Growing up in California, my experience of climate change was not always as apparent as it should have been. California has been in the midst of a drought for basically my entire life. The current 'megadrought' has lasted since 2000 (Tensions rise as drought worsens and heat surges across California - The Washington Post), so I have only ever known dry conditions, low rainfall, and persistent conserve water orders from the city. Research now says this megadrought is the driest span for the region in 1,200 years and is being fueled by climate change (Tensions rise as drought worsens and heat surges across California - The Washington Post). Dry conditions have been common throughout California's history (Drought (ca.gov)), so many Californians haven't necessarily experienced that moment where the weather has felt drastically different. For me, it feels more like things have gotten gradually worse and because we were already a dry region, the gradual change was hard to see while it was happening. Every day we heard about the drought, drove by reservoirs with low levels, and saw billboards of farmers asking for more water, and people became numb to it all. It is like when you look at your dog and realize they are old and have grey hairs, but when they were growing up, they never looked all that different from one day to another. So now, it is pretty apparent the region has been hit hard by climate change, but in the moment, it just felt like the product of living in a dry region.
One climate change effect I have noticed is the increase in wildfires. Growing up, wildfires occurred but they were generally pretty small and were not national news. Over the past several years, California has been in the national news for widespread wildfires that have displaced people and greatly affected air pollution. The figure below shows a very clear trend in acres burned by wildfires increasing significantly over the past decade.
During the Fall of 2020 there was a day that nearby wildfires blanketed the sky with particulate matter and ash and blocked out the sun for the entire day. It is not the best picture (below), but it has no filter and was taken at 3:45pm on September 9th, which is during the time of year where it is brightest in the afternoon! This was my first real moment of experiencing a weather event I had not experienced before. Wildfires had never impacted the entire area to this degree (at least in my memory), so it really got me and my family thinking about what the future might look like as wildfire season is prolonged and intensified.
Source: Picture taken by me
I do think that some recent events have made people in the Bay Area take notice of climate change. In my experience though, the entire area is pretty detached from nature. It will take watershed moments like that day when the entire sky was blanketed with ash to make people realize what the future could hold. In that same vein, while there have been water restrictions in the past, there has never been a moment where there was no water or water had to be shut off. Until that day comes, I am not so sure the Bay Area residents, and the West as a whole, will truly understand how they have been impacted by climate change. I do know there are some regions of CA such as up North in the Klamath River Basin that actually have had water shutoffs, so climate change certainly is felt differently in different regions of the state.
This course contained a lot of useful and interesting information about Midwest Ecology. The landscape is really different from California, so it was really good information for me to learn about. I specifically enjoyed the content on the Great Lakes because it is such an iconic part of the US, yet there is hardly any recognition of the ecological problems going on in the system. I had not heard about any of the ecological problems in the Great Lakes before this class which shows how outside of the region, it gets very little publicity (or I am looking in the wrong spots)!
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Jared, really good article! You perfectly conveyed the shifting baseline syndrome where people grow up and perceive new environmental conditions as normal because it's all they've ever known. Without education, people could go their whole lives not noticing there's a problem. You made a good point that it takes big events to make people wake up to these problems. You can't ignore a fire in your backyard.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Sarah. I think your analogy about noticing the changes of your dog was very helpful. Thinking about it now, growing up I've always heard new headlines about the droughts in California but since I don't live there I have not really thought about the reality of living there. I'm sorry that there are several things that you may find worrying that I may not living in Wisconsin. You've definitely shifted my perspective more in the scope of how climate change is affecting different areas.
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