Prepared by Kristin L. Legg (Greater Yellowstone Network) and Kathryn B. Ireland (World Wildlife Fund)
In 2011 the Greater Yellowstone Interagency Whitebark Pine Subcommittee finalized the Greater Yellowstone Whitebark Pine Strategy. The subcommittee noted in the report that there was not enough information at the time to understand the impacts of climate change on whitebark pine. Since then there have been numerous studies that look at the vulnerability of the species in the Greater Yellowstone Area and also explore adaptation options for whitebark pine conservation.
Whitebark pine (
Pinus albicaulis) is considered a keystone species in upper elevations where treeline transitions into alpine. Stands of trees provide many ecosystem services such as tasty and highly nutritional seeds for wildlife, snow retention into the summer, and suitable habitat for other plant species to establish.
The tree is threatened by many factors such as the non-native white pine blister rust, native mountain pine beetle that is occurring in higher elevations as a result of warming temperatures, changes in wildland fire regimes and past fire management practices, and direct and indirect effects of climate change such as increased drought and more favorable conditions at higher elevations for other trees species that could outcompete smaller whitebark pine.
The most recent publication,
Putting Climate Adaptation on the Map: Developing Spatial Management Strategies for Whitebark Pine in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem
, explored how to spatially allocate actions outlined in the strategy under two scenarios while incorporating climate projections. The first scenario was business as usual, meaning following the strategy as described which meets current policies (i.e. wilderness) and logistical constraints (i.e. distance from roads) across all agencies. The second scenario looked at conservation actions if climate change projections for whitebark pine and competing tree species were considered and if there were no policy or logistical constraints. As one might expect there were more areas available for implementing adaptation actions without the constraints although there are areas where there was overlap across the different management scenarios. These areas of overlap could be good candidate locations for experimental management actions and monitoring.
This study is informative to the Whitebark Pine Subcommittee and others working on whitebark pine conservation, as it provides one more piece to the climate adaptation puzzle. While this study benefited from the already established Whitebark Pine Strategy, this modeling approach to spatially prioritize management actions can be applied to other species and ecosystems. It is important to note that this study is also a great example of collaboration and coproduction between scientists and land managers. There were frequent 'check-ins' throughout the study which led to both the scientists and managers becoming better informed on the outcomes and applications of management actions.
