Abstract
Climate and weather inevitably form part of a community’s life and culture. Benign weather is essential for food and other production, and extreme weather events impact on security and well-being. Nineteenth-century colonists in Australia and New Zealand were challenged in their endeavor to create European cultures, economies, and agriculture by their non-European environments and climates, which periodically threw up severe weather that destroyed or proved to be a setback in their “progress.” We now understand that extreme weather in these regions is often associated swings in the El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) or Southern Oscillation Index (SOI) and that it played a significant role in shaping colonial experiences (chapter 1). However, there were also many severe weather events that lie outside the identified ENSO activity.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsPreview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Notes
For a broader discussion of much of the material in this chapter see Don Garden, Droughts, Floods & Cyclones: El Niños That Shaped Our Colonial Past (Melbourne: Australian Scholarly Publishing, 2009).
There are many descriptions of ENSO generally and for Australia. These are useful: Eugene Linden, The Winds of Change: Climate, Weather and the Destruction of Civilizations (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2006);
Diaz, H. F. and V. Markgraf, eds., El Nino and the Southern Oscillation: Multiscale Variability and Its Impacts on Natural Ecosystems and Society (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000);
Andrew Sturman and Nigel Tapper, The Weather and Climate of Australia and New Zealand, 2nd ed. (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 2006);
Peter Whetton, “Floods, Droughts and the Southern Oscillation Connection,” in Windows on Meteorology: Australian Perspective, ed. Eric K. Webb (Melbourne: CSIRO, 1997);
Rob Allan, Janette Lindesay, and David Parker, The El Niño Southern Oscillation and Climatic Variability (Melbourne: CSIRO Publishing, 1996).
For descriptions of ENSO in New Zealand see: Erick Brenstrum, The New Zealand Weather Book (Nelson: Craig Potton Publishing, 2003);
Brett Mullan, “Effects of ENSO on New Zealand and the South Pacific,” in Prospects and Needs for Climate Forecasting, Proceedings of a Workshop / sponsored by the New Zealand Climate Committee, ed. Deborah Braddock (Wellington: Royal Society of New Zealand, 1996);
Jim Salinger, “Conditions Leading to Droughts in New Zealand,” Water & Atmosphere 3, no 1 (March 1995): 11–12;
Basher, Reid, The 1997/98 El Niño Event: Impacts, Responses and Outlook for New Zealand, National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research, Science & Technology Report no 73, 1998, 1.
A. I. McKerchar, and C. P. Pearson, “The Spring Southern Oscillation Index Conditions Summer Lake Inflow Probabilities, South Island, in Prospects and Needs for Climate Forecasting, Proceedings of a Workshop sponsored by the New Zealand Climate Committee, ed. Braddock (Wellington: Royal Society of New Zealand, 1996), 33.
Hawkes Bay Flood Relief Fund, Executive Committee Report, January 14, 1898; M. B. Boyd, City of the Plains: a History of Hastings (Wellington: Victoria University Press, 1984), 77;
M. D. N. Campbell, Story of Napier 1874–1974, (Napier: Napier City Council, 1975, 82 ff; PBH, April 23, 1897.
Michael McKernan, Drought: the Red Marauder (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 2005), 96–7.
Henry Lawson, Collected Short Stories (Sydney: Angus & Robertson, 1982).
Dora Wilcox, “After the Flood,” in Verses from Maoriland (London: George Allen, 1905).
Julian C. Kuzma, “Landscape, Literature and Identity: New Zealand Late Colonial Literature as Environmental Text, 1890–1921” (PhD thesis, University of Otago, 2003), 49.
For a discussion of the factors that shaped late nineteenth-century Australian art, see Leigh Astbury, City Bushmen: the Heidelberg School and Rural Mythology (Melbourne: Oxford University Press, 1985).
David Day, The Weather Watchers: 100 years of the Bureau of Meteorology (Melbourne: University Publishing, 2007);
J. F. de Lisle, Sails to Satellites: A History of Meteorology in New Zealand (Wellington: New Zealand Meteorological Service, 1986).
MC, March 21, October 5, 1901, May 24, June 11, August 20, 1902; RH, May 31, 1897; MM, September 22, 1898; Day, The Weather Watchers; J. M. Powell, Plains of Promise Rivers of Destiny; Water Management and the Development of Queensland 1824–1900 (Brisbane: Boolarong Publications, 1991).
MC, May 30, 1902; Gerard Blackburn, Pioneering Irrigation in Australia to 1920 (Melbourne: Australian Scholarly Publishing, 1999);
P. J. Hallows, P. J. and D. G. Thompson, The History of Irrigation in Australia (Mildura: Australian National Committee on Irrigation and Drainage, 1995); Powell, Plains of Promise.
RH, November 11, 1895; J. M. Powell, Watering the Garden State: Water, Land and Community in Victoria 1834–1988 (Sydney: Allen & Unwin, 1989); Blackburn, Pioneering Irrigation.
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 2014 James Beattie, Emily O’Gorman, and Matthew Henry
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Garden, D. (2014). Extreme Weather and ENSO: Their Social and Cultural Ramifications in New Zealand and Australia in the 1890s. In: Beattie, J., O’Gorman, E., Henry, M. (eds) Climate, Science, and Colonization. Palgrave Studies in the History of Science and Technology. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137333933_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137333933_4
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, New York
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-46245-2
Online ISBN: 978-1-137-33393-3
eBook Packages: Palgrave History CollectionHistory (R0)