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If "extreme patterns in precipitation and temperature fluctuation" are doing that, you should see decreased greening in the satellite data. But we haven't. ht

If "extreme patterns in precipitation and temperature fluctuation" are doing that, you should see decreased greening in the satellite data. But we haven't. https://www.nature.com/articles/nclimate3004 https://www.nature.com/articles/nclimate3004 According to the above (2016) Nature article, 25% to 50% of the globe shows greening, with only 4% showing browning.

win96 7y ago
Lower yielding crops are still green, color has nothing to do with the weight produced per plant. Yield is related to physiological stress on the crop: over water a plant it stays green while the roots rot, put it in drought conditions or heat it up for slightly longer and it gets stressed; either way you're reducing the harvest yield. Additionally if the greening is occurring in previously permafrost soils that are not very useful for farming then there is not an increase in the food produced by that green area.
- romaaeterna 7y ago
  World crop yields are up year on year, according to the USDA. See Table 01 World Crop Production Summary here: https://apps.fas.usda.gov/psdonline/circulars/production.pdf https://apps.fas.usda.gov/psdonline/circulars/production.pdf
  - win96 7y ago
    Interesting, although year to year is a bit of a small scale to compare. Also the first sentence mentions a drought that dropped 5% of Russian wheat from the previous month, but that left the yield 4% higher than the previous year. It's possible that the increases from higher temps offset the longer droughts in some cases. If variance in rain and temperature continue to increase there will eventually be a tipping point where yields are severely reduced.
    - romaaeterna 7y ago
      Well sure, there must be a tipping point somewhere, but the earth has been a lot hotter in the past than it is now, and biomass was in much greater quantity at such times. It's glacial maximums that are really concerning to me personally. It's very unlikely that we could feed so many billions of people as we do now if we ever enter another ice age.

win96 7y ago

Lower yielding crops are still green, color has nothing to do with the weight produced per plant. Yield is related to physiological stress on the crop: over water a plant it stays green while the roots rot, put it in drought conditions or heat it up for slightly longer and it gets stressed; either way you're reducing the harvest yield. Additionally if the greening is occurring in previously permafrost soils that are not very useful for farming then there is not an increase in the food produced by that green area.

romaaeterna 7y ago
World crop yields are up year on year, according to the USDA. See Table 01 World Crop Production Summary here: https://apps.fas.usda.gov/psdonline/circulars/production.pdf https://apps.fas.usda.gov/psdonline/circulars/production.pdf
- win96 7y ago
  Interesting, although year to year is a bit of a small scale to compare. Also the first sentence mentions a drought that dropped 5% of Russian wheat from the previous month, but that left the yield 4% higher than the previous year. It's possible that the increases from higher temps offset the longer droughts in some cases. If variance in rain and temperature continue to increase there will eventually be a tipping point where yields are severely reduced.
  - romaaeterna 7y ago
    Well sure, there must be a tipping point somewhere, but the earth has been a lot hotter in the past than it is now, and biomass was in much greater quantity at such times. It's glacial maximums that are really concerning to me personally. It's very unlikely that we could feed so many billions of people as we do now if we ever enter another ice age.