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• 2016 Smokies wildfires: Six years later, the good and the bad come into focus as natural recovery continues
  in News
  By Ben Pounds

  Journalists and park officials document damage from the November 2016 wildfires that killed at least 15 people and left hundreds of dwellings and businesses in ruins. Thomas Fraser/Hellbender Press via Knoxville Mercury

  How the 2016 Great Smoky Mountains National Park wildfire affected salamanders and other life, six years on

  GATLINBURG — The disastrous Chimney Tops 2 wildfire of 2016 occurred some six years ago, but researchers are still looking at its ecological effects.

  The Discover Life in America 2023 Colloquium brought together researchers this month from different fields and universities to present findings on research in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. 

  Researchers presented on many topics, ranging from trout to the history of the Mingus family in the park.

  One such presentation, the first of the day, from William Peterman, associate professor in wildlife ecology and management at Ohio State University, focused on the effects wildfires had on salamander populations, which he described as negative.

  Other presenters touched on the wildfire’s effects as well, including its effects on vegetation and its beneficial effects on the diversity of bird species.

  “Smoky Mountains is the self-proclaimed salamander capital of the world,” Peterman said. He focused his study on the plethodontid family of salamanders, which breathe through their skin.

  “Kind of think of them as a walking lung,” he said.

• 5 big threats to the world’s rivers
  in News
  By Tara Lohan

  A biologist with Conservation Fisheries surveys a stretch of Little River near Walland, Tennessee to determine fish viability and identify rare species for transplantation. Thomas Fraser/Hellbender Press

  Human activities have imperiled our waterways — along with a third of freshwater fish and other aquatic species

  This story was originally published by The Revelator.

  If we needed more motivation to save our ailing rivers, it could come with the findings of a recent study that determined the biodiversity crisis is most acute in freshwater ecosystems, which thread the Southern landscape like crucial veins and arteries.

  Rivers, lakes and inland wetlands cover 1 percent of the Earth but provide homes for 10 percent of all its species, including one-third of all vertebrates. And many of those species are imperiled — some 27 percent of the nearly 30,000 freshwater species so far assessed by the IUCN Red List. This includes nearly one-third of all freshwater fish.

  How did things get so bad? For some species it’s a single action — like building a dam. But for most, it’s a confluence of factors — an accumulation of harm — that builds for years or decades.

• Wither wisteria: ‘People care about our land’
  in News
  By Ben Pounds

  Anne Child removes invasive exotic plants during a recent Tennessee Citizens for Wilderness Planning event to mark National Public Lands Day at TVA’s Worthington Cemetery in Oak Ridge. Ben Pounds/Hellbender Press

  Citizens pay it back on Public Lands Day in Oak Ridge, Smokies and beyond

  OAK RIDGE — Rain drizzled as volunteers dug and clipped plants in woods around an old cemetery turned science lab.

  It was a Public Lands Day event at Tennessee Valley Authority Worthington Cemetery Ecological Study area in Oak Ridge near Melton Hill Lake. Tennessee Citizens for Wilderness Planning, an environmental organization based in Oak Ridge, led the Sept. 24 work party in support of American public lands.

  Other events were held throughout the country to mark the date (including Great Smoky Mountains National Park), which has proven itself to be the most productive day of the year for citizen sweat equity in public lands.

• There’s a whole world in the dirt beneath your feet
  in News
  By Tara Lohan
  The Dust Bowl of the 1930s resulted in the displacement of tons of soil in the midst of a drought similar to the one that grips the Southwest today. Library of Congress

   

  Dirt is far from just dirt. It’s a foundation for life.

  This story was originally published by The Revelator.

  Look down. You may not see the soil beneath your feet as teeming with life, but it is.

  Better scientific tools are helping us understand that dirt isn’t just dirt. Life in the soil includes microbes like bacteria and fungi; invertebrates such as earthworms and nematodes; plant roots; and even mammals like gophers and badgers who spend part of their time below ground.

  It’s commonly said that a quarter of all the planet’s biodiversity lives in the soil, but that’s likely a vast understatement. Many species that reside there, particularly microorganisms such as viruses, bacteria, fungi and protists, aren’t yet known to science.

• Another look at the parallel war Russia is waging against the natural environment
  in Feedbag
  By Thomas Fraser
   

  New York Times: Ukraine environmental holocaust just the latest in ways war scars the Earth

  Open armed conflict understandably abrogates immediate concerns about the natural environment.

  Despite the tens of thousands of human deaths already caused by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the war’s impact on natural systems can’t be understated.

  In some cases, Russian troops have taken up positions in natural parks and protected ecological areas in Ukraine. The Black Sea coast is an important remaining area of biodiversity in Europe. Ukrainian counterattacks, while understandable, have also inflamed environmental consequences.

  There are also immediate risks to human respiratory health from the fires sparked by attacks on fuel depots and chemical facilities.

  War’s negative environmental impacts are by no means a new thing: See the use of Agent Orange by the U.S. in Vietnam and the wasteland of burning oil fields left behind in the Gulf War.

  War is bad for every living thing.

• Fire, fog, floods: Scientists probe climate-change impacts in Smokies
  in News
  By S. Heather Duncan

  Many climate-change related issues have appeared since publication of this vintage map of Great Smoky Mountains National Park. Library of Congress

  Invasive insects are among the vanguard of noticeable climate changes in America’s most-visited national park

  GATLINBURG — Ants scurry beneath the carpet of last year’s leaves in Great Smoky Mountains National Park. The native ants are busy spreading the seeds of violets and bloodroot, preparing a new carpet of spring wildflowers to draw thousands of visitors.

  But the local insects aren’t alone under there. They have become prey to venomous Asian needle ants that also prowl the leaf litter.

  These invaders dine on termites, other ants and insects, while stealing habitat from them. Unlike invasive fire ants, needle ants can live in pristine forests and build large colonies with hundreds of queens. But like fire ants, needle ants have a painful sting that can trigger an allergic reaction. 

  Climate change is expected to make it easier for invasive species like needle ants to upset the delicate balance of this temperate rainforest full of rare plants and animals. That’s just one example.

• New digital maps outline precious pockets of remaining U.S. biodiversity and the threats they face
  in News
  By Dave Russell

  The endangered Indiana bat is among threatened and endangered species in Great Smoky Mountains National Park.  U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service

  Southern Appalachians show red as a warning on new detailed biodiversity maps 

  This story was originally published by the Sylva Herald.

  SYLVA — Great Smoky Mountains National Park has long been known for its abundance of different species of flora and fauna.

  Credit old mountains in a warm, sunny and wet region with varying types of climate, soil and stone for that large number.

  “The park is almost certainly the most biodiverse national park in North America,” said Paul Super, national park science coordinator. “And certainly the most studied of any national park.”

  A group of environmental organizations recently put together a series of maps illustrating the regions with the biggest threats to their biodiversity, and the area around Jackson County and the national park showed up in the red, showing risk. One such map, based on NatureServe data, is among the most detailed maps of endangered and threatened species ever produced.

• Zigging and zagging to find the Zigzag
  in News
  By Keenan Thomas

  UT doctoral student Bryce Wade examines a Southern zigzag salamander he found at Ijams Nature Center in South Knoxville. Keenan Thomas/Hellbender Press

  On the happy herping trail: Bryce Wade searches for salamanders

  KNOXVILLE — Bryce Wade scours the nature trail, turning over rocks and logs. On this overcast day at Ijams Nature Center, he searches beneath the leaves on the ground for one creature: salamanders.

  Underneath the rocks, logs and leaves, salamanders populate the cool, moist earth, avoiding the sun whenever they can. Wade is looking for a particular type: a winter species informally called the Southern zigzag salamander (Plethodon ventralis). 

• Naturalists have documented 77 new species in Smokies since 2011
  in News
  By Smoky Mountain News
  The calico pennant dragonfly (Celithemis elisa) is among 77 new species discovered in Great Smoky Mountains National Park over the last decade. Wikipedia Commons

  Apps and public research help uncover new layers of life in Southern Appalachia

  This article was originally published by Smoky Mountain News.

  Visitors armed only with a free app and love of nature have documented more than 4,000 species in Great Smoky Mountains National Park since 2011, according to the nonprofit Discover Life in America, including 77 not previously documented in the park by anyone else. 

  DLiA, which manages the All Taxa Biodiversity Inventory project that aims to catalogue all species residing in the extremely diverse park, recently analyzed more than 71,000 records from the app, iNaturalist, to discover the impact these casual observations have made on the project. 

• Public biological survey searches for the Smokies most-wanted species
  in News
  By Rhonda Wise

  A child snaps a photo of a flower beetle on a wild hydrangea in Great Smoky Mountains National Park.  Valerie Polk

  Grab your phone and get to some citizen science

  Rhonda Wise writes for the public affairs office of Great Smoky Mountains National Park

  Discover Life in America (DLiA), the nonprofit science research partner, is inviting the public to participate in the Smokies Most Wanted program. This initiative allows visitors to help preserve park species by recording sightings of animals, plants, and other organisms from their smartphones using the iNaturalist app.