threshold of p < 0.05. Among the treatments belonging to Group A according to Tukey’s HSD test, the treatment with the highest mean spatial presence denoted as ★. Treatments not belonging to Group A denoted as ▽. Treatments without ▽ belong to Group A with the treatment with ★. Range of SEs: 0.03–0.13). Among the treatments belonging to Group A according to Tukey’s HSD test, the treatment with the highest mean engagement denoted as ★. Treatments not belonging to Group A denoted as ▽. Treatments without ▽ belong to Group A with the treatment with ★. Range of SEs: 0.05–0.11). Interaction effects of viewing distance × lateral viewing position The interaction effect of viewing distance × lateral viewing position was significant for ecological validity (p = 0.031). Six of the ten treatments were in the same group (A) with 4m-P1 (viewing distance-lateral viewing position), which provided the highest mean (SD) ecological validity of 3.03 (0.62) (Fig 7). Among the treatments belonging to Group A according to Tukey’s HSD test, the treatment with the highest mean ecological validity denoted as ★. Treatment not belonging to Group A denoted as ▽. Treatments without ▽ belong to Group A with the treatment with ★. Range of SEs: 0.08–1.12). Effects of display curvature radius Although display curvature radius (p = 0.025) significantly affected negative effects, the five display curvature radius levels were placed in one group according to post hoc testing. Discussion This study considered three media form factors (display curvature radius, viewing distance, and lateral viewing position) and examined their effects on seven TV watching experience elements. Although display curvature radius alone did not appreciably affect any of the seven TV watching experience elements, the interaction of display curvature radius × viewing distance × lateral viewing position significantly affected both spatial presence and engagement, indicating that the display curvature radius indirectly affected TV watching experience. Indeed, 4000R–4m–P1 (display curvature radius-viewing distance-lateral viewing position) exhibited the highest mean spatial presence and engagement. A further analysis recommended that the display curvature radius be equal to the viewing distance and lateral viewing position be P1 or P2 for a better TV watching experience. Among the three media form factors, lateral viewing position was the most influential to TV watching experience. Among the six TV watching experience elements, engagement was most influential to user satisfaction. Below, each effect is interpreted more in detail, and the effects of the field of view and viewing angle on TV watching experience are additionally discussed, as these two factors vary with the display curvature radius, viewing distance, and lateral viewing position. Interaction effects The interaction of display curvature radius × viewing distance × lateral viewing position significantly affected spatial presence and engagement. Spatial presence increased when the display curvature radius approached a viewing distance, and the lateral viewing position was less off-center, with the highest spatial presence observed at 4000R–4m–P1 (display curvature radius-viewing distance-lateral viewing position). Additionally, the lateral viewing position affected spatial presence more adversely for the flat vs. curved screen for both viewing distances. Engagement exhibited similar results to spatial presence, with the highest engagement observed at 4000R–4m–P1. In addition, the interaction of viewing distance × lateral viewing position significantly influenced ecological validity. For viewing distances of 2.3 m and 4 m, ecological validity decreased as the lateral viewing position was more off-center, with a more prominent effect of the lateral viewing position observed at a viewing distance of 4 m. Specifically, ecological validity significantly decreased at P5 (140 cm) for a 2.3 m viewing distance vs. P4 (109 cm) for a viewing distance of 4 m. Therefore, sitting closer (2.3 m vs. 4 m) could be considered to improve ecological validity, especially when the lateral viewing position is inevitably approximately 1 m off-center (e.g. in multi-viewer conditions). Effects of display curvature radius Display curvature radius alone did not appreciably affect any of the seven TV watching experience elements. Contrarily, some previous studies showed that curved displays provided better TV watching experiences than flat displays. A study [68] found that the visual presence at a viewing distance of 2 m was 18% (for 2D content) and 9% (for 3D content) higher on a 45" 4200R curved TV screen relative to a 45" flat screen, argued to be due to improvements in visual sensitivity at the lateral areas of the curved screen. ‘Realness’ considered as a presence factor during watching was higher on 55" curved TVs relative to their flat counterpart when the viewing distance (5 m) was equal to the display curvature radius. Varying experimental durations and visual stimuli appear to have created these discrepancies [31]. Effects of viewing distance In this study, viewing distance was significant only for visual comfort, with 6% greater comfort at 4 m (5.8 H) than 2.3 m (3.4 H). These two viewing distances were within the range recommended (3–7H for flat HD TVs [19]), although the 4 m (5.8 H) viewing distance exceeded the ranges recommended for non-HD TVs, 5H (29”), 3–5.2 H (38"), 3–4 H, and 0.8–4.8H for HD TVs [27, 40, 41, 45, 46], (see Table 5 and Fig 9). As median and mean viewing distances observed in homes of 6 H and 6.5 H [43], respectively, viewing distances outside the above recommended ranges appear common in practice. It was reported that the mean preferred viewing distance for visual comfort using HD TVs was 3.8 W (6.8 H) for 32" TVs, 3.6 W (6.5 H) for 37" TVs, and 3.6 W (6.5 H) for 42" TVs [80]. These values are also above the values (6 H for 36" and 5 H for 73" HD TVs) recommended by ITU [42]. It should be noted that these studies involved different display sizes and resolutions. Viewing distances used in the current study vs. those from the literature (Data in the grey area are available only in terms of display height or display width; recommended range values are indicated by solid lines). Although viewing distance had no significant effect on the four sub-concepts of presence investigated here (0.067≤ p ≤ 0.29), three sub-concepts of presence (excluding negative effects) were perceived higher at 2.3 m than 4.0 m. An appropriate viewing distance for a given display size is generally required to enhance presence, whereas watching TV from excessively short or long distances decreases presence [36, 37]. The presence of 29" analog TVs was highest at a viewing distance of 5 H (2 m), followed by 3 H (1.3 m) and 7 H (3 m) [40]. It was found that involvement [31], similar to engagement [62], was highest at a viewing distance of 5.2 H (1.1 m) for 17" TVs, 3 H (1.65 m) for 42" TVs, and 2 H (1.65 m) for 65" TVs, respectively. Additionally, it was found that a viewing distance of 2.5 H (2 m) provided the highest visual presence when watching 2D images on 65" flat ultra-high-definition (UHD) TVs, followed by 0.6 H (0.5 m) and 5 H (4 m) [68]. When similar viewing conditions are considered, the current results resemble those of these studies [31, 40, 68]. Effects of lateral viewing position This study recommends viewing positions P1 and P2 (or a lateral viewing position < 70 cm off-center) for watching TV. More off-center positions than P2 degraded TV watching experience, evidenced by decreases in the spatial presence (11–23% for P3–P5), engagement (11–21% for P3–P5), ecological validity (10–24% for P4–P5), image quality (9–11% for P3–P5), and user satisfaction (7–12% for P4–P5) relative to P1. Such degradations can be attributed to the decrease in the field of view and increase in the viewing angle caused by more lateral deviations of the viewing position. Effects of field of view and viewing angle In this study, the field of view did not appear to influence TV watching experience substantially. Geometrically, the field of view increases as the display curvature radius approaches a viewing distance, a viewing distance decreases, or a lateral viewing position approaches the central position. In addition to shorter viewing distances [85] and larger display sizes [85], higher attention and arousal levels due to a wider field of view [86] can increase presence, a feeling of being in a virtual world. Presence is influenced by the relative amount of information incoming from the virtual compared with the physical environment [87]. Presence increases if the viewer’s visual field of view is more occupied by the on-screen image [88]. Though the magnitude of the field of view was predominantly determined by viewing distance in this study, the effects of viewing distance (2.3 m and 4 m) on spatial presence, engagement, and ecological validity were non-significant. A wider field of view at a viewing distance of 2.3 m did not significantly increase presence, presumably due to the decrease in visual comfort created by the shorter viewing distance (visual comfort at 2.3 m was 5.4% lower than at 4 m). Conversely, lateral viewing position significantly affected presence, although it affected the field of view less than viewing distance. Fields of view at 2.3 m were wider than those at 4 m by up to 12.8° across lateral viewing positions, whereas the difference in the fields of view between viewing distance 2.3 m and 4.0 m at the same lateral viewing position was ≤ 8° (See Table 3). Some prior studies using varying screen sizes rather than viewing distances showed that the field of view significantly influenced presence. It was found that the physical presence during a 30 min gaming task was higher on an 81" screen (diagonal field of view = 76°) than on a 13" screen (18°) [67]. The perceived presence during a driving task on a triple screen comprising three 2300 × 1750 mm screens was highest with a 180° field of view, followed by 140° and 60° [89]. However, the effect of change in viewing angle (as determined by lateral viewing position) on presence was not examined in these two studies. In the present study, presence decreased as viewing angles increased (or lateral viewing positions were more off-centered). Specifically, significant decreases in presence (in terms of spatial presence, engagement, and ecological validity) began at a viewing angle of 17.0° (P3) for a 2.3 m viewing distance and 9.9° (P3) for a 4 m viewing distance. Previous studies reported mixed results. In one study, the visual presence of a 2D image on a 65" UHD flat TV at a viewing distance of 2 m deceased by 17% when the viewing angle was increased from 0° to 45° [54]. Conversely, the presence on an 86" screen at a viewing distance of 0.9 H (1.75 m) did not significantly change at three viewing angles (–19°, 0°, and +19°) [16]. This inconsistency is presumably due to the increased presence with the combined effect of a larger screen size (55–86") and a closer viewing distance (2–1.75 m) vs. 55"-2.3 m or 65"-2 m. In the current study, image quality decreased as viewing angles increased (or lateral viewing positions were more off-centered). Significant decreases in image quality began at a viewing angle of 17.0° (P3) for a 2.3 m viewing distance and 9.9° (P3) for a 4 m viewing distance. Previous studies reported similar results. The quality of 2D images on 55" flat and curved TVs at a viewing distance of 2.2 m was degraded as viewing angle increased from 0° to 30°, with a more severe degradation observed with a flat TV [55]. Similarly, the quality of 2D images on flat displays at a 6H viewing distance decreased as viewing angle increased from 0° to approximately 80° [71]. Decreases in presence and image quality with increasing viewing angle (or at more off-center lateral viewing positions) observed in the current study appear to be in part due to the perceived image distortion with the increase in viewing angle [6]. In the current study, image quality at P1 and P2 was comparable across the four different display curvature radii. Viewing angles at a viewing distance of 2.3 m and at P3 increased by up to 29.6° for a flat TV, and image quality began to degrade. These results were in accordance with a previous finding—perceptual constancy observed within viewing angles ≤ 28.6° [9]. In addition, the image quality was positively correlated with the three sub-concepts of presence, namely, spatial presence, engagement, and ecological validity, with bivariate correlations of 0.40, 0.36, and 0.53 (p < 0.0001), respectively. To better examine the effect of an actual TV viewing context on TV watching experience, it seems necessary to allow for wider viewing angles. Although the largest viewing angle considered in this study (30.3° at a viewing distance of 2.3 m) exceeded the mean viewing angle of 23.3° obtained in a field survey [48], viewing angles observed in actual households have ranged between ± 30° [90], ± 45° [91], and ±60° [49]. Of note, however, the current study recommends P1 or P2 (or lateral viewing positions closer than P3) for a better TV watching experience, and the viewing angle for 2.3m-P3 was 17°. Regression of user satisfaction on six TV watching experience elements In the current study, a regression model (R2adj = 0.67) for user satisfaction was developed using six TV watching experience elements. Based on the standardized beta weights, engagement, visual comfort, and image quality were 5.4 times (=0.43/0.08), 5.0 times (=0.40/0.08), and 2.8 times (=0.22/0.08) more influential to user satisfaction than negative effects, indicating that improving these three TV watching experience elements can improve user satisfaction more effectively. Engagement increased when the display curvature radius was equal to the viewing distance and the lateral viewing position was < 70 cm off-center (Figs ​(Figs66 and ​and8C).8C). The mean visual comfort rating was higher with a viewing distance of 4 m (Fig 8A). The image quality increased when the lateral viewing position was < 70 cm off-center (Fig 8E). Therefore, 4000R-4m-P1/2 (display curvature radius-viewing distance-lateral viewing position) is recommended for user satisfaction. Limitations and future studies Some limitations were encountered in the current study. First, display curvature radii were simulated using projection films and a beam projector instead of actual display panels. Although comparatively high-fidelity mock-ups were used in this study (vs. static images attached to curved surfaces [6, 11]), these mock-ups were different from actual displays. Second, 5 min videos were used in experiments. Previous studies on presence used task durations ranging from 1.5 min [69] to 1 h [31]. An additional study is warranted to examine the effects of display curvature radius, viewing distance, and lateral viewing position on diverse TV watching experience elements during longer-term TV watching. Third, subjective ratings were used to assess TV watching experience. Some behavioral or physiological measures are available to assess presence, visual comfort, image quality, and user satisfaction (including eye movements [92], electrocardiograms [92], and electroencephalograms [93]). Additional studies are necessary to develop validated objective measures and experimental methods that can account for the TV watching experience of multiple viewers simultaneously and to support conclusions of this study drawn based on subjective measures only. In addition, it would have been better to obtain a simultaneous judgment of confidence for each subjective rating made by the participant. Fourth, the effects of gender, age, and personal characteristics were not considered. The effect of display size on presence was not significant in the male group, whereas the female group reported higher presence with wider displays [1]. A separate study [40] revealed that those with higher immersive tendencies reported higher presence during TV watching, but observed no significant gender effects. TV watching experience could also be affected by ocular changes with age (e.g. functional degradations of the visual system with age [94] and visual fatigue in presbyopic eyes [95]). Personal characteristics (such as a willingness to suspend disbelief, knowledge or prior experience with the medium, and personal types [96]) are also important factors for presence. Fifth, in addition to the three media form factors (display curvature radius, viewing distance, and lateral viewing position) considered in this study, media content factors (overall theme, narrative, and story) can influence TV watching experience in terms of involvement [72], engagement, and ecological validity [73]. To examine the effects of the three media form factors on TV watching experience, this study controlled media content factors using similar videos. Finally, this study considered 55" screen sizes and two viewing distances; other screen sizes and viewing distances should be considered in future studies. Despite the above limitations, the findings of this study can help determine effective combinations of display curvature radius, viewing distance, and lateral viewing position for a better TV watching experience with 55" TVs. Supporting information S1 Data Funding Statement This study was funded by the National Research Foundation of Korea (NRF–2016R1A2B4010158). The funder had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript. Data Availability All relevant data are within the paper and its Supporting Information files.

TV watching experiences than flat displays. A study [68] found that the visual presence at a viewing distance of 2 m was 18% (for 2D content) and 9% (for 3D content) higher on a 45" 4200R curved TV screen relative to a 45" flat screen, argued to be due to improvements in visual sensitivity at the lateral areas of the curved screen. ‘Realness’ considered as a presence factor during watching was higher on 55" curved TVs relative to their flat counterpart when the viewing distance (5 m) was equal to the display curvature radius. Varying experimental durations and visual stimuli appear to have created these discrepancies [31]. Effects of viewing distance In this study, viewing distance was significant only for visual comfort, with 6% greater comfort at 4 m (5.8 H) than 2.3 m (3.4 H). These two viewing distances were within the range recommended (3–7H for flat HD TVs [19]), although the 4 m (5.8 H) viewing distance exceeded the ranges recommended for non-HD TVs, 5H (29”), 3–5.2 H (38"), 3–4 H, and 0.8–4.8H for HD TVs [27, 40, 41, 45, 46], (see Table 5 and Fig 9). As median and mean viewing distances observed in homes of 6 H and 6.5 H [43], respectively, viewing distances outside the above recommended ranges appear common in practice. It was reported that the mean preferred viewing distance for visual comfort using HD TVs was 3.8 W (6.8 H) for 32" TVs, 3.6 W (6.5 H) for 37" TVs, and 3.6 W (6.5 H) for 42" TVs [80]. These values are also above the values (6 H for 36" and 5 H for 73" HD TVs) recommended by ITU [42]. It should be noted that these studies involved different display sizes and resolutions.

yes

Product Design

Are curved TV screens better for viewing?

yes_statement

"curved" tv "screens" provide a "better" "viewing" experience.. "viewing" is enhanced with "curved" tv "screens".

https://history-computer.com/the-best-reasons-to-buy-a-curved-tv-today/

The 6 Best Reasons to Buy a Curved TV Today - History-Computer

The 6 Best Reasons to Buy a Curved TV Today Curved TVs are an exciting innovation in television technology. Thanks to their distinctive design, they’ve quickly become popular choices among consumers who appreciate the experience provided by curved screens. Many people have been eagerly waiting to experience it first-hand. These TVs feature curved shapes designed to provide a more immersive viewing experience. Their screens mimic the human eye’s shape for more natural and comfortable watching. Hence, you may wish to buy a curved TV as they are especially helpful for long-form content viewing sessions such as movies or a television series. Curved TVs stand out from the competition thanks to their distinctive design and a host of additional features that make them attractive investments for buyers. Curved models typically boast higher resolution and contrast ratios, meaning sharper and clearer picture quality. Plus, they tend to offer wider viewing angles so viewers can sit anywhere within the room and still experience high image quality. If you’ve been thinking about purchasing a curved TV, there is no better time than right now. Keep reading to learn the top six reasons why a curved TV might be the TV for you. Some Background on the Curved TVs Curved TVs refer to television sets that incorporate an irregularly curved display screen for an enhanced viewing experience. Thus, provides more of an immersive viewing experience by wrapping the image around its viewer and creating more depth and dimension in their viewing. Curved TVs first made their debut in the early 2000s when Samsung and LG introduced prototype models of this technology. While expensive at launch, early models faced criticism for limited viewing angles that made them unsuitable for many living rooms. Over time, however, advancements in manufacturing technology allowed more affordable and practical curved TVs to become widely available. By the mid-2010s, curved TVs had become both accessible and widely popular due to technological advances. As a consequence, making large curved displays with superior picture and contrast quality a reality. Popularity continued to soar; by end of 2010, major manufacturers like Samsung, LG, and Sony offered multiple curved models in response to consumer demand. Today, curved TVs remain a popular choice among consumers seeking an immersive cinematic experience. Available in various sizes, from small screens suitable for gaming to large wall-mounted displays that can be used for movie watching and sporting events, they remain increasingly popular despite some limitations. Some experts argue flat screens may be more suitable depending on content types being watched, but you can be the judge of that. Reasons to Buy a Curved TV Curved TVs provide an enhanced viewing experience with its distinct design. Their curvier screen offers wider field of view and reduces glare for easier on-eye viewing; their stylish modern aesthetic adds elegance to any room they reside. Here are three compelling reasons for owning one: Immersive Viewing Experience Curved TVs create an engaging viewing experience that is difficult to replicate with flat-screen sets. Their curvature creates a more natural and uniform viewing surface, drawing you deeper into the action on-screen. Plus, its reduced peripheral vision loss helps prevent eye strain or discomfort when watching for extended periods. As you watch a movie or play video games on a curved TV, its curve helps create depth and dimension that puts you right inside the action. Plus, with no sweet spot issue common among flat-screen models, every seat in the room becomes optimal when watching together — perfect for large families or groups of friends who like watching together. Curved televisions also help reduce glare and reflections. This makes viewing easier in bright rooms, as the curve spreads light more evenly across its surface. Thereby decreasing direct illumination that directly hits your eyes and relieving strain or discomfort experienced when watching. As well as offering an immersive viewing experience, curved TVs also add aesthetic value to your home. Their modern design fits in beautifully with any room’s decor. The unique shape makes this screen stand out from traditional flat-screen models. We earn a commission if you make a purchase, at no additional cost to you. 08/10/2023 09:57 pm GMT Enhanced Contrast and Color Accuracy Curved televisions have been designed to deliver an engaging viewing experience. One key factor contributing to this experience is increased contrast and color accuracy. Contrast is defined as the difference between the brightest and darkest parts of an image, such as how deep blacks appear compared to vibrant whites. A higher contrast ratio will create more vibrant and lifelike images with deeper blacks and brighter whites. Therefore curved televisions have been designed specifically to increase this ratio for an enhanced viewing experience, particularly when used in darker rooms. Color accuracy refers to a television’s ability to display colors as intended for viewing, which may result in washed-out images or oversaturated hues. Curved TVs are specifically engineered to deliver accurate and vibrant colors. Enhancing contrast and color accuracy creates an improved viewing experience, bringing images to life and appearing more vivid and real. You’ll notice this whether watching a movie, playing video games, browsing the web or simply browsing images. They appear more dynamic and engaging. Improved Off-Angle Viewing Curved TVs provide numerous advantages over their flat counterparts regarding off-angle viewing. Their design ensures every point on the screen is equally far away from the viewer’s eyes for an enhanced viewing experience. This eliminates distortion that occurs with flat screens when watched from non-center positions. Curved TVs feature a gentle curvature to reduce any distortion and color fading around the edges of their screens. Thus, producing more natural images devoid of visual defects that occur with flat-screen TVs. Plus, their design helps decrease glare and reflections, making watching easier in bright rooms or those with numerous windows. We earn a commission if you make a purchase, at no additional cost to you. 08/11/2023 05:54 am GMT Larger Screen Size Options Curved TVs with larger screen size options are an appealing reason to purchase one. When compared to flat screens, curved televisions offer immersive viewing experiences that rival cinematic experiences right in your own home. This creates an exciting theater atmosphere and gives viewers the feel of going to the movies. A larger screen also lets more action come through at once for an exciting viewing adventure. Therefore, when it comes time to watching movies or playing video games or browsing the web, a larger screen size option can provide a much more enjoyable and satisfying experience than its flat counterparts do. Additionally, larger screen size options allow viewers to sit farther from the TV. This is especially important for those in larger living rooms and entertainment spaces. A curved TV with a larger screen size means you can sit further back without losing clarity of image. This also means more time spent relaxing while enjoying favorite shows or movies without straining eyes or neck. Larger screen size options in curved TVs also provide a wider viewing angle, meaning you can sit in various positions and still experience an excellent picture without any loss in quality. A larger screen size option in a curved TV makes for more immersive viewing, whether with friends and family or simply solo. We earn a commission if you make a purchase, at no additional cost to you. 08/11/2023 12:42 pm GMT Improved Sound Quality Curved TVs boast superior sound quality compared to flat-screen TVs. Their unique curved design creates a more immersive viewing experience, impacting sound quality. Therefore, their curvature helps distribute sound more evenly for a balanced, natural tone, allowing audio to come through more clearly in large rooms where sounds may distort or echo. These TVs also tend to come equipped with advanced sound systems that enhance the overall audio experience, such as Dolby Atmos or DTS-HD technologies that deliver clear, crisp sound that makes you feel immersed in the storyline. Such advanced systems create a more lifelike audio experience. Hence, making you feel as though you’re right there in the action. Curved TVs often come equipped with built-in speakers that direct sound towards the viewer for a more focused audio experience, which can help those without separate sound systems to rely on these TV speakers instead of purchasing separate sound systems. This feature is especially helpful for those without separate systems to supplement them as this helps improve overall audio experience. They are built to look their best, often sporting sleek and modern designs to complement any living room or home theater setup. Furthermore, curved TVs make you feel as if you’re in the middle of the action, enhancing audio/visual entertainment such as movies, games, and streaming music. In contrast, flat screen televisions may provide less immersive and enjoyable audio/visual experiences. Reduced Reflection and Glare Curved TVs have quickly gained in popularity thanks to several advantages they provide over traditional flat-screen models, with reduced reflection and glare being among them. Reflection and glare can be common issues while watching television in well-lit rooms, particularly with flat TV screens. Reflection occurs when light from outside sources bounces off of the television screen to reduce the visibility of content. Glare refers to direct lighting, which causes discomfort to the eyes. Curved TVs significantly alleviate these issues. The curved design of a TV screen helps distribute light evenly across its surface, minimizing reflections and glare for easier watching in bright rooms without experiencing eye strain and discomfort. Furthermore, this ensures content remains clear and visible even in brightly lit environments. Alternatives to Curved TVs Curved TVs were once all the rage, but some people are opting for flat screens or smart displays as alternatives to curvier TVs. Here are a few alternatives you might consider for your next TV purchase. Flat Screen TVs Flat screen televisions have become an increasingly popular alternative to curved models for several reasons. First, their traditional and timeless design fits seamlessly with any decor in any home, while offering improved viewing for those sitting at an angle by eliminating distortion caused by curvier screens. It can also be more budget-friendly, offering more size choices and easier installation onto walls without special brackets or adjustments required to level out its display. Flat screen TVs also provide more versatile placement options than their more obtrusive counterparts, with options such as placing it on a stand, mounting to a wall, or hanging from the ceiling. Their adaptable nature makes them ideal for small apartments, dorm rooms and any spaces with limited wall space. Furthermore, some can even double as computer monitors — making flat screen TVs an attractive choice for people wanting their television for both entertainment and work purposes. Image quality of flat screen TVs has come a long way over recent years. Thanks to modern technologies, they now deliver stunning picture quality, vivid color reproduction, and wider viewing angles, so everyone in a room can experience clear pictures regardless of where they sit. OLED TVs Although some curved screens have OLED technology, most OLED TVs tend to be flat screen designs. OLED stands for Organic Light Emitting Diode and refers to how each pixel on an OLED screen produces light. Unlike traditional LED/LCD displays, each OLED pixel can turn on and off independently for precise black levels and wider color gamut. One of the key advantages of OLED TVs is their slim and lightweight design. OLED panels are flexible, making them suitable for use in TVs. By comparison, curved TVs tend to be bulkier and heavier due to their curved screens which add weight and depth compared to OLED models, making OLED an excellent option for those seeking sleek and contemporary television designs. OLED televisions also boast excellent viewing angles. Their pixels emit their own light source, providing clear and vivid imagery at any angle of viewing compared to curved models which may experience image distortion and color shift from off-center viewing positions. OLEDs make an ideal solution for large rooms or those who like watching from different perspectives. OLED televisions also claim to have superior color accuracy and contrast than their curved counterparts, offering better black levels and contrast ratios that make them suitable for use in dark rooms where deep blacks and accurate colors are crucial components of viewing experience. Curved TVs without OLED technology often struggle to produce deep blacks and accurate colors for an engaging viewing experience, thus lessening immersion while viewing. Projector Screens Projector screens offer an alternative and unique viewing experience when it comes to movies, TV shows, and games. While curved TVs have fixed screen sizes that cannot be adjusted accordingly for optimal viewing experiences or conserve space, projector screens allow you to adapt their size according to your room or preference. This creates larger displays for more engaging experiences or smaller ones that conserve space. Projector screens also offer more cost-effective viewing solutions than curved TVs, often costing hundreds of dollars less and being compatible with more projector models. Thus, giving you more choice at lower costs for an optimal viewing experience. Another advantage of projector screens is their greater versatility when it comes to placement. Curved TVs, on the other hand, must be placed in specific spots in a room in order to provide optimal viewing. Projector screens on the other hand can be placed anywhere within any given room and still create an impressive and vibrant display. It is perfect for home theaters, gaming rooms or any space where large displays are desired. Conclusion Overall, there are numerous compelling arguments in favor of buying a curved TV. From movie buffs to those just wanting an exciting way to enjoy their shows and movies, curved TVs offer an unparalleled viewing experience that cannot be rivaled. Packed with advanced features and sleek designs, they make excellent home entertainment systems upgrades. Curved TVs create an immersive viewing experience, offering a wider viewing field and reducing distortion and visual noise. Their design creates uniform distances between all parts of the screen and viewer for enhanced naturalness and life-likeness of imagery. How does a curved TV enhance my viewing experience? Curved TVs add an enhanced viewing experience by offering more natural viewing angles that reduce eye strain and make the entire screen easier to see. Furthermore, its curve creates more uniform distance between viewer and screen for an engaging watching experience when watching movies or playing games. Can a curved TV be wall-mounted? Yes, curved TVs can be mounted to the wall like any flat one. When selecting a wall mount suitable for their size and weight of TV, as well as following manufacturer’s instructions for installation. Are curved TVs more expensive than flat ones? Typically, curved TVs tend to cost more than their flat counterparts; however, the price disparity depends on its size, brand name and specifications. How does a curved TV affect viewing distance? A curved TV should be viewed from a specific distance recommended by its manufacturer in order to maintain its natural curvature of screen and provide an immersive viewing experience. Therefore, it’s crucial that you stay within this recommended viewing distance in order to take full advantage of your curved TV experience. Can a curved TV serve both home entertainment and gaming purposes? Yes, curved TVs can be used both for home entertainment and gaming. Their immersive viewing experience and uniform distance from the screen make them ideal for both uses. Furthermore, some models feature gaming-specific features such as low input lag or fast refresh rates to elevate gaming experiences further. What is the difference between an OLED TV and a curved TV? An OLED TV uses organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) to produce images, while curved TV refers to the shape of its screen. Some TVs offer both features — with some OLED models sporting both features as well. Not all curved models are considered OLED models or vice versa! Best Buy Available here: https://www.bestbuy.com/discover-learn/benefits-of-a-curved-tv-or-monitor/pcmcat1647443957553#:~:text=A%20reduced%20field%20of%20vision,visuals%20as%20their%20flat%20counterparts.

Available in various sizes, from small screens suitable for gaming to large wall-mounted displays that can be used for movie watching and sporting events, they remain increasingly popular despite some limitations. Some experts argue flat screens may be more suitable depending on content types being watched, but you can be the judge of that. Reasons to Buy a Curved TV Curved TVs provide an enhanced viewing experience with its distinct design. Their curvier screen offers wider field of view and reduces glare for easier on-eye viewing; their stylish modern aesthetic adds elegance to any room they reside. Here are three compelling reasons for owning one: Immersive Viewing Experience Curved TVs create an engaging viewing experience that is difficult to replicate with flat-screen sets. Their curvature creates a more natural and uniform viewing surface, drawing you deeper into the action on-screen. Plus, its reduced peripheral vision loss helps prevent eye strain or discomfort when watching for extended periods. As you watch a movie or play video games on a curved TV, its curve helps create depth and dimension that puts you right inside the action. Plus, with no sweet spot issue common among flat-screen models, every seat in the room becomes optimal when watching together — perfect for large families or groups of friends who like watching together. Curved televisions also help reduce glare and reflections. This makes viewing easier in bright rooms, as the curve spreads light more evenly across its surface. Thereby decreasing direct illumination that directly hits your eyes and relieving strain or discomfort experienced when watching. As well as offering an immersive viewing experience, curved TVs also add aesthetic value to your home. Their modern design fits in beautifully with any room’s decor. The unique shape makes this screen stand out from traditional flat-screen models. We earn a commission if you make a purchase, at no additional cost to you. 08/10/2023 09:57 pm GMT Enhanced Contrast and Color Accuracy Curved televisions have been designed to deliver an engaging viewing experience.

yes

Product Design

Are curved TV screens better for viewing?

yes_statement

"curved" tv "screens" provide a "better" "viewing" experience.. "viewing" is enhanced with "curved" tv "screens".

https://www.bestbuy.com/discover-learn/benefits-of-a-curved-tv-or-monitor/pcmcat1647443957553

Benefits of a Curved TV or Monitor - Best Buy

Benefits of a Curved TV or Monitor A guide to immersive screens. Do you wish you could improve your efficiency at work? Are you thinking of ways to upgrade your home theater? Curved screens can take care of both wishes by adding extra dimensions to televisions and computer monitors. Are curved monitors worth it? Is it time to buy a curved TV? Read on to learn about the many advantages of curved TVs and monitors. What are curved TVs and monitors? As the name suggests, this type of television and monitor features a curved screen that creates an even field of vision. Flat screens, particularly larger ones, lose a certain amount of clarity at the sides. A reduced field of vision occurs because the edges are farther away from your eyes. By curving the edges, the screen improves the clarity of the image. Many curved TVs and monitors provide the same lightning-quick response time, high dynamic range, and 4K ultra-high-definition visuals as their flat counterparts. What is the point of a curved TV? While they share the same level of performance, curved televisions offer benefits that a flat screen can’t. The advantages of a curved screen include: Immersive experiences Expanded field of view Crisper images Striking configuration What does a curved TV do? The visual experience of a curved television provides depth and breadth simultaneously, providing greater immersion in what you’re watching. The curvature creates increased contrast ― the visual differentiation between black and white ― and sharpness at the edges of the screen. This leads to improved images from every angle. The sleek design also makes a bold statement for your decor. What are the benefits of a curved monitor? A necessity for most jobs, a computer screen occupies the focal point of a modern workspace, at home or the office. A curved screen provides more than an exciting visual experience. The benefits of a curved monitor include: Reduced eye strain More desk space Increased efficiency Greater immersion Studies have documented that the design of curved monitors may actually reduce strain on your eyes. The crispness of the image at the edges allows for a wider monitor and thus an expanded workspace ― especially important for graphic design projects or tasks with lots of visual data. Additionally, people can read text on curved monitors more quickly than flat ones. The immersive experience also helps you focus on important tasks. Does your work require several windows to be opened at once? A multimonitor setup expands the desktop for maximum efficiency. Curved monitors offer versatility. For example, you can stack them or position them side by side. Can you wall-mount a curved TV? Thankfully, you don't need a special wall mount for a curved TV. Standard wall mounts accommodate them as well as they do flat TVs ― within the size and weight limits of the mount. Be aware that the curvature eliminates the sleek profile that a mounted flat-screen TV produces, though some owners like the unique appearance. Curved TVs make a striking integration into a corner TV stand. Why does an entertainment center need a curved TV? The vibrant images and immersive feel take your home theater that much closer to the center of the action. Blockbusters and sports championships provide ideal opportunities for an immersive viewing experience. Film buffs, sports fanatics and avid gamers have every reason to love the rich picture provided by curved televisions. The vivid images and expanded field of view benefit everything from video games to the big game. Although when compared to flat TVs, curved TVs, have a slower average refresh rate than a monitor. Is a curved monitor better for gaming? As with curved TVs, curved monitors produce depth, immersion and contrast. That aspect is extremely beneficial when playing games depicting intense action, detailed simulation and everything in between. Most curved monitors feature a refresh rate of more than 120Hz, which translates to seamless visuals and rapid action. Combined with the right gaming accessories, a curved screen can deliver the ultimate immersive experience. Why does a home office need a curved monitor? With more professionals working from home, an optimized home office is less of a luxury and more of a necessity. When wondering if curved monitors are better than flat monitors, the answer primarily depends on the time you spend looking at a screen during the workday. The health benefits of a curved monitor combine nicely with ergonomic office furniture and optimal lighting to support your physical wellness. A properly positioned curved monitor eases your eyes, neck and back. The expanded visual landscape contributes to improved performance that streamlines your workday. Greater efficiency helps you complete your projects faster, leaving more time to enjoy with family and friends. Now that you’re aware of the amazing possibilities of curved monitors and televisions, you can begin exploring which screen is right for you.

Benefits of a Curved TV or Monitor A guide to immersive screens. Do you wish you could improve your efficiency at work? Are you thinking of ways to upgrade your home theater? Curved screens can take care of both wishes by adding extra dimensions to televisions and computer monitors. Are curved monitors worth it? Is it time to buy a curved TV? Read on to learn about the many advantages of curved TVs and monitors. What are curved TVs and monitors? As the name suggests, this type of television and monitor features a curved screen that creates an even field of vision. Flat screens, particularly larger ones, lose a certain amount of clarity at the sides. A reduced field of vision occurs because the edges are farther away from your eyes. By curving the edges, the screen improves the clarity of the image. Many curved TVs and monitors provide the same lightning-quick response time, high dynamic range, and 4K ultra-high-definition visuals as their flat counterparts. What is the point of a curved TV? While they share the same level of performance, curved televisions offer benefits that a flat screen can’t. The advantages of a curved screen include: Immersive experiences Expanded field of view Crisper images Striking configuration What does a curved TV do? The visual experience of a curved television provides depth and breadth simultaneously, providing greater immersion in what you’re watching. The curvature creates increased contrast ― the visual differentiation between black and white ― and sharpness at the edges of the screen. This leads to improved images from every angle. The sleek design also makes a bold statement for your decor. What are the benefits of a curved monitor? A necessity for most jobs, a computer screen occupies the focal point of a modern workspace, at home or the office. A curved screen provides more than an exciting visual experience. The benefits of a curved monitor include: Reduced eye strain More desk space Increased efficiency Greater immersion Studies have documented that the design of curved monitors may actually reduce strain on your eyes. The crispness of the image at the edges allows for a wider monitor and thus an expanded workspace ―

yes

Product Design

Are curved TV screens better for viewing?

yes_statement

"curved" tv "screens" provide a "better" "viewing" experience.. "viewing" is enhanced with "curved" tv "screens".

https://interestingengineering.com/culture/which-is-better-curved-or-flat-screen-tvs

Have you ever wondered what happened to the curved TVs?

Whatever happened to curved TVs? Widely considered better than flat-screen TVs a few years ago, you can be hard-pressed to find them today. Plenty of comparison websites exist, and we have attempted to condense the arguments into one short article. Ultimately there are some differences, benefits, and disadvantages of curved screens over flat, but one of the reasons for the curved TVs' failure was their price tag and impracticality. What are the differences between flat-screen TVs and curved TVs? Ultimately there isn't much difference between the two except for the inherent differences in screen shape. But, that being said, there are some noticeable differences in watching them, their design, and their choice of models. Subscribe Stay ahead of your peers in technology and engineering - The Blueprint By their very nature, curved TVs stand out more than flatscreen TV — for obvious reasons. Their shape draws the eye, and if this interests you, you might want to consider getting a curved TV over a flatscreen alternative. Curved TVs also tend to be a bit "fatter," and mounting them on a wall might look odd. Conversely, flat-screen TVs are thinner and can be mounted on walls without issues. As most other devices tend to have straight lines, a flat-screen TV will likely fit your interior decoration more than a curved TV. Another major difference between the two is the choice of models you have. There is a considerably smaller selection of curved TV models on the market than flatscreens. They also tend to be over 40 inches (101cm) in size and are generally more expensive than flatscreen alternatives. Curved TVs also tend to come with all the bells and whistles of modern TVs, whereas you can opt for less capable flatscreens (without 4K, say) to fit your budget and needs. The main differences between the two are their price tag, available model choices, and how they look when off. When you sit down to watch something, you can unlikely spot any real difference — all specs being equal. What are the pros and cons of a curved TV? The short answer is it does depend. Both have pros and cons, but ultimately, any deciding factor will come down to cost and personal choice. Overall, curved TVs have some benefits regarding immersiveness, depth, and contrast, but they also have limitations in viewing angle, ideal picture quality, and hanging on walls. Additionally, they can be expensive, and the benefits are more pronounced in larger models. Of course, this is not intended to be exhaustive but merely an overview. Curved TVs offer a slight improvement in "immersiveness." But this entirely depends on how far away you are from the screen. Despite this, the extra fraction of a degree and the slightly larger screen will increase your viewing immersion by default. Reflections can be exaggerated on curved TVs. Their shape can create a 'funhouse' mirror effect from reflections on the screen. Despite the hype, they will never replicate theatre-quality immersion. Depth is enhanced. The depth created by the curve of the screen, especially in larger screens, with OLED technology, does improve viewing depth a bit. Some manufacturers, like Samsung, also include further depth enhancement technology to improve the 3D effect of their curved TVs. The viewing angle can be limited on curved TVs. The curve narrows the quality viewing angle of these TVs considerably, particularly for smaller models that are less than 65 inches (165 cm). Curved TVs provide a greater field of view. While this effect is not as pronounced as some might claim, it is slightly improved on curved TVs. Ideal picture quality can only be seen dead-center. Viewing any 4K tv off-center tends to begin to spoil the quality of the picture. The "sweet spot" for best viewing quality is much narrower than for flat TVs. Curved TVs have a superior contrast. Although, most reviews of curved TVs reveal that this is more to do with additional technology in the devices than the curved screen itself, per se. They are less easy to hang on a wall. Unlike their flat contemporaries, curved TVs are inherently harder to hang on a wall of their shape. Curved TVs do look the part. While this is merely a matter of taste, curved TVs are undoubtedly interesting, aesthetically speaking, in and of themselves. You need to buy bigger TVs to get any real benefit. As most of the benefits from curved TVs are seen in larger models, the price to benefit you might force your hand. Curved TVs tend to be very expensive. Equally sized flat TVs tend to be much cheaper. Why is a curved TV better? Put curved TVs are not that much better than flat-screen TVs. Most reviewers don't believe the premium price tag of a curved TV is worth it. For any real benefits of curved TVs, you must sit close to the screen or view from extreme angles. Cur curved TVs might be for you if you like their aesthetics and don't mind paying a premium. But, if you are looking for a massive improvement to your overall viewing experience, you might be disappointed with curved screens. Their price-to-benefit isn't worth it. Because of their shape, they also introduce some new issues you won't find with flat-screen TVs. Other commentators also point out that some of the best TV manufacturers are currently enamored with them; for consumers to benefit from 4K technology, they have little choice but to buy one. This has led to many believing that curved TVs are the way to go when they only need a 4K quality flat-screen TV. Curved TVs tend to offer very little benefit over their equivalent flat-screen competitors. Any real benefits from the technology come with the larger models; even then, it's not that impressive. If you like the look of a curved TV, go ahead but don’t expect amazing results from the curve alone. Are curved TVs a fad? Are they just a fad? Given their current market share, this would appear to be the case. It seems unlikely that even if curved TVs begin to fall in price to be more in line with flat-screen TVs, they will be rescued. But, at the end of the day, if you like the look of a curved TV, go ahead and buy it. It may, one day, become a retro-classic. The choice between the two ultimately falls upon you, the consumer. But if you have looked around, you might have realized — they don't seem like they're in it for the long haul.

The curve narrows the quality viewing angle of these TVs considerably, particularly for smaller models that are less than 65 inches (165 cm). Curved TVs provide a greater field of view. While this effect is not as pronounced as some might claim, it is slightly improved on curved TVs. Ideal picture quality can only be seen dead-center. Viewing any 4K tv off-center tends to begin to spoil the quality of the picture. The "sweet spot" for best viewing quality is much narrower than for flat TVs. Curved TVs have a superior contrast. Although, most reviews of curved TVs reveal that this is more to do with additional technology in the devices than the curved screen itself, per se. They are less easy to hang on a wall. Unlike their flat contemporaries, curved TVs are inherently harder to hang on a wall of their shape. Curved TVs do look the part. While this is merely a matter of taste, curved TVs are undoubtedly interesting, aesthetically speaking, in and of themselves. You need to buy bigger TVs to get any real benefit. As most of the benefits from curved TVs are seen in larger models, the price to benefit you might force your hand. Curved TVs tend to be very expensive. Equally sized flat TVs tend to be much cheaper. Why is a curved TV better? Put curved TVs are not that much better than flat-screen TVs. Most reviewers don't believe the premium price tag of a curved TV is worth it. For any real benefits of curved TVs, you must sit close to the screen or view from extreme angles. Cur curved TVs might be for you if you like their aesthetics and don't mind paying a premium. But, if you are looking for a massive improvement to your overall viewing experience, you might be disappointed with curved screens. Their price-to-benefit isn't worth it. Because of their shape, they also introduce some new issues you won't find with flat-screen TVs.

no

Product Design

Are curved TV screens better for viewing?

yes_statement

"curved" tv "screens" provide a "better" "viewing" experience.. "viewing" is enhanced with "curved" tv "screens".

https://www.grandviewresearch.com/industry-analysis/curved-televisions-market

Curved Televisions Market Size & Trends | Global Industry Report ...

The global curved televisions market is poised for steady growth over the forecast period owing to the availability of enhanced features such as better picture quality, high contrast & less reflection, and ultra-high definition (UHD) resolution. In addition to these, curved television (TV) provides an enhanced viewing experience through functions such as auto depth enhancer, uniform viewing distance, and 3D & 4D compatibility. OLED and LED technology used in curved television offer durability, high energy efficiency, and less operational cost. Moreover, increased viewer demands for enriched visual effects bundled with crisp sound output have led to the growth of the global curved TV market. Curved designs offered by manufacturers create a more balanced and uniform view as compared to their flat counterparts. Geometric distortion can be reduced with the help of slight curvature. For instance, in Flat TVs, the corners of the screen are farther than the center which makes them smaller, thereby resulting in an elongated trapezoidal view, whereas in curved televisions the slight curvature reduces the distortion by approximately 50% at a typical 8-foot viewing distance. The OLED TV with its curved form provides a curved trajectory which helps to maintain constant viewing focus. Curved televisions with 4K resolution provide enhanced image quality on a relatively large screen. Curved televisions offer a better viewing experience on account of their larger & brighter screen in comparison to flat televisions because of the convergence of light on the center of the screen. Curved OLED televisions reduce power consumption in comparison to CRT and LCD televisions. Curved design reduces the number of reflections on the screen and eliminates certain angles which help in making the display technology provide perfect blacks and dark image contents thereby preventing the light from being reflected off the screen. High manufacturing costs are expected to limit the growth of the curved televisions market to a few key applications such as commercial trade centers, shopping malls, and use by affluent consumers. Moreover, technological barriers in the R&D of curved televisions are expected to pose a major challenge to the growth of the market. The global curved TV market can be segmented on the basis of screen size into large, medium, and small screen televisions. The market can also be segmented according to the end-user segment into commercial, institutional and residential users. Manufacturers are expected to focus on the untapped residential curved television market to gain a competitive advantage. In terms of revenue, North America and Europe are expected to be the major contributors to the curved TV market due to the increase in the demand of customized solutions for television screens. Increased disposable incomes and changing consumer preferences in developing economies such as India, Brazil, and Japan are estimated to fuel the growth of the curved televisions market in the Asia Pacific region. Important: Covid19 pandemic market impact The ongoing COVID-19 outbreak has adversely affected the display industry with manufacturing operations temporarily suspended across major manufacturing hubs, leading to a substantial slowdown in the production. Major manufacturers including Samsung, LG Display, and Xiaomi among others have suspended their manufacturing operations in China, India, South Korea, and European countries. In addition to having an impact on the production, the ongoing pandemic has taken a toll on the consumer demand for display integrated devices, likely exacerbated by the lockdown imposed across major countries. Uncertainty regarding the possible length of lockdown makes it difficult to anticipate how and when a resurgence in the display industry will occur. On the flip side, increased demand for displays in medical equipment including ventilators and respirators is expected to keep the demand for displays afloat in the coming months. The report will account for Covid19 as a key market contributor. Please fill out the form below for a free PDF report sample & online dashboard trial.

The global curved televisions market is poised for steady growth over the forecast period owing to the availability of enhanced features such as better picture quality, high contrast & less reflection, and ultra-high definition (UHD) resolution. In addition to these, curved television (TV) provides an enhanced viewing experience through functions such as auto depth enhancer, uniform viewing distance, and 3D & 4D compatibility. OLED and LED technology used in curved television offer durability, high energy efficiency, and less operational cost. Moreover, increased viewer demands for enriched visual effects bundled with crisp sound output have led to the growth of the global curved TV market. Curved designs offered by manufacturers create a more balanced and uniform view as compared to their flat counterparts. Geometric distortion can be reduced with the help of slight curvature. For instance, in Flat TVs, the corners of the screen are farther than the center which makes them smaller, thereby resulting in an elongated trapezoidal view, whereas in curved televisions the slight curvature reduces the distortion by approximately 50% at a typical 8-foot viewing distance. The OLED TV with its curved form provides a curved trajectory which helps to maintain constant viewing focus. Curved televisions with 4K resolution provide enhanced image quality on a relatively large screen. Curved televisions offer a better viewing experience on account of their larger & brighter screen in comparison to flat televisions because of the convergence of light on the center of the screen. Curved OLED televisions reduce power consumption in comparison to CRT and LCD televisions. Curved design reduces the number of reflections on the screen and eliminates certain angles which help in making the display technology provide perfect blacks and dark image contents thereby preventing the light from being reflected off the screen. High manufacturing costs are expected to limit the growth of the curved televisions market to a few key applications such as commercial trade centers, shopping malls, and use by affluent consumers. Moreover, technological barriers in the R&D of curved televisions are expected to pose a major challenge to the growth of the market.

yes

Product Design

Are curved TV screens better for viewing?

yes_statement

"curved" tv "screens" provide a "better" "viewing" experience.. "viewing" is enhanced with "curved" tv "screens".

https://eagletvmounting.com/why-curved-tvs-failed/

Why Curved TVs Failed? 6 Major Reasons - Eagle TV Mounting

2. Reflections causing Glossy Screen Here, a glossy screen tends to affect the viewing angles. When glossy screens are fitted to TVs, they are more likely to get reflections that can block your view. This doesn’t offer you the same experience of viewing just like flat-panel TVs offer. Undoubtedly, curved TVs are prone to have problems with reflections. In case if you are willing to fix the reflection issues of the curved TV screen, then a few hacks can help you there: First, change the screen angle of the picture to limit any reflections. Remember to shift the display screen far off from the light source. This can create reflections and makes a clear difference. Secondly, you can fit a matte picture protector on the screen to counter reflections. However, finding the exact matte display layer that properly covers your TV can be challenging. Additionally, sticking a matte layer to your TV screens can be worrisome because air bubbles might get trapped under your protector. So, this can be a tricky solution for large screens. The easiest trick to wade off reflections is by turning off the lights to enjoy experiences like commercial cinemas. This might not work in the morning when natural light is available. You can also place LED strips on the back side of your TV if you have one of the early models. They work as bias lights and offer ambient lighting around the sweet spot. 5. Placement of the Curved TV If you want to create an aesthetic look within your sweet spot, placing a curved screen will give you a tough time. Compared to flat tv, a curved screen seems too weird when positioned on a wall mount. However, changing the seating position and setting may help improve image quality. Whatsoever placement you try, curved TVs tend to appear a little odd in your room setting. 6. Lack of Availability Although the unavailability of a curved TV won’t be settled as a technical issue, it can put you in chaos when you require technical repairs or support. Because curved screens disappeared from the market long ago, you might find it tricky even to get one. Moreover, you may have a tough time searching for third-party support in case something doesn’t work. The availability of curved-screen TV parts is also questionable, so replacing a part can be troublesome. If you’re facing any curved screen issues, get it checked physically. The best way to do it is by contacting a service center approved by Samsung company. Although, asking for a local repairman’s help might be a waste of time as curved TVs are uncommon compared to flat-screen TVs. What are the Pros and Cons of Curved TVs? Although some problems are meant to be fixed while watching curved TVs, it has some advantages that are worthy of your investment. Theater-like Display TV directors make screenplay as realistic as possible so the audience can have a lifelike experience. And curved TVs deliver it exceptionally on your home screen. Curved TVs were built to stimulate eye movement and replicate peripheral vision. Since your eyes sense the arc of the screen, the pictures become more three-dimensional and natural. It feels like you’re living inside the movie. Broader Field of View The slightly arched design of the curved screen offers you more space in your vision field. Although, it can only be experienced when you’re positioned in the right spot, the front and center. Sharpened Image Quality on the Edges The curved TVs track your eye shape, thereby making pictures seem to get sharper at the corners. I have been working in the electrical and Audio/Visual field for over 19 years. My focus for EagleTVMounting is to provide concise expertise in everything I write. The greatest joy in life is to provide people with insight information that can potentially change their viewpoints. Our #1 goal is just that! OUR PROMISE LEGAL: We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites. As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases. $60 OFF special only applies to service orders and/or service requests over $400 in value. Due to our strict scheduling and dispatch guidelines a 20% cancellation fee will incur if customer decides to cancel service request within 24 hours of requested service. Additional surcharges may apply when the tech, installer, or integrator arrives at service location. Any service requests or additional services rendered, outside the scope of work will be charged according to service. Any additional time added, a service surcharge of $149 an hour will be added. Free quotes are available via phone, text, and email during normal business hours. Trip fee may apply if service location is outside our service area On-site consultations are available for a $99 fee. Service calls where no service is performed are subject to a $99 service fee to cover time, travel costs as well as consultation. ​Any advertised promos are limited to 1 per customer/household. Must mention promo at time of booking. Offers may not be combined. Discounts apply to additional same day installs only. All installed services performed and equipment sales are final. Credit card transactions are subject to a 3.75% processing fee. Personal checks are not accepted.

The availability of curved-screen TV parts is also questionable, so replacing a part can be troublesome. If you’re facing any curved screen issues, get it checked physically. The best way to do it is by contacting a service center approved by Samsung company. Although, asking for a local repairman’s help might be a waste of time as curved TVs are uncommon compared to flat-screen TVs. What are the Pros and Cons of Curved TVs? Although some problems are meant to be fixed while watching curved TVs, it has some advantages that are worthy of your investment. Theater-like Display TV directors make screenplay as realistic as possible so the audience can have a lifelike experience. And curved TVs deliver it exceptionally on your home screen. Curved TVs were built to stimulate eye movement and replicate peripheral vision. Since your eyes sense the arc of the screen, the pictures become more three-dimensional and natural. It feels like you’re living inside the movie. Broader Field of View The slightly arched design of the curved screen offers you more space in your vision field. Although, it can only be experienced when you’re positioned in the right spot, the front and center. Sharpened Image Quality on the Edges The curved TVs track your eye shape, thereby making pictures seem to get sharper at the corners. I have been working in the electrical and Audio/Visual field for over 19 years. My focus for EagleTVMounting is to provide concise expertise in everything I write. The greatest joy in life is to provide people with insight information that can potentially change their viewpoints. Our #1 goal is just that! OUR PROMISE LEGAL: We are a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for us to earn fees by linking to Amazon.com and affiliated sites. As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases. $60 OFF special only applies to service orders and/or service requests over $400 in value.

yes

Product Design

Are curved TV screens better for viewing?

yes_statement

"curved" tv "screens" provide a "better" "viewing" experience.. "viewing" is enhanced with "curved" tv "screens".

https://www.deckersons.com/blog/samsung-curved-uhd-tv

Samsung Curved UHD TV is Your Front Row Seat to Everything ...

Samsung Curved UHD TV is Your Front Row Seat to Everything Samsung Curved UHD TV draws you into the picture and provides the ultimate immersive experience. It will enhance any design aesthetic and make sure every seat in the house is a great one. Discover the ultimate immersive experience with the new curved design and lifelike UHD 4K picture quality of the Samsung Smart HU9000 UHD TV. Samsung’s curved screen is supported with proprietary technology that creates an accurate picture with exceptional color, without any picture distortion. It has a dramatically improved field of view that creates a panoramic effect and helps the picture feel bigger. What does UHD Mean? UHD refers to the 4K picture quality. With four times the resolution of Full HD, you're completely immersed and part of every moment. Until you see it for yourself, it's hard to imagine the flawless picture quality that you will see with UHD TV. And, you can watch any movie, sport, show or streaming content at 4 times the resolution of full HD with UHD Upscaling. UHD Upscaling delivers the complete UHD picture experience with a proprietary process including signal analysis, noise reduction, UHD upscaling and detail enhancement to seamlessly upconvert SD, HD or full HD content to UHD-level picture quality. Samsung Makes UHD Even Better The Samsung Curved UHD TV is packed with features to enhance the Ultra High Definition viewing experience. The Auto Depth Enhancer analyze regions of each image and automatically adjusts the contrast for a greater sense of depth, creating greater detail and a more natural image. UHD Micro Dimming adjusts brightness to deliver deeper darks and brighter whites, eliminating distortion and giving a crystal clear image. PurColor allows for a more nuanced color spectrum and with Wide Color Enhancer Plus, you'll witness a wider spectrum of colors. You'll enjoy enriched colors while watching your favorite movies and shows and even older, non-HD content. Samsung UHD Curved TV Made for the Way You Live With intuitive controls, multiple screen viewing options, a smart remote, apps and smart interaction, the Samsung UHD TV adapts to you. With the Smart TV and Smart Hub, you can browse and organize your movies, videos, streaming content and live TV into a convenient and quick hub. And with the S-Recommendation, your TV will even help you out when you are looking for something new! Do it all on one screen. Transform your TV into four screens that can access four different sources of content. Watch live TV, video clips and the web all at once. Watch your favorite golf tournament on one screen and search the web for current standings on another. Then watch a video tutorial to master your swing while navigating your Smart TV panel on the fourth screen. Tired of using a remote? Intuitively control your TV using hand motions. Use them to browse the Smart Hub, play games and more with the built in pop-up camera. Voice Command lets you talk to the TV to search what’s on or to perform basic commands such as "last channel," "record" or "turn off." Want to share that video of your little angel? With Screen Mirroring, you can mirror your phone or other compatible mobile device's screen onto the TVs screen wirelessly. This feature allows you to use your big screen television instead of your device's smaller screen for showing content, media playback, or other function.

Samsung Curved UHD TV is Your Front Row Seat to Everything Samsung Curved UHD TV draws you into the picture and provides the ultimate immersive experience. It will enhance any design aesthetic and make sure every seat in the house is a great one. Discover the ultimate immersive experience with the new curved design and lifelike UHD 4K picture quality of the Samsung Smart HU9000 UHD TV. Samsung’s curved screen is supported with proprietary technology that creates an accurate picture with exceptional color, without any picture distortion. It has a dramatically improved field of view that creates a panoramic effect and helps the picture feel bigger. What does UHD Mean? UHD refers to the 4K picture quality. With four times the resolution of Full HD, you're completely immersed and part of every moment. Until you see it for yourself, it's hard to imagine the flawless picture quality that you will see with UHD TV. And, you can watch any movie, sport, show or streaming content at 4 times the resolution of full HD with UHD Upscaling. UHD Upscaling delivers the complete UHD picture experience with a proprietary process including signal analysis, noise reduction, UHD upscaling and detail enhancement to seamlessly upconvert SD, HD or full HD content to UHD-level picture quality. Samsung Makes UHD Even Better The Samsung Curved UHD TV is packed with features to enhance the Ultra High Definition viewing experience. The Auto Depth Enhancer analyze regions of each image and automatically adjusts the contrast for a greater sense of depth, creating greater detail and a more natural image. UHD Micro Dimming adjusts brightness to deliver deeper darks and brighter whites, eliminating distortion and giving a crystal clear image. PurColor allows for a more nuanced color spectrum and with Wide Color Enhancer Plus, you'll witness a wider spectrum of colors. You'll enjoy enriched colors while watching your favorite movies and shows and even older, non-HD content.

yes

Product Design

Are curved TV screens better for viewing?

yes_statement

"curved" tv "screens" provide a "better" "viewing" experience.. "viewing" is enhanced with "curved" tv "screens".

https://www.oled-info.com/lg-display-explains-why-curved-tv-preferable-flat-one

LG Display explains why a curved TV is preferable to a flat one ...

LG Display explains why a curved TV is preferable to a flat one When Samsung and LG released their curved OLED TVs (and later on curved LCDs as well), a lot of people didn't understand why is that good for. Most reviewers and consumers seem to prefer a flat design - which means you can hang the TV on the wall and it looks better. It seems that there's still a lot of confusion here, and today LG Display published an article that explains the advantages of curved TVs (it also details the company's flexible OLED technology). According to LG, there are several such advantages. First of all, the Curved OLED TV can enhance the viewer’s immersive experience with its curved form. The screen "wraps around the viewer" and so there's a comfortable feeling of stability and immersion. LG explains that the curved screen has a curved trajectory similar to a person’s ‘Horopter Line’ allowing the maintenance of a constant focus. The second advantage is the distance to the viewer is constant (unlike a flat TV in which the middle is closer than the edges). This means that in a flat TV there's a subtle image and color distortion which does not happen in a curved panel. The larger the flat screen and the closer the distance from the screen, the distortion becomes more noticeable. The final advantage is that a curved screen feels larger and brighter compared to a flat TV. This, again, enhances the viewing experience. LGD says that a viewer will feel that the size of a curved TV screen is larger than its actual size. Curved OLED TV also feels brighter because the light coming from the screen is focused on the center of the screen. Comments First of all: Either people see for themselves that a curved TV provides a better picture or they don't. If you have to explain why the picture SHOULD look better it is time to rething your business model. At least that's the way I see it. Second of all: The article basically uses a lot of scientific wording, but does not provide any real data. All that stuff about the Horopter Line is true, the only question is what dimension does the display have to be and what viewing distances are we talking in order to actually see a difference. In the picture you posted the guy is sitting like 50 cm in front of a huge display...of course in that scenario a curved display would help. Problem is that this is a completely unrealistic scenario. The real question is how much improvement do I get when I sit 2-3 meters away from a 55-60" TV? Marketing, marketing, marketing....The TV biz is all about product differentiation,especially when it is in a relatively slow growth mode. LG is pushing its advantage over Samsung in the OLED TV space to create a 'leader' status. Curved TV is a very modest improvement on flat panel screens, but give it to the marketing guys and it becomes a new TV category, and potentially a way to differentiate an LG product (and hopefully extract a premium from buyers, which is the ultimate end game). What I want is a less expensive OLED TV. If that means that LG uses some of the 'curved TV' marketing money to further their manufacturing R&D, it would likely have a greater financial benefit down the road. Selling a few more $6000 OLED TVs that are produced on a very expensive pilot line is moot relative to developing a clear manufacturing path to a relatively inexpensive large screen OLED process. Yes, LG would be the 'big dog' in a very small market currently, but what about 2-3 years down the road? Is Samsung asleep, or are they laying low until they have improved the process enough to make money? Hard to tell, but they did it with small panels while everyone said it would never be cost effective, and now its their most profitable display business... As far as I know none of the big display producers are earning real money with the rund of the mill mass produced displays anymore. Overcapacity and the resulting price erosion made sure of that. What they need is something for which people are willing to pay an affordable premium (as was the case early on in the flat panel market). Over the last couple of years they put their hopes in 3D which backfired big time as very few people were willing to pay extra for this. Now they are betting on 4K technology and / or OLED. However whether or not people are actually willing to pay a sufficiently high premium for this remains to be seen. Personally I wouldn't pay extra for 4K while I might be willing to pay some premium for OLED (certainly not $6000 though). The only people who this might appeal to are those who are capable of understanding what LG is saying, and yet I cannot help but feel that those who are capable of understanding LG's marketing blather will not be sold by it. For the vast majority of viewing scenarios in my home, more than one person will be looking at the display at any one time. A set that has a singular "sweet spot" is not practical in those situations. I personally think that LG should stop trying to differentiate themselves based on technobabble that will sell only to those who think it is better. The trouble is that people who think it is better probably cannot afford it. When prices get lower, I'll buy a big OLED, but it will not be curved. In our viewing room the monitor is more than 15 feet away from the viewer. At that distance a 60" monitor would be curved only 10 degrees - enough to make the monitor difficult to mount but hardly enough of a curve to provide "properly focused light" or an "emmersive experience". At most, one person can enjoy the purported benefits of this viewing experience. If a couple is watching a movie then neither is at the exact optimal location no matter how close they sit. I've been waiting for OLED TVs since I first heard about the possibility in the 1990s. I've followed their excruciatingly slow progress to market, thinking every year that they were just around the corner. Now they're here, and from all reports are everything I thought they'd be in terms of picture quality. The only thing holding me back from getting one at this point, besides price, is that both LG and Samsung have chosen to use curved screens on their initial models. What were they thinking? If I wanted something that only worked for one viewer at a time, I'd get a head mounted display, instead of a 60" screen. Maybe by the time prices come down, they'll have come to their senses, and be offering something that works in the real world. The description provided by the people is not for them to "re-think" their business model as you said. Their business model was developed by running many scitific experiments and knowing what will work best. The explanation is for the viewers to understand why one __may__ feel better over the other one. Of course, at the end it is user's choice to go with flat or curved. However, there are users that like to figure out what's the difference between a curved and flat - I feel this was for those people and not to convince people of anything. Geomatrically (and I am sure I will hear a whole lot about it just about now), the shortest distance is almost always preferred because that gives you a better viewing experience. We as human being can definitely see things that are close to us than things that are at a larger distance. So, a curve creates that shortest distance and keeps the viewer at a constant length from the object, which provides a good experience for the viewer. Your question at the end is also a good one. I'd also love to know about an optimal distance. But I think that's really a viewer's call based on many different factors - Price of the TV Size of the TV Size of the room Where you want to place your couch / chair to watch TV What's your mood on a particular sunday when you wanna watch Giant that could be different from watching Packers How would you go about figureing out an optimal distance for a TV. Mathematically you could come up with an optimal distance for a TV, but some other person like yourself might just want to go with what they feel. So, while mathematically there is an optimal distance, yet that will be different from one person to another person based on their vision capacity. H8rz, epic mee-meez - how about you come back when you're a big boy. You probably own a 17" BENQ monitor and watch everything thorugh your PC or other eye raping compromise. Curved screens possibly can fill your periphery and are great if you have one cinema or even wall sized ... or enjoy having your nose to the 55" glass. The rest is marketron drivel (a little bit of science, a lot of bull crap). OLED out-classes Plasma and LED in contrast and viewing angle - two things that actually matter if you're not a lone in a small dark room. Thin, big OELD screens will sell themselves on those merits and price drop from mass production. Not pointless curviture. And if you do not sit exactly in the center but instead on the right side, the right panel side is curved away from you so it is much more distorted for you then! This way it is only ideal for ONE viewer at a time right in the center of it! And the second disadvantage about curved display is, that flat lines turn curved aswell! Since the corners are closer to you than the middle part, lines are distorted now instead of truly flat! Curved is such a bullshit I can't believe it that they produced such a crap... Typical Korean design mentality. Make the product and launch without real market testing. If I'm spending premium dollars for an OLED display there are two things I'm expecting. Thin depth and fantastic picutre quality. Curving the display adds to the overall depth and does not benefit picture quality unless everyone is sitting exactly at centre of the curved radius. Thin is more important. The idea of hanging your TV on your wall like a picture frame the most attractive feature of OLED TV. Somewhere the Korean engineering leadership has lost their way. "Look what I can do.." has overtaken the market primary needs. Focus on flat TV that can hang on the wall using a piano wire (like a picture) and its a winner. Invest in a design that enables power and signal connectivity without adding depth. Forget curved...... waste of time. All those factors you cite about optimal distance are true for flat screens, but not for curved screens. The explanation from LG makes it clear: The curved screens are designed for one (or one couple) to sit and watch optimally, and only if they have their room set up to sit in one specific, optimal spot. So.... It turns upside down the old methods of choosing a TV. Instead of setting up a living room in the best way possible for your own living, you buy a TV, then measure out where to put the couch, and then put everything else around that. Furthermore, it's the particular curve of the TV is what determines that optimal spot. Looking at the curves on these units, it seems that optimal position is relatively close to the screen so if you have a largish living room then it's unlikely that *anyone* will get that optimal veiwing. And heaven help people who're sitting too far to one side. Or people who have multiple spots that they like to sit in, depending on what's on or what else is going on. I'd LOVE to buy a new OLED TV, the picture looks fantastic, but this curved nonsense is just silly. I want it thin and flat so I can mount it on the wall. Curved is nothing but a gimmick, we spent decades trying to make TVs as flat as possible and now they're curving it the other way just to get a novel appearance.

Thin, big OELD screens will sell themselves on those merits and price drop from mass production. Not pointless curviture. And if you do not sit exactly in the center but instead on the right side, the right panel side is curved away from you so it is much more distorted for you then! This way it is only ideal for ONE viewer at a time right in the center of it! And the second disadvantage about curved display is, that flat lines turn curved aswell! Since the corners are closer to you than the middle part, lines are distorted now instead of truly flat! Curved is such a bullshit I can't believe it that they produced such a crap... Typical Korean design mentality. Make the product and launch without real market testing. If I'm spending premium dollars for an OLED display there are two things I'm expecting. Thin depth and fantastic picutre quality. Curving the display adds to the overall depth and does not benefit picture quality unless everyone is sitting exactly at centre of the curved radius. Thin is more important. The idea of hanging your TV on your wall like a picture frame the most attractive feature of OLED TV. Somewhere the Korean engineering leadership has lost their way. "Look what I can do.." has overtaken the market primary needs. Focus on flat TV that can hang on the wall using a piano wire (like a picture) and its a winner. Invest in a design that enables power and signal connectivity without adding depth. Forget curved...... waste of time. All those factors you cite about optimal distance are true for flat screens, but not for curved screens. The explanation from LG makes it clear: The curved screens are designed for one (or one couple) to sit and watch optimally, and only if they have their room set up to sit in one specific, optimal spot. So.... It turns upside down the old methods of choosing a TV. Instead of setting up a living room in the best way possible for your own living, you buy a TV, then measure out where to put the couch, and then put everything else around that.

no

Seismology

Are earthquakes more likely during full moons?

yes_statement

"earthquakes" are more "likely" during full "moons".. full "moons" increase the likelihood of "earthquakes".

https://www.nature.com/articles/nature.2016.20551

Moon's pull can trigger big earthquakes | Nature

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript. Moon’s pull can trigger big earthquakes Subjects Geologic strain of tides during full and new moons could increase magnitude of tremors. The seaside town of Pelluhue, Chile, in 2010 after a magnitude 8.8 earthquake and the resulting tsunami. Credit: Joe Raedle/Getty Images Big earthquakes, such as the ones that devastated Chile in 2010 and Japan in 2011, are more likely to occur during full and new moons — the two times each month when tidal stresses are highest. Earth’s tides, which are caused by a gravitational tug-of-war involving the Moon and the Sun, put extra strain on geological faults. Seismologists have tried for decades to understand whether that stress could trigger quakes. They generally agree that the ocean’s twice-daily high tides can affect tiny, slow-motion tremors in certain places, including California’s San Andreas fault1 and the Cascadia region2 of the North American west coast. But a new study, published on 12 September in Nature Geoscience3, looks at much larger patterns involving the twice-monthly tides that occur during full and new moons. It finds that the fraction of high magnitude earthquakes goes up globally as tidal stresses rise. Satoshi Ide, a seismologist at the University of Tokyo, and his colleagues investigated three separate earthquake records covering Japan, California and the entire globe. For the 15 days leading up to each quake, the scientists assigned a number representing the relative tidal stress on that day, with 15 representing the highest. They found that large quakes such as those that hit Chile and Tohoku-Oki occurred near the time of maximum tidal strain — or during new and full moons when the Sun, Moon and Earth align. For more than 10,000 earthquakes of around magnitude 5.5, the researchers found, an earthquake that began during a time of high tidal stress was more likely to grow to magnitude 8 or above. Breaking point A lone pine tree that survived the 2011 earthquake and tsunami in Japan. Credit: The Asahi Shimbun via Getty Images “This is a very innovative way to address this long-debated issue,” says Honn Kao, a seismologist at the Geological Survey of Canada and Natural Resources Canada in Sidney. “It gives us some sense into the possible relationship between tidal stress and the occurrence of big earthquakes.” Perhaps the miniscule added strain of tides, he says, could be the final factor that nudges a geological fault into rupturing. The current study will not be the final word on the matter, adds Kao. There are just too many factors that contribute to triggering an earthquake — such as how stress transfers within the ground to cause a geological fault to move — to untangle exactly what role tides might have. But “the results are plausible”, says John Vidale, a seismologist at the University of Washington in Seattle who helped to debunk some of the more tenuous tide–earthquake claims4. “They’ve done a very careful job.” The discovery does not affect how societies should prepare for possible earthquakes, says Ide. Even if slightly enhanced by the tides, the probability of a quake happening on any particular day in an earthquake-prone region remains very low. “It’s too small to take some actions,” he says. Ide is now looking at an additional list of earthquakes that occur where plates with oceanic crust plunge beneath continental crust, to see if the pattern holds up there as well.

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript. Moon’s pull can trigger big earthquakes Subjects Geologic strain of tides during full and new moons could increase magnitude of tremors. The seaside town of Pelluhue, Chile, in 2010 after a magnitude 8.8 earthquake and the resulting tsunami. Credit: Joe Raedle/Getty Images Big earthquakes, such as the ones that devastated Chile in 2010 and Japan in 2011, are more likely to occur during full and new moons — the two times each month when tidal stresses are highest. Earth’s tides, which are caused by a gravitational tug-of-war involving the Moon and the Sun, put extra strain on geological faults. Seismologists have tried for decades to understand whether that stress could trigger quakes. They generally agree that the ocean’s twice-daily high tides can affect tiny, slow-motion tremors in certain places, including California’s San Andreas fault1 and the Cascadia region2 of the North American west coast. But a new study, published on 12 September in Nature Geoscience3, looks at much larger patterns involving the twice-monthly tides that occur during full and new moons. It finds that the fraction of high magnitude earthquakes goes up globally as tidal stresses rise. Satoshi Ide, a seismologist at the University of Tokyo, and his colleagues investigated three separate earthquake records covering Japan, California and the entire globe. For the 15 days leading up to each quake, the scientists assigned a number representing the relative tidal stress on that day, with 15 representing the highest. They found that large quakes such as those that hit Chile and Tohoku-Oki occurred near the time of maximum tidal strain — or during new and full moons when the Sun, Moon and Earth align.

yes

Seismology

Are earthquakes more likely during full moons?

yes_statement

"earthquakes" are more "likely" during full "moons".. full "moons" increase the likelihood of "earthquakes".

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2105489-full-and-new-moons-linked-to-timing-of-largest-deadliest-quakes/

Full and new moons linked to timing of largest, deadliest quakes ...

Full and new moons linked to timing of largest, deadliest quakes Chalk another one up for the weird effects of the moon. Full and new moons seem to make earthquakes more likely – at least the largest, most devastating quakes. Although the effect is too small to make much difference in preparing for earthquakes in the short term, the discovery could some day provide key insights into the ways that they develop and grow. During full and new moons, the sun, moon and Earth align, meaning that gravity tugs more strongly on the planet’s crustal plates. The resulting “Earth tides” and increased tidal movements in the oceans can add to the stresses on earthquake faults. Advertisement It therefore seems plausible that they might make the faults more likely to slip. A few studies have previously found hints that this might be true, but the effect of the tides has barely been detectable. Now Satoshi Ide and his colleagues at the University of Tokyo, Japan, have found a clearer link. They analysed the size of tidal stresses in the two weeks prior to large earthquakes, with a magnitude of 5.5 or greater, over the past two decades. In contrast, smaller quakes showed no tendency to cluster at these times. When the researchers looked more closely, they found that on days with high stress, earthquakes are more likely to be large than at times of lower stress around the half-moon. This may be because the increased stress gives an extra boost to slipping faults, allowing a small slip to spread into a larger rupture, they suggest. Scientific tremor Other seismologists are cautiously excited about Ide’s results. “It’s a very interesting and intriguing observation. If it’s right, it’s a very big deal,” says Emily Brodsky, an earthquake physicist at the University of California, Santa Cruz. However, she notes that the sample size of just a dozen earthquakes is tiny for such an important result. Seismologists may have to wait for more great quakes to see whether the pattern holds, she says. Even if further results bear out Ide’s pattern, it may have little practical effect. The risk of an earthquake on any given day is already tiny, so a slight increase or decrease based on the phase of the moon is unlikely to alter preparations or planning, says John Vidale, a seismologist at the University of Washington in Seattle. Instead, learning about the moon’s tidal kick-start may help seismologists understand how small ruptures progress into larger earthquakes, says Brodsky — which could eventually pay off with better predictions.

Full and new moons linked to timing of largest, deadliest quakes Chalk another one up for the weird effects of the moon. Full and new moons seem to make earthquakes more likely – at least the largest, most devastating quakes. Although the effect is too small to make much difference in preparing for earthquakes in the short term, the discovery could some day provide key insights into the ways that they develop and grow. During full and new moons, the sun, moon and Earth align, meaning that gravity tugs more strongly on the planet’s crustal plates. The resulting “Earth tides” and increased tidal movements in the oceans can add to the stresses on earthquake faults. Advertisement It therefore seems plausible that they might make the faults more likely to slip. A few studies have previously found hints that this might be true, but the effect of the tides has barely been detectable. Now Satoshi Ide and his colleagues at the University of Tokyo, Japan, have found a clearer link. They analysed the size of tidal stresses in the two weeks prior to large earthquakes, with a magnitude of 5.5 or greater, over the past two decades. In contrast, smaller quakes showed no tendency to cluster at these times. When the researchers looked more closely, they found that on days with high stress, earthquakes are more likely to be large than at times of lower stress around the half-moon. This may be because the increased stress gives an extra boost to slipping faults, allowing a small slip to spread into a larger rupture, they suggest. Scientific tremor Other seismologists are cautiously excited about Ide’s results. “It’s a very interesting and intriguing observation. If it’s right, it’s a very big deal,” says Emily Brodsky, an earthquake physicist at the University of California, Santa Cruz. However, she notes that the sample size of just a dozen earthquakes is tiny for such an important result. Seismologists may have to wait for more great quakes to see whether the pattern holds, she says.

yes

Seismology

Are earthquakes more likely during full moons?

yes_statement

"earthquakes" are more "likely" during full "moons".. full "moons" increase the likelihood of "earthquakes".

https://www.usatoday.com/story/tech/sciencefair/2016/09/12/full-moon-high-tides-earthquakes/90259216/

Study: Full moon can trigger big earthquakes

Study: Full moon can trigger big earthquakes Could California's long-dreaded "Big One" be triggered by a full moon? Perhaps, says a new study out Monday that claims large earthquakes are more likely during unusually high tides, which occur during full and new moons. High tides, which typically occur twice a day, are caused when ocean water is moved by the gravitational pull of the moon. But twice a month, during a full or new moon, tides are especially high because the moon, earth and sun all line up together. (These twice-monthly tides are known as "spring" tides.) Big quakes can occur when this additional weight of tidal water strains geological faults, according to the study. Though this theory is not new, this is the first study to display a firm, statistical link. Precisely how large earthquakes occur is not fully understood, but scientists say they may grow via a cascading process where a tiny fracture builds up into a large-scale rupture. If so, the authors’ results imply that the likelihood of a small fracture cascading into a large earthquake are greater during high tides. The study was led by Satoshi Ide, a seismologist at the University of Tokyo and appeared in the peer-reviewed British journal Nature Geoscience. Ide found that some of the most devastating recent earthquakes, such as the 2004 Sumatra quake that killed 230,000 people and the 2011 quake in Japan that killed 15,000, both hit during periods of high tide. In fact, his research team determined that nine of the 12 biggest quakes on record happened near or on days with full or new moons. The scientists found no clear correlation between high tides and small earthquakes. The study could help improve earthquake forecasting, the authors say, in places that are especially vulnerable to high seismic activity "Scientists will find this result, if confirmed, quite interesting," said University of Washington seismologist John Vidale, who was not part of the study. He cautions that "even if there is a strong correlation of big earthquakes with full or new moons, the chance any given week of a deadly earthquake remains miniscule," making predictions rather unhelpful. The study's other authors are Suguru Yabe and Yoshiyuki Tanaka, also of the University of Tokyo.

Study: Full moon can trigger big earthquakes Could California's long-dreaded "Big One" be triggered by a full moon? Perhaps, says a new study out Monday that claims large earthquakes are more likely during unusually high tides, which occur during full and new moons. High tides, which typically occur twice a day, are caused when ocean water is moved by the gravitational pull of the moon. But twice a month, during a full or new moon, tides are especially high because the moon, earth and sun all line up together. (These twice-monthly tides are known as "spring" tides.) Big quakes can occur when this additional weight of tidal water strains geological faults, according to the study. Though this theory is not new, this is the first study to display a firm, statistical link. Precisely how large earthquakes occur is not fully understood, but scientists say they may grow via a cascading process where a tiny fracture builds up into a large-scale rupture. If so, the authors’ results imply that the likelihood of a small fracture cascading into a large earthquake are greater during high tides. The study was led by Satoshi Ide, a seismologist at the University of Tokyo and appeared in the peer-reviewed British journal Nature Geoscience. Ide found that some of the most devastating recent earthquakes, such as the 2004 Sumatra quake that killed 230,000 people and the 2011 quake in Japan that killed 15,000, both hit during periods of high tide. In fact, his research team determined that nine of the 12 biggest quakes on record happened near or on days with full or new moons. The scientists found no clear correlation between high tides and small earthquakes. The study could help improve earthquake forecasting, the authors say, in places that are especially vulnerable to high seismic activity "Scientists will find this result, if confirmed, quite interesting," said University of Washington seismologist John Vidale, who was not part of the study.

yes

Seismology

Are earthquakes more likely during full moons?

yes_statement

"earthquakes" are more "likely" during full "moons".. full "moons" increase the likelihood of "earthquakes".

https://www.voanews.com/a/mht-moon-phases-linked-to-big-quakes/3504520.html

Moon Phases Linked to Big Quakes

Follow Us Moon Phases Linked to Big Quakes FILE - Seagulls fly as the full moon rises behind the ancient marble Temple of Poseidon at Cape Sounion, southeast of Athens, on the eve of the summer solstice, June 20, 2016. Share Moon Phases Linked to Big Quakes share Full moons may cause bigger earthquakes, according to a new study. Researchers at the University of Tokyo say large quakes are more likely during high tides, which happen twice a day. During high tides, the oceans are pulled by the moon’s gravity, but during a full and new moon, twice a month, the tides are particularly high, especially when the moon, sun and Earth line up. “The probability of a tiny rock failure expanding to a gigantic rupture increases with increasing tidal stress levels,” the researchers wrote on an article that appeared in the British journal Nature Geoscience. While the theory is not new, the study is the first to find a statistical link between the moon and earthquakes. For example, the researchers found that the 2004 Sumatra quake as well as a major 2011 quake in Japan both happened during high tides. The researchers say nine of the 12 biggest quakes ever recorded were timed with full or new moons. The findings could help with earthquake forecasting, especially in places like Japan where earthquakes are common. "Scientists will find this result, if confirmed, quite interesting," said University of Washington seismologist John Vidale, who was not involved in the study. But he added that "even if there is a strong correlation of big earthquakes with full or new moons, the chance any given week of a deadly earthquake remains miniscule."

Follow Us Moon Phases Linked to Big Quakes FILE - Seagulls fly as the full moon rises behind the ancient marble Temple of Poseidon at Cape Sounion, southeast of Athens, on the eve of the summer solstice, June 20, 2016. Share Moon Phases Linked to Big Quakes share Full moons may cause bigger earthquakes, according to a new study. Researchers at the University of Tokyo say large quakes are more likely during high tides, which happen twice a day. During high tides, the oceans are pulled by the moon’s gravity, but during a full and new moon, twice a month, the tides are particularly high, especially when the moon, sun and Earth line up. “The probability of a tiny rock failure expanding to a gigantic rupture increases with increasing tidal stress levels,” the researchers wrote on an article that appeared in the British journal Nature Geoscience. While the theory is not new, the study is the first to find a statistical link between the moon and earthquakes. For example, the researchers found that the 2004 Sumatra quake as well as a major 2011 quake in Japan both happened during high tides. The researchers say nine of the 12 biggest quakes ever recorded were timed with full or new moons. The findings could help with earthquake forecasting, especially in places like Japan where earthquakes are common. "Scientists will find this result, if confirmed, quite interesting," said University of Washington seismologist John Vidale, who was not involved in the study. But he added that "even if there is a strong correlation of big earthquakes with full or new moons, the chance any given week of a deadly earthquake remains miniscule."

yes

Seismology

Are earthquakes more likely during full moons?

yes_statement

"earthquakes" are more "likely" during full "moons".. full "moons" increase the likelihood of "earthquakes".

https://temblor.net/earthquake-insights/1417-1417/

Could a solar eclipse cause an earthquake? - Temblor.net

Could a solar eclipse cause an earthquake? Originally published on: September 12, 2016 Could the alignment of the moon really be a key to unlocking when large earthquakes will occur? Today’s solar eclipse is the first one to cross the entire United States since 1918. (Photo from: almanac.com) Starting at 10:15 a.m. on the West Coast, millions of Americans will begin to take in the first solar eclipse to cross the entire country since 1918. In total, it will take the eclipse approximately 90 minutes to cross the country, in an event that has drawn people from all over the globe. Even though eclipses happen about every 18 months, this one is the most accessible to Americans in 38 years. However, if you miss this one, the next total solar eclipse to cross the US will be on April 8, 2024. For the town of Carbondale, Illinois, residents are lucky enough to be in the path of totality for both today’s eclipse, and the one in seven years. One question that frequently comes up in Google searches is whether or not an eclipse could cause an earthquake. While the eclipse itself is unlikely to cause an earthquake, the increased tidal stresses during a new moon, which is required for a solar eclipse, could slightly increase the likelihood of a large earthquake. In an article published last year in Nature Geoscience, tidal reconstructions done by a team of Japanese scientists appear to show that large subduction zones are highly sensitive to changes from tidal stresses. By analyzing and simulating tides in the two weeks prior to large events (e.g. 2004 Sumatra, 2010 Chile, and 2011 Tohoku), they found that the earthquakes tended to occur at times of maximum stress (During full or new moons). As can be seen from the above image, the 2004 M=9.3 Sumatra earthquake occurred during a period of maximum tidal shear stress. In total, the Japanese team found that of the 12 largest earthquakes ever recorded, nine fell on or near days with full or new moons. For comparison, 1 kPa is equivalent to 1.5 ounces/square inch. In other words, it is extremely small, but applied over an extremely large area. The Japanese team, led by Dr. Satoshi Ide, is not predicting when earthquakes will occur. However they are suggesting when large magnitude earthquakes are slightly more likely to occur. They are quick to point out though that this study only applies to large magnitude earthquakes and that a relationship between tidal stress and smaller magnitude earthquakes remains “elusive.” Nonetheless, the large earthquakes they examined caused huge damage and resulted in significant loss of life. The devastating 2011 Tohoku earthquake and ensuing tsunami caused billions of dollars of damage and the deaths of thousands. The study published last year suggests that tidal stresses could influence large magnitude earthquakes. Photo from SFDEM While tidal influence on earthquakes has been debated since the 19th century, most scientists remain unconvinced. This is largely due to the difficulty in producing reliable data, as well as the fact that tides impart such as small amount of stress when compared to tectonic forces. However, this study is one of the few to show a statistical link, and turned heads. In an interview with USA Today, University of Washington seismologist Dr. John Vidale said, “Scientists will find this result, if confirmed, quite interesting.” However, just because scientists find something interesting does not mean they will jump on the bandwagon. Additionally, Vidale pointed out that because the likelihood of deadly earthquakes occurring on a weekly basis is so infinitesimal, this study won’t help with predictions. Furthermore, even if a clear correlation is found, it is unlikely the information will be able to be used in a practical sense. Mark Quigley, University of Melbourne associate professor in active tectonics and geomorphology, and this author’s former supervisor, said in an interview that he doesn’t see any practical use “in the context of coastal seismic hazard and public safety,” especially when compared to building codes and tsunami evacuation plans. This is likely true as evacuating coastal regions during times of increased tidal stress is unlikely to catch on. Despite this caveat, this study does lend itself towards potentially opening a door in determining when and how subduction zone earthquakes occur. It is likely that from this work, greater attention will be given to tidal stresses when assessing when earthquakes occur. However, if you are lucky enough to be in the path of totality during today’s solar eclipse, do not think about earthquakes, just enjoy the surreal experience of being plunged into darkness during the middle of the day. Privacy Overview This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience.

One question that frequently comes up in Google searches is whether or not an eclipse could cause an earthquake. While the eclipse itself is unlikely to cause an earthquake, the increased tidal stresses during a new moon, which is required for a solar eclipse, could slightly increase the likelihood of a large earthquake. In an article published last year in Nature Geoscience, tidal reconstructions done by a team of Japanese scientists appear to show that large subduction zones are highly sensitive to changes from tidal stresses. By analyzing and simulating tides in the two weeks prior to large events (e.g. 2004 Sumatra, 2010 Chile, and 2011 Tohoku), they found that the earthquakes tended to occur at times of maximum stress (During full or new moons). As can be seen from the above image, the 2004 M=9.3 Sumatra earthquake occurred during a period of maximum tidal shear stress. In total, the Japanese team found that of the 12 largest earthquakes ever recorded, nine fell on or near days with full or new moons. For comparison, 1 kPa is equivalent to 1.5 ounces/square inch. In other words, it is extremely small, but applied over an extremely large area. The Japanese team, led by Dr. Satoshi Ide, is not predicting when earthquakes will occur. However they are suggesting when large magnitude earthquakes are slightly more likely to occur. They are quick to point out though that this study only applies to large magnitude earthquakes and that a relationship between tidal stress and smaller magnitude earthquakes remains “elusive.” Nonetheless, the large earthquakes they examined caused huge damage and resulted in significant loss of life. The devastating 2011 Tohoku earthquake and ensuing tsunami caused billions of dollars of damage and the deaths of thousands. The study published last year suggests that tidal stresses could influence large magnitude earthquakes. Photo from SFDEM While tidal influence on earthquakes has been debated since the 19th century, most scientists remain unconvinced.

yes

Seismology

Are earthquakes more likely during full moons?

yes_statement

"earthquakes" are more "likely" during full "moons".. full "moons" increase the likelihood of "earthquakes".

https://www.wired.com/2013/05/earthquakes-patterns-and-predictions/

Earthquakes, Patterns and Predictions | WIRED

Earthquakes, Patterns and Predictions Collapse portion of the Bay Bridge, brought down by the 1989 Loma Prieta earthquake. Can we predict earthquakes using current technology and information, or are we merely looking for patterns that aren't there?Photo: US Geological Society Patterns, Patterns Everywhere Yesterday's post was a ringer. What you were actually looking at was a random distribution of earthquakes that I generated using the R statistical package. The earthquakes themselves are real (at least the magnitude), representing the 3,776 earthquakes over magnitude 4 between January 1 and May 24. However, I had R assign a random day between 1 and 144 (1/1-5/24) to each earthquake. Many of you saw through my ruse, but did some of you start to convince yourself that there was a coherent pattern in this data? Maybe that some of the larger earthquakes occurred within a few days of the new moon? Maybe that lulls were happening during full moons? Did it seem plausible? That is because humans love to find patterns, especially in large data sets. We don't even know we're doing it (notice how Mary can show up on a potato chip?) Yet, here we are, always looking for patterns and an explain for the distribution of events or objects. In geology, there is probably no bigger a subject than "pattern recognition" (or lack thereof) in earthquake prediction, to the point that some claim they can predict when and where an earthquake will strike. Sadly, we just can't do that with our current technology and knowledge of the Earth, but people still fall prey to believing in these false patterns. Human brains are good at seeing patterns, whether it be to see the ripe fruits to pick in a tree, to notice the snake ready to strike or to see that elephant in the sky when you're looking at clouds. Our ancestors were those who survived and thrived because they were able to see the patterns in their environment to find food, avoid predators, and get a mate. One idea is that our brains want to see patterns, even false ones, so as not to miss the right pattern when it comes along -- because if you miss that pattern for "snake", you might end up dead. This ability mixed with culture became superstition, which in itself is pattern recognition, although the patterns can be false. Work by Foster and Kokko (2009) models the behavior of people when it comes to superstitious beliefs (i.e., patterns that are false) and found that people should be apt to accept a false pattern if the cost of accepting that pattern is lower than the cost of not accepting the false pattern. Foster and Kokko (2009) sum this up by saying: The evolutionary rationale for superstition is clear: natural selection will favour strategies that make many incorrect causal associations in order to establish those that are essential for survival and reproduction ... the inability of individuals—human or otherwise—to assign causal probabilities to all sets of events that occur around them will often force them to lump causal associations with non-causal ones **Or, in other words, it is better to believe wrong and right things (and thus get all the right things) than accidentally miss some of the right things. For example, many traditional cultures have pregnancy taboos. Many pregnancies don't make it, and the causes aren't often clear. However, people try to see some sort of pattern. It is low cost to believe that women should not eat certain foods, avoid the full moon, and never butcher an alligator if any of those things just might aid in the survival of her child. Low cost for believing in some good and some bad stuff in trade for high evolutionary rewards. Thus, cultures adopt taboos for pregnant women that may seem silly, because it was difficult to see which of the few taboos actually has a causal relationship (if any). Granny wants you to do them all, just to be on the safe side. So, your brain is hypersensitive to patterns because you inherited this ability from your ancestors. If great great great Grandma Ape wasn't hyper about patterns, she wouldn't have survived long enough to be your ancestor. However, the cost is that we tend to try to see things that aren't always there. That is what happened when you looked at the random 2013 earthquake data. We can't actually see the causal probabilities for the distribution of earthquakes because they are so complex, so instead we try to fit them to easier relationships, like the phase of the moon. This might help explain why people will believe in their own method to predict earthquakes/eruptions or believe other's models without adequate understanding. There have been a number of studies into why people believe conspiracies (again, a pattern that has a false basis) or see patterns when none exist. We all want to see patterns in the data, events or objects, but sometimes the pattern isn't there or it is contained in much more complex layers that can be difficult or impossible to understand based on our current level of information about the processes involved. The Real 2013 Earthquake Distribution Now, here is the real distribution (honestly), with some of the largest (M7+) earthquakes labeled: USGS Earthquake data . That is a lot of M4+ earthquakes -- 3,776 to be exact. So that means each day, there are, on average, ~26 magnitude 4 or larger earthquakes on the planet. This means anyone who claims that we're likely to have an earthquake on Earth on a given day is right -- we are (it just isn't very predictive). Now, most of the earthquakes are M4-5, so noticeable to the region near the earthquake but rarely devastating, but wow, just the normal seismicity of the planet is remarkable. There are a few things you can notice in this real dataset. First, it isn't a true random probability distribution -- that earthquakes are really randomly distributed through time. This is likely due to clusters of foreshocks and aftershocks associated with large earthquakes. Just look at the peak around the M8 Tonga earthquake (on February 6 - Day 37) -- there are many more earthquakes in the day before and after than any other 2-3 period of 2013. However, as Eneva and Hamburger (1989) concluded in a study looking at earthquakes in Central Asia, it you remove the fore/aftershocks of large earthquakes from any earthquake distribution, the rest of the earthquakes are randomly distributed through time. Now, there are many who want to ascribe predictive powers to the moon phase or distance when it comes to earthquake distributions. Let's take a look at those graphs: All M4+ earthquakes between January 1 and May 24, 2013. The lunar phases are listed above the earthquakes, with open circles = full moon, crossed circles = new moons. Graph by Erik Klemetti using USGS earthquake data. Here (above) are the earthquakes with moon phases listed along the top. There is no clear match between new or full moons and the occurrence of earthquakes or their magnitude. There are some new moons (such as in February) where activity when up, but also new moons (such as in March) where nothing changed. If you want to construct a predictive model, that doesn't bode well. Kennedy and others (2004) did a statistical test of this "syzygy" and found no correlation between moon phase and earthquakes in the San Francisco area -- at least not enough to make it anything close to a predictive tool for earthquakes. Earth tides -- the result of flexing of the Earth's crust due to the gravitational relationship between the Earth and the Moon (think ocean tides) -- does seem to play some role in trigger some earthquakes, but as Cochran and others (2004) and Metivier and others (2009) found, it is only during the strongest of those tides and only on small, shallow earthquakes. So, it seems that something as simple as moon phases cannot be used to predict when and where an earthquake will occur. All M4+ earthquakes between January 1 and May 24, 2013. Lunar distance is marked across the top, with up triangles = perigee (closest), down triangles = apogee (farthest). Graph by Erik Klemetti using USGS data. This figure (above) is earthquakes with lunar perigee (nearest) and apogee (farthest) positions marked. Much like the moon phases, there are no matches between the number and magnitude of earthquakes and the moon's distance from the Earth. I discussed why this is likely true when we've had the so-called "Supermoon" that people where saying would cause a sharp increase in earthquakes and eruptions (hey look, we survived!) What both of these two plots suggest is that the distribution of earthquakes is not likely to be controlled by something as simple as lunar phase or distance. Predicting Earthquakes We could go on with a list of all sorts of external variables: solar flare activity, alignment of planets, gamma ray bursts, whatever. What becomes clear is that earthquake occurrence is likely much more dependent on the state of stresses on individual faults within the Earth rather than any forces coming from outside the Earth. Now, to anyone trying to predict earthquakes, this revelation must be maddening because the phase of the moon or solar flares are easy to observe (and use as a predictor). However, the state of stress on a fault at 50 km depth beneath Tibet? That is something we don't know and can't know with our current level of technology. Remember, the focus (hypocenter) of most earthquakes are at depths of tens to hundreds of kilometers below the surface, and we humans have only drilled into the uppermost few kilometers of the planet. Collecting data that can tell us the state of stress on all the known active faults alone is far beyond our current capabilities -- and that is exactly what we need to be able to make accurate predictions of when an earthquake will occur on a given fault. As Geller (1997) and Geller and others (1997) conclude, we haven't even come close to developing a reliable (and believable) method for predicting earthquakes. All of this adds up to this simple statement: prediction of earthquakes is currently impossible. Does this mean that the quest to predict earthquakes (or future eruptions, for that matter) is in vain? Well, that becomes tricky. The short answer, with our current technology and knowledge of the Earth's interior, is yes. Geller and others (1997) say that we should be putting our efforts into better mitigation against disasters by identifying areas prone to earthquakes rather than trying to predict when they might occur or, as Kagan (1997) suggests, building models for predicting aftershocks of large earthquakes. However, Wyss (1997) and Wyss (2001) disagree, and say that earthquake prediction could happen if only we continue to study it. Wyss (2001) points out that there is a stigma associated with studying earthquake/eruption prediction* amongst established geoscientists -- as he puts it: The dream of discovering how to predict earthquakes attracts individuals who put enormous energy into promoting unfounded ideas with the public and policy makers. Unfortunately, it takes a great deal of effort to show the flaws in highly advertised claims of success in earthquake prediction, and not all are able to understand the reasons for which the work is invalid. **Wyss (2001) says that the stigma associated with the study of earthquake or eruption prediction needs to be removed, because as our technology and understanding of the planet advances, so should our ability to predict these events -- but not if no one is studying them. The problem lies in getting past the charlatans and snake oil dealers who give a bad name to research into predictive models. They claim to predict when earthquakes are likely to strike (as I said above, they strike all the time) and then claim that any earthquake that occurs validates their prediction -- it especially helps it one of the ~26 earthquakes M4 or greater that can occur each day happens near someplace populated. So, we need to be very careful when we tread into earthquake (or eruption) prediction. There are many people out there on Twitter or the internet claiming to know how to predict earthquakes using some of the very methods I've just discussed. And people believe them, because they can present that they claim is a pattern and the cost of believing these "predictors" is low for most people. You can check out the "success" rates of some of these people claiming to have figured it out on Quack Predict, a website dedicated to outing these fake predictions and false earthquake prophets. However, as I've tried to lay out here, the cost in believing these people who don't put their work up to peer scrutiny and don't answer to when they are wrong (which is close to 98% of the time in most cases) can be high -- it might prevent real research in earthquake or eruption prediction from occurring. Even beyond this more abstract reason, it can have real ramifications in public trust and preparedness in places where that unexpected earthquake occurs. * Wyss (2001) does make an interesting argument that volcanologists have it easy in the game of predicting earthquakes -- as he claims that for volcanoes, we know the location, that the result is binary (eruption, no eruption), there are limited styles of eruption that might occur and that the timeframe of knowing an eruption might happen is short (days to weeks ahead of time). Not sure I buy his argument, but interesting to compare earthquake to eruption prediction. {Special thanks to my wife, Dr. Susan Klemetti, for help with the anthropology and evolutionary psychology of pattern recognition.} Welcome to Eruptions, a blog about all things volcanic. Eruption is written and maintained by Erik Klemetti, an assistant professor of Geosciences at Denison University. His passion in geology is volcanoes, and he has studied them all over the world. You can follow Erik on Twitter, where you'll get volcano... Read more The machine learning tool is helping physicists with the daunting challenge of analyzing large but nearly empty data sets, like those from neutrino detectors or particle colliders. Steve Nadis WIRED is where tomorrow is realized. It is the essential source of information and ideas that make sense of a world in constant transformation. The WIRED conversation illuminates how technology is changing every aspect of our lives—from culture to business, science to design. The breakthroughs and innovations that we uncover lead to new ways of thinking, new connections, and new industries.

Now, there are many who want to ascribe predictive powers to the moon phase or distance when it comes to earthquake distributions. Let's take a look at those graphs: All M4+ earthquakes between January 1 and May 24, 2013. The lunar phases are listed above the earthquakes, with open circles = full moon, crossed circles = new moons. Graph by Erik Klemetti using USGS earthquake data. Here (above) are the earthquakes with moon phases listed along the top. There is no clear match between new or full moons and the occurrence of earthquakes or their magnitude. There are some new moons (such as in February) where activity when up, but also new moons (such as in March) where nothing changed. If you want to construct a predictive model, that doesn't bode well. Kennedy and others (2004) did a statistical test of this "syzygy" and found no correlation between moon phase and earthquakes in the San Francisco area -- at least not enough to make it anything close to a predictive tool for earthquakes. Earth tides -- the result of flexing of the Earth's crust due to the gravitational relationship between the Earth and the Moon (think ocean tides) -- does seem to play some role in trigger some earthquakes, but as Cochran and others (2004) and Metivier and others (2009) found, it is only during the strongest of those tides and only on small, shallow earthquakes. So, it seems that something as simple as moon phases cannot be used to predict when and where an earthquake will occur. All M4+ earthquakes between January 1 and May 24, 2013. Lunar distance is marked across the top, with up triangles = perigee (closest), down triangles = apogee (farthest). Graph by Erik Klemetti using USGS data. This figure (above) is earthquakes with lunar perigee (nearest) and apogee (farthest) positions marked.

no

Seismology

Are earthquakes more likely during full moons?

no_statement

"earthquakes" are not more "likely" during full "moons".. full "moons" do not increase the likelihood of "earthquakes".

https://www.scirp.org/journal/paperinformation.aspx?paperid=96303

Sun-Moon-Earth Interactions with Larger Earthquakes Worldwide ...

The aim of this paper is to investigate the effects on Moon-Earth gravitational variations and Moon phases during three Solar Cycless (SC22, SC23, SC24). The first part defines gravitational forces as a force that creates an oscillation when the moon is reaching the Perigee, the smallest distance between the Moon and Earth during its rotational movement around Earth. It has a small amplitude and large period. Unlikely other authors, we do not find a direct connection between the Moon phases and big earthquakes worldwide. The study is performed through the three Solar Cycless, which refers to the variation in the Sun’s magnetic field. However, a strong indication appeared that almost the totality of the largest quakes studied happened preferentially at the subduction zones, in the Southern Hemisphere. In this research we apply experimental data to find the tide force, and the Perigee position is an experimental value. Other parameters are experimental, such as the length of Solar Cycless, the Moon’s phases connected to each earthquake where M ≥ 7.5. The calculations use regression in time to find the results. Our model considers in the regression the period 1986-2018. This paper is a continuation of former research on the gravitational force variation of Moon-Earth and how it would influence the rise of worldwide earthquakes. In our former paper [1] has been verified that Moon-Earth has a gravitational force that varies during the month when the Moon is at the Perigee. This force creates a wave with a small variation in amplitude and a large period, which has been calculated as well. The period analyzed was shorter than in the present study 1996-2008. The results have indicated that apparently the gravitational moon variation effects more subduction zones, and several locations which occur more earthquakes in the period studied. We also studied the possible correlation between Moon phases and earthquakes searching the historical earthquakes catalog 1700-2016. The results showed the largest earthquakes often surge at subduction zones. However, it does not have any relation with Moon phases, New Moon or Full Moon. In the paper after that, [2] we have added the Sun to the interactions with Moon-Earth and earthquakes. The Solar Cycless comprehends a period of eleven years it was the next implicit variable used. The period analyzed for this search was 1996-2016, it included two Solar Maxima that could indicate the presence or absence of influence or not in the enhancement of quakes. Other such studies examined the development of earthquake events during the seasons. To do this, we needed to divide the Global research into Northern and Southern Hemispheres since the seasons occur differently in each hemisphere. It was found to the Northern Hemisphere there was a slight increase in the earthquakes during Spring and Summer [3]. The present research considers three Solar Cycless, the gravitational force oscillation is calculated for each cycle, which could be a possible correspondence of large earthquakes for each maximum of the gravitational force. Next, we ascertain a possible connection with Moon phases New or Full, which are supposed to influence the larger earthquakes that occur worldwide for each Solar Cycles, as defined under moon cycles. Larger earthquakes magnitudes depend on the region in which they are happening. During this first approach we consider the magnitudes where M ≥ 7.5. For these earthquakes, the following set of data includes dates, location, magnitudes, moon phases, and hemisphere, fit into each cycle, SC22, SC23, and SC24. The results show an oscillation between the moon and earth, which mainly affects the tidal waves in the subduction zones. We will present the data set for each section studied, explaining what the explicit and implicit sets are. Our data is composed of experimental data collected from different catalogs for Solar Cycless [4], [5] ; perigee/apogee data sets [6] [7], and, earthquakes [8] [9] [10]. In the case of earthquakes, it is possible to check the events in at least three worldwide catalogs. 2. The Perigee Force Variation The lunar orbit around the Earth is elliptical therefore twice monthly is considered to be at the Perigee (closest to the Earth) and twice at the Apogee (the furthest from Earth). The force among the two bodies is F = G M m r 2 (1) In Equation (1), M is the Earth’s mass, m is the moon’s mass, G = 6.67 × 10−11 N∙m2∙kg−2 are all constants, and the only variable is r2 which is the Earth-Moon distance. This variable is collected from the catalog [6] which also gives the value of the moon phases New Moon and Full Moon. Since the New or Full Moon sometimes are not closer to the earthquake occurrence, we also used [7]. The variation of the distance between the Earth and Moon gave a Perigee force during three Solar Cycless. The maximum F = 2.32 × 1020 N and the minimum is F = 2.14 × 1020 N. Several times the maximum values occurred near the Full or New Moon, but this was not a rule. The minimum values also occurring during the First or Third quarter. Therefore, there is not a real connection that the Full or New moon is attaching events at the Perigee position. The development of the force at the Perigee position shows an oscillation corroborated for each cycle searched. We constructed Tables 1-3, for the moon cycle and the respective Solar Cycles, shown in Figures 1-3. In the figures, the maximum value corresponds to the maxima of the tidal force generated by the Equation (1). Figure 1. SC22, the perigee variation force 1986-1996. The force is displaying a wave, with small amplitude and large period. The variations of force among Earth and Moon could possibly explain the shallow moonquake occurrences. There are four types of moonquakes [11]. Deep moonquakes have a depth of nearly 700 km below the surface of the moon. Meteor impacts, two-week-long thermal moonquakes, and when the darkness covers half of the moon, the temperatures can fall to −240 degrees Fahrenheit. When that same surface makes its return to sunshine, the temperature swings wildly back to +250 degrees Fahrenheit. When the frozen crust suddenly expands, it can cause a moonquake. Shallow Moonquakes are the most powerful and the most worrisome for researchers and those eager to colonize the moon. Of the four types of quakes, these are the ones that could do some real damage. The variation in gravitational force and oscillations created will affect the moon surface. This oscillation happens throughout the years and has a small amplitude and, large periods. The moon surface variation has different temperatures in a small period that causes cracks and fractures in its surface. This probably affects all the body since when it contracts, the temperatures fall and when it dilates it rises. It would be a cause of shallow earthquakes on the moon. According to the references, they only happened 28 times period 1972-1977, when seismological events were observed from the instrument astronauts left behind. The magnitude of quakes observed could reach M5 [11]. 1) Solar Cycless, Perigee Variation, Large Earthquakes In order to understand our calculations, first we calculated the moon cycles and its variations by the variable r, into a Solar Cycles [12]. The Sun rotation magnetic field creates a giant helicoidal field that is sent through space and hit the Earth’s rotational and oscillating magnetic field. Induced currents will be created parallel to this magnetic field lines according to Faraday-Maxwell equations. The following lists are the calculation of tide forces by each perigee position by month and year. We constructed Figures 1-3 in the text, with the data below. In the equation Φ is the flux of the magnetic field, and E is the electromotive force (EMF). Therefore, Sun, rotating its axis in connection with Earth’s magnetic field the Birkeland currents [13], [14], [15] and [16]. During a Solar Cycles, the Birkeland currents intensities will increase during a solar maximum for each cycle or if exceptional Coronal Mass Ejections, X flares or solar storms occur, enhancing the parallel currents and auroral lines Figure 4. Previously we pointed out that solar storms and induced currents at the magnetosphere and ionosphere from such interaction would disturb not only the magnetosphere, but also the Earth’s surface. The Earth field is squeezed when Solar Wind speeds increase. The solar wind velocity varies in range of 300 - 800 km/s. Those variations affect the Earth’s magnetic field with strong geomagnetic storms. Overall, the disturbances by the Sun’s magnetic field rotation creates a changing magnetic field; therefore, inducing an EMF around Earth’s field lines or parallel currents. It is easier to detect this in the Earth’s pole. The Earth’s rotation Figure 4. This file is ineligible for copyright and therefore in the public domain because it consists entirely of information that is common property and contains no original authorship. The sun magnetic field lines, it varies with the solar wind speed and rotation on its axis. also makes the dipolar magnetic field rotates. The interplanetary field is one Gauss double of the Earth’s magnetic field on average. The interaction between both magnetic fields, the rotation of both bodies, and the Solar wind speed variations enhances the currents, which is known as aurora borealis. The current intensity is enhanced by Solar wind speed variations during Coronal Mass Ejects and X flares directed toward the Earth’s magnetosphere, [17]. The Solar Cycless are the Sun’s magnetic field moving in a cycle. Most of the Solar Cycless are approximately eleven years, at which point the Sun’s magnetic field completely flips, north and south poles exchange places. The sunspots are caused by the Sun’s magnetic fields, and its varying activity during the cycles. The beginning of a Solar Cycles is a minimum, when the Sun has the least sunspots, as we are having now in the middle of 2019. Over time, solar activity will rise, and the number of sunspots will increase. Solar Cycless have been observed since 1755 which is considered Solar Cycles 1. Here, we are working with the following Solar Cycless; Solar Cycles 22, 1986-1996; Solar Cycles 23; 1996 (June)-2008, and Solar Cycles 24; 2008 (January)-2019 (possible end cycle). From the three pictures, we observed the Moon, when at the Perigee creates an oscillation with a period range of 52,080 hours-54,000 hours. The moon’s speed around Earth is 3883 km/h and generate a wavelength that varies between −1.94 × 107 km - 2.05 × 107 km. It is possible to research if this wave would influence the rise of earthquakes. The middle of the Solar Cycles is the solar maximum, or when the Sun has the most sunspots. As the cycle ends, it fades back to the solar minimum, and then a new cycle begins. In this paper, the calculations of moon forces are through of three Solar Cycless. Solar Cycless will give the interaction between the variations in the solar magnetic field and possible connections with the Moon and the Earth through earthquakes. The maximum of the first Solar Cycles analyzed (1986-1996) was July 1989. Comparing this with the data from the earthquakes, the data shows only two big earthquakes for this year; one in May 20, the other on Dec. 12 both during the Full moon. For the Solar Cycles 23 (1996-2008), the maximum occurred in March 2000, when the following quake events occurred May 25, May 28, June 18, November 16, November 17, all, during the Full moon. During the Solar Cycles 24 (2008-2019 September) the maximum occurred on April 2014, when five events occurred, four in April, two under the New Moon, and two during the Full Moon and one in June, under the New Moon. Therefore, the variation of the Sun magnetic field, through its cycle, showed to be stronger during the Full Moon. Examining Tables 1-3 the events occurred at the years of Maximum Solar activity and most of the New or Full moon events occurred before the earthquakes. Here we can determine that the activity of large earthquakes will appear most at the Full moon at the maximum of Solar Cycless. Our research indicates that the Solar Magnetic Force is much more important to events on Earth than the gravitational ones between the Sun-Earth interactions. The Sun has a large and helicoidal field; the magnetic field in average on the Sun is around 1 Gauss. It is twice as strong as the average field on the surface of Earth (0.5 Gauss). This paragraph shows that if there is any stronger interaction between Sun-Earth it will be more in their magnetic field variation. 2) Larger Earthquakes, Moon Phases There are four moon phases: new moon, full moon, first quarter and third quarter, and the phases in between. In this part of our research, we consider only New or Full Moon, the difference between the data and the possible connection with a large earthquake event. In the paper, [1] an extensive study was done to determine if any Moon phase was more likely to happen an earthquake M > 4.5. At a full moon, the Earth, Moon, and Sun are in approximate alignment, just as with the New Moon, however, the moon is on the opposite side of the earth. Therefore, the entire sunlit part of the moon is facing us. To figure out if the importance of these two phases, our Tables 1-3 are constructed for each Solar Cycles; 22, 23 and 24, and the quakes searched have a magnitude M ≥ 7.5 worldwide. Besides, the day, location and, magnitude are determined by the Moon phase on the day it happened and, also the Hemisphere. [18] The hemisphere is important for greater earthquakes since we showed in a former paper that the larger earthquakes are taking place at subduction zones which are located more at the Southern Hemisphere. The next three Tables show small differences found in the data set. Next Table 4 defining the largest earthquakes which occurred during the SC 22. Table 4, Solar Cycles 22 results show that quakes with magnitudes M ≥ 7.5 more often occurred in the Southern Hemisphere (55%), than in the Northern Hemisphere (45%), Figure 5. Southern Hemisphere had 10% more events, located in the subduction zones. See the earthquakes above M7.8 highlighted in pink. The moon phases show that 48% occur near the Full Moon, and 52% at the New Moon, as in Figure 6. The number of total events analyzed during SC22 was the smallest from the three cycles, only 44 larger quakes occurred at total. Table 4. This table is showing the events of the earthquakes during period 1986-1997 (Solar Cycles 22) magnitudes M > 7.5, the locations, and the closest Moon phase at the time (Full or New), also the Hemisphere in which it occurred. Figure 6. Solar Cycles 22, earthquakes M ≥ 7.5 and the full or new moon occurrences. The quasi-totality of larger events occurred at the subduction zones most frequently on the Pacific side. Pacific side is the location of most of the subduction zones if compared with Mediterranean. Rare occurrences on the Mediterranean subduction zones point out other diverse mechanisms, more than just the one discussed in this paper [18], [19]. Nevertheless, happened some exceptions to subduction zones occurred on the Myanmar-China border (1988), magnitude M7.7. Another one in Kizan (1997), M 7.5, and the last one in Northern Bolivia (1994), M8.2, at a location in a rupture point depth of 631.3 km below the surface. The conclusion for this Solar Cycless examining larger earthquakes indicates a possible connection between the tidal variation but not a strong bond with the Moon Phases. There is no evidence that New or Full Moons would increase such events, at this point. Neither the Perigee variation enhances the frequency or magnitude of such earthquakes. Instead, the variation of the tidal wave boosts the possibility of events in such regions with a delayed time to take effect on the earthquake surge. As observed, seldom times it will happen during the perigee when the moon is closest to the Earth (two times). Southern Hemisphere occurrences are more frequent since the world presents huge rupture points in South America where the depths of earthquakes are below 600 km another one near the Fiji Islands (depths bigger than 700 km) as it will be explained in a subsequent search. Table 5 belongs to the Solar Cycles 23 and defining the largest earthquakes occurred into the period 1997-2008. There are 63 events in total with M ≥ 7.5 showing similar results from Table 4 (SC22). In this table, an occurrence at the Southern Hemisphere for larger quakes happened 54% Figure 7. From those quakes, relevant difference as New Moon had 53% quakes, at Full 47% tremors as shown at Figure 8. Earthquakes above or equal M7.8 are highlighted in green, Table 5. Table 6 refers to the events to Solar Cycles 24, the last Cycle analyzed, we also highlighted the events M ≥ 7.8 in yellow. This Cycle had a total of 66 tremors M ≥ 7.5 almost the same number of tremors as in the Cycle 23. Here the percentage of quakes that happened at the Southern is double of the Northern, see Figure 9. Figure 10 shows 57% of earthquakes happened at the New Moon. If it is considered the period 1986-2018 the earthquakes M ≥ 7.5 happened 59% at the Southern Hemisphere and, 55% during the New Moon. Next, it is a study for the largest earthquakes and their occurrences by magnitude, phase and hemisphere. The data set for three Solar Cycless, make it possible to find out how much the gravitational force of Moon-Earth variation and the tectonics influence on subduction zones can increase the number of events during these periods. Initially we considered larger events the earthquakes M ≥ 7.5 separating by cycles. Comparing the events found the Solar Cycles 22 has the smallest number of larger events. During Solar Cycles 22, 44 larger events, Solar Cycles 23, 63 larger events, and Solar Cycles 24, 66 larger events occurred. Solar Cycles 24, presenting double the number of tremors at the Southern Hemisphere than the other two cycles. Also, the quakes happened with more frequency at or close to the New Moon. Therefore, there is the Solar Cycless maximum, Moon Phases (New or Full), and the correlated variation on the tidal forces as we did at the first part of this paper. All these variables appear to be correlated to the of subduction zones locations. Full moon looks to be important during the Solar Cycles maximum, when the biggest events occurred at the subduction zones and tightly correlated with this phase. Largest (M ≥ 7.8) Earthquakes vs. Moon Phases, Hemispheres The latest results from Section 3 showed that earthquakes tend to appear in the Southern Hemisphere during the new moon. The goal now is to study what happens to the highest magnitude earthquakes that occurred in the last three cycles over a period between 1986-2018. We extracted the highlighted data from the last three Tables 4-6 and constructed three new ones. Tables 7-9 are earthquakes with magnitude M ≥ 7.8 for each cycle studied. The tables show the date they occurred, the locations, hemisphere magnitude, with a difference as the exact moon phase nearest the occurred earthquake. Table 7 displays the largest earthquakes M ≥ 7.8 during the Solar Cycles 22. The column for the Moon phases, showing the closest phase to the event, two events occurred at the 1st Q, five at the New moon, two at the 3rd Q and four at the full Moon. Therefore, the New moon is still the phase when more events happened for this Cycle. Table 8, the relation between the Moon phases and the earthquakes are the following, four at the 1st Q, five at the 3rd Q, five at the Full moon, and nine at the New moon. On this cycle the New moon has a higher occurrence than the other three phases, SC23. Table 9 is the last cycle studied or SC24 displaying the major events with the same parameters analyzed for the other two cycles. In this cycle the moon phases are six for New and 3rdQ, and eight for Full and 1st Q. Analyzing the moon phases for the entire period 1986-2018 the totality of earthquakes happened according to the moon phases 1st and 3rd Q had 14 and 13 largest events respectively, full moon, 17 events, and New moon 20 events it means that largest events happened most at the New Moon, 31% followed by the Full Moon 27%. Table 7. Showing the parameters for the largest earthquakes on the cycle SC2, M ≥ 7.8. Table 8. Showing the major events M ≥ 7.8 occurred worldwide for the SC23. Here the major events at the Northern Hemisphere happen during the minimum of the cycle, or 2003-2007. Tables 6-8, for SC22, SC23 and SC24 results, resumed in Figure 11. Figure 11 represents the three tables, (Tables 7-9) for the biggest earthquakes worldwide M >or equal 7.8. Observe Tables 7-9 are the biggest earthquakes worldwide for each cycle we searched. Analyzing the three cycles by Hemisphere and Moon Phases, for the largest earthquakes, the results are the following; the biggest occurrences are in the Northern Hemisphere for SC22 (57%), to SC23 was at the Southern Hemisphere (53%) and for SC24 at the Southern Hemisphere (65%). It pointed out the earthquakes likely to happen more at the Southern hemisphere with a small discrepancy on the SC22. The same analysis for the Moon phase for the largest events showing a growth of events in conjunction with a New Moon. The New Moon appears in 57% (SC22), 59% in (SC23) and 78% (SC24%). Considering the entire period 1986-2018, for earthquakes M ≥ 7.8 we obtained to the Moon phases is 31% for New Moon and 27% for Full moon. The Southern Hemisphere has 60% of occurrences for earthquakes with the highest magnitudes for the period 1986-2018. Figure 11. It shows the relationship for Tables 7-9 into cycles, SC22, SC23, and SC24. The events are occurring most at the Southern Hemisphere at the New Moon phase with magnitudes M ≥ 7.8. 4. Results Discussion The first part of this paper calculated an oscillatory force between Moon-Earth that is created with the variation of the Perigee position twice or three times by month. Our results find an oscillatory tidal force varying during the last three Solar Cycless. Those cycles were defined within the period 1986-2019, one Solar Cycles is defined in periods of 10 - 11 years. The gravitational force Moon-Earth is an oscillation that has maximum and minima when the distance between the two bodies is at the perigee or the minima. Our next step was to associate the evolution of these oscillations and the largest earthquakes happened into the period 1986-2018. The Moon phases are cyclical as well, and each month there is the occurrence of Full, first quarter, third quarter and New Moon. The rotational movement of the Moon around the Earth is stable, systematically along the months, and the variation for the perigee is small. Our results pointed out that gravitational force Moon-Earth has small growths during some periods and decreases if the distance between the two bodies increases. The disruption of the external parameters happens during Solar Storms, Coronal Mass Ejection or a geomagnetic storm towards the day magnetosphere, when the Solar wind speed sudden increases. If the solar wind is strong enough or if the magnetic field inside the wind cancels the magnetic field of the Earth, some plasma can get through. Strong bursts of solar wind can squeeze the Earth’s magnetosphere compressing until it bounces back like a vibrating rubber ball. Those abrupt external variations would disturb the earthquakes occurrence, as explained in [1]. The explanation for our results that the largest earthquakes happened during the New Moon at the Southern Hemisphere, is that at the New Moon the gravitational forces Sun-Moon are aligned with the Earth increasing the effects of both bodies. At the Southern Hemisphere is the location with the majority of the subduction zones easily influenced by the tidal forces from the Sun-Moon during this period. The occurrences of earthquakes are always higher at the Southern Hemisphere, particularly in the last cycle SC 24 the proportionality was 66% of events were at the Southern. Examining the next search about the causality of New or Full Moon occurrence for larger earthquakes M ≥ 7.5 it is found that for all cycles, the incidence of events on the New moon is above 50% in relation to Full Moon. A last remark is about the influence of the Sun on Earth that remains into the electromagnetic force interactions between the two bodies rather than gravitational ones. 5. Conclusion Our conclusions point out that Sun-Moon-Earth may interact with each other influencing the largest earthquakes. However, those larger events mostly showed to be dependent in the area searched. It is contingent on the tectonics, fabric, and zones involved in the study. The locations more susceptible to the Moon-Earth relations are in the Southern Hemisphere. The presence of the subduction is important, and most are located in the Northern or Southern Pacific. However, there is a very deep subduction location at the Southern Pacific, as in Fiji with 700 km depth. Finally, the influence of external variables, such as Sun-Earth, Moon-Earth or Sun-Moon-Earth is subtle and is dependent from the location where the event happened. A next study could be developed to understand the importance of Moon gravitational forces for earthquakes with smaller magnitudes as M ≥ 5 or for shallow earthquakes.

The number of total events analyzed during SC22 was the smallest from the three cycles, only 44 larger quakes occurred at total. Table 4. This table is showing the events of the earthquakes during period 1986-1997 (Solar Cycles 22) magnitudes M > 7.5, the locations, and the closest Moon phase at the time (Full or New), also the Hemisphere in which it occurred. Figure 6. Solar Cycles 22, earthquakes M ≥ 7.5 and the full or new moon occurrences. The quasi-totality of larger events occurred at the subduction zones most frequently on the Pacific side. Pacific side is the location of most of the subduction zones if compared with Mediterranean. Rare occurrences on the Mediterranean subduction zones point out other diverse mechanisms, more than just the one discussed in this paper [18], [19]. Nevertheless, happened some exceptions to subduction zones occurred on the Myanmar-China border (1988), magnitude M7.7. Another one in Kizan (1997), M 7.5, and the last one in Northern Bolivia (1994), M8.2, at a location in a rupture point depth of 631.3 km below the surface. The conclusion for this Solar Cycless examining larger earthquakes indicates a possible connection between the tidal variation but not a strong bond with the Moon Phases. There is no evidence that New or Full Moons would increase such events, at this point. Neither the Perigee variation enhances the frequency or magnitude of such earthquakes. Instead, the variation of the tidal wave boosts the possibility of events in such regions with a delayed time to take effect on the earthquake surge. As observed, seldom times it will happen during the perigee when the moon is closest to the Earth (two times).

no

Seismology

Are earthquakes more likely during full moons?

yes_statement

"earthquakes" are more "likely" during full "moons".. full "moons" increase the likelihood of "earthquakes".

https://www.scimex.org/newsfeed/large-earthquakes-may-be-associated-with-high-tides

EXPERT REACTION: Large earthquakes linked with high tides ...

EXPERT REACTION: Large earthquakes linked with high tides Japanese researchers say they have found a link between high tide and large earthquakes, which may indicate a greater likelihood of earthquakes following the new or full moon. The study involved reconstructing the size and amplitude of tidal stress from the two weeks prior to earthquakes that registered a magnitude of 5.5 or higher, over the last 20 years. The research indicated large earthquakes in Indonesia (2004), Chile (2010), and Japan (2011), among others, occurred at times of high tidal stress, and the frequency of large earthquakes compared to small earthquakes increased with tidal stress. Media Release Large earthquakes are more likely to occur at times of full or new Moon, according to a study published online this week in Nature Geoscience. Although it seems intuitive that the fault lines on Earth that are already close to failure could be pushed into slipping by the gravitational forces of the Sun and Moon, firm evidence for tidal triggering of earthquakes has been lacking. Satoshi Ide and colleagues reconstruct the size or amplitude of tidal stresses — rather than just the timing of high tide or tidal phase — in the two weeks prior to large earthquakes (magnitude 5.5 or greater) that have occurred over the past two decades. Although they find no clear correlation between tidal stress and small earthquakes, they do find that some of the largest earthquakes: including 2004 Sumatra, Indonesia; 2010 Maule, Chile; and 2011 Tohoku-oki, Japan, occurred during times of high tidal stress amplitude. They also find that the fraction of large earthquakes compared to small earthquakes increases as the amplitude of tidal stress increases. Precisely how large earthquakes initiate and evolve is not fully understood, but they may grow via a cascading process whereby a tiny fracture builds up into a large-scale rupture. If so, the authors’ results imply that the likelihood of a small fracture cascading into a large earthquake are greater during the Spring tide. Thus, knowledge of the tidal stress state in seismic regions could help in assessing the probability of an earthquake. Attachments: Expert Reaction These comments have been collated by the Science Media Centre to provide a variety of expert perspectives on this issue. Feel free to use these quotes in your stories. Views expressed are the personal opinions of the experts named. They do not represent the views of the SMC or any other organisation unless specifically stated. Mark Quigley, Associate Professor in Active Tectonics and Geomorphology, University of Melbourne Tanaka and colleagues have been working on this problem for many years and have published some nice theories. But I remain unconvinced that the timing and characteristics of large earthquakes clearly correlate to lunar cycles or tidal stresses, nor do I think potentially tidally triggered seismicity has any real practical utilization in the context of coastal seismic hazard and public safety. Here is why. The Tohoku earthquake occurred on March 11, 2011. There was a new moon on March 4th, a quarter moon on the 12th, and a full moon on the 19th. So this timing is exactly the opposite of what one would expect if the timing of this earthquake was associated with full or new moons. Ide et al acknowledge this lack of temporal correlation in their paper. The tidal shear stresses Ide et al estimate, resolved on to the fault plane that ruptured in the Tohoku earthquake, were higher in the 30 days both before and after the occurrence of the Tohoku earthquake. So there is not a clear correlation between the peak tidal shear stress and the timing of earthquake nucleation. Perhaps more importantly, these tidal stress changes are also very small (less than +/- 0.3 kPa) compared to the stress changes that occur at the front of a propagating earthquake rupture, which may be several MPa. In other words, earthquake-induced stress changes at the front of a propagating rupture are probably 1000 to 10,000 times greater than tidal ones. Interestingly, there was a magnitude 7.2 earthquake two days before the Tohoku earthquake, with a rupture plane that was very close to the nucleation point of the Tohoku earthquake. This event also did not correlate with a full moon or any anomalous tidal stresses. The static and dynamic stresses induced by this foreshock on the Tohoku earthquake hypocentral region would have greatly exceeded any sort of tidal effect. A seismic hazard warning on the basis of this foreshock would have had more scientific justification than one based on the approaching full moon (8 days after the Tohoku earthquake actually occurred) or tidal stress perturbations. Ide et al also suggest that the magnitude frequency distributions of earthquakes from some settings show some sort of correlation with tidal stresses. I cannot evaluate this hypothesis fully, but I can say that this relationship is least convincing in the setting I consider is most analogous to the Canterbury region (California), where the ‘b values’ (binned by tidal shear stress) are essentially within error across the spectrum of lunar-induced tidal stresses. It is important to recognize that I am not saying that tidal stresses are unimportant things to consider within the variety of processes that may influence earthquake behaviour. But when we consider how such a phenomenon could be practically considered within a coastal hazard perspective, what is the recommendation here? That we stay away from beaches close to subduction zones on full moons? This certainly would not have helped in the Tohoku example. Many countries like Japan have earthquake early alarm systems, seismic building codes, well-engineered sea walls, and evacuation strategies in place; these are the measures that help to reduce seismic and tsunami risk. There were definitely some shortcomings (e.g., inadequate sea wall heights to deal with a larger than estimated tsunami wave height, coastal land development in high hazard regions, the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster), but certainly we are not so naïve to think that the solution to these sorts of problems lies in the extraction of a tidal signal from seismicity. With fairness, Ide et al do not claim to do this in their study. Last updated: 03 Nov 2016 4:46pm News for: International Media contact details for this story are only visible to registered journalists.

Attachments: Expert Reaction These comments have been collated by the Science Media Centre to provide a variety of expert perspectives on this issue. Feel free to use these quotes in your stories. Views expressed are the personal opinions of the experts named. They do not represent the views of the SMC or any other organisation unless specifically stated. Mark Quigley, Associate Professor in Active Tectonics and Geomorphology, University of Melbourne Tanaka and colleagues have been working on this problem for many years and have published some nice theories. But I remain unconvinced that the timing and characteristics of large earthquakes clearly correlate to lunar cycles or tidal stresses, nor do I think potentially tidally triggered seismicity has any real practical utilization in the context of coastal seismic hazard and public safety. Here is why. The Tohoku earthquake occurred on March 11, 2011. There was a new moon on March 4th, a quarter moon on the 12th, and a full moon on the 19th. So this timing is exactly the opposite of what one would expect if the timing of this earthquake was associated with full or new moons. Ide et al acknowledge this lack of temporal correlation in their paper. The tidal shear stresses Ide et al estimate, resolved on to the fault plane that ruptured in the Tohoku earthquake, were higher in the 30 days both before and after the occurrence of the Tohoku earthquake. So there is not a clear correlation between the peak tidal shear stress and the timing of earthquake nucleation. Perhaps more importantly, these tidal stress changes are also very small (less than +/- 0.3 kPa) compared to the stress changes that occur at the front of a propagating earthquake rupture, which may be several MPa. In other words, earthquake-induced stress changes at the front of a propagating rupture are probably 1000 to 10,000 times greater than tidal ones.

no

Climate Change

Are electric cars a solution to climate change?

yes_statement

"electric" "cars" are a "solution" to "climate" "change".. "electric" vehicles help combat "climate" "change".. the use of "electric" "cars" contributes to mitigating "climate" "change".

https://www.planetizen.com/blogs/112490-electric-cars-wont-solve-climate-change

Electric Cars Won't Solve Climate Change | Planetizen Blogs

Electric cars might look great in your driveway, but they're also a symbol of a systemic problem: a consumer and car-based approach to addressing transportation's climate impacts. Not only that, they're an ineffective solution to climate change. Transportation-related carbon emissions are the top source of U.S. carbon emissions Transportation-related carbon emissions account for 14% of our global carbon emissions and are the largest source of U.S. carbon emissions at 29%. Therefore, it is crucial that the U.S. cuts our transportation emissions to meet the Paris Climate accords' goal—50% of our 2017 emissions. While the COVID-19 pandemic temporarily lowered some of these transportation emissions in 2020, the long-standing trend is that we've failed to make a dent in our transportation-related emissions—they've stayed all but constant for the past 15 years. Suppose we fail to address climate change and the air pollution emissions from gas vehicles. In that case, we have significant problems looming: mass species die off, increasing natural disasters, destruction of our fisheries, horrible air pollution, wars over water, and much more. With 82% of U.S. emissions in 2018 coming from road vehicles, it's clear that we need to cut our emissions from cars by taking combustion engine vehicles off the roads as rapidly as we can. The solution that has been popularized for this? Electric cars vs gas vehicles—and electric vehicles don't go far enough. Carbon lock-in: the #1 problem with electric cars The biggest problem is carbon-lock in—when we spend to build something like a power plant or an electric car, the economics, and sociology of the new production incentivizes continued operations. After making significant investments in a solution, companies and governments don't want to switch to a better solution immediately—they make considerable capital investments in new construction or purchases, and they pay off those investments over time. With manufacturing lines for cars, new power plants, or oil pipelines, there are also jobs associated with new facilities, and this further complicates shutting down such efforts due to economic and social entanglements. This is the problem with Tesla; they’re not intent on finding the best solution to our climate crisis. Due to this, temporary solutions—such as a mass retrofit to electric cars—are hard to move on from. Just like when a family purchases a gas vehicle, they're unlikely to buy a new electric car or stop driving that car the very next year due to the sunk cost of the vehicle. We can't afford to take half measures; the investments we've already made in today's energy system may already push us past the goals of the Paris climate agreement, even if we immediately stop investment in new fossil fuel infrastructure. We need to think bigger and reimagine the systems we use to address the climate crisis, move people, build, and more. We can't continue to be locked into a car-based system—that's not thinking big enough. Logistical challenges with changing to electric vehicles There are multiple other problems with prioritizing electric vehicles as the key solution to our climate crisis versus merely a piece of the puzzle. One issue is one of logistics and scale - there are estimated to be more than 1.4 billion, potentially as many as 1.5 billion vehicles in operation in the world today—and that number has been doubling every 20 years or so since the 1970s. It's untenable politically or logistically in many countries to quickly swap out or retrofit all current vehicles for electric. Even with accelerating electric vehicle adoption rates, electric cars are a vast minority of new car sales. Electric cars won't save us Politicians don't want to tell you that electric vehicles won't solve the ecological problems created by transportation. The car companies certainly want you to think they will, proposing electric cars as the latest thing to buy and lobbying for tax credits and incentives for electric car purchases. However, electric vehicles won't solve our carbon emissions challenge fast enough – and prioritizing cars as a transportation method is extremely inefficient when it comes to space in our cities, another crucial part of the climate change equation. With less than a decade to reduce carbon emissions to 50% of our 2017 annual emissions, electrics cars won't get us nearly close enough even if we drastically increase our electric vehicle production and immediately switch to electric vehicles. Instead, we'll lock-in a level of carbon emissions that is unsustainable, particularly as personal vehicles are sold across the world's burgeoning population. Denser, urban cities can develop massive efficiencies in transportation, logistics, and housing that enable them to emit significantly less carbon (and cut down far fewer forests, crucial to converting the CO2 in our atmosphere) than sprawling suburban developments. If everyone has an electric car in the future, it’ll take up significant urban space, particularly compared with alternative transportation modes. In urban environments (where the majority of the world’s population lives and where a full 68% of the world’s population is projected to be by 2050), there are plenty of other greener, more sustainable options. Research shows that roughly half of all car trips in US cities are under three miles and can be replaced with zero-emissions micromobility options such as scooters and bikes. For those who may not want to get unduly sweaty ahead of a business meeting, or who can’t or don’t want to put in the effort, e-bikes are a great option and can take tons of car trips off the road, saving space in our cities, and taking car trips off the road entirely. Urban environments allow us to leverage mass transit with buses, rail, and subway systems, all providing vast efficiencies over moving people vs. cars. These are also significantly more accessible to people without the considerable upfront costs of purchasing a car, not to mention the public health benefits of avoiding all those car accidents, one of the leading causes of death in the United States.The good news? Getting off fossil fuels pays for itself One of the under-discussed factors with getting cars off the road is that know it pays for itself. Car companies certainly don’t want us to think about the fact that even if climate change didn’t exist, the air pollution from gas vehicles more than pays for the cost of transitioning to alternative transportation options. As researchers continue to hone in on air pollution’s direct and indirect effects, they’ve realized just how stark the problem is. At the August 5th, 2020 hearing of the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Reform, Drew Shindell, Nicholas professor of earth science at Duke University (and a lead author on both recent IPCCreports), laid out the numbers: “Over the next 50 years, keeping to the 2°C pathway would prevent roughly 4.5 million premature deaths, about 3.5 million hospitalizations, and emergency room visits, and approximately 300 million lost workdays in the U.S.” On average, this amounts to over $700 billion per year in benefits to the U.S. from improved health and labor alone, far more than the cost of the energy transition. These are vast numbers—as clean energy has gotten so inexpensive, it’s clear that the air quality benefits alone are enough to pay for the energy transition. While climate change can only be halted with the cooperation of the world, the numbers show that even if the United States were to be the only country to get rid of fossil fuels and the benefits of avoiding global warming were not to materialize, the air quality benefits would still pay for the cost of divesting from fossil fuels. Shindell’s team looked at a scenario where the United States met the zero-emissions standards of the Paris Climate Accords 2°C while the rest of the world continued with current policies. Shindell testified that “We found that U.S. action alone would bring us more than two-thirds of the health benefits of worldwide action over the next 15 years, with roughly half the total over the entire 50-year period analyzed.” Regardless of whether we can fully combat climate change, it’s clear that we need to divest our society from fossil fuels—saving lives and money while reducing urban sprawl and commute times. We can build a sustainable future Electric cars are not going to save us alone. While they’re often touted by marketing and government officials as the solution to our climate challenges, the truth is that we have to adjust our transportation model entirely and move away from a car-centric approach to transit to achieve better health outcomes, combat climate change, and avoid poisoning our rivers. While electric cars are superior in their pure greenhouse gas emissions to gas counterparts, they are still bad for the environment in other ways and inefficient ways of moving people that encouraging suburban sprawl. If we’re still sprawling outwards as populations grow, we’re not going to be able to achieve the efficiency needed in transportation and housing to meet our climate and space needs. We’ll also deeply damage our environment, getting rid of green space for single-family housing, cutting down trees that are doing important work filtering carbon from the atmosphere, and poisoning our rivers and streams with the heavy metals present in car tires. Instead, we need more efficient transportation forms to be prioritized, letting us move people faster and with far fewer carbon emissions. Rail, both high-speed and in-city light rail, is an essential part of this equation: buses, micromobility technologies, and increased biking and walking through dense, interconnected neighborhoods with safe walking and riding areas. Conor Bronsdon is a Seattle based writer and consultant with Olive & Goose. His work has been published in Planetizen, The Urbanist, and by Microsoft Services. You can read more of his writing at conorbronsdon.com. He is focused on the creative applications of technology and political will to solve problems and recently served as the Chief Strategist for the appointment of Seattle City Councilmember Abel Pacheco.

This is the problem with Tesla; they’re not intent on finding the best solution to our climate crisis. Due to this, temporary solutions—such as a mass retrofit to electric cars—are hard to move on from. Just like when a family purchases a gas vehicle, they're unlikely to buy a new electric car or stop driving that car the very next year due to the sunk cost of the vehicle. We can't afford to take half measures; the investments we've already made in today's energy system may already push us past the goals of the Paris climate agreement, even if we immediately stop investment in new fossil fuel infrastructure. We need to think bigger and reimagine the systems we use to address the climate crisis, move people, build, and more. We can't continue to be locked into a car-based system—that's not thinking big enough. Logistical challenges with changing to electric vehicles There are multiple other problems with prioritizing electric vehicles as the key solution to our climate crisis versus merely a piece of the puzzle. One issue is one of logistics and scale - there are estimated to be more than 1.4 billion, potentially as many as 1.5 billion vehicles in operation in the world today—and that number has been doubling every 20 years or so since the 1970s. It's untenable politically or logistically in many countries to quickly swap out or retrofit all current vehicles for electric. Even with accelerating electric vehicle adoption rates, electric cars are a vast minority of new car sales. Electric cars won't save us Politicians don't want to tell you that electric vehicles won't solve the ecological problems created by transportation. The car companies certainly want you to think they will, proposing electric cars as the latest thing to buy and lobbying for tax credits and incentives for electric car purchases. However, electric vehicles won't solve our carbon emissions challenge fast enough – and prioritizing cars as a transportation method is extremely inefficient when it comes to space in our cities, another crucial part of the climate change equation.

no

Climate Change

Are electric cars a solution to climate change?

yes_statement

"electric" "cars" are a "solution" to "climate" "change".. "electric" vehicles help combat "climate" "change".. the use of "electric" "cars" contributes to mitigating "climate" "change".

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/03/02/climate/electric-vehicles-environment.html

How Green Are Electric Vehicles? - The New York Times

Listen to This Article Around the world, governments and automakers are promoting electric vehicles as a key technology to curb oil use and fight climate change. General Motors has said it aims to stop selling new gasoline-powered cars and light trucks by 2035 and will pivot to battery-powered models. This week, Volvo said it would move even faster and introduce an all-electric lineup by 2030. But as electric cars and trucks go mainstream, they have faced a persistent question: Are they really as green as advertised? While experts broadly agree that plug-in vehicles are a more climate-friendly option than traditional vehicles, they can still have their own environmental impacts, depending on how they’re charged up and manufactured. Here’s a guide to some of the biggest worries — and how they might be addressed. One way to compare the climate impacts of different vehicle models is with this interactive online tool by researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who tried to incorporate all the relevant factors: the emissions involved in manufacturing the cars and in producing gasoline and diesel fuel, how much gasoline conventional cars burn, and where the electricity to charge electric vehicles comes from. If you assume electric vehicles are drawing their power from the average grid in the United States, which typically includes a mix of fossil fuel and renewable power plants, then they’re almost always much greener than conventional cars. Even though electric vehicles are more emissions-intensive to make because of their batteries, their electric motors are more efficient than traditional internal combustion engines that burn fossil fuels. An all-electric Chevrolet Bolt, for instance, can be expected to produce 189 grams of carbon dioxide for every mile driven over its lifetime, on average. By contrast, a new gasoline-fueled Toyota Camry is estimated to produce 385 grams of carbon dioxide per mile. A new Ford F-150 pickup truck, which is even less fuel-efficient, produces 636 grams of carbon dioxide per mile. But that’s just an average. On the other hand, if the Bolt is charged up on a coal-heavy grid, such as those currently found in the Midwest, it can actually be a bit worse for the climate than a modern hybrid car like the Toyota Prius, which runs on gasoline but uses a battery to bolster its mileage. (The coal-powered Bolt would still beat the Camry and the F-150, however.) “Coal tends to be the critical factor,” said Jeremy Michalek, a professor of engineering at Carnegie Mellon University. “If you’ve got electric cars in Pittsburgh that are being plugged in at night and leading nearby coal plants to burn more coal to charge them, then the climate benefits won’t be as great, and you can even get more air pollution.” The good news for electric vehicles is that most countries are now pushing to clean up their electric grids. In the United States, utilities have retired hundreds of coal plants over the last decade and shifted to a mix of lower-emissions natural gas, wind and solar power. As a result, researchers have found, electric vehicles have generally gotten cleaner, too. And they are likely to get cleaner still. “The reason electric vehicles look like an appealing climate solution is that if we can make our grids zero-carbon, then vehicle emissions drop way, way down,” said Jessika Trancik, an associate professor of energy studies at M.I.T. “Whereas even the best hybrids that burn gasoline will always have a baseline of emissions they can’t go below.” Raw materials can be problematic Like many other batteries, the lithium-ion cells that power most electric vehicles rely on raw materials — like cobalt, lithium and rare earth elements — that have been linked to grave environmental and human rights concerns. Cobalt has been especially problematic. Mining cobalt produces hazardous tailings and slags that can leach into the environment, and studies have found high exposure in nearby communities, especially among children, to cobalt and other metals. Extracting the metals from their ores also requires a process called smelting, which can emit sulfur oxide and other harmful air pollution. And as much as 70 percent of the world’s cobalt supply is mined in the Democratic Republic of Congo, a substantial proportion in unregulated “artisanal” mines where workers — including many children — dig the metal from the earth using only hand tools at great risk to their health and safety, human rights groups warn. The world’s lithium is either mined in Australia or from salt flats in the Andean regions of Argentina, Bolivia and Chile, operations that use large amounts of groundwater to pump out the brines, drawing down the water available to Indigenous farmers and herders. The water required for producing batteries has meant that manufacturing electric vehicles is about 50 percent more water intensive than traditional internal combustion engines. Deposits of rare earths, concentrated in China, often contain radioactive substances that can emit radioactive water and dust. Focusing first on cobalt, automakers and other manufacturers have committed to eliminating “artisanal” cobalt from their supply chains, and have also said they will develop batteries that decrease, or do away with, cobalt altogether. But that technology is still in development, and the prevalence of these mines means these commitments “aren’t realistic,” said Mickaël Daudin of Pact, a nonprofit organization that works with mining communities in Africa. Instead, Mr. Daudin said, manufacturers need to work with these mines to lessen their environmental footprint and make sure miners are working in safe conditions. If companies acted responsibly, the rise of electric vehicles would be a great opportunity for countries like Congo, he said. But if they don’t, “they will put the environment, and many, many miners’ lives at risk.” Recycling could be better As earlier generations of electric vehicles start to reach the end of their lives, preventing a pileup of spent batteries looms as a challenge. Most of today’s electric vehicles use lithium-ion batteries, which can store more energy in the same space than older, more commonly-used lead-acid battery technology. But while 99 percent of lead-acid batteries are recycled in the United States, estimated recycling rates for lithium-ion batteries are about 5 percent. Experts point out that spent batteries contain valuable metals and other materials that can be recovered and reused. Depending on the process used, battery recycling can also use large amounts of water, or emit air pollutants. “The percentage of lithium batteries being recycled is very low, but with time and innovation, that’s going to increase,” said Radenka Maric, a professor at the University of Connecticut’s Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering. A different, promising approach to tackling used electric vehicle batteries is finding them a second life in storage and other applications. “For cars, when the battery goes below say 80 percent of its capacity, the range is reduced,” said Amol Phadke, a senior scientist at the Goldman School of Public Policy at the University of California, Berkeley. “But that’s not a constraint for stationary storage.” Various automakers, including Nissan and BMW, have piloted the use of old electric vehicle batteries for grid storage. General Motors has said it designed its battery packs with second-life use in mind. But there are challenges: Reusing lithium-ion batteries requires extensive testing and upgrades to make sure they perform reliably. If done properly, though, used car batteries could continue to be used for a decade or more as backup storage for solar power, researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology found in a study last year. Brad Plumer is a climate reporter specializing in policy and technology efforts to cut carbon dioxide emissions. At The Times, he has also covered international climate talks and the changing energy landscape in the United States.More about Brad Plumer A version of this article appears in print on , Section B, Page 5 of the New York edition with the headline: No Tailpipe Doesn’t Mean No Emissions. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

Listen to This Article Around the world, governments and automakers are promoting electric vehicles as a key technology to curb oil use and fight climate change. General Motors has said it aims to stop selling new gasoline-powered cars and light trucks by 2035 and will pivot to battery-powered models. This week, Volvo said it would move even faster and introduce an all-electric lineup by 2030. But as electric cars and trucks go mainstream, they have faced a persistent question: Are they really as green as advertised? While experts broadly agree that plug-in vehicles are a more climate-friendly option than traditional vehicles, they can still have their own environmental impacts, depending on how they’re charged up and manufactured. Here’s a guide to some of the biggest worries — and how they might be addressed. One way to compare the climate impacts of different vehicle models is with this interactive online tool by researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who tried to incorporate all the relevant factors: the emissions involved in manufacturing the cars and in producing gasoline and diesel fuel, how much gasoline conventional cars burn, and where the electricity to charge electric vehicles comes from. If you assume electric vehicles are drawing their power from the average grid in the United States, which typically includes a mix of fossil fuel and renewable power plants, then they’re almost always much greener than conventional cars. Even though electric vehicles are more emissions-intensive to make because of their batteries, their electric motors are more efficient than traditional internal combustion engines that burn fossil fuels. An all-electric Chevrolet Bolt, for instance, can be expected to produce 189 grams of carbon dioxide for every mile driven over its lifetime, on average. By contrast, a new gasoline-fueled Toyota Camry is estimated to produce 385 grams of carbon dioxide per mile. A new Ford F-150 pickup truck, which is even less fuel-efficient, produces 636 grams of carbon dioxide per mile. But that’s just an average.

yes

Climate Change

Are electric cars a solution to climate change?

yes_statement

"electric" "cars" are a "solution" to "climate" "change".. "electric" vehicles help combat "climate" "change".. the use of "electric" "cars" contributes to mitigating "climate" "change".

https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2022/11/dont-get-fooled-electric-vehicles-really-are-better-for-the-climate/

Don't get fooled: Electric vehicles really are better for the climate ...

Share this: You may have heard the myth that electric vehicles are just as bad for the climate — or worse — than gas-powered cars and trucks. One common myth claims that the climate-warming pollution caused by manufacturing electric vehicle batteries cancels out the benefits. Not so. Electric vehicles don’t cause more pollution in the long run Electric vehicles, often called EVs, are responsible for less global-warming pollution over their life cycle than gas-powered vehicles, despite the fact that battery manufacturing — for the moment — increases the climate impacts of EV production. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency explains the issue in a nutshell: “Some studies have shown that making a typical electric vehicle (EV) can create more carbon pollution than making a gasoline car. This is because of the additional energy required to manufacture an EV’s battery. Still, over the lifetime of the vehicle, total greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions associated with manufacturing, charging, and driving an EV are typically lower than the total GHGs associated with a gasoline car.” (emphasis added) The climate is changing, and our journalists are here to help you make sense of it. Sign up for our weekly email newsletter and never miss a story. Let’s walk through the key data leading to this conclusion, with the help of the lead author of a 2022 Union of Concerned Scientists report evaluating the lifetime impacts of electric and gasoline vehicles. Manufacturing an electric vehicle does cause carbon pollution Although an electric vehicle creates less climate pollution over its life cycle than a gas-powered vehicle, manufacturing an EV typically generates more pollution. That’s mostly a result of the energy required to mine the materials used in batteries, transport them to the production facility, and manufacture them. “However, even now, those emissions are small compared to the savings when you’re driving the vehicle,” said David Reichmuth, senior engineer at the Union of Concerned Scientists and co-author of the 2022 report cited above. Most of a vehicle’s emissions occur during the portion of its life when it is driven. And electric vehicles deliver a benefit no gas-powered car can: They eliminate tailpipe emissions. That goes a long way in improving air quality and climate goals. The amount of climate pollution generated by driving an EV depends on the mix of electricity available in the region where it’s used. For example, if EV drivers live in an area where most grid power is supplied by fossil fuels, then charging up will have a bigger climate footprint than in places where most energy comes from wind and solar. Still, Reichmuth said that driving using electricity is cleaner than gasoline even with the current electricity mix in the United States. And his research shows that as more renewables have come online in recent years, EV charging has been getting cleaner. In 2012, only 46% of U.S. residents lived in a place where driving an average EV created less climate pollution than the most fuel-efficient gasoline car, which then was a Prius. Today, no matter where you live, driving an average EV results in lower emissions than driving an average gas-powered car. And over 90% of the U.S. population now lives in places where driving an average all-electric vehicle produces fewer emissions than even the most efficient hybrid-gas vehicle — Hyundai’s Ioniq Blue. Bottom line: Reichmuth’s team compared an average gas-powered sedan (32 miles per gallon) with an average-efficiency EV (300-mile-range battery) and found that the EV reduces total lifetime emissions by 52%. “You can also think of it as the manufacturing emissions being a deficit or debt that is sort of ‘paid back’ by emissions savings,” Reichmuth said. For the average driver — one who drives about 10,650 miles a year — “there’s a net climate benefit as long as that car’s on the road for two years,” Reichmuth said. “And most of these cars are being driven 10 to 15 years, so it really is a net benefit.” More clean power and innovation are likely to cut pollution from electric vehicle manufacturing In the future, adding more renewables to the power mix and continuing to make other technological advances are likely to help reduce the climate impacts of EV manufacturing. “Some of those manufacturing emissions will be helped as we both clean up the grid and clean up transportation,” he said. Reichmuth’s research looked at what would happen if car manufacturers switch to using renewable energy at their factories.“If you’re using 100% carbon-free electricity in battery manufacturing,” he said, “it would reduce battery emissions by 27%.” Some emissions result from transporting materials from the point of extraction to production facilities, so electrifying the industrial trucking sector would also help improve manufacturing’s climate footprint. Verdict: electric cars are already better for the climate than gas-fueled vehicles — but there’s room for improvement. ​The transportation sector accounts for about 27% of total U.S. climate-warming pollution, making it the largest contributor to the nation’s emissions. Cleaning up passenger cars is therefore vital to addressing climate change. Electric cars are already doing exactly that. “It’s clear from my research and other people’s research that the average EV represents a significant emissions reduction — even when you consider battery manufacture,” said Reichmuth. “We do need to reduce the emissions from manufacturing, just as we need to reduce the emissions from driving overall.” “But overall, if we’re trying to figure out how to maintain the mobility that we have without adding to global warming emissions already changing our climate,” he said, “it’s clear that switching from gasoline to an electric motor is part of that solution.” Got other questions about electric vehicles? Drop us a line at editor@yaleclimateconnections.org. Tom Toro is a cartoonist and writer who has published over 200 cartoons in The New Yorker since 2010. Daisy Simmons is a freelance writer and editor with more than 15 years of experience in research-driven storytelling. In addition to contributing to Yale Climate Connections since early 2016, she also... More by Daisy Simmons

Bottom line: Reichmuth’s team compared an average gas-powered sedan (32 miles per gallon) with an average-efficiency EV (300-mile-range battery) and found that the EV reduces total lifetime emissions by 52%. “You can also think of it as the manufacturing emissions being a deficit or debt that is sort of ‘paid back’ by emissions savings,” Reichmuth said. For the average driver — one who drives about 10,650 miles a year — “there’s a net climate benefit as long as that car’s on the road for two years,” Reichmuth said. “And most of these cars are being driven 10 to 15 years, so it really is a net benefit.” More clean power and innovation are likely to cut pollution from electric vehicle manufacturing In the future, adding more renewables to the power mix and continuing to make other technological advances are likely to help reduce the climate impacts of EV manufacturing. “Some of those manufacturing emissions will be helped as we both clean up the grid and clean up transportation,” he said. Reichmuth’s research looked at what would happen if car manufacturers switch to using renewable energy at their factories. “If you’re using 100% carbon-free electricity in battery manufacturing,” he said, “it would reduce battery emissions by 27%.” Some emissions result from transporting materials from the point of extraction to production facilities, so electrifying the industrial trucking sector would also help improve manufacturing’s climate footprint. Verdict: electric cars are already better for the climate than gas-fueled vehicles — but there’s room for improvement. ​The transportation sector accounts for about 27% of total U.S. climate-warming pollution, making it the largest contributor to the nation’s emissions. Cleaning up passenger cars is therefore vital to addressing climate change. Electric cars are already doing exactly that.

yes

Climate Change

Are electric cars a solution to climate change?

yes_statement

"electric" "cars" are a "solution" to "climate" "change".. "electric" vehicles help combat "climate" "change".. the use of "electric" "cars" contributes to mitigating "climate" "change".

https://bonpote.com/en/are-electric-cars-a-solution-to-tackle-climate-change/

Are electric cars a solution to tackle climate change ?

Are electric cars a solution to tackle climate change ? Are electric cars an ideal solution for the climate emergency? Text by Aurélien Bigo, Researcher on the energy transition in the transport sector. Translated by Stéphanie de la Sayette 2035 will mark the end of the sale of Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) cars in France and more widely in the European Union, leaving the way for electric cars. The transition is already underway: electric cars represented 13% of car sales in 2022 in France, a figure that is increasing each year. This policy is mainly driven by climate change. However, it is not uncommon to read or hear that electric cars would be worse for the climate than ICE. So, what do the studies say? Is going electric better in France? What about in other countries in the world? Which phase(s) of the life cycle of an electric car and a ICE emit the most? What other issues relating to cars in general, electric cars may solve (or not)? How do we ensure a sustainable and virtuous development for electric cars? Let’s try and untangle this (electric!) debate… Electric car or Internal Combustion Engine car, which one is better? Several studies have analysed and compared the GHGs of ICE versus electric cars in France, by taking into account all stages of the lifecycle of a car, from the production of the vehicle to its end of life, including its use and maintenance. We call it: “life cycle analysis” (or LCAs). The studies found that, in France, emissions are around 2 to 5 times lower for an electric car than for a ICE (petrol or diesel). The image below summarises the 10 studies compiled for France over the past 10 years Results of the main life cycle assessments on Internal Combustion Engine and electric cars for France In France, electric cars are better. What about the rest of the world? In Germany, China…? The energy mix used to recharge EV batteries strongly impacts their carbon footprint. In France, the low-carbon electricity mix thus gives a strong advantage compared to other countries. The IPCC compilation and many academic studies (here, here or here) show that, in the vast majority of countries in the world, the electric car is already a better choice. For example, in Germany, the decreases of GHG emissions are around -25% to -60% (division by 1.3 to 2.5) depending on the studies. Only in a few countries, which are largely dependent on coal for their electricity, is the negative impact of electric cars often found to be greater than for ICE, for example in India or Poland, and sometimes in China, according to the analysis (see the document in section 3 for the sources and details). But even in these countries, and due to the gradual decarbonisation of electricity, the electric car will become a better option than ICE in the coming years. Further, at the global level, the International Energy Agency estimates that electric is on average emitting two times less than ICE today. It is still insufficient at this stage to achieve the climate goals, but the benefits are already clear. And the role of electric vehicle will be major in decarbonising transportation in the future. Indeed, the IPCC indicated in its Third Part of its Sixth Assessment Report: “ Electric vehicles powered by low-carbon electricity offer the main potential for decarbonizing land transport, in life cycle analysis”. Several factors explain the discrepancies between the different studies of the life cycle analysis. They influence the level of emissions of vehicles in absolute terms, but also the differential between ICE and electric (in %). Among the most significant factors are: the electric mix for the use of EVs, the total mileage of the vehicles over their lifetime, various batteries properties (including: capacity, emissions associated with their production, potential second life), their size, their energy consumption, and whether emissions linked to infrastructures are taken into account. These factors, and the main results of the studies cited above, are summarised in the slides below. Even for a single factors, different hypothesis may be relevant. It is therefore the order of magnitude is what is important to keep in mind. Nevertheless, despite the diversity of hypothesis of the studies for France, the conclusion is always the same: when it relates to the impact on the climate, an electric car is doing much better than a car that runs on petrol! Is the production of an electric car emitting more than the production of a Internal Combustion Engineone? This must be the most debated issue in relation to electric cars. It is true that the production phase of electric cars is emitting more GHGs. This surplus of emissions is approximately +50% (but varies from approximately +20% to more than a multiplication by 2 according to studies) and is essentially due to the manufacture of the battery. On the other hand, in France, the emissions resulting from the use of an electric car are easily 15 times lower than for a Internal Combustion Engine car. This is because the final energy consumption for an electric car is about 3 times lower, thanks to a more efficient engine (which would limit the surplus of electricity consumption needed for electric cars to 20% of current consumption, even without energy sobriety). But also because electricity generation in France emits about 5 to 6 times less CO2 per unit of energy than producing and burning petrol. Emissions are now greater for vehicle production For electric cars in France, the bulk of emissions comes from the production phase of the vehicle. This is a major difference with Internal Combustion Engine in terms of emissions over their life cycle. For petrol vehicles, more than three-quarters of GHGs are linked to the usage of the vehicle (i.e. the production and combustion of fuels). It is the opposite for electric cars, where three quarters of the overall impact on climate are due to the production of the vehicle, while the use of the vehicle emits little CO2. What is true for the impact on the climate is also true for several other environmental impacts of cars and their costs: these are higher for the production (or purchase) of electric vehicles, but lower when it relates to the usage of the vehicle. To limit these production costs, it is therefore better to focus on lighter vehicles with a smaller battery. Is an electric SUV worth it? It depends how you look at it. The study by Hung et al (2021) gives us 3 findings relating to the climate impact, in France, depending on the type of vehicle, from the mini-car to the large SUV: For the 4 types of vehicles assessed, the percentage in reduction in emissions when switching from ICE to electric is similar, nearing -70%; On the other hand, with an equivalent engine, over its life cycle, the mini-car will have emissions that are twice as low as the large SUV, hence why light vehicles should be favoured; Thus, electrifying a large SUV allows a reduction in emissions twice as large as electrifying a small car, because the reduction percentage is similar, but the large SUV has more impact. Therefore, the electrification of vehicles makes it possible to reduce the carbon impact regardless of the type of vehicle. And the benefits are all the greater when replacing old, high-emitting ICE vehicles. Change in life-cycle emissions when switching from a combustion to an electric car (in %) for a mini-car (left) and an SUV (right). Source : Hung et al, 2021. Regionalized climate footprints of battery electric vehicles in Europe. But vehicle electrification alone will not be enough to achieve our climate goals. Its deployment is too slow compared to the short-term reductions needed. The electric car often remains too emitting (especially for the heaviest vehicles). Wasting voltage resources (especially metals used for the battery) can limit the electrification of a higher number of more virtuous vehicles. It is therefore necessary to combine electrification with a strong transformation of our mobility towards more energy sobriety. Electric SUVs, which are less aerodynamic and often heavier, do not meet this dual requirement. Do electric cars solve problems relating to vehicles in general? It depends which sustainability issues we are looking at. Beyond the impact on the climate, cars currently have many other environmental, social and health impacts. The benefits of electric linked to the phasing out of petrol By removing the need for petrol for the vehicle usage, the benefits of switching to electric are on several levels. The most significant challenge with regard to climate change is exiting from fossil fuels, along with improving health and quality of life relating to air and noise pollution. For air pollution, switching to electric means that pollutants from the exhaust of Internal Combustion Engine are eliminated (however there are still emissions of particles beyond the exhaust). It also means that noise pollution relating to the internal combustion of ICE is eliminated, even though the noise of the vehicle’s friction with the air and the road remains, in particular when driving above 50 km/h. The negative impacts are therefore reduced, without however disappearing completely. The disadvantages of cars in general remain Transitioning to electric will not have any impact on several other nuisances associated with cars. First, the space taken by vehicles, whether in traffic or parked, have the consequence of limiting the space that could be used by other modes of transport, or social activities, and it reinforces the artificialisation of soils and “urban heat islands”. Electric cars will not change anything on accident rates either, considering road fatalities in France have not fallen for 10 years. New constrains on the resources with electric Finally, it is mainly on the question of resources that electrification poses new sustainability challenges, compared to ICE. It would take more than several articles on the subject, but in a nutshell, we already know that Internal Combustion Engine, and the automotive system as a whole, are highly resource-intensive. Electric cars require more precious metals for batteries, with its own issues in terms of availability, pollution, social and/or geopolitical issues associated with the extraction of these resources. But the oil needed for Internal Combustion Engine is not exempt of similar issues. Can we keep the same attitudes towards mobility in the future? Electric cars only reduce parts of the problems related to cars without solving them entirely. If we want to respond appropriately to the various transition challenges, we need to reduce our dependence on cars as a means of transportation. It will not be enough to transition from 38 million ICE private cars to 38 million (or more) electric private cars, whilst keeping the same habits with regards to usage. Electric cars emit more than walking, cycling, the train (with the exception of diesel train when not at full capacity) and most of road public transport (depending on the number of passengers). The latter are also likely to evolve towards lower emissions in the future. Carbon impact in life cycle assessment of different modes per passenger kilometre How to ensure a virtuous deployment of electric cars? The environmental and financial costs of electric cars are high during the production phase. This means that it will be necessary to ensure a virtuous deployment of electricity by: Limiting the production of new vehicles: for this, we must offer alternatives to the use of individual car (walking, cycling, train, bus, etc.) and promote car-free lifestyles to support reduction/elimination of number of cars owned by individual households; Manufacture vehicles with as light, aerodynamic and with as little energy requirement as possible, with reasonable battery capacities and autonomy calibrated on daily journeys, rather than on the few long-distance journeys made throughout the year; Extend the lifecycle and the mileage: with high impacts and costs during production, it would be best to make the vehicles the most profitable, by using them extensively, in particular by sharing them more, and by extending their lifecycle as much as possible. In summary, the share of electricity used by motorised vehicles needs to be the highest possible, whilst limiting the number of batteries sold. We will need to engage all levers of the energy transition, both technological and from an energy sobriety point of view, including: reduction of mileage, modal shift towards active alternative modes of mobility and public transport, better sharing of vehicles, speed limit and vehicle weight, electrification, etc. Is it better to keep my old Internal Combustion Engine or to change it for an electric car? There is no straightforward or right answer. It strongly depends on several factors, including the vehicle and its usage, the future of Internal Combustion Engine (breakdown or resale), the impacts considered (CO2 emissions, resources, pollution, etc.) and the length of time over which these impacts are measured. Going electric means additional emissions, consumption of resources and pollution in the short term (during the production phase), but with a view to gradually reduce some of it over the life cycle of the vehicle in the long term. If you are looking to change vehicle, the only time where it does not make sense from a climate perspective to switch to electric, is if you very rarely use the car. This is because there is more impact during the production phase, for little gain during the lifecycle of the vehicle, if not driven much. The best thing to do is to try to live without a car and use alternative solutions as much as possible (walking, cycling, train, bus, carpooling, etc.), and occasionally rent a vehicle (electric, ideally!) for journeys that require a car. In all the other cases, and if you have the possibility of installing a charging station at home or have one nearby (yes, there is still a lot to do when it comes to the issue of charging station!), it is better to go electric. If you have a city car that has been manufactured in large quantities (like a Twingo), the ideal is to “retrofit” your ICE. This consists of transforming a Internal Combustion Engine into an electric one, which is virtuous from the point of view of resources usage. However, the offer to do so is not very developed at this stage, which means having to buy new to renew the park. Price, range, size… what type of electric vehicle should I choose? There is no single answer here, it depends on your usage and needs. If you have no other choice than using a car, the most virtuous option is to choose an electric vehicle calibrated for daily use. Until now, the tendency was to do the opposite and calibrate the purchase of a car on the few exceptional journeys we take throughout the year (such as going on holidays). For example, buying a 5-Seater car, easily exceeding 1.5 tonnes, traveling at 180 km/h, with an electric autonomy of several hundred kilometers… when it ends up being used for trips with 1 or 2 people on board, often at a maximum speed of 80 km/h, and less than 80 km from home for 98.8% of its usage. Even when a two-person household has two cars, usually those cars are 5-Seater. Oversizing is the tendency for a large number of vehicles! It means a larger vehicle size with larger batteries. This is costly both for the environment and for the wallet, often making electric cars unaffordable: every time the weight of the vehicle increases by 100 kg, its purchase price increases by 3,000 Euros. For example, the Dacia Spring weighs around 1 ton and sells for around 20,000 Euros (excluding bonuses). For cars of 2 tons and more, it increases to 50,000 Euros or more. Turning to lighter vehicles Sign of a growing interest for inexpensive electric models, the lightest electric cars on the market are among the best sellers of 2022 in France. The Peugeot e-208 city car is in the lead, ahead of the Dacia Spring, and the electric versions of the Fiat 500 and the Renault Twingo are in 5th and 6th position. Still, the most energy efficient vehicles are rarely produced or assembled in France (except for the Renault Megane e-Tech or the Renault Zoé). Aligning environmental and societal issues with those of the local economy and jobs must be a priority for the industrial policy in France. Beyond these electric city cars, lighter electric cars are even more virtuous if they develop well as a replacement for the car. For example, electric cars weighing less than 500 kg such as the Renault Twizy (or the Mobilize Duo which will replace it) which has a version limited to 80 km/h, the Microlino which goes up to 90 km/h or the Citroën Ami which is limited to 45 km/h. These light electrical cars are the intermediate vehicles between a bicycle and a car. They are much more energy efficient than current cars and yet can respond to several daily usage (we will come back to this). Intermediate vehicles between bicycle and car, an opportunity for low-energy vehicles. Source: Frédéric Héran, article in The Conversation Our attitudes towards driving cars must change For long distance and when the autonomy of electric cars is insufficient, alternative modes of transportation like the train, coach, carpooling or car rental, are by far the best option. These alternatives must be strongly encouraged, and public authorities must develop the offers to enable as many people as possible to limit themselves to drive lighter electric vehicles with a reasonable battery capacity and range. Finally, we also need to limit the negative impacts of electric cars on the power grid and avoid using fossil fuels during peak times (in winter in particular). For this, it is important to recharge the vehicle battery during off-peak hours. This can be facilitated by a smart (or remote) charging control system, to best adapt to the pressure on the power grid. What about hydrogen? Hybrid? Biofuels? Sticking to petrol vehicles is incompatible with our climate goals. If electric is favoured in the future to replace it, it is because the other alternatives offered are not up to the challenges. Hydrogen across the world is still produced at more than 99% from fossil fuels, which means its decarbonisation will be slow, and the energy efficiency from hydrogen use is much worse than that of battery-powered electricity, its cost is much more important, and the charging grid will forever remain less developed than for electric. This means that hydrogen will not be a mass solution for cars (more information in this article). By extension, this conclusion is also valid for synthetic fuels (or “e-fuels”), produced from hydrogen, and whose overall efficiency is even lower. The current development of hybrid and rechargeable hybrid is far from being virtuous, with heavy and very expensive vehicles, and they still rely too much on fossil fuels to be an interesting long-term alternative to get out of petrol (more info in this article). Biofuels and biogas, a good option? Finally, biofuels or biogas are mostly available in insufficient quantities. If we wanted to replace all the petrol consumed in transportation with first-generation biofuels, we would have to use all the land cultivated in France for their production (almost 50 Mtep consumed, 3-4 tep/ha and 15.6 Mha cultivated). Further, if we want to avoid competition with usage for food, we must switch to 2nd generation biofuels, based on waste or non-recovered biomass, which means resources are even more limited, and must be re-directed towards the sectors or modes of transportation that have the fewest alternatives available. Conclusion: what to take away from all of this? First of all, the electrification of cars is crucial for the climate. All the scenarios in France or in the world agree on this. Intentionally or not, to oppose electricity is to oppose the achievement of our climate goals and to make us dependent on oil for longer. However, electrification is far from being a perfect and magic solution. It will not be enough to solve the climate challenge posed by transportation or more generally the problems relating to cars. Moreover, many of the criticisms about electric vehicles (it consumes too many resources, is too polluting, too expensive, makes us dependent on other countries, etc.) are true of the Internal Combustion Engine. It is therefore the issue of choosing an individual car for our mobility, and the type of vehicles and usage we make of it, that we need to focus on changing, if we want to move towards more sustainable mobility. However, this aspect of energy sobriety is sorely lacking in current transportation policies, which urgently need to change, including: reducing the weight of vehicles, limiting speed at 110 km/h, moderating distances and air traffic, developing cycling, rail and public transport, carpooling… If we had to remember one message: the future of the car will certainly be electric, but the individual car should not be the future of our mobility. Thanks The author Aurélien Bigo would like to thank the following persons for the exchanges on the subject and/or for the proofreading:

Are electric cars a solution to tackle climate change ? Are electric cars an ideal solution for the climate emergency? Text by Aurélien Bigo, Researcher on the energy transition in the transport sector. Translated by Stéphanie de la Sayette 2035 will mark the end of the sale of Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) cars in France and more widely in the European Union, leaving the way for electric cars. The transition is already underway: electric cars represented 13% of car sales in 2022 in France, a figure that is increasing each year. This policy is mainly driven by climate change. However, it is not uncommon to read or hear that electric cars would be worse for the climate than ICE. So, what do the studies say? Is going electric better in France? What about in other countries in the world? Which phase(s) of the life cycle of an electric car and a ICE emit the most? What other issues relating to cars in general, electric cars may solve (or not)? How do we ensure a sustainable and virtuous development for electric cars? Let’s try and untangle this (electric!) debate… Electric car or Internal Combustion Engine car, which one is better? Several studies have analysed and compared the GHGs of ICE versus electric cars in France, by taking into account all stages of the lifecycle of a car, from the production of the vehicle to its end of life, including its use and maintenance. We call it: “life cycle analysis” (or LCAs). The studies found that, in France, emissions are around 2 to 5 times lower for an electric car than for a ICE (petrol or diesel). The image below summarises the 10 studies compiled for France over the past 10 years Results of the main life cycle assessments on Internal Combustion Engine and electric cars for France In France, electric cars are better. What about the rest of the world? In Germany, China…? The energy mix used to recharge EV batteries strongly impacts their carbon footprint. In France, the low-carbon electricity mix thus gives a strong advantage compared to other countries.

yes

Climate Change

Are electric cars a solution to climate change?

yes_statement

"electric" "cars" are a "solution" to "climate" "change".. "electric" vehicles help combat "climate" "change".. the use of "electric" "cars" contributes to mitigating "climate" "change".

https://www.ucsusa.org/about/news/cleaner-now-ever-driving-electric-cars-and-trucks-cuts-global-warming-emissions

Cleaner Now Than Ever: Driving Electric Cars and Trucks Cuts ...

Washington (July 25, 2022)—The future of transportation is electric—and that future has real benefits not just for electric vehicle drivers, but for everyone. As more drivers make the switch to electric vehicles, that means a cleaner, healthier future with less global warming emissions. In a new analysis, “Driving Cleaner: How Electric Cars and Pick-Ups Beat Gasoline on Lifetime Global Warming Emissions,” the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) shows that switching to electric cars or pickup trucks from comparable gasoline vehicles is one of the most effective ways we can reduce emissions and avoid the worst impacts of climate change. On average, electric vehicles produce less than half the global warming emissions that come from driving a similar gasoline vehicle. This advantage has grown with a cleaner electrical grid and more efficient EV technology. And that advantage holds over the whole lifetime of the vehicle, from manufacture to driving to disposal. Transportation is the largest source of global warming emissions in the U.S., and more than half of that pollution comes from passenger cars, trucks, and SUVs. Making the emissions cuts we need to fight climate change means electrifying the cars and trucks that we use to get around. “The electric vehicle market is poised to grow dramatically, with more options than ever, from small cars to pickup trucks,” said David Reichmuth, senior vehicles engineer in the Clean Transportation Program at UCS. “This is an exciting moment—and drivers can be confident that by making the switch, they’ll be helping to rein in climate change.” Today, the average electric vehicle is so clean that the global warming emissions are the equivalent of driving a car getting 91 miles to the gallon. For 90 percent of the country, driving an electric vehicle is cleaner than driving even the most efficient gasoline vehicle. That’s up from two-thirds of the country in 2015—a remarkable improvement in less than a decade, thanks mostly to an increasingly clean electric grid. Manufacturers are delivering electric versions of more vehicle models, and that’s especially important for pickup trucks, a growing part of the passenger vehicle market. Switching from a gasoline pickup truck to an electric pickup truck will reduce the total global warming emissions over the truck’s lifetime by 57 percent. The climate advantage of an electric vehicle includes the vehicle’s entire life cycle—from manufacturing to driving to disposal. A vehicle purchased today will be on the road for many years to come. Conventional cars require the extracting, refining, and burning oil for every mile they drive over their lifetime. Electric vehicles, however, have the potential to get even cleaner over their lifetime as electricity generation moves away from fossil fuels and towards renewable sources. While electric vehicles are cleaner and cheaper to fuel than gasoline vehicles, they’re still a small portion of the cars on the road today. To make sure that everyone can benefit from the advantages of electric vehicles and the transition can happen as quickly as possible, governments should invest in incentives and infrastructure to make driving electric more accessible—and a cleaner, more resilient grid to charge them. “Transitioning to an electric car or truck is one of the most critical tools for fighting climate change, and it’s a positive change that car buyers can make right now,” said Reichmuth. “The electric future is cleaner, it’s healthier, and it’s within reach.”

Washington (July 25, 2022)—The future of transportation is electric—and that future has real benefits not just for electric vehicle drivers, but for everyone. As more drivers make the switch to electric vehicles, that means a cleaner, healthier future with less global warming emissions. In a new analysis, “Driving Cleaner: How Electric Cars and Pick-Ups Beat Gasoline on Lifetime Global Warming Emissions,” the Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) shows that switching to electric cars or pickup trucks from comparable gasoline vehicles is one of the most effective ways we can reduce emissions and avoid the worst impacts of climate change. On average, electric vehicles produce less than half the global warming emissions that come from driving a similar gasoline vehicle. This advantage has grown with a cleaner electrical grid and more efficient EV technology. And that advantage holds over the whole lifetime of the vehicle, from manufacture to driving to disposal. Transportation is the largest source of global warming emissions in the U.S., and more than half of that pollution comes from passenger cars, trucks, and SUVs. Making the emissions cuts we need to fight climate change means electrifying the cars and trucks that we use to get around. “The electric vehicle market is poised to grow dramatically, with more options than ever, from small cars to pickup trucks,” said David Reichmuth, senior vehicles engineer in the Clean Transportation Program at UCS. “This is an exciting moment—and drivers can be confident that by making the switch, they’ll be helping to rein in climate change.” Today, the average electric vehicle is so clean that the global warming emissions are the equivalent of driving a car getting 91 miles to the gallon. For 90 percent of the country, driving an electric vehicle is cleaner than driving even the most efficient gasoline vehicle. That’s up from two-thirds of the country in 2015—a remarkable improvement in less than a decade, thanks mostly to an increasingly clean electric grid. Manufacturers are delivering electric versions of more vehicle models, and that’s especially important for pickup trucks, a growing part of the passenger vehicle market.

yes

Climate Change

Are electric cars a solution to climate change?

yes_statement

"electric" "cars" are a "solution" to "climate" "change".. "electric" vehicles help combat "climate" "change".. the use of "electric" "cars" contributes to mitigating "climate" "change".

https://www.euronews.com/next/2022/09/19/why-tech-companies-are-wrong-to-think-electric-cars-are-a-solution-to-climate-change

Why tech companies are wrong to think electric cars are a solution to ...

Electric cars are not the solution Tech companies offer to replace - little by little - vehicles equipped with internal combustion engines, which are considered too polluting, with electric vehicles which have a much lower carbon footprint. But lower doesn't mean zero either. It’s true that fully electric vehicles do not emit waste products but the batteries that supply energy to the vehicle are made of minerals like lithium and cobalt which have an impact on climate change. “In order to create an electric car, a lot of minerals need to be mined and much of that will continue to happen in the global south. And those mines have incredible environmental and health impacts in the places that they exist,” explained Marx. ADVERTISEMENT The priority should therefore not be to replace every car with its electric equivalent but rather to rethink mobility in general. "Placing so much focus on the automobile and even now the electric automobile is not the way that we solve our mobility problems, but rather it's time to invest in transit, in cycling, in walkable cities, to get people out of cars altogether," they said. Changes need to be fair For Marx, change is needed to ensure a better future for our planet, and for that change to be beneficial to our society as a whole, it must be done fairly. And to do this we need to understand that the transformation of our mobility is part of a set of changes that are necessary. "The mobility system is one piece of this, but we also need to pay attention to how it's in conversation with other systems within the city to ensure that the policies that we take to improve transportation are equitable for everyone, and not just the people who can afford to live in the areas where those improvements are made," they said.

Electric cars are not the solution Tech companies offer to replace - little by little - vehicles equipped with internal combustion engines, which are considered too polluting, with electric vehicles which have a much lower carbon footprint. But lower doesn't mean zero either. It’s true that fully electric vehicles do not emit waste products but the batteries that supply energy to the vehicle are made of minerals like lithium and cobalt which have an impact on climate change. “In order to create an electric car, a lot of minerals need to be mined and much of that will continue to happen in the global south. And those mines have incredible environmental and health impacts in the places that they exist,” explained Marx. ADVERTISEMENT The priority should therefore not be to replace every car with its electric equivalent but rather to rethink mobility in general. "Placing so much focus on the automobile and even now the electric automobile is not the way that we solve our mobility problems, but rather it's time to invest in transit, in cycling, in walkable cities, to get people out of cars altogether," they said. Changes need to be fair For Marx, change is needed to ensure a better future for our planet, and for that change to be beneficial to our society as a whole, it must be done fairly. And to do this we need to understand that the transformation of our mobility is part of a set of changes that are necessary. "The mobility system is one piece of this, but we also need to pay attention to how it's in conversation with other systems within the city to ensure that the policies that we take to improve transportation are equitable for everyone, and not just the people who can afford to live in the areas where those improvements are made," they said.

no

Climate Change

Are electric cars a solution to climate change?

no_statement

"electric" "cars" are not a "solution" to "climate" "change".. "electric" vehicles do not effectively address "climate" "change".. the adoption of "electric" "cars" does not solve the problem of "climate" "change".

https://iai.tv/articles/why-electric-cars-are-a-mistake-auid-2241

Why electric cars are a mistake | Conor Bronsdon » IAI TV

Why electric cars are a mistake Electric cars won't solve climate change | Conor Bronsdon is a writer and speaker in tech, software development and Web 3/crypto. Podcaster at Dev Interrupted @DevInterrupted & Spaces Host. 1,938 words Read time: approx. 10 mins Electric cars are hyped to an almost religious status. Companies, both old and new, from Tesla and Rivian, Ford and Mercedes, all are going electric. However, they are ineffective at solving climate change. We should focus our efforts elsewhere, writes Conor Bronsdon. Elon Musk is wrong; Tesla won't save the planet from climate change. Electric cars might look great in your driveway, but they're also a symbol of a systemic problem: a consumer and car-based approach to addressing transportation's climate impacts. Not only that, they're an ineffective one. Transportation-related carbon emissions are the top source of US carbon emissions Transportation-related carbon emissions account for 14% of our global carbon emissions and are the largest source of US carbon emissions at 29%. Therefore, it is crucial that the US cuts our transportation emissions to meet the Paris Climate accords' goal —50% of our 2017 emissions. While the COVID-19 pandemic temporarily lowered some of these transportation emissions in 2020, the long-standing trend is that we've failed to make a dent in our transportation-related emissions – they've stayed all but constant for the past 15 years. Suppose we fail to address climate change and the air pollution emissions from gas vehicles. In that case, we have significant problems looming: mass species die off, increasing natural disasters, destruction of our fisheries, horrible air pollution, wars over water, and much more. With 82% of US emissions in 2018 coming from road vehicles, it’s clear that we need to cut our emissions from cars by taking combustion engine vehicles off the roads as rapidly as we can. The solution that has been popularized for this? Electric cars vs gas vehicles—and electric vehicles don't go far enough. ___ This is the problem with Tesla; they’re not intent on finding the best solution to our climate crisis ___ Carbon Lock-In: the #1 problem with electric cars The biggest problem is carbon-lock in—when we spend to build something like a power plant or an electric car, the economics, and sociology of the new production incentivizes continued operations. After making significant investments in a solution, companies and governments don't want to switch to a better solution immediately—they make considerable capital investments in new construction or purchases, and they pay off those investments over time. With manufacturing lines for cars, new power plants, or oil pipelines, there are also jobs associated with new facilities, and this further complicates shutting down such efforts due to economic and social entanglements. This is the problem with Tesla; they’re not intent on finding the best solution to our climate crisis. Due to this, temporary solutions—such as a mass retrofit to electric cars—are hard to move on from. Just like when a family purchases a gas vehicle, they're unlikely to buy a new electric car or stop driving that car the very next year due to the sunk cost of the vehicle. We can't afford to take half measures; the investments we've already made in today's energy system may already push us past the goals of the Paris climate agreement, even if we immediately stop investment in new fossil fuel infrastructure. We need to think bigger and reimagine the systems we use to address the climate crisis, move people, build, and more. We can't continue to be locked into a car-based system—that's not thinking big enough. ___ There are estimated to be more than 1.4 billion, potentially as many as 1.5 billion vehicles in operation in the world today ___ Logistical challenges with changing to electric vehicles There are multiple other problems with prioritizing electric vehicles as the key solution to our climate crisis versus merely a piece of the puzzle. One issue is one of logistics and scale - there are estimated to be more than 1.4 billion, potentially as many as 1.5 billion vehicles in operation in the world today—and that number has been doubling every 20 years or so since the 1970s. It's untenable politically or logistically in many countries to quickly swap out or retrofit all current vehicles for electric. Even with accelerating electric vehicle adoption rates, electric cars are a vast minority of new car sales. Electric cars won’t save us Politicians don't want to tell you that electric vehicles won't solve the ecological problems created by transportation. The car companies certainly want you to think they will, proposing electric cars as the latest thing to buy and lobbying for tax credits and incentives for electric car purchases. However, electric vehicles won't solve our carbon emissions challenge fast enough – and prioritizing cars as a transportation method is extremely inefficient when it comes to space in our cities, another crucial part of the climate change equation. With less than a decade to reduce carbon emissions to 50% of our 2017 annual emissions, electrics cars won't get us nearly close enough even if we drastically increase our electric vehicle production and immediately switch to electric vehicles. Instead, we'll lock-in a level of carbon emissions that is unsustainable, particularly as personal vehicles are sold across the world's burgeoning population. Denser, urban cities can develop massive efficiencies in transportation, logistics, and housing that enable them to emit significantly less carbon (and cut down far fewer forests, crucial to converting the CO2 in our atmosphere) than sprawling suburban developments. If everyone has an electric car in the future, it’ll take up significant urban space, particularly compared with alternative transportation modes. In urban environments (where the majority of the world’s population lives and where a full 68% of the world’s population is projected to be by 2050), there are plenty of other greener, more sustainable options. Research shows that roughly half of all car trips in US cities are under three miles and can be replaced with zero-emissions micromobility options such as scooters and bikes. For those who may not want to get unduly sweaty ahead of a business meeting, or who can’t or don’t want to put in the effort, e-bikes are a great option and can take tons of car trips off the road, saving space in our cities, and taking car trips off the road entirely. Urban environments allow us to leverage mass transit with buses, rail, and subway systems, all providing vast efficiencies over moving people vs. cars. These are also significantly more accessible to people without the considerable upfront costs of purchasing a car, not to mention the public health benefits of avoiding all those car accidents, one of the leading causes of death in the United States. The Good News? Getting ourselves off fossil fuels pays for itself One of the under-discussed factors with getting cars off the road is that know it pays for itself. Car companies certainly don’t want us to think about the fact that even if climate change didn’t exist, the air pollution from gas vehicles more than pays for the cost of transitioning to alternative transportation options. As researchers continue to hone in on air pollution’s direct and indirect effects, they’ve realized just how stark the problem is. At the August 5th, 2020 hearing of the US House Committee on Oversight and Reform, Drew Shindell, Nicholas professor of earth science at Duke University (and a lead author on both recent IPCCreports), laid out the numbers: “Over the next 50 years, keeping to the 2°C pathway would prevent roughly 4.5 million premature deaths, about 3.5 million hospitalizations, and emergency room visits, and approximately 300 million lost workdays in the US.” ___ Over $700 billion per year in benefits to the US from improved health and labor alone, far more than the cost of the energy transition · The increased labor productivity is valued at more than $75 billion. · On average, this amounts to over $700 billion per year in benefits to the US from improved health and labor alone, far more than the cost of the energy transition. These are vast numbers—as clean energy has gotten so inexpensive, it’s clear that the air quality benefits alone are enough to pay for the energy transition. While climate change can only be halted with the cooperation of the world, the numbers show that even if the United States were to be the only country to get rid of fossil fuels and the benefits of avoiding global warming were not to materialize, the air quality benefits would still pay for the cost of divesting from fossil fuels. Shindell’s team looked at a scenario where the United States met the zero-emissions standards of the Paris Climate Accords 2°C while the rest of the world continued with current policies. Shindell testified that “We found that US action alone would bring us more than two-thirds of the health benefits of worldwide action over the next 15 years, with roughly half the total over the entire 50-year period analyzed.” Regardless of whether we can fully combat climate change, it’s clear that we need to divest our society from fossil fuels—saving lives and money while reducing urban sprawl and commute times. We can build a sustainable future Electric cars are not going to save us alone. While they’re often touted by marketing and government officials as the solution to our climate challenges, the truth is that we have to adjust our transportation model entirely and move away from a car-centric approach to transit to achieve better health outcomes, combat climate change, and avoid poisoning our rivers. While electric cars are superior in their pure greenhouse gas emissions to gas counterparts, they are still bad for the environment in other ways and inefficient ways of. moving people that encouraging suburban sprawl. If we’re still sprawling outwards as populations grow, we’re not going to be able to achieve the efficiency needed in transportation and housing to meet our climate and space needs. We’ll also deeply damage our environment, getting rid of green space for single-family housing, cutting down trees that are doing important work filtering carbon from the atmosphere, and poisoning our rivers and streams with the heavy metals present in car tires. Instead, we need more efficient transportation forms to be prioritized, letting us move people faster and with far fewer carbon emissions. Rail, both high-speed and in-city light rail, is an essential part of this equation: buses, micromobility technologies, and increased biking and walking through dense, interconnected neighborhoods with safe walking and riding areas. Join the conversation On the main website, you can learn more about ongoing excellent services like retro parts restoration options. You may also get proven solutions for effective maintenance, ensuring the long life of them. You're welcome to explore a selection of parts to be found at this online shop from reputable manufacturers

We can't afford to take half measures; the investments we've already made in today's energy system may already push us past the goals of the Paris climate agreement, even if we immediately stop investment in new fossil fuel infrastructure. We need to think bigger and reimagine the systems we use to address the climate crisis, move people, build, and more. We can't continue to be locked into a car-based system—that's not thinking big enough. ___ There are estimated to be more than 1.4 billion, potentially as many as 1.5 billion vehicles in operation in the world today ___ Logistical challenges with changing to electric vehicles There are multiple other problems with prioritizing electric vehicles as the key solution to our climate crisis versus merely a piece of the puzzle. One issue is one of logistics and scale - there are estimated to be more than 1.4 billion, potentially as many as 1.5 billion vehicles in operation in the world today—and that number has been doubling every 20 years or so since the 1970s. It's untenable politically or logistically in many countries to quickly swap out or retrofit all current vehicles for electric. Even with accelerating electric vehicle adoption rates, electric cars are a vast minority of new car sales. Electric cars won’t save us Politicians don't want to tell you that electric vehicles won't solve the ecological problems created by transportation. The car companies certainly want you to think they will, proposing electric cars as the latest thing to buy and lobbying for tax credits and incentives for electric car purchases. However, electric vehicles won't solve our carbon emissions challenge fast enough – and prioritizing cars as a transportation method is extremely inefficient when it comes to space in our cities, another crucial part of the climate change equation. With less than a decade to reduce carbon emissions to 50% of our 2017 annual emissions, electrics cars won't get us nearly close enough even if we drastically increase our electric vehicle production and immediately switch to electric vehicles.

no

Climate Change

Are electric cars a solution to climate change?

no_statement

"electric" "cars" are not a "solution" to "climate" "change".. "electric" vehicles do not effectively address "climate" "change".. the adoption of "electric" "cars" does not solve the problem of "climate" "change".

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0306261919307834

The role of electric vehicles in near-term mitigation pathways and ...

There is an urgent need to pursue both EV uptake and demand side solutions. Abstract The decarbonisation of the road transport sector is increasingly seen as a necessary component to meet global and national targets as specified in the Paris Agreement. It may be achieved best by shifting from Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) cars to Electric Vehicles (EVs). However, the transition to a low carbon mode of transport will not be instantaneous and any policy or technological change implemented now will take years to have the desired effect. Within this paper we show how on-road emission factors of EVs and models of embedded CO2 in the vehicle production may be combined with statistics for vehicle uptake/replacement to forecast future transport emissions. We demonstrate that EVs, when compared to an efficient ICE, provide few benefits in terms of CO2 mitigation until 2030. However, between 2030 and 2050, predicted CO2 savings under the different EV uptake and decarbonisation scenarios begin to diverge with larger CO2 savings seen for the accelerated EV uptake. This work shows that simply focusing on on-road emissions is insufficient to model the future CO2 impact of transport. Instead a more complete production calculation must be combined with an EV uptake model. Using this extended model, our scenarios show how the lack of difference between a Business as Usual and accelerated EV uptake scenario can be explained by the time-lag in cause and effect between policy changes and the desired change in the vehicle fleet. Our work reveals that current UK policy is unlikely to achieve the desired reduction in transport-based CO2 by 2030. If embedded CO2 is included as part of the transport emissions sector, then all possible UK EV scenarios will miss the reduction target for 2050 unless this is combined with intense decarbonisation (80% of 1990 levels) of the UK electricity grid. This result highlights that whilst EVs offer an important contribution to decarbonisation in the transport sector it will be necessary to look at other transport mitigation strategies, such as modal shift to public transit, car sharing and demand management, to achieve both near-term and long-term mitigation targets.

There is an urgent need to pursue both EV uptake and demand side solutions. Abstract The decarbonisation of the road transport sector is increasingly seen as a necessary component to meet global and national targets as specified in the Paris Agreement. It may be achieved best by shifting from Internal Combustion Engine (ICE) cars to Electric Vehicles (EVs). However, the transition to a low carbon mode of transport will not be instantaneous and any policy or technological change implemented now will take years to have the desired effect. Within this paper we show how on-road emission factors of EVs and models of embedded CO2 in the vehicle production may be combined with statistics for vehicle uptake/replacement to forecast future transport emissions. We demonstrate that EVs, when compared to an efficient ICE, provide few benefits in terms of CO2 mitigation until 2030. However, between 2030 and 2050, predicted CO2 savings under the different EV uptake and decarbonisation scenarios begin to diverge with larger CO2 savings seen for the accelerated EV uptake. This work shows that simply focusing on on-road emissions is insufficient to model the future CO2 impact of transport. Instead a more complete production calculation must be combined with an EV uptake model. Using this extended model, our scenarios show how the lack of difference between a Business as Usual and accelerated EV uptake scenario can be explained by the time-lag in cause and effect between policy changes and the desired change in the vehicle fleet. Our work reveals that current UK policy is unlikely to achieve the desired reduction in transport-based CO2 by 2030. If embedded CO2 is included as part of the transport emissions sector, then all possible UK EV scenarios will miss the reduction target for 2050 unless this is combined with intense decarbonisation (80% of 1990 levels) of the UK electricity grid. This result highlights that whilst EVs offer an important contribution to decarbonisation in the transport sector it will be necessary to look at other transport mitigation strategies, such as modal shift to public transit, car sharing and demand management, to achieve both near-term and long-term mitigation targets.

no