Plants flowering later on the Tibetan Plateau
Shorter growing season linked to warmer winters on ‘the roof of the world’. In many regions, climate change has advanced the timing of spring events, such as flowering or the unfolding of leaves. But the meadows and steppes of the Tibetan Plateau are bucking that trend — plants are starting to bloom later in spring, making the growing season shorter. This change could threaten the livelihood of the thousands of nomads who survive by raising cattle on the plateau. “I’ve worked in the Tibetan Plateau region for 25 years,” says Jianchu Xu, an ethnoecologist at the World Agroforestry Centre in … Read more…