Climate Oversight

Hikers Could Soon Become Citizen Scientists in Climate Change Monitoring

2011-01-05T01:00:00Z

There's a mobile app for just about anything these days. From getting you to do more push-ups and track your calorie intake to sharing with your friends what you're watching on TV, smart phones have become a handy lifestyle tool. But they are becoming more than just that: they can also be used for the greater good.

Case in point, the National Park Service in 2009 launched an app that has created a small army of citizen scientists in the mountain range that bisects Los Angeles. "What's Invasive" educates users on the top six most invasive plants within the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area and asks hikers to snap and upload photos of the plants (GPS location is automated) to a public database. That has helped park rangers identify where the invasives are spreading, enabling them to destroy them before more harm is done in the park's 153,000 acres.

]]> The project's success had led to the app's expansion in other local areas such as Palos Verdes Pensinsula, Catalina Island and Channel Islands National Park, and further away in Hawaii, Washington D.C. and even Denmark.

Now that they have a taste of how useful crowdsourcing can be, officials are developing yet another app, this time to track the effects of climate change.

"We know climate change is happening," explained Christy Brigham, Chief of Planning, Science and Resource Management, "this is more to see how plants and animals are going to respond to that change."

Once again working with UCLA's Center for Embedded Network Sensing, an app to be released this year will enable hikers who routinely visit the same trail track a plant's life cycle, known as pheno phases (that is, from leaf out to flowering and so on).

What park scientists aim to see is if plants are going through seasonal changes differently--for example, are they flowering in the summer instead of spring?--and if so, find out if they are adapting or suffering.

"One of the plants we're concerned about are valley oaks because they are such a key element of our ecosystem," said Brigham of the big trees that create a places for animals to perch and food for insects (leaves) and mammals (acorns). Because the Los Angeles area is the southern end of valley oak distribution, climate stress is an issue "It would be a huge deal if we lost them," she noted.

The app is scheduled to be released in March.

Photo of Los Angeles in the distance from the Santa Monica Mountains by Flickr user szeke. It is used under a Creative Commons License.

A Promising Effort for the Endangered Yellow-Legged Frog

2011-01-04T23:15:03Z

Once ubiquitous to mountain ranges in Southern California, the yellow-legged frog today is estimated to have a wild population of about 150 adults. That's according to last week's NPR story on the latest efforts to save the endangered species, which has suffered a 90% population loss since the 1970s. Reasons include fire, floods and disease, but also a change in climate.

"In the last 15 years, it has gotten warmer in the winters," Geologist and director of the James San Jacinto Mountains Reserve Becca Fenwick told NPR. "It doesn't stay cold in the same way, so the storms don't build up and create a large snowpack at this elevation."

Scientists from the San Diego Zoo this winter freed 18 tadpoles into the wild in Riverside County's San Jacinto Mountains. "The initial success that we have had with tadpole survival is very encouraging, but the real test will be how many tadpoles survived through the harsh winter," said Frank Santana, a zoo research technician.

]]> Since 2006, the zoo's Institute for Conservation Research, along with several government partners, has been working to "establish populations of frogs back into the wild at sites where they were historically found." What that means is re-introducing them to more than 160 locations in Southern California. As of their last update, there were only nine known populations.

The image on this page was taken by flickr user Alessandro Catenazzi. It is used under a Creative Commons License.

Climate Oversight: Politics & Climate Research, Side by Side

2011-01-04T20:00:00Z

The next couple of years could be very interesting for climate policy. With the 112th Congress' Republican-controlled House, the Environmental Protection Agency and climate regulations will likely be put under the microscope (even some would like to see it swept off the plate). For example, incoming chair of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, Rep. Fred Upton of Michigan would like the EPA's proposed greenhouse gas regulations overturned outright.

]]> Closer to home, Southern California's Darrell Issa, who has stated his belief in zero-emission clean energy generation, promises to give a broad look at regulations put in place by bureaucracy. Climate could definitely be included in that, even if it didn't make his list of top six priorities for his House Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

While discussions about climate policy will surely be happening at the national level, climate-related research continues to happen right here in our own backyard. Southern California is located in one of the world's seven Mediterranean biomes, which are some of the rarest and most biologically diverse areas on the planet. Because of that, some experts say it could someday be a climate change hotspot.

Throughout the upcoming weeks and months, Climate Oversight will chronicle the climate debates our politicians engage in while detailing the stories of scientists and their research from the field. Please join us in this endeavor by suggesting stories, leaving comments on posts and following us on Facebook and Twitter.

The image on this page was taken by flickr user OrangeCounty_Girl. It is used under a Creative Commons License.