Environment

Biospheres of the Rocky Mountains

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Biospheres are important ecological areas around the globe for protecting species diversity and for learning how to best sustain development ecologically, economically and socially. Science and solutions learned in each area are shared globally through the United Nations, and this is particularly important now that we face a global climate crisis. UNESCO currently recognizes three biospheres in the Rocky Mountain Region, and up to 2017, there were five more described below.

The Rocky Mountain Biosphere in Colorado roughly encompasses Rocky Mountain National Park and some of the Rocky Mountain Wilderness to the north. Some of the charismatic species in the biosphere are Bighorn Sheep, Elk, Mountain Lions, Pika and Snowshoe Hare. Scientists have studied species that have been wiped out of the area, like the Grizzly, Gray Wolf and Bison, as well as species that have moved in, like Moose. The exceptionally high altitudes define unique ecosystems of global importance.

The Crown of the Continent Biosphere in Montana includes Glacier National Park (see photo of author & son above). (Perhaps to de-emphasize the shrinking glacier problem, the Biosphere dropped the name “Glacier” in 2017). The biosphere is home to rare charismatic species like Grizzly Bears, Lynx and Wolverines. Over 100 years of scientific data on wildfires, snowpack, species populations, and more have been collected and shared from this park and its sister park Waterton Glacier in Canada. Like Rocky Mountain, the biospheres here cover the Continental Divide, which defines the direction of rivers across the US to the Atlantic & Pacific, but from here rivers also flow north to the Arctic, making these biospheres of particularly important for studying migrating species.

Yellowstone-Grand Teton Biosphere in Wyoming obviously includes Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks. One of the most intact predator-prey-scavenger biospheres on earth, with large herds of Elk and Bison, Grizzly Bears, Cutthroat Trout and Bald Eagles, and unrestricted rivers, this is an exceptionally important global biosphere.

Unfortunately, in 2017 the Trump Administration canceled 5 other biospheres in the Rocky Mountain Region. Apparently, the Israelis were upset that Palestinians were allowed to participate in UNESCO and used the place name “Palestine” in the name of a joint heritage site, so the US ended over forty years of scientific cooperation and research sharing with the world and removed many US biospheres from the global program.

The programs canceled in 2017 included three in Colorado: Central Plains Biosphere in the northeast, Fraser Biosphere in central, and Niwot Ridge Biosphere in the north. The Central Plains was particularly valuable in the study of short grass prairie ecosystems. Fraser was important in studying the interaction of forests, rivers and climate. Niwot Ridge contributed important research into alpine tundra ecosystems, glaciers, high altitude plants and climate change.

In Montana, the Coram Biosphere, west of Glacier NP ended in 2017. Coram was important in the study of forest regeneration and forest management. And in Utah, the Desert Biosphere, near Great Basin also ended in 2017. Desert, begun by President Hoover, contributed to our understanding of scrublands and pasturelands in hot and dry areas.

I’ve traveled in, through or next to all five canceled Rocky Mountain biospheres in my electric car, and they’re also uniquely beautiful places. But biospheres aren’t primarily meant for tourists, they’re meant for nature and for scientists. While some research continues at many of these sites, the international scientific and policy management cooperation was cut off. Especially facing a global climate crisis, we need to be actively cooperating to find global solutions to our ecological threats. Also, it seems bizarre to remove our own natural scientific research areas from participation in international science, due to deep-rooted political feuds in the Mideast. I hope these irrational mistaken biosphere withdrawals can be reversed by the current or future administrations, so that the global learning can continue.

Biosphere 2

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From 1991 to 1993, eight people lived in this huge sealed greenhouse or giant terrarium in Arizona, growing their own food and attempting to live without outside intervention. Built at a cost of some $250 million, the complex includes the artificial ocean above, multiple tropical growing zones, industrial HVAC, and even a unique, massive ‘lung’ to equalize air pressure at different temperatures. Results were mixed, but there are important lessons to be learned.

Humans like to believe we can control our environment and that we have conquered nature. The truth is that we don’t completely understand nature, and when we try to control it, there are unintended consequences.

The most serious problem was a gradual reduction in oxygen, which threatened to kill the participants by around day 500 and required emergency intervention. Despite all the plants, overall, the system produced too much carbon dioxide. Also, the participants complained of constant hunger, unable to eat enough calories per day, which made it difficult to complete their extensive daily chores. Many plants and pollinators did not survive, but stowaways like cockroaches thrived. Still, they survived for two full years. Others later managed shorter stints, but bickering and mismanagement soon ended fully sealed living experiments.

From 1995 to 2003, Columbia University managed the site and completed groundbreaking research here scientifically proving up to 90% declines in oceanic coral due to artificially high levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide. Unfortunately, the coral later died when the site went back on the market, although there are plans to try to reintroduce it. Today the site is run by Arizona State University, which offers both a general self-guided tour and specialized guided tours, in addition to hosting students and researchers. When fully funded, the semi-tropical desert forests are very well controlled and measured, enabling many scientific experiments on micro ecosystems to be carried out under laboratory conditions. Tracers can be added to water and carbon dioxide, so researchers can figure out exactly what plants are doing in different conditions. Unfortunately, the whole complex is extremely energy intensive, and it is run on diesel and natural gas, which both contribute carbon pollution to exacerbate the climate crisis.

Some believe that technology will allow us to adapt to the worst effects of climate change. The truth is that we need to spend our time, energy and money trying to protect Biosphere 1 (Earth) from carbon pollution. This massive, extremely expensive, carefully engineered and scientifically researched project could barely take care of eight people for two years. That’s neither an efficient nor effective use of resources, but it quickly illustrates how difficult it is to scale environmental technologies to the point that they are practical. How big of a terrarium would we need to feed eight billion people? Far better to take care of the Earth, while we still have hope.

Forest Wildfires

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I know it’s winter, but we need to talk about wildfires. There is a common, simple-minded view—popular among those who deny climate change—that overzealous park employees unnaturally suppressed fires, causing wildfires today. End of story. Once we ‘catch up’ on the ‘fire deficit’ everything will be fine. This is bunk.

Last year Canada had a record-smashing year of wildfires, and the frequency of wildfires far exceeds what is normal, considering the naturally slow growth rate of trees in boreal forests. Most of these fires were in remote northern Canada, where historic fires were not even reported, let alone suppressed. The estimated number of fires was not too high, but many of the fires were mega fires, burning over seven times as many acres as the modern historic average. There is only one explanation for the scale of the wildfires last year, and it isn’t Smokey the Bear. The primary cause of increasingly severe forest fires is carbon pollution. 

The first humans to change natural fire ecology in North America were natives who for centuries used fires in the valley for agriculture and to attract game with new grass. The most destructive humans by far were loggers who clear cut whole forests. During the Great Depression, roads and campgrounds were developed in both old and regrown forests, bringing millions of visitors who parked their hot cars on dry grass, dropped their cigarettes on pine needles and left their campfires unattended, causing a dramatic increase in forest fires. Firefighters responded by putting out fires when they threatened nearby communities.

We changed forest fire ecology in complex ways over centuries, so the simple ‘fire suppression’ explanation is false. We don’t know exactly what the forest’s natural ecology was like before man started playing with fire here, but man’s brief experiments for a few decades last century—causing wildfires due to camping and suppressing some fires at the edges—all account for maybe 2% of the life of a Giant Sequoia. Yosemite park rangers tracked all fires within the park since the 1930’s, and for decades none of the fires were large enough to matter to the overall health of the forests until recently. Past fires were often 100 or maybe 1000 acres, but recent forest fires are 100,000 or 1,000,000 acres. Our hotter climate has changed everything. Now we need to change our perspective from our recent past to the consequences of our carbon pollution on the future. Extinction is not a mistake we can correct later. 

California has the most national parks with 28 park units, and about 12 of them have some type of large forest, often wilderness. I’ve been in all of those forest parks in the past year or so, and 9 now have huge swaths of dead trees from recent wildfires. 

Only Muir Woods, a small coastal redwood forest park along a creek surrounded by wealthy suburbs, has been spared. Pinnacles has had multiple wildfires in the past three years, but firefighters managed to contain them quickly. Even foggy Redwood park lost 11,000 acres in 2003 due to the Canoe Fire. 

This level of wildfire is not normal; it is out of control, and it is getting worse. Discussing past firefighting efforts and increasing the rate of manmade fires is not going to fix the problem. If we do not stop our carbon pollution, then 100 years of environmentalists’ efforts to save these forests for future generations will be wasted. 

Capitol Reef National Park

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The dome in the middle reminded folks of the US Capitol, but the geologic speciality of the park is the reef, or Waterpocket Fold, one of the longest continually exposed monoclines (like a wrinkle) in the world, almost 100 miles north to south. Cathedral Valley in the north and Muley Twist Canyon in the south are difficult to access without a high clearance 4×4, but the geologic layers can all be seen in the middle cross section near the Fruita orchard. The Hickman Bridge trail above is a good place to see the dome, but the scenic drive along the fold is exceptional. The unpaved side trip into Capitol Gorge is particularly striking, and there’s a hike from the parking lot up to see the eroded round water-pockets for which the fold is named.

This is a great park to learn about the geology of the west, from the high country mountains like Great Basin and Rocky at 12,000 feet, to the high plateaus like Cedar Breaks at 10,000 feet and Bryce at 8,000 feet, to standing up country with Natural Bridges at 6,000 feet, Arches at 5,000 feet, Zion at 4,000 feet and the many layered Grand Canyon spanning from 8,000 to 2,000 feet, and all the way down to the low desert of Death Valley more than 250 feet below sea level. Here, the ranger’s geology talk explained how the changing climate and continental shifts over hundreds of millions of years left repeated layers of deposits, lifted them up unevenly and eroded them into the wonderful scenery we see today. The same patterns repeat, not just one ancient inland sea or forest or swamp or grassland or desert, but many repeated environments were slathered over one another and pressed into rock.

Why are there weird discolored greenish mounds along the Green River? Those were from one of the swampy periods (Morrison) when oxygen was low, materials were soft and clay-like and they contain late Jurassic dinosaur fossils. Why are there similar colored layers at much different altitudes? They were from different swampy periods and contain different fossils. What causes the alternating pink and beige layers of hoodoos and other rock formations? The layers are made of the same kind of rock, but in some years the iron oxidized and in others it couldn’t due to water changes. Where did all the sand come from to make all the sandstone layers? Much of the sand eroded from the old Appalachian Mountains, flowed down ancient rivers and blew across to the west.

Even if you’re completely uninterested in Geology, you might be interested in the outlaws who hid in the remote areas nearby, like the Wild Bunch, which included Butch Cassidy & the Sundance Kid. Or maybe tour the old orchard and learn about pioneers. Or take a moment to think of those Uranium miners, many Native Americans, who still suffer radiation poisoning, or think about the wildlife who can’t read the warning signs. This is an uncrowded and under appreciated national park. Highly recommended.

LBJ Memorial Grove on the Potomac

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I bet LBJ would joke that this monolith is a middle finger salute to DC. But the grove is a tribute by his wife to his environmental legacy, recognizing LBJ’s unsurpassed legislative achievements in one term: the Wilderness Act, the Clean Water and Clean Air Acts, the National Historic Preservation Act, the Endangered Species Act, and the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act. While meant to reflect nature and his Texas roots, the monolith looks unfinished, like the work ahead of us to save our climate.

Grant-Kohrs Ranch National Historic Site

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Before barbed wire many ranches raised cattle free range, meaning without fences, and cowboys would drive herds of cattle up to halfway across the country. This ranch helps preserve a few elements of that iconic way of life, as a working ranch with beaver-slide hay stackers (invented nearby) and a variety of animals. The displays depicting the cowboys put real faces on the young men whose lifestyle was romanticized by books, radio, TV and film.

When I stay in state park campgrounds, like Bannack near here, I’ve been reading Louis L’Amour’s books which helped mythologize the West. I often find I’m following the same routes and seeing the same places he did. One of his scripts could easily have come from the history of Bannack where a corrupt sheriff and his gang, ”the innocents”, killed over 100 people and robbed even more before the townspeople figured it out and hung him from his own gallows.

Another local site is the Anaconda copper mine smelting tower, site of a horrific pollution scandal. There’s still a large Superfund site cleaning up here. The mountains, valleys, forests and rivers here are stunning, but greed often drives men to devastate both their communities and their environment. We must look deeper than myths, see what’s going on behind the scenes and act before damage becomes irreparable.