Taking the Pulse of Greater Yellowstone: Successes and Challenges in Sustaining a Wildland Ecosystem in the 21st Century
Andrew Hansen
Professor in the Department of Ecology, Director of the Landscape Biodiversity Lab,
MSU
Time and Location
Date: Monday, December 4, 2017
Time: 6 PM
Place: Hager Auditorium, Museum of the Rockies
A reception will follow the lecture in the museum lobby.
This lecture is co-sponsored by the Burton K. Wheeler Center for Public Policy.
Watch the video of Dr. Hansen's lecture
Summary
Yellowstone is famous for being the world's first national park, one of the largest temperate wildlands, including all native species, and a role model for wildlife management. But like wildlands globally, Yellowstone is facing increasing human pressure and climate change. Andrew Hansen will discuss the concept of "greater" in the moniker Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem, the impact of people in the wildlands, trends in vital signs of ecological health and ways forward in the coming century.
About the speaker
Hansen studies the interactions between abiotic factors such as climate, soils and topography, and human land use and biodiversity. From 2011 to 2016, he served as the lead principal investigator of NASA's Landscape Climate Change Vulnerability Project. This collaboration with the National Park Service, NASA and academic scientists and managers developed decision support tools that can be used to assess the vulnerability of ecosystems and species to climate and land use change and evaluate management options. He co-authored the book Climate Change in Wildlands: Pioneering Approaches to Science and Management, which was published in 2016. He teaches "Landscape Ecology and Management" and "Macrosystems Ecology" for the Department of Ecology.
The American West Lecture Series features experts from around the country discussing the history, literature and culture of the West; issues affecting the wildlife and fisheries of the region; and the West's geography, geology and resources. The series is co-sponsored by the Burton K. Wheeler Center and is a program of the Center for Western Lands and Peoples, an interdisciplinary research center within the MSU College of Letters and Science that is focused on the places and peoples of the Western United States and Canada.