Ecological Transition and Biodiversity Management

Photo by William Bowman

Ecological transition is a concept that aims to put in place a new social and economic model in order to respond intelligently to ecological challenges.

Biodiversity management recognizes that we need a host of organisms in order to maintain soil health and provide food and other essentials for communities

Pilot Study : Consequences of fuel reduction management on carbon drawdown, biological diversity.

A core project needed to support multiple goals of our study involves estimating and measuring carbon responses to management and fire.  To do this we will use the Community Terrestrial Systems Model (CTSM).  This is the terrestrial component of the Community Earth System Model that is used for global-scale climate change projections. The model can also be used for weather forecasting and ecological predictions at local and regional-scale applications. CTSM is developed in Boulder at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) with collaborations from the university research community, including faculty at CU Boulder.  Notably, CTSM provides a numerical platform to represent landscape ecohydrological function and variability in mountainous regions, simulate ecosystem responses to climate change and disturbance, and investigate ecosystem C sequestration potential under different management options. The model has been applied successfully elsewhere (Gray et al. 2021; Newman et al. 2021; Cheng et al. 2022) and is being used by our high elevation research site, the NWT LTER site, and in a local subalpine site by Musselman, a participant on the CIVIC project. This effort will be used across forest, savanna, and grassland landscapes, and will be explored at a tool to assess soil responses to regenerative agriculture.

Get Involved with the Boulder Pollinator Garden Project - The city runs programs to encourage the creation of high quality pollinator habitats throughout Boulder, both on public and private properties