Breaking up forests is just as bad for global warming
How broken up a forest is can affect local temperatures as much as the forested area, a new study has found. Using satellite data, researchers found that in tropical and temperate zones, dividing continuous forests into smaller, isolated patches significantly raised surface temperature. The findings mean climate action needs to track fragmentation, too. The striking wing patterns of butterflies may be a visual defence. By studying high-speed videos of butterfly flights and using 3D computer models, scientists found the combination of flapping wings and contrasting patterns, such as stripes and bright edges, creates an optical illusion that tricks a predator’s eyes and confuses its judgment of the insect’s speed and direction.
Because it exposed more open ground to snow cover, which reflects sunlight, in high-altitude boreal forests, however, fragmentation had a cooling effect.
The team said this “potentially represents one of the most successful visual defence strategies in moving animals”.
