Global Warming Updates

Climate change threatens Central Rockies trout

Mon, 28 Nov 2011 19:50:57 +0000

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As I wade into the east fork of Montana’s Bitterroot River with my fly rod on an August afternoon, I count myself lucky to feel a swift current. The water is at a normal level for late summer, and that is becoming a rare treat in the Central Rocky Mountains, a region that extends from the Canadian border through Wyoming. Since 1951, average late-summer stream flows have been dropping. And while that’s troubling news for trout fishermen, it could be disastrous news for native trout.

With several other scientists, I began studying Central Rockies stream flow four years ago after several hot, dry summers reduced flows to the point of endangering aquatic species and forced the closure of popular blue-ribbon rivers. Declining flows raised concerns about the already threatened bull trout, and elevated water temperatures in Montana’s Big Hole River posed an immediate threat to the last arctic grayling population in the Lower 48.

Was this just a temporary anomaly, or was there a long-term trend at work? Was this caused by climate change? The fly-fisherman in me worried about my beloved trout. The scientist in me thought back to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change prediction that, as a result of global warming, the Central Rockies will start to experience lower river levels in summer much more often.

Like many others, I wanted answers, so I joined colleagues at the University of Montana to study long-term stream flow trends in more than 150 Central Rockies streams using U.S. Geological Survey records from 1951 to 2008. What we found was alarming: Our analyses indicate that 89 percent of non-regulated watersheds – undammed rivers – are experiencing significant declines in stream discharge.

In simpler terms, late-summer stream flow has been declining since 1951, often causing visibly lower August stream flows in many rivers across the West. Although limited historical data make it difficult to determine the direct cause of this trend, various pieces of the puzzle point toward rising average temperatures across the globe – climate change – as the culprit. In the Central Rockies, long-term warming has caused a multitude of changes to the hydrologic cycle. Researchers have documented decreases in mountain snowpack, more rain falling during winter, earlier spring runoff in rivers, and increased evaporation during hotter summers.

To understand the potential causes of these trends, we selected a number of USGS gauging stations at pristine sites – undammed streams with no water diversion – and then examined the relationship between stream flow and a number of other variables (like average air temperatures). Not only did we find that air temperatures were substantially warmer now than they used to be, we also found a strong relationship between these warmer air temperatures and declining stream flows at most of the pristine sites.

Regardless of the cause, lower stream flows could have severe consequences for trout. Less water in streams during summer means less habitat and potentially warmer water temperatures.

As I work upstream, carefully casting my fly behind each boulder, questions fill my head. What does the future hold for native trout in the Central Rockies? Will they adapt? Will they disappear? What can we do? With scientists projecting continued warming in the region, the future looks ominous for native trout.

There are many aspects of this region’s future that are uncertain, but one thing has become clear: Species that depend on cool water, such as trout, will be under a lot more stress in the years to come.

For a more details on the research, see the September online issue of the Journal of Climatic Change. DOI: 10.1007/s10584-011-0235-1.

Win for the climate - Keystone XL pipeline delayed

Thu, 10 Nov 2011 22:32:43 +0000

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The Wilderness Society welcomes the Administration’s decision to slow down the Keystone XL pipeline juggernaut long enough to address the looming catastrophe of climate change.

Last week, the Department of Energy announced that in 2010 we saw the largest ever recorded year-to-year jump in the emissions of harmful carbon pollution. This rate is above the worst case projections made by the Nobel-prize winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change when it issued its last large report on global warming in 2007. At the time it forecast global temperatures rising between 4 and 11 degrees Fahrenheit by the end of the century with the best estimate at 7.5 degrees.

The destruction of carbon storing forests and the increase in greenhouse gas emissions from the production and ultimate use of the oil from the Canadian tar sands would impose an environmental insult on our planet from which our children may never recover.

The decision by the Obama administartion to delay the Keystone XL pipeline keeps the forests standing and the climate safe for another day.

Climate Change sets its sights on Thanksgiving

Wed, 09 Nov 2011 19:20:18 +0000

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It’s pretty clear that climate change will have a host of victims, from coastal communities and cities, to drought-stricken plains states.

Already it is affecting the breakfast table, harming production of maple syrup and coffee.

Now it looks like climate change is set to undermine one of the great American institutions: Thanksgiving.

If you’re like me, Thanksgiving isn’t Thanksgiving without a big slice of homemade pecan pie to fully contribute to a post-dinner food coma in front of a football game. But the extreme temperatures in Texas, the second largest pecan-producing state, are threatening this year’s crop, and could have devastating implications for years to come on this key ingredient to pecan pie. This is particularly alarming to southern family traditions, as noted by South Carolina native Louise Tucker: “Thanksgiving without pecan pie would be like Christmas without Santa!”

This year’s historic drought in the Lone Star state has reduced the annual pecan crop by approximately 40%. And unfortunately, it is likely that the hot, dry weather in Texas will be closer to the norm, rather than the exception, for years to come.

That’s why it is increasingly vital to stop denying the reality of climate change, and start supporting real solutions to capping the unchecked carbon pollution that is warming our world and threatening our jobs, our livelihoods, and our holidays.

Even the climate skeptics are coming around to what many of us have known for a long time – that climate change is real, and it is happening. Now it is time to step up and take action to stop it.

Our energy policy is plainly anti-pecan pie, providing massive government subsidies for carbon polluters that spew greenhouse gases into the air and expect the rest of society to pay for the consequences. If you’re in the pro-pecan pie camp, it is time to fight back. It is time for a pro-pecan clean energy policy which rejects the special interest pleadings of the polluters, embraces wind and solar development and welcomes the life-affirming work of the Environmental Protection Agency’s that keeps our air clean and free of carbon pollution.

America’s Forests Feeling the Heat from Beetles and Wildfires

Fri, 21 Oct 2011 18:49:50 +0000

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Across America’s western regions, our vast green forests are changing colors, but not the traditional fall colors we celebrate this time of year. Millions of acres of pine forests in the central and northern Rockies are turning red, victimized by beetles that used to die off during cold winter months.

Similarly, vast expanses of forests and rangelands in the Southwest and parts of Texas are blackened in alarming amounts by an increasing number of wildfires.

Climate scientists, ecologists, forest service officials and outdoor enthusiasts alike are troubled by images of these red and black mountain forests. On the one hand, they know that fire and beetles have always been part of the ecology of a healthy forest. On the other, they are troubled by the frequency and intensity of beetle-kill and fires in the last decade, and the predictions by scientists that these extremes can be expected to worsen in the coming decades. As described so well in a recent article in the New York Times (“With Deaths of Forests, a Loss of Key Climate Protectors”), we can now see the signs of global warming right before our very eyes, as rising average temperatures and deepening drought reduce the margin of adaptability of natural systems to cope with natural stresses driven to unnatural extremes.

As our forests degrade, we are losing a vital defense against climate change. Trees absorb about a quarter of the world’s carbon dioxide emissions – equal to nearly all the carbon dioxide spewing from the world’s cars and trucks. When millions of acres of trees die, they not only lose much of their ability to absorb emissions, they can become net carbon sources – emitting more than they absorb. Keeping forests healthy is a fundamental defense against the consequences of man-made climate change.

But there are limits to what we can accomplish with wiser management. The root cause of the new hyper-stresses on our forests is not in the forests themselves, but in an energy policy that literally subsidizes the sources of massive destruction. Current policy subsidizes the consumption of electricity from coal plants, gasoline from oil refineries, and natural gas production from pipelines. The carbon from these polluting sources is dumped into the atmosphere without cost to the polluter, but at great cost to the rest of us and to the forests which protect us. The beetles take the rap while the polluters take the money and run.

Understanding the real causes does not mean ignoring the effects. Even if all greenhouse gas emissions ceased immediately, the gases already in the atmosphere would continue threatening our environment. We are learning more every day about what works to keep forests resilient, and work is begging to be done to restore stream buffers, remove invasive species, reforest after intense fire, and decommission unused logging roads so they don’t become highways for erosion.

But there are limits to what can be done in the face of change at the scale and pace of global warming. We don’t have the resources to match the gathering storm, and often the public demand to “do something” sometimes leads policymakers and land managers to overreact by stripping the land of unsightly beetle damage or aggressively suppressing fire in the back country– actions which interfere with nature’s extraordinary ability to heal itself.

Worse still is the reluctance to speak plainly about the only long-term solution. The consensus of scientists is that a true catastrophe looms. It can be blocked, at least partially, if we stop dumping carbon pollution into the air and using clean renewable sources of energy instead. If we do not, Mother Nature will send us ever stronger, unmistakable, undeniable signals of her own. They will come in the form of more severe fires in Rick Perry’s Texas, more severe drought in Herman Cain’s Georgia, more severe flooding in Mitt Romney’s New England, and more severe heat waves in Barack Obama’s Chicago.

Our green landscapes have shown a remarkable ability to regenerate again and again, but their capacity to survive repeated cycles from green to red, to black, and back to green is not infinite. The future survival of these landscapes is now critically dependent on our willingness to speak out and demand policies that reduce the carbon pollution that is forcing unnatural cycles of burn and blight.

Are you interested in The Wilderness Society’s work on climate policy? Check out these links:

Natural resources climate adaptation and sequestration
Public Health and climate
Energy Efficiency - Saving Energy Saves Land
The Wilderness Society's Comment letter on forests and the Adaptive Management Plan for the California cap-and-trade regulation.