Re: coping with environmental variability

Bob Wilson (bobw@ncatfyv.uark.edu)
Thu, 27 Apr 1995 14:26:32 -0500 (CDT)

Ann Clark <ACLARK@CROP.UOGUELPH.CA> wrote:
>
> Seems some chaps have concluded that one of the unexpected changes
> accompanying what is increasingly looking like "global warming" is
> increased variability in the starting/ending of growing seasons.
> Untimely startings and endings would have significant repercussions
> for both grain crop (annual) and pasture/hay (perennial) systems.
>
> I'd be interested to know if anyone has done research on "coping with
> variability" - whether in annual or perennial systems. I'm not
> talking now about managing for predictable seasonal problems - e.g.
> midseason drought - but rather, coping with unpredictable problems -
> like a season that starts a month late or ends 2 weeks early. I'd be
> particularly interested in sensitivity/risk analyses, from both
> biological/agronomic and profitablity perspectives.

Check out Applied Chaos Theory:

1. Applied Chaos Theory: A Paradigm for Complexity
A.B. Cambel 1993
Academic Press, Boston 246 pp.

2. Chaos and Integrability in Nonlinear Dynamics: An Introduction
Michael Tabor 1989
Wiley & Sons, New York 364 pp.

3. Chaos and the Evolving Ecological Universe
Sally J. Goerner 1993
World Futures General Evolution Studies, v.7 255 pp.
ISBN 2881246354

4. Chaotic Vibrations: An Introduction for Applied Scientist and
Engineers
F.C. Moon 1987
Wiley & Sons, New York 309 pp.

This may be one of those great questions in science - like Bill Cosby's
"Why is there air"?
_________________________________________________________________
Bob Wilson
Fayetteville, Arkansas USA
bobw@ncatfyv.uark.edu
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