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Motorists traveling on the famous Peak to Peak Highway, north of Nederland, admiring the scenery or heading to Brainard Lake, may well pass a sign indicating one of the world's most important ecological research sites. term in the world.
The University of Colorado Mountain Research Station, located in the Arapaho-Roosevelt National Forest and a few kilometers west of Colo. 72, is the starting point for some of the most important research being conducted on the nuanced and changing dynamics of alpine ecology anywhere in North America.
This work is increasingly focused directly on the signals and effects of climate change – a problem that has not even been addressed by scientists when Dr. Francis Ramaley, a professor of biology at the University of Colorado, launched the program. summer biology camp at Tolland in the vicinity in 1909.
This camp, where the main tools included hunting rifles, shovels and butterfly nets, was closed in 1919 and, after the purchase of the land by the university to the north, it built what was known as the university camp name.
He succeeded John W. Marr, professor of biology at Ramaley, who launched in 1946 the project of ecology of the mountain, the program on the mountain climate and the project of ecology of the slope is , and who played a key role in the creation of the Institute of Arctic and Alpine Ecology. which would merge in 1952 with the University Camp as an Institute for Arctic Research and Alpine Skiing.
The frontier of research on the effects of climate change, where animals and plants live in extreme limits of environmental tolerance up to 12,000 feet, has continued to spread there – with radars and drones entering the ground now moving rifles and shovels – for more than half a century.
"The idea that humans could have such an omnipresent impact on the regional environment but also on the global environment was not really understandable at the time," Bill said. Bowman, director of the research station for 29 years. .
Now, said Bowman, a professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at CU Boulder, "this is the very theme of the research being conducted there, the impact humans have on the world. ;environment.
A soup of alphabets from laboratories and agencies is directly involved in research outside the research station. These include not only INSTAAR, the national network of ecological observatories, the National Ocean and Atmosphere Administration and the Observatory of Critical Areas, but also researchers who do not have heavy acronyms rooted in their curriculum vitae.
"We have everything we need, whether it's graduate students who are preparing their master's thesis or groups that have been working there for almost 40 years now," said Bowman. "And really, no matter who can do research there. We do not make any distinction as to whether they are rich and famous, or just beginner in science. We are really proud that many researchers have their first research experience in this country. "
The case of precision
The mechanized roar of a snowcat is the soundtrack of the daily commute of many scientists who use the research station.
The basic facilities of the Mountain Research Station, including the John W. Marr Alpine Laboratory, a family pavilion for up to 32 visitors, as well as Kiowa's laboratory and classroom, equipped with 39 meeting space accommodating 24 people, perched at only 9,500 feet.
With individual data collection points spread over difficult terrain, with the maximum (12,267 feet) and snow can accumulate in some places from a depth of 15 to 20 feet, simple navigation in this living laboratory can prove to be a daunting challenge.
But many who work there consider the opportunity to do it. For example, Duane Kitzis, Senior Research Associate at CU Boulder's Cooperative Institute for Environmental Science, who works for the Global Surveillance Division of the Earth System Research Laboratory at NOAA. He has been climbing the Niwot Ridge since 1987, collecting air samples to provide calibration equipment for measuring greenhouse gases in laboratories around the world. It now performs more than 400 standard air measurements a year there.
NOAA's Global Monitoring Division has also been taking air samples to measure greenhouse gases since 1967 at a separate collection site on Niwot Ridge. It was the first site of the division's cooperative air sampling network, which now has 68 sites in 36 countries, including the South Pole. Each vial sample contains air containing all the gases, such as carbon dioxide, methane and halogenated hydrocarbons, present in the air at their natural concentrations. Fifty-five different gases are accurately measured in each balloon.
Fifty-five different trace gas species are measured accurately in the air of each sampled flask.
"Continuous long-term measurement programs are of utmost importance," said Kitzis. "One of our missions is monitoring the atmosphere of molecules linked to greenhouse gases. To be able to observe very small spatial and temporal changes, you need continuous measurement data. You do not just have to create data where we did not take it. "
The NOAA bottle collection site and the standards preparation site, chaired by Kitzis, are fully managed by the NOAA Global Monitoring Division.
"Two days a week, I'm going to a small remote area in the Rocky Mountains," he said. "In a word, it's a paradise for me. Over the years, I've seen bears, moose, lion, bobcat, moose, not to mention small creatures. I've been fortunate to be immersed in nature every week of my life. There are days when I drive a snowball at work or go hiking or skiing. In the summer, I can get in the car and when I close the gate … behind me, I know it's one of the best jobs I could ever have.
He believes his work is essential to understanding the ever-changing image of changes in the atmosphere.
"So that we can make statements about carbon dioxide and other trace gases that are increasingly influencing climate change, if we want to talk about changes in sources and sinks. fossil fuel emission with regard to the production of fossil fuels, to have a continuous chronology composed of the best measurement accuracy. That's what the Global Reference Network Team on Greenhouse Gases is doing "
"It's too dry"
Katharine Suding is a senior researcher for one of the major research programs conducted in the breathtaking landscape above the research station. Known as the long-term ecological research program of Niwot Ridge, it is an interdisciplinary research initiative aimed at developing a predictive understanding of ecological processes in high altitude mountain ecosystems and contributing to great progress in ecology.
"We need to study and monitor these complex systems over the long term to begin to understand how they work and to predict how they will work in the future," Suding said of the project. funding from the National Science Foundation. .
The Niwot Ridge Research Program has climatic (temperature and precipitation) records from 1952 at four locations along an elevation gradient exceeding its "D1" site; it is the one that is perched at 12,267 feet.
The Suding project has the regular participation of about 15 teachers, eight staff members, 25 graduate students and 10 undergraduate students from CU Boulder University. A few are in full-time positions at the research station, and one or two rarely leave work under a microscope by examining samples in laboratories in Boulder. Most share their time between the city and the alpine world.
On a recent trip – by snowmobile, through the snow that still covered the landscape until May – in the research area of his 4-square-kilometer program, Suding, professor in the Department of Ecology and evolutionary biology of CU and researcher at INSTAAR, observed the interaction of snowpack, snowmelt, temperature changes and air quality at multiple consequences on the fragile ecosystem.
"We know that in the forests, with a longer summer, the forests are not so good, because they are very stressed in July and August, when it is very hot and they do not have enough humidity "she said. "We thought the tree line would expand if the summer was longer and warmer. But it does not go up, because young trees can not start growing here because they are too dry. "
Suding noted that while the winters are warming, the snowfall at this altitude is still relatively constant.
"It's really the way these two things are changing together that affect the mountain response," she said.
Suding's research territory is located in the far west of the Boulder watershed, where CU Boulder scientists also collect data, working only with permission from city authorities. At the top of the watershed, at 12,513 feet, is the Arikaree Glacier, which Suding's predecessor, Mark Williams, predicted could completely disappear within 20 to 25 years. This sobering forecast has not changed.
According to Suding, predicting our future climate depends on understanding the evolution of our ecology, particularly in response to the dramatic changes brought about by the industrial revolution.
"The great driving force behind our work at Niwot is that we really need to understand our past, what has happened in recent decades, to understand what will happen in the future," she said. declared.
"I often think that we forget the importance of monitoring the current dynamics and just thinking about the future. These systems are so complex that we will not be able to predict well if we do not have long-term studies and measurements. Water, wildlife, skiing, snow, these are things that the mountain gives us, and we must follow them to make sure they are preserved. "
CU Boulder's geography professor, Tom Veblen, has been engaged since 1981 in the research station in studies involving Engelmann spruce, subalpine fir and lodgepole pine. It included the individual tagging of one of more than 8,000 trees to track changes in each of them. This is one of the very few long-term monitoring studies of tree populations in the western United States.
"One of the key findings of tree population monitoring is that from the mid-1990s, when we observed a trend towards warmer and drier conditions, we also observed a significantly increased tree mortality rate, "said Veblen. "On average, the tree mortality rate has increased by 250%, which includes only background mortality," not including fire or infestation by the beetle.
The work of his PhD student Robbie Andrus also revealed that over the last 35 years, the decrease in the frequency of cold, wet years – this spring would be an exception to this trend – has created a less favorable environment for the future. 39, establishment of new tree seedlings.
"The basic message to remember for our highland forests, our subalpine forests, is that where some people could have expected warming temperatures to be favorable (for tree growth). we see exactly the opposite … In the Rocky Mountain region, warmer temperatures have a negative impact on tree growth and survival. "
Veblen, whose work is under the auspices of the entire program overseen by Suding, said the living laboratory offered by the environment over the mountain research station is a considerable scientific asset . Graduate students have come from as far as New Zealand to conduct research, he said.
"It's a great help for our own research and to attract researchers from around the world," he said.
The network of national ecological observatories, also funded by the National Science Foundation, is another partner of the research station. It is currently a 30-year project to provide open-access continental data on changing ecological and climatological conditions at 81 sites. the United States – 47 terrestrial and 34 aquatic – including an observatory at Niwot Ridge.
"The Niwot site represents a particular data point in our observatory, the highest site in our network and representative of the alpine tundra," said Chau Tran of NEON, who oversees it. "The data we collect can be used in conjunction with the many existing researchers to increase the robustness of their data."
It's emotional for me
Noah Molotch, Associate Professor of Geography at CU Boulder, also a member of INSTAAR and senior investigator of the Niwot Ridge Project, was driving a rifle in the snowcat during a recent visit to Suding. He was attracted by the study of this ecosystem by a love of snow elicited by his passion for snowboarding, while he was from Santa Barbara, where skateboarding was his closest equivalent.
Molotch can understand in detail how the dynamic interaction between snowfall, accumulation, runoff and ambient temperatures, both at altitude and in the ground, gives an idea of how spring and summer will unfold throughout the entire Front Range ecosystem, as well as the importance of learning as much as possible about the impact of an element of the ecological fabric on the other.
But as the vast area of mixed conifers shrinks – much of this new growth replacing that of miners from a bygone era for its own purposes – it is also able to highlight high-level changes. altitude that scientists study in a language that most fighters traffic on the Interstate 70 until their favorite ski resort can understand.
"We are at quite a high altitude and temperatures are pretty cold in Colorado, for example in the ski resorts of California, Oregon or Washington. And so, it means that the most obvious impacts of global warming on skiing will be visible in these places, before they are seen here, "he said.
But the impacts will be felt on our own winter playgrounds, primarily in the composition of the snow, because the warmer air temperature affects the density of the snow, thus producing a less fluffy champagne powder , producing instead heavier and moister snow, as Molotch reminds us – and not affectionately – of Lake Tahoe.
The rise of the sea and the intensification of hurricanes are the signals of climate change that make the headlines, the changing characteristics of our snow that it provides – and is currently studying – using tools such as a grid of 88 square meter snow patrolled near the Niwot Ridge tundra laboratory 11,600 feet – the material too.
"The exhilarating sensation I feel, my winter experience in Colorado, which brought me to Colorado as a snowboard fan in the 1990s, is an important part of my life. And the idea that my children, my grandchildren or their grandchildren may not live the same as me, is emotional for me and it's sad. And I think for many people in Colorado, if they think about it very deeply, the feeling is probably the same. "
Bowman strives to travel to the research station once a week, despite the many duties of his service at CU Boulder, and would like to be there much more often. While recognizing the importance of all the work that is being done there, he enjoys the opportunity that he offers to reconnect regularly with aspects of the Colorado experience that make life here special.
However, he noted, he lives on site from early June to mid-August, when the school is over and winter finally abandons his grip on the rugged landscape for only a few weeks .
"It's one of the best kept secrets," he said of his mission. "It's the best job at CU."
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