Present climate and biological change - Climate Change: Biological and Human Aspects - page 217

mould ( Fusarium nivale ) devastated crops. It thrives under melting snow cover or
prolonged, cold, drizzly weather. Additionally, due to the increased number of days
of snow cover, the stocks of hay for the animals ran out in some pre-Little Ice Age
benign areas, so livestock were fed on less-nutritious straw and pine branches. Many
cattle had to be slaughtered. Others still died in the heavy snow. Marginal lands at high
latitudes were similarly pressured. In northern Norway many farms were abandoned
for better land in the bottoms of valleys. By 1387, Norwegian agricultural production
and tax yields were far less compared with what they had been around 1300. By the
1460s it was being recognised that this change was long-term. As late as 1665 the
annual Norwegian grain harvest is reported to have been only 67-70% of what it had
been in the year 1300 (Lamb, 1995).
The Little Ice Age did not just affect marginal lands but also sensitive crops in
less harsh areas; crops that required specific climatic conditions at specific times in
the thermal growing season. Illustrative, as previously noted, is the Roman Saserna's
suggestion of viticulture as a climate proxy. Grapes require a narrow range of con-
ditions for ripening and so are particularly sensitive to climate change. The Little
Ice Age saw many countries with a strong viticulture industry, such as France, have
bad years for wine coincident with climate swings. Naturally those areas, such as
southern England, that had benefited from the MCA and which had become the new
northern margin for viticulture, were not able to grow vines much after 1400. German
wine production between 1400 and 1700 was never above 53%, and at times was as
low as 20%, of the production before 1300.
The sociological impacts of the Little Ice Age have also been suggested to have
resulted in one particularly gruesome aspect of European life of the time and partic-
ularly around the 1590s: persecution. It is human nature to want to point the finger of
blame when detrimental events take place. Local food, being a key biological driver,
and food security, were more important locally than today, when developed nations
have access to harvests from different parts of the planet. A poor harvest for a farmer
in the 16th century caused personal hardship and poor harvests for a village or town
would undermine the economy. It was therefore easy to blame someone for casting a
spell that ruined crops, and so the 1590s were particularly notorious for witch hunts
and executions. Indeed, as would be expected from a climate perspective, southern
Europe saw fewer witch executions than more northern countries such as Germany,
where there were many. Indeed, warmer Spain, which is famed for the Inquisition,
had comparatively few executions. Here crop damage was far less of a factor than
the desire to convert people to the 'true faith'. Crop damage was worse in the north
and again catastrophic on the northern marginal lands. So much was this so that the
descendents of those who previously had taken advantage of the northern migration
of marginal lands at the beginning of the MCA found their fortunes reverse with the
Little Ice Age. This is particularly highlighted by the pattern over the centuries of
international migrations. During the climatic anomaly years of 800-1200 Iceland

and Greenland were settled by the Vikings from Scandinavia. By around

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1100
the population of Iceland peaked at some 70 000 and this is clearly climate-related.
Human remains from Norse burial grounds in Greenland have been found that in
the 20th century were in permanently frozen soil that was virtually impossible to dig
by hand. This suggests, for the bodies to have been buried, that the average local

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