Bruce Melton, ClimateDiscovery.org
(Instagram logs with photos and video are below the summary.)
Across the Central Rockies from the San Juans to Rocky Mountain National Park, beetle attacks are growing again. The beetles and impacted trees are changing though. Gone are the mountain pine beetles as they have had their way with most of the large stands of their favorite prey, the lodegepole and ponderosa pines. The mountain pine beetle is the most aggressive of the native bark beetles and it attacked first, targeting water stressed trees so they could be successful with an attack of nearly 100 million acres across the US and Canada.
New and less aggressive species of bark beetle are now taking advantage of continued drought and cumulative stress and attacking other species of pine, as well as firs and spruce. The predominant recent kill we observed across the Central Rockies this trip targeted high elevation spruce. Above 10,000 to 11,000 feet, the spruce kill is very significant with most places seeing a total of 50 to near 100 percent mortality since the attacks started.
This trip started with rain and mudded up the Icemelter pretty good (our custom Suburban trail vehicle). But this is what the Icemelter is for. We can’t chase beetles across four-wheel drive trails atop the highest peaks in the US without four-wheel drive. And sleeping in a tent is for the bears. We sleep in the Suburban, on four-inch thick foam pads. We can make camp in five minutes and be cooking dinner, or bagel and blaze in the morning to get to the shooting fast. Camping at the motel is a rarity. If we were to motel it every night, it’s hours to the wilds where most of the the impacts are.
We started at Cathedral Campground in the Rio Grande National Forest, our family’s favorite campground in south central Colorado, a place I have known since 1970. It has changed over the years, moving from a mixed forest of aspen, spruce and fir at 9,400 feet, to a forest more dominated by conifers with a substantial amount of aspen remaining. The climate change impacts here started about a decade ago with mostly budworm, a moth larvae that eats the new growth tips of conifers. The infestation does not create immediate mortality, but after years of having their buds eaten off, the forest around camp is changing to one of more sticks than living trees. This year however, the budworms were almost absent. Who knows why, maybe a better than average snow year. The creek is still far lower than ever. The snowfields that once fed this roaring little creek are no more. One can see the outlines of the old banks, the banks I fished from when I was a kid, many feet back from the current banks, covered with grass and brush. The legions of wildflowers that once covered the area in summer are only present in exceptionally wet years. It’s dry almost all the time though. With a summer season nearly twice as long as it was in our old climate, end of summer dryness comes long before summer is over. It is however, wonderfully cool after coming from the oven in Texas.
Next was Mesa Verde National Park in the far southwest of Colorado. On the way, over Wolf Creek Pass, the spruce beetle kill of the last decade was almost complete and extended farther down the mountain than in previous years. We were looking at the forest regeneration failure at Mesa Verde. Fires around the turn of the century had not regenerated following a trend across the West of lack of forest recovery after fire. It’s too warm. This year was no different, still no baby pinyon or junipers recolonizing the burns. The difference this year was a good snow year last, that had created a bloom of gorgeous yellow chamisa across the emerging grasslands.
Next we cruised up Colorado 550 north of Durango to Molas Pass. At 10,910 feet it is an excellent observatory to see into the high peaks of the San Juan Mountains and Weminuche Wilderness Complex. We have been watching this vista’s beetle progression for a decade now and above 10,000 feet the predominant spruce forest has seen at least a 50 percent mortality.
Taylor Reservoir to the northeast of Gunnison was our next destination. I have wanted to show Jeannie the astonishing sunset afterglow behind the Collegiates for years. (Jeannie, trail name DJ, is my wife, number 1 assistant and boss.) The Collegiate range has the highest concentration of fourteeners in Colorado and the lower 48. On the way we looked at the fir beetle attack in Ouray and on the Ouray side of the Million Dollar Highway at Red Mountain Pass. There seemed to be more red kill this year than years past, with mortality increasing and approaching 50 percent. Conifers turn red the year after the beetles have killed them for their young. This is called red kill by foresters. The second year the reds change to brown and the third the needles mostly fall leaving behind the gray bones of the trees, often called gray kill.
The road up Tayler River Canyon has some recent red kill, as well as previous mortality totaling 20 or 30 percent. Taylor reservoir is still almost completely untouched, but up the road to Tin Cup has seen better days. In addition to modest beetle kill there was a big blowdown last year. These blowdowns are becoming more common with more extreme weather.
The next day we drove through what could be the largest living organism in the US, a 15 miles stretch of Aspen west of Crested Butte, where aspen in groves are all connected to the same root system. The aspen was nearing peak color and was it was a stupendously yellow drive. But this is where we discovered that aspen decline had activated again in the Central Rockies. After the decline became pretty bad in the late 2000s, it had almost disappeared in the Central Rockies, but now it was back. Up to about ten percent of aspen had succumbed to the decline. What this decline is, is a combination of insect attack, disease infestation and water stress, where no individual stress is mortal, but after years of stress individual trees to relatively large sections (acres) of the aspen grove succumb.
From the aspen grove we drove on north to Chapman Campground on the upper Fryingpan River near Basalt and the money community of Aspen. We have been coming to this campground above Ruedi Reservoir since 1996 and until about 2010 there was no beetle attack. Today there is a good 30 or 40 percent mortality around the reservoir. The upper Fryinpan above the reservoir is not too bad, but the lower Fryingpan has several areas of active red kill and a good 20 percent mortality. This is rather uncommon at this lower altitude below 8,000 feet, and it appears much of the kill is from budworm, though the red kill is characteristic of bark beetle attack.
From the Fryingpan we headed to Rocky Mountain National Park’s Westgate Entrance to repeat our repeat photography of the beetle kill at the entrance monument that began in 2008 with the massive beetle kill that year. What we found was that wildfire had come through two years ago. This was extreme wildfire, common today because of nonlinear drying with increased warming. It wiped out any regeneration that had begun.
Farther into the park we left the burn. Regeneration is proceeding, but the regrowing lodgepole pine are not too thick. This aligns with half of western forests that are regenerating after wildfire (where beetle kill is likely similar), are only regenerating at half the normal 20th century rate. The sparsity of the regeneration was obvious because lodgepole normally regrows from total disturbance as thick as hair on a dog. This is the way of lodgepole. Their growth in super dense stands is quite characteristic. Most of this regrowth was spotty, with lots of room to move around between young trees.
The campgrounds were full in the park so we grabbed a rare motel on Interstate 25 away from the big money in Estes Park and had a wonderful anniversary dinner. It’s nice not to camp all the time.
Next day we found that the National Park Service was now requiring reservations to enter the park between 9 am and 2 pm because of crowding. Boo… Around we turned forsaking the shooting of new beetle attack on the east side of the park we had scouted the evening before, and headed down towards a campsite west of Buena Vista, almost exactly in the middle of Colorado, at Monarch Pass Campground near Monarch Pass.
The trip south through South Pass south of Breckenridge was replete with plenty of beetle kill, though it has been a dozen years since we were here and it is hard to say the current status of the attack.
We found Monarch Campground closed by the Forest Service, a hazard of camping in late September in the Rockies. The rangers do not want campsites getting snowed in before they are properly closed creating a perceived need by some Forest Service regions to close campgrounds early. Boo again… We hooked it on up back to Gunnison and found another motel by about 10 pm. A two-fer, two nights in a row in a motel. A long day.
After this long day, a reflection of the climate change meaning of all this forest degradation is in order. When a forest sees a doubling of its mortality, this halves carbon storage. Because forests are only modest sequestration agents to begin with (their combined sequestration is great because of their great aerial extents), a doubling of mortality almost certainly means the forest flips from sequestration to emissions of greenhouse gases. Normal forest mortality is on the order of 0.25 percent or one in 400 hundred every year. Once we restore our climate back to the evolutionary boundaries of these forests, because of their slow growth rate with above freezing temperatures happening (normally) only about four months of the year, these high altitude forests will take from 80 years to a couple of centuries to become mature enough so that new sequestration will overcome the natural collapse emissions from forests and soils.
The last full day of the trip we headed down to Lake City, one of the pivot points of the Alpine Loop, a series of hundred plus year old mining trails that are now a major wilderness four-wheel drive recreation attraction. On the way south on Colorado 149 from Gunnison, budworm and beetle attack were common with mortality in excess of 30 percent. This area is one of those areas of lower elevation impacts we have been seeing more and more often. We pulled in to Lake City just in time for an early afternoon ice cream.
One of the must-do tasks of any Alpine Loop four-wheeling adventure is a mid-day break at the San Juan Soda Company in Lake City. Their soda fountain and ice cream is legendary. After our treat, we headed on up towards Lake San Cristobal and Cinnamon Pass, to see what we could see of the new beetle kill there. The last time we were in this part of the Alpine Loop area was in 2019 where we found brand new red kill beetle attack with mortality of about 5 percent. Before, no red kill had been evident along this trail. This trip, the kill was likely 50 percent or more. The aspen were stunning however and beauty reigned as even beetle kill is beautiful because it is natural. The cause of course is us, but the beetles are just doing their job. Every time our climate changes abruptly, the beetles assist Mother Nature in the collapse and re-evolution of her natural systems so that they can be populated with new species and mechanisms that are tolerant of the changed conditions. These beetle attacks and the collapse of our world’s forests are of the rarest things human civilization has ever encountered. The last time this occurred was when our climate changed abruptly at the end of the last ice age about 10,000 years ago.
The four-wheel drive trail up to Cinnamon Pass was fantastic as usual. It follows the Lake Fork of the Rio Grande River to the highest fountain of its headwaters. We share the trail these days with dozens of ATV and side-by-side recreationists, with jeep types being outnumbered. Our full-size Suburban was one of just a few full-size vehicles on the trail this day. But this is our metal camper away from bears so we take our time and get to the top nonetheless.
At about 10,500 feet the trail forks and we shift into four-wheel high range that helps negotiate the ever increasing ledges and holes in the trail. The forest becomes spotty with avalanche chutes slicing through from the heights to the abyss below. The trail becomes exposed with long falls down the mountain sides. It is a narrow trail, just wide enough for a full-size vehicle. Occasional pull-offs allow two vehicles to pass. The beetle kill is evident all around and below. Its browns, oranges, reds and grays compliment the grays, yellows, purples and reds of the peaks and the yellows and golds of the aspens, alders and tundra plants that mix with the wide variety of greens of the healthy conifers, unturned aspens and undergrowth; truly a riot of color.
At about 11,500 feet the trail forks again as we approach treeline. We shift into four-wheel low range and crawl up the steep switchbacks and ledges. A golden eagle graces a rock spire jutting up a hundred and fifty feet above the edge of the trail. We are above treeline and the beetle kill fades in the valley below us as the exposure increases. Multiple switchbacks are now visible from much fo the trail. Above, the peaks contrast sharply with the heavy-bottomed clouds of the afternoon mountain effect.
Uphill traffic has the right of way but regardless, one must scan the tundra for oncoming traffic. It can be near impossible to back up through a ledge riddled switchback so prudence is needed to ensure safety. When meeting another adventurer’s vehicle, a common thing at pullouts because the width is so limited when two vehicles meet, is that both vehicles must pull in their mirrors or risk a smack. It’s common to stop for a moment and exchange pleasantries with the four-wheel trail climbing tribe, window to window. “Where you from?” and “Where you headed today?” are common discussion topics in addition to, “Had your ice cream in Lake City yet?”
On up we crawled, ever higher, above two and half miles high to the summit of Cinnamon Pass, negotiating a dozen or two switchbacks with ledges that would make an all-wheel drive town SUV weep. The pikas little song “binhhh” is common in the talus. A marmot basks in a shaft of sunlight between swirling clouds. The uncommon thing about Cinnamon Pass is the colors of the rocky peaks. The cinnamon colors, yellows, mauves and purples literally shout at the sky – and are the reason for all the mining. Color in the rock says precious minerals are here.
After a few short but beautiful minutes at the pass at 12,640 feet and a stiff wind with the temperature in the 30s, we said goodbye to this glorious world and began our trip back to the flatlands and 100 degree temperatures.
(The following are our Instagram logs from this filming trip.)
September 18, 2023
September 19, 2023
September 20, 2023
September 21, 2023
September 22, 2023
September 23, 2023
September 24, 2023
September 25, 2023
September 26, 2023