Science
How to Plan a Garden With Climate Change in Mind
The silent season is drawing to a close.
All winter, there was little birdsong to lift my heart. The occasional caw of a crow, the chickadee-dee-dee of a chickadee, the big song of the little Carolina wren that now stays on our Pennsylvania farm all winter. But no courtship call of great horned owls, no wood thrush or Baltimore oriole. Still, I rejoiced in the music that remained.
I just heard the first notes of our first returning songbird, though, a red-winged blackbird, and the snowdrops have begun to poke out of the ground.
The other day, I moved last fall’s potted tulips and hyacinth from the unheated side of the barn to the warmth of the garden room to force their blooms. But the vegetable garden is an icy mud puddle and the flower beds, still mulched with shredded leaves, show little signs of life. Boxwood is covered in burlap and snow fence is draped around trees and shrubs to prevent deer from devouring them.
Those deer, which have changed from the color of milk chocolate to dark, break through our makeshift deterrents anyway and eat the yew, euonymus, arborvitae, and this winter, even the holly. Squirrels race around adding to their larders, but the chipmunks are nowhere to be seen yet. They’re in their dens I suppose, as are the opossum, raccoons and the bears, too.
Once I longed for a greenhouse, but now I, too, wish to hibernate in winter, to take time off from sowing, potting and nurturing. To walk in snowy woods and observe animal tracks, study ice patterns on the pond, to be one with the season. I want to read by the fire and peruse garden catalogs, imagining what next year’s garden will be like, expecting, as all gardeners do, that next year will be better than the last. As Vita Sackville-West wrote in her poem “The Garden:”
The gardener dreams his special own alloy
Of possible and the impossible.
But what is possible anymore? As I reflect on last year’s abysmal season, I wonder how I will adapt to the changes I witness.
A year ago, winter was so warm that shrubs hardly died back and, last spring, dripped with foliage, a welcome sight but not normal. Spring was so hot I missed that lovely, cool, window for transplanting. I didn’t know when to plant early season, cold-hardy vegetables, certainly not in 85 degrees, or when to set out tender plants.
“After danger of frost,” is common wisdom, but when is that now? My Plant Hardiness Zone shifted recently because the average coldest temperature in my area is now three degrees higher than it was in 2012. But even that new guidance didn’t help me.
Mid-May felt like mid-June. Then, we had hail on May 29.
I planted poppies in April anyway (they like cool weather) but the seeds were washed away by floods, which can now stretch here from April through October. Between June and November, we had a drought. The grass was brown. Dogwood and tulip poplar lost their leaves in July. My vegetable garden resembled a cracked riverbed, the soil so hard that weeding was nearly impossible.
Streams ran dry, so for the first time in 36 years I saw deer wade into the pond to drink. Little food was available for them, so they sauntered up to our garage and ate the deer-resistant lavender. On my walks in the forest, I was struck by that lack of undergrowth, particularly a huge patch of Canadian Wood Nettle, a North America native that is a host plant for Red Admiral and Eastern Comma butterflies. Chanterelles never fruited in their usual spots. I worried that our spring would run dry.
Pennsylvania saw record wildfires in fall. Two lilacs, which normally appear in spring, bloomed in October, and in late November I was still harvesting what little I did manage to grow.
All this reminds me of a radio program called “Piano Puzzler” that my husband and I listen to on Saturday mornings. The composer Bruce Adolphe rewrites a familiar tune in the style of a classical composer. He changes the tune’s tempo, harmony or mode and contestants try to name the tune and composer. Imagine “Hey Jude” in the style of Brahms. Somewhere in my brain the tune sounds familiar, yet something is off, the music is disorienting. Occasionally, I guess correctly. Often, not.
Gardening in climate change is the same: confusing, with a lot of guessing.
What’s a home gardener to do?
“The only predictable thing is that it is going to be unpredictable.” said Sonja Skelly, director of education at Cornell Botanic Gardens in Ithaca, N.Y. “It’s been crazy up here, too.”
Last spring was hot in Ithaca as well, so the vegetable gardener started planting two weeks before the May 31 frost-free date. Then came extreme temperature fluctuations, but the plants set out earlier did better because they got established. Those planted on the target date were stunted and had a poor growing season. “A good lesson,” Dr. Skelly said. Row covers, which allow gardeners to get plants in earlier and grow them later in the season, are “going to be really important in climates like ours,” she said.
Cover crops like millet, sorghum, and black-eyed peas have been successful at the botanic gardens. They improve water retention, decrease weeds, reduce erosion and limit negative microorganisms in soil. The birds love them, Dr. Skelly said.
She recommended planting together what the Haudenosaunee people call the three sisters: corn, beans and squash. This system produces a better per-hectare yield than any monoculture cropping system, she said.
Drip irrigation is another solution, Dr. Skelly said. “It adds moisture where it’s needed, at the roots,” she said. Water is released slowly, stays put, and doesn’t run off like hand watering or using sprinklers.
“Observe, take notes, ask questions, seek out answers,” Dr. Skelly advised. “What are the neighbors seeing?” Learn by going to local botanic gardens, public gardens and nature centers, which have been working on this problem for a while now. “Keep the cycle of information flowing, talking with friends and family and neighbors as a way to help us figure it out. That’s so important,” she said.
Dr. Skelly believes it’s crucial for home gardeners to really understand their plants. “Maybe climate change will be the way to know our gardens far better,” she said. “We have to.”
I’ve long depended on experts to teach me how to garden responsibly. To help, not harm, the environment. I plant a diverse range of plants, including natives for pollinators, and have learned to celebrate native weeds like fleabane. I practice companion planting. I don’t spray pesticides or insecticides and, instead of synthetic fertilizers, use compost or make my own out of comfrey or stinging nettle. I wish I could buy plants in something other than plastic.
But the more I ponder gardening in the time of climate change, the more I believe we home gardeners are going to have to figure out many solutions for ourselves. So much of gardening is trial and error and erratic weather patterns mean we’ll have to experiment even more, to do our own studies. In essence, we must become citizen-scientists of our own vegetable patches and flower beds.
Cornell Botanic Gardens has a climate change demonstration garden, but, really, we all do. None of us has been through this before. And in the end, we’re all in this together, navigating a strange new world of digging in soil and growing things, each trying as we might to contribute to a new way of gardening in a changing world.
Daryln Brewer Hoffstot’s collection of essays, “A Farm Life: Observations From Fields and Forests,” was published by Stackpole Books.
The Los Angeles County Department of Public Health is investigating a confirmed measles case in a resident who recently traveled internationally, the agency said in a release Saturday.
This is the fifth measles case identified by the county this year as outbreaks increase across the U.S. and globally.
The infected resident arrived at the Los Angeles International Airport on Thursday on Alaska Airlines Flight 1354. Other travelers at Tom Bradley International Terminal B that day between 6 a.m. and 8 a.m. may have been exposed to the virus, officials said.
Public health officials are advising residents to check their immunization status and watch for symptoms if exposed. The measles-mumps-rubella vaccine is the most effective protection from measles, according to the public health department.
“As measles cases increase, it is important that residents take steps to make sure they are fully protected,” L.A. County Health Officer Muntu Davis said in a statement. “The MMR vaccine is the safest and most reliable way to prevent measles and protect yourself, your family, and your community.”
In coordination with the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, L.A. County Public Health will notify travelers seated near the infected person on the flight.
Affected travelers are at risk of developing measles from seven to 21 days after exposure to the virus. Symptoms include rash, fever, cough and red, watery eyes.
Measles can lead to complications including pneumonia, brain swelling and even death. Those with symptoms should notify their healthcare facility before visiting, officials said.
So far this year, 1,814 measles cases have been confirmed nationwide, including 48 in California.
In January, health officials recorded the most amount of cases since the U.S. achieved elimination of the virus in 2000.
Archaeologists working in Egypt have discovered a remarkable combination of Homeric epic and Egyptian ritual: a 2,000-year-old mummy with a papyrus fragment of the “Iliad” sealed in a clay packet outside its wrappings.
It is the first time a literary work has been found playing a functional, spiritual role in the mummification process. And it suggests that for a Roman-era Egyptian, the “Iliad” — specifically some lines from Book 2’s “Catalogue of Ships” — was perhaps as crucial for navigating the afterlife as a magical spell.
“The find is incredibly significant, primarily for the discovery of such a papyrus with Greek literary text in its original context,” said Foy Scalf, an Egyptologist at the University of Chicago. “We have evidence that such Greek literary texts could be used as magical amulets and that Homer was frequently cited in such amulets, as well as in the large handbooks now known as ‘The Greco-Egyptian Formularies.’ The new find directly supports that indirect knowledge.”
The mummy, a nonroyal male, was unearthed by the Mission of the University of Barcelona at a burial site known as Oxyrhynchus, as part of a project directed by Ignasi-Xavier Adiego of the university’s Institute of Ancient Near East. Leah Mascia, a specialist in the written and material culture of Greco-Roman and Late Antique Egypt at the Free University of Berlin, coordinated the collaborative breakthrough that finally brought the damaged text to light.
Recognizing that the heavily degraded papyrus required careful analysis, Dr. Mascia worked with a conservator, Margalida Munar, to stabilize the artifact, and Dr. Adiego, an authority on the Carian language, to study the text. Together, their combined expertise in preservation and linguistics allowed them to identify and read the document.
After six years of painstakingly reconstructing tomb fragments, Dr. Mascia uncovered a rare moment of cultural alchemy: Roman Egypt, where foreign and local customs merged. Her analysis, which identified embalmer seals and folding patterns of the papyrus packet, suggests that classical Greek epics were not merely read but physically repurposed.
Traditionally, mummified bodies were buried with sepulchral texts like the “Book of the Dead” and “The Book of Breathing,” formulaic manuals intended to protect and guide the deceased through the underworld. Yet, by the early Roman period, a major shift emerged: the introduction of sealed papyrus packets placed upon the dead.
These new packets contained a surprising mix of texts, including Greco-Egyptian magic, documentary records and even literary works like the “Iliad,” indicating a personalized, alternative funerary practice.
Out of the dumps
The Oxyrhynchus necropolis, located near the modern village of El-Bahnasa about 120 miles south of Cairo, is not just a burial site but an archaeological mother lode. Located on the banks of the Bahr Yussef canal, the area is speckled with ancient garbage dumps that managed to preserve everything from wedding invitations and tax records to horoscopes and early Christian gospels.
The ruins of Oxyrhynchus were initially documented by Vivant Denon, a scholar during Napoleon’s 1798 Egyptian campaign. But they held a secret that remained buried for an additional century, until 1896, when British archaeologists dug up more than 400,000 fragments of papyri from the ancient trash heaps. The discoveries ultimately included lost masterworks by poets and playwrights like Sappho and Euripides, transforming millenniums-old refuse into a cornerstone of classical literature.
In the 1990s, the Mission of the University of Barcelona and the University of Cairo began a joint project largely funded by the Spanish Ministry of Culture and the Egyptian Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities. This ongoing mission, directed by Maite Mascort i Roca and Esther Pons Mellado and staffed by archaeologists, epigraphists and papyrologists, focuses on various sectors of the necropolis, including No. 22, where experts are reconstructing the elaborate social and religious life of residents during the transition from the Ptolemaic to the Roman era.
Researchers exploring the multichambered burial site have exhumed a remarkable trove of treasures, among them mummies adorned with golden tongues — gold foil placed over the mouth — and at least one with copper, ritualistic additions that may have ensured that the dead could confidently speak their case to Osiris, the god of death and resurrection, before judgment.
A separate, distinct area of the necropolis — Sector 42 — has yielded large jars containing cremated remains. One vessel held the bones of an adult, an infant and a feline, along with fabric fragments. While these individuals most likely date to a slightly different period from the “Iliad” mummy, the immense complexity of these rites implies a wealthy, status-conscious class, providing fresh insight into the spiritual anxieties of the Roman-era community.
A cultural passport
Recovered in December from Tomb 65, the fragmentary papyrus packet contains a passage from the 2,800-year-old “Iliad” that functions as a detailed inventory of the Achaean army’s naval strength and regional origins, describing the forces arrayed against Troy to retrieve Helen. The text mentions specific commanders, such as Guneus, who arrived with “two and twenty ships from Cyphus,” and Tlepolemus, a “son of Hercules” who brought nine ships from Rhodes.
Dr. Mascia’s findings reveal a deliberate, intimate act: a document prepared in a mummification workshop and placed directly upon the body of the deceased. “These sealed papyrus packets may have been regarded as part of an alternative funerary procedure,” she said, adding that further studies were essential to prove this hypothesis.
This spiritual first-aid follows a long tradition. Dr. Scalf noted that “The Greco-Egyptian Formularies” even suggests the “Iliad” doubled as a literal medical kit. For a bed-bound patient shivering with malaria, the prescription was simple: Brace your head against a papyrus scroll of Book 4 to break the fever.
For residents navigating the complex, vibrant crossroads of Roman Egypt, Greek literary papyri may have functioned as a crucial cultural passport, said Anna Dolganov, a historian at the Austrian Archaeological Institute. In Egypt, being Hellenic connoted an exclusive social status and financial privilege — and had to be meticulously documented through genealogies going back across several centuries.
Buried with the dead, the “Iliad” perhaps served as a cheat code for a more comfortable afterlife. Dr. Dolganov wonders if carrying the epic poem was a deliberate strategy to secure entry into the Greek underworld, effectively sidestepping the torturous trials of Egyptian mythology. For these individuals, a Hellenic identity wasn’t just for this world — it was an eternal upgrade, offering a smoother path and higher status in the great beyond.
Science
Ten times worse than benzene — California updates its science on two chemicals in everyday air
Two toxic contaminants present in California’s ambient air appear to be much stronger carcinogens than previously known, state environmental health officials announced Thursday.
The draft finding from the state’s Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment finds that acrolein and ethylene oxide may pose an estimated cancer risk more than 10 times higher than benzene, a serious carcinogen linked to leukemia and other cancers.
It is the first step in a review process before final risk values are adopted, and it arrives at a time federal air-quality regulations are being reined in.
“If the early air monitoring results bear out, and if the draft cancer values developed are close to what eventually becomes final, then each air contaminant poses an unacceptable cancer risk,” said Kris Thayer, OEHHA’s director.
The update reflects the state’s evolving understanding of its most dangerous pollutants, which has shifted over the decades from visible pollutants, such as smog, to more invisible ones that cause cancer, heart disease and other health harms.
It comes only two months after the Trump administration’s Environmental Protection Agency moved to roll back standards on ethylene oxide, or EtO, in an effort to save millions of dollars in compliance costs for facilities that use the chemical for medical sterilization. The administration said it acted to “safeguard the supply of essential medical equipment,” but experts said the move will also expose more people to health risks.
It also follows a new national report from the American Lung Assn. that found 82% of Californians live in counties with unhealthful air, nearly double the national average.
“This is an important step to better understanding the harms of pollutants impacting Californians’ health,” said Will Barrett, assistant vice president for nationwide clean air policy at the American Lung Assn., who reviewed the state’s findings for The Times. “Following the latest available health science to determine risk is crucial to protecting health.”
Ethylene oxide is a colorless gas often used in the sterilization of medical devices, particularly those that can’t be cleaned using steam or radiation.
Acrolein can be formed when materials burn, such as cigarettes, e-cigarettes and vapes, wood, plastics and gasoline for cars, trucks, ships and aircraft. It can also be released by cooking fats and oils at high temperatures, and has been found in water produced by oil and gas operations and is an ingredient in some pesticides used in irrigation canals.
People can take steps to protect themselves from acrolein exposure in everyday life by avoiding smoking tobacco or using e-cigarettes and vaping products, avoiding smoke from fires or exhaust from diesel and gasoline vehicles and equipment — much of which can also help reduce exposure to ethylene oxide, officials said. When cooking with oils or fats, people should avoid very high temperatures and use a range hood fan when possible.
While both chemicals have been present in the state’s air for years, the new assessments from OEHHA are based on the latest science on health risks, officials said. Both acrolein and ethylene oxide were found to pose an estimated cancer risk exceeding 800 in 1 million — on par with the cancer risk that diesel exhaust was estimated to pose when it first emerged as a major public health concern in the 1990s, the agency said.
In response to the findings, Gov. Gavin Newsom’s May budget revision, released Thursday, includes $2.5 million in funding for the California Air Resources Board and OEHHA in support of research to help reduce people’s exposure to acrolein and ethylene oxide. The funding will help the state identify and track major sources of the chemicals and turn the findings into public health policy outcomes, officials said.
OEHHA’s assessment provides the first cancer risk value for acrolein since it was classified as probably cancer-causing to humans by the International Agency for Research on Cancer in 2020. Ethylene oxide was already identified as a carcinogen by the state, but the new assessment updates its risk levels based on the new research. The risk calculations are based on air monitoring data, which vary across the state depending on location, nearby sources and other factors.
Officials said the findings underscore the state’s efforts to strengthen environmental protection measures for residents at a moment when federal officials seek to loosen them.
“Especially in light of some of the national rollbacks we’re seeing on protections for public health, it really underscores how important the work that we’re doing here in California is,” said Courtney Smith, principal deputy executive officer with the Air Resources Board. “Not only for protecting the health of Californians, but also to ensure that there is rigorous, solid science available to other entities as well who may want to pursue additional protections.”
Short-term exposure to EtO by inhalation can cause headaches, dizziness, nausea, fatigue respiratory irritation and other adverse health effects, according to the federal Agency for Toxic Substances and Disease Registry. Longer-term exposure increases the risk of cancers of the white blood cells, such as non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma, as well as breast cancer.
Inhaling acrolein can cause nose and throat irritation and a decreased breathing rate. Chronic exposure, such as through cigarette smoke, has been linked to the development of asthma, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and respiratory cancers.
The findings also come as California continues to receive poor grades on air quality. The American Lung Assn. annual State of the Air report found that the five U.S. counties with the worst smog pollution are all in California. Bakersfield was the metropolitan area with the worst level of year-round particle pollution for the seventh year in a row, while Los Angeles was the city with the worst ozone pollution, as it has been for 26 of the last 27 years.
“Californians face the most significant smog and soot challenges in the nation, but our air agencies have followed the science to build policies and programs to make real headway,” Barrett said. The state’s latest assessment “speaks to the need for ongoing local efforts while the federal government ignores the science and opens the door for more pollution. California must continue to invest in things like cleaning up truck fleets, broader public education and the underlying science to guide policies to protect health.”
Thursday’s announcement kicks off a 45-day public comment period, after which the draft assessments may be revised before undergoing additional public comment, peer review by the state’s Scientific Review Panel on Toxic Air Contaminants, and eventual adoption.
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