Our grandchildren will see a different shoreline, a different forest, and a different array of birds than we see.  We are familiar with cardinals, titmice, red-bellied woodpeckers and opossums that were not here in our grandparents' era.

When I first moved to Rhode Island in the early 1970s, seniors commented that outdoor skating, formerly possible by Thanksgiving, was often not safe in January. We haven't seen winter irruptions of redpolls and evening grosbeaks since the 1980s. Last year, cherry trees in Providence bloomed in late December.  Yes, the climate in Rhode Island is changing.

Early blooming is becoming more common.  Among the plants studied in Boston's Arnold Arboretum, flowering times have moved forward over the decades, with the plants flowering eight days earlier on average from 1980 to 2002 than they did from 1900 to 1920. What has influenced this early flowering? Primarily temperature, says Richard Primack, a Boston University biology professor and head of the research team.  According to Bio-Medicine, Boston's mean annual temperature has increased since 1985 by 1.5 degrees Celsius or nearly 3 degrees Fahrenheit, and those temperatures are correlated with earlier blooming.

But, like the frogs that become accustomed to incremental increases in water temperature (until their life in the laboratory ends at the 212 o notch), we humans do acclimate to warmer temperatures.  So why worry? We will not boil to death until the sun sears us billions of years from now, and besides, there's air conditioning.  What's not to enjoy from milder winters and less furnace burning?  

It's that nagging conscience that says "We share this planet with polar bears and musk oxen, southern penguins and northern snowy owls."  It's our understanding of cascading effects as warmer temperatures push forest species, trees and the animals that rely on them, northward toward diminution. With more of the year in higher temperatures, animals that need warmer weather to survive and insects that need warmth to remain active, will thrive in a future, milder Rhode Island.  Those that need cold will likely decline or move northward if they can.

David Gregg, executive director of the Rhode Island Natural History Survey summarized the situation well.  "If I wanted to live in a part of the country where giant crickets were a regular part of my kitchen's fauna and I had to deal with chiggers AND ticks when I went outside, I'd move to Virginia," he commented.  "I've learned to live with ticks and I like my hymenoptera small and manageable. I don't want to live with chiggers or fire ants or malaria mosquitoes or killer bees. Frost has protected us New Englanders from these things and from kudzu and God knows what. And yet with global warming, all these creatures and more have just got their tickets punched for an express trip to a quaint New England village.  Doubt it? Have you experienced the chiggers now making their way around Long Island, New York?"

Warmer water is already affecting Narragansett Bay.  The Rhode Island Department of Environmental Management reports that Narragansett Bay is warming even faster (3º Fahrenheit since 1950) than the overall climate in the state.  URI scientists believe the warmer bay is a likely factor in the steep declines in commercially valuable, cold-water fish and shellfish like winter flounder and lobster.

Sea level has risen a little more than half a foot in Rhode Island since 1929 and is predicted to rise another 7 to 23 inches by 2100.   The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) researcher, James Titus, says that without changes in global temperature patterns, escalating melting after 2100 could add another 39 inches to ocean levels.   An increase in ocean level of 6 to 9 inches may not seem like anything to worry about, but the measurement is an average number, not describing the extent of high tide inundation or the flood line in storms.  The EPA estimates that 30,000 to 35,000 acres of shoreline, lower than an elevation of three and a half feet, could be taken from Rhode Island's 660,000 total acreage. That is somewhere around a 5% loss.

Mostly, it's not about us here in southern New England. We may not experience much more than the discomforts of warmer summers, their likely accompaniment of more polluted air, and varying availability of fruits and vegetables as climate patterns shift north.

Essentially, it's about plants, animals, and habitats whose lives rely on periods of cold and about all the major "what-ifs."  Will polar bears survive?  What will happen as Arctic ice-dependent species decline and the animals they prey upon increase?  What will happen as the tundra melts? Will peach trees produce sufficient quantities in the Mid-Atlantic States?  Will apple orchards grow on the plains of Canada?  Where will wheat be farmed?  How will altered patterns of precipitation affect food production?  What if the Gulf Stream ceases to function and our coast becomes colder? The ripple effect through the ecosystem could be extensive.

We breathe out carbon dioxide and digestion produces methane.  The more there are of us, our vehicles, our appliances, our pets, and our cattle inhabiting Rhode Island and the rest of the planet, obviously the more of those earth-warming gases will go into the atmosphere.  All combustion generates carbon dioxide.  However, growing the combustibles as vegetation also consumes the carbon dioxide in photosynthesis, versus fossil fuels, whose photosynthesis occurred long ago and do not consume, but only add CO2  to the environment.

Major policy shifts are needed, but are hindered by our accommodation to increasing temperatures  and the natural inclination towards status quo.   How much do we each enjoy warmth and convenience?  How much do we love polar bears?  How much are we awed by the intricacies of ecosystem relationships?

If you would like to receive a booklet about the impacts of global warming in Rhode Island, please contact emarks@asri.org or call 949-5454, ext. 3003.

Eugenia Marks is the Senior Director of Policy