Droughts: Global Warming or Nature?

Recently, I was searching the internet for historical information on a local park.  The park has a row of stone columns that appear quite old.  And for the life of me, I can’t figure out what they were used for.

I found a historical write-up of the local area written in 1954.  It didn’t answer my question but had some interesting information.  In the write-up, the author mentions that the area was currently (1954) enduring a drought similar to one suffered exactly 100 years earlier in 1854.

“Just 100 year ago, in 1854, this area suffered a terrible drought, similar to the one today. Everything green turned brown.  The Ohio River quit running, and boat traffic stopped (there were no stage dams then). You could walk across the river. It finally rained in November, and then began to snow. Many of the settlers went hungry and their livestock starved to death.”

Additional searches found multiple articles about the Drought of 1854.

So, was global warming already affecting our environment in 1854, because if this happened today, the global warming crowd would be all over it.  Remember, this is well before the two devices most blamed for global warming existed:  coal-fired power plants and the automobile.

Another often blamed greenhouse gas producer is the common dairy cow.  Their belches (not flatulence) contain methane.  Since the American Buffalo (Bison) is a member of the cow family (Bovine), maybe they were the cause of global warming back then.  The buffalo population in 1800 was estimated to be over 60 million, down to 35 million in 1850.  That’s a lot of methane.  If they were the cause of global warming or climate change back then, were buffalo hunters doing the environment a favor by nearly wiping them out?  I don’t think so.

I’m thinking the REAL cause of droughts, above average rainfall, severe winters, mild winters, increased or decreased tornado and hurricane activity is Nature.  It’s “natural” for the weather condition pendulum to swing back and forth.  And on occasion, it will hit severe in one direction (drought) or severe in the other direction (heavy rain/floods).  But most of the time it stays in the normal zone.

My own observations on climate change:

I’ve owned the same house for 24 years.  In that time, the creek across the road has only been bone dry once and only flooded enough to make the road impassable twice.  The blockage only lasted a day.  The previous owner said the water well that services the property had never gone dry and it never went dry while I was using it.

The first 10-12 years I lived here, about mid-July the grass would turn brown.  I would only have to run the mower every 2-3 weeks, mainly to cut the tops off of the weeds.  Sometimes it was so dry, a dust mask was necessary when mowing. But for the past 10-12 years, the grass has remained green all summer into the Fall.  It has to be cut every week and on occasion raked.  This seems to be the opposite effect I would expect from global warming.  Remember the predictions saying the earth was going to become a burned out cinder?

Regardless of what the computer models say about global warming, I’m not seeing it; and we should be based on all of the dire predictions.  Al Gore said in January 2006 that we only have only 10 years left to save the planet from turning into a total frying pan.  Well, in about three months those ten years will be up.

I also found these interesting articles about past environmental disasters predictions that never came to pass.

Seven Big Failed Environmentalist Predictions

Remember those predictions about global cooling, overpopulation, mass starvation, and resource depletion?  When they never came to pass, the doomsayers would just move on to the next.  They got to make a living right?  Why work when you can get huge government grants to study non-existent phenomenon.

Another good read: Embarrassing Predictions Haunt the Global-Warming Industry

This article talks about how there will “Climate Refugees” caused by global warming, the North Pole would be ice free by 2013 and snow would soon become a thing of the past.

I guess that shipload of global warming researchers who’s ship got trapped in the ice in 2014 were really surprised.  Al Gore said the ice would be gone.  When snow didn’t become a thing of the past and snowfall levels were actually well above normal, the abnormal levels were blamed on global warming.

And another good read and video:  2008 ABC News Special

In this ABC News hour long special report, they predicted by 2015, New York would be under water, milk would cost $13.00 a gallon, gas would be $9.00 a gallon and the earth’s population would only be 2.7 billion.  Fast forward to real world  2015:  The price of gas is going down, milk is around $3.00 a gallon, the earth’s population is 7.2 billion people and we’re not sending life preservers to New York City

And lastly, one of my favorites.  Things Caused by Global Warming

A blogger in the United Kingdom maintains a website with links to articles that blame global warming for just about everything, like: roads wearing out, teenage prostitution, space junk increase, coral reefs growing and coral reefs shrinking (?) and on and on. At last check, there were 883 links.  Some links have become inoperative as websites delete these ridiculous stories.

Global warming, decide for yourself if it’s real.  Personally, I can’t buy in to “man-made” global warming or climate change.  But “natural” changes in our environment have been around since the earth began.

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