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One Stick at a Time: Climate Vulnerability & Forest Management in the West

Film Screening & Discussion

Beaver ponds on Lost Lake are storing water both on the surface and below

For the last year, Kent Woodruff, a retired US Forest Service biologist from Winthrop, has been engaging people across the west in discussions about what we can do to soften the impacts of climate change. As our already dry landscape and water resources become impacted by climate change, this topic will be increasingly relevant to our ecological and human communities.

Kent is concerned that all the resources we manage, including forests and rangelands, streams and rivers, roads and trails, sensitive plants, and our important recreation areas are all facing stress from climate change that increases each year. A new level of cooperation and conservation planning is needed in order to prepare for shifts in the intricate balance of ecological relationships. Now is the time to protect the biodiversity that makes our region so unique.

Kent worked for 41 years as a wildlife biologist. On Friday, November 3rd, 2017, he shared an independent film about the climate adaptation work that he has done with beavers, and the attempts of others in Washington to find some solutions to the impacts that continue to become more intense. Community members learned what biologists are doing in the Methow Valley, and the film served as a conversation starter to encourage sharing of thoughts about what can be done to make our landscapes more resilient to climate change.

For those really eager to get as much climate change-related info as possible, you can subscribe to the Climate and Biodiversity Digest by Lance Olsen. If you prefer to subscribe via email: climateandbiodiversity-request@bigskynet.org.
Here are some examples of topics you will find on the Climate and Biodiversity Digest:

  1. How Americans Think About Climate Change, in Six Maps
  2. Lancet: Global Health Crisis and 1 Billion Climate Refugees by 2050 
  3. US politics: Some political humor 
  4. Bloomberg: War on solar scaled back 
  5. Forest Service muzzles Montana scientists blocked from discussing Climate & Wildfires 
  6. Current Climate Pledges won’t halt the heat at 2C (Lance Olsen)
  7. AGU: Isotopes, old water, groundwater –> forest’s flowing stream 
  8. EOS: IPCC Chair Discusses Limiting Global Warming to 1.5?C
  9. Registration open for November Conservation Psychology free webinar
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