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  • CLIMATE CHANGE

CLIMATE CHANGE IN GLACIER NATIONAL PARK AND OTHER NATIONAL PARKS

Our National Parks are some of the best-protected places on earth. Yet climate change and environmental degradation have already begun impacting the parks and will continue to pose significant threats in the future if we don’t act to reverse the current trend of global warming.

“If we continue to increase our emissions of heat-trapping gases, a disrupted climate will cause the greatest damage to our national parks ever.”
~ Stephen Saunders, NRDC

Pikas
The American pika is threatened by rising temperatures that have significantly diminished its habitat. Also nicknamed boulder bunnies, these cold-loving, alpine dwelling creatures can perish from overheating. In 2003, the World Wildlife Fund sponsored a study that found pikas had vanished over a ten-year period from 7 of 25 sites in Nevada, California, and Oregon. In 2008, the pika became the first mammal in the lower 48 to be considered for endangered species status because of the impacts of global warming.

Glaciers
At the current accelerated rate of melt, scientists predict glaciers will disappear from Glacier National Park by 2030. In the North Cascades, the park’s total glacial mass has shrunk 80% since 1956.

Geysers
Old Faithful could become less faithful as the result of climate change. A study in the June 2008 issue of Geology suggested that drought has lengthened Old Faithful’s eruption cycle. A nine-year study by Shaul Hurwitz of the U.S. Geological Survey measured the relationship between drought and geyser activity; Mr. Hurwitz predicts that if current trends continue, “Our grandchildren will have to wait longer for Old Faithful to erupt.”

Bighorn Sheep
Desert Bighorn sheep in Death Valley, Joshua Tree, Canyonlands, Zion, Grand Canyon, and Great Basin National Parks face extinction. California’s bighorn sheep populations have already dwindled from 80 to 30 locations.

Joshua Trees
Rising temperatures might cause more than 90% of this iconic tree to disappear from its namesake park within a century.

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