Aspen and the End of Snow
THE MAGAZINE
Aspen and the End of Snow
By NATHANIEL RICH Feb 2014
Can America's greatest mountain town save itself, and the rest of us, from global warming?
Aspen is running out of snow.
The ski season is a month shorter than it was 50 years ago. It will be nearly two weeks shorter still by 2030, and it will continue to shrink in subsequent decades. In the spring, wet slab avalanches – in which an entire slope slides slowly down a mountain, devouring the trees, rocks, and ski lifts in its path – will become increasingly common. The slope most prone to avalanches lies directly above Spar Gulch, an intermediate ski trail that is one of Aspen Mountain's main thoroughfares, and one of the only routes off the mountain. The beginner slopes will become pockmarked with rocks and turf, requiring snow machines to make up the difference. By 2100, should current conditions persist, there will no longer be any snow at the base of Aspen Mountain.
But Aspenites may not worry very much about skiing then. They will have larger concerns. As the mountain's snowpack shrinks, the waterways will languish. Streams will flow higher in midwinter, from January to March, but they will run dangerously low in June and July, threatening the survival of the riparian ecosystem – its brown and cutthroat trout, chorus frogs, aquatic snails, and backswimmers; the common muskrats, American beavers, and moose that drink from it; the olive-sided flycatchers, Brewer's sparrows, and bald eagles that roost on its banks; and the wetlands and forests it nourishes. Eighty percent of Colorado's wildlife needs access to a riparian habitat in order to survive, but today these habitats make up only 1 percent of the state's land. Aspenites also need access to waterways in order to survive – two frail mountain creeks, Castle and Maroon, provide the city with its water. During early spring and autumn, the creeks will flood more often, while during summer, when water demand from crops and residents is at its highest, they will be more likely to run dry. A 2006 report by the Aspen Global Change Institute concluded that the Roaring Fork River, the repository of all of the mountains' streams, "could be dried up in most years."
With less snowmelt, fighting the forest fires will be more difficult. During the first half of this century, fires are expected to burn as much as three times larger than in the previous half. In the second half of the century, the fires will be smaller but more frequent; they will occur, on average, every other year. But that is not taking into account the damage done by increased outbreaks of insect infestation. As fewer winter nights drop below freezing, the populations of gypsy moths and various types of bark-eating beetles will thrive. The Aspen study concluded that "the risk of unprecedented insect outbreaks could be one of the most dramatic effects of climate change on Aspen's forests." So far the Roaring Fork Valley has been spared the fires that have victimized so much of the West, but in recent years, a ravenous population of pine beetles has been busily preparing the lodgepole pines that surround Aspen for future conflagrations.
Many of the trees aren't waiting around for that eventuality, however. Species that thrive in cold temperatures and high altitudes, like firs and spruces, have begun migrating up the mountains, fleeing the increasingly inhospitable valley. "One might expect a slow creep of the tree line and vegetation upward," says Kevin Trenberth, a senior scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research's Climate Analysis Section. The dominant vegetation type will shift from taiga-tundra to boreal conifer forest. Aspen is even losing its aspens.
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much more sadness:
http://www.mensjournal.com/magazine/print-view/aspen-and-the-end-of-snow-20140117
= new reply since forum marked as read
The northeast is up to their assholes in snow!
