Evaluating Regional Patterns in Nitrate Sources to Watersheds in National Parks of the Rocky Mountains using Nitrate Isotopes

2008 ◽  
Vol 42 (17) ◽  
pp. 6487-6493 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leora Nanus ◽  
Mark W. Williams ◽  
Donald H. Campbell ◽  
Emily M. Elliott ◽  
Carol Kendall
Keyword(s):  
National Parks ◽  
Rocky Mountains ◽  
Nitrate Sources ◽  
Regional Patterns ◽  
Nitrate Isotopes

Low wolverine (Gulo gulo) density in a national park complex of the Canadian Rocky Mountains

2020 ◽  
Vol 98 (5) ◽  
pp. 287-298
Author(s):  
M. Barrueto ◽  
M.A. Sawaya ◽  
A.P. Clevenger
Keyword(s):  
National Parks ◽  
Edge Effects ◽  
Rocky Mountains ◽  
Population Data ◽  
Home Ranges ◽  
Large Carnivores ◽  
Canadian Rocky Mountains ◽  
High Quality ◽  
Buffer Zones ◽  
Gulo Gulo

Large carnivores are sensitive to human-caused extirpation due to large home ranges, low population densities, and low reproductive rates. Protected areas help maintain populations by acting as sources, but human-caused mortality, habitat displacement, and edge effects occurring at protected area boundaries may reduce that function. The national parks Banff, Yoho, and Kootenay in the Canadian Rocky Mountains are refugia for large carnivores, including wolverines (Gulo gulo (Linnaeus, 1758)). Despite growing conservation concern, empirical baseline population data for wolverines remain scarce throughout their range, including most of Canada. We hypothesized (i) that in these national parks, wolverine density matched values expected for high-quality habitat, and (ii) that edge effects decreased density towards park boundaries. We conducted systematic non-invasive genetic sampling surveys covering >7000 km2 (2011 and 2013). Using spatial capture–recapture models, we estimated mean (±SE) female (1.5 ± 0.3 and 1.4 ± 0.3 wolverine/1000 km2), male (1.8 ± 0.4 and 1.5 ± 0.3 wolverine/1000 km2), and combined (3.3 ± 0.5 and 3.0 ± 0.4 wolverine/1000 km2) densities for 2011 and 2013, respectively. These estimates were lower than predictions based on density extrapolation from nearby high-quality habitat, and density decreased towards park boundaries. To benefit the population, we recommend creating buffer zones around parks that protect female habitat and prohibit harvest.

Holocene tephrostratigraphy and glacial fluctuations in Waterton Lakes and Glacier national parks, Alberta and Montana

1985 ◽  
Vol 22 (7) ◽  
pp. 1093-1101 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gerald Osborn
Keyword(s):  
19Th Century ◽  
National Parks ◽  
Rocky Mountains ◽  
National Park ◽  
Glacier National Park ◽  
Glacial Deposits ◽  
Canadian Rockies ◽  
Continental Divide ◽  
Minimum Age ◽  
Waterton Lakes National Park

Waterton Lakes National Park in Alberta and Glacier National Park in Montana lie along adjacent sections of the continental divide in the Rocky Mountains. In cirques or near divides there is evidence for two ages of glacial deposits. Younger deposits are generally well preserved, poorly vegetated, and bear no tephra and no or very small lichens. Older deposits are more poorly preserved, better vegetated, bear Rhizocarpon sp. lichens at least up to 92 mm in diameter, and bear tephra. The tephra often occurs in two different coloured horizons, but both are compositionally equivalent to Mazama tephra.The older advance has a minimum age of about 6800 14C years BP and a probable maximum age of about 12 000 14C years BP. It is correlated with the pre-Mazama Crowfoot Advance of the Canadian Rockies. Deposits of the younger advance are probably not too much older than mid-19th century, because some glaciers began retreating from the deposits about then. The younger advance is correlated to the Cavell Advance of the Canadian Rockies and the Gannett Peak Advance of the American Rockies.Both advances were minor. The older advance left moraines about 1.5 km or less beyond present glacier margins and depressed ELA's an average of 40 m below modern values.

scholarly journals Regional patterns and proximal causes of the recent snowpack decline in the Rocky Mountains, U.S.

2013 ◽  
Vol 40 (9) ◽  
pp. 1811-1816 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gregory T. Pederson ◽  
Julio L. Betancourt ◽  
Gregory J. McCabe
Keyword(s):  
Rocky Mountains ◽  
Regional Patterns

scholarly journals A Cytogentic Analysis of Cutthroat Trout in the Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Parks

1978 ◽  
Vol 2 ◽  
pp. 107-111
Author(s):  
Robert Kitchin
Keyword(s):  
National Parks ◽  
Rocky Mountains ◽  
Genetic Basis ◽  
Cutthroat Trout ◽  
Widespread Distribution ◽  
Behavioral Diversity ◽  
Continental Divide ◽  
Salmo Clarki

The cutthroat trout, Salmo clarki, is the trout species native to the Rocky Mountains on both sides of the Continental Divide. The widespread distribution of cutthroat trout in several independent drainages has resulted in the formation of considerable morphological and behavioral diversity both within and between cutthroat trout populations. Behnke has described several different subspecies of Salmo clarki on the basis of their meristic serological characteristics. However, because the genetic basis of these characteristics is unknown, the results of these studies have been inconclusive for the taxonomic designations of cutthroat trout subspecies in Grand Teton and Yellowstone National Parks.

Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks and the Middle Rocky Mountains: Casper, Wyoming to Salt Lake City, Utah, July 20–30, 1989

10.1029/ft328 ◽  
1989 ◽  
Author(s):  
J. David Love ◽  
Gerald E. Nelson ◽  
William G. Pierce ◽  
Roderick A. Hutchinson ◽  
James C. Coogan ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
National Parks ◽  
Rocky Mountains ◽  
Salt Lake ◽  
Salt Lake City ◽  
Lake City

Assessment of lake sensitivity to acidic deposition in national parks of the Rocky Mountains

2009 ◽  
Vol 19 (4) ◽  
pp. 961-973 ◽  
Author(s):  
L. Nanus ◽  
M. W. Williams ◽  
D. H. Campbell ◽  
K. A. Tonnessen ◽  
T. Blett ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
National Parks ◽  
Rocky Mountains ◽  
Acidic Deposition

scholarly journals “Hands Off Our National Parks”: The Alpine Club of Canada Hydro-development Controversies in the Canadian Rockies, 1922-1930

2006 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 129-155 ◽  
Author(s):  
PearlAnn Reichwein
Keyword(s):  
National Parks ◽  
Interest Group ◽  
Rocky Mountains ◽  
Public Domain ◽  
Shared Vision ◽  
Hydro Development ◽  
Canadian Rockies ◽  
Hetch Hetchy

Abstract Through the 1920s, hydro development proposals for irrigation and power dams impinged on Canada's national parks in the Rockies. The Alpine Club of Canada — a mountaineering organization formed in 1906 — rallied opposition to dams and insisted that national parks were an inviolable public domain. National Parks Commissioner J.B. Harkin and ACC Director A.O. Wheeler created an alliance that highlighted the club's role as a key interest group and recreational stakeholder with a shared vision of the mountain parks. Conflicts over dams in Rocky Mountains and Waterton Lakes national parks were politically and philosophically compared to the great battle of the “Hetch Hetchy” aqueduct in California.

scholarly journals Exotic Plants of the Northern Rocky Mountain Environmental Zones

1984 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
pp. 111-114
Author(s):  
Bryant Woods ◽  
Tad Weaver
Keyword(s):  
Data Analysis ◽  
National Parks ◽  
Rocky Mountains ◽  
Rocky Mountain ◽  
Exotic Plants ◽  
Northern Rocky Mountains

Exotic plants occur in national parks and forests throughout the northern Rocky Mountains. We report here progress on a study to determine their physiological and ecological ranges within major environmental zone of the region. To date, we have clarified objectives, refined methodology, and sampled 80-85% of initial sites chosen in Glacier NP. We begin data analysis in January, and will sample in both Grand Teton and Glacier in the coming summer.

A 15,000 year record of vegetation and climate change from a treeline lake in the Rocky Mountains, Wyoming, USA

The Holocene ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 22 (7) ◽  
pp. 739-748 ◽  
Author(s):  
Scott Mensing ◽  
John Korfmacher ◽  
Thomas Minckley ◽  
Robert Musselman
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Rocky Mountains ◽  
Vegetation Change ◽  
Climatic Variability ◽  
High Elevation ◽  
Sagebrush Steppe ◽  
Climate Projections ◽  
Upward Movement ◽  
Regional Patterns ◽  
Vegetation And Climate

Future climate projections predict warming at high elevations that will impact treeline species, but complex topographic relief in mountains complicates ecologic response, and we have a limited number of long-term studies examining vegetation change related to climate. In this study, pollen and conifer stomata were analyzed from a 2.3 m sediment core extending to 15,330 cal. yr BP recovered from a treeline lake in the Rocky Mountains of Wyoming. Both pollen and stomata record a sequence of vegetation and climate change similar in most respects to other regional studies, with sagebrush steppe and lowered treeline during the Late Pleistocene, rapid upward movement of treeline beginning about 11,500 cal. yr BP, treeline above modern between ~9000 and 6000 cal. yr BP, and then moving downslope ~5000 cal. yr BP, reaching modern limits by ~3000 cal. yr BP. Between 6000 and 5000 cal. yr BP sediments become increasingly organic and sedimentation rates increase. We interpret this as evidence for lower lake levels during an extended dry period with warmer summer temperatures and treeline advance. The complex topography of the Rocky Mountains makes it challenging to identify regional patterns associated with short term climatic variability, but our results contribute to gaining a better understanding of past ecologic responses at high elevation sites.

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