1. The Little Ice Age By Rachel Nicole Tunnell

2. The Little Ice Age (LIA) was a period of cooling occurring after a warmer North Atlantic era known as the Medieval Warm Period The "Little Ice Age" can only be considered as a modest cooling of the Northern Hemisphere during this period of less than 1°C relative to late 20th century levels The colder weather impacted agriculture, health, economics, social strife, emigration, and even art and literature During the Warm Period a Boom in population happened with the result of leaving a large population starving during the 1st year of the “Little Ice Age” and by the 6th year 1.5 million people had died from starvation or famine related diseases in England. By the end of the “Little Ice Age” 25 million people perished from Famine, Famine related diseases or the Bubonic plague (which was also widespread due to the colder temperatures) also known as the black death The Film “The Little Ice Age”

3. Perhaps hardest hit were the Norse settlements in Iceland and Greenland. The population of famine-ridden Iceland dwindled during the Little Ice Age to half its previous numbers Despite all the hardships, there was a lighter side to the Little Ice Age. In London, freezing of the Thames River were celebrated with carnival-like "Frost Fairs" with food, drink and entertainment on the ice These Frost Fairs went from 1607 with the first till 1814 with the last. In New York the Harbor froze over and gave a passage way across from Manhattan to Staten Island. Eskimos were able to Kayak as far as Scotland This was known as the year without a sun Theories on the Little Ice Age… Addition of fresh water caused a problem with the oceanic conveyor belt and cause the water to be less dense as well as the sun not producing enough rays due to solar variation, sulfur deposits found making people think it was caused from volcanic eruptions and having hot gas in the atmosphere, but there are no clear concessions. The Film “The Little Ice Age”

4. Map of Reconstructed Temperatures

5. Any of several dates ranging over 400 years may indicate the beginning of the Little Ice Age: 1250 for when Atlantic pack ice began to grow 1300 for when warm summers stopped being dependable in Northern Europe 1315 for the rains and Great Famine of 1315-1317 1550 for theorized beginning of worldwide glacial expansion 1650 for the first climatic minimum Evidence from mountain glaciers does suggest increased glaciations in a number of widely spread regions outside Europe prior to the 20th century, including Alaska, New Zealand and Patagonia. The team found an increase in cereal pollen from 1200 onwards (reflecting agricultural expansion), followed by a sudden dive around 1347, linked to the agricultural crisis caused by the arrival of the Black Death, most probably a bacterial disease spread by rat fleas Pollen and leaf data support the idea that millions of trees sprang up on abandoned farmland, soaking up carbon dioxide from the atmosphere The conventional terms of "Little Ice Age" and "Medieval Warm Period" appear to have limited utility in describing trends in hemispheric or global mean temperature changes in past centuries "The atmosphere is in equilibrium with the ocean and this tends to dampen or offset small changes in terrestrial carbon uptake," stated by Professor Richard Houghton, a climate expert from Woods Hole Research Center in Massachusetts Facts from Little Ice Age Sources

6. Wikipedia http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_ice_age The Little Ice Age in Europe http://www.sunysuffolk.edu/mandias/lia/little_ice_age.html BBC News http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4755328.stm GES Humans and Global Change http://www.geology.um.maine.edu/ges121/lectures/11-little-ice-age/little-ice-age.html Sources and Websites Used