Long-term monitoring of high-elevation white pine communities in Pacific West Region national parks
McKinney ST, Rodhouse T, Chow L, Latham P, Sarr D, Garrett L, Mutch L. 2011. Long-term monitoring of high-elevation white pine communities in Pacific West Region national parks. Pages 51-55. In Keane RE, Tomback DF, Murray MP, Sdhmidt CM (ed): The future of high-elevation, five-needle pines in Western North America: Proceedings of the High Five Symposium. Proceedings RMRS-P-63. Missoula, Montana. June 28-30, 2010. U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service. Rocky Mountain Research Station, Fort Collins, Colorado
This is an extended abstract from a poster presented at the High Five Symposium. It describes the objectives, approach, methods, and management applications for the high-elevation white pine monitoring protocol developed by three National Park Service Pacific West Region Inventory & Monitoring networks. National Park Service Inventory and Monitoring (I&M) networks conduct long-term monitoring to provide park managers information on the status and trends in key biological and environmental attributes (Vital Signs). Here we present an overview of a collaborative approach to long-term monitoring of high-elevation white pine forest dynamics among three Pacific West Region I&M networks: Klamath (KLMN), Sierra Nevada (SIEN), and Upper Columbia Basin (UCBN). Whitebark pine (Pinus albicaulis) is monitored in five national parks: Lassen Volcanic and Crater Lake in the KLMN, and Yosemite, Sequoia, and Kings Canyon in the SIEN. Foxtail pine (P. balfouriana) is monitored in Sequoia and Kings Canyon, and limber pine (P. flexilis) is monitored in Craters of the Moon in the UCBN (Figure 1). Previous but limited sampling efforts report relatively low levels of infection by the non-native pathogen, Cronartium ribicola (white pine blister rust). In the KLMN, up to 20 percent of whitebark pine trees were found to be rust infected during a 2000 survey (Murray and Rasmussen 2003). In 2009, the same general areas were surveyed again, and 25 percent of whitebark pine trees were rust infected; however 18 percent of the trees had cankers that were inactive, complicating current estimates of impact (KLMN unpublished report). Mountain pine beetle were largely responsible for a 5.4 percent decrease in whitebark pine since 2003 in the KLMN (Murray 2010). Several surveys report that less than 1 percent of sampled whitebark pine are rust infected in SIEN parks (Duriscoe and Duriscoe 2002; Maloney and others 2008; Das and Stephenson unpublished data). Rust was not found on foxtail or limber pine within plots in our parks; however, one infected foxtail pine was identified in Sequoia in 1995, and several infected limber pine trees were found in Craters of the Moon in 2006 (Duriscoe and Duriscoe 2002; McKinney and others submitted).
- Type
- Conference Proceeding Paper
- Authors
- McKinney, Shawn; Rodhouse, Tom; Chow, Les; Latham, Penelope; Sarr, Daniel; Garrett, Lisa; Mutch, Linda
- Units
- CRLA , CRMO , LAVO , SEKI , SIEN , YOSE
- Keywords
- Crater Lake National Park, Craters of the Moon National Monument and Preserve, foxtail pine, High-elevation Forest Monitor, high-elevation white pines, Klamath Network, Lassen Volcanic National Park, limber pine, Long-Term Monitoring, Mountain pine beetle, National Park Service, Pacific West Region, Pinus albicaulis, Pinus balfouriana, Pinus flexilis, Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks, Sierra Nevada Network, Upper Columbia Basin Network, White Pine Blister Rust, Whitebark Pine, Yosemite National Park