Resources

LCCs have produced a wealth of informational documents, reports, fact sheets, webinars and more to help support resource managers in designing and delivering conservation at landscape scales.

Vulnerability Factors Affecting Soils

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Vulnerability Factors Affecting Soils

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Using Soil Vulnerability to Predict Changes in Vegetation Cover in Response to Climate Change

Date posted: June 25, 2019
Potential for vegetation change on sensitive soils (MIRCO Medres scenarios) for 2041 to 2050 in the Southern Rockies LCC, USA.
Date posted: June 25, 2019

Globally, ecosystemsare subjected toprolonged droughts and extremeheat events, leading to forest die-offs and dominance shifts in vegetation. Some scientists and managers view soil as the main resource to be considered in monitoring ecosystem responses to aridification. As the mediumthroughwhich precipitation is received, stored, and redistributed for plant use, soil is an important factor in the sensitivity of ecosystems to a drying climate.

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Shallow Soils

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Shallow Soils

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Soils with High Risk of Water Erodibility

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Soils with High Risk of Water Erodibility

Date posted: June 25, 2019

High Wind Erodibility Groups

Date posted: June 25, 2019

High Wind Erodibility Groups

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Low Available Water Storage Capacity

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Low Available Water Storage Capacity

Date posted: June 25, 2019

MC2 projections of historic potential vegetation types (1971-2000)

Date posted: June 25, 2019

MC2 projections of potential vegetation types for (2041 to 2050) under the MIROC3 GCM scenarios.

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Drought sensitive soils SRLCC North vulnerability map

Date posted: June 25, 2019

High Percent Calcium Carbonate

Date posted: June 25, 2019

High Percent Gypsum Content of Soils - SSURGO SRLCC North - Vulnerability

Date posted: June 25, 2019

High Sodium Absorption Ratio

Date posted: June 25, 2019

High Sodium Absorption Ratio - SSURGO SRLCC South

Date posted: June 25, 2019

High Percent Gypsum Content of Soils

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Drought sensitive soils SRLCC South vulnerability map

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Potential for vegetation change on sensitive soils (CSIRO scenarios) for 2041 to 2050 in the Southern Rockies LCC, USA.

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Data from this research are publicly accessible on databasin.org. The goals of the project included: 

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Alkaline Soils

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Alkaline Soils

Date posted: June 25, 2019

MC2 projections of potential vegetation types for (2041 to 2050) under the CGCM3 GCM scenarios.

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Potential for vegetation change on sensitive soils (CGCM3 scenarios) for 2041 to 2050 in the Southern Rockies LCC, USA.

Date posted: June 25, 2019
MC2 projections of potential vegetation types for (2041 to 2050) under the CSIRO GCM scenarios.
Date posted: June 25, 2019

Acidic Soils

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Acidic Soils

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Potential for vegetation change on sensitive soils (consensus of 8 scenarios) for 2041 to 2050 in the Southern Rockies LCC, USA

Date posted: June 25, 2019

This report reviews tree mortality rates in stands of mature Fremont cottonwood (Populus fremontii Wats.) along streams and rivers in semiarid and arid portions of the western United States.  Along rivers where floodplains lack younger, replacement forest patches, these rates will determine how fast existing dryland riparian woodland and forest habitats used by migratory birds and other wildlife will shrink or disappear.  I first review longevity and mortality rates in trees, emphasizing cottonwoods and poplars in the genus Populus, and then use these data and the observed

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Within the last quarter Siglo has: Substantially completed model build parametrization, and testing; Further developed the final model and report; and Presented the status of the project to stakeholders in Utah. Please see a copy of draft methods below. In addition, we have attached a copy of the presentation.

Date posted: June 25, 2019

SRLCC Cottonwood Stand Dynamics Geodatabase

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Springs—ecosystems where groundwater reaches the Earth's surface—are among the most biologically, socio-culturally, and economically important water resources (Stevens and Meretsky 2008). Many endangered species, and numerous rare or endemic species of plants, invertebrates, amphibians, and fish are found only at springs in the United States. Springs are highly sacred to indigenous cultures that use them for water supplies, medicinal, ceremonial, and other purposes.

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Trout Unlimited will extend its existing Adopt-a-Trout program to the Henrys Fork River, a tributary to the Green River in the Colorado River basin. The project will include work with the Wyoming Game and Fish Department and local schools to tag and monitor Colorado River Cutthroat trout movements to learn more about fish passage issues, areas of high entrainment, habitat use, and native and wild trout migratory patterns.

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Climate change and wildfire are interacting to drive vegetation change and potentially reduce water quantity and quality in the southwestern US. Forest restoration is a management approach that could mitigate some of these negative outcomes. However, little information exists on how fuel treatments combined with climate change might influence hydrology across large forest landscapes that incorporate multiple vegetation types and complex fire regimes.

Date posted: June 25, 2019

The Shivwits Band of the Paiute Indian Tribe of Utah (PITU) has recognized the need to

identify and assess the potential impacts of landscape-level stressors, such as climate change

and drought, on tribal and ancestral lands and resources, such as water resources and

culturally significant species and the habitats and ecosystems that support them. With

funding from the Southern Rockies Landscape Conservation Cooperative, the Shivwits hired

Barbara Dugelby1 of Round River Conservation Studies to conduct the assessment and

Date posted: June 25, 2019

The restoration of historical fire regimes is often a primary objective in the conservation of fire-adapted forests. However, individual species’ responses to future climate change may uncouple historical vegetation–disturbance relationships, producing potentially negative ecological consequences to fire restoration. We used a landscape simulation model to assess how forest pattern will respond to future climate regimes and whether the restoration of historical fire regimes will benefit forest conservation under future climate regimes.

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Three webinars presented by the Springs Stewardship Institute.

Date posted: June 25, 2019

This document summarizes research conducted to develop and apply climate

analysis tools toward a better understanding of the past and future of climate variability in

the state of Utah. Two pilot studies developed analysis tools through the investigation of

natural variability in precipitation systems in Africa, and research into long-term changes

and trends in spring rainfall over the U.S. Great Plains. Our third study used tree-ring

data to estimate snowpack in the state of Utah to 1850, doubling the length of record and

Date posted: June 25, 2019

The main purpose of this project was illustrated in Figure 1 of the original proposal, which is copied here.  In that figure, the projection of water supply for the Colorado River in the 21st century is frequently portrayed as a ‘smeared future’, confused by large uncertainties in the output from the CMIP5 model ensembles (Colorado River Basin Water Supply and Demand Study released by the Bureau of Reclamation in January 2013).

Date posted: June 25, 2019

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between canopy density and optimal

snowpack conditions. In order to perform this investigation, the physically-based snow energy

model, Southwestern Forest Snow Energy Model (SFSEM), was developed. Modeling of

snowpack dynamics was completed with SFSEM for 1070 forest stands in the Valles Caldera

National Preserve (VCNP). The modeling exercise was performed for the December 2015 to

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Interactive maps of springs distribution and analysis of the Southern Rockies LCC.

 

Date posted: June 25, 2019

Snowpack observations in the Intermountain West are sparse and short, making them

difficult for use in depicting past variability and extremes. This study presents a reconstruction

of April 1 snow water equivalent (SWE) for the period of 1850–1989 using increment cores

collected by the U.S. Forest Service, Interior West Forest Inventory and Analysis program (FIA).

In the state of Utah, SWE was reconstructed for 38 snow course locations using a combination of

Date posted: June 25, 2019

This reports summarizes work and key findings to date from the Upper RIO Grande Basin SNOwfall Measurement and streamFLOW (RIO-SNO-FLOW) Forecasting Improvement Project conducted from Jan. 1, 2014 through Dec. 31, 2015. The project area was centered over the upper mainstem Rio Grande and Conejos River basins in southern Colorado. This report is organized into 7 chapters that detail the major elements of the project including; a Project Description, NOAA Gap-filling Radar, NASA Airborne Snow Observatory, In-Situ Ground Observations, Distributed Hydrologic Modeling, and Community Engagement.

Date posted: June 13, 2019

Since the last reporting period, the project team has been focused on conducting spatial analyses of habitat complexity at tributary junctions and finalizing the decision support model and report on the Colorado River. The decision support model was completed and report finalized and designed to inform restoration opportunities on the Colorado River corridor in Utah. The final draft of the CO report is awaiting final USGS review and layout for publication as an Open File Report. Results of the study were presented at the USGS River Restoration workshop in Flagstaff, AZ, June 23-24.

Date posted: June 13, 2019

This project had two primary goals: 1) To develop a process for integrating data from multiple sources to improve predictions of climate impacts for wildlife species; and 2) To provide data on climate and related hydrological change, fire behavior under future climates, and species’ distributions for use by researchers and resource managers.

Date posted: June 13, 2019

Future expected changes in climate and human activity threaten many riparian habitats, particularly in the southwestern U.S. Using Maximum Entropy (MaxEnt3.3.3) modeling, we characterized habitat relationships and generated spatial predictions of habitat suitability for the Lucy’s warbler (Oreothlypis luciae), the Southwestern willow flycatcher (Empidonaxtraillii extimus) and the Western yellow-billed cuckoo (Coccyzus americanus).

Date posted: June 13, 2019