Seventeen glacially sheared stumps in growth position and abundant detrital wood fragments were exposed by stream avulsion at the terminus of the Saskatchewan Glacier in 1999. The stumps lay buried beneath the glacier and over 5 m of glacial sediment until historical recession and stream incision exposed the 225- to 262-year-old stand of subalpine fir, Englemann spruce and whitebark pine trees. Crossdating and construction of two radiocarbon-controlled floating tree-ring chronologies showed that all the subfossil stumps and boles exposed at this location were killed during a Neoglacial advance of the Saskatchewan Glacier 2,910 ± 60 to 2,730 ± 60 ¹⁴C years B.P. These findings support the Peyto Advance as a regional glaciological response to changing mass balance conditions.

Current concerns about inorganic contaminants in food products have raised consumer awareness of anthropogenic sources of heavy metal contamination in ecosystems and their potential threat to human health. Mining and exploration of mineralized zones is a major source of such contamination. Mining throughout the Patagonia Mountains, Arizona, has left a legacy of surface water contamination by acid mine drainage (AMD). This study assessed the impacts of AMD on soils and plants throughout the study area. Concentrations, transport, and loading of heavy metals (Ag, As, Cd, Co, Cr, Cu, Fe, Mn, Mo, Ni, Pb, Sb, and Zn) in soils and plants was quantified using total concentrations, suggested toxic levels, and plant and soil pollution indices. Pollution indices were modified to include antimony and molybdenum. Pollution indices greater than 100 were found in areas disturbed by mining, remediation sites and beyond. Cattle grazing on grasses contaminated by metals were documented.

I studied diel activity patterns of female desert bighorn sheep ( Ovis canadensis mexicana) in the Little Harquahala Mountains, Arizona, July 1985-June 1986. Diurnal activity patterns were similar throughout the year. Nocturnal activity patterns were similar for all seasons except spring when activity significantly (P = 0.003) decreased. Bighorn sheep were active an average of 39 and 33% of any given hour during the day and night, respectively. Diurnal ambient temperatures and relative humidity were significantly (P ≤ 0.048) correlated with bighorn sheep activity during all seasons. Bighorn sheep spent a majority of the time foraging in the fall and winter, but spent more time resting during spring and summer. Bighorn sheep obtain water in their food throughout the day; percent moisture content of forage species remained high (≥ 32%) for any given hour of the day throughout the year.

Emory oak (Quercus emoryi) and Arizona white oak (Q. arizonica), currently being harvested for fuelwood in encinals of southern Arizona, usually regenerate through stump sprouting. Adjacent to a Huachuca Mountains fuelwood cutting area, 3 replications of four thinning treatments (25%, 50%, 75%, and 100% intensity) were established in January, 1986. Regeneration was assessed one year later by examining the effects of thinning intensity, partial or complete stem cluster cutting, and tree characteristics. Clearcutting greatly increased the proportion of stumps that sprout for Emory oak and increased sprout volume production for both species in comparison to thinned plots. Partially cut multi-stemmed tree clusters were less likely to sprout and have less sprout volume growth after one year than completely cut clusters. Regression models were developed to estimate sprout volume production based on thinning intensity, percent stem basal area cut, tree vigor, number of tree stems, and heart rot.

Fens are abundant in the San Juan Mountains. By exploring the geomorphology and geochemistry of fen wetlands, the functions that fens serve can be better understood. In this research, two main studies were conducted involving the geomorphology and geochemistry of fens. The first study involved a complex investigation of the geomorphology of five fen sites in the San Juan Mountains near Silverton, Colorado. Geomorphic maps were constructed for each fen site at a scale of ~1:3,000. A geomorphic classification scheme was then made based on fen location, and fens were placed in one of three categories: 1) valley-bottom, 2) valley-side, and 3) terrace. Fen circularity and elongation values were calculated for thirty fens to determine morphometry. A pattern for elongation of fens emerged between the three types of alpine fens with valley-bottom fens having an average elongation value of 1.7, valley-side 2.4, and terrace 1.9. Valley-side fens are more elongated than valley-bottom and terrace fens, which exhibit similar elongation values. In addition, sediment samples at each site were sectioned along visual breaks in the sediment column and were sieved. Mean phi values were calculated for each section and at each site. The mean phi values at California Gulch, Glacial Lake Ironton, Howardsville, Red Mountain Pass North, and Red Mountain Pass South, are 0.2112, 0.9045, 1.6028, 0.0178, and 1.0516, respectively. Overall, coarse-grained particles are associated with valley-side fens, and medium-grained particles are associated with valley-bottom and terrace fens. The second part of the study involved investigating the geochemistry of fen sediment. The geochemistry portion of this research focused on concentration and isotopic ratios of Pb and the amount of 137Cs in fen sediment to better understand variations of Pb with depth and calculate approximate sedimentation rates. Based on isotopic ratios of Pb, binary mixing was determined with the presence of ore mineralized Pb and non-ore mineralized. Binary mixing of two types of ore-mineralized Pb is present at the Howardsville fen and both ore-mineralized and non-ore mineralized Pb is present at the Red Mountain Pass North fen. Based on 137Cs in fen sediment at Howardsville, an average rate of deposition of sediment is approximately 0.16 cm/yr, with a visible change in sedimentation rates pre- and post-1960s.

My thesis focuses on agricultural livelihoods and EU integration in the Southern Carpathian Mountains of Romania.  I analyse how the EU’s Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) was deployed by policy makers and elites in the first year after EU membership, and how it shaped the livelihood possibilities of <i>tarani </i>(peasants).  Given the polarised nature of Romania’s post-socialist agrarian structure, the CAP excluded peasants from its policies, and demanded they change their <i>exploatatii/ferme de subzistenta;</i> (subsistence farms) into commercial farms.  Arguing from the premise that ‘subsistence farms’ are actually <i>gospodarii taranesti</i> (peasant households) working on different principles from farms altogether, it was possible to inquire into the strategies people deployed resourcefully in their everyday work to keep making a living. I analyse EU integration as a modern political and economic project that seeks to make the radically complicated pathways of people and things ‘transparent’.  I pursue the question of how the neoliberal expansion of economic rationality to all spheres of life shapes the actions of people. My ethnography captures the unease people felt in the face of the current transformation of value and illustrates how a much longer history of devaluing peasants has been taking place.  It makes clear how the devaluation of peasants and their produce is part of a larger epistemological project of development and progress.  My analytical framework enables me to show how the effects of polarisation and externalisation have had serious consequences for the ways people think about questions of freedom, success, merit and the ‘just state’ in Romania today.  My research suggests the need for a broader epistemological shift in the face of crisis, from a dominance approach towards commons thinking.

No description available.

No description available.

In Pacific North America, a substantial amount of the streamflow available during the dry summer months originates from melting mountain snowpacks. Since the start of the twenty-first century, these mountain snowpacks have been declining due to the impacts of global climate change and could have severe implications for future water availability in many regions. To develop robust predictive models of future water availability derived from mountainous snowpacks, the longest possible data record is required. However, instrumental data for snow measurements, when available, are limited to a length of only five or six decades in most regions of Pacific North America. In this study, tree-rings from snow-depth sensitive tree species (mountain hemlock (Tsuga mertensiana (Bong.) Carrière) and subalpine fir (Abies lasiocarpa (Hook.) Nutt.)) were used as a proxy to develop a 258-year record of precipitation as snow (PAS) for the southern Coast Mountains of British Columbia. Four snow models were evaluated based on a suite of dendroclimatological model diagnostics. From these, one PAS reconstruction was carried out. The reconstruction was unable to properly validate using the leave-one-out cross validation method. This result is attributed to the combination of a short calibration period, a potentially weak climate signal, and the absence of signal enhancement. Despite this outcome the research resulted in number of inferences and recommendations useful for future research. / Graduate

Weather, how we tangibly engage with climate in our everyday lives, is a central underpinning to life in Canada and around the world. This thesis investigates relating to weather through a focused exploration of wind in the everyday lives of fire lookout observers in the Canadian Rocky Mountains. Stitching together approaches from anthropology, phenomenology and mountain meteorology, it brings to bear insights on coexisting with weather changes through an understanding of lived mountain climates. Perched atop the front ranges of the Alberta Rocky Mountains are located a string of mountain fire lookouts. Tasked with discerning and detecting smoke plumes that may signal the start of a wildfire, lookout observers, who inhabit these remote lookout places for five to six months of the year, are attentive to the wind’s effect on visibility, its role in wildfire processes, and as a force to contend with in their daily lives on the lookout. Through participant observation, interviews and photo elicitation, I draw on fire lookout observers’ past and present experiences of wind, and its role in larger weather processes. With many lookout observers returning to their posts season after season, the breadth and depth of their experience stretches over three decades. Over the course of a summer’s fieldwork, I hiked in, and at times lived with, lookout observers. Walking, as a contemplative research practice, continued beyond the field and into analysis, engaging in a process I call ambulant listening as an alternative to transcribing interviews verbatim. This involved walking and listening to interviews multiple times, with notes later drawn out visually using mind maps. Through this process, I learned that wind stirs up much more than simply considering air in motion. Entwined in a variety of multi-sensory engagements, wind touches on broader themes of awareness, encounter and wonder that emerge as weather consciousness. This study offers a rare lens into a way of life that has been increasingly shuttered across Canada and around the world, while at the same time exemplifying ways of being and knowing weather inherent to coexisting with increasingly uncertain and unpredictable weather patterns in the midst of climate change. / Graduate / 0326, 0334,0314,0344 / kristen.walsh@hotmail.com