Drought

Migratory wildlife need to balance the benefits of migration and reproduction with the physiological costs. This is particularly challenging in dynamic environments like wetlands, where food levels can vary greatly from year to year. For shorebirds in the Great Basin region, saline or terminal lakes provide essential habitats during their annual life cycle. To understand how changes in hydrology...

FORT aquatic scientists analyze rings of riparian trees relating tree growth and establishment to historical flow. They then use the tree rings to reconstruct the flow in past centuries. Flow reconstructions discover the frequency and magnitude of past droughts and floods—information that is essential for management of rivers and water supplies. They have pioneered the use of cottonwood, a...

FORT scientists study interactions among river flow, riparian vegetation and channel change at low elevations across the western United States. Cooperators include the National Park Service, Bureau of Land Management, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and Bureau of Reclamation. Research areas include reservoir management, control of invasive species, drought response and flood erosion after fires...

FORT scientists established a Common Garden at the Colorado State Forest Service Nursery in Fort Collins, Colorado in 2005 to study the phenology of riparian cottonwood in relation to annual variation in temperature. Phenology is the seasonal timing of life history events including leaf opening, flowering, seed release, bud formation and leaf senescence.

Climate-driven forest disturbances, particularly drought-induced tree mortality and large high-severity fires from increasingly warm and dry conditions, are altering forest ecosystems and the ecosystem services society depends on (e.g., water supplies) in the Southern Rockies and across the Western U.S. We will combine unique, long-term place-based ecological data, diverse methods (e.g., paleo...

Within areas of overlapping sagebrush and pinyon-juniper ecosystems, wildlife populations are declining due to habitat fragmentation and degradation, changing environments, and human development. However, management to bolster species associated with one ecosystem may result in negative consequences for species associated with the other. Thus, land managers are challenged with balancing which...

Tree-ring science is a component of our interdisciplinary ecological research program that focuses on the effects of drought and human land use on forest ecology, fire ecology, and ecohydrology.

Below are ongoing or completed research projects related to forest ecosystems at the New Mexico Landscapes Field Station.

Staff associated with the New Mexico Landscapes Field Station.

Drought, hotter temperatures, and insect outbreaks are affecting dryland ecosystems across the globe. Pinon-juniper (PJ) woodlands are a widespread vegetation type common to drylands of North America, which have been hit particularly hard by a warming climate. Specifically, mass tree die-off events are transforming PJ woodland structure, composition, and distributions. This project aims to...

For over 30 years we have monitored the ecosystem dynamics of the mesas and mountains of northern New Mexico, co-located with mangers. We use a place-based science approach, defined as “science that is founded on long-term, repeated, field data and observations, as well as traditional knowledges, and regularly engages local managers and community members.” This approach enables us to provide land...

Riparian ecologists at the Fort Collins Science Center study interactions among flow, channel change, and vegetation along rivers across the western United States and worldwide. Our work focuses on issues relevant to the management of water and public lands, including dam operation, invasive species, and ecological restoration. Investigations take place on a range of scales. For example...