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Climatic anomalies affect agricultural production, so the identification of climate change at the local level is a pressing task. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has generated indices that allow the identification of extreme climate events. Recent studies of weather and climate variation have increasingly used the climate extreme indices defined by the IPCC. This article dwells upon the ICC (climate change indicators) software written in the Java language which is a convenient tool for storing and processing large sets of daily weather data. The software allows the calculation of 27 climate change indices and four indices for growing vines. Built-in analytical tools help identify trends and climate anomalies on different time intervals. The application is additionally supplied with important functionality for statistical data processing and visualization. Tools that help analyzing climate change can foster wiser strategic decision-making in the management of agriculture and ecosystems.

The influence of different dosages and fractions of bio-char on agrophysical properties and aggregate structure of soddy-podzolic soils was studied in 100-day model experiment. Two kinds of soddy-podzolic soils - sand and clay loam - contrasting in texture were investigated. In the experiment greenwood bio-char prepared by industrial methods was used. Bio-char fractions of 3-5 mm and ≤ 2 mm at the dosages of 2 % and 5 % by weight of the soil were used. In several variants of the experiment the bulk density, total water capacity, thermal capacity of dry soil and aggregate size distribution (dry- and wet-sieving) were measured. Soil without the addition of bio-char served as a control. For statistical data processing one-way ANOVA with post-hoc analysis by Tukey’s HSD test was applied. As a result, changes in all investigated agrophysical properties of soils were revealed. It was shown that bulk density of both soils was reduced in the variants at 5 % dosage of bio-char regardless of fraction. Significant changes of total water capacity are observed in sandy soil irrespective of the dosage of bio-char. Significant change of total water capacity of clay loam soil was recorded only for the variants with a 5 % dosage of bio-char. The greatest effect on the indicators of thermal capacity in both soils was provided at 5 % dosage of coarse bio-char. The application of bio-char improves the aggregate state and the structure index of clay loam soil as well as increases the coherence of sandy soil, fundamentally not changing the indicators of water resistance of both soils. A significant effect gain in using bio-char at a higher dosage was noted almost for all indicators.

In a model experiment, the effect of waste from deep processing of algae on the properties of mineral soil was investigated. In the experiment, sod-podzolic soil of different granulometric composition was used: sandy loam, clay and medium loam. The experiments were laid in vessels, in different versions. As a control, the studied soil was used without the introduction of algae (sandy loam, clay, loam). We used 500 g of mineral soil per 1 vessel and waste from deep processing of fucus vesiculata at a dose of 2% and 0.5% of the soil weight. As a result of the research, new data were obtained on the dynamics of organic carbon content in mineral soils (sod-podzolic clay, sod-podzolic loam, sod-podzolic sandy loam) when brown seaweed was introduced as a meliorant. The use of Fucus vesiculosus L. as a meliorant (0.5-2%) contributes to a significant increase in carbon, phosphorus, and exchangeable calcium in the soil, resulting in a decrease in soil acidity. Keywords: ALGAE, SOD-PODZOLIC SOILS, SANDY LOAM SOIL, CLAY SOIL, MEDIUM LOAM

The authors discuss the experience of the educational adult center in the context of the idea - "education throughout the life". In the frame of the last three years the Centre organized the monitoring and analytical work to create a system of education and finding ways to improve the efficiency of working with people of "the third age". The article presents the facts and analytical conclusions on the results of the monitoring.