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Climatic warming above the Arctic Circle: are there trends in timing and length of the thermal growing season in Murmansk Region (Russia) between 1951 and 2012?

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Abstract

Anomalies in the timing of the thermal growing season have become obvious in the NE part of Fennoscandia since 2000. They are in accordance with climatic changes reported for Europe and Fennoscandia. The actual length of the growing season reached 120 days on average, onset on 30 May and ending on 27 September (1981–2010). Shifts in the timing of the growing season and its mean prolongation by 18.5 days/62a are demonstrated for Murmansk Region (1951–2012). In this period, the onset of the growing season advanced by 7.1 days/62a, while the end was extended by 11.4 days/62a. The delay in the end of the growing season is similar to the entire Fennoscandian pattern but it has not been detected in the rest of Europe. The regional pattern of climatic regimes in Murmansk Region remained stable in comparison with earlier climatic maps (1971). However, the actual shifts in the timing of the growing season were more pronounced in colder (oceanic and mountainous) parts. Recent climatic trends could influence the retreat of the tundra zone and changes in the forest line. Losses of tundra biodiversity and enrichment of the northern taiga by southern species could be expected from present climatic trends.

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Notes

  1. A maximum elevation is given in brackets for each mountain range.

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Acknowledgments

We acknowledge the E-OBS dataset from the EU-FP6 project ENSEMBLES (http://ensembles-eu.metoffice.com) and the data providers in the ECA&D project (http://www.ecad.eu).

We are grateful to P. Uotila (Helsinki) for discussions concerning the borders of the biogeographic provinces of Eastern Fennoscandia; N. Koroleva (Kirovsk) and R. Lampinen (Helsinki) for discussion and for links to vegetation maps; and H. Tømmervik (Tromsø, Norway) and A. Hofgaard (Trondheim, Norway) for recent literature on climatic changes in Fennoscandia. We are obliged to G. H. Harper (RBGE, UK) for checking the quality of our English.

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  1. Polar-Alpine Botanical Garden-Institute, 184230, Kirovsk, Murmansk Region, Russia

    Ilona Blinova

  2. Agricultural Climatology, Faculty of Life Sciences, Humboldt-University of Berlin, Berlin, Germany

    Frank-Michael Chmielewski

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Correspondence to Ilona Blinova.

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Blinova, I., Chmielewski, FM. Climatic warming above the Arctic Circle: are there trends in timing and length of the thermal growing season in Murmansk Region (Russia) between 1951 and 2012?. Int J Biometeorol 59, 693–705 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00484-014-0880-y

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