Blooms before bees: What an early spring could mean for pollinators
While some of us might be enjoying the unseasonably warm weather, the early spring sunshine could be a problem for plants and pollinators.
Photo by Zhang Kiev
New research has revealed that plants in the UK are now flowering almost a month earlier on average, as a result of changing temperatures. The researchers based their analysis on more than 400,000 observations of plants dating back to the mid-18th century, in locations from the Channel Islands to Shetland, and Northern Ireland to Suffolk.
The team from the University of Cambridge found that the average first flowering date from 1987 to 2019 is 26 days earlier than the average first flowering date from 1753 to 1986. The same period coincides with accelerating global warming caused by human activities.
These latest findings support an array of scientific research that consistently shows how first flowering dates have shifted over time.
