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Home Planet: Are Our Seasons Changing?

27/12/2011

Are Our Seasons Changing?

BBC Radio 4 - Home Planet, Are Our Seasons Changing?

Do second flushes of spring blooms signal changing seasons?

Presented by Richard Daniel. Magnolias have been reported blooming again in autumn and rhubarb has been harvested in December. Does this mean that our seasons are changing?

This year some magnolias bloomed again in the autumn and other plants such as rhubarb are also showing some particularly unseasonable behaviour. 

This week one listener wants to know whether this means our seasons are changing, and what might be the probable impact of such a change. You also want to know whether seabirds are taking valuable fish out of the nets of fishermen, or is it we humans doing the same to gulls, auks and gannets? Why do planets always end up orbiting around their star's equator? And what are the mysterious coronal holes that appear in the Sun's atmosphere?

On the panel this week are astronomer Dr Carolin Crawford of Cambridge University; Professor Andrew Watkinson, Director of Living with Environmental Change; and Professor Philip Stott and environmental scientist of the University of London.

The programme is presented by Richard Daniel.


Producer: Toby Murcott 
A Pier production for BBC Radio 4.

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