COLEMAN, M.D., HINCKLEY, T.M., MCNAUGHTON, G., and SMIT, B.A. 1992. Root cold hardiness and native distribution of subalpine conifers. Can. J. For. Res. 22: 932-938. Root and needle cold hardiness were compared in seedlings of subalpine conifers to determine if differences existed among species originating from either cold continental climates or mild maritime climates. Ahies amabilis (Dougl.) ...

Six soil samples (Pantnagar, Chamoli, Almora, Ranichauri, Pithoragarh and Badrinath) belonging to different geographical locations of Western Himalayas in India, were analyzed to diversify the nitrogen fixing bacterial community using nifH gene biomarker DNA from soil samples were isolated and amplified using nifH gene specific primers. Genomic DNA and PCR amplified products were then individua...

We surveyed snowshoe hare (Lepus americanus) and mountain cottontail (Sylvilagus nuttallii) in coniferous forests in northern New Mexico. L. americanus was restricted to the Sangre de Cristo and San Juan ranges in a narrow band of elevations corresponding to subalpine coniferous forest. In contrast, S. nuttallii was widely distributed and virtually cosmopolitan, occupying a wide range of elevat...

New Guinea’s mountains provide an important case study for understanding early modern human environmental adaptability and early developments leading to agriculture. Evidence is presented showing that human colonization pre-dated 35ka (ka1⁄4 thousands of uncalibrated radiocarbon years before present) and was accompanied by landscape modification using fire. Sorties into the subalpine zone may h...

Woody plants are spreading in many alpine and subalpine ecosystems and are expected to continue increasing in response to land abandonment and global warming. This encroachment threatens species diversity, and considerable efforts have been deployed to control it. In this study, we combined a lattice model and field data to investigate the efficiency of different management strategies in contro...

Increased human land use has resulted in the increased homogenization of biodiversity between sites, yet we lack sufficient indicators to predict which species decline and the consequence of their potential loss on ecosystem services. We used comparative phylogenetic analysis to (1) characterize how increasing conversion of forest and grasslands to grazing pasturelands changes plant diversity a...

USDA Forest Service Proceedings RMRS-P-15-VOL-5. 2000 In: Cole, David N.; McCool, Stephen F.; Borrie, William T.; O’Loughlin, Jennifer, comps. 2000. Wilderness science in a time of change conference— Volume 5: Wilderness ecosystems, threats, and management; 1999 May 23– 27; Missoula, MT. Proceedings RMRS-P-15-VOL-5. Ogden, UT: U.S. Department of Agriculture, Forest Service, Rocky Mountain Resea...

Understanding the functional impacts of pollinator species losses on plant populations is critical given ongoing pollinator declines. Simulation models of pollination networks suggest that plant communities will be resilient to losing many or even most of the pollinator species in an ecosystem. These predictions, however, have not been tested empirically and implicitly assume that pollination e...

Ongoing climate warming has been demonstrated to impact the cryosphere in the Indian Himalayas, with substantial consequences for the risk of disasters, human well-being, and terrestrial ecosystems. Here, we present evidence that the warming observed in recent decades has been accompanied by increased snow avalanche frequency in the Western Indian Himalayas. Using dendrogeomorphic techniques, w...

The purpose of this study was to establish what effects soil trampling impacts may have had on tree growth and plant community succession at subalpine elevations in the North Cascade Mountains of Washington. While soil penetrability of an impacted site was not different from that of control sites, other soil characteristics were significantly different. Species diversity was greater at the impa...