New Zealdand: unseasonal frost wreaks havoc

An unseasonal frost has wreaked havoc in plant nurseries and vineyards across the district.
Helen and Bill Hargreaves at Terrace Gardens nursery saw the signs and thought they were prepared for the worst.
They clambered out of bed well before sunrise yesterday morning hoping to get the water on to their 30,000-odd Christmas lilies in time to save them from frost bite.
“We don’t know whether it was worth it or not at this point. We won’t know the real impact for another few days but we’ve certainly lost a lot of lilies,” she said.
But the damage didn’t end with the outdoor stock; when the couple opened the shade house they were greeted by hundreds of blackened and wilting plants. The cold snap not only took out cucumbers, zucchinis, tomatoes and all the usual frost tender plants; even marigolds and other frost hardy plants were nipped.
“We expected it to get cold and we had covered the frost tender plants in the shade house, but even under two layers it still got them,” Mrs Hargreaves said.

Climate theory 'like Y2K scam' - The Canberra Times

Dubbed the ''inconvenient professor'' by mining industry chiefs, Professor Plimer said large amounts of scientific evidence already questioned the existence of human-generated climate change.

He said scientific research in Australia was more likely to go ahead if it shadowed Government policy.

''Scientists play politics the same as everyone else,'' he said in his speech, titled ''Human-induced Climate Change a Load of Hot Air''.

''I think we've got people playing games in politics,'' he said.

''If you want the research funding and if you want the money, then ... follow the money, follow the pocket of paradise, but it could actually send us broke.''

Reported ''doomsday'' scenarios attributed to human-induced climate change were overstated or wrong, he said. Reports that Tuvalu would be inundated as sea levels rose had been debunked by scientists who had known since 1830 that the island nation was sinking, he said.

''The problem with Tuvalu is that it sits on a crack of the Pacific Ocean where the ocean floor is sinking: no wonder it is inundated.''.