Global Warming Effects

Global warming is not a problem occurred rather it is a problem created.we the people are responsible for this devastating cause.All these developmental issues made today without concerning to global warming effects that help rise in the globalwarming today is the serious matter of Earth`s declination due to the to the global warming.This globally rising problem signifies that we are the one and only reason for all the declining lives in this nature i.e.we are responsible for the extinction of all the flora and fauna and even it may be the overwhelming problem for us.

Here the polar bears are fighting for their survival, all the polar ice caps and glaciers are melting,also the ozone layer(the protectective layer for all the creatures) is being depleted, living creatures are losing their habitat,and else problems are being faced by the Mother Earth.All these facts happening are trying to warn us.So we must be thinking of the the solution either to avoid or to compensate these problems.It is because we caused it and we are the one to solve these problem.

Many practices are being held today for this serious crisis by the whole world which shows our implementation.I, also being one of us,thinking i must do what i can,made this site so as i could get you all people the information about the whole world on this problem that are on my approach.I hope i could be the part to save this world from this crisis by bringing awareness through this work.

Conservation of flora and fauna in global warming

Global warming and climate change has become a global issues and concern within the regional and international levels. In the context of national scope, this issues had grew stronger after Indonesia had been selected to become host of the 13th Conference of the Party to the United Nation Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC COP 13). The venue took place in Denpasar, Bali.

Our earth has already experienced the phenomena of global warming and climate change which leads to hazardous climate events. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has released numbers of research which has proved that the earth are warming and climate are changing. The IPCC is an independent scientific body under the UNFCCC.
The phenomena of hazardous climate events has an enormous impact to the environment and human livelihood. Global warming and unpattern climate changes threatened farming for food security, clean water availability, human and ecosystem health. Global warming also threatened the existence of small island nations because of the rising of sea level.

Eventhough climate changes has become global issue, but there are still many communities around the world who has not known and understand what is global warming and climate changes. Many of us living in developing countries are limited to information on global warming and climate changes. For many developing countries like Indonesia, efforts to develop public awareness on global warming and climate changes are urgently needed in order to enhance public understanding on the issues.

In the efforts of spreading awareness on global warming and climate change, Peka Indonesia collaborating with IISES and TMII conducted one day seminar on global warming and climate change. The seminar was conducted on January 22nd 2007 in Indonesian Miniature Garden, Jakarta with seminar theme "Conservation of Flora and Fauna in the middle of changing climate and global warming"

The aim of this one day seminar is to spread out informations on global warming and climate change to the public especially for the staffs of Indonesian Miniature Garden. Participants will received informations on the effect of global warming to the existence of biodiversity, how we can contribute to minimize carbon emission, and how we can actively involve in the conservation of our nature environment. Thus we can minimize the effects of global warming.

On this one day seminar, we invited Dr. Sony Keraf (former minister of environment) as a key note speaker. Dr Keraf gave presentation on the science of global warming and climate change and efforts initiate by countries in the world to adapt to climate change. We also invited 5 other speaker to give prensentation on this seminar, they are, Dr. Suryo Wiyon (Department of Agriculture, IPB), Kuswandono (Gede Pangrango National Park), Dr. Rosicon Ubaidilah (Indonesian Institute of Science), and Arif (Pelangi Foundation). These five speaker gave presentations on the topic of global warming and its effect to the earth environment, effect of global warming to flora and fauna, socializing the result of UNFCCC Bali 2007, and opportunity for public involvement to reduce the effect of global warming. The seminar was attended by 150 participant, mostly from staffs of Indonesian Miniature Garden and several from public in general. We sees that forum-forum seminar like this are still needed in order to spread out the information on global warming and climate change. We envision that through good understanding, the public will increase their awareness toward global warming and will initiate an action to contribute on reducing carbon emission, thus minimalizing the hazardous effects of global warming and climate change.

The impact of the greenhouse effect on natural terrestrial environments:

The public is increasingly aware of the significance of the greenhouse effect. There is an expectation that Governments will take preventative and remedial action urgently. However, in the ecological arena there is as yet no consensus about how this should be done.

For example, ecological theory suggests that big changes in climate will, over sufficient time, result in major changes in the species composition and relative abundance of species within ecological communities. But these changes could arise because of species adaptation and evolution in situ, or because of migration to 'track' appropriate climatic conditions. Or, of course, a mixture of the two.

In south eastern Australia there has been a great deal of movement of ecological communities as the climate has gradually changed. The very gradual drying and warming as the continent has drifted,north has resulted in the replacement of most of the rainforest communities with dry-environment communities. Very few species that were once part of the rainforest seem to have evolved into new varieties or species adapted to hotter, drier conditions.

This history suggests that the correct conservation strategy for our flora and fauna is for them to be allowed or assisted to migrate as the climatic bands move. Otherwise it appears that they will perish. The Bio-Clim models showing climatic zones moving hundreds of kilometres, in some cases, reinforce the notion that species or ecological community mobility is important. People even talk of whole nature reserves or Parks being 'in the wrong place' and imply that they should somehow be 'moved'. So the strategy that comes to mind as being the most significant is the maintenance or indeed the re-establishment of corridors to provide for the necessary movement.

However this 'evidence' does not capture all of what is going on. An alternative history has played itself out in special circumstances. For example, on permanent islands, temporary islands (like the Grampians) and in quasi-islands caused by sharply differing geological zones, species have often been trapped in situ, with nowhere to go despite the climatic changes. In such cases many (most?) of the species survive despite the physiological stress, and go on to adapt in-situ. This often leads to accelerated speciation. A good example is the south west of Western Australia where the underlying geology is very broken up and diverse. The region has been subjected to far more extreme changes in climate than south eastern Australia because of the sea current switching effect caused by temperature changes and yet, unlike the south east of Australia, the species have clung on in place. The fact they have nowhere to go because they cannot migrate out is not the critical issue. What is important is that many of the plants from outside the zone, that might otherwise have been better adapted and could therefore have displaced the original species, have not been able to invade because of the barrier created by the different soil types.

So it seems that it is not so much physiological stress, but competition that decides whether most species will persist in the face of climate change. The enormous adaptability of most plants and animals is demonstrated by agriculture, domestic gardens, botanic gardens and zoos where species from extraordinarily different original environments can often survive so long as competition is kept at bay.

These special cases suggest that maintaining the stability of the species composition, that is controlling inputs of weeds and pest animals, is the critical strategy. In fact now that human land use changes have changed most natural areas into ?islands? it seems appropriate to use the example of natural ?islands? to guide us in choosing a species survival strategy.

If we adopt the basic ?island? model, then we have to resolve a paradox about stability and change, especially in the case of small ?islands?. Small ?islands? risk the loss of species due to stochastic shocks - fires, droughts, disease, etc. It is important to have corridors or some other means of allowing species to re-colonise any ?de-stocked? habitat. This implies that species mobility is important. However small ?islands? are more prone to invasion by weeds and pests from the surrounding zone. So minimising species mobility is important. (It seems that the ideal solution would be to surround small native habitat ?islands? with a semi-permeable membrane! - to allow in the local natives but prevent the invasion of exotics.) Larger bush areas, being able to provide for their own restocking, do not raise this dilemma so severely.

So it seems as a universal principle we should not encourage the maximum movement of species in the face of the greenhouse effect. Instead, the conservation of native species is generally best served by maintaining as high a level of stability as the normal short run fluctuations of the environment will allow.

Britain`s changing flora & fauna

Species under efffect

European beaver

Last autumn's news, that beavers were being released into a pen at the Cotswold Water Park as a prelude to full-scale reintroduction, provoked the usual press hysteria about the damming of rivers and the destruction of trees. In fact the animals in question are European beavers, a much more environmentally-friendly animal than their Canadian cousin, and more likely to improve habitats rather than destroy them. Beavers were originally native here, but went extinct sometime during the 16th century, as a result of hunting for their fur. In mainland Europe, they fell to a low point of 1200 individuals during the 19th century, but have since made a strong recovery.

Wild boar

The conservation authorities were somewhat embarrassed when reports of "really wild" boars began to appear in the press - usually as a result of an unfortunate motorist literally bumping into one. As escapees from commercial farms, policy dictated that they should be recaptured or killed, to prevent them establishing a permanent presence. But the legislation ignored the fact that wild boars were originally native to Britain, dying out in the 17th century as a result of over-hunting. Once at large, they are also notoriously difficult to track down. So, despite its controversial status, the wild boar looks set to make a permanent return.

Early spider orchid

During the construction of the Channel Tunnel, almost five million cubic metres of chalk marl was extracted and used to construct a nature reserve, Samphire Hoe near Folkestone. Almost immediately rare orchids began to colonise, and the site is now home to thousands of early spider orchids, one of our rarest species. Common on the continent, this chalk grassland specialist is also found on Ministry of Defence sites and downland reserves in southern England and north Wales. As its name suggests, it usually flowers for a few weeks in late April and early May.

European swallowtail

Larger and paler than the British version, sightings of European swallowtails have increased in the past few years, and the species is now a regular visitor to southern England, where it has occasionally bred. Ironically, the distinctive British swallowtail, confined to a few sites in the Norfolk Broads, remains highly vulnerable, due to its dependence on a single food-plant - milk-parsley. Another migrant butterfly, the clouded yellow, has recently begun to overwinter in Britain, with successful breeding reported from, among other sites, the cliffs above the beach at Bournemouth!

Marsh frog

Introduced to Romney Marsh in Kent in the mid-1930s, this noisy and colourful amphibian is now a familiar sight - and sound - in waterways throughout south-east England. As soon as the sun comes out, the marsh frog - a voracious predator - makes its presence known by puffing out its cheeks and producing a loud croak. However, it is a shy creature, and will retreat into the water as soon as it realises it is being observed. This species is likely to benefit from climate change, which should allow it to extend its range northwards, wherever there is suitable wetland habitat.

Black kite

In the developing world, black kites have learned to hang around rubbish dumps, where they are adept at scavenging for anything even remotely edible. They also have an unappealing, though undoubtedly impressive, trick of snatching food from people's hands, demonstrating their acrobatic flying skills. Whether they can put such talents to the test here is open to question, though their adaptability was revealed last summer when a wandering black kite paired with one of the red kites released as part of the Scottish reintroduction programme. Looks likely to follow hard on the heels of the cattle egret as our next avian colonist.

Striped dolphin

Mainly found in tropical and sub-tropical seas, the striped dolphin is able to survive in British waters because of the warming influence of the North Atlantic Drift. Until recently sightings were confined to the English Channel, but in the past decade or so it has spread farther north, with records from the west coast of Scotland, the North Sea and even the Shetland Isles - just a few degrees south of the Arctic Circle. Most records are, unfortunately, of animals stranded on beaches. When seen at sea it can be distinguished from its commoner relatives by the distinctive pale stripe along its sides.

Humpback whale

Incredible though it may seem, the most acrobatic of all the world's whales is now a regular visitor to our coastal waters, where lucky observers may witness it leaping out of the sea in an action known as "breaching". The original European population of this great whale was wiped out more than 500 years ago, but by the 1980s, after it was granted protection under international law, the species began to appear again. The increase in sightings is likely to be partly a result of the rise in popularity of whale- watching trips, but may also be due to rising sea temperatures caused by global climate change.

Cattle egret

A contender for the title of the world's most successful bird, having managed to colonise Australasia and the Americas, and even reach Antarctica, from its original Old World home. It is now spreading north through Europe at a rapid rate, and looks likely to follow the example set by its close relative, the little egret, and become a permanent addition to our avifauna. As their name suggests, cattle egrets live in close association with livestock, feeding on invertebrates attracted by their dung. In the breeding season adults acquire elegant buffy-orange plumes, which they use in courtship display.

European bee-eater

The attempted breeding by a pair of these exotic and colourful birds in the Wye Valley last summer was, unfortunately, curtailed by a hungry fox. But bee-eaters did successfully nest in a County Durham quarry in 2002, raising two young under the admiring gaze of thousands of birders. Although often considered a Mediterranean species, the bee-eater has spread rapidly northwards during the latter half of the 20th century, and may well make a permanent leap across the Channel during the next few years. Birders would do well to listen for their distinctive bubbling call, given by migrating flocks flying high overhead.difficult to track down.


The departing

Snowy owl

In 1967, birders on the island of Fetlar in Shetland celebrated the unprecedented breeding of snowy owls, the very first time this arctic species had nested in Britain. They had extended their range southwards as the result of a brief period of climatic cooling in north-eastern Scotland and Scandinavia. Sadly for Harry Potter fans, as temperatures rose, conditions became unsuitable for this magnificent owl, and breeding last occurred in 1975. Today, snowy owls occasionally turn up as wandering visitors to Shetland and the Western Isles, but are unlikely to breed here again.

White-beaked dolphin

Despite a welcome increase in sightings of whales and dolphins in British and Irish waters, this species appears to be heading into a possibly terminal decline. Scientists monitoring sightings and beach strandings of white-beaked dolphins have found a dramatic drop in numbers. This is most likely a result of a rapid rise in sea temperatures, itself due to global climate change, which affects this cool-water species more than most. Unless the warming trend is reversed, the white-beaked dolphin is likely to disappear first from the shallow waters around our west coast, then from the cooler North Sea.

Greater horseshoe bat

The rarest of our 17 species of bat - and indeed one of our rarest mammals gets its name from the distinctive horseshoe-shaped flap of skin around its nose, which aids it in the process of echolocation. It is confined to south-west England and south Wales, probably because the mild climate of these areas enables it to feed during the winter. The relict Welsh population, in particular, suffers from low genetic diversity, and without conservation efforts may not survive much longer. This bat's rapid decline is due to changes in traditional farming practices and the consequent reduction in insect food.


Ptarmigan

One of a trio of montane specialists likely to suffer from the effects of global warming on their Scottish highland home, the others being snow bunting and dotterel. These all depend on the delicate arctic-alpine ecosystem of the high tops. Each year the decrease in snow cover on the Cairngorm plateau, and the resulting changes in vegetation and insect life, threaten these rare and fascinating birds with extinction. Ptarmigan are the only British birds to turn completely white in winter for camouflage - which may not seem quite such a good idea if the snow disappears.

Wood white

This delicate butterfly thrives on "edge" habitats, such as open rides through woodland. It enjoyed a brief population boom in the 60s and 70s, thanks partly to the legacy of Dr Beeching: the wholesale closure of rural railway lines created a temporary glut of new habitat. Since then, like so many of our woodland butterflies, it has declined in numbers. It did appear to be thriving in Ireland, until observant scientists discovered that most Irish "wood whites" in fact belonged to a different species - the two only being told apart by examining their genitalia under the microscope.

Wild cat

This legendary and almost impossibly elusive predator faces rapid extinction. This is not, as with so many other creatures, because of climate change or modern farming practices, but simply because interbreeding with feral and domestic moggies has so diluted the gene pool, that there may now only be a few hundred truly wild cats in existence. Most of those that do remain are in the remotest parts of the Grampian Mountains and the Scottish Highlands. Not always easy to tell apart from hybrids, pure-bred cats show distinctive vertical black stripes on their coat and black rings around their tails.

European tree frog

A small, usually bright green amphibian, which is, however, able to change colour at will, and may appear in various shades from lime green to greyish-brown. More often heard than seen, its repetitive call has been compared to a barking dog or quacking duck. Once thought to be an alien species introduced here by humans, new evidence suggests that a long-established colony in the New Forest did, in fact, comprise native animals. Unfortunately this was discovered too late to protect the tree frog, which now appears to be extinct in Britain.

Wart-biter bush cricket

The wart-biter bush-cricket is just managing to cling on in five widely separated populations on ancient chalk grassland and heathland in southern Britain, from the South Downs to Wiltshire. It is one of our largest and most impressive insects: almost four centimetres long, bright green, and with fearsome jaws that make short work of its smaller relatives. Despite its common name, this species has probably always been rare and localised in Britain - the English name is a translation of the Latin "verrucivorus" - pertaining to warts.

Stinking hawk's beard

Despite its off-putting name, this little plant is attractive in a modest way, with golden-yellow flowers appearing from June to August. When crushed, the leaves give out the characteristic "bitter almond" scent of cyanide. Unfortunately this member of the dandelion family does not seem to have inherited its commoner cousin's survival skills: the last native specimen was observed by a bungalow at Dungeness, Kent, in 1980. Soon afterwards it was reintroduced there, under the protective eye of, among others, the late film director Derek Jarman. Sadly most of his specimens were eaten by rabbits, the stinking hawk's beard's most frequent nemesis.

Red-backed shrike

During the mid-1990s, following a rapid decline, this diminutive predator became the latest species to go extinct as a British breeding bird. The last pair hung on in the East Anglian brecks, where warm summers provided just enough large insects to feed their young. This decline in insect life, due mainly to the overuse of agricultural pesticides, is undoubtedly the main cause of the red-backed shrike's disappearance. However, there is a possibility that climate change could benefit the species, with warmer, drier summers and a more continental-type climate recreating the right conditions for it to return.

Flora and fauna at risk on shrinking meadows

Flora and fauna at risk on shrinking meadows

In damp fields at various sites around the country, scientists are hard at work counting plants, as part of a major new project to save Britain's last few remaining floodplain meadows.

Once common across the floodplains of England and Wales, these flower-strewn meadows declined dramatically due to urbanisation and changes in farming practice. Since the 1950s, 98 per cent of species- rich meadows have been lost, leaving less than 1,000 hectares scattered around the country.

The remaining fragments, though protected by national and European law, are at risk from a range of factors including climate change and inappropriate management. By carrying out detailed surveys during the next 10 years, scientists hope to find out what is happening to them and how we can protect them.

Floodplain meadows evolved over hundreds of years and were highly prized for their natural fertility, maintained through regular winter flooding. Every year they yielded a valuable hay crop, and then provided grazing for animals. Today, they help alleviate flooding through winter storage of floodwaters and provide a habitat for an enormous range of plants and animals, including butterflies, birds such as curlews and snipe, and flowers such as the rare snake's head fritillary.

"Due to their position on floodplains, these meadows are particularly sensitive to changes in rainfall pattern," explains David Gowing, professor of botany at The Open University, which is hosting the project. "And being species-rich, they are sensitive to the increasing burden of nutrients and pollution from the wider river catchment and the atmosphere."

But understanding what affects floodplain meadows and how, is no easy task. Emma Rothero is the project's outreach co-ordinator, also based at The Open University. She explains: "In the past, changes in farming practice were responsible for the meadows' disappearance but now they are threatened by things like gravel extraction and development, which can reduce the amount of water reaching the meadows, and by flood defences.

"Too much water can be as damaging as too little, as the plants do not tolerate being flooded into the growing season. Other factors which cause changes in nutrient levels, such as sewage treatment works and increases in fertiliser application in the catchment, can also be a problem."

By monitoring the floodplains over a long period of time the scientists hope to amass a large database of information. But the work involved is painstaking. "These are botanically rich environments with up to 40 species per square metre," says Rothero.

"At the moment we are staking out a number of sites around the country with one-metre by one-metre quadrats. A quadrat is basically a square on the ground. On one site you might have 200 quadrats. You record all the plants within each quadrat. On some sites we are taking samples of soil and hay and looking at the nutrient levels, and on some we are recording water levels using electronic data loggers. If you collect this data over a long period of time, you can see how the plant species change in response to water and nutrient levels.

"The aim is to get good scientific information to people like landowners, conservation officers, site managers and policy-makers, so they can make decisions about site and catchment management. We plan to run workshops and courses, and to make the scientists accessible to those with questions and issues on wildflower floodplain meadows."

The Floodplain Meadows Project is hosted by The Open University in partnership with the Environment Agency, Natural England, The Grasslands Trust, the Field Studies Council, The Wildlife Trusts and the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology. It has been set up with funding from the Esmee Fairburn Foundation and the Garfield Weston Foundation, but the team needs to raise more funds to support the project in the long term, says Rothero. "If anyone wants to support us, we'd be interested in hearing from them."

Polar flora and fauna under global warming impact

In agreement with the different climate models developed by researchers and confirmed by the IPCC (the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), the poles are the regions of the world where climate change is and will be the most rapid. This development is not without impact on the organisms living in those regions, some of which are the subject of increasing concern amongst biologists.

It's getting warm at the poles!

The trend towards Arctic warming is generalised, and in some regions the temperature has risen by more than 3°C over the past 50 years. This is more than ten times faster than the rest of the planet, where the average increase was only 0.6°C over the past century.

At the other end of the world, and although warming at present only affects the Antarctic peninsula, the phenomenon, although it has recently slowing, is just as marked: 4-5°C in the past 50 years…

Early trends in the south…
Because of the effect of temperature on the distribution of living organisms in these extreme environments, such changes are not without consequences.
"On the Antarctic peninsula, only two flowering plants were seen on exceptional occasions in the past," points out Pete Convey, from the BAS (British Antarctic Survey). "But over the past thirty years, antarctic grass and pearlwort have been developing in the south, as are several species of moss. All are benefiting from a lengthening in the periods of thaw."

Other effects are seen in the marine environment, following a regional trend towards a halt to the spread of pack ice. This ice is necessary to ensure the winter development of juvenile krill (a small crustacean which looks like a shrimp and upon which an impressive range of predators are dependent) and there has been a reduction in the frequency of successful breeding years. Their predators are also suffering: Wayne Trivelpiece from the NOAA (the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) has thus seen the disappearance of the chinstrap penguin from the multi-species colony he has been studying for nearly 30 years near to the Polish Arctowski research station: "It is probably the reduction in krill fecundity which is the reason for the decline of Adélie and chinstrap penguins on the Antarctic peninsula." The same effects have been seen in South Georgia, where Keith Reid & John Croxall from the BAS have shown that the growing competition for krill between sea lions and Macaroni penguins has led to a marked decline in the latter.

… and much disquiet in the north

As made clear a few months ago by the ACIA (Arctic Climate Impact Assessment) report in Reykjavik, the effects of global warming on fauna and flora are even more pronounced in the Arctic. Terry Callaghan, from the Abisko Scientific Research Centre in Sweden, explains: "On land, amongst other phenomena, warming has caused a gradual melting of the permafrost (permanently frozen ground), with the disappearance of hundreds of pools and lakes (because they have drained into the thawed soil) and the flora and fauna which inhabit them. We have also seen a gradual spread of forest coverage to the north, to the detriment of the tundra, where millions of migrating birds have their breeding grounds."

"Because the forests are darker, the albedo (percentage of reflected solar radiation) of these areas has fallen and thus created a positive retroaction which enhances warming," adds Glenn Patrick Juday, from the University of Alaska. "At the same time, we are seeing an increase in the number of fires and massive swarms of insect pests in several regions around the Arctic landmass."

The situation is no better in the Arctic Ocean: the average surface area of pack ice (measured at the end of each summer) has shrunk in 30 years by practically a million square kilometres (around 15 to 20%). This gradual shrinkage is causing increasing problems for the species associated with sea ice, whether these are single-cell algae, the copepod crustaceans which graze on them, the fish which hide in them and so on, up the chain to that most emblematic animal of the North Pole, the polar bear.

Polar bears facing major problems
According to Andrew Derocher from the University of Alberta in Canada, and his colleagues, shrinkage of the pack ice has caused a reduction in the numbers of ringed seals as well as in their accessibility for polar bears, for whom they are the principal prey. This is of crucial importance for the female bears when it comes to building up fat reserves before fasting for several months in winter and giving birth to their young. Indeed, researchers have shown that in Hudson Bay, each week the spring thaw advances represents a 10 kg loss of weight for female bears by the time they enter the snow den where their young will be born. In addition, warming also increases the frequency of winter rains and the collapse of these dens.

Sadly, there are few prospects for an improvement in the Arctic pack ice, because climate models agree on a continuous rise in the average temperature over the 100 years to come: up to 7°C for the ocean and up to 10°C in winter. The ACIA report even suggests the possible disappearance of summer pack ice between now and 2100…

Dying of heat in the Antarctic
On the other hand, at the other end of the globe, the formidable mass of the Antarctic ice sheet may protect the Antarctic Ocean from global warming. But at a local level, and once again in the context of rising temperatures in the peninsula, a series of joint studies, headed in particular by Lloyd Peck from the BAS and Hans-Otto Pörtner from the Alfred Wegener Institute in Germany, recently put forward new reasons for concern. Their research on several marine invertebrate species has shown that the oxygen supply necessary for several vital functions, such as reproduction, is easily disturbed by a rise in water temperature. In fact, a 4°C rise would be sufficient to condemn several populations, or even some species with a limited distribution, to extinction.

Trees of Andalucia on threat of global warming

Spanish Fir
Pinsapo
Abies Pinsapo

In 1837, during one of his exploratory visits to the south of the Iberian Peninsula, the Swiss Botanist Edmond Boisser discovered a new species of tree: Abies Pinsapo, popularly known as the pinsapo pine or Spanish fir.

The tree can grow up to 30m tall and live as long as 200 years. It has tiny needle-like leaves, which are extremely sharp and cylindrical in shape, and although this foliage appears lightweight, it throws out a very dense shade on the ground.

Found only in the southern mountains of Andalucia and in the north of Morocco, botanists discovered that the pinsapo had been around since the Tertiary geological time period - before the Ice Age! How could it have survived?

What probably happened is that the climatic changes occurring during the Pleistocene period were not as intense in Andalucia as might be assumed. In that case, the glaciers of the Ice Age that reached down from the North may have stopped short of these mountains, thus saving the species from extinction.

What the elements couldn't destroy man almost did. At the beginning of the last century, due to extensive cultivation, pinsapo numbers were dwindling. In 1964 there were just 700 hectares of pinsapo forests remaining. Now, thanks to careful forestry management, there are 5000 hectares.

However, just as this distinctive tree looked set to last until the next Ice Age, a new threat has appeared - the fungus 'heterobasidium annosum'. Invisible but deadly, the fungus attacks the roots, moves up the trunk and finally brings the tree down. Experts consider that changes in the climate (local effects of global warming) have weakened the species' resistance to this fungus, which in normal circumstances would not pose a threat.

So far, the response of the regional government has been to burn infected specimens to prevent the spread of the disease. Ecologists are calling for a seed bank to ensure the survival of the species. In the future pinsapos could then be planted in areas where the effects of global warming have been less noticeable, such as Sierra Nevada and Cazorla.