About five years ago, before the public widely knew that the world's greenhouse gas emissions were tipping the climate over the point of no return, Alex Johnson, Durham's urban forester, was weighing what trees to plant to replace the mass die-off of the city's willow oaks.
...climate change
Embedded in bark, the Emerald Ash Borer gleams like the gem. Adult females lay their eggs in the cracks and crevices of ash trees, and once hatched, larvae, cream-colored and as thin as filament, gnaw into the deeper layers. They chisel fatal curlicues that disrupt the flow of nutrients. A few months later, the life cycle begins again, and the adults emerge through a D-shaped hole in the bark. By that time, the tree is dying or dead of starvation.
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The summer of 2018 ranks among the wettest on record in eastern North Carolina, a consequence of climate change and its driver — greenhouse gas emissions. The NC Department of Environmental Quality’s draft Greenhouse Gas Inventory shows the state’s contributions to a warming and unpredictable global climate...
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