How climate change may be threatening national parks—…parks a warning system…

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http://features.csmonitor.com/environment/2009/04/09/how-climate-change-may-be-threatening-national-parks/

How climate change may be threatening national parks

Thriving forest pests and melting glaciers may make parks a warning system for climate change effects.

By Daniel B. Wood | Staff writer/ April 9, 2009 edition

Twentynine Palms, Calif.

With a scruffy, desert floor extending as far as the eye can see in all directions – dotted with the Mojave Desert’s signature spiky, gnarled Joshua trees – veteran park ranger Joe Zarki kneels down in the dust.

Pointing to an invasive, red brome grass, which has proliferated here in the past few years, he explains why the rise in temperatures that have helped it thrive could signal the end of Joshua trees within a century. “These exotic grasses dry out, which means that the fires we have are getting larger in size, spread more rapidly, and are harder to put out,” Mr. Zarki says.

Unlike lodgepole pines and other conifers that were replenished in Yellowstone National Park after devastating fires in 1988 in Wyoming, the moisture-sensitive Joshua tree grows in a specific microclimate and cannot easily reproduce itself in the wake of widespread destruction. A recent study showed that Joshua trees are not replenishing after fires that now routinely claim thousands of acres. In the 1970s, a typical fire scorched less than an acre.

The disappearance of the Joshua tree may be just one way in which climate change is affecting our national parks. According to researchers, climate change is contributing to:

• The possible loss of all the glaciers in the Glacier National Park within 20 years.


• Dying coral reefs in Biscayne and Virgin Island National Parks due to increased heat and disease.


• Insect pests thriving and destroying forests ranging from the Great Smoky Mountains to Yellowstone.


• Declining water levels at Lake Mead because of extended droughts.

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