Taking stock at Yellowstone

– Hotter, drier conditions have led to more severe wildfires in Yellowstone National Park, while growing numbers of visitors have harmed everything from prized hydrothermal features to its famed grizzly bears, the park said in a report.

Average temperatures in Yellowstone, which has been designated as both World Heritage and Biosphere Reserve sites by a United Nations panel, are exceeding historical norms even as climate change is blamed for a string of fires that have increased in size and which last longer, according to the study.

The 60-page “The state of Yellowstone vital signs and select park resources, 2017” report is one of just four compiled in the past decade.

They are designed to track one of the largest, nearly intact temperate ecosystems in the world.

Yellowstone is celebrated for geothermal areas that contain about half the world’s active geysers, as well as forests, mountains, meadows, rivers and lakes.

The report shows it has seen warmer summers with less moisture and shorter winters in recent years.

Researchers noted an increase in the size of wildfires that impact vegetation and degrade air quality and said the future holds more of the same. –Reuters

Pinedale