Sustainable biosphere function

 

Global "Conveyor Belt" ocean current

To understand the driving forces in climate change it is necessary to take this information on board.

Go here for more, much more: http://gotbooks.miracosta.edu/oceans/chapter9.html

This "Conveyor Belt" (simplified here) global current system is one of the major influences in our biosphere, governing climate impacts. When this current changes it can brings storms, droughts,floods, fair weather & foul.

In our immediate global climate change phase this system is being influenced by input of ice melt waters from the poles and glaciers as a result of atmospheric warming coming from our pollution. Unprecedented catastrophes of ever-heightened scale and intensity are becoming commonplace.

Yes, we know!

We have known this for nearly a century but now immediate home territory impacts are making us acutely aware Now we are experiencing the deadly intensification of the havoc as a result of our denial and inattention to biosphere function. It is a sad fact that, for our species, it takes catastrophe before we are roused to group action. After the event.

We locals living here on the Tweed caldera were given that huge wake up call by Cyclone Debbie. Many are now seriously asking to be educated in what climate change means, how it is occurring. And what could possibly be coming.

Each of us must become savvy, going beyond the emotional responses, rejecting the nonsense that is parlayed around by idiots, and become clear-headed on the facts of planetary biosphere function.

Then as a community we can have serious discussions as to how best to deal with an uncertain future. Where to invest our precious life energies in ways useful to survival of potentially destructive climate-driven events.

We have seen the "It Takes a Town" response to Debbie's destruction.

Let's take it further: 

One Planet, One People, One Future. 

Cooperation in the face of a Common threat. 

Together we can do it. 

All on same Page. 

Singing from same song-book.

Slogans are one thing, action is a matter of common will.

Committed and United in one goal.

Sustainable biosphere function

Here comes another storm season. The 1st cyclone is brewing out in the East Coral Sea. We saw the Northern Hemisphere summer and worst storms ever recorded in so many places. Wholesale destruction, loss of lives, communities, lifeways. Reaping the whirlwind takes on a sinister reality. None of us is immune. The culling has begun. Forget about going to Mars, let's try to survive here.

Go to the above link off image to start your thinking into how it all works so each of us is on much same page as far as the facts are concerned. Let us try to be prepared. As a whole community. Education for Right Action.

Slim hopes?

Remember the last thing that came out of Pandora's Box was Hope!

"When troubles call, and your back's to the wall

There a lot to be learned, that wall could fall....

But he's got high hopes, he's got high hopes

He's got high apple pie, in the sky hopes" - sings old Frankie

TIPPING POINT

TIPPING POINT

BUCKY BOOGIES ON THE EDGE OF THE ABYSS





LIMITS TO GROWTH



PLAYING WITH INCENDIA.

I've been learning 3-D digital art in a new program, Incendia , in last months.
Go here to view the other results.

The above Incendia images are my comments on what's going down as we approach the climate change tipping point and weather the global financial crisis, or the comprehensive failure of extreme capitalism, as Kevin Rudd expresses it.

I watch with interest. Uncontrollable forces affecting every living thing on this planet.

How will it all pan out?

I am beyond expressing anything much about it all now, except thru my art, as I doubt we can do much except try to survive. The time for remedial action was last century when we could have averted a lot of the problems becoming catastrophic by addressing biosphere carrying capacity in better management of sustainable life support systems & population controls.

I think few realised that the threat was real and partied like there was no tomorrow.
The future is NOW.

My opinions, such as they are, are in previous posts. However action is all that counts and apart from being as minimalist as I can in my lifestyle here, I can do no more.

Good luck everyone.

Try to be kind & share the burden, not destroy eachother in some blighted Mad Max scenario.

Yes, we will survive, but will civilisation endure?

How will it all look in 100 years from now?

I am coping by creating art (aka selfish pleasures), and appreciating this extraordinary thing we call life, living in hope that our stupidity will not result in our annihilation.

While there is LIFE.......ah yes, but will we be part of it?

Is HOPE all we have now?

Life is Jesta Bowl of Cheeries

Latest Apophysis fractals

THE CHERRY BOWL

CROCHET

TROPICAL FISH

Playing around on Apophysis is a fun & productive way of passing my last days.

The endless rain persists, but last week has seen champagne Autumn coolness kick in with showers early, giving spectacular misty dawns, followed by glorious mornings of sunshine before the clouds move in to bring more showers later & into the night. Gentle soft rain. Couldn't be better, for wet season weather.

Of course the insects are in full abundance, sandflies especially.
I've had a couple of scary spider bites that have made me very sick for a few days.

The flock pigeons have arrived, but their numbers so few it makes me weep.
Once the noise of hundreds, thousands, darkening the sun, was like a low F1-11 passing over treetops. Yesterday the flock numbered less than 20 birds.

The depletion of wildlife as our numbers increase and invade the last wild places is past critical, Researchers keep giving us the facts, but it's all fait accompli.

Like the coming climate change events, like our uncontrolled numbers impacting on the life support systems, unstoppable.

So we put it down to biosphere evolution. This is what happens. Watch and learn.
Doing anything is a shoulda, coulda. Back then, when we first became aware.
But few listened and those who shoulda & coulda didn't.
Fact is we didn't & now it is too late.

How do we stop the icecaps melting?
How do we stop the ocean conveyor belt currents changing?
How do we stop the populations expanding?
How do we control Mammon, pollution?

Oh yes, there are/were ways and all hands to the pumps, but, drat, too little, too late.

It coulda worked

It shoulda worked

But it ain't gunna work because the process is in motion.

Prepare for the culling.

The northern spring flowers and we in the south eat the fruits of autumn.

Enjoy the cherries.

LAST DAZE BEFORE CLIMATE CHANGE RAVE PARTY

EVENT IN THE HATCHERY

............................



ANOTHER RANTING RAVE
FOR SUE

&
YOU

if you can bear it

!!

I'm afraid you wouldn't like me very much if I told you what I do with strays, but I do live on a wildlife reserve and domestic escapees wreak havoc. The wildlife has been seriously decimated by feral animals in the time I've lived here.

I grew up with a dog called AspadelladouchByTheSea (Aspy for short), 2 cats called Pinkle & Purr & later another called Black Magic. Later I bred myself an Arab stallion called Banzai (from Banjo out of Ayesha). I came from that kind of 'normal'.

But my travels showed me our impacts on ecosystems and when I came here I dedicated my life to conservation and righting the land-use wrongs, as this land had been ravaged by logging, bananas, cattle, pigs & goats by various different owners over 150 years since Euro settlement.

Feral animals were abundant. A big management problem as being close to a National Park which some people seem to think is the place to dump unwanted pets, plus having a next door so-called Wildlife Reserve, which then had caged animals, both native and exotic, so it was actually a zoo in effect. The captives frequently escaped.

Worst of all were the packs of hounds the local dairy farmers fed milk slops to after the milking and then let loose to roam the mountains in marauding packs.The idea was the hounds became tick-infested as they moved thru the bush and they developed immunity (or died horribly). When they returned for their milk slops they were milked for serum which was then sold to vets who used it to save their client's tick-affected pets.

Obviously a pack of hungry dogs hunting in the wilderness ate any animals they could, including the koalas, wallabies, possums & etc etc etc.

Fortunately those practices ceased n 90's when environmental groups lobbied and prohibitive laws were finally passed that recognized the values of native ecosystems conservation. But much damage had been done by then.

The wild dogs, descendants of those packs and dumped pets, came around after my scraps and howl in packs, very unnerving. They have been known to attack people so I keep my doors closed at night. Fortunately they are fewer these days.

Every now & again well-meaning neighbors, or the Parks Service, put down 1080 poisons baits & that gets a few of them. A horrible death I also have to endure as they don't always die quietly & tidily in distant unseen places.

Then carrion eaters dispose of the carcass. So the quolls, bandicoots, possums, skinks & other native wildlife that eat carrion die too. And the poison goes all they way down to the dung beetles & worms.

Cats are as much of a problem and much harder to eradicate. I saw a feral cat here a few weeks ago that was the size of a bobcat, very scarey. That was no sweet pretty kitty can tell you.

Once there were possums, quolls, bandicoots, pademelons, skinks, frogs, koalas, echidnas, snakes and the full array of inhabitants one would find in a healthy wet to dry sclerophyll forests & rainforest montaine ecosystem.

In the wet we just had I saw ONE frog. In the 80's the roar of their mating numbers around the ephemeral pools made it impossible to sleep some nights.

Then came the cane toads.

Then went the frogs, the snakes, the skinks, the bandicoots & all that used to predate on frogs & ate canetoads instead. Deadly poisonous creatures. I have one frozen in my freezer as speak. The only way to dispose of them is to burn them they are so toxic.

Now I feed the kookaburra so she can breed, because her food chain is severed. I don't like feeding wildlife, but must say when she turned up with 2 emergent nestlings last week I nearly cried with relief. But now what will THEY eat? They are a species of giant kingfisher & rely on streams for fish & amphibians & snakes,lizards & skinks to survive.The streams have been depleted thru kids throwing stones & turning over the rocks & taking whatever they fancy might be fun in a bottle, till it dies. Plus pollution from Park visitor impacts & increased settlement impacts on the riparian zones.

My grass used to be grazed by a herd of about 20 macropds of various species, wallabies & pademelons mostly. Now ONE pademelon timidly grazes, keeping right close to the edges near the surrounding bush.

Now I have to employ a man to cut the grass. That means machinery and the noise disturbs what other creatures there are, plus inadvertently killing the odd legless lizard, of which very few are left.I haven't seen a skink in several years and I used to have about 20 scooting around the studio & outside, very friendly,. They controlled the insect that wanted to live with me too..

Possums are now totally absent...gone...I used to have about 20 of about 4 different species.

Quolls are GONE, haven't seen one or heard one in 10 years.

I now have ONE koala where in 80's there were 20+, in the 90's there were 8 or so... now only ONE!! I heard it crying the other night, so sad, no reply to it's mating call this year when normally the screams of ecstasy would make yr hair stand on end for hours at a time. I called this place Koala Mountain Sanctuary & dedicated it to the conservation of the core population of koalas it then supported. It seems it will be a sad epitaph, not a statement of success. There will be no new generations. The dogs got them all except this last solitary male.

All this because of people letting their cats & dogs stray or dumping them.
It's not the animal's fault. It's people.

So I'm afraid I'm seriously unsentimental when I see the plight of these uncontrolled domestic ex-pets. Cats and dogs are very efficient hunters and because Australia's major large carnivorous predator is the introduced dingo, which only arrived around 4,000 years ago, most of the wildlife species don't have that necessary instinct to combat them, so they are just sitting ducks, so to speak.

I had a friend who worked in Diplomatic Corps & had just come back from a stint in Martinique,some years back now. She told me the wildlife on those Caribbean islands has been so decimated as to be reduced to very few species. It is the same world over.

Wherever we go with our baggage & friends, we destroy the very base of the systems that have evolved only by the full compliment of their native inhabitants. Take links from the chain and it all falls apart. We are a very uncomfortable species to be a part of.

I thought I was part of the solution, but find I am a very definite part of the problem.

So, sorry to rain on yr parade, but it would be hypocritical of me to nod, smile & wave when I feel so very much otherwise on this issue of saving strays.

Please don't take it personally, because I respect you and where you are coming from. I thought if I spelled out clearly what has happened here you could understand why I am of that opinion.

My brand of green is very deep ecology green.

I am beyond being aghast at what we do and have done, so now I just try to live as lightly on the planet as I possibly can and watch the movie.
I can't combat The Greater, the damage is done and we are now reaping the consequences of our mass stupidity.

Maybe we should write messages on the cave walls now...

Control our numbers,

Respect the life supporting resource base & its component working parts

Use appropriate non-polluting technology

So if there are any survivors they can at least have a few guidelines to a more successful sustainable management plan for our species' survival in its' next manifestation.

The weather has suddenly become full-blown beautiful diamond days summer.

Butterflies everywhere. At least they are still in abundance. Maybe because there are fewer birds to eat them!

I will try not to think of these things and return to fractalising to divert my mind in the creation of useless ephemeral images that are total self indulgence so I can post them on DA & Flickr & have 3 or 4 Commenters say cool or WOW or some such ego booster.

Ho Hum

STARSHIP HANGAR

Readying for the Voyage to next Goldilocks Planet

as

if

..............

TRUTH

A SERMON TO MARK AUSTRALIA DAY 2008.

FOR SUE.

Wollumbin Dreaming

You say I traveled far to find the Truth, and I did, but it was not until I found my home here on the mountain that the Truth was finally revealed.

That was because I studied Biosphere Function, Evolution, Prehistory, Astronomy Physics & etc.

Letting go all notions of God & replacing mythology with scientific facts.

I felt at the time, and still do, that if we were to right the wrongs and establish a sustainable life supporting management plan for The Way Forward we had to understand the fundamental Truth about It All.

By which I mean the way the universe works to produce life on planets and what the mechanisms are that turn stardust into living consciousness in our perceiving minds.

Objectively and subjectively.

The organism in the midst of the conditions must understand what those conditions are that support its existence and functioning body and mind.

This was obviously a Huge Call for Little Me!

But the truth I have finally nutted out has finally revealed itself, sometimes steps of it in Eureka moments, sometimes in slow iceberg slides of consciousness awakenings & realizations over days & weeks that eventually showed me a new viewpoint when the iceberg righted itself & started floating.

I had to figure out time, motion, chemistry, planetary formation, evolution, anthropology, the anthropic principle, the anthropocentric viewpoint, socio political evolution thru his and her stories, the way human systems work, human migration patterns, rise & fall of civilizations,biosphere evolution itself.

The wholistic view of It All.

When a planet is Just Right For Life, it is called a Goldilocks planet. When we search the universe for planets, we seek those Goldilocks planets. But whether we will survive to ever explore another life supporting planet is now in serious doubt.

Consider This question:

How does biosphere evolution work?

How did that lumpy chunky fireball floating around the sun
turn stardust into a living watery biosphere envelope
populated by an integrated ecology of plants & animals
that support another (super?) species
that relies on all the rest for its existence
and has the ability to see itself in context
and the technology to maybe even translocate some core DNA to another Goldilocks planet
when the biosphere it has plundered collapses
under its uncontrolled population pressures and resource mismanagement?

And another question: What is that Sun?

Well, that was what I needed to know.

That was the truth I sought, beyond all the socio/political/religious human mythologies,beyond all this stuff about Chosen Ones,The Coming Messiah,The Son of God, The Pantheon of Gods, God the Supreme One, Buddha. & etc.

I had a discussion recently on the subject of Holy. I find such a concept rather precious. However I concede it has a place if it is translated into actions of respect and nurture.

In my Truth all concepts of Holy in terms of anthropocentric mythical beings have been replaced by the concept of the Holy Earth and the living biosphere that exists as it interacts with the Sun, the moon and space. Holy, to me, are the ecosystems such as the rainforests, riparian zones, wetlands, rivers, oceans, reefs, deserts, etc. and all those places where things exist that support and drive our precious life support system, the Biosphere.

I also regard all lifeforms, including human beings, and especially our children, as Holy. They are all Holy. To be respected, defended and supported in the best way we can. In the case of our human population, education as to the precious nature of life and existence is paramount.

Putting offerings on these holy altars by investing our energies in their sustainable future should be our species credo.

Now, slowly, some things are changing for the better, despite a lot of negative behaviors like war & crime,as the knowledge of this Truth which I find I now share with many, is getting to those who control the Power & the Energy systems and, most of all,the purse strings to get the action happening for a Sustainable Future.

But, alas, unfortunately, we are too late. Climate change is now upon us.

You wonder how much is passing cyclic change and how much is deep modification ?

It is both, but the deeper changes are now influencing the seasonal & cyclic events. We have been told to expect greater intensity and frequency of events. That has been evident as one hottest year on record builds on the last and the melting icecaps influence the global conveyor belt ocean currents, unleashing many complex reactions.

The biosphere systems are moving into new balances, skewing our life supports.

Here in Oz I have just experienced a small dose of what many others have experienced in varying forms of magnitude in recent weeks as floods drove people from their homes, killed livestock, destroyed crops and property over an area larger than GB.

My isolation of last weeks is now over, as a vital bridge was built today and at last I can access the wider world. I survived. As have many flood affected people. But at a cost.

As these incremental costs mount across the planet, pressures will build. How we handle what is to come is the big worry.

The Mad Max scenario of fuel wars and outlaws controlling through looting, fear and violence, could be one unthinkable stage of what is to come.

Human nature has cooperation inbuilt. Compassion, sacrifice for the greater good and all such laudable virtues are a recognizable part of being human.

However we all have the knowledge that when push comes to shove the less pleasant aspects of our nature start manifesting.

Avarice & greed overcome caring & sharing. Bullying and threats turn to violence and murder. Tribal feuds turn into genocide.

Climate change may wreak havoc, but will our survival depend on defeating our greatest enemy, ourselves?

This is the Truth I have found. It ends with a further question.

Change is the constant and we must adjust to the ever changing nature of existence.

Climate Victim.

The endless rain enters the 17th week of wetness, (except for 3-4 sunny days mid-November 07) including a major flood event that came in a January 4th midnight cloudburst, causing huge damage all across district and 2nd highest flood on record.

About 570 mm in last 25 days. Over 22 inches on old scale.
But months of it before that.
A very wet wet season.

Bridge across creek at entrance after the mid night 280mm deluge of January 4, 2008.

Looking out across bridge towards main road entrance after the night's cloudburst of 040108.

Two weeks of bronchial flu, having to sleep in wet bed that got soaked in deluge & wet weather since plus too weak to move mattress anyway, and run out of clean sheets. Got myself to hospital when I felt like I was getting pneumonia. The good doctor gave me antibiotics and am on mend but still ill, it's slow. Couldn't talk for 5 days and it still hurts to cough. I cough a lot.

Everything is soaked & I have to sit with hot air blower on as I write to keep dry as the 100 percent humidity means I'm wet all the time. Have to use hair dryer on head every half hour or so to dry out hair.

Biting midges and mosquitoes mean mosquito coils... means inhaling toxic fumes... means aggravated spasms of painful coughing.

Other complications I won't go into here have turned my life from happy to miserable.

STRANDED!
The road collapse of 160108.
Luckily nobody was on the crossing.

Now a DISASTER as the road has suddenly collapsed where it crosses a 20m plus deep knife gully on my exit road and I'm stuck in, unable to get out for supplies. Being partly lame hasn't helped, especially as yesterday my dicky knee went out of joint and I can't walk very well at all. On the steep wet slippery rocks that constitute the paths between studio & bunkhouse this is a nightmare of inching along balancing umbrella, walking stick & whatever I'm trying to carry between houses.

Water pours around running over every surface in an endless sog, even when the rain eases. Where there is grass there is a swamp of mud and slime. Where there are rocks they are all slippery & slimey. Inside the houses all is moulds. Every bit of clothing, bedding, carpets damp & mouldy.

The endless wet has also meant can't get car in under shelter as it gets bogged at slushy entrance to carport. So it sits out in rain and is cranky to start & runs on 3 pots. At least I have it to get me as far as the washout, about 1 km from houses.

Have supplies to last a few more days and my road-sharing neighbors can bring me necessities, as they have a car on other side of the collapse, but that hardly solves the problem. Trying to overcome the anxiety, but eating & sleeping now difficult.

Must summon inner resources to solve the problem & release myself from this prison.

I keep wondering what can happen next. Is this the end? Will some miracle happen to get me to safe haven and my usual happy self again?

Even poor kookaburra can't fly she's so wet. When she tried to take off after I fed her she dropped into bushes and I had to rescue her & put her up onto a branch to give her elevation.
I hear her chuckling in the tree as I write.

Her message is:

LET'S LAUGH
NO POINT IN CRYING IS THERE!

Homage to Escher

Been working on a series of Escher-esq images in Apophysis 2.07beta based on 5spiralsInline flame of DeviantART's Fractal-Impact Mixed flame pack . Used the Super Susan script of Phoenixkeyblack, also from deviantART. Good site that!

Came up with a whole swag of images Escher would love. I do too. I keep thinking what he might have done with fractal generators like Apophysis. I am definitely a hobbit being carried on the backs of giants & wizards....wither....?

So here's a small sample from my series:

Homage to M.C. Escher

I'll leave them nameless. You can check out more of them on my Flickr & DevianART sites, click on links in Anu Links at right.

Good rain is falling, with the odd thunderstorm. Sandflies very bitey.

It seems like the people are finally working around the war lord mentalities that have dominated thinking & media noise for so long. Of course there's nothing like the terrifying scenario of rising sea levels to focus minds to mutual survival.

But still our numbers grow. Oz is now 21 million. Land of the Ruddites.

Somehow the population pressure/carrying capacity keeps being whited out of the equation. Doesn't it occur to the decision makers that less people means less pollution, less impacts on the biosphere? Ah yes...the elephant in the room. We don't want to go there, do we!

FULL MOON, ORCHIDS & BETTY IS 86.

SEPTEMBER FULL MOON

Is that a UFO bottom right?
Nah...just the 747 from Coolangatta to Sydney with headlights blazing as it does its big swooparound & heads south west from coast.

Celebrated Betty's 86th last night with veranda drinks & dinner watching full moon rise over caldera. Then showed her flickr & blogspot, explaining how, if her traveling clan posted to web, she'd be able to access their pix & diaries. I think she was impressed.

Gosh....I AM! It's such high magic this technology. Here's a good shot I got of her two days ago.

Betty is a hearty 86! Congratulations Betty!

A few more orchids have come into bloom.
This one is the Tongue orchid, Dendrobium linguaforme.

Tongue orchid

Below, this is the extravagant large raceme of the King orchid, Dendrobium speciosum. This year only 1 raceme, instead of the 6-12 it usually present. The other plants of this species, usually so abundant, have not flowered at all.

King Orchid

The drought has cut deep. This morning I harvested the solitary lemon my bush lemon beside studio gave me this year. Normally they are so abundant they litter the ground at this time and I'm busy preserving them or freezing the juice.

The fact that eastern states farmers are quitting their farms, committing suicide in frightening numbers, pulling up whole orchards, looking at totally failed crops & putting the sheep to graze off what has managed to come up but is unharvestable, is not getting through to a lot of people I think.

The implications are huge. Can we survive as a population from what the Ord River will provide?

Populate and Perish.

I'd like to congratulate my old friend from way back then, Karl Kruszelnicki , who is running for Senate under the Climate Change banner in next election.

DR. KARL FOR PRESIDENT !

Karl you are such an amazing man, always had great admiration for what you do & say. You simply MUST run for President eventually.

That's all she wrote....

Sto kalo.

Eclipse of the Blue Full Moon.

The Dark Hand of Chaos

A dark vision has emerged as I create digital images in Agony, SaVaGery, Chaoscope, GIMP & other recently acquired digital imaging programs.


With the Equine flu, the Bird flu, the Greek & southern European fires, the horrors in Iraq, Afghanistan, the African atrocities & famine, the price of wheat, stock markets in crisis, major weather events...it goes on & on.....all giving me a sense of dread as to the future of beautiful planet Earth, it is no wonder my art has turned dark.


Does it help to keep saying positive things, to play the Pollyanna card, when it is quite obvious that things are less than good.


Maybe it's the eclipse of the full moon doing it to me.

I look outside, I feel the beautiful clear balmy spring weather after a week of excellent rains.
All is well here. Hard to be the happy camper knowing the pain so many are in from so many sources.

Que sera...

I hear that our planet is dying. It is NOT dying. Certainly the biosphere is being severely impacted by our inappropriate technology and pollution.

But it is our NUMBERS that drive the engine of that problem.

Surely we must address carrying capacity as well as lifeways and technology if we are to reach a better balance for the life support systems to function.

Don't shoot the messenger.

Love to Us All,

Anu.