Retreat of the Cold

The time may come when cotton will be grown in the state of New York and corn far north in Ontario. Last week Dr. George H. T. Kimble, British-born director of the American Geographical Society, told the New York Publicity Club that the climate of the North Atlantic region is growing unmistakably warmer.

The change is most noticeable in Canada. The mean annual temperature of Montreal, said Dr. Kimble, has risen from 42DEGF in the 1880s to 46DEGF in 1950. Along the bleak natural boundary between Canada's forests and the barren Arctic, the trees are marching northward. Saplings of tamarack, spruce and birch are appearing where none grew before.

As the isotherms (i.e., lines of equal temperature) shift northward on the weatherman's maps, the northern limits of warmth-loving crops move northward, too. In eastern Canada, cereals can be grown 100 miles farther north than ever before. The change is due partly to better varieties and better cultivation methods, but partly to milder Canadian climate. Southern Ontario is already experimenting with cotton.

The northeastern U.S. is also warming up. New York has gained about three degrees, with longer but not notably hotter summers. In large cities the rise of temperature has been somewhat helped by the smoke and heat released by man's activities, but part of it is natural.

The change of climate, said Dr. Kimble, extends all over the lands surrounding the North Atlantic. In Russia the southern limit of permafrost (permanently frozen ground) is receding northward up to 100 yards a year. Many Norwegian slopes are raising barley where only grass grew before. Even the fish of the North Atlantic are taking advantage of the change. The cod, which are very sensitive to temperature changes, have migrated northward some 500 miles since 1920.

In the southern parts of the U.S. there has not been so much change. Other meteorologists, says Dr. Kimble, have reported a slight cooling of the tropics. So there is no imminent danger that the jungle will muscle in on Alabama.

What caused the warming-up Dr. Kimble does not know. He thinks it may be related to some change in the Gulf Stream or in the warm air masses that originate in the Gulf of Mexico region. Neither does he know whether the warming will continue. It may be part of a cycle, he says, "but you can work up a cycle for anything."

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