Global warming is robbing the earth with pine trees. According to the Associated Press, plant experts claim that global warming has killed 40 to 80 percent of the pinon pine trees in the Four Corners during the drought in 2002 and 2003. And, at one site near the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico , 90 percent of the pinons died. “Even seemingly small changes in temperatures have had devastating effect on our vegetation”, says plant scientist Lisa Floyd-Hanna of Prescott College, Prescott, Ariz. According to him, temperatures, on average, were three degrees higher during the 2002-2003 period than during the last major drought, 1953-1956. To add to the devastation, if the pines don’t have enough water to generate sap that will eject the beetles, they become easy victims of the ips beetle, which actually kills the trees.
Via: LovelandFYI