> herds are struggling through both a “white” dzud, in which very deep snow hinders their access to grass, and an “iron” dzud, in which a brief thaw is followed by a rapid, hard freeze, locking pastures in ice.
That's the worst... where I live, the temperature tends to get just above zero after snowstorms, just enough to make the snow wet and more compact, and then when it freezes over again it's basically a piece of ice which takes ages to melt later. I suppose that with the weather previously being more stable, it wouldn't do that often in Mongolia? But now that it both snows more and the temperature varies more widely, this is a recipe for disaster. Hope they find ways to adapt with the help of modern tools, but of course it's easier said than done, specially when they probably don't have any money to invest in things that could help and even if they could, the infrastructure just doesn't exist.
That's the worst... where I live, the temperature tends to get just above zero after snowstorms, just enough to make the snow wet and more compact, and then when it freezes over again it's basically a piece of ice which takes ages to melt later. I suppose that with the weather previously being more stable, it wouldn't do that often in Mongolia? But now that it both snows more and the temperature varies more widely, this is a recipe for disaster. Hope they find ways to adapt with the help of modern tools, but of course it's easier said than done, specially when they probably don't have any money to invest in things that could help and even if they could, the infrastructure just doesn't exist.