Page 10 - Flathead Beacon // 4.22.15

10 | APRIL 22, 2015 NEWS FLATHEADBEACON.COM
Glacier Park Stonefly Threatened by Climate Change
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7th
Montana’s ranking among the top states committed to locally produced foods. The ranking was based on the number of farmers markets, community supported agriculture operations, farm-to-school program participation, cooperatively owned food hubs and the per capita value of direct-to- the-public food sales by farmers.
$300
Citation for anyone believed to be driving under the influence who refuses to submit to a drug test following the Legislature’s approval of a new law toughening the state’s DUI penalties.
1.4 million
Paper cups used during the Boston Marathon, which took place on April 20, two years after terrorists bombed the event, killing three people and wounding more than 260 others.
Wildlife advocates seeking protections for rare aquatic insect dependent on melting glaciers
By TRISTAN SCOTT of the Beacon
Wildlife advocates say one of Glacier National Park’s most obscure species is on the brink of extinction, and has become a veritable canary in the coal mine of a rare mountain ecosystem threatened by cli- mate change.
While the western glacier stonefly doesn’t loom as large as some of North America’s charismatic megafauna, which often capture attention in discussions about a warming world – polar bears, griz- zlies, wolverines – the tiny aquatic insect has been grabbing headlines due to its de- pendence on high-alpine, glacier-fed melt- water streams in Glacier Park, making it the new poster-bug of global warming.
The western glacier stonefly, or Zapa- da glacier, lives exclusively in cold-water streams fed by Glacier Park’s melting gla- ciers and snowfields, and a recent study by government researchers in the park links the insect’s survival directly to the fast-de- clining glaciers.
On April 15, wildlife advocates with the Center for Biological Diversity asked a judge to force federal officials to de- cide if a rare aquatic insect that’s found only in Montana’s Glacier National Park should be protected under the Endan- gered Species Act.
“Protection can’t come soon enough for this stonefly,” said Tierra Curry, a senior scientist at the Center for Biological Diversity. “Glacier National Park will have no glaciers in 15 years if we don’t take action to curb climate change. The plight of the glacier stonefly is a wakeup call that, unless the United States takes major action to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions, this special insect and more than one-third of all plants and animals on Earth could go extinct
by 2050.”
Western glacier stoneflies were first
identified by scientists in 1963. They live in five streams fed by cold water from glaciers in northwest Montana, on the east side of the Continental Divide. Those glaciers are predicted to vanish by 2030 – in part because of warmer temperatures due to climate change – and researchers say the stoneflies also could disappear.
In the lawsuit, the Center for Biologi- cal Diversity said the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service failed to follow through on a 2011 finding that protections might be needed for the insects. Although the FWS deter- mined that Endangered Species Act protec- tions might be warranted for the stonefly, the agency still hasn’t issued a decision on the petition.
The group has asked U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan in Washington, D.C., to de- clare the agency violated federal law by not issuing a final determination on whether the species should be listed as threatened or endangered.
Joe Giersch, a U.S. Geological Survey scientist based in Glacier National Park, recently led a study linking the insect’s survival to the fast-declining glaciers, and continues to research their distribution in Glacier’s high-alpine terrain.
In the study, Giersch and researchers with Bucknell University and the Univer- sity of Montana used data spanning from 1960 to 2012 to illustrate habitat range con- tractions of the western glacier stonefly as- sociated with glacial recession.
Giersch said Glacier is home to numer- ous cold-water dependent aquatic species that are at risk of extinction due to the loss ofpermanentsnowandice,andunderthe specter of a warming climate, the biodiver- sity of not just those species, but aquatic al- pine species worldwide, is threatened.
Still, he said, their habitat warrants further species, and the concern should not be focused on a single studies because the threat is representative of an entire, unique ecosystem.
“More research is urgently needed to assess the extent to which climate change
threatens the persistence of [the western glacier stonefly] and other endemic moun- taintop invertebrates and communities in GNP and worldwide,” Giersch said.
“We have been working with the Fish and Wildlife Service to do more work on the species, which we will be doing this summer to get a better idea of the distri- bution of the stonefly in Glacier National Park,” he added.
Since 1900, the mean annual temperature in Glacier National Park has increased by about 2.5 degrees Fahrenheit – nearly two times the global mean temperature increase. Of the estimated 150 glaciers in the park in 1850, only 25 remain, and they continue to shrink.
Clint Muhlfeld, an aquatic ecologist with the USGS, said the stonefly’s contract- ing habitat means action to mitigate the ef- fects of climate change on the species is im- perative.
“Survival of these species will require dispersal to suitable habitats via upstream range shifts or migration to other streams. However, there is nowhere to go for these species - it’s squeeze play at the top of the Continent,” Muhlfeld said. “Dispersal to other suitable sites that may be tens to hundreds of kilometers from Z. glacier’s current range is highly improbable, so as- sisted migration may be the only manage- ment option to prevent extirpation and ex- tinction.”
According to the Center for Biological Diversity, stoneflies are excellent indica- tors of the health of their freshwater habi- tats. Extremely sensitive to changes in wa- ter quality, they are among the first organ- isms to disappear from degraded rivers and streams.
Despite their importance, these in- sects are one of the most imperiled groups of animals in North America: More than 40 percent of all stoneflies are vulnerable to extinction because they are especially sensitive to pollution, according to the center, which petitioned for the stonefly with the Xerces Society for Invertebrate Conservation.
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