Plenary Sessions
National Native Plant Materials Development Program: Ensuring Options in a Changing Climate
Peggy Olwell
Presentation (PDF)
Following record breaking wildfire seasons of 1999 and 2000, Congress directed the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) to develop and implement a program for site appropriate native plant materials. The NPMDP is coordinating organizations around the country to collect, curate and conserve plant diversity before it is lost. With the assistance of more than 500 partners, BLM is leading the interagency Native Plant Materials Development Program (NPMDP) to ensure the quality and quantity of genetically appropriate native plant materials are available commercially for restoring native plant communities across the American landscape.
Developing a crop from native wild species begins with seed collection. Seeds of Success (SOS) is the native seed collection phase of the NPMDP. SOS makes the primary collection of common native species that are needed for restoration after fire, weed eradication, energy development, or for use in climate adaptation strategies. Almost 100 teams are collecting nation-wide to add to the more than 9,500 collections which collectively form the Seeds of Success National Collection.
Climate change is altering native plant communities at a greater rate than previously anticipated and the effects on native plant communities could be extensive. To avoid the threat of habitats dominated by monocultures of invasive species, we may need to move and establish native plant materials to more northern latitudes if plant communities cannot adapt to climate change.
Developing native plant materials and having native seed stored in long-term conservation storage and available on the market for restoration will provide federal agencies with some of the most important tools to help address threats to natural systems posed by destructive events such as wildfires, invasive species, and climate change.
Peggy Olwell is the Plant Conservation Program Manager for the Bureau of Land Management in Washington, DC. Peggy has worked on endangered species issues for more than 25 years. Prior to BLM, Peggy was the Endangered Species Program Manager for the National Park Service where she was instrumental in developing the Plant Conservation Alliance, a partnership of 15 federal agencies and over 275 state and private organizations. Currently, she is chair of the PCA Federal Native Plant Committee.
Prior to NPS, Peggy was the Conservation Program Manager for the Center for Plant Conservation where she developed policy and guidance for the National Collection of Endangered Plants. Peggy also worked as the Regional Botanist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service’s Southwest Regional Office of Endangered Species where she developed and implemented recovery plans and Endangered Species Act listings for many of the endangered plants of Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas.
Peggy co-edited with Don Falk and Connie Millar an Island Press publication, Restoring Diversity: Strategies for Reintroduction of Endangered Plants. She is chair of the North American Plant Specialist Group for IUCN. Peggy received her B.S. in Botany from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and her M.S. in Biology from Southern Methodist University.
Climate trends in the West, and implications for phenology and aridification
Steven W. Running
Presentation (PDF)
Although annual temperatures have risen in the western US 1-2 degrees in the last 50 yr, the biggest story is the change in seasonal hydrology and summer drought. Earlier snowmelt is initiating spring growth earlier, but also causing extended summer drought. The extended drought period is now propagating new insect epidemics and more active wildfire. I will describe climate projections to 2100, with some analysis of how seasonal phenology may change also.
Steven W. Running received a Ph.D. (1979) in Forest Ecology from Colorado State University. He has been with the University of Montana, Missoula since 1979, where he is a University Regents Professor of Ecology. His primary research interest is the development of global and regional ecosystem biogeochemical models integrating remote sensing with bioclimatology and terrestrial ecology. He is a Team Member for the NASA Earth Observing System, Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer, and he is responsible for the EOS global terrestrial net primary production and evapotranspiration datasets. He has published over 260 scientific articles and two books. Dr. Running has recently served on the standing Committee for Earth Studies of the National Research Council and on the federal Interagency Carbon Cycle Science Committee. He has served as a Co-Chair of the National Center for Atmospheric Research Community Climate System Model Land Working Group, a Member of the International Geosphere-Biosphere Program Executive Committee, and the World Climate Research Program, Global Terrestrial Observing System. He currently serves on the advisory NASA Earth Science Subcommittee, and the NOAA Science Advisory Board Climate Working Group. Dr. Running shared the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007 as a chapter Lead Author for the 4th Assessment of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Dr. Running is an elected Fellow of the American Geophysical Union and is designated a Highly Cited Researcher by the Institute for Scientific Information. In the popular press, his essay in 2007, “The 5 Stages of Climate Grief” has been widely quoted.
Plant migration in times of climate change
Stephen T. Jackson
Presentation (PDF)
Ongoing and future climate change poses important challenges for ecological restoration and biological conservation. Plant species will need to adjust their habitat distributions and geographic ranges to compensate, and these adjustments may need to be rapid given the combined magnitude and rate of climate change currently projected for the coming decades. Rates of change may exceed natural capacity for seed dispersal and population expansion, motivating consideration of assisted migration and other large-scale human interventions. Paleoecological studies indicate that plant species have considerable natural capacity for adjusting to rapid and high-magnitude climate changes, but this capacity is not infinite. Careful assessment of specific cases will be needed to determine which species are in most need of assistance and which will likely do well on their own. Species migrations of the past have often been episodic, paced by interactions between biotic processes (seed dispersal, population growth) and interannual to millennial-scale climate variability. Similar patterns should be anticipated for the future, because long-term climate trends resulting from greenhouse-gas forcing will interact with ongoing natural interannual to multidecadal climate variability. This poses challenges for restoration and transplantation; efforts successful under one transient climate regime may fail in another. Emergence of novel climates in many regions under greenhouse forcing imposes high uncertainty in prediction of future species ranges, at least using currently available modeling tools. Finally, climate change will interact with invasive species, pests and pathogens, and human land-use and other activities to influence species ranges and populations. Successful management, restoration, and conservation efforts will have to balance between direct intervention (e.g., assisted migration, ecological engineering) and more-passive approaches that let natural responses run their course with modest intervention. Choosing among these will require not only better knowledge and tools, but more-effective bidirectional communication between researchers and practitioners.
Dr. Stephen Jackson studies the effects of environmental change on forests, woodlands, and wetlands. A native of southern Illinois, he studied botany and geology at Southern Illinois University at Carbondale, and received a Ph.D. in Ecology and Evolutionary Biology from Indiana University in 1983. He was a National Science Foundation Post-Doctoral Fellow in Environmental Biology in residence at Brown University, and has held faculty positions at Indiana University, Idaho State University, Northern Arizona University, and, most recently, the University of Wyoming, where he is Professor of Botany and Director of the Program in Ecology. He served as Vice-Chair of the National Research Council Committee on Geologic Records of Biosphere Dynamics, and currently serves on the editorial boards of Frontiers in Ecology & Environment and Ecosystems. He has also served on review panels for the National Science Foundation, advisory committees for the National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON), and the Scientific Advisory Board of the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (NCEAS).
Jackson was selected as a 2006 Aldo Leopold Leadership Fellow in Environmental Sciences, and in 2009 was elected a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He is currently President-Elect of the American Quaternary Association.
Jackson’s current work uses tree-rings, fossil rodent-middens, and sediments from lakes and bogs to document the dynamics of Rocky Mountain woodlands and Great Lakes forests during the past 10,000 years. These systems have experienced repeated species invasions and extinctions in response to changing temperature and precipitation. These case studies from the past tell us how climate change might affect ecosystems in the future. Jackson is committed to exploring the management, policy, and forecasting implications of long-term records of ecological and environmental change.
Restoration at a National Scale, Success Stories at the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service
Robert E. Snieckus
The USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service is celebrating its 75th anniversary of providing conservation to the nation’s private landowners. From a humble beginning as the Soil Erosion Service in the 1930’s Dust Bowl era, the NRCS of today relies on native populations for ecological restorations, habitat and energy. This talk will focus on three themes: the surprising changes to the American landscape documented by our newly released Natural Resource Inventory; techniques that help policy makers and stakeholders visualize what restoration projects might look like; and cost effective tools that can help quantify the success of large scale native plant installations.
Bob Snieckus is the National Landscape Architect with the USDA Natural Resources Conservation Service in Washington, DC. His work focus is on the ecological systems of landscapes, healthy, sustainable communities, and the impact new technologies have on environmental design. Utilizing charrettes, visual simulation, & multi-media, Bob facilitates the policy, planning, and design of restoration, flood reduction, recreation and wetland projects throughout the US.
Synthesis of Tuesday Luncheon Discussions
Tom Kaye
Presentation (PDF)
Tom presents a summary and highlights resulting from Tuesday’s facilitated roundtable discussions on the Native Plant Materials Development process.
Tom Kaye is Executive Director of the Institute for Applied Ecology (IAE), a non-profit organization dedicated to conservation of native species and habitats through restoration, research and education. He is also a Courtesy Assistant Professor at Oregon State University. Tom has a BS from The Evergreen State College (1980), and MSc (1989) and PhD (2001) from Oregon State University. After working for Olympic National Park (1984-1987), he joined the Oregon Department of Agriculture’s Plant Conservation Biology Program (1988-2000) where he conducted research and contributed to policy for management of threatened and endangered plant species. He has served on the IUCN Species Survival Commission, Re-introduction Specialist Group. Tom’s current area of research includes endangered species reintroduction and response to climate change, exotic species invasion dynamics, prairie restoration, and population viability analyses. Much of his recent work has focused on conservation planning in Oregon.
