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Landscape-scale conservation of threatened and endangered species is often challenged by multiple, sometimes conflicting, land uses. In Hawaiʻi, efforts to conserve native forests have come into conflict with objectives to sustain non-native game mammals, such as feral pigs, goats, and deer, for subsistence and sport hunting. Maintaining stable or increasing game populations represents one of the greatest obstacles to the recovery of Hawaii’s 425 threatened and endangered plant species. Many endemic Hawaiian species have declined and become endangered as a result of herbivorous non-native game mammals. Meanwhile, other environmental changes, including the spread of invasive grasses and changing precipitation patterns...
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Hawaiʻi is considered a worldwide biodiversity hotspot, with nearly 90 percent of its native plants found nowhere else in the world. However, about half of these native plants are imperiled by threats including human development, non-native species, and climate change. Through this project, scientists modeled the relative vulnerability of over 1,000 native plant species to the effects of climate change. A panel of experts in Hawaiian plant species assisted with the development of the model and verified its results. From the model, researchers were able to develop a vulnerability score for each plant species and identify categories of species with high, medium, and low vulnerability to climate change. This information...
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Hawaiian shorelines and near-shore waters have long been used for cultural activities, food gathering and fishing, and recreation. As seascapes are physically altered by changing climate, the ways in which people experience these environments will likely change as well. Local perspectives of how seascapes are changing over time can help managers better understand and manage these areas for both natural persistence and human use. For this project, researchers conducted interviews and surveys of surfers and other ocean users to gather observations and perceptions of change over time at Hilo Bay, Hawaiʻi. They combined these results with historical data on public beach use and biophysical data from monitoring buoys...
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The beaches of the Hawaiian Islands attract nearly 9 million visitors each year, who inject around $15.6 billion into the state’s economy and support almost 200,000 jobs. Beyond their economic importance, Hawaiian beaches are also culturally and ecologically valuable. However, climate change driven sea-level rise is causing many beaches to disappear, endangering property, infrastructure, and critical habitats. The goal of this project was to develop a method for forecasting erosion-vulnerable beach areas that could be used in coastal management planning. Researchers focused on the island of Kauaʻi, modeling beach response to rising sea level over the next century and producing maps that provide information about...
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Coral ecosystems of West Maui support a vibrant tourism industry and provide tangible economic benefits to the community. Hawaiian nearshore reefs generate about $800 million in annual revenue, not including the ecosystem services they provide - such as critical habitat for diverse fish species and buffering coasts from storm surges. The Hawaiian economy depends on healthy coral ecosystems, yet reefs are currently facing multiple threats, including changing climate conditions, local land-based pollution, and sediment erosion. Erosion of soils into nearshore coastal zones is a chief concern facing land managers in West Maui. Intermittent rainfall can carry sediment from sources such as dirt roads, agricultural fields,...
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Haleakalā National Park (HNP) and the surrounding landscape spans many different land cover types, some of which are undergoing vegetation changes that can reduce the amount of water that infiltrates into soil. Decreased soil infiltration can lead to the erosion of terrestrial habitats, increases in the amount of sediment entering aquatic habitats, and flooding of downstream areas as runoff increases after storms. Currently, HNP managers are attempting to control runoff and erosion to avoid loss and damage within park boundaries and parks located downstream. Managers in HNP have expressed a need for information on current and future runoff and erosion risk to help prioritize management within the park and other...
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Agriculture and agroforestry (tree cultivation) are important activities for the Marshall Islands and other small islands to ensure food security and human health. The Marshallese have a long tradition of interplanting food-producing trees such as coconuts, breadfruit, and pandanus with bananas and root and vegetable crops. Locally grown food crops support community self-sufficiency, promote good nutrition, and can also serve as windbreaks and stabilize shorelines to lessen storm damage and erosion. However, climate change is posing serious challenges for growers, as they struggle to adapt to climate impacts including saltwater intrusion, changing precipitation and temperature patterns, and the spread of invasive...
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The conditions of coral reefs in the Hawaiian Islands are predicted to decline significantly from climate change over the next 100 years. To better prepare for the impacts of climate change on Hawaiian reefs, the research team uses a system of models to simulate ocean waves and circulation, rainfall and storm run-off, and coral reef community dynamics through the year 2100. These models will identify reef areas that are either vulnerable or resilient to the many stressors that the future may hold for reefs. The team’s hope is that this work can identify areas that might benefit from management actions to minimize local stressors such as land-based pollution. Through a collaborative partnership with state and federal...
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The fast pace of change in coastal zones, the trillions of dollars of investment in human communities in coastal areas, and the myriad of ecosystem services natural coastal environments provide makes managing climate-related risks along coasts a massive challenge for all of the U.S. coastal states and territories. Answering questions about both the costs and the benefits of alternative adaptation strategies in the near term is critical to taxpayers, decision-makers, and to the biodiversity of the planet. There is significant public and private interest in using ecosystem based adaptation approaches to conserve critical significant ecosystems in coastal watersheds, estuaries and intertidal zones and to protect man-made...
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Small Pacific islands are especially vulnerable to climate change. Challenges these coastal communities face include sea level rise, erosion, saltwater intrusion, flooding, droughts, and coral bleaching which in turn affect food and water security, infrastructure, and the health of humans and ecosystems. These small islands also have limited resources; therefore, managing them effectively is important to ensure sustainable communities and healthy environments. To support natural resource management, accurate, detailed, up-to-date geospatial data and products are vital to help monitor these resources, identify potential threats, and reveal potential solutions. Through this project, the University of Guam (UoG)...
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This project was designed to use climate models to produce projections of changes in sea temperatures and ocean chemistry for coastal marine areas in Micronesia as well as reports that describe the outlook of culturally important marine sites in Guam and CNMI. The projections and maps were expected show what the current state of climate science suggests the future holds for marine areas in Micronesia if we continue to use fossil fuels aggressively. These projections of sea conditions will become the foundation of outlook reports for Tumon Bay in Guam, Lao Lao Bay and Saipan Lagoon in Saipan, and northern Tinian Island. The selected areas are among the most important sites for recreation in Guam and CNMI and, as...
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Surrounded by saltwater, Hawaiian communities depend on freshwater streams for consumption, irrigation, traditional Hawaiian practices, and habitat for native fish and other stream life. It is important to be able to predict how Hawaiʻi’s streams will be affected by changing rainfall patterns to enable sustainable management of critical freshwater resources. However, to date, limited data and the uncertain effects of climate change have hindered predictions of future streamflow. Through this project, scientists developed a model that provides a way to estimate future stream low flow (streamflow during a period of prolonged dryness) by categorizing streams based on their physical characteristics. While the model...
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The Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI) spreads over 29 atolls and has a population of over 50,000 people; over 27,000 of those people live on the Majuro Atoll, RMI’s capital. Sea level rise threatens the very existence of RMI as high-end projections of sea level rise by the end of the century exceed the average elevation of these low atoll reef islands. Already, waves wash over Majuro during “king tides” when strong winds blow from the west across the broad lagoon, or when there are high open ocean waves. Flooding waves breach island shores in multiple locations and wash into homes, cemeteries, across roads, and into commercial districts. Over the past decade, there has been a widespread exodus of residents...
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Over the past century, Hawaiʻi has experienced a pronounced decline in precipitation and stream flow and a number of severe droughts. These changes can have wide-reaching implications, affecting the water supply, native vegetation and wildlife, wildfire patterns, and the spread of invasive species. Several climate-related factors are influencing Hawaiˈi’s landscapes and contributing to these changes. These include climate change, climate variability, and drought (referred to collectively as CCVD). Climate variability describes how the climate fluctuates on a yearly basis around average values, while climate change describes patterns of long-term continuous change in the average. While it is understood that CCVD...
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Coral reefs provide numerous ecosystem goods and services critical to human well-being (e.g., protection from storms and floods, food, income, recreation, and cultural practices), but they are threatened by growing human pressures and climate change. Resource managers must make complex decisions when developing adaptation plans that are cost-effective and maintain coral reef functions while still allowing for human use and development. Through this project, scientists developed a decision-support tool for managers to (1) identify the areas that provide the most critical coral reef services (i.e., supply the most value to humans) as well as the areas of reef most threatened, and (2) compare the effects of reef management...
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As elevation increases, both temperature and moisture availability decrease. In many parts of the world, this decrease in temperature is a limiting factor for vegetation—at certain elevations, the temperature becomes too cold for plants to survive. However in the tropics, moisture availability may play a more important role than temperature in determining the altitude at which forests can grow. For example on Haleakalā, a volcano on the Hawaiian Island of Mauʻi, the forest line is not found at the same elevation everywhere, as you would expect if it were controlled by temperature. Rather, the forest line is highest in the wetter eastern-most end and lower on the drier, western end of the volcano. Research also...
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While home to many people and a rich diversity of unique plant and animal life, the U.S. territories of Guam and American Samoa are especially vulnerable to the effects of climate change because of their small size, geographical remoteness, and exposure to threats such as sea-level rise and increased storm surge. Developing predictions of future conditions is often the first step in helping decision makers and communities plan for change. However, to date, available global climate models have been too coarse in resolution to be useful for planning in the context of small, isolated islands. This project produced the first-ever set of high-resolution climate projections for Guam and American Samoa, providing information...
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The Hawaiian Islands are home to some of the world’s most culturally valuable but imperiled forest birds, including brightly colored native honeycreepers, many of which are threatened or endangered. One of the major threats these birds face is avian malaria, which is spread by a species of introduced mosquito and can have death rates exceeding 90 percent. For decades, upper mountain forests have provided refuge for Hawaiian forest birds because mosquitoes (and thus the disease) could not survive the cooler temperatures. However, warming associated with climate change could change this. Scientists used climate data and an epidemiological model to evaluate the future impacts of avian malaria on Hawaiian forest birds...
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As one of the lowest-lying island nation-states in the world, the Republic of the Marshall Islands (RMI) is acutely vulnerable to sea-level rise, flooding, and the associated intrusion of saltwater into crucial freshwater supplies. Persistent drought is further affecting agricultural production in the RMI. Many Marshallese communities are already experiencing these changes and are migrating to larger islands within the RMI and to other countries like the U.S. to, among other things, seek alternative means of making a living and access healthcare. The number of Marshallese residing in the U.S. has rapidly risen over the past two decades, from 7,000 in 2000 to 22,000 in 2010. There is also substantial internal migration,...
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The threat of rising sea levels to island communities is well known. However, sea-level rise projections are often depicted in ways that are not intuitive or directly applicable to community members and resource managers who most need the information. Scientific information about sea-level rise needs to be presented in a way that effectively communicates the very real risk posed to coastal communities, infrastructure, and cultural assets. This project builds upon data developed through previous USGS Pacific Islands CASC work. It goes beyond simple sea-level rise visualizations and leverages the ever-growing computational power of modern smart devices to provide interactive and immersive outreach materials through...
map background search result map search result map 21st Century High-Resolution Climate Projections for Guam and American Samoa Vulnerability of Hawaiian Forest Birds to Climate Change Projections of Future Coral Reef Communities in DOI-Managed Coastal Areas in the Hawaiian Islands Valuing Climate Change Impacts on Coral Reef Ecosystem Services Establishing Climate Change Vulnerability Rankings for Hawaiian Native Plants Modeling the Response of Hawaiʻi’s Streams to Future Rainfall Conditions Developing an Agroforestry Dashboard for the Marshall Islands Forecasting Beach Loss from Sea-Level Rise on the Island of Kauaʻi Changing Hawaiian Seascapes and Their Management Implications Measurement of El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO)-related Climate Conditions and Ecosystem Responses in Hawaiʻi Assessing the Sustainability of Culturally Important Marine Sites in Guam and CNMI Understanding Sediment Transport to Coastal Waters and Coral Reefs in West Maui Influences of Climate Change, Climate Variability, and Drought on Human Communities and Ecosystems in Hawaiʻi Understanding the Effect of Climate Change on the Migration of Marshallese Islanders Building Capacity for Coordination of Strategic Science Research in the US-Affiliated Pacific Islands Simulating and Projecting Future Impacts of Sea Level Rise on Majuro Atoll Identifying the Risk of Runoff and Erosion in Hawaiʻi’s National Parks Managing Non-native Game Mammals to Reduce Future Conflicts with Native Plant Conservation in Hawai‘i Visualizing Sea-level Rise at Puʻuhonua O Hōnaunau National Historic Park with Interactive, Virtual Technology (A Prototype Augmented-Reality Mobile-Phone Application) Evaluating Ecosystem-Based Adaptation Options for Coastal Resilience Visualizing Sea-level Rise at Puʻuhonua O Hōnaunau National Historic Park with Interactive, Virtual Technology (A Prototype Augmented-Reality Mobile-Phone Application) Understanding Sediment Transport to Coastal Waters and Coral Reefs in West Maui Vulnerability of Hawaiian Forest Birds to Climate Change Simulating and Projecting Future Impacts of Sea Level Rise on Majuro Atoll Forecasting Beach Loss from Sea-Level Rise on the Island of Kauaʻi Changing Hawaiian Seascapes and Their Management Implications Assessing the Sustainability of Culturally Important Marine Sites in Guam and CNMI Influences of Climate Change, Climate Variability, and Drought on Human Communities and Ecosystems in Hawaiʻi Projections of Future Coral Reef Communities in DOI-Managed Coastal Areas in the Hawaiian Islands Establishing Climate Change Vulnerability Rankings for Hawaiian Native Plants Modeling the Response of Hawaiʻi’s Streams to Future Rainfall Conditions Developing an Agroforestry Dashboard for the Marshall Islands Understanding the Effect of Climate Change on the Migration of Marshallese Islanders Identifying the Risk of Runoff and Erosion in Hawaiʻi’s National Parks 21st Century High-Resolution Climate Projections for Guam and American Samoa Building Capacity for Coordination of Strategic Science Research in the US-Affiliated Pacific Islands Evaluating Ecosystem-Based Adaptation Options for Coastal Resilience