Lake Clark National Park and Preserve: Natural Resource Condition Assessment

Zanon, Jacob; Komp, Mike; Meinke, Lonnie; Nadeau, Andy; Randerson, Matthew; Robertson, Andrew; Drazkowski, Barry

The Natural Resource Condition Assessment (NRCA) Program aims to provide documentation about the current conditions of important park natural resources through a spatially explicit, multi-disciplinary synthesis of existing scientific data and knowledge. Findings from the NRCA will help Lake Clark National Park and Preserve (LACL) managers to develop near-term management priorities, engage in watershed or landscape scale partnership and education efforts, conduct park planning, and report program performance (e.g., Department of the Interior’s Strategic Plan “land health” goals, Government Performance and Results Act). The objectives of this assessment are to evaluate and report on current conditions of key park resources, to evaluate critical data and knowledge gaps, and to highlight selected existing stressors and emerging threats to resources or processes. For the purpose of this NRCA, staff from the National Park Service (NPS) and Saint Mary’s University of Minnesota – GeoSpatial Services (SMUMN GSS) identified key resources, referred to as “components” in the project. The selected components include natural resources and processes that are currently of the greatest concern to park management at LACL. The final project framework contains 14 resource components, each featuring discussions of measures, stressors, and reference conditions. This study involved reviewing existing literature and, where appropriate, analyzing data for each natural resource component in the framework to provide summaries of current condition and trends in selected resources. When possible, existing data for the established measures of each component were analyzed and compared to designated reference conditions. A weighted scoring system was applied to calculate the current condition of each component. Weighted Condition Scores, ranging from zero to one, were divided into three categories of condition: low concern, moderate concern, and significant concern. These scores help to determine the current overall condition of each resource. The discussions for each component, found in Chapter 4 of this report, represent a comprehensive summary of current available data and information for these resources, including unpublished park information and perspectives of park resource managers, and present a current condition designation when appropriate. Each component assessment was reviewed by LACL resource managers, NPS Southwest Alaska Network (SWAN) staff, or outside experts. Existing literature, short- and long-term datasets, and input from NPS and other outside agency scientists support condition designations for components in this assessment. However, in some cases, data were unavailable or insufficient for several of the measures of the featured components. In other instances, data establishing reference condition were limited or unavailable for components, making comparisons with current information inappropriate or invalid. In these cases, it was not appropriate or not possible to assign condition for the components. Current condition was not able to be determined for 5 of the 14 components (35%) due to these data gaps. For those components with sufficient available data, the overall condition varied. Four components were determined to be of low concern: brown bear, Dall’s sheep, bald eagles, and salmon. One component, moose, was of moderate concern. Three components were considered to be of high concern; caribou, climate, and glaciers. Detailed discussion of these designations is presented in Chapters 4 and 5 of this report. Several park-wide threats and stressors influence the condition of priority resources in LACL. Those of primary concern include human use impacts and climate change. Understanding these threats, and how they relate to the condition of park resources, can help the NPS prioritize management objectives and better focus their efforts to maintain the health and integrity of the park ecosystem, as well as its cultural landscape.

Lake Clark National Park and Preserve: Natural Resource Condition Assessment

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