Week 13 Blog Post

 Olivia Langosch 

What did you do in lab today?

Weather is day to day. Climate is the average of weather over a thirty-year period. 

"Weather is your mood, climate is your personality." "Climate is what you expect, weather is what you get." 

The Goldfinch is going to move up North, hotter and humid here, not environment that it likes. 

We also looked at data in the slides about climate change and we made this paragraph with our table group about the data we found: 

Climate change can be seen in many of the diagrams that we were presented with. One that we noticed that had data which helps prove climate change is happening is the Snowy december chart where it showed that in 2007 there was 20.27 inches of snowfall, and in 2019 there was only 1.1 inches. This shows that there must have been increasing temperatures because snow was not able to form and therefore snow and low temperatures have drastically decreased over the last 10 years. Another chart that we found helpful when answering this question is the Poor Elsa chart where it shows the number of days per year without frost has increased over time, from only 150 days in 1893 to 170 days in 2005. This is caused by the increase in average temperature, causing less frost to be able to form. One more chart that we found helpful is the Hot Days: Des Moines. From 2010-2035, the number of predicted days over 90 degrees with higher emissions in des moines went from about 22 to a predicted 85 days in 2099. This shows a drastic increase in heat with a trending upward scale. We understand that deforestation and an overall increase in temperature can cause many species to lose their habitats and become unable to adapt. However, we weren’t quite sure what “zones” meant in the Habitat Changes graph.

What was the big question?

How do we know that the Goldfinch is in danger in Iowa? 

What type of data do we have that supports that climate change is happening? 

What questions did you derive from the shared data? 

What answers did you find? 

What did you learn in Thursday’s discussion?

I learned about how there are cold and hot climates. 

LOWER- Latitude (location to the equator, warmer closer to the equator), Ocean Currents (temp of ocean currents affects temp of air that passes over it.), Wind & Air Masses (how the winds move), Elevation (higher in altitude, colder in temperature, as air expands, it cools.), Relief (precipitation created when an air mass rises to cross a mountain barrier.) Near Water (summer- water acts like an air conditioner, winter- water acts like a heater, continental climate- away from water, maritime climate- close to water.) 

What did you learn?

From the pressbook, I learned that in Iowa, the climate change is affecting us by the more precipitation and drought. There is an increase in extreme precipitation leading to more floods, and there are more periods of drought. 

What was most helpful?

I enjoyed reading about what is happening in Iowa because it's necessary to know for us because we are here. It gave me a better understanding of what is really happening because I never really understood this kind of material that is taught, but this chapter helped me. 

What do you need more information on?

I think practicing some questions like what we talked about in lecture more because it will help me get a better understanding in general about all of this.