Headwaters

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Bonus | How the Going-to-the-Sun Road Got Its Name, and More! Jun 27, 2025

Show notes

How did the Going-to-the-Sun Road get its name? What's the difference between "the east side" and East Glacier? Take a shallow dip into place names of Glacier in this short bonus episode. Send us your questions for future episodes at glac_media_lab@nps.gov with the subject "Headwaters."

Glacier Conservancy: glacier.org Frank Waln music: www.instagram.com/frankwaln Stella Nall art: stellanall.com

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TRANSCRIPT:

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[mellow beat playing]

Peri Sasnett: Welcome to Headwaters. This is a science and history show from Glacier National Park.

Daniel Lombardi: I'm Daniel.

Peri: And I'm Peri.

Daniel: This show is brought to you by the Glacier National Park Conservancy, as always.

Peri: And this is a bonus episode for those of you planning a trip to Glacier sometime soon.

[mellow beat fading]

Daniel: So not so much as a deep dive, as much as...

Peri: A shallow... a dip.

Daniel: A quick dip. Okay, we're going to talk about place names. [beat plays briefly] I think the place names around here can be a little confusing.

Peri: I remember when I started here and people just were throwing out, like, Many Glacier and the North Fork and the Middle Fork. It's very confusing.

Daniel: There's a lot of forks.

Peri: This is true.

Daniel: So, first of all, we're talking about Glacier National Park in Montana.

Peri: There is also a Glacier National Park in Canada, and also Glacier Bay National Park in Alaska.

Daniel: Not those. We're talking about Montana.

Peri: Okay, so just to note up front, a lot of place names in Glacier come from a lot of different languages, perhaps least of all English. Originally the landscape had a lot of names from Salish, Blackfoot, Kootenai, and Cree languages. Then, French trappers came into the area and lots of other people have come here over the years with lots of different names for many of the same places.

Daniel: So if you're encountering a name that you're not understanding right away, it might be because it's a name coming from a language that you are not familiar with.

Peri: Right, or like a direct translation from a language that is not English. I always reach for a book called "Place Names of Glacier National Park." [beat plays briefly]

Daniel: I got it right here. This is probably the best book that I know of that it's, you know, a few hundred pages of all of the place names from a park map and it's got a little bit of history of all of them.

Peri: Yeah, here's maybe my favorite quote from that book. It says, "Each language portrays a universe of its own and it will often be difficult to fit the universe of one language into the universe of another," which kind of speaks to what we were talking about earlier where all these names come from all these different languages and they don't always make sense in translation.

Daniel: Yeah, I like that. That's interesting. All right, well, with that in mind, Peri, let's, uh, start really broad. [beat plays briefly] Take me around the park. I know that the North Fork has nothing to do with like a spoon or a fork, but it has something to do with a river. So maybe start there. What's the North Fork?

Peri: Okay, so the North Fork refers to the north fork of the Flathead River, which splits into three forks. One comes down from the north along the west edge of the park.

Peri and Daniel: Confusing.

Peri: Yeah.

Peri: The Middle Fork flows along the south of the park, also confusing, and the South Fork is not in the park. Did that help?

Daniel: Uh, okay. But at any rate, they're all forks of the Flathead River and they all come together to form the main stem of the Flathead River.

Peri: Yeah, which flows west of the park towards the Flathead Valley.

Daniel: Right. Now, I hear people talk about the east side a lot. [beat plays briefly] There's more to it than that, though.

Peri: Yes, so the east side of Glacier has a series of big valleys, each with more or less confusing names. So there's Many Glacier, St. Mary, which some people call St. Mary’s, it's controversial, and Two Medicine.

Daniel: Okay.

Peri: And then there's a town called East Glacier, which is not the same as the whole east side. East Glacier also has its own history of many different names.

Daniel: Yeah.

Peri: It, at one point, was called a Glacier Station, because the railroad stops there. And it also was called Midvale.

Daniel: Yeah.

Peri: So in 1950, they changed it to East Glacier. [beat plays briefly] And we are on the west side. We are in the town of West Glacier, which is near Lake McDonald and Apgar.

Daniel: Yeah, okay. Yes, West Glacier, according to the Holterman book, was formerly called Belton, and then they changed the name just so it would be more friendly to tourists, I guess.

Peri: Or more confusing?

Daniel: Maybe. So it used to be called Belton, but today it's called West Glacier. And again, it goes without saying probably that Indigenous people have their own names for these places. The Kootenai have a word for the Belton area that means something like Spotted Foot Mountains.

Peri: Okay, so three of the main entrances to the park are [beat plays briefly] West Glacier, East Glacier, and St. Mary. I feel like we probably confused people even more about those, but.

Daniel: Well, let's zoom in. What's in between West Glacier and St. Mary?

Peri: Going-to-the-Sun Road.

Daniel: That's what everyone's here for.

Peri: This is true.

Daniel: So it's --.

Peri: A road to the sun.

Daniel: Yes, Going-to-the-Sun Road is not between East Glacier and West Glacier.

Peri: That's Highway 2.

Daniel: But between St. Mary and West Glacier is Going-to-the-Sun Road. Now, Jack Holterman here has a little bit of history on the name, Going-to-the-Sun Road. You would expect nothing less.

Peri: I would not.

Daniel: Okay, "This most unforgettable name in Glacier turns out to be a bit disappointing. Well, at least if we follow James Willard Schultz, who bluntly told the Geographic Board of Names in 1929, quote, "I myself named Going-to-the-Sun Mountain, there is no Indian legend in connection with its name."" But then Jack Holterman goes on to explain that there actually were a bunch of different Indigenous legends associated with that mountain and with similar names.

Peri: Okay, so James Willard Schultz is a big character that pops up a lot in Glacier.

Daniel: In early park history.

Peri: Yeah, and something that I learned just a few years ago is that when you look at the map in Glacier, you see a lot of names that you might think are native names for things like Going-to-the-Sun Mountain or Rising Wolf Mountain, all of these places. However, James Willard Schultz actually applied those names to all those features that probably already had different, much longer standing Indigenous names and probably many different ones from many different tribes.

Daniel: So in some ways, some of these names are kind of a blending of Euro-American early trapper explorer names mixed up with the Indigenous names that existed at that time.

Peri: Yeah, and confusingly, James Willard Schultz did a combination of naming things because he thought certain names sounded cool, but also naming places in honor of actual Indigenous people.

Daniel: People he was friends with.

Peri: Yeah, his contemporaries.

Daniel: [beat plays briefly] Yeah, so I guess we've just made this all more confusing than it started.

Peri: I'd like to think we've sparked some interest, perhaps, for people.

Daniel: At the very least, all I can say is, you know, take out your park map and ask some questions.

Peri: Yeah, there's a lot of overlapping eras of history here and a lot different cultures that have been a part of this landscape.

Daniel: And names really kind of capture all of that history in an interesting way.

Peri: Totally.

Daniel: Well, this has just been a quick dive into some park names and history. We'll be releasing some new episodes soon, so stay tuned.

Peri: And if you have more questions in the meantime, or if you wanna try and stump the ranger, we love trivia questions.

Daniel: So you can send us an email.

Peri: Yes. At glac underscore media underscore lab at nps dot gov.

[mellow beat playing]

Daniel: We'll put that in the show notes, too.

Peri: If you want to learn more about what the Glacier Conservancy does, you can visit their website at glacier.org.

Daniel: You can also just support the show directly by leaving a review in Apple podcasts. It used to be called iTunes, but Apple podcast or, you know,

Peri: You're really dating yourself.

Daniel: Whatever app you use for podcasts, go leave us a review, even if you haven't listened to all of Headwaters yet, you're not sure you like it.

Peri: Just give us five stars anyway.

Daniel: Yeah, and then go back and listen to the past five years of episodes that we have. There's a lot of good stuff out there and we got more coming, so stay tuned.

Peri: If you like the show, tell your friends about it.

Daniel: Thanks for listening!

[mellow beat fading]

Climate and Electrical Solutions with Katie Pfennigs Sep 30, 2024

Show notes

A conversation with Katie Pfennigs, who is the Director of External Affairs and Energy Services at the Flathead Electric Cooperative. This episode was recorded in May 2024. Headwaters is created by Daniel Lombardi, Gaby Eseverri, Peri Sasnett, and Madeline Vinh. Glacier Conservancy: glacier.org/headwaters Frank Waln music: www.instagram.com/frankwaln/ Stella Nall art: www.instagram.com/stella.nall/ Climate change in Glacier: www.nps.gov/glac/learn/nature/climate-change.htm ---TRANSCRIPT:--- Lacy: Headwaters is brought to you by the Glacier National Park Conservancy. Peri: This is Headwaters, a show about how Glacier National Park is connected to everything else. My name is Peri, and I'm speaking into a microphone pretty much entirely powered with renewable electricity. That's because the Pacific Northwest has a lot of big hydroelectric dams, but also because Glacier has been installing rooftop solar to supplement the power we draw from the grid. This episode is part of our Climate Conversations series about how the world is being altered by the burning of fossil fuels. Over the past century and a half, human activity has emitted enough greenhouse gases to warm the Earth's climate more than one degree Celsius, with more warming on the way. Daniel has been sitting down with experts to talk about how that warming is altering Glacier National Park, our lives and our futures. Like a lot of places, we are transitioning away from fossil fuels here at the park. That means swapping fossil fuel appliances and vehicles with electric alternatives. [mellow beat beginsto play ] As you'll hear in this episode, this is not an easy transition. To do it, we're going to need a lot more electricity -- something like three times more than we currently generate in America. But according to the nonprofit Rewiring America, the good news is that because electricity is so much more efficient, will only need about half as much energy as we're currently using. These climate conversations don't have to be listened to in any order. Each one stands on its own. This one was recorded in the spring of 2024 when my co-host, Daniel, talked with Katie Pfennigs from Flathead Electric Co-op, which is the organization that provides power to the west side of the park. I think I might have learned more from this one than any other in the series, so I hope you enjoy it. Daniel: Welcome to Headquarters. We're going to talk about climate and electricity and electrical solutions to climate change. Could you introduce yourself? And I'm curious what you like about your job at Flathead Electric Co-op. Katie: Sure. I'm Katie Pfennigs. I am the community relations manager at Flathead Electric Co-op. It's a lot of fun. Daniel: Yeah. What do you think's kept you there for almost a decade? Katie: You know, I grew up in the Flathead. I came back after my undergraduate work, and I just-- I love this area. I love this community. And working at a co-op is so community based. Really, it's just it just feels like a way for me to to have a really positive and significant impact on the community that I love. Daniel: Yeah, say more about that. What is an electric co-op? Katie: So kind of a unique, a unique business model. But a cooperative is actually owned by all of the members that we serve. So if you pay a bill to Flathead Electric for your electricity, you are in fact, an owner of the co-op. There is no-- no profit. There are no shareholders. So really, it's just a really neat way to operate a business. Very, very member centric. Daniel: So nationally there are for-profit electric companies, I assume? Katie: Yes. Daniel: And they they create electricity and send it to their customers in order to generate a profit. But that's not what Flathead electric Co-op does. Katie: Exactly. Daniel: It's community owned. Katie: Exactly. Yes. Yep. We were, you know, when we we were very first started it was during the time right after the Rural Electrification Act, which, you know, that act was landmark legislation that that really changed the way that rural America looked in that it provided opportunities for some of the rural parts of our country that had no access to electricity. You know, Flathead Electric is is like all other co-ops in that we had a group of farmers who who came together and pooled resources and got some funding through the Rural Electrification Act to start Flathead Electric Co-op and started very, very small. And we've grown today to serve just over 58,000 members. Daniel: So the Rural Electrification Act, REA, it was a New Deal, Great Depression-era program. 1936. Katie: Yes. And then Flathead Electric was was founded in 1937. Following that. Daniel: My understanding was basically rural areas like this one, like Montana, there wasn't enough money to be made for for-profit electric companies to string power lines out to ranches and small towns. Katie: You've got it. Yeah. At the time. At the time, a lot of people thought that electrifying the rural parts of our country just was not economically feasible or just could not happen. So it did take legislation to accomplish that, that goal. Daniel: Wow. And now so that was it was about 90 years ago. And Flathead Electric Co-op has been here ever since then. Katie: We have. And we've grown and, you know, since then went through a fairly large acquisition. And and we're somewhat unique in that we don't only serve rural areas. A lot of the co-ops in the country just serve the the rural areas, the outskirts of the the municipalities. But Flathead Electric actually serves the municipal areas of, you know, Kalispell, Whitefish, Columbia Falls, Bigfork, and then all the way up to Libby as well, which does make us a little bit unique in the co-op world and also contributes to us being the largest co-op in in the state of Montana by a long shot and second largest utility to Northwestern Energy that's an investor owned utility. Daniel: Okay. Do you think Flathead Electric, is it also a an energy utility? Is that the category you'd put it in or is that a little different? Katie: I would put us in the category of an electric utility. Daniel: Okay. Katie: Energy really is a much broader concept than electricity. You know, energy really is just the ability to to do work. And electricity is a form of energy where you're taking that work and running it through some sort of a generation facility, you know, whether that's hydropower, so-- which is what powers most of our area, you're right. But that's, you know, taking that that running water, that motion and running it through a hydroelectric dam to generate electricity and then transmitting that to power homes to do a different type of work. Right? In homes and businesses. Daniel: Yeah. Okay. Here in Glacier, we are then dealing with multiple utilities because we use we're using propane or using natural gas often to heat our buildings. But then we're working with Flathead Electric Co-op. We're getting electricity to run our computers and turn the lights on and everything. Katie: You know, when someone has access to natural gas, typically that's what they're using for their home, home heating and water heating, which are the two biggest users of electricity or energy in a home, and then the park is very similar. So you might have electrically powered lights and outlets and, you know, whatever whatever else your needs are that aren't hooked to natural gas, aren't hooked to propane. Daniel: Yeah, exactly. We have a combination of both in Glacier. And one of the downsides to that is that there's quite a bit more greenhouse gas emissions associated with burning fossil fuels like gas and propane. But before we get into that, a big thing that you deal with then is the grid. What is the grid? Katie: Right. So the grid, if we're just talking about the physical grid, is everything from the generating facility -- so again, I'll use hydropower as as my example here because that's the world I live in. And so everything from the hydroelectric dam, And then that power is then transmitted, right? You have to always have to get power from where it's generated to where it's needed. And the way that that's done is through the rest of the grid, which is a transmission system of of high voltage transmission lines and then a series of substations and transformers that transform that, that high-voltage electricity into a lower voltage that can be carried over a series of distribution lines. And that's what Flathead Electric does as a-- we're a distribution co-op. So we build the distribution system, which is the part of the grid that carries it carries that power to homes and businesses in our service area where that power is again stepped down. So that it can be served right into your your home or your business or whatever that need may be. So there's another another step in that grid. Daniel: Okay. Katie: So everything from the generating facility through the transmission system in the substations and then our distribution system and right to where it gets to your your home would be considered the grid. Daniel: Well, then let's go to the first step in that process. Generation, electrical generation around here, we have several hydroelectric facilities and like regionally, there's a lot of hydroelectric power. So where does Flathead Electric get its electricity? Katie: Yeah. So the vast majority of our power comes from the Bonneville Power Administration, which is the federal power marketing agency that was formed to market the power coming from federal projects. Most of those federal projects are the federal Columbia River Hydropower System, which is a series of 31 federal hydro projects all throughout the Columbia River Basin, including two that happen to live right in our service area, right? The one I drove by as I was coming up here, Hungry Horse Dam, is what most people are familiar with in our area, but we also serve-- our service area goes up to Libby Montana, which is where the Libby Dam is located. And both of those are federal hydro projects. So, yes, that power is generated by those dams and then a series throughout the rest of the Columbia River basin all the way out to the Pacific Ocean. So everywhere between here and here and there, Idaho, Washington, Oregon. Daniel: So for the most part, most of the electricity used at least on the west side of Glacier National Park, it's coming from hydroelectric facilities. Katie: Yes. Well, all the electricity, I mean, really almost all the electricity purchased from Flathead Electric specifically would be coming from those hydroelectric facilities. Yes. Daniel: But that said, there are wires that all connect to a greater grid that's regionally greater and I suppose even nationally larger. Katie: Yes. So we are we're part of-- from the transmission system perspective, we're part of what's called the Western Interconnect. And that's really... Most of the Western United States is all interconnected through a giant transmission system. And that allows us to balance the grid, which is obviously very important. You have to to keep the lights on. You have to have the supply of electricity and the demand for electricity have to match up exactly at any given minute to keep the grid in balance. And so having, you know, more of that interconnection helps us regionally do more of that. Daniel: And on that larger grid than there are lots of generating facilities. There's coal plants and not just hydro, there's solar, there's all kinds of things, right? But locally we can say that pretty much all the electrons we're getting here are from hydroelectric. Katie: Yeah, I would say I think it's about 85% of our power mix is, you know, those large hydro projects. We've also got, Bonneville also markets a nuclear project, which is about 10% of our portfolio. But overall, yes, Flathead Electric's power mix is 96% carbon free, which is it's just really great for our service area. We're very, very proud of that. Daniel: That's cool. Katie: Yeah, we have developed a few local generation projects. They're fairly small projects, but they're still just a great addition to our power mix and locally generated power, which is pretty exciting. So we've got two existing community solar projects and then one that we'll be breaking ground on early this summer. Actually, we're just in the final stages of selling the generation from that project. And then we've also got a landfill gas to energy. So it's methane, taking the methane gas that is produced at a landfill and turning that into electricity. And then we've also got partnership with Stoltza here for a biomass generator. We purchase the power that is created at that facility, and we've got a couple of partnerships for some small hydro projects within our service area as well. And then more and more we're seeing, you know, our members are also joining us as part of the of the generation mix in that they're generating some of their own power as well, not unlike the park up here with the with the solar panels and small hydro projects that exist here. [mellow beat begins to play] Daniel: Yeah, we've got solar panels on this rooftop right here. Katie: You do. [beat finishes playing, marking the transition] Daniel: Well, we're lucky then, here at Glacier National Park because we're looking for electricity that comes without much or any greenhouse gas emissions. So we're really lucky that we have solar here, but we have that most of the electricity where we're getting is relatively carbon-free coming from hydroelectric systems. Katie: Yeah. Yeah. We're very, very fortunate to have access to the federal hydro system, not only as, you know, hydropower, non-carbon generating resource, but it's also an extremely affordable and reliable, you know, most importantly, as we as, we start to look at significant resource adequacy concerns on our our grid as a whole, that reliability piece is really critical. And what makes it reliable is the ability to ramp it up and down instantaneously to meet the demand that's on the system, right? So we talked about that supply and demand having to be in constant balance and hydropower allows us to keep that in balance as well. Daniel: So the other great thing about hydro is that it's like the gas- or the coal-fired power plants that are adjustable in that you can pretty easily adjust the amount of electricity you're you're creating and that it's creating electricity, whether it's dark out, whether it's winter or summer. There are real baseload source of electricity. Katie: Yeah, it's an incredible resource. My favorite by far and, you know, completely renewable. Obviously, the water continues to go through the river and, and it rains and snows again, and it melts, and it-- and the whole system starts over. And yes, we can ramp it up. We can ramp it down to meet expected loads. So, I mean, really, it's kind of the original renewable. Yeah, that's what I like to refer to it as. Daniel: So hydro is a really important part of the electric transition. It's really important. Part of our solution to climate change really is, you know, getting us a lot of baseload electricity that's relatively carbon free. That said, there are some downsides. We don't want to dam every river for a lot of reasons. Katie: Right, yes. Daniel: And that, you know, a lot of the good hydro spots are taken. They're established. It's not like we can just scale up hydro very easily anymore. Katie: No, we're not going to be building any more large…

Full show notes at the publisher

Bonus | How to Win at Glacier Aug 20, 2024

Show notes

A lively debate between Michael Faist and Peri Sasnett about the best activities in Glacier, moderated by Sophia Britto. If you're planning a visit to the park, this episode might give you some ideas!

Glacier Conservancy: glacier.org Frank Waln music: instagram.com/frankwaln Stella Nall art: instagram.com/stella.nall Glacier National Park: nps.gov/glac

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TRANSCRIPT:

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Lacy Kowalski: Headwaters is brought to you by the Glacier National Park Conservancy.

Sophia Britto: Our purpose is to tell unexpected stories about how Glacier is connected to everything else. But today's bonus episode will be a little different. Instead of telling a story, I'm hosting a debate between Michael and Peri about the best activities to do in Glacier.

Michael Faist: Oof. [Gameshow music starts, then fades to background]

Sophia: Hi, I'm Sophia, you're listening to. Headwaters, a podcast from Glacier National Park.

Peri Sasnett: I'm Peri.

Michael: I'm Michael.

Sophia: Here in my hands, I have a ranger hat full of little pieces of paper with different activities you could do in Glacier National Park.

Michael: Okay.

Sophia: I will pull one of these pieces of paper, and on it will be an activity. And whoever speaks first, that's their stance. And the other person has to argue the opposite.

Peri: Oh...okay.

Michael: Here we go.

Peri: Michael and I can get in a fight about anything.

Michael: That's that's the easy part. It's winning the fight... that's the hard part.

Peri: I'm ready.

Sophia: So let's pull the first topic and get started.

Michael: [Paper rusting sounds] Okay. Camping. [Electronic selection sound] Well, I love camping. That's my stance. If you come to a national park, odds are you're here to kind of disconnect from normal life. Unplug, so to speak. Sounds corny, [Peri laughs] but how often do you get to wake up with the sunrise, go to sleep at the sunset. Show off your ability, or lack thereof, to build a campfire. Have s'mores. It's just the perfect national park experience.

Peri: Well, I hate camping. There are way too many bugs. Glacier can be very mosquito at certain times of year. Also, you say "great, you get to see the sunsets and wake up with the sunrise!" In Glacier, in the summer, that is too late and too early. You're not getting enough sleep and fundamentally you're paying someone to sleep on the ground. Hard pass. [Michael laughs]

Sophia: I would give that one to Michael. I feel like bug spray is a thing. [Peri and Michael laugh] If I'm in my tent, I'm relatively safe from the bugs. I'm going to enjoy the great outdoors occasionally. I don't have to do it all the time.

Michael: Okay.

Peri: [Paper rusting sounds] All right. Floating slash tubing. [Electronic selection sound] Love it. Floating the stretch of Lower McDonald Creek from Apgar to West Glacier is right outside my house. And really easy to do after work. And I love that I get to see a part of the park that's right by my house, but from a totally different perspective than I would see it otherwise. Also, great birds.

Michael: I hate floating and tubing because it requires you to have two different vehicles. You've got to put one in where you start, and you have to park one where you get out and you have to spend all that time, waste all that time, I would say, shuttling back and forth. Whereas hiking, you can start and end at the same place, no problem there. Loop hikes, there are not loop rivers. Anti floating. [Peri laughs] You're just baking in the sun the whole time. Sophia: Personally, I didn't grow up near rivers, so I am loving them here. So, I'm sorry Michael I have to side with Peri floating and tubing. That's pretty fun.

Peri: Yes.

Michael: This is too bad. All right... What's next. [Paper rusting sounds] Stargazing. [Electronic selection sound] Well, I love stargazing, and here's why: I don't know the names of almost any constellations, [Peri laughs] and that doesn't matter. I can pick out the Big Dipper, the Little Dipper. Beyond that, it's just like, Earth's screensaver. You could stare at it. It's mesmerizing. It's special to look for comments. It's... I mean, what's better than staring up at the night sky?

Peri: Okay. Night skies. Thumbs up. Stargazing. Thumbs down. You have to stay up. Way too late. Here in Glacier. In the summer. It's not even fully dark till well after midnight. There's too much to be doing during the day. We don't have time to be stargazing at night. It's my bedtime.

Michael: During the daytime that she's so excited about. It's been like, 95 degrees. Nighttime. Cool 70s. Beautiful skies. And also, coffee exists, so.

Sophia: I'm siding with Michael here. Yeah. Love the stars here. You can see the Milky Way in Glacier National Park, which is pretty special. Yeah.

Michael: I'm glad I drew first on that one.

Peri: [Paper rusting sounds] Okay. Fishing. [Electronic selection sound] I don't have a lot to say about fishing. Those who've listened to Season Two will recall that the last time I went fishing, I was six and an alligator ate my bobber. [Michael laughs] So it's just adding work to another activity I'd rather be doing. Like I'm floating down the river on a boat? I just want to enjoy that. It feels like a lot of work to be sitting there, waving a fishing rod around. Or if I'm like, fly fishing, standing in the shallows. Like, I could just be swimming, or eating, or picnicking, you know? I don't need it.

Michael: Well, I love fishing. It is one of the most meditative ways to gain a deep understanding of an ecosystem in Glacier. The park only encourages you to catch or touch one type of animal in the park, and it's fish. [Peri laughs] You're allowed to catch them. There are some that you aren't, but it's just such a unique experience in the park to be able to get to know the aquatic wildlife and have an excuse to just go stand in a river for two hours.

Peri: Michael, how many times have you been fishing in Glacier?

Michael: Twice. [Peri and Sophia laugh]

Sophia: Maybe I need to become a fish girl. I've never been fishing before, which is surprising for being from Texas. But your arguments pretty convincing. Michael. I know you can find out more information about fishing regulations on our website, so if anybody else is interested in hopping on the fish train, check it out.

Michael: Fish train!

Peri: No. [Michael and Sophia laugh}

Michael: [Paper rusting sounds] Driving Going-to-the-Sun Road. [Electronic selection sound] Big fan. Love it. I mean, it's like the ultimate experience here, it's the experience that put Glacier on the map for people to come visit. It's where I would say 90% of the pictures of the park come from, is from driving Going-to-the-Sun, maybe 75.

Peri: Mmm...

And that is because you get to witness three different distinct ecosystems in one two-hour drive. You get to have incredible wildlife sightings from the safety of your vehicle, from bears, to bighorn sheep, mountain goats. You get to drive to over 6600ft. What's not to love?

Peri: Here's what's not to love: driving. What if you take a shuttle so you don't have to drive Going-to-the-Sun Road? You can see all those things, but you can spend way more time actually looking at them. Instead of having to spend all that thought and energy looking at the road, avoiding other cars and said, bighorn sheep and mountain goats. And if you just sit on a shuttle, and let someone else do the driving, you can appreciate the scenery. Its type one fun. There you go.

Sophia: Honestly, the shuttle sounds pretty nice to me. Or being a passenger, I would say. Yeah, I'm siding with Peri on this. [Peri laughs].

Michael: Dang it!

Peri: All right. [Paper rusting sounds] One more... Birding! [Electronic selection sound] I love birding. I love trying to figure out who they are, what they look like, who's singing and... you may not get to see a grizzly bear when you come here. I'm sure you won't see a mountain lion. I'm. A few of you might... But I never have. But almost everywhere you go in Glacier, you'll find birds. You can come at any time of year and see birds. And especially if you come in the spring. They're constantly singing and calling and just making this place richer and more beautiful.

Michael: Well, here's my hot take on birding. [Peri laughs] I love birds. I mean, they are the soundtrack to our mental image of nature itself. But as you said, they are everywhere. I could see birds where I grew up in Ohio, and I can ID them and have a very similar experience. If I wanted to see a grizzly bear, I'd have to go to the zoo. So, birding in Glacier? It's fun to hear birds as you go out and hike, but it's not an activity in its own right. Birds are the background to experiences you could only have here, and that people are coming from across the country to have because they can't have it at home. So that's that's my hot take on birding.

Peri: I'm never taking you birding again. [Michael and Sophia laugh]

Sophia: Honestly, Peri, your passion for birding speaks to me. There's hundreds of birds you could see here, and that's a very special experience. So, I have to side with Peri here, Michael.

Michael: Okay. I disagree, but it has been decided. [Peri laughs]

Peri: It's okay. I won... you... just accept it. [Gameshow music starts, then fades into background] I feel like we covered a lot, but there are so many other activities that we didn't talk about.

Michael: What's another activity?

Peri: I would say berry picking.

Michael: Yeah.

Peri: I love picking huckleberries.

Michael: Classic.

Peri: It's an iconic part of a Glacier summer... just wouldn't be the same without it.

Michael: If you are trying to plan a trip to Glacier and interested in what sort of activities you can find here, check out our website at nps.gov/GLAC and it can help you plan a great trip.

Sophia: We're hard at work on the next season of Headwaters. Stay tuned for bonus content like this and more episodes about your favorite national park.

Peri: Headwaters is made possible with support from our nonprofit partner at the Glacier National Park Conservancy. We are so grateful for all that they do for us. Check them out at Glacier.org. And if you have a moment to leave us a review and your podcast app, that helps us so much. Thanks for listening.

Michael: You know, one activity we missed?

Peri: Hm?

Michael: Podcasting. [Peri laughs] I mean, there are more activities here than we could cut up and put in a ranger hat. I like them all.

Peri: Me too. Despite everything that we just said.

Climate and Living with Fire with Jennifer Gibson Aug 02, 2024

Show notes

A conversation with Jennifer Gibson, who coordinates post-wildfire response for the National Park Service. This episode was recorded in May 2024. Headwaters is created by Daniel Lombardi, Gaby Eseverri, Peri Sasnett, and Madeline Vinh. Glacier Conservancy: glacier.org/headwaters Frank Waln music: www.instagram.com/frankwaln/ Stella Nall art: www.instagram.com/stella.nall/ Climate change in Glacier: www.nps.gov/glac/learn/nature/climate-change.htm Whiskeytown National Recreation Area: www.nps.gov/whis ---TRANSCRIPT:--- Lacy Kowalski: Headwaters is brought to you by the Glacier National Park Conservancy. Peri Sasnett: This is Headwaters, a show about how Glacier National Park is connected to everything else. My name is Peri, and I find the ecology and politics of wildfire endlessly interesting. However, I also recognize that wildfire can be challenging and scary to live with, and at times even deadly. And all of this is made worse by a warmer climate. For this episode, my co-host Daniel interviewed Jennifer Gibson in the spring of 2024. She's the post-wildfire coordinator for the National Park Service. She tells a gripping, emotional, and frankly stressful story about when the park unit she was working at burned almost entirely in a matter of days during the 2018 Carr fire. You probably remember hearing about that fire on the news, and just for clarity, it spelled C-A-R-R, not like a car that you drive. That fire eventually burned 230,000 acres and killed eight people. [mellow beat begins to play] And this story is not as unique as you might think. In 2022, 95% of Sunset Crater National Monument burned. That same summer, a wildfire burned over 95% of Bent's Old Fort National Historic Site. A year later, three national parks in the famously wet Pacific Northwest all had their largest fires on record: Olympic, North Cascades and Redwood. So this conversation is about one person surviving a deadly wildfire. But it's also about how the National Park Service is surviving in a new reality of wildfire, accelerated by climate change. [beat plays for a few seconds and resolves, marking a transition into the interview] Daniel Lombardi: Jennifer Gibson, welcome to Headwaters. Thanks for coming on. Maybe start with just telling us what's your job. Jennifer Gibson: Hi. Thanks for having me. My job now is the National Park Service's post-wildfire programs coordinator. So I'm based out of the National Interagency Fire Center. My job now is to assist and help parks in recovering from wildfire. And that's essentially overseeing the Burned Area Emergency Response program. Daniel: What did-- what was your title during the Carr Fire at Whiskeytown National Recreation Area? Jennifer: The Chief of Resources and Interpretation. Daniel: We're talking specifically about the Carr Fire in Northern California. But this story, as dramatic and shocking as it is, it could very easily happen pretty much anywhere in the American West. Of course, it could happen here in Glacier National Park. Obviously, we have big wildfires here, but the kind of unprecedented, fast moving and property and life threatening wildfire that you're describing, there's no reason that couldn't happen here in Glacier. Jennifer: Yeah, it can happen in Glacier. It can happen in North Cascades. You know, it could be another Whiskeytown or, some parks are burning down, like 70% of Lassen Volcanic National Park burned in the Dixie Fire, 80% of Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation burned in the Woolsey Fire. Look at Lava Beds. So 70% of Lava Beds burned in 2020, the remaining 30% burned in 2021. Daniel: And we're not necessarily pinpointing any one of these fires and saying this is, this burned the way that it did because of climate change. But larger, more frequent, more intense wildfires is exactly what we expect in a hotter climate that we now have. Jennifer: Yeah, Whiskeytown had the hottest days on record and the lowest fuel moisture for 1000 hour fuels on record. It's not just one thing. When it comes down to it, it's this... Is it climate change or is it everything coming into an alignment with climate change as a contributing factor? And that could be a really dangerous combination, because I really don't think I don't think science is keeping up with the changing environment. I don't think our management and policy is keeping up with the changing environment. I feel like a bunch of us resource staff or park staff, all of us together, interpreters, whomever, facility managers, we're all standing here now in this age, 2024, and we're watching our parks rapidly change around us. Like, I think this cohort that we have now working in national parks, we are definitely challenged with this whole new unexpected thing called climate change. And with that's intermixed with all these other factors. I feel like we're witnessing the change in our national parks. Daniel: Yeah. The entering, into a, not a new reality, but a, an unstable and ever-shifting reality. [beat plays to mark a transition] So Whiskeytown has kind of a funny name. What-- what is Whiskeytown, really simply? It's, it's a national recreation area, part of the Park Service. Jennifer: It is. It's a unit of the National Park Service. It follows the mission of the National Park Service. It is a recreation area, so it's really like the, it's like Golden Gate National Recreation Area, Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area. It's really about recreation for the local visitors. Daniel: And living there for 20 years, it probably became like a pretty important place to you to. Jennifer: Yeah, I lived, one mile from the park boundary, so I had a really short commute. So my weekends, if I wanted to get a hike in, if I wanted to go botanizing, kayaking, I always went up to the park. The whole community loved Whiskeytown. Daniel: For someone who doesn't-- isn't familiar with Whiskeytown, one of the key features is a large dam and a reservoir, a huge lake right in the middle of the park unit. There's a lot of urban areas right next to the the park unit, and it's all a pretty mountainous, forested area. Jennifer: It is extremely diverse. It goes from 600ft in elevation, up to 6200ft in a really short distance. So it's really steep. So it goes from oak woodlands and grass up to subalpine fir, like Red Fir forest and montane chaparral. It has old growth forests and spotted owls in the higher elevations, but in the lower elevations it has chaparral and chamise and things that you would see at Santa Monica mountains. So that's one of the reasons why I love that park so much, because it was so incredibly diverse. Daniel: It's basically like all of California smushed into one park unit. Jennifer: Yeah, totally. And it was great. Like really crazy biotic assemblages living together in the same location, like Pacific giant salamanders and whiptail lizards, like something from a, Pacific Northwest meets the desert, you know, in the same campground. So it's, it's a really cool place, but it has waterfalls, lots of biking trails, lots of hiking trails, kayaking. It's-- it's a really nice place. Daniel: So we're going to talk about what happened at Whiskeytown in 2018, which was a big wildfire. Just big picture, this was one of the larger fires in California history. What's wild is it's moved down a lot of notches on that records list since then. But this happened in 2018 and it burned-- this is in Northern California around the town of Redding. When did the Carr Fire start for you? Jennifer: It started the day of initial attack in July 2018. It was hot. We were on the, I think, July in Redding and Shasta County, we were at, triple digit weather, like, it was hot even for Redding for July. About 1:00, 1:30, we heard over the radio that there was a fire near Carr Powerhouse Road, which is next to our historic district, the Tower House Historic District, which is like a concentration of your most important cultural resources, layers of history there, prehistoric, historic. Daniel: So it's July 2018. The temperatures are getting up into the low 100 degrees. It's very hot. I'm imagining it's not cooling off a whole lot at night. Jennifer: I think it was like 113, 114, we were bumping up against the highest temperatures ever recorded in the park. Daniel: Wow. So it's very hot, very dry. And you hear on the radio, okay, there's a fire. And I bet-- I'm guessing that at that point that wasn't unusual. You've heard a lot of fires come in over the radio, maybe even some that summer. And so you go to check it out. At that point, everything feels routine, I guess. Jennifer: Yeah. No, we -- it was something we do regularly, like, you know, there's fire. We could stand on the highway, tie in with the duty officer, make sure, you know, just be there if they need information, not get in the way. We give them advice if they need it. This is what we do. But this one just went completely sideways. Seeing fire taking off so... spreading so rapidly and erratically, the weirdest thing that I saw was fire zipped around a hillside sideways. Like fire goes uphill, right, naturally, and it follows winds. And it wasn't really that windy out, but it went around sideways, and I'm like, well, that's really weird. And then the fire spotted into this historic orchard where we have these really old orchard trees that were planted in the 1800s so they're unique heirloom varieties. And all of a sudden I started watching them burn and I'm like, oh my God, it's like 20 years of restoration, if not more, trying to save these orchard trees and stabilize them, and we've been working so hard, and we'd just grazed this whole area with goats to keep the weeds down and for fire suppression. And I was standing there on the highway going like, is this really happening? And then it burned down a historic structure that we just restored. And then it spotted behind me on the other side of the highway where that historic house is. It's one of the oldest homes in Shasta County. This was not ever something I could fathom happening at such a rapid pace. And there's water drops, dozers are being pushed, helicopters were overhead... And yeah, within the, the first couple hours it was completely chaotic, like there was nothing we could have done to stop that fire. I think the hard part was, there was a seasonal, she was screaming into the radio, like, "somebody get my therapy dog!" And we're like, oh my god, her therapy dog's in park housing, which is up the canyon. And two of the guys I work with, they went up there, kicked the door down, grabbed the dog -- they got the therapy dog right before the building burned down. And it was it was really, really intense -- like, all the things that I could never, ever wrap my head around were happening so fast. And that was the first hour of the Carr Fire. I'm not proud of a lot of the decisions that I made, but I never thought I would be pushed into making rapid fire decisions like this. Daniel: So right away, one of your biggest concerns is that because of where the fire starts, some historic buildings, some Indigenous archeological sites, you know, a historic orchard, and park housing, you know right from the start that all of those are threatened by this fire. And so you're making calculations and decisions about how to protect those resources from the very start. Jennifer: Yep. Yeah. Correct. Daniel: And some of those choices are hard. Like, I imagine when you're fighting fire, you don't usually want to just, send the bulldozers and all the heavy equipment in right away, because those are obviously destructive in their own way. But if it's a choice between bulldozers or burning up in a fire, you pick the bulldozers. And so that was one of the first hard choices you have to make, it sounds like. Jennifer: Yeah, so in urban interface parks like Santa Monica Mountains and Whiskeytown, you know, working with bulldozers is a part of, of life. Like you, you have to accept some level of impact to protect communities. So it's-- it's life and property first. More wilderness parks, you know, like parks with sequoias, it might be... life and sequoias might be your priority. Daniel: That's the kind of decision that you're actually probably used to making. You've been around fires you, and usually you have hours, if not days, to kind of think through the balance between bulldozers and letting a certain area burn or not, like there's usually more time. But in this case, it went from thinking about those questions to then almost instantly it just being about putting the fire out as fast as possible because things were burning so fast. Jennifer: Yeah. No, the whole park burned in three days, three operational periods. We lost structures, park housing, infrastructure, the community on of French Gulch lost homes, the community of Old Shasta was wiped out, the um, Keswick was wiped out like, by the F3 fire tornado went through Keswick, and then the west side communities. It was completely devastating. And then never could have imagined a F3 fire tornado going into a community, a town where there's homes and a Chase Bank, you know? [laughs in disbelief] So that's unimaginable to me. But again, you know, keep in mind also that the Carr Fire was just, what was it, 4 or 5 months right before the Camp Fire and the Woolsey Fire. And these were other destructive fires. And the Camp Fire was far more destructive than the Carr Fire. So the Carr Fire should have been a wake up call for everybody else. But it caught those communities off guard, too. Daniel: Yeah. So you said that those first few hours were a literal whirlwind. What happened next? Jennifer: You know, I had to regroup with my staff. And almost everybody is a qualified and experienced Resource Advisor. So they knew-- they're experienced with fire, they knew what to do. They put on their Nomex and-- but for some reason, throughout the fire, like we kept thinking that we would catch it. Because resources were not limited, like there were no other fires going on in the area. So Redding has like, you know, you have Cal Fire, you have Redding smokejumpers, hotshots, Forest Service, you have all these resources right there in Redding. And so when resources aren't limited, you know, you kind of think like, well, you know, you can throw the world at this thing and we can get it out. But we did. We threw the world at it. And it was we could not put that fire out. And, we launched dozers immediately. And I kept thinking to myself, like, well, we'll catch it, we'll catch it. And, it ended up like each time we, we couldn't catch it. And, we were completely shocked. And I was just completely like, each time I went home, at the end of the day, I'm like, I should start making piles to evacuate, you know? So I would make piles and, but I'm like, "we'll catch it. This can't be." And it was this, state of disbelief, I think. But, I think the third night, about 10:00 at night, I had a coworker call me, and he's like, Jen, you have to go to Whiskeytown Dam. You have to see this. And, I'm like, "it's 10:00 at night. It's hot out, like what's happening?" So I drove up to the park and went to the dam, and there was like hundreds of people on the dam, visitors like-- and they're all out there watching the fire blow up, and it's nighttime. So this is when you have-- the humidity's supposed to go up. Fire behavior is supposed to go down. You're supposed to have some nighttime recovery. But it was still really hot. I…

Full show notes at the publisher

Bonus | Visiting Glacier in Style Jul 03, 2024

Show notes

Planning a trip to Glacier and don't know what to wear? We've got fashion tips for you, along with the latest news from the park.

Glacier Conservancy: glacier.org Frank Waln music: www.instagram.com/frankwaln Stella Nall art: stellanall.com

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TRANSCRIPT:

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Lacy: Headquarters is brought to you by the Glacier National Park Conservancy.

Peri: Welcome to Headwaters. I'm Peri.

Madeline: And I'm Madeline.

Peri: Headwaters is a science and history show about Glacier National Park. And this is a special bonus episode for those of you considering coming to the park this summer or fall. And today we have for you a series of breaking news headlines, each followed by some fashion advice from Madeline.

Madeline: That's right.

Peri: We should just play the little like breaking news. *Dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun dun* [Newscaster music starts] Going-to-the-Sun Road is open all the way to Logan Pass. And do remember you need a vehicle reservation if you're coming in from the west side between 6 a.m. and 3 p.m. Madeline, what fashion advice would you give to someone driving the road?

Madeline: I think people hear "driving," and they're like, all I need are my driving flip flops, what they don't think about is you're going to want to get out of your car. At least once I'd say.

Peri: At least once.

Madeline: Statistically.

Peri: Probably.

Madeline: So pack your hiking flipflops as well.

Peri: Great advice.

Madeline: Thank you.

Peri: All right. [Newscaster music] As of July 3rd, the Highline Trail is not open. The upper half of the Grinnell Glacier Trail is also not open, and something to keep in mind is that even trails that are open, anything at high elevation you may encounter snow, including on the trail to Hidden Lake Overlook. Snow is always wet. It's always cold. It can be pretty slippery or even dangerous, so keep that in mind for at least a few more weeks if you're hiking in the park. Madeline, what do people need if they're hiking on snow?

Madeline: I have two boxes in my head. I've got waterproofing and traction. There's a lot of ways to accomplish that. Maybe hiking boots.

Peri: Sure.

Madeline: If you don't have hiking boots, maybe you have grocery bags and soccer cleats. Why not combine those? So put those grocery bags on your feet. Put those feet in your soccer cleats. Suddenly you're checking those boxes.

Peri: I love that. It's very childhood snow day chic. [Newscaster music] The free shuttles are up and running for the season. You can take the shuttle bus instead of driving, and you don't need a vehicle reservation for that. And you can stop at a bunch of different places along going to the town road. Do expect the shuttles to be full and busy, though. They're quite popular. Madeline, what should people consider wearing for the shuttle bus?

Madeline: The tagline for that whole experience is see and be seen. There are strangers around you. Suddenly you're part of the attraction of the road. If that is something you care about, just wear your favorite outfit.

Peri: Totally. [Newscaster music] In other news, park lakes are open to paddling. Lake McDonald, Bowman, Kintla, Two Medicine are all open to personal non-motorized watercraft if you get them inspected before heading out to prevent the spread of aquatic invasive species. Some park lakes are also open to motorized boats, but those require more extensive inspection. Madeline. What fashion advice do you have for people doing paddling?

Madeline: Everyone knows that you're on water. I don't think enough people are thinking about water getting on you. So maybe think about a poncho.

Peri: Love a poncho.

Madeline: Preferably clear, so that others can see your life jacket and be inspired by your sartorial example.

Peri: Love that. [Newscaster music] The longest running Indigenous speaker series in the National Park Service is in full swing for the summer. That means almost every night somewhere in the park one of Glacier's Tribal partners is giving a public presentation for free. Madeline, what do you wear when you go to an NAS program?

Madeline: I want to be able to focus, so bug protection is top of mind for me.

Peri: Yes.

Madeline: This is the time for a head to toe bodysuit. Pull that out of the back of your closet. If you don't have that, bug net over a wide brimmed hat. Ankle protection. Close toed shoes.

Peri: Yes. Protect the hands and feet.

Madeline: The probisci of the mosquito here? They're strong and they're long. [Peri laughs] And you don't want that getting anywhere near your skin.

Peri: That's great advice.

Madeline: Thank you.

Peri: Finally, our last headline. [Newscaster music] The fishing season is open for summer 2024. Within park boundaries, you do not need a fishing license, but there are still a variety of rules and regulations, so be familiar with those. And remember that all native fish you catch have to be released. Madeline, what's your fishing fit?

Madeline: All right, I've gone fishing twice, [Peri laughs] so I feel pretty qualified to talk about this. I've also seen lots of pictures of people holding fish. So from both those things, I'm going to say pockets.

Peri: Like those vests with all the pockets.

Madeline: Yes.

Peri: Do you put the fish in the pockets?

Madeline: Like, if you want to. I think that's... With pockets, you have options so you can put the fish in there. You can put snacks in there. You can put snacks for the fish in there. And then you also don't want to forget a big smile. That seems to be pretty key.

Peri: The best accessory.

Madeline: Yeah. So it's like people have a really big fish and then they have a really big smile. And...

Peri: And the pocket.

Madeline: They seem correlated. Yeah.

Peri: Well, thanks for the advice, Madeline, and thanks everyone for tuning in. We have more bonus episodes coming soon, and we are also working on a new big season of Headwaters that will be released next year.

Madeline: Headwaters is made possible by our partner, the Glacier National Park Conservancy.

Peri: We could not do this without them, and if you want to help us out, you could leave a review in iTunes or your podcast app and share the show with your friends.

Madeline: ITunes? Does that even exist anymore? [Newscaster music fades in]

Peri: Yeah, maybe I'll say Apple.

Madeline: Thank you for listening!

Peri: And Happy Fourth of July.

Bonus | Answering Your Questions May 31, 2024

Show notes

A mini mailbag episode answering listener-submitted questions. Send us your questions for future episodes at glac_media_lab@nps.gov with the subject "Headwaters."

Glacier Conservancy: glacier.org Frank Waln music: www.instagram.com/frankwaln Stella Nall art: stellanall.com

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TRANSCRIPT:

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Gaby Eseverri: [mellow beat playing] Hi, I'm Gaby. You're listening to Headwaters, a podcast from Glacier National Park.

Daniel Lombardi: Hey, Gaby, I'm Daniel.

Gaby: [laughs] Hi, Daniel.

Daniel: And this is the mailbag or Q&A episode. We're answering questions.

Gaby: Yeah. So listeners have provided questions for us over the last week or so. [music fades out] And I'll be asking you what the people want to know.

Daniel: Oh, you're asking me?

Gaby: I'll be asking you.

Daniel: I'm not ready for this.

Gaby: We're releasing bonus episodes this spring and summer to help visitors plan their trips to the park, or to just generally get a feel for what's going on.

Daniel: What do you got for me?

Gaby: What do you think was our most asked question?

Daniel: I think the question that rangers get asked the most is where is the bathroom? But I bet you people want to know when is Going-to-the-Sun Road going to open for the summer.

Gaby: Ding ding ding.

Daniel: That's right?

Gaby: Yeah yeah,.

Daniel: Yeah. Everyone, everyone wants to know when is Going-to-the-Sun Road going to open for the summer because it feels like it's not summer till the sun road opens. Well, sorry, we don't have an answer.

Gaby: We really don't know. We don't have any, like, further, more information than what you know.

Daniel: I could say that it seems to usually open in June -- the roads crew are actively plowing it right now -- sometimes early July, but generally it's sometime in June. If it's like a low snow year and we don't have a whole lot of snow in the winter, then it opens in the earlier side of June. If it is a big snowy winter, then it's probably going to be later in June, if not early summer.

Gaby: Or a rainy spring.

Daniel: Yeah, spring weather matters a lot too. Yeah, yeah. Bad weather, avalanches, all that slows the work down.

Gaby: Yeah. Hopefully it'll be open soon. I'm excited. It will definitely mark the arrival of summer. Angela says, can you just talk about beargrass?

Daniel: I… I will try. Uh, beargrass is not a grass, it is a member of the corn lily family. I mean, it is a flower, basically. It has grass on the bottom, and what people love then is that every few years, each plant will shoot up a big asparagus- Dr. Seuss-type flower that looks like a giant q-tip, sometimes like 3 or 4 feet tall.

Gaby: They don't pop up yearly, right?

Daniel: Right. You know, as spring comes along like this, we're always like, is this going to be a big flower year? When was the last time we had a big bear grass year? But there's always there's always some bear grass and...

Gaby: Yeah.

Daniel: I love it.

Gaby: I guess we'll see what this year looks like. [beat plays briefly] Sridevi asks, what are the places to visit without a vehicle reservation? That's a, that's a big one.

Daniel: Yeah. So in 2024 you do need a vehicle reservation, but that's only to get into the busiest parts of the park during the busiest hours of the day in the peak summer season. So if you're visiting in the fall, you don't need to worry about it. If you like to get up early or drive into the park late, again, you don't need to worry about it. It's just for those peak hours. Now, also, it's not for every area of the park. In summer 2024, entering into Two Medicine or the east side of Going-to-the-Sun Road at St Mary. You don't need a vehicle reservation for those areas either. And I promise they are spectacular areas of the park.

Gaby: Truly amazing. Yeah. Yeah. Okay, awesome. Hopefully that's helpful. And as always, check nps.gov/glac for more information and all of the details about vehicle reservation. [beat plays briefly] Claire wants to know, what's it like working for the park. You've been working for the park for seven years, right?

Daniel: This park, yeah. I've made a career out of working for the Park Service, and I love it. The best part about working for the Park Service is that you are working in and getting to, you know, be a part of these amazing places. I love being a part of something that is like, iconic of our country and our landscape and a thing that we all share together. Working for the parks is amazing. I highly recommend it. Go to USAjobs.gov and watch for ranger postings. [beat plays briefly] Give me another one. Give me a hard one.

Gaby: Okay. Olive asks, what are people most surprised about after visiting?

Daniel: Maybe a big surprise is how cold and how like wet the weather can be, especially in the first half of summer.

Gaby: Totally like in West Glacier or East Glacier it'll be beautiful and sunny, and then you go up to Logan Pass and it's snowing.

Daniel: Like literally snowing. Yeah. The other thing I think that can surprise people about the weather is how in the second half of summer, how hot it can be. They'll be like, oh, it's Glacier National Park, it's the mountains. It'll be cool. But then they start going on a hike with one little water bottle and they're like, oh...

Gaby: It's hot and.

Daniel: It's over 90 degrees. And yeah, it's kind of humid. And yeah, it can get really hot.

Gaby: Yeah. Last summer it hit 100.

Daniel: Wow.

Gaby: [beat plays briefly] So Jack has a question about construction.

Daniel: Okay, Jack, here's the situation. In Montana, we have two seasons: winter and construction.

Gaby: Ha ha. [sarcastic laugh]

Daniel: Yeah. And here we are entering construction season. There's all kinds of jokes about this. You know, the traffic cones, that they put out around construction sites?

Gaby: The bright neon orange.

Daniel: I've heard people joke that that's, you know, Montana State flower. I think other states make these jokes, too.

Gaby: Definitely, yeah.

Daniel: But it's true, the window for construction in Glacier National Park is pretty small because we have such a long winter season, so you have to squeeze all the repair and update, you know, projects into a pretty narrow window. So you can hear the construction going on outside right now. There is construction going on in the park, a whole bunch of different areas, you know, they're working on bridges, they're putting in new sewer lines.

Gaby: They're doing a lot of work. So it will most likely be a part of your visit. Yeah.

Daniel: But if you're just flexible, like it shouldn't be a big deal.

Gaby: Yeah. Not a big deal at all. Check nps.gov/glac for all of those construction updates and all those details as to where those projects are going to be.

Daniel: Yeah, that's basically the answer to everything. Go on our website. Check it out. Yeah. Plan ahead.

Gaby: [beat plays briefly] Okay. This is [laughs] maybe one of my favorite questions that we got. MissCurlyGirly asks, is the damage reversible?

Daniel: This question is sort of silly and also like kind of deep, right, which is fun. Having no idea what curlygirly is actually asking about, I would say let's be optimistic. Let's envision a better future than the one we're living in, you know?

Gaby: Totally.

Daniel: The damage is reversible. We can fix things that are broken and we can...

Gaby: Imagine better futures.

Daniel: Absolutely.

Gaby: [beat plays briefly] This is a little bit of a history question. Are you ready for this?

Daniel: I'll give it a shot.

Gaby: Zach wants to know, how did the whole Glacier-Waterton connection come to be?

Daniel: Well, that is a good question. Basically, there was Rotary Clubs, these are like community social clubs, and they started talking about how these two national parks that share an international border could be and should be an example to the world about international peaceful cooperation. And they sort of developed the concept and everyone liked it, got behind it, and in the 1930s, the international, the world's first international peace park was born.

Gaby: Glacier-Waterton.

Daniel: Well, technically, it's Waterton Glacier International Peace Park.

Gaby: And Zach, if you want to learn more, I would recommend going back to Season One and listening to the Goat Haunt episode where Michael and Andrew dive deeper into Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park.

Daniel: Yeah, that's a good idea. I was I thought you were going to say go to the website. I'm like, oh, people are going to be tired of hearing that.

Gaby: Oh no no, no.

Daniel: Yeah. But it's so true though.

Gaby: [beat plays briefly] I have three from Elizabeth.

Daniel: [laughing] I didn't know three questions was allowed, but okay, let's hear them.

Gaby: What do we do when we see fellow tourists not following Leave No Trace principles? Ooh.

Daniel: Yeah, that's hard. I mean, it's not your job to police other people. That's said, I feel like if you have the social skills and the situation is... allows for it, find a way to be friendly and...

Gaby: And be curious, yeah, I would say ask some questions before we make assumptions as to what people are doing or if they're doing something quote unquote wrong.

Daniel: Yeah, yeah. I mean, if you see something dangerous or blatantly illegal happening, you should definitely tell a ranger. But trust that everyone's doing their best.

Gaby: Totally.

Daniel: And that being friendly goes a long way.

Gaby: Absolutely. How do we convince people that nature is worth protecting as much as people?

Daniel: That's a good question. I like that one. You know, people are nature. The national parks operate with the belief that a really important part about getting people to care about the world around them, and to care about this country's history and making the world a better place is learning and experiencing and making connections firsthand. So that is a really central part of the mission of the National Park Service is to give people an opportunity to come visit natural places like Glacier National Park and make those connections and realize why that's so important to protect and preserve and honor.

Gaby: Yeah, totally. Okay. Elizabeth has one more question.

Daniel: Oh is it, what's my favorite beetle? I knew it.

Gaby: That's exactly right.

Daniel: Mountain pine beetles. A natural insect that eats away at pine trees in the park. It's not good for those pine trees, but it's good for the ecosystem as a whole. And they're cool little beetles.

Gaby: Are these the beetles on whitebark pines?

Daniel: Pretty much every species of tree in the park has an associated species of beetle. So, yeah, whitebark pine included.

Gaby: That's so cool. And if you want to know more about beetles or whitebark pine, you can go listen to Season Two of the podcast. Of course. Thanks, Elizabeth, for those questions. [beat plays briefly] Okay, so the next question is from Lane, who wants to know how has climate change impacted the way the park is managed?

Daniel: Yeah, that's a good question. I mean, it's... it would actually probably be simpler to say how has climate change not impacted the way the park is managed, because it it infiltrates every decision made in the National Park Service at this point. There are broadly four big categories in how the National Park Service is responding to climate change. One is through communication. So just doing things like podcast episodes about, you know, educating on the topic. Then there's science. There are scientists actively studying how a shifting climate is directly impacting the resources or the plants, animals, history, culture and all of that. How that's being impacted. But then on top of communication and science, there is also a whole lot of adaptation work. Basically people studying and thinking about how, okay, we have more wildfire now because of climate change, how do we need to shift our response to wildfire in the face of that? Right. And then the fourth big area of the National Park Service's response to climate change is mitigation. And that means that we're trying to actively reduce the amount of greenhouse gases that are emitted inside the national park, reducing the amount of fossil fuels burned, stuff like that.

Gaby: How are we doing that?

Daniel: Putting solar panels on roofs, switching to more fuel efficient or zero emission vehicles, recycling, composting basically anywhere we can find ways to reduce the park's emissions, we're trying to do that.

Gaby: And that's not just here, right? That's across the National Park Service.

Daniel: Yeah, it's across the federal government in general.

Gaby: That's great. How might visitors see and/or experience everything that you talked about?

Daniel: Well, if you come to Glacier National Park in your electric vehicle, you can plug it in and charge it with pretty much renewable energy resources that we have here, with hydropower. You're going to see solar panels on the roofs of some buildings. But you're also going to experience the impacts of climate change. Almost inevitably, it gets a lot hotter here in the summers than it used to. We have a lot more wildfire smoke than we used to.

Gaby: And of course, the namesake of this park.

Daniel: Everyone wants to come and hike to a glacier, or take a look at the glaciers as they melt. So that's a big part of the visitor experience these days.

Gaby: [beat plays briefly] Okay Daniel, I'm going to close it out with one more question.

Daniel: Okay.

Gaby: Okay. What snakes are in the park?

Daniel: We have two kinds of snakes. They're both garter snakes, we have two species of garter snakes. And neither of them are venomous or dangerous. Snakes are cool. A lot of people don't come here for the snakes, but they really should.

Gaby: [laughing] It's always, "where can I see a grizzly bear?"

Daniel: Never "where can I see a garter snake?"

Gaby: [laughing]

Daniel: Yeah. All right, well, if people have more questions, they can, you know, hit us up on social media or email us here at the podcast.

Gaby: Glac_media_lab@nps.gov [mellow beat begins to play]

Daniel: We'll put it in the show notes too. Our music's by Frank Waln and our art is by Stella Nall.

Gaby: They're both great. Check out their work.

Daniel: Info's in the show notes.

Gaby: Headwaters is made possible with support from our nonprofit partner, the Glacier National Park Conservancy. We absolutely could not be doing this without them. Check them out at glacier.org. If you have a moment to leave us a review in your podcast app, that helps so much.

Daniel: Thanks for listening. [music fades out]

Bonus | How to Level Up Your Trip Planning May 16, 2024

Show notes

A mini episode on the various ways to plan a trip to Glacier. Tune in to our next bonus episode where we'll answer listener-submitted questions on the show. Email your questions to glac_media_lab@nps.gov with the subject, "Headwaters." Glacier Conservancy: https://glacier.org/headwaters/ Frank Waln music: https://www.instagram.com/frankwaln/ Stella Nall art: https://stellanall.com/

---

TRANSCRIPT:

---

[drum and synth beat starts to play]

Lacy Kowalski: Headwaters is brought to you by the Glacier National Park Conservancy.

Daniel Lombardi: Hello. You're listening to Headwaters, a podcast from Glacier National Park. I'm Daniel.

Madeline Vinh: Hi, I'm Madeline.

[beat concludes]

Daniel: And the point of this show is to tell stories about how Glacier is connected to everything else.

Madeline: This bonus episode is a little different, though. It'll just be Daniel and I chatting about different resources and strategies for planning a trip to Glacier.

Daniel: We are talking trip tips.

Madeline: Trip tips.

Daniel: Trip tips.

Madeline: We are here in the park. We're here in Headquarters in West Glacier and the Park is pretty quiet right now. But the best time to plan for a trip to Glacier is well before you get here.

Daniel: Mhm.

Madeline: So, Daniel, what are some of the resources that you'd suggest people look into?

Daniel: Well, I think we have to start with official sources. Right? We have a website, nps.gov that stands for National Park Service dot government nps.gov/glac. "GLAC" is short for Glacier. That is your primary resource. That's going to have everything you need to plan a trip to the Park.

Madeline: Okay.

Daniel: Glacier maybe is a hard park to plan for because it's a big place. It's a complicated place, but there are a few other things I think people should know about.

Madeline: Officially or unofficially?

Daniel: Both.

Madeline: Okay.

Daniel: Officially, we have a podcast that's called Headwaters.

Madeline: What?

Daniel: You're listening to it right now. Also officially, we have social media channels. We're always Glacier NPS, whether it's on YouTube or Facebook or Instagram or Twitter or whatever. You can look us up. Follow us and that should help you plan a trip.

Madeline: Cool. Okay, so there are a lot of great sounding official resources but you've kind of hinted at unofficial resources. What do the unofficial resources have that the official ones don't?

Daniel: In general, I think people are sleeping on unofficial trip planning resources. So think of things like Facebook groups, YouTube channels, general blogs, books.

Madeline: Mhm.

Daniel: Let me back out and say that official resources are great. The Park website is going to have when campgrounds open and close. How much things cost? How far are distances between things? When are campfire programs? The park website has all of that stuff and you can trust it. It's a .gov website. You know you can trust nps.gov/glac, but if you're on a Facebook group, I think you shouldn't be expecting to get the facts and the dates and the numbers. You go to a Facebook group to get the opinionated, subjective, you know, human personal-.

Madeline: Mhm.

Daniel: -answers. Let me show you one on the laptop here, if I can get this to open up.

Madeline: Daniel is typing. He's using one finger at a time. He's typing aggressively. You might sometimes hear that.

Daniel: Sometimes I can use two fingers.

Madeline: But today is not one of those days.

Daniel: Okay, so I just went on Facebook and I searched Glacier National Park or National Parks. There are tons, dozens, maybe hundreds of Facebook groups. Gosh, yeah. And they are dedicated to helping people plan trips to national parks. It's an amazing resource that I don't think enough people know about.

Madeline: It sounds like thousands of people know about them.

Daniel: You, you got me there.

Madeline: But I'll compare that to the millions that visit national, national parks.

Daniel: Okay, so this group is it's a private Facebook group that anyone can request to join. It's called "National Park Trip Planning Advice and Help By The National Park Obsessed." And to give you an example of what it's like... Here's a post by Caitlin. Here, maybe I should have you read this.

Madeline: Caitlin says, "Just curious. In your opinion, what has been the hardest national park to plan? I've just started traveling to the parks and will hit my fifth this year, but so far for me, mine has been Glacier.".

Daniel: Ooh.

Madeline: Tough.

Daniel: I liked this one comment that someone responded to Caitlin with. Millie said Glacier was hardest for me, too, because quote, "because of the sheer number of amazing things to see and hikes to do, etc."

Madeline: You know, I don't hate that you can't go wrong here.

Daniel: Here's another unofficial source that I recommend people check out if they're if they're interested in this kind of thing. Go on YouTube. Type in Glacier National Park and look up travel vlogs. You're not going to get dates of campground opening closure, but just getting a visual look at what it's like in the park at a certain time of year, what it feels like to travel. It can be really helpful preparing you before you come visit.

Madeline: Just if you maybe want a little bit more of a visual. Sounds like vlogs are great.

Daniel: So here's a vlog from Nicole from last year. This is vlog "Video 13 Northern Montana and Glacier National Park Solo Female Traveler."

Madeline: Okay, so that's kind of like a POV, day in the life.

Daniel: Yeah, I love it. So this is one woman's experience visiting Glacier, traveling alone. You want to know what that's like okay. This person has already done it and recorded it, and you can get their opinion about it.

Nicole: So I just pulled over to see what the deal with reservations were for Glacier and-.

Madeline: Sounds great. People can look into those. Are there any hazards that people need to be aware of venturing into those territories?

Daniel: Any unofficial source you're using to plan a trip. I think you take it with a grain of salt. So if you're on a Facebook group and you're like reading the comments, it might be helpful. But also just, you know, keep some skepticism in your mind when you're reading through that kind of thing. Or if you're watching, you know, some random YouTube video about the park.

Madeline: Right. Okay. So it makes sense that that would be both a pro and a con. If you're looking for someone's opinion, sometimes you'll agree with that, sometimes you won't. So you still might need to have a little bit of a critical lens going in.

Daniel: Exactly.

Madeline: Okay.

Daniel: All right. Well, this has been just a little bonus episode. We are actively working on future seasons of the podcast, but they're not going to be coming out for a while. So stay tuned. Stay patient, stay subscribed, stay hydrated.

Madeline: All right. Headwaters is made possible with support from our nonprofit partner, the Glacier National Park Conservancy.

Daniel: You should check them out at their website. It's glacier dot org because they're our nonprofit partner. The Park's official website though nps.gov/glac.

[drum and synth beat starts to play]

Madeline: If you have a moment to leave us a review in your podcast app, we'd appreciate it. It helps a lot.

Daniel: Next time we're going to do a mailbag episode. So if you have any questions that you want the Headwaters team to answer on this podcast, just send us an email, put Headwaters in the subject line and our email address is glac_media_lab@nps.gov. We'll put it in the show notes too. Thanks for listening.

[beat fades out]

Climate and Health with Dr. Danielle Buttke May 14, 2024

Show notes

A conversation with Dr. Danielle Buttke, who works for the National Park Service at the intersection of human, wildlife, and environmental health. This episode was recorded in September 2023. Glacier Conservancy: https://glacier.org/headwaters Frank Waln music: https://www.instagram.com/frankwaln/ Stella Nall art: https://www.instagram.com/stella.nall/ Climate change in Glacier: https://www.nps.gov/glac/learn/nature/climate-change.htm Public health in National Parks: https://www.nps.gov/orgs/1735/index.ht ---TRANSCRIPT:--- Lacy Kowalski: Headwaters is brought to you by the Glacier National Park Conservancy. Peri Sasnett: This is Headwaters, a podcast made in the verdant wonderland that is Glacier National Park. Millions of people come here each year looking for a break from the stresses of everyday life. My name is Peri, and this episode is an interview that my co-host Daniel did with Dr. Danielle Buttke, talking about the intersection of climate change and public health. They talk about how the health of our climate, environment, and communities is all intertwined. This episode is part of a series of conversations we've been having with a wide variety of climate change experts. These episodes don't have to be listened to in any order, each one stands on its own. And they all focus on a particular aspect of the way the world is being altered by the burning of fossil fuels. Over the past century and a half, human activity has released enough greenhouse gases to warm the Earth's climate over one degree Celsius, with only more warming on the way. Throughout 2023, Daniel sat down with experts to talk about how that warming is altering Glacier National Park, our lives and our futures. [drum and synth beat starts to play] Peri: I've always been interested in the idea that people and nature are deeply connected. Maybe you know that already, if you listened to our season on whitebark pine. Still, I don't think I was prepared to hear Dr. Buttke explain these interconnections with so much scientific rigor. I was also struck by how profoundly our health is connected to our climate. I think this interview is essential listening. [beat concludes] Daniel Lombardi: So thanks for talking to us. We wanted to talk to you, Dr. Buttke, about public health and climate change and how climate change is impacting human health and the health of our natural environment, and how those two things are intertwined and all tangled up together. Danielle Buttke: I'm excited to be here today. Daniel: So you have an impressive background, right? You have a Master's in public health. You've studied environmental sciences, and you also have a degree in veterinary medicine, the health and epidemiology of animals. Is that kind of a good summary of that? Danielle: It is, yeah. I had a little bit of a circuitous route to where I am today. Originally wanted to study and work in environmental science and wildlife conservation, which was where my, my Ph.D. work really focused, and realized somewhat early on that animals knew how to survive just fine. It was really that humans were, were taking over the resources and had basic needs that, that needed to be met before we could ask them to conserve resources for tomorrow. And that's when I switched to public health. Daniel: So what's your job now? Tell us about where you work and what you do. Danielle: So I currently lead the One Health program for the National Park Service, and One Health is simply the recognition that both human health, animal health and environmental health are all completely interdependent and interlinked. And when we think about the multiplicity of health outcomes and players, when we're looking at a specific problem, we all benefit when we think about health as a more holistic construct. Daniel: A lot of times I think your job gets really kicked into high gear when like there's a hantavirus outbreak or something in a national park. Is that right? Danielle: It is, yeah. Because we share so much of the same biology with other species, we often share a lot of the same diseases. Diseases that pass between humans and animals -- and they can often go in either direction -- SARS-CoV-2 or COVID is a perfect example of that, you know, they're called zoonotic diseases. And that's really where I got my start and where a lot of my work is focused, on those infectious diseases that can pass between humans and animals. Hantavirus is a perfect example of one of those. And so increasingly in our work, we're finding that when the environment is healthy, when we keep those ecosystems healthy, those ecosystem processes are occurring in the way that nature intended. We have many, many fewer disease risks and many, many fewer disease spillover events. Daniel: Interesting. So I think one thing that's maybe surprising to some people, but talking with you, it seems pretty obvious, that like one approach to studying climate change or thinking about climate change is to think about it through a lens of public health, of environmental health. Do you encounter people that find that surprising, or that's a new idea for them. That these that climate change and environmental health and human health are connected. Danielle: It's really surprising to me to hear and see how many people have not thought about that connection. In every aspect of the way in which climate change impacts the environment, has a similar impact on human health. And yet studies have shown that few people are aware of those impacts, even if they've personally been impacted by a climate disaster or climate emergency. Because when people understand climate change as an impact to their daily lives and their personal health and their family's health, I think it really helps people to understand why it's so important they take action. And it also helps to clarify the ways in which they can personally take action in their local community, in their home and the environment around them. Daniel: Yeah. Do you think it's helpful for us to define the difference between health and disease? Danielle: I think that Western medicine, and my own profession, has focused heavily on disease because it's really easy to see. It's very easy to measure. We have specific tests for specific diseases, and oftentimes it's it's something that we can directly treat. Health is a really difficult thing to measure. Health is not simply the absence of disease, but an individual's ability to thrive within the environment that they exist in, whether it's a human or an animal. And it's therefore a lot easier to understand why health is more directly impacted by climate change than disease per se. Even though we do know that climate change dramatically influences the rate, the types and the severity of infectious diseases. But again, health is much broader than just disease, and therefore the impacts of climate change are much broader than just disease. [drumbeat plays, marking a transition] Daniel: What are some examples of climate change really impacting wildlife health and wildlife disease that you've come across in your work? Danielle: Climate change can influence the actual reproduction of a bacterium or a virus. Under warmer temperatures, or higher or sometimes even lower amounts of precipitation, certain bacteria and viruses can replicate faster, to a higher level, or for a longer period of time. Mosquito-borne viruses are a perfect example of this. When you have a longer, warmer summer, mosquitoes can replicate much more quickly and rapidly, they're present for a longer period of time throughout the year, and those viruses within those mosquitoes can also replicate more rapidly under those warming temperatures. We're also seeing that infectious diseases are changed under climate change because of the ways in which the environment influences where those animals thrive and survive. Avian malaria in Hawaii is a perfect example of this. While neither the mosquitoes nor the the parasite that causes malaria are native to Hawaii, they have become endemic in bird populations and in mosquito populations there. Prior to the warmer temperatures we've seen under climate change, a lot of the native bird species were able to only survive and evade malaria at very high elevations on the mountains in Hawaii. With climate change, those mosquito vectors are moving up in elevation, and those native bird species that are extremely susceptible to malaria, because they didn't evolve with this non-native parasite, are dying out from malaria. And as the mosquitoes move up, there's fewer and fewer refugia, or safe places, for those birds to survive and hide from both the mosquito and the malaria parasite. And we've seen a lot of those native birds go completely extinct because of this parasite. In fact, there's a variety of studies show that there's probably only a few more years left for some of these native bird species to survive without going extinct, if we don't take action now to eradicate that non-native mosquito and that non-native parasite that's present on the island. Daniel: Wow. So basically, in the case of Hawaii and the birds there, it's a story of climate change and a story of invasive or non-native species in that the mosquitoes and the malaria is historically wasn't there. But this is -- generally, all around the world, what's happening is as the climate warms, these mosquitoes and the diseases they carry are able to spread into new places and impact more people and new species of wildlife as well. Is that right? Danielle: That's absolutely correct. Daniel: So we're seeing the potential for these mosquitoes to expand their ranges. Does their range contract alongside, too? As it gets hotter and hotter, they can move to higher elevations and farther north, but then does their the southern end or the lower end of their ranges shrink at the same time? Or are they able to tolerate the heat better? Danielle: For for many species, absolutely. There is not necessarily an expansion of range. Oftentimes, it's just a shift in the range in which these organisms can survive. However, it's not just climate change that's happening on the landscape. It's also human development of landscapes. And humans create microclimates that are oftentimes much more conducive to having these parasites, whether it's ticks, mosquitoes, pathogens themselves, survive. So, for example, here in Colorado, on the Front Range, we have a lot of irrigation because people like green lawns, they like having trees that might not otherwise be able to live on this landscape. And when we have irrigation, we know we have dramatically increased rates of mosquito-borne disease, such as West Nile virus. And so we have, by altering the landscape, changed the way in which these pathogens can survive and interact. And you have kind of a one-two double whammy of that land-use change that's expanding the range, as well as those, those changes from climate change that are expanding the season under which these pathogens can thrive. But I want to be clear it's not always a unidirectional: more disease because of climate change. If we're seeing decreases in precipitation or longer periods of time between which we have rainfall events, that can impact the survival of of ticks. And so it's not always that climate change is causing more pathogens to occur on the landscape. And maybe in some circumstances that's causing them to contract their range or be present for a shorter period of time. But at the end of the day, humans and animals evolved under very specific, discrete conditions. And when we have more rapid and more unpredictable changes in weather and conditions, this means that we are more susceptible to diseases. And diseases are more able to opportunistically take advantage of new niches. Daniel: What I'm hearing you say is that, yes, the shift in mosquitoes and disease, the shift in range and the lengthening of the season, those are concerning. But maybe something that's understated here then is that climate change is just increasing kind of the chaos in the system, and the complexity, which makes all of this just harder to manage. Danielle: That's a perfect way to put it. Daniel: Well, let's talk about the pika research, then. What's happening with pika and climate change and disease? Danielle: So pika are amazing little creatures that have evolved to fill a very specific niche at these very high elevation sites. So a big study that we have going on now is to understand how climate change may be influencing the other small mammals that are moving up to those higher-elevation sites. Because they're seeing warmer temperatures up at those higher-elevation sites, they're able to survive and interact with new populations and they're often bringing their diseases with them. And indeed, there's previous studies that have found, you know, certain species of small mammal that are known to be impacted by plague and carry fleas that can very easily and readily transmit the plague bacterium. They are now found at higher elevation sites where pika are also found. So we're really interested in looking at how those warmer temperatures may be driving new species to interact with pika, and they may be bringing the diseases that could potentially kill pika with them. Daniel: Wow. So if someone hasn't heard of pika before, pikas are these really cute little mammals that are related to rabbits. So they're not really like mouse-like, they're much cuter than that. Size of potatoes, they love to live under the rocks high in the mountains and then like store up flowers for the winter because they don't actually hibernate. They don't sleep through the winter, right? They just hide under the rocks and eat their hay pile all winter long. Danielle: Yeah. An adorable squeaky potato is a great way to put it. Daniel: [laughs] So to stay warm in the winter, they hide under, you know, heavy, deep snows. And that keeps it, you know, it doesn't really get a whole lot colder than freezing point -- than 32 degrees. The snow actually insulates them from the colder air blowing around at the tops of the mountains. But then if you have changes in the amount of snow you're getting, or how warm the winters are, you might get less snow. And that could really hurt their ability to survive through the winter. So that's the general climate impact facing pika. But now you're describing something much more nuanced and complicated, and that is all these other animals, squirrels and mice and all kinds of little creatures that that have fleas, that have potentially diseases. And they're moving up the mountains because it's getting warmer up there and it's nice. And so they're interacting with the pika more, potentially sharing diseases. Am I getting that relationship right? Danielle: Exactly. And I think it also really highlights what we talked about earlier, that interplay between health and disease. It's not just about whether or not a disease is present, it's how healthy is that population to begin with? How resilient is it to changes in its environment, in the introduction to new diseases? When you both have the loss of snowpack happening, as well as the introduction of a new disease, you're much more likely to see declines in that population because they don't have that resilience. Daniel: So it's like, yeah, bringing some new diseases into a population of pikas isn't great, but so long -- if they're really healthy, then maybe that's not a big deal. But if they're really stressed and not very healthy because they've been freezi…

Full show notes at the publisher

Climate and History with Elizabeth Villano Apr 30, 2024

Show notes

A conversation with Elizabeth Villano, from the NPS Climate Change Response Program, about telling climate stories and finding hope. This episode was recorded in June of 2023. Glacier Conservancy: https://glacier.org/headwaters Frank Waln music: https://www.instagram.com/frankwaln/ Stella Nall art: https://www.instagram.com/stella.nall/ Climate change in Glacier: https://www.nps.gov/glac/learn/nature/climate-change.htm Climate change across the NPS: https://www.nps.gov/subjects/climatechange/index.htm ---TRANSCRIPT:--- Lacy Kowalski: Headwaters is brought to you by the Glacier National Park Conservancy. You're listening to Headwaters, a show from Glacier National Park. Peri Sasnett: Glacier is usually thought of as a nature park, but it's also steeped in human culture and history dating back thousands of years. My name is Peri, and this episode is an interview with climate change interpreter and park ranger Elizabeth Villano. She talks about how climate change isn't just a nature or science story, but is also a history and culture story, and about how national parks and historic sites across the country can lead that conversation. This episode is part of a series of conversations we've been having with a wide variety of climate change experts. These episodes don't have to be listened to in any order, each one stands on its own. And they all focus on a particular aspect of the way the world is being altered by the burning of fossil fuels. Over the past century and a half, human activity has released enough greenhouse gases to warm the Earth's climate over one degree Celsius, with only more warming on the way. Throughout 2023, Daniel sat down with experts to talk about how that warming is altering Glacier National Park, our lives and our futures. [drum and synth beat starts to play] This is an interview that surprised me. Each turn in the conversation went in directions I didn't expect. I've always known that climate change is a big story that connects to pretty much everything, but I'd never heard it explored this fully. If you enjoy visiting national parks, or especially if you like going to ranger programs, this conversation is for you. [beat concludes] Daniel Lombardi: Elizabeth, welcome to headquarters. Elizabeth Villano: Thanks so much, Daniel. It's great to be here. Daniel: Will you introduce yourself? Where do you work? Elizabeth: I work for the Climate Change Response Program, which is the centralized unit within the National Park Service that does climate change communication, resilience, adaptation work for all of the National Park Service sites. Daniel: And before that, you worked for a bunch of national park sites in the San Francisco Bay Area, right? Elizabeth: Yeah, I worked at Alcatraz Island, the Marin Headlands, Muir Woods, and Rosie the Riveter World War Two Home Front National Historical Park. Daniel: Okay, so you're you are a park ranger wearing the flat hat, talking to the public, talking about trees, talking about the history of World War Two, talking about all kinds of stuff. Elizabeth: And federal prisons. Daniel: Okay. And now you're working with all the national parks around the country, four hundred-some of them. And you're helping them incorporate climate change into what they're already doing? Elizabeth: Yeah, I think at last count, there was 424 National Park Service sites across the country. Daniel: Okay. Elizabeth: And all of those interpreters have a really important job of engaging the public with their site specifically. Mm hmm. And so I am kind of in the next step up from that, where I help create training materials and actually facilitate and lead trainings that help those interpreters find their own site connection to climate change. Daniel: Is there a park site that isn't connected to climate change? Elizabeth: Definitely not. Daniel: And that is exactly why I wanted to talk to you. We're having this whole series of conversations about climate change in the national parks. And I wanted to talk to you because you are talking to all these other national parks, talking about how climate change is connected to everything we do, including historical and cultural park sites. It's not just about the big nature parks like Glacier. Elizabeth: Yeah, exactly. And in those big nature parks like Glacier, finding the unexpected connections that sometimes create the deeper meanings for visitors. Daniel: So there for sure wasn't any like, you know, "aha" wake up moment for you on climate change. Like what underpins, you know, what's your motivation? Why do you want to tell climate stories at all? Elizabeth: So the mission of the National Park Service is to preserve these places that we're in unimpaired for future generations. Mm hmm. And a lot of people understand when we say things like, don't feed the bears, right? That's not an unimpaired state. That is humans feeding bears. Mm hmm. They understand when we say don't throw litter on the ground. Right. Because that's not unimpaired. If we really want to stay true to our mission statement, then we absolutely have to talk about here's ways that we can reduce our carbon footprint so that these places remain unimpaired for future generations, for people to continue enjoying these beautiful places that we love and cherish so much. That's just another form of advocacy that we absolutely need to do. Daniel: Especially in a place like Glacier that's so easy to see. And such an important point you're making is that. Climate change is impacting and changing in a negative way. Glacier National Park. And we have to acknowledge that and we have to explore it. We have to talk about it. We have to tell the climate stories of Glacier National Park and of all the other park sites as well. Elizabeth: Mm hmm. Yeah. Even if your park site doesn't have a glacier to melt or, you know, a sea level rise that will destroy your resource, you're still a part of this larger interconnected system across the nation where if we are protecting the National Park Services resources, you're a part of that movement. So part of my work is developing training tools so that anyone across the Park Service can say, How do I talk about climate change more effectively? And then the other part of that is actually leading and facilitating trainings. Daniel: And that's one of the reasons I wanted to talk to you, is because I know you're working on a a big resource, a big toolkit called History and Hope, which is a tool that's going to help more national parks, especially national historical parks, talk about climate change and talk about climate change in places that maybe they haven't a lot in the past. Is that right? Elizabeth: Yeah. The full title is History and Hope: Interpreting the Roots of Our Climate Crisis and Inspiring Action. Daniel: Okay. I'm I'm really excited to talk to you today. And I want to talk to you about how the national parks can interpret climate change into the future. Maybe a new approach to talking about climate change that's different than what we've done in the past. But let's start with you a little bit. Did you have a moment or a turning point where you started thinking about climate change a lot more or differently? Elizabeth: Well, you know, I was thinking about if I had a wake up moment in thinking about climate change as a whole, and I realized the answer is no. It's just been a part of my consciousness since I can remember. Mm hmm. And I think that unfortunately, that's just how the trajectory of climate change, knowledge and understanding is going to go. And as you talk with people who are younger than me, especially, there's no wake up moment. It's yeah, I was born into a world that is increasingly in hospitable and is going to change in ways that we can't imagine or comprehend. Mm hmm. Daniel: You could imagine a climate scientist 30 years ago or something, and they do some experiments or finally read some new research, and they have this wake up moment. But for people, for millennials, for Gen Z, for younger people, there's not moments like that. It's sort of you learn about it before you really understand it. And it's just climate change is kind of an ever present thing. Is that what I mean? That's how it feels for me too. Elizabeth: Yeah, absolutely. It's just a part of how I view the world. Any time I'm in the outdoors, it's always kind of there in the back of my mind. And I think a part of my journey with the Park Service was figuring out, okay, we have this massive systemic issue and we're only really talking about it in spaces we think of as natural. But of course, this problem is so much bigger than just in natural spaces. Mm hmm. So how do we use park service sites that are more than just natural? All the cultural history embedded into them to help us think through those really challenging issues with climate change? Daniel: Yeah. Why? Why And how do you think National Park sites, whether they're cultural or historical or natural, like why are park sites so well-suited for communicating climate change? Elizabeth: I think first I've noticed in myself and other Park Service interpreters that we kind of hold a false binary of what's natural and what's cultural. Mm hmm. We say, like, this park is natural. There's glaciers, there's trees, there's rocks. And this park is cultural. It talks about wars and World War Two. And yeah, every park site has all of it. Daniel: Like Glacier National Park is known as a natural park. We have grizzly bears. We have glaciers. Right. But of course, there's a lot of cultural and history here. And I imagine in the same way a site like Rosie the Riveter, you know, that's interpreting World War Two history, it's really a culture site. But of course, it is also part of the natural world and about the natural environment. So they're connected. But beyond that, there's something about like place based learning. And when you go to a place, it helps you learn about something like climate change in a different way. I think national parks as a whole are getting, you know, 300 some million visitors were really trusted and park rangers are really trusted. A. Authorities. It makes something so important like climate change, it makes it really important to talk about at such important places like National Park sites, I think. Do you agree? Elizabeth: Yeah. And when people come to these sites, they're kind of in a different state of mind. Mm hmm. You know, they're on vacation mode. They're more open to learning, receiving information and feel really connected to the place that they're in. Mm hmm. National parks have such an immense power of place, it can kind of transport you into a different way of viewing the world. Yeah. And not just that. I think if you think about who the nation's storytellers are. Mm hmm. We're kind of the only agency or one of the only agencies that's employed to tell stories of our nation's past, as well as a trained workforce who understands how to dig into these histories and help people find their relevance with them. You'll often hear interpreters or the phrase interpretation. Mm hmm. And I used to get a lot like, What does that mean? Mm hmm. I'm not a language interpreter. I don't translate French to English, but I do interpret why this place matters to you and what helps you find your relevance to it. And so that was really the purpose of this project. And this toolkit is finding more ways we can interpret climate change so that we can say, here's a connection in this park site that maybe relates back to your own life more, that relates back to the qualities of being a person existing in a really messy world. [drumbeat plays to mark a transition] Daniel: How did you start out talking about climate change when you were interpreting to the public? When people ask you about climate change, how how did you approach the topic with people? Elizabeth: It was pretty dark, really. Daniel: I think it was the same for me. Elizabeth: I was working at Muir Woods National Monument, which is a beautiful redwood forest about an hour north of San Francisco, and the fog in and around the Bay Area is decreasing. It's decreased by about 30% since the 1950s. And the redwoods rely on the fog. Uh, so at the end of my talk, I would kind of, you know, the crescendo would be the fog is disappearing. And what is that going to mean for these trees? And I think, you know, I would just leave these really uncomfortably long pauses where I would start imagining the worst and people would start imagining the worst. Daniel: Mm hmm. Elizabeth: And I think the the underlying tone of what I was saying is, I'm so glad you're here now because they're not going to be here anymore. Mm hmm. And. When you're engaging with people, when you're doing programs, it's so energizing usually. And I would just leave these programs feeling so depleted and sad and depressed. And we've seen that people who are interpreting climate change, people who are doing the science of climate change, are really starting to feel depressed and worn down because we're so immersed in this topic that feels really hopeless. Daniel: Yeah, I think you know that That's exactly how I approached interpreting and talking to the public about climate change when I first started as well. I was, you know, I'm not afraid of scary stories. I like the the doom side of things. I definitely early on focused on climate impacts. You know, climate change is causing wildfire to increase. It's causing the glaciers to melt. And here's how these animals are impacted and this is how much hotter it is. And, you know, telling kind of the the heavy impact side of the story, that was definitely the way I went at it. And I don't know that, you know, I would think that that half is important. You have to recognize that. But it definitely feels like there's something missing. Elizabeth: Yeah. I mean, did you feel hopeful when you talked about that? Daniel: I... I don't... I don't know that I did. I think I felt really pretty pessimistic, and I'm guessing that's how the audience felt as well. Elizabeth: I mean, we are just such social creatures. Like if you think about when your friend is sad, like it kind of pulls you down to. Especially like as the authority figure when you were sad. Like people feel that. Yeah. The doom and gloom approach to climate change interpretation. I think it's pretty pervasive. And, you know, I think in part it's because we have a lot of science. There's no disputing really these climate impacts. And so as an interpreter, when you're looking for something to talk about, you gravitate towards these facts and you want to share them with people you feel so passionately about, the place you live in, work in play in, that you want to bring people into that with you. And I just think. You know, if you are a first time visitor to a National Park Service site and you go to a talk about glaciers melting and then you go back home and it's kind of hard to get food on your table or you're worried about making rent or, you know, you're stuck in a city. You kind of forget what it was like to be in that place. Like, what does a melting iceberg mean to you? If you like, picture your eyes and you think about climate change. The images that are going to come to mind are probably. Icebergs, melting polar bears losing their homes. Maybe like lakes that have been dried out from immense drought or wildfires. And I think as a public, as people were pretty…

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Climate and the Future of Forests with Dr. Tyler Hoecker Apr 16, 2024

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A conversation with Dr. Tyler Hoecker, who studies forest ecology and the changing dynamics of fire as the climate warms. This episode was recorded in August of 2023. Glacier Conservancy: https://glacier.org/headwaters Frank Waln music: https://www.instagram.com/frankwaln/ Stella Nall art: https://www.instagram.com/stella.nall/ Climate change in Glacier: https://www.nps.gov/glac/learn/nature/climate-change.htm Dr. Hoecker’s research: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0378112721009051 ---TRANSCRIPT:--- Lacy Kowalski: Headwaters is supported by the Glacier National Park Conservancy. Peri Sasnett: This is Headwaters, a show about how Glacier National Park is connected to everything else. My name is Peri, and I'm talking to you from the dense forests of northwest Montana. This episode is an interview that my co-host Daniel did with forest ecologist Dr. Tyler Hoecker about how wildfires exacerbated by climate change are upending our forests. This episode is part of a series of conversations we've been having with a wide variety of climate change experts. These episodes don't have to be listened to in any order, each one stands on its own. And they all focus on a particular aspect of the way the world is being altered by the burning of fossil fuels. Over the past century and a half, human activity has released enough greenhouse gases to warm the Earth's climate over one degree Celsius, with only more warming on the way. Throughout 2023, Daniel sat down with experts to talk about how that warming is altering Glacier National Park, our lives and our futures. [drum and synth beat starts to play] I find fire fascinating, so I think this conversation was one of my favorites. I feel like I've heard most of the usual stories about wildfire so many times, so I was really excited to hear about Dr. Hoecker's research on how forests are responding to climate change. It felt like a new angle. I learned a lot, and I hope you do too. [beat concludes] Daniel Lombardi: So, Dr. Tyler Hoecker, welcome to Headwaters. Tyler Hoecker: Thanks so much for having me. Daniel: It feels pretty good that we're talking today, or auspicious or bad, on like just this week the smoke really rolled into the park. We have several new fires burning right around us. It's very much fire season, so it's a good time to have this conversation. Will you introduce yourself and talk about kind of your job and the work you're doing right now? Tyler: Sure. So I'm Tyler Hoecker. I'm a research scientist at the University of Montana in Missoula. And right now I'm doing research trying to understand how climate change is changing fire activity across the western U.S. and trying to project how fires and forests might change into the future. Daniel: How did you get into fire stuff, like how did that become the path for you? Tyler: I think everybody is sort of drawn to fire, in a, in a weird way, you know, fires are pretty important, has been an important like catalyst, you know, for civilization. And so I think it's sort of just a compelling thing. Daniel: It's kind of a universal concept, that fire and flames draw your eye and like draw you in. Tyler: Absolutely. Absolutely. It's hard to think about forests in the West without thinking about fire. I remember as an undergrad, I took a a forest ecology and policy class, and we went to a community fire meeting. And I just remember being really fascinated by the process. And it was clear to me pretty quickly that it was really important at shaping forests in the West. And so I was really interested in understanding it. And, you know, it's sort of interesting to think back on that. You know, that was 2010. And, you know, I think fire scientists probably understood what was what was unfolding in terms of fire in the West. But I don't think anybody would have been able to really predict, you know, what's happened in the last 13 years since in terms of the amount of area burned every year. And, yeah, the types of fire events that we're seeing every summer now. Daniel: Yeah. So let's jump into some fire ecology. At one point I was hiking up Mt. Brown and it was kind of in the fall, early fall, the fireweed was blooming and like the sun was rising and kind of glowing through it. And there was the cloud layer was like fog all in the forest. And so I was walking through that and it had burned, you know, like a year before. So everything is charred and crisp and like pretty black. There's no living trees. But in that morning light, it was so beautiful. And for me it was kind of like a pivot point. This, like black backed woodpecker, flew down and landed on the tree in front of me and was feasting on beetles that like the fire-killed trees. And I was like, Oh my gosh, like fire is not ugly. The aftermath of fire can be really beautiful. And I knew intellectually that it's also ecologically important. So maybe we can start with something like that. Like why, why is fire important in a place like Glacier National Park? Tyler: So one of the things that I like to, to maybe start by kind of acknowledging or stating is that fire, in seasonally dry places, is inevitable. I mean, it's important to think about the benefits and the risks and things like that. And it's also important to acknowledge that it's inevitable. And it's just it is. And it will always, it will always happen in seasonally dry places. Daniel: Yeah. So like, this place gets dry. There's lots of things growing here -- trees -- it's going to burn. Tyler: Exactly. And so that means that everything that we see when we look at forests in fire-prone places are shaped by fire. Right? And so the species that we see, that's the forest structure or kind of the age of the trees and the way that they're arranged on the landscape in a place like Glacier, that that is driven primarily by fire and the history of fire. Daniel: The animals and the trees that have lived here for millions of years have lived here with fire for billions of years. They always have coexisted. Tyler: Exactly. But the biggest thing is that fires create what we call, like heterogeneity. You know, the opposite of homogeneity. Heterogeneity is variation in species composition, in structure and physical structure of a vegetation. And that heterogeneity confers resilience, right? And so a forest and an ecosystem that's heterogeneous, that's diverse and variable is going to be more resilient to future disturbances, to different pressures and stresses to insects and pathogens to drought. Daniel: So would you say, when you say that fire creates heterogeneity in an ecosystem, in Glacier National Park, it kind of sounds like you're saying fire creates complexity. Tyler: Absolutely. Daniel: Okay. And that creates complexity means different habitats, which means that allows for biodiversity for more kinds of life to live in one place. Tyler: Absolutely. So biodiversity basically emerges from complexity. Right? A complex system has more niches, has more opportunities for different types of organisms, and that creates a richer system. Daniel: Compared to, say, a cornfield or like a forest that's all just one kind of -- lodgepole pine say. You know, it's just all one tree. So only certain kinds of birds, only certain kinds of animals are going to live there. You start mixing that up, you burn it and different trees start growing, then you're getting more complexity. You're getting more biodiversity. Tyler: Yep. Daniel: That's cool. Tyler: Yeah. Daniel: Not every tree in the forest has the same adaptations to fire. Some trees are adapted where they like a little bit of fire. Others, they only grow in places that probably aren't going to burn. So maybe you could break that down a little bit. Like, what are the strategies for trees? What are your options? Tyler: Right. So trees or plants, you know, have these, as you described them, quirks, right. These characteristics. And in, and in sort of the ecology world we call those traits, but I think makes more sense to call like a strategy. So basically your options are to avoid fire, to be a species that can either hang out for a long period in the understory and during a long fire free period, or can tolerate cool, wet sites where fire is less common and happens never or very infrequently. So those are species like subalpine fir, Engelmann spruce, western red cedar, western hemlock. Those are trees that grow in regions or in microclimates that tend not to burn very often or tend to burn very infrequently. And so there's a long fire-free interval in which they can establish and become dominant. Daniel: So if you're familiar with the park, then like somewhere like the Fish Creek campground or the Avalanche area. These are like little pockets in the landscape where a creek goes through the middle, they get a lot of rain right there, they get a lot of snow. And so you have a lot of cedar and hemlock, these forests that are really dense and dark and mossy, you can just feel that it doesn't feel like fire comes through there very often. Tyler: Exactly. Yeah. And so the other strategy or another strategy is to resist fire, and to survive fire as an individual. So those are species like ponderosa pine, western larch, and they have things like thick bark. They drop their lower branches, so that there aren't ladder fuels that would carry flame to the crown. They have rot-resistant wood, so that when their trunk is scarred by fire, that exposed wood doesn't rot. Hmm. Daniel: And then there's all kinds of species that are-- there's all kinds of other strategies, too. Tyler: Yeah. And so there's there's maybe sort of a third strategy around what we might say, fire embracing, or fire resilient. Daniel: Fire loving. Tyler: Yeah, fire loving. And so these are species that, like in the case of lodgepole pine, they've adapted a strategy where individuals are killed, but they have mechanisms for their genes to carry on. So older lodgepole pine tend to produce some serotinous cones, and they're, they're cones that are closed, and they're bound up by resin. And serotinous cones stay closed until they're heated by fire. Daniel: They're waiting for fire. Tyler: They're waiting for fire. And so this is a strategy. This is like putting all your money under the mattress and waiting for that opportunity to strike it big. Right? So the individual bearing those cones is probably dead, as are all of the individuals around it. But what you have is this environment that's perfect for lodgepole pine seedlings. It's bare mineral soil, it's high light, it's low in competition. And so they seed, you know, millions of seeds onto a, into an environment that's perfect for for their regeneration. And so then you have a new single-age cohort that recovers after the fire. Daniel: Interesting. Tyler: The other sort of version of being a fire-embracing, or fire-resilient, is to be able to resprout. So that things like aspen or cottonwoods or shrubs. Daniel: That is they're not good at surviving the fire, but they'll grow back faster than every -- all the other trees. Right. Tyler: So they survive in a way, their underground structures survive. The top is killed and they can re sprout from that underground. Those underground root structures. Daniel: It doesn't have to regrow its roots, it's already got them. Tyler: Yep. It's starting with a bit of a trust fund there and so can do really well. Daniel: So there's we have all these trees in the park. We've got ponderosa pine in the North Fork, we've got cedar, we've got big dense forests of lodgepole and larch. We've got it all in Glacier. It's a pretty diverse place. So what is the fire regime or what is the history and pattern of wildfire, naturally, in Glacier National Park? Tyler: Yeah. So, you know, one of the things that's really fun and cool about studying fire in Glacier is that high tree diversity. So you have all of these different individual species that sort of respond and coexist with fire in different ways like we talked about. And what that also means is that the fire regime across Glacier is different depending on where you are. So most of Glacier is what we would call Subalpine forest. So that's forests that are dominated by species like Engelmann Spruce subalpine fir douglas fir, larch, western white pine a little bit. Daniel: Okay. Tyler: So these are sort of the mid to high elevation, you know, before you get into that alpine whitebark pine zone. Those are forests that burn infrequently and at high severity. So infrequent in that context means every 150 to 300 years or so. Daniel: Wow. Tyler: So that's what we would call infrequent. Mm hmm. And because there's this long time period between fires, there's a long opportunity or a lot of opportunity for biomass to accumulate. And so that means that when fires do come through, they burn at high severity, they burn really hot, they kill most of the trees, they burn off the organic matter on the, on the surface of the soil. There are some places in Glacier that have a more frequent and less severe fire regime. So places like the North Fork, because they're in sort of a warm, dry microclimate and because they have species that can survive fire, that sort of creates the conditions for a more frequent fire regime, which would be burning every 5 to 50 years or maybe 5 to 100 years. Daniel: So it could be pretty common. Yeah, every five years. Tyler: Yeah so that's-- and then at low severity, meaning that relatively few individuals are killed in a fire. Right. So maybe some trees are killed, but most of the large mature individuals survive and maybe the small trees in the understory are killed. Hmm. It's also important to note that in a lot of places, those frequent fire regimes were supported by human burning, you know, by by cultural burning, by Indigenous people. Daniel: Okay. So the park has some areas that historically would have burned pretty regularly, maybe sometimes even as much as every five or ten years, and burning at a fairly low severity. It's clearing out the shrubs and burning the grasses around the trees, burning some of the little trees. But most of the park is stand-replacing fires. Most of the park is not burning that often. In recent years we've had the Howe Ridge fire. We've had the the Sprague fire. What kind of fires are those? Are those the frequent fires or the infrequent ones that happen only every few hundred years? Tyler: So those two fires together were a really cool opportunity as a scientist, because what we had there was fires that burned in forests that were historically pretty similar on either side of Lake McDonald. And those both of those fires burned almost into that Cedar-Hemlock zone, but mostly in that kind of mid-elevation subalpine forest zone. And the Sprague Fire was really kind of what we think of as typical of the historical fire regime in Glacier. So fire where those trees were in that range of 150 to 300 years old. So you had old forests, pretty big trees, relatively dense and had not experienced fire for a long time. Daniel: So this the Sprague fire then, I remember when that started, and that's the fire that ultimately burned down Sperry Chalet. This-- this is a fire that you're saying is what we would expect in Glacier National Park, that those trees, 200, 300 years old, they're kind of right on schedule to to burn. Tyler: Right. Daniel: But then now things are changing. What is the relationship, if we step back for a second, between fire and climate? We know things are getting hotter. I'm sure that…

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