11-23-07
Mr. Tom Furrer, a teacher at Casa Grande High School in Petaluma, has taught his students about global warming for twenty years. He teaches Wildlife Biology and also leads the United Anglers, an organization founded to restore the habitat and population of the Chinook Salmon and the Adobe Creek Steelhead Trout. This year, California hatcheries have experienced the worst salmon return in several years. I asked Mr. Furrer if he thought this had anything to do with climate change, and in the process I was given a great deal of information on what climate change has done to wildlife in Alaska, where Furrer has spent his summers working for twenty-four years as well.

Parreira: Have you seen anything unusual in the fish this year that you think could be a result of global warming?

Furrer: I can't say that anything I've seen this year is because of global warming. What happens with the fish is like the weather. If you have a hot day, you can't say "Oh, it's global warming." In order to decide whether something is directly related to climate change, you have to study it for several years. If you see a correlation in the data over time, then you can conclude that they are related. But I can't say that what's happened to the fish has to do with climate change. Not yet.

Parreira: You've been working in Alaska for a long time, haven't you?

Furrer: Yes, for twenty-four years

Parreira: Have you seen any changes in wildlife where you work?

Furrer: YES. We've seen a number of things. The most obvious, of course, is the loss of glaciers. The glaciers I used to walk on have disappeared. They're gone. In fact, at this point Alaska may not even have a winter this year, because nothing has frozen. They're saying, "Bring out your bathing suits, because we're not having a winter." Also, the trees are dying.

Parreira: Is that because of the melting of the permafrost?

Furrer: No, it's not that at all. They've been dying because of a bark beetle which used to not be able to survive the winter. Now that it's warmer, these bark beetles live through the winter. So all the places there used to be all these trees, there aren't trees there anymore. Another part of the problem is that we've been seeing forest fires up there too.

Parreira: Is there anything else?

Furrer: There are so many other things. Now yellow jackets are living up there too. There used to never be any bees in Alaska, and now there are yellow jackets everywhere. Other things like spiders and ticks are living there too, and they were never there either. Now it's warm enough that they can live there, and native species can't compete with them.
The ocean is also showing signs of change. We've seen whales washed up on the beach dead, which is a sign that the ecosystem in the ocean is collapsing.

Parreira: Is there anything we can do to keep the polar bears from drowning? Can't we make artificial ice floes for them?

Furrer: It's true that the polar bears are drowning, but they're drowning because they have to swim further for their food supply. If their food supply is becoming scarcer, they'll starve to death, even if we could keep them from swimming such long distances.

Parreira: Thank you for your time!

Furrer: Thank you.