Las Vegas Holds Key to Abrupt Climate Change plus 1 more |
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Las Vegas Holds Key to Abrupt Climate Change Posted: 09 Nov 2015 11:00 AM PST
Summary: According to new U.S. Geological Survey research published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, springs and marshes in the desert outside Las Vegas expanded and contracted dramatically in response to past episodes of abrupt climate change, even disappearing altogether for centuries at a time when conditions became too warm
Contact Information: Heidi Koontz ( Phone: 303-202-4763 ); According to new U.S. Geological Survey research published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences USA, springs and marshes in the desert outside Las Vegas expanded and contracted dramatically in response to past episodes of abrupt climate change, even disappearing altogether for centuries at a time when conditions became too warm. This new record, gleaned from dirt and rocks exposed in the desert just outside the city limits, provides an unprecedented look into how climate change can affect fragile desert ecosystems in the American Southwest. Kathleen Springer, a geologist with the USGS and former Senior Curator at the San Bernardino County Museum, was the principal investigator and lead scientist for this study showing that desert wetlands are extremely sensitive to climate change. “This is a story of water,” said Springer. “Water was plentiful in the desert at times in the past, but when climate warmed, springs and wetlands dried up, and the plants and animals living in the harsh desert environment were out of luck.” During the Pleistocene, between approximately 100,000 and 10,000 years ago, wetlands dotted the landscape in the area just north of Las Vegas, attracting a plethora of ice age animals, including mammoths, sloths, sabre-toothed cats, dire wolves, and extinct species of bison, horse, and camel, and later, the first human inhabitants to the area. Today, existing desert wetlands are home to a number of threatened and endangered species that rely on the ecosystem for water in an otherwise arid landscape. Their fate may lie in the hands of a rapidly changing climate. “What we're seeing in the geologic record frames what we are observing today,” said Springer. "The drought that California is currently experiencing is extreme, but droughts are an inherent part of the climate system and have occurred repeatedly in the past." The study was initiated by the Bureau of Land Management, which called for an integrative approach to studies that emphasize the geological age and context of fossils, as well as a comprehensive analysis of how local hydrologic systems responded to climate change in the past. “Scientists collect fossils all the time,” said Scott Foss, a senior paleontologist with the BLM. "What is remarkable about this work is the vision that Kathleen had of making sure her team understood the intricacies of the deposits in incredible detail, which allowed them to determine how climate affected the local landscape. It was an immense undertaking, and one that will serve as a benchmark for generations to come for those interested in understanding the effects of climate change on desert ecosystems.” Studies examining the effects of climate change on springs and desert wetlands will continue through the USGS’s Climate and Land Use Change Research and Development Program, and will build upon the investigations conducted in the Las Vegas Valley, a large portion of which is now protected as Tule Springs Fossil Beds National Monument. When the monument was established in December 2014, the BLM turned their stewardship over to the National Park Service, who will determine how to interpret the unique land and its former inhabitants for the public. “The future of this newly designated national monument and what it can tell us about the effects of climate change is all about the past,” said Springer. “And the past is the key to the present.” |
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Newly Released Photo Catalog Puts US Landscapes On Exhibit Posted: 09 Nov 2015 08:30 AM PST
Summary: The U.S. Geological Survey announced today that it has made part of a huge national repository of geographically referenced USGS field photographs publicly available
Contact Information: Chris Soulard ( Phone: 650-329-4317 ); Paul Laustsen ( Phone: 650-329-4046 );
The U.S. Geological Survey announced today that it has made part of a huge national repository of geographically referenced USGS field photographs publicly available. USGS geographers developed a simple, easy-to-use mapping portal called the Land Cover Trends Field Photo Map. The entire collection contains over 33,000 geo-referenced field photos with associated keywords describing the land-use and land-cover change processes taking place. Initially, nearly 13,000 photos from across the continental US will be available to the public, yet the online collection will grow as more processed photos become available. “This is a treasure trove of royalty and copyright-free photography collected using consistent procedures,” said Chris Soulard, project leader and USGS research geographer. “We envision that these photos will captivate general audiences and fulfill a myriad of scientific needs.” Sharing these unique field photos provides an excellent resource for the scientific community with potential to develop future research, such as future repeat photography projects or applications where photos may validate remote sensing classifications. Serving USGS data interactively to the public is integral to the USGS mission and provides opportunities for future scientific collaboration by communicating USGS land change research to the broader public and scientific community. “The benefit of these photos being hosted by the USGS is equal access to all without copyright concerns and quality control,” said Jason Sherba, USGS geographer and project web-developer. The photography was collected as part the USGS National Land Cover Trends Project, a research effort that spanned over ten years and represented one of USGS’ largest cross-center research efforts. The project employed Landsat imagery between 1973-2000 to derive rates, causes, and consequences of contemporary land use/land cover change. Photos were collected between 1999 and 2007 to serve as an aid in Landsat-derived land-use/land-cover change analyses and assessments. The map viewer was developed to present photographs within a land use/land cover change mapping context, yet photos may also be found on the USGS Earth Explorer website.
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