The Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem (GYE) is one of the last remaining large, nearly intact
ecosystem
An ecosystem (or ecological system) consists of all the organisms and the physical environment with which they interact. These biotic and abiotic components are linked together through nutrient cycles and energy flows. Energy enters the syst ...
s in the northern
temperate zone of the
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. While large volumes of water can be found throughout the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface water. About 71% of Earth's sur ...
.
It is located within the northern
Rocky Mountains
The Rocky Mountains, also known as the Rockies, are a major mountain range and the largest mountain system in North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch in straight-line distance from the northernmost part of western Canada, to New Mexico ...
, in areas of northwestern
Wyoming
Wyoming () is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is bordered by Montana to the north and northwest, South Dakota and Nebraska to the east, Idaho to the west, Utah to the southwest, and Colorado to t ...
, southwestern
Montana
Montana () is a state in the Mountain West division of the Western United States. It is bordered by Idaho to the west, North Dakota and South Dakota to the east, Wyoming to the south, and the Canadian provinces of Alberta, British Columb ...
, and eastern
Idaho
Idaho ( ) is a U.S. state, state in the Pacific Northwest region of the Western United States. To the north, it shares a small portion of the Canada–United States border with the province of British Columbia. It borders the states of Monta ...
, and is about .
Yellowstone National Park
Yellowstone National Park is an American national park located in the western United States, largely in the northwest corner of Wyoming and extending into Montana and Idaho. It was established by the 42nd U.S. Congress with the Yellowst ...
and the
Yellowstone Caldera
The Yellowstone Caldera, sometimes referred to as the Yellowstone Supervolcano, is a volcanic caldera and supervolcano in Yellowstone National Park in the Western United States. The caldera and most of the park are located in the northwest corn ...
'hotspot' are within it.
The area is a flagship site among conservation groups that promote
ecosystem management
Ecosystem management is an approach to natural resource management that aims to ensure the long-term sustainability and persistence of an ecosystems function and services while meeting socioeconomic, political, and cultural needs. Although indig ...
. The Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem (GYE) is one of the world's foremost natural laboratories in
landscape ecology
Landscape ecology is the science of studying and improving relationships between ecological processes in the environment and particular ecosystems. This is done within a variety of landscape scales, development spatial patterns, and organizatio ...
and
Holocene
The Holocene ( ) is the current geological epoch. It began approximately 11,650 cal years Before Present (), after the Last Glacial Period, which concluded with the Holocene glacial retreat. The Holocene and the preceding Pleistocene togeth ...
geology
Geology () is a branch of natural science concerned with Earth and other Astronomical object, astronomical objects, the features or rock (geology), rocks of which it is composed, and the processes by which they change over time. Modern geology ...
, and is a world-renowned recreational destination. It is also home to the diverse
native plant
In biogeography, a native species is indigenous to a given region or ecosystem if its presence in that region is the result of only local natural evolution (though often popularised as "with no human intervention") during history. The term is eq ...
s and
animals of Yellowstone.
History
Yellowstone National Park boundaries were drawn in 1872 with the intent to include all the known
geothermal basins in the region. As landscape ecology considerations were not incorporated into original boundary, revisions were suggested to conform more closely to natural topographic features, such as the ridgeline of the Absaroka Range along the east boundary. In 1929, President Hoover signed the first bill changing the park’s boundaries: The northwest corner now included a significant area of petrified trees; the northeast corner was defined by the watershed of Pebble Creek; the eastern boundary included the headwaters of the Lamar River and part of the watershed of the Yellowstone River. In 1932, President Hoover issued an executive order that added more than between the north boundary and the Yellowstone River, west of Gardiner. These lands provided winter range for elk and other ungulates. By the 1970s, the
grizzly bear
The grizzly bear (''Ursus arctos horribilis''), also known as the North American brown bear or simply grizzly, is a population or subspecies of the brown bear inhabiting North America.
In addition to the mainland grizzly (''Ursus arctos horri ...
's (''Ursus arctos'') range in and near the park became the first informal minimum boundary of a theoretical "Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem" that included at least . Since then, definitions of the greater ecosystem's size have steadily grown larger. A 1994 study listed the size as , while a 1994 speech by a Greater Yellowstone Coalition leader enlarged that to .
In 1985 the
United States House of Representatives
The United States House of Representatives, often referred to as the House of Representatives, the U.S. House, or simply the House, is the lower chamber of the United States Congress, with the Senate being the upper chamber. Together they ...
Subcommittees on Public Lands and National Parks and Recreation held a joint subcommittee hearing on Greater Yellowstone, resulting in a 1986 report by the
Congressional Research Service
The Congressional Research Service (CRS) is a public policy research institute of the United States Congress. Operating within the Library of Congress, it works primarily and directly for members of Congress and their committees and staff on a ...
outlining shortcomings in inter-agency coordination and concluding that the area's essential values were at risk.
Protected areas
Federally managed areas within the GYE include:
*
United States National Park Service
The National Park Service (NPS) is an agency of the United States federal government within the U.S. Department of the Interior that manages all national parks, most national monuments, and other natural, historical, and recreational propertie ...
(NPS) —
Yellowstone National Park
Yellowstone National Park is an American national park located in the western United States, largely in the northwest corner of Wyoming and extending into Montana and Idaho. It was established by the 42nd U.S. Congress with the Yellowst ...
,
Grand Teton National Park
Grand Teton National Park is an American national park in northwestern Wyoming. At approximately , the park includes the major peaks of the Teton Range as well as most of the northern sections of the valley known as Jackson Hole. Grand Teton ...
, and
John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Memorial Parkway
John D. Rockefeller Jr. Memorial Parkway is a scenic road and protected area that connects Grand Teton National Park and Yellowstone National Park in the U.S. state of Wyoming. It is federally owned and managed by the National Park Service by ...
.
*
United States National Forest Service (USFS) —
Gallatin,
Custer
George Armstrong Custer (December 5, 1839 – June 25, 1876) was a United States Army officer and cavalry commander in the American Civil War and the American Indian Wars.
Custer graduated from West Point in 1861 at the bottom of his class, b ...
,
Beaverhead-Deerlodge,
Caribou-Targhee,
Bridger-Teton, and
Shoshone National Forest
Shoshone National Forest ( ) is the first federally protected National Forest in the United States and covers nearly in the state of Wyoming. Originally a part of the Yellowstone Timberland Reserve, the forest is managed by the United States ...
s
*
United States Fish and Wildlife Service
The United States Fish and Wildlife Service (USFWS or FWS) is an agency within the United States Department of the Interior dedicated to the management of fish, wildlife, and natural habitats. The mission of the agency is "working with othe ...
(USFWS) —
National Elk Refuge
The National Elk Refuge is a Wildlife Refuge located in Jackson Hole in the U.S. state of Wyoming. It was created in 1912 to protect habitat and provide sanctuary for one of the largest elk (also known as wapiti) herds. With a total of , the refu ...
,
Red Rock Lakes
The Red Rock Lakes Wilderness is within the Red Rock Lakes National Wildlife Refuge in southwest Montana, United States. The wilderness occupies more than three fourths of the refuge and was set aside to enhance species preservation, especially f ...
and
Grays Lake National Wildlife Refuge
Grays Lake National Wildlife Refuge is a National Wildlife Refuge of the United States located in southeastern Idaho. It has the largest hardstem bulrush marsh in North America. Located in a high mountain valley near Soda Springs, the refuge and ...
s
Ten distinct
National Wilderness Area
The National Wilderness Preservation System (NWPS) of the United States protects federally managed wilderness areas designated for preservation in their natural condition. Activity on formally designated wilderness areas is coordinated by the Na ...
s have been established within the GYE's
National Forests since 1966, mandating a higher level of
habitat
In ecology, the term habitat summarises the array of resources, physical and biotic factors that are present in an area, such as to support the survival and reproduction of a particular species. A species habitat can be seen as the physical ...
protection than the USFS otherwise uses.
The GYE also encompasses some privately held and state lands surrounding those managed by the U.S. Government.
The Trust for Public Land
The Trust for Public Land is a U.S. nonprofit organization with a mission to "create parks and protect land for people, ensuring healthy, livable communities for generations to come". Since its founding in 1972, the Trust for Public Land has compl ...
has protected over about 40 projects in the Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem.
Management by species
Ecological management has been most often advanced through concerns over individual
species
In biology, a species is the basic unit of classification and a taxonomic rank of an organism, as well as a unit of biodiversity. A species is often defined as the largest group of organisms in which any two individuals of the appropriat ...
rather than over broader ecological principles. Though 20 or 30 or even 50 years of information on a population may be considered long-term by some, one of the important lessons of Greater Yellowstone management is that even half a century is not long enough to give a full idea of how a species may vary in its occupation of a wild ecosystem.
The Yellowstone hot springs are important for their diversity of
thermophilic
A thermophile is an organism—a type of extremophile—that thrives at relatively high temperatures, between . Many thermophiles are archaea, though they can be bacteria or fungi. Thermophilic eubacteria are suggested to have been among the earl ...
bacteria. These bacteria have been useful in studies of the evolution of
photosynthesis
Photosynthesis is a process used by plants and other organisms to convert light energy into chemical energy that, through cellular respiration, can later be released to fuel the organism's activities. Some of this chemical energy is stored in ...
and as sources of thermostable
enzyme
Enzymes () are proteins that act as biological catalysts by accelerating chemical reactions. The molecules upon which enzymes may act are called substrates, and the enzyme converts the substrates into different molecules known as products ...
s for
molecular biology
Molecular biology is the branch of biology that seeks to understand the molecular basis of biological activity in and between cells, including biomolecular synthesis, modification, mechanisms, and interactions. The study of chemical and phys ...
. Although the smell of
sulfur
Sulfur (or sulphur in British English) is a chemical element with the symbol S and atomic number 16. It is abundant, multivalent and nonmetallic. Under normal conditions, sulfur atoms form cyclic octatomic molecules with a chemical formul ...
is common and there are some sulfur fixing
cyanobacteria
Cyanobacteria (), also known as Cyanophyta, are a phylum of gram-negative bacteria that obtain energy via photosynthesis. The name ''cyanobacteria'' refers to their color (), which similarly forms the basis of cyanobacteria's common name, bl ...
, it has been found that
hydrogen
Hydrogen is the chemical element with the symbol H and atomic number 1. Hydrogen is the lightest element. At standard conditions hydrogen is a gas of diatomic molecules having the formula . It is colorless, odorless, tasteless, non-to ...
is being used as an energy source by
extremophile
An extremophile (from Latin ' meaning "extreme" and Greek ' () meaning "love") is an organism that is able to live (or in some cases thrive) in extreme environments, i.e. environments that make survival challenging such as due to extreme tem ...
microbe
A microorganism, or microbe,, ''mikros'', "small") and ''organism'' from the el, ὀργανισμός, ''organismós'', "organism"). It is usually written as a single word but is sometimes hyphenated (''micro-organism''), especially in olde ...
s.
Flora
Among
native plant
In biogeography, a native species is indigenous to a given region or ecosystem if its presence in that region is the result of only local natural evolution (though often popularised as "with no human intervention") during history. The term is eq ...
s of the GYE,
whitebark pine (''Pinus albicaulis'') is a species of special interest, in large part because of its seasonal importance to grizzly bears, but also because its distribution could be dramatically reduced by relatively minor
global warming
In common usage, climate change describes global warming—the ongoing increase in global average temperature—and its effects on Earth's climate system. Climate change in a broader sense also includes previous long-term changes to ...
. In this case, researchers do not have a good long-term data set on the species, but they understand its ecology well enough to project declining future
conservation status
The conservation status of a group of organisms (for instance, a species) indicates whether the group still exists and how likely the group is to become extinct in the near future. Many factors are taken into account when assessing conservation ...
. A more immediate and serious threat to whitebark pines is an introduced
fungal rust disease,
White Pine Blister Rust
''Cronartium ribicola'' is a species of rust fungus in the family Cronartiaceae that causes the disease white pine blister rust. Other names include: (French), (German), (Spanish).
''Cronartium ribicola'' is native to China, and was subseque ...
(''Cronartium ribicola''), which is causing heavy mortality in the species. Occasional resistant individuals occur, but in the short to medium term, a severe population decline is expected.
Estimates of the decline of
quaking aspen (''Populus tremuloides'') on the park's northern range since 1872 range from 50% to 95%. Perhaps no conservation controversy underway in Greater Yellowstone more clearly reveals the need for comprehensive interdisciplinary research.
Several factors are suspected in the quaking aspen's changing status, including:
*
Native American influences on numerous
mammal
Mammals () are a group of vertebrate animals constituting the class Mammalia (), characterized by the presence of mammary glands which in females produce milk for feeding (nursing) their young, a neocortex (a region of the brain), fur ...
species and on
fire ecology
Fire ecology is a scientific discipline concerned with natural processes involving fire in an ecosystem and the ecological effects, the interactions between fire and the abiotic and biotic components of an ecosystem, and the role as an ecosystem ...
-return intervals before the creation of the park in 1872.
*European influences on
wildfire
A wildfire, forest fire, bushfire, wildland fire or rural fire is an unplanned, uncontrolled and unpredictable fire in an area of combustible vegetation. Depending on the type of vegetation present, a wildfire may be more specifically identi ...
frequency since 1886; regional
climate
Climate is the long-term weather pattern in an area, typically averaged over 30 years. More rigorously, it is the mean and variability of meteorological variables over a time spanning from months to millions of years. Some of the meteorologi ...
warming.
*Human harvests of
beaver
Beavers are large, semiaquatic rodents in the genus ''Castor'' native to the temperate Northern Hemisphere. There are two extant species: the North American beaver (''Castor canadensis'') and the Eurasian beaver (''C. fiber''). Beavers a ...
and
ungulate
Ungulates ( ) are members of the diverse clade Ungulata which primarily consists of large mammals with hooves. These include odd-toed ungulates such as horses, rhinoceroses, and tapirs; and even-toed ungulates such as cattle, pigs, giraffes, ...
s in the first 15 years of the park's history, and of
wolves
The wolf (''Canis lupus''; : wolves), also known as the gray wolf or grey wolf, is a large canine native to Eurasia and North America. More than thirty subspecies of ''Canis lupus'' have been recognized, and gray wolves, as popularly un ...
and other
predator
Predation is a biological interaction where one organism, the predator, kills and eats another organism, its prey. It is one of a family of common feeding behaviours that includes parasitism and micropredation (which usually do not kill t ...
s before 1930.
*Human settlement on traditional ungulate migration routes north of the park since 1872; ungulate (especially
elk) effects on all other parts of the ecosystem since 1900; and human influences on elk distribution in the park.
Fauna
Anecdotal information on grizzly bear abundance dates to the mid-19th century, and administrators have made informal population estimates for more than 70 years. From these sources, ecologists know the species was common in Greater Yellowstone when
Europe
Europe is a large peninsula conventionally considered a continent in its own right because of its great physical size and the weight of its history and traditions. Europe is also considered a Continent#Subcontinents, subcontinent of Eurasia ...
ans arrived and that the population was not isolated before the 1930s, but is now. Researchers do not know if bears were more or less common than now.
A 1959-1970
bear
Bears are carnivoran mammals of the family Ursidae. They are classified as caniforms, or doglike carnivorans. Although only eight species of bears are extant, they are widespread, appearing in a wide variety of habitats throughout the No ...
study suggested a grizzly bear population size of about 176, later revised to about 229. Later estimates have ranged as low as 136 and as high as 540; the most recent is a minimum estimate of 236, but biologists think there may be as many as 1,000 bears in the ecosystem. Although the Greater Yellowstone population is relatively close to recovery goals, the plan's definition of recovery is controversial. Thus, even though the population may be stable or possibly increasing in the short term, in the longer term, continued
habitat loss
Habitat destruction (also termed habitat loss and habitat reduction) is the process by which a natural habitat becomes incapable of supporting its native species. The organisms that previously inhabited the site are displaced or dead, thereby ...
, climate change, and increasing
human
Humans (''Homo sapiens'') are the most abundant and widespread species of primate, characterized by bipedalism and exceptional cognitive skills due to a large and complex brain. This has enabled the development of advanced tools, cultu ...
activities may well reverse the trend.
Yellowstone cutthroat trout
The Yellowstone cutthroat trout (''Oncorhynchus clarkii bouvieri'') is a subspecies of the cutthroat trout (''Oncorhynchus clarkii''). It is a freshwater fish in the salmon family (family Salmonidae). Native only to a few U.S. states, their ...
(''Oncorhynchus clarki bouvieri'') have suffered considerable declines since European settlement, but recently began flourishing in some areas. Especially in
Yellowstone Lake
Yellowstone Lake is the largest body of water in Yellowstone National Park. The lake is above sea level and covers with of shoreline. While the average depth of the lake is , its greatest depth is at least . Yellowstone Lake is the largest fre ...
itself, long-term records indicate an almost remarkable restoration of robust populations from only three decades ago when the numbers of this
fish
Fish are Aquatic animal, aquatic, craniate, gill-bearing animals that lack Limb (anatomy), limbs with Digit (anatomy), digits. Included in this definition are the living hagfish, lampreys, and Chondrichthyes, cartilaginous and bony fish as we ...
were depleted because of excessive harvest. Its current recovery, though a significant management achievement, does not begin to restore the species' historical abundance. Also, they declined because of invasive lake trout. An aggressive lake trout removal program has caused the cutthroats to rebound.
Early accounts of
pronghorn
The pronghorn (, ) (''Antilocapra americana'') is a species of artiodactyl (even-toed, hoofed) mammal indigenous to interior western and central North America. Though not an antelope, it is known colloquially in North America as the American a ...
(''Antilocapra americana'') in Greater Yellowstone described
herd
A herd is a social group of certain animals of the same species, either wild or domestic. The form of collective animal behavior associated with this is called '' herding''. These animals are known as gregarious animals.
The term ''herd'' i ...
s of hundreds seen ranging through most major
river valley
A valley is an elongated low area often running between hills or mountains, which will typically contain a river or stream running from one end to the other. Most valleys are formed by erosion of the land surface by rivers or streams ...
s. These populations were decimated by 1900, and declines continued among remaining herds. On the park's northern range, pronghorn declined from 500-700 in the 1930s to about 122 in 1968. By 1992 the herd had increased to 536.
Gray Wolf reintroduction
The park is a commonly cited example of
apex predator
An apex predator, also known as a top predator, is a predator at the top of a food chain, without natural predators of its own.
Apex predators are usually defined in terms of trophic dynamics, meaning that they occupy the highest trophic lev ...
s affecting an ecosystem through a
trophic cascade Trophic cascades are powerful indirect interactions that can control entire ecosystems, occurring when a trophic level in a food web is suppressed. For example, a top-down cascade will occur if predators are effective enough in predation to reduce t ...
. After the reintroduction of the
gray wolf
The wolf (''Canis lupus''; : wolves), also known as the gray wolf or grey wolf, is a large canine native to Eurasia and North America. More than thirty subspecies of ''Canis lupus'' have been recognized, and gray wolves, as popularly un ...
in 1995, researchers noticed drastic changes occurring.
Elk, the primary prey of the gray wolf, became less abundant and changed their behavior, freeing riparian zones from constant grazing. The respite allowed willows and aspens to grow, creating habitat for
beaver
Beavers are large, semiaquatic rodents in the genus ''Castor'' native to the temperate Northern Hemisphere. There are two extant species: the North American beaver (''Castor canadensis'') and the Eurasian beaver (''C. fiber''). Beavers a ...
,
moose
The moose (in North America) or elk (in Eurasia) (''Alces alces'') is a member of the New World deer subfamily and is the only species in the genus ''Alces''. It is the largest and heaviest extant species in the deer family. Most adult ma ...
, and scores of other species. In addition to the effects on prey species, the gray wolf's presence also affected the park's
grizzly bear
The grizzly bear (''Ursus arctos horribilis''), also known as the North American brown bear or simply grizzly, is a population or subspecies of the brown bear inhabiting North America.
In addition to the mainland grizzly (''Ursus arctos horri ...
population. The bears, emerging from hibernation, chose to scavenge off wolf kills to gain needed energy and fatten up after fasting for months. Dozens of other species have been documented scavenging from wolf kills.
See also
*
Ecology of the Rocky Mountains
The ecology of the Rocky Mountains is diverse due to the effects of a variety of environmental factors. The Rocky Mountains are the major mountain range in western North America, running from the far north of British Columbia in Canada to New Me ...
*
References
Further reading
*{{cite book , last=Turner , first=Jack , title=Travels in Greater Yellowstone , location=New York , publisher=St. Martin's Press , isbn=978-0-312-26672-1 , year=2008 , url-access=registration , url=https://archive.org/details/travelsingreater00turn
External links
Greater Yellowstone Coalition: The Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem websiteUSGS Rocky Mountain Mapping Center: Greater Yellowstone EcosystemYellowstone-Teton Clean Energy CoalitionThe Trust for Public Land - Greater Yellowstone Ecosystem Program
Ecology of the Rocky Mountains
Environment of Idaho
Environment of Montana
Environment of Wyoming
Northwestern United States
Yellowstone National Park
Fauna of the Rocky Mountains
Flora of the Rocky Mountains
Systems ecology