Monday, April 24, 2006
Global Warming restructures plant (and animal) biogeography
Climate change forces plants to search for better places to live:
Climate change is reshaping the landscape of Britain as rising temperatures allow orchids and ferns to flourish in the north, while other species retreat to cooler conditions on high land and mountainsides.So, individual species migrate, proliferate or die-out. This also means that entire ecosystems are being remodelled.
The conclusion, published today in a comprehensive survey of the nation's flora, suggests that the changing climate has already brought about a rapid and dramatic shift in the country's plantlife, a trend researchers say will be exacerbated by future warming.
