From Water to Wildlife: Linking Water Timing and Availability to Meadows and Wildlife in a Changing Climate Active

Mountain meadows in the western United States provide key habitats for many plant and wildlife species, many of which rely exclusively on these areas. Mountain meadows are also treasured by the public and provide beautiful areas to view wildflowers and wildlife on public lands such as national parks. However, mountain ecosystems are expected to be disproportionately affected by climate change. There is a limited understanding of how mountain meadows are changing, how temperature and precipitation may be driving those changes, and how this will impact sensitive species that inhabit these landscapes. Natural resource managers have an immediate need to understand these relationships to conserve or restore habitats and to manage vulnerable plant and wildlife species.

The research team will work with wildlife and natural resource managers in three mountainous national parks spanning Washington and Montana to address these questions: Olympic, Mount Rainier, and Glacier National Parks. The team will use remote-sensing and statistical models to map meadow habitat in the three parks, to quantify how the habitats are changing, and to understand how snow and water affect meadow dynamics. Then, the team will use these models to understand and predict the presence of vulnerable wildlife species in the parks, including the Olympic marmot (a sensitive species that lives almost exclusively in Olympic National Park), pika (a subalpine species sensitive to temperature changes), and bumblebees (which provide important pollination services in meadows and farms). Finally, the team will work with the national parks to identify areas of resilient and vulnerable habitat for these species and develop tools to inform meadow conservation and management decisions for vulnerable wildlife species. The results will be presented to parks, scientific groups, other stakeholders, and the public.