Everyone Talks About The Cold

When ever political scandals are fading for the moment, there is always a reason to talk about the weather. Looking at all major news outlets today, the polar vortex has stolen all the headlines. 

While it really appears to be extremely cold in the midwest, there is no reason to doubt global warming. Global warming is, like the term suggests. a global happening. It has nothing to do with people in Chicago freezing their butts off on any day in January. The deep freeze in the midwest is certainly not a global problem. What's going on locally, is called WEATHER. And weather is different than global warming. Mixing weather with global climate would be comparing apples with oranges. World temps are rising. With rising temps we get a melt-off of ice in polar regions. When ice melts, the level of the seas are rising. Talk to people living along the coast. They have seen rising seas for quite some time. If all the ice covering Antarctica, Greenland, and in mountain glaciers around the world were to melt, sea level would rise about 70 meters (230 feet). The ocean would cover all the coastal cities. And land area would shrink significantly. 
This horror scenario will not happen tomorrow just yet, but we are on the way.

Besides of causing a problem for low-lying areas, it will also bring significant to the ecology. Examplewise I can mention the fisheries along the north-east of the U.S. and Canada. Since conventional fishing for cod, haddock and pollock is heavily restricted, fishermen concentrate on lobster catches. But lobsters have largely disappeared from certain areas due to warming waters.  South of Cape Cod lobsters have been disappearing at an alarming rate.

Story:FAIRHAVEN — Tom Tomkiewicz remembers when there were so many lobster traps in Buzzards Bay it looked as if he could walk across the water on their buoys.

Now, the 42-year-old lobsterman and his dwindling number of colleagues have to set their traps far out to sea, well beyond view of the coast, to catch the few lobsters that remain.

“There’s nothing here,” said Tomkiewicz, one of only 35 Massachusetts lobstermen who still have permits to fish in the state and federal waters that stretch from Nantucket Sound to Long Island Sound. “It’s crazy.”

The Bay of Fundy is still cold and we still catch lobster here, but the average water temperature is rising as well. Maybe it is only a question of time until the lobster has moved even farther north on its search for colder waters.