Sierra Nevada Network

Monitoring: Vital Signs

Thirteen Vital Signs – Sierra Nevada Network

Below is more detailed information on the thirteen vital signs that the Sierra Nevada Network will pursue for protocol development. Several Vital Signs are grouped according to the wider ecosystem being studied. Current sampling designs and protocols are found in the Sierra Nevada Network: Vital Signs Monitoring Plan (2007).

Abbreviations:
SIEN   Sierra Nevada Network
DEPO  Devils Postpile National Monument
SEKI    Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Park
YOSE   Yosemite National Park

Weather and Climate
Snowpack
Surface Water Dynamics
Wetland (Meadow) Water Dynamics
Water Chemistry
Nonnative Invasive Plants
Forest Popluation Dynamics
Meadow and Wetland Plant Communities
Amphibians
Birds
Fire Regimes
Landscape Mosaics
Macroinvertebrates (Meadows / Wetlands)


Lakes: Surface Water Dynamics, Water Chemistry, Amphibians
Rivers and Streams
Vital Signs: Surface water dynamics, water chemistry, amphibians.

Justification: Sierra Nevada Network parks protect over 4,500 lakes and ponds and thousands of kilometers of rivers and streams that have some of the bestt water quality in the Sierra Nevada. High-elevation lakes are critical components of the parks’ ecosystems, popular visitor destinations, and habitat for declining amphibian species. We will be monitoring three indicators in high-elevation lake ecosystems: water chemistry, hydrology, and amphibians. Hydrological and water chemistry measures are good indicators of aquatic and terrestrial ecosystem condition and trend because they reflect changes within the larger watershed. High-elevation lakes of the Sierra Nevada are especially sensitive to change because the waters are oligotrophic and have very low buffering capacities. It is well documented that amphibians are sensitive to ecosystem changes, are easy and relatively inexpensive to monitor, and measurements are highly repeatable. The main stressors that impact Sierra Nevada lake ecosystems include anthropogenic nitrogen deposition, pesticide deposition, climate change, non-native fish, visitor use, and pathogens (i.e., chytridiomycosis—an infectious disease that affects amphibians). Changes in nutrient cycles and shifts in phytoplankton communities in Sierra Nevada lakes have already been detected and attributed to increased nitrogen and phosphorous inputs. Mountain yellow-legged frog (Rana muscosa) and Yosemite toad (Bufo canorus) populations are rapidly declining—they are candidates for listing as ‘endangered’. Change detected in high-elevation lakes can be an early warning indication of change that may eventually occur at other elevations and ecosystem types.
Parks: SEKI, YOSE

Monitoring Objectives:
Survey Sites:

1. Detect long-term trends in lake water chemistry for Sierra Nevada Network lakes.

• Temp, pH, sp. conductance, dissolved oxygen, acid neutralizing capacity
• Major ions: Ca, Na, Mg, K, Cl, SO4
• Nitrate, dissolved organic nitrogen, total dissolved nitrogen
• Total dissolved phosphorus
• Particulate nitrogen, particulate phosphorus, particulate carbon

2. Characterize Sierra Nevada Network lakes.
3. Determine the proportion of Sierra Nevada Network lakes above threshold values for selected constituents.
4. Detect long-term trends and abundance of high-elevation anurans, particularly mountain yellow-legged frog, Yosemite toad, and Pacific tree frog for Sierra Nevada Network lakes.

Rivers and Streams
Vital Signs: Surface water dynamics, water chemistry.

Justification: Sierra Nevada Network parks protect over 4,500 lakes and ponds and thousands of kilometers of rivers and streams that have some of the highest water quality in the Sierra Nevada. Water resources are critical components of the parks’ ecosystems and popular visitor recreation and camping destinations. Hydrological and water chemistry measures are good indicators of aquatic and terrestrial ecosystem condition and trends because they reflect changes within the larger watershed. The stressors of greatest concern to the parks’ flow regimes and water quality are climate change, altered fire regimes, air pollution (i.e. nitrogen and pesticide deposition), and local impacts from visitor use and park operations.

Park: DEPO, SEKI, YOSE

Monitoring Objectives:
The Network will identify specific monitoring objectives in fall of 2007 when the Rivers and Streams protocol development begins.

Weather and Climate
Vital Signs: Weather and climate, snowpack.

Justification: Climatic forces are a major driver of Sierra Nevada ecosystems. Current patterns of vegetation, water dynamics, and animal distribution in the Sierra are determined largely by cumulative effects of past and present climates. Not surprisingly, anthropogenic climate change is the stressor that is predicted to have the most pronounced effects on Sierra Nevada ecosystems. Changes attributed to climate change have already been observed in Sierra Nevada---peak spring stream flows begin a week to almost three weeks earlier than they did in the mid 20th century (Cayan et al. 2001, Dettinger 2005) and glacial extent has declined markedly in the past several decades (Basagic in progress). A recent resurvey of vertebrate transects in Yosemite that were originally surveyed in 1911-1920 suggests that a warming climate may be affecting animal distributions. Elevational shifts were observed in ground squirrels, alpine chipmunks, and pika (Patton 2006). Weather and climate monitoring information will enable managers to better track climate change in Sierra Nevada parks and its effects on park resources. Weather and climate information will also enable us to better explain trends observed in other vital signs.

Park: DEPO, SEQU, KICA, and YOSE

Monitoring Objectives:

The Network will identify specific monitoring objectives in fall 2007 upon completion of a Climate Monitoring Assessment project the Network established with the Western Regional Climate through the Great Basin CESU. The purpose of this project is to assess the current climate monitoring Network in Sierra Nevada parks, provide the necessary analyses, and make recommendations on how the Sierra Nevada Network can best allocate its resources to enhance weather and climate monitoring.

Meadow Ecological Integrity: Wetland (meadow) Water Dynamics, Meadow and Wetland Plant Communities , Macroinvertebrates (Meadows)
Vital Signs: Wetland water dynamics, meadow plant communities, meadow invertebrates.

Justification: Meadow wetlands are of ecological importance disproportionate to their size. They are areas of high net productivity, high species diversity, and serve important physical and chemical functions such as nutrient uptake, sediment trapping, and habitat for wildlife. Meadows produce food for wildlife both within the meadows and adjacent upland areas. Meadows are important to park visitors for their wildlife, wildflower displays, overall aesthetic qualities, and as forage for recreational pack stock. Meadows are fragile and may be impacted from many different stressors that include grazing (contemporary from pack stock and alterations caused by historic grazing practices with cattle and sheep), invasive plants and animals, trampling (human and stock), atmospheric nutrient deposition, agricultural contaminant deposition, global warming, disturbance (human and stock), habitat fragmentation from trails, altered hydrology from trails and roads, non-native diseases, and loss of sediment due to altered fire regime in adjacent upland areas. Meadows were selected for monitoring because of their ecological significance, fragility, and because they are represented well across the Sierra Network landscape in montane, subalpine, and alpine areas and in all sizes from small to large. National Wetland Inventory maps show that over 14,000 meadow wetlands occur within the Network.

Park: DEPO, SEKI, YOSE

Monitoring Objectives:

1. Determine temporal changes in species composition and abundance of meadow vascular and non-vascular flora, including changes in exposed bare ground.
2. Determine temporal changes in the composition and relative abundance of above-ground meadow invertebrate populations at the level of Family (Order when necessary for efficiency) except for identifying ants to species.
3. Determine temporal changes in hydrology including the duration, depth, and timing of surface and ground water.
4. Document temporal changes in wet meadow geomorphic process to include sediment flux into meadows and meadow soil density for sentinel sites and morphology and condition of meadow streams at all sites.
5. Document temporal changes in electrical conductivity and water temperature of meadow water.
6. Document temporal changes in coarse measures of anthropogenic influences to meadows.

For each of the objectives, the protocols will be designed to detect at least a 20 percent decadal change with 80 percent power.

Landscape Dynamics: Landscape Mosaics, Snowpack
Vital Signs: landscape mosaics, fire regimes, snowpack, glaciers.

Justification: Regional science has identified habitat fragmentation, invasive species, altered fire regimes, pollution, and climate change as the five primary threats to Sierra Nevada systems. The parks of the Sierra Nevada Network help to protect one of the nation’s and the world’s most biotically unique and diverse locations; the region is identified as a global biodiversity hotspot. In accordance with this recognition, resource managers of the Sierra Nevada Network parks must document and assess landscape changes. To assess change, the landscape components and dynamics to be monitored will include land use, vegetated land cover mosaic and condition, fire occurrence, snow cover extent and duration, and extent of glaciers and permanent snow fields. Fire regimes and climate are the most important ecosystem drivers in the Sierra Nevada. While monitoring of climate is a separate protocol, we have included monitoring fire regimes in the landscape dynamics protocol due to the direct effects of fire on plant community composition and structure. Fire regime characteristics (such as size, frequency, and severity) are sensitive to changes in climate regime and will influence vegetation pattern (including patch and gap dynamics).

Remote sensing of land use patterns offers a relatively rapid and cost effective method to assess large and small spatial scale changes in the landscape. There are two primary justifications for wanting to monitor the change in landscape dynamics or mosaics over time. One is to document the change where and when it occurs, informing response to crises or directing managers to areas of heightened concern. Collected data and analysis will allow for the preparation of scientific responses to environmental change. The second is to use data to build models of predicted future landscape mosaic patterns, allowing managers to better prepare for and then manage for ecosystem changes that are likely to affect processes, systems, and individual species.

Parks: DEPO, SEKI, YOSE

Monitoring Objectives:

The objectives are to answer the following questions

1. How is land cover and land use changing over time? Describe landscape pattern (status and trends) in and outside park of the mosaic (extent, size distribution, etc). Include both vegetation and abiotic land cover (snow and rock).
2. How are the landscape units changing in distribution and abundance over time? Monitor the status and trends of landscape composition (abitoic and vegetation types) in space and time (richness, evenness, etc).
3. How is the condition of plant communities or vegetation alliances changing in space and time? Monitor vegetation condition using several remotely sensed metrics (NDVI, LAI, FPAR).
4. Monitor fire occurrence (location and spatial extent), severity, and fire type annually, and the temporal nature of fire events (including ignition and area burned seasonally) intra-annually. This will provide information to determine trends in fire return interval and fire size.
5. How is the spatial extent and duration of snow cover changing over time?

How is vegetation phenology changing over time? Monitor changes in the timing of leafout and duration of growing season.

Forest Dynamics
Vital Signs: Forest tree population dynamics, lichen communities, or specific taxon Bryoria fremontii (which will be considered as an additional vital sign if feasible).

Justification: Forests occupy a significant portion of the vegetated area of Sierra Nevada parks, and giant sequoias are part of the enabling legislation for the parks’ establishment. Forest tree population dynamics, or primarily, establishment, growth and death rates of trees are sensitive to changes in two major drivers in the Sierra Nevada: climate and fire. While there are other aspects of forest vegetation we will consider monitoring (e.g., lichen communities), we focus primarily on forest tree population dynamics because: 1) there is a successful track record of doing this kind of work already in these parks, and a wealth of baseline data exists; 2) forest tree population dynamics data are interpretable, and changes are often closely tied to drivers and/or stressors whose effects we seek to better understand (fire, climate, pollution and non-native species); and 3) trees comprise a keystone life form, creating the array of microclimates and habitats that entrain other ecosystem components and processes (such as wildlife and hydrology). Forests provide humans with irreplaceable resources and services; climatic change will profoundly affect forests; and forests may profoundly affect climatic change because they sequester the majority of the terrestrial biosphere’s carbon, and they affect surface albedo and the hydrologic cycle.

Parks: SEKI, YOSE (DEPO to be included if species selected for monitoring occur in the monument).

Monitoring Objectives:
Giant sequoia, sugar pine, and whitebark pine were the species initially identified as highest priority.

1. Determine trends in populations of selected tree species (birth, growth, death rates). Add growth form to this list if monitoring whitebark pine.
2. Monitor trends in causes of tree death.
3. Monitor trends in white pine blister rust prevalence in five-needle pine populations.

Evaluate feasibility of adding this objective/vital sign:

Detect changes in the relative abundance of selected lichen taxa. [Bryoria fremontii, macrolichen communities in several vegetation types].

Fire Regimes

The parks' fire monitoring programs began in 1982 for Sequoia & Kings Canyon, 1978 for Yosemite and 1992 for Devils Postpile. The programs in Sequoia & Kings Canyon and Yosemite initially focused on monitoring weather and fire behavior, vegetation, and dead and down surface fuels in giant sequoia groves and other early experimental prescribed burns in mixed-conifer forests. Over time, the monitoring programs expanded to other plant communities as the prescribed fire programs progressed. In recent years, Sierra Nevada fire-monitoring programs have broadened to include additional vegetation, wildlife, water, and/or fire regime components. Devils Postpile does not currently have a Fire and Fuels Management Plan (NPS, in progress); however, fire effects monitoring plots were established in association with a 1992 wildfire that burned approximately twothirds of the monument.

Monitoring environmental and fire condition provides information to guide fire management strategies for both wildland and prescribed fires; such monitoring encompasses a wide variety of fire topics, including

• environmental and fire conditions
• fire effects on vegetation and fuels
• mechanical fuels-treatment monitoring
• fire effects on animals
• fires effects on water
• fire regimes, restoration, baseline fire history

In addition to fire-related monitoring conducted by SIEN park staff, USGS-Western Ecological Research Center staff at both Sequoia and Kings Canyon and Yosemite Field Stations have contributed a huge amount of fire-related monitoring in SIEN parks and the greater Sierra Nevada region. USGS projects in our parks are an integral part of NPS resource management information and decision-making.

Landbirds
Vital Signs: Landbirds.

Justification: Increasingly, birds are perceived as appropriate indicator species of local and regional change in terrestrial ecosystems. Sierra Nevada Network parks together provide over 1,600,000 acres of habitat for over 200 species of birds, including many neotropical migrants. SEKI, YOSE and a few other large habitat areas in the Sierra Nevada have been designated by the American Bird Conservancy as Globally Important Bird Areas (IBA). The aim of the IBA Program is to identify and conserve key sites for birds. Analysis of North American Breeding Bird Survey data indicates that numerous bird species exhibit declining long-term population trends in the Sierra Nevada region.

Parks: DEPO, SEKI, YOSE

Monitoring Objectives:
The landbird workgroup will be meeting during Spring 2007 to refine its monitoring objectives and review funding alternatives.

1. Determine status or trends in abundance (density) and frequency of occurrence in birds in SIEN parks during the breeding season.

• Make park-level inference on changes in density and frequency of occurrence of widely distributed species in the Sierra Nevada to describe SIEN patterns, variation, and differences between parks.

If funding for landbirds is limited due to other vital sign priorities, the Network may instead:

2. Make SIEN-level inference in density and frequency of occurrence for subalpine, riparian, wetland, and other habitat-specialist species.

Non-native Plants
Vital Signs: non-native plants.

Justification: Invasive non-native plants can bring about significant changes in ecosystems by changing structural attributes of native plant communities (physiognomy, species composition, genetic diversity) and the processes that support them (fire, nutrient cycling, hydrology, soil erosion, decomposition). There are over 200 non-native plant taxa in Sierra Nevada Network parks, and new introductions continue to occur. Many of these taxa are invasive, or a threat to native plant and animal communities—they compete for space and resources, and often do not meet the same habitat needs of animals as do native plants. However, vast areas of the Network parks are free of invasive plants, and the highest invasive plant management priority for each of the parks is to prevent new introductions to these weed-free areas, to detect new introductions early in the invasion process, and to provide rapid eradication response. This protocol will provide parks with a systematic, efficient procedure for detecting new introductions.

Parks: DEPO, SEKI, YOSE

Monitoring Objectives:

1. Periodically review park weed management databases and update NPSpecies with new taxa not yet vouchered and documented. From NPSpecies, update each park’s non-native species list, using a defined set of criteria for inclusion, and evaluate changes.
2. Create and periodically update a “watch list” of species that are not present in the parks but are known to exist in the region or to have the potential to become problematic in the region.
3. Create and periodically update early detection monitoring priorities for species in the non-native and watch lists using a transparent, documented system.
4. Compile and periodically update polygons of weed-free areas, high-value resources areas, and naturally-disturbed areas, from a defined set of criteria, using existing information.
5. Within the polygons defined in Objective 4, detect (1) watch-list species and (2) new populations of priority species already present in the parks through either (a) complete search/census, or (b) sampling within search frames narrowed by selection criteria based on vectors, environmental factors, and other susceptibility measures.

Expand scope of personnel searching for watch-list species by developing SOPs and training materials to be included in other I&M protocols, in wilderness ranger duties, and in other park staff and volunteer efforts as appropriate.

Current planning status is found in the Sierra Nevada Network: Vital Signs Monitoring Plan.

Learn More

Climate Change
Habitat Fragmentation and Human Use
Altered Fire Regime
Air Contaminants and Atmospheric Deposition
Non-native Species
New Climate Monitoring Station at Devils Postpile National Monument