One of the biggest challenges facing resource managers today is not knowing exactly when, where, or how climate change effects will unfold. To help federal land managers address this need, the North Central CASC has been working with the National Park Service to pioneer an approach for incorporating climate science and scenario planning into NPS planning processes, in particular Resource Stewardship Strategies (RSS).

The purpose of this study was to understand how the U.S. Department of Interior’s federal land and resource managers and their stakeholders (i.e., NPS, BLM, FWS, BOR, BIA and tribes, among others) are experiencing and dealing with drought in their landscapes. The database is part of the Drought Risk and Adaptation in the Interior project.

The combination of climate change and altered disturbance regimes is directly and indirectly affecting plant communities by mediating competitive interactions, resulting in shifts in species composition and abundance. Dryland plant communities, defined by low soil water availability and highly variable climatic regimes, are particularly vulnerable to climatic changes that exceed their historical range of variability.

Fossil fuel and agriculture have increased atmospheric concentrations of the greenhouse gases carbon dioxide and methane, which have caused global air temperature to increase by almost 1- degree Celsius. In the absence of climate mitigation, over the next century human-driven climate change is expected to increase temperatures from pre-industrial levels by more than 2-degrees. Understanding the consequences of climate change on ecosystems and the services they provide are critical for guiding land management activities that aim to improve resiliency and to prevent species losses.

Preparing for and responding to drought requires integrating scientific information into complex decision making processes. In recognition of this challenge, regional drought early warning systems (DEWS) and related drought-information tools have been developed under the National Integrated Drought Information System (NIDIS). Despite the existence of many tools and information sources, however, the factors that influence if a tool(s) is (are) used, which tools are used, and how much benefit those tools provide remain poorly understood.

The purpose of this project was to estimate and map the probability that grassland converts to cropland in the northern plains and prairie region given potential climate change. This region provides critical breeding and migratory habitat for waterfowl and other wetland-dependent species, and is also a highly productive agricultural region. Generally, the regional effects projected by climate models are increasing temperatures and more variable precipitation, which could provide incentives for private landowners to convert native and managed grassland to intensive cropland.

Projected suitable habitat models were constructed in randomForest (R package, version 4.6-10) using a set of presence points for the species derived from element occurrence and herbarium records, together with temperature, precipitation, and soil variables. The current distribution used modeled historic period (1970-2000) climate variables from the appropriate matching GCM model run. These model parameters were then used with projected climate data to get future (2020-2050) modeled suitable habitat for each scenario.