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The Nisqually River Delta represents the largest wetland restoration in the Pacific Northwest. The restoration resulted in a 50% increase in potential salt marsh habitat. The Delta supports threatened salmon fisheries, large populations of migratory birds, and provides unique opportunities for recreation. The Delta also provides multiple ecosystem services, which are the benefits that wildlife or ecosystems provide to people. Development and changing climate patterns threaten to alter the Delta and the ecosystem services it provides. This study aims to quantify the value of existing and potential future ecosystem services from the Delta and provide insight into the vulnerability of the mosaic of habitats that support...
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Surface-water availability has been identified as one of the biggest issues facing society in the 21st century. Where and when water is on the landscape can have profound impacts on the economy, wildlife behavior, recreational use, industrial practices, energy development, and many other aspects of life, society, and the environment. Projections indicate that surface-water availability will be generally reduced in the future because of multiple factors including climate change, increased drought frequency and severity, and altered water and land use. Thus, it is important resource managers understand which areas are most vulnerable to reduced water availability impacts, and to what extent current conditions may...
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In the Pacific Northwest, land and resource managers strive to make decisions that benefit both natural and human communities, balancing ecological and economic demands including wildlife habitat, forest products, forage for grazing, clean water, and wildfire control. Climate change adds a layer of complexity to the planning process because of its uncertain effects on the environment. In order to make sound decisions, managers need information about how climate change will affect wildlife habitat, both on its own and in conjunction with management actions. The goal of this project was to explore how future climate may interact with management alternatives to shape wildlife habitat across large landscapes. Scientists...
The Northwest Regional Gap Analysis Project (NWGAP) is an update of the Gap Analysis Program's mapping and assessment of biodiversity for the five-state region encompassing Washington, Idaho, Oregon, Montana, and Wyoming. It is a multi-institutional cooperative effort coordinated by the U.S. Geological Survey Gap Analysis Program. The primary objective of the update is to use a coordinated mapping approach to create detailed, seamless GIS maps of land cover, all native terrestrial vertebrate species, land stewardship, and management status, and to analyze this information to identify those biotic elements that are underrepresented on lands managed for their long term conservation, in other words, "gaps". This...
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For thousands of years, Pacific lamprey and Pacific eulachon have been important traditional foods for Native American tribes of the Columbia River Basin and coastal areas of Oregon and Washington. These fish have large ranges – spending part of their lives in the ocean and part in freshwater streams – and they require specific environmental conditions to survive, migrate, and reproduce. For these reasons, Pacific lamprey and Pacific eulachon are likely threatened by a variety of climate change impacts to both their ocean and freshwater habitats. However, to date, little research has explored these impacts, despite the importance of these species to tribal communities. This project will evaluate the effects of...
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The overarching project goal was to develop overlapping conceptual models of environmental and community health indicators in reference to climate forecasts. The sensitivity of species and habitats to climate was cross-walked with recently developed Coast Salish community health indicators (e.g., ceremonial use, knowledge exchange, and physiological well-being) in order to demonstrate how Indigenous Knowledge can be used in conjunction with established landscape-level conservation indicators (e.g., shellfish and water-quality) and employed to identify resource management priorities. Project products included: (1) maps and models that highlight potential impacts in regard to Swinomish first foods and cultural sites;...
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Snow conditions are changing dramatically in the mountains of the interior Pacific Northwest, including eastern Washington, northern Idaho, and western Montana. These changes can both benefit and hinder a variety of wildlife species. The timing and extent of seasonal snowpacks, in addition to snow depth, density, and hardness, can impact the ability of wildlife to access forage, their ability to move across the landscape, and their vulnerability to predators, to name a few. In order to respond effectively to changes in snow conditions, wildlife managers need tools to identify areas and promote conditions that maintain late spring and early summer snowpack for some sensitive species. Managers also require an index...
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Natural resource managers are confronted with the pressing challenge to develop conservation plans that address complex ecological and societal needs against the backdrop of a rapidly changing climate. Climate change vulnerability assessments (CCVAs) provide valuable information that helps guide management and conservation actions in this regard. An essential component to CCVAs is understanding adaptive capacity, or the ability of a species to cope with or adjust to climate change. However, adaptive capacity is the least understood and evaluated component of CCVAs. This is largely due to a fundamental need for guidance on how to assess adaptive capacity and incorporate this information into conservation planning...
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Invasive species have increasingly severe consequences for ecosystems and human communities alike. The ecological impacts of invasive species are often irreversible, and include the loss of native species and the spread of disease. Implications for human communities include damaged water transportation systems, reduced crop yields, reduced forage quality for livestock, and widespread tree death - which can lead to increases in wildfire and loss of biodiversity. Changing climate conditions may facilitate the spread of invasive species, making this a key management and conservation concern across the United States. This project will synthesize what we know about how climate change impacts the spread of invasive...
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Climate change, drought, habitat alterations, and increasing water demands are leaving less water available for streams of the Pacific Northwest and for fish like salmon. As water levels drop, some small streams become fragmented, transforming from a ribbon of continuous habitat into a series of isolated pools. Fragmented streams may pose a serious threat to salmon. For example, juveniles that become stranded in small pools are at increased risk to overheat, starve, or be consumed by predators. Healthy salmon populations can cope with fragmentation and recover from a bad drought-year. However, many salmon populations are endangered and face long-term drought. Land and resource managers are increasingly finding...
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Climate change impacts on water resources in the Pacific Northwest are predicted to have transformational effects on agriculture. Loss of winter snow pack, reduced summer stream flows, and increased summer temperatures are all phenomena that have already been observed, and are expected to worsen over this century. Research is ongoing in the Northwest to understand agriculture practices that might allow farmers to prepare for these climate change impacts. One potential technique is the use of biochars (charcoal made from decomposition of organic matter at high temperatures in the absence of oxygen), which can be used as a soil amendment that can increase soil moisture retention, improve agricultural yields, and hold...
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As temperature and precipitation patterns change, different species in different areas will be affected in different ways. Some places may serve as refuges for wildlife—places where animals can remain or to which they can easily move to escape the worst impacts of climate change. This project will establish a Refugia Research Coalition to leverage recently funded Northwest CASC research projects on the topic of ecological refugia. The goal of this collaborative effort will be to synthesize our understanding of ecological refugia in the Pacific Northwest and how best to use refugia-related research products as tools for adaptive management planning in the region. Ecological refugia will be an important means of protecting...
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Big sagebrush plant communities are important and widespread in western North America and are crucial for meeting long-term conservation goals for greater sage-grouse and other wildlife of conservation concern. Yet wildfire is increasing in the West, turning biodiverse, shrub-based ecosystems dominated by sagebrush into grasslands containing invasive species such as cheatgrass and less overall plant and animal diversity. These transformations negatively impact people and ecosystems by reducing habitat quality for wildlife and the aesthetic value of the landscape. Understanding how sagebrush communities are already responding and will continue to respond to changes in wildfire, invasive species, and climate is...
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Wildfires are one of the greatest threats to human infrastructure and the ecosystem services humans value in the western US, but are also necessary in fire-adapted ecosystems. Wildfire activity is widely projected to increase in response to climate change in the Northwest, but we currently lack a comprehensive understanding of what this increase will look like or what its impacts will be on a variety of ecological and hydrologic systems. This project addressed one critical part of those impacts: the islands of unburned vegetation within wildfires. Unburned islands occur naturally as wildfires burn across landscapes, and are important habitat refuges for species -- places where plants and animals survive the fire...
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The Schitsu'umsh people (Coeur d’Alene Tribe of Idaho) have an intimate relationship with their landscape and a rich knowledge of how to interact with the environment in a way that benefits human, plant, and animal communities alike. Such knowledge and practices can provide valuable insight as to how tribal and non-tribal resource managers, communities, and governments can best respond to the effects of a changing climate. This project was a pilot effort to collect and translate indigenous knowledge and practices into shareable formats. Researchers developed documents, images, lesson plans, and innovative, interactive 3-D virtual reality simulations that effectively convey Schitsu’umsh knowledge and practices and...
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The headwaters of the Columbia River Basin in the Northern Rocky Mountains region is widely recognized as a stronghold for native fish, containing some of the last remaining connected cold-water habitats for species such as the threatened bull trout and native westslope cutthroat trout. However, as temperatures rise, non-native invasive fish species could be poised to prosper in the region as conditions start to favor warm-water species over those that require cooler waters to thrive. The spread of invasive fish species has the potential to devastate native fish populations, stream habitats, and the local cultures and economies that depend on healthy aquatic ecosystems – including the region’s multi-billion dollar...
map background search result map search result map Climate, Land Management and Future Wildlife Habitat in the Pacific Northwest Understanding the Interactions Between Human Health, Environment, and Climate in Salish Sea Communities Assessing Climate Change Impacts on Pacific Lamprey and Pacific Eulachon Disappearing Refugia: Identifying Trends and Resilience in Unburned Islands under Climate Change Collecting and Applying Schitsu’umsh Indigenous Knowledge and Practices to Climate Change Decision Making Toughnut Mine Intermediate Level Stopes and Sublevel Above First Level Workings along Toughnut Include No. 1 Evaluating the Effectiveness of Assisted Migration and Fish Rescue Programs Assessing the Use of Biochar for Drought Resilience and Crop Productivity Climate Change Impacts on Invasive Species in the Northwest: A Synthesis and Path Forward Big Sagebrush Response to Wildfire and Invasive Grasses in the 21st Century Predicting Climate-Induced Expansions of Invasive Fish in the Pacific Northwest: Implications for Climate Adaptation of Native Salmon and Trout Establishing a Refugia Research Coalition (RRC) for Collaborative Refugia-Related Research and Management in the Pacific Northwest Estimating the Spatial and Temporal Extent of Snowpack Properties in Complex Terrain: Leveraging Novel Data to Adapt Wildlife and Habitat Management Practices to Climate Change Evaluating Species’ Adaptive Capacity in a Changing Climate: Applications to Natural-Resource Management in the Northwestern U.S. Assessing the Benefits and Vulnerability of Current and Future Potential Ecosystem Services of the Nisqually River Delta and other Puget Sound Estuaries Development of a Surface Water Index of Permanence (SWIPe) Database to Assess Surface Water Availability for Ecohydrological Refugia Understanding the Interactions Between Human Health, Environment, and Climate in Salish Sea Communities Evaluating the Effectiveness of Assisted Migration and Fish Rescue Programs Assessing the Benefits and Vulnerability of Current and Future Potential Ecosystem Services of the Nisqually River Delta and other Puget Sound Estuaries Collecting and Applying Schitsu’umsh Indigenous Knowledge and Practices to Climate Change Decision Making Climate, Land Management and Future Wildlife Habitat in the Pacific Northwest Establishing a Refugia Research Coalition (RRC) for Collaborative Refugia-Related Research and Management in the Pacific Northwest Disappearing Refugia: Identifying Trends and Resilience in Unburned Islands under Climate Change Estimating the Spatial and Temporal Extent of Snowpack Properties in Complex Terrain: Leveraging Novel Data to Adapt Wildlife and Habitat Management Practices to Climate Change Evaluating Species’ Adaptive Capacity in a Changing Climate: Applications to Natural-Resource Management in the Northwestern U.S. Climate Change Impacts on Invasive Species in the Northwest: A Synthesis and Path Forward Assessing the Use of Biochar for Drought Resilience and Crop Productivity Development of a Surface Water Index of Permanence (SWIPe) Database to Assess Surface Water Availability for Ecohydrological Refugia Assessing Climate Change Impacts on Pacific Lamprey and Pacific Eulachon Big Sagebrush Response to Wildfire and Invasive Grasses in the 21st Century Predicting Climate-Induced Expansions of Invasive Fish in the Pacific Northwest: Implications for Climate Adaptation of Native Salmon and Trout