http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/oct/10/climate-2c-global-warming-target-fail

Youtube told us that close to a decade ago!

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2015/oct/09/global-warming-is-shrinking-californias-critical-snowpack

This, however, is a much more recent finding...

BatteriesNotIncluded wrote on Oct 11^th, 2015 at 4:13pm:

This, however, is a much more recent finding...

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2015/oct/09...

The guardian, once again bringing up the rear. This was reported a month ago.

Blue oaks don't grow in the snow pack. Blue oaks don't like getting their feet wet. As shown in the accompanying photo, they grow on the slopes. Snowpack melt would have limited, if any, impact.

from the paper-

'For those particular oaks (Quercus douglasii), the width of their annual rings reflects the winter precipitation they receive. Because the same storms that water the oaks also dump snow in the Sierra Nevada just to the west, the width of the blue oaks’ rings is a good proxy for snowpack in the Sierras, Trouet said.'

2 things

One:  'the the same storms that water the oaks also dump snow in the Sierra Nevada just to the west, ' They didn't show any evidence for that, it may just be an assumption. But being scientists they should have included any evidence.

Two: 'Other researchers had already measured the width of tree rings for 1,505 blue oaks in California’s Central Valley from 33 different sites. '

Sierra Nevadas are to the east of Central Valley. Really poor review, let alone peer-review.

lee wrote on Oct 11^th, 2015 at 6:12pm:

Blue oaks don't grow in the snow pack. Blue oaks don't like getting their feet wet. As shown in the accompanying photo, they grow on the slopes. Snowpack melt would have limited, if any, impact.

" A warmer world is also a wetter world because there is more moisture in the air. Therefore, there is a potential for more snow."

That is a myth if not wishful thinking for those in Cali.

Blue oaks pretty much grow anywhere which is not always a good thing. They are indigenous to the rocky mountain west but I can tell you they don't always grow on slopes. Who knows? Maybe in Cali they do.

Many of them are dying not due to weather but simply due to disease like root rot such as Armillaria and Ganoderma which in most cases is caused by wet soils. The scrub oak around here also looks weird. It did not bloom fully around here until late June to due excessive rainfall.

http://s18.postimg.org/jklokvvdl/DSC_0020.jpg

That a photo I took this morning off how much the trees around here look "sickly" and are dying/slowing rotting not due to lack of moisture but from the flooding we had here late spring.

The lack of snowfall in the Sierra Nevada mountain range is alarming and it really doesn't look like much of a significant snowpack is expected for winter 2015. No idea how that state is going to survive come next summer.

The state will survive. Here 10 year droughts are not uncommon. Might have to let almond trees die tho.

Marla wrote on Oct 12^th, 2015 at 12:13am:

Many of them are dying not due to weather but simply due to disease like root rot such as Armillaria and Ganoderma which in most cases is caused by wet soils.

if the sols is too wet; must be too much snow. ;)

lee wrote on Oct 12^th, 2015 at 2:05pm:

if the sols is too wet; must be too much snow.

Snow isn't wet.  Melted slow is though.

The thing about snow is it is just an indicator of a complex system like any other.

What makes a system 'complex' is the fact it is measured by various indicators and what those indicators actually mean is subject to debate.

Hence the need for the term 'democracy' all those years ago...