Since ice records began in 1973, Great Lakes ice cover has declined by an average of 30 percent. Records also show that the lakes are icing over later in the winter yet still melting around the same time in the spring.

Great Lakes Ice Cover 1970-2009. Source USGCRP 2009.

This year is better, but still below normal average. Satellites help us get a better image of how the Great Lakes look from above. These images use composite of data taken from NOAA satellites orbiting the earth’s poles and radar scans of the lakes by the National Ice Center. Here’s what ice cover looked like a month ago versus today. Darker colors like greys and blacks indicate higher ice concentration:

Great Lakes Ice Cover and Water Temperatures Comparison of January and February 2013. Graphic from NOAA Great Lakes Surface Environmental Analysis (GLSEA).

Great Lakes Ice Cover and Water Temperatures Comparing February 2010 and February 2013. Graphic by NOAA Great Lakes Surface Environmental Analysis (GLSEA).

Impact on Wildlife

Wildlife in a Warming World, the latest report by the National Wildlife Federation tells the story of what’s happening to wildlife throughout the U.S. with some specific impacts for the Great Lakes Region.

• Warming in Lake Superior helps the invasive sea lamprey thrive, harming native fish.
• Moose populations in Minnesota have dropped from 4,000 to ~100 since the mid-1980s.
• Many fish species eggs depend on ice cover for protection from dangerous winds or waves. Also, ice cover helps to ward off any bacterial growth that may affect the survival of the fish. Ice fishing – part of a multi-billion dollar fishing industry — is also affected as the ice is a no longer reliable platform to partake in the activity.
• Wetland habitat for many wildlife species is also affected as it depends on stable ice for protection from erosion. Our wetlands in the Great Lakes are vital to bird, turtle, snakes, and other amphibian habitat, protecting the lakes from sediment pollution and cleaning our drinking water.

You can learn more by listening to my radio interview Warming Lake Superior Stresses Wildlife, Observers Say on CBC News Radio.

How does ice cover look from our perspective?

Click here to view the embedded video.

A neat time lapse video tells the story of this year’s ice cover on Lake Erie. From our shoreline perspective, it looks icy. That is why satellite data and images are increasingly important to tell the bird’s-eye view of the story so we can act before it’s too late.

Solutions

Ice Caves in Grand Haven along Lake Michigan. Photo by National Park Service.

• Federal, state, and tribal governments have developed a comprehensive plan for helping the nation’s fish, wildlife, and plants adapt to climate change.  The Administration needs to release and implement this strategy.
•  Wildlife and park managers, with the support of the public, need to understand the vulnerability of their resources to climate change and develop forward-looking approaches to manage these changes.
• Management plans for lands and waters need to provide the space needed for wildlife species to shift across the landscape in response to climatic changes.

Second: A transition to cleaner, more secure sources of energy like offshore wind, solar power and next-generation biofuels while avoiding dirty energy choices like coal and tar sands oil will put us on the path to reverse this very alarming trend. We need ice on the Great Lakes, for future generations, for ourselves, for wildlife.

And that’s not all – in the forest, an immediate concern  is the potential for hemlock woody adelgid to have a major range expansion, and possibly wipe out eastern hemlock altogether.

These insects are native to Japan and feed on and kill eastern hemlock trees. The bug’s range is constrained to places where minimum temperatures remain above -20 degrees Fahrenheit… which now includes where I grew up, in North Carolina, and soon could include the forests in the entire Northeast. Climate model projections indicate that temperature increases could place the entire range of this tree above this temperature threshold, leading to range-wide declines and possible loss of the tree species altogether.

Why do we care? “I am more of a wildlife gal/guy than a tree one”, you say?
Eastern Hemlock is the most significant whitetail deer wintering cover in southern and central NH and parts of Maine and much of Massachusetts. Hemlock is used both as cover and forage during deep snow or cold temperatures. Loss of hemlock from the bugs could significantly drop the number of deer who make it through the winter, especially as we have more extreme winter storms that dump larger amounts of snow.

“But we need to worry about the economy, what about the economy?” Good question.  Deer drive hunting license numbers, important revenue in most states.  A significant reduction in deer numbers drives license sales and hunters getting out and spending money down correspondingly. Hunting and fishing license sales provide the bulk of state fish and wildlife funding in many states, which protects our wildlife and our pristine places.

A few fun facts from the Congressional Sportsmen’s foundation:

• The $12 billion anglers spent on boats and other special equipment in 2011 is more than the global revenues for Starbucks that year .
• Hunters spent $6 billion on guns, ammunition and archery equipment in 2011. That’s the same as the sales of bicycles in the United States.
• And hipsters beware: Sportsmen spend $90 billion annually – that’s more than the combined 2011 global revenues for Apple’s iPhone and iPad.

“I am convinced! What can we do about?” I am so glad you asked. We have a plan!

1. Reject tar sands in the US (including a pipeline here in New England)

2. Cut climate pollution from coal fired power plants

and last but not least,

3. Get the word out:  talk to your friends and neighbors, post this on your facebook page, and share it on twitter.

National Wildlife Photo Contest entry by Lois Settlemeyer.

With climate change bearing down on polar bears and their Arctic home, and without a plan in place for cutting carbon pollution by 50 percent by 2030, scientists have started preparing rescue plans for the imperiled animals.  These “crisis management plans,” laid out in the journal Conservation Letters, include some desperate strategies such as feeding the bears during increasingly long ice-free periods — a measure that goes against rule No. 1 for bear biologists.

However, as NWF bear biologist Sterling Miller explains, these proposed crisis plans are most appropriately viewed as pleas for action on climate change as they do not provide any real answers to the problem of starving bears:

“The reality is that unless something is done soon to curb global warming, there is no hope for polar bears. Measures like providing food for the bears are simply not sustainable in the long run.  At best, they will only work as a stopgap solution to buy the bears a little more time until climate change impacts can be reversed.  They are not long-term solutions.”

Change happening faster than expected

With sea ice melting faster than originally projected, scientists are starting to prepare for the worst. Just one exceptionally bad year of ice melt could send polar bear populations plummeting, requiring governments around the world to react quickly. In addition to providing food directly to polar bears, scientists are floating other non-conventional ideas, such as moving bears from southern areas to northern ones. To ensure the safety of people, some polar bears may need to be killed or confined in short-term holding pens.

As highlighted in NWF’s recent report, Wildlife in a Warming World, polar bears are not the only animals struggling to survive climate change.  Without meaningful action to address the cause of climate change—carbon pollution—treasured species from around the planet will begin to continue to suffer losses.

Still time to act

Fortunately, renewed hope is on the horizon. From the emphasis put on climate change in President Obama’s inaugural address to the recent creation of the Bicameral Climate Change Task Force in Congress, our elected leaders are signaling a new commitment to cutting carbon pollution.

It is not too late for polar bears. We can still avoid the worst impacts of climate change and give arctic wildlife a fighting chance with your help. Take action/Donate

Speak up for hungry polar bears and their cubs—urge President Obama to set strong limits on carbon pollution.

Today, a bipartisan group of Western representatives and senators introduced the Public Lands and Renewable Energy Development Act of 2013.

I am feeling giddy. Let me tell you why.

Growing up on the East Coast, our town playground and basketball court were the extent of my understanding of public lands. Though our eastern states also have their fair share of state and federal forest land and park systems, my first experience with real public lands came during a cross country bicycle ride. I fell in love with the wide open spaces I didn’t have in my backyard back home.

On a bike it’s easy to see how much use we get out of our federal public lands—like the 285 million acres managed by the Bureau of Land Management. Hunting, fishing, hiking, all forms of energy development, ranching, off-road vehicle use, and incredible wildlife habitat to boot. Experiencing our Western public lands in person made me proud to live in America.

I’ve since learned more about the pressures our public lands are feeling, particularly from a rapidly changing climate and energy development decisions. National Wildlife Federation’s recent report, Wildlife in a Warming World, highlighted the impacts of increased drought, wildfire, and invasive species on big game, sagebrush habitat, and other sensitive wildlife

A Framework for Renewable Energy Development on Public Lands

So that gets us back to the bill introduced today by Sen. Jon Tester (D-MT) and others. It creates the framework for more efficient, responsible renewable energy development on public lands and would strategically direct the revenue from development to pay back local communities, fish and wildlife resources, and hunting and angling access potentially impacted by this clean energy development.

It’s a win-win for clean energy and wildlife conservation and you heard it right in the intro—supported by Westerners from both parties. That’s cause for celebration in and of itself!

In 2009, our public lands had zero approved solar energy projects and very few wind energy projects. With a lot of effort, this changed over the last three years, with now over 30 projects and 12GW permitted, enough power for 3-5 million homes per year.

To be frank, our current system for wind and solar development on public lands is woefully inefficient for every interested stakeholder—the clean energy industry and the wildlife advocate. It nearly always results in more conflict than necessary.

This bill helps solve these significant barriers to clean energy development and wildlife conservation. It also ensures some of the revenues from development on public lands goes back to impacted communities, particularly through a conservation fund for cumulative impacts to the landscape and sportsmen’s access.

As we embark on a clean energy future, there is a model to avoid. 140 years ago the U.S. Congress passed a law to promote mining and Western expansion, with provisions that hinder wildlife and habitat conservation to this day. For decades, campaigns have worked to fix that mining law.

Let’s not look back 30 years from now with the realization that we made the same policy mistakes in the rush to stop carbon pollution with wind and solar energy on public lands. Instead, let’s put in place now the right framework for efficient, sustainable development of wind and solar energy and help address its impacts with a conservation fund.

Learn more about NWF’s efforts to advocate for wildlife-friendly renewable energy >>

Hunters and anglers are seeing the fallout of climate change firsthand. Photo by Lew Carpenter.

“We’re out there. We’re outside hiking the mountains and wading the rivers and wandering the landscapes. When the snow comes late and the elk stay up in the high country until the hunting season is over, we notice. When the beetles overrun a new piece of country and the forest begins to die off we notice. When our rivers are low and warm because of drought and our biologists have to close it down because the fish are stressed from high water temperatures and low oxygen levels, we notice. And when the smoke from October forest fires fills our alleys and blocks out the mountains to the point where we can’t hunt or fish, we notice.”

Tanner explained during a recent press event for a new National Wildlife Federation report, Wildlife in a Warming World: Confronting the Climate Crisis, that he has experienced all those things “right here in Montana.’’  As chairman of the advocacy group Conservation Hawks, he works with other hunters and anglers to educate sportsmen and sportswomen about climate change and make sure that sportsmen’s voices are heard on “the biggest threat we’ve ever faced.”

“Hunters and anglers are starting to realize that we’re about to get slammed,” Tanner said. “Climate change is going to trash everything we care about, the places we hunt and fish, our outdoor traditions and our sporting heritage, our families, our kids.”

For Tanner, climate change is a moral issue. “Somebody has to stand up and say that this is wrong, that we can’t turn our backs on our sons and our daughters and our grandkids. Somebody has to stand up for our values in traditions and for the natural world that we cherish.”

Tanner believes hunters and anglers are the ones to lead the charge because of their numbers, because so many of them are conservative-leaning and can speak to politicians of all stripes – and because they’re on the front lines of the landscape-transforming, climate-change-driven events. He believes sportsmen can help persuade the people who need to be at the table – conservative politicians – to take a seat.

“There are 37 million hunters and anglers in the United States,” he said. “We are the 800-pound gorilla in the group, the one that nobody talks about because we haven’t really made any noise yet.”

A fire-ravaged mountainside and discolored, beetle-infested trees in Colorado’s Poudre Canyon are stark rememinders of climate change’s effects. NWF photo by Judith Kohler.

That will change as more sportsmen make the connection between what they’re seeing in the fields, mountains and streams and climate change, Tanner said.

“And I think what you’re going to see more and more is hunters and anglers who tend to be conservative, who for the most part are a little bit more traditional than maybe some other segments of society, pushing on politicians, particularly red-state politicians, to get involved saying, ‘This impacts me deeply and if you care about me and my family, if you care about our traditions the way you said that you have in the past, then you need to change your mind on this. You need to go to the table, you need to address this.’”

Want to help? Share this post with your friends who hunt and fish.

For more than 20 years, Europe has been producing clean energy – and tens of thousands of jobs – from its offshore wind resources. Just last year, nearly 300 turbines were installed in order to bring their current offshore wind generation up to just under 5,000 MW. Here in America, we have an immense offshore wind resource sitting right off our shores, yet as the article points out we are still struggling to get our first turbines into the water.

Offshore wind turbines located near Denmark. Flickr photo by Kim Hansen.

Let’s put this into perspective

America needs real, sustained leadership at both the state and federal levels to advance large-scale clean energy sources in this country if we are to protect current and future generations from the dangers of climate change. NWF’s recent report, Wildlife in a Warming World: Confronting the Climate Crisis, details the devastating impacts we are already seeing across America from climate change. America’s reliance on high-polluting fossil fuels simply has to change if we are to confront this urgent threat, and our vast offshore wind resource presents a truly compelling alternative.

As President Obama said on Inauguration Day:

“The path towards sustainable energy sources will be long and sometimes difficult. But America cannot resist this transition; we must lead it. We cannot cede to other nations the technology that will power new jobs and new industries—we must claim its promise. That is how we will maintain our economic vitality…”

Appropriately-sited offshore wind power is a viable, reliable and clean source of energy that can move America away from polluting fossil fuels that are warming the planet at unsustainable rates. Atlantic wind power is available in close proximity to our largest population centers, and blows strongest during times of peak demand — offering a massive local energy source that can diversify our energy mix and offer a hedge against the volatility of fossil fuel prices. A robust offshore wind industry in the U.S. promises to be an economic powerhouse — with hundreds of thousands of new jobs in design, manufacturing, construction, and operation. We can no longer afford to ignore this opportunity: offshore wind power can and must be part of America’s energy future.

An offshore wind turbine in the Thames Estuary, U.K. Flickr photo by Phil Hollman

Fortunately, there is good news

All along the Atlantic coast — from Maine to Georgia — states are taking steps forward in the pursuit of offshore wind energy. Most recently, newly elected North Carolina Gov. Pat McCrory has called for offshore wind development off the coast of North Carolina. After more than a decade of delay, the Cape Wind project in Massachusetts has secured the contracts it needs to cross the finish line, and an exciting demonstration project is moving forward in state waters off of Rhode Island. Both of these projects could potentially commence construction as early as next year.

Additionally, the federal Bureau of Ocean Energy Management is moving the leasing process forward in varying forms off the coasts of 10 states (Maine, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New York, New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina and Georgia). Seven pilot-scale projects just received funding from the Department of Energy, and Congress recently prevented the critical Investment Tax Credit for offshore wind from expiring at the end of 2012.

The potential and interest are there. Now is the time to move beyond these preparatory building blocks and into real action to ensure favorable, predictable markets for clean energy.

Let’s look at the Maryland example, the central focus of the Washington Post article. Governor Martin O’Malley and the leadership of the General Assembly are pushing a bill designed to spur progress in advancing offshore wind energy off Maryland’s coast. The federal government has already identified a formal Wind Energy Area for Maryland, and six companies so far have expressed interest in building projects within it.

And there is broad public support. Business groups in Maryland, as well as environmental and public health organizations, are all actively supporting this offshore wind bill as a key next step in making offshore wind a reality off their shores. A January poll found that a growing number of Marylanders and a strong bipartisan majority, 72 percent, support developing offshore wind power. Maryland residents from all political and geographic subgroups said they would pay $2 more per month on their electricity bills to support offshore wind.

Governor O’Malley’s quote in the article hits the nail on the head:

“If we do nothing, large chunks of Maryland will be underwater in the foreseeable future. There will be drought, there will be famine and human pain, suffering and displacement — that’s the one thing we really do know for sure; 98.99 percent of all scientists agree.”

The time for stalling is over.  Climate change has not stalled – quite the opposite. Our reliance on polluting fossil fuels continues. Our state and federal leaders must lean into the wind and take meaningful steps forward to ensure America harnesses our largest untapped clean energy resource.

TAKE ACTION – Speak up for offshore wind energy!

Moose photo by Rick Libbey

“The state’s moose population has been in decline for years but never at the precipitous rate documented this winter,” said Tom Landwehr, DNR commissioner. “This is further and definitive evidence the population is not healthy. It reaffirms the conservation community’s need to better understand why this iconic species of the north is disappearing from our state.”

The state’s annual hunting season isn’t a cause for the moose’s decline. Researchers last month began an ambitious research project to figure out what’s killing them off. Calves are dying at higher rates than normal and, more significantly, adult moose in their prime are dropping dead.

What was once a healthy population sustainable enough to allow hunting is now in rapid decline. The population in northeast Minnesota has been declining for years, from 8,840 in 2006 down to only about 2,760 counted in January 2013. While just 46 bull moose were harvested in 2012, the population plunged by nearly 1,500 moose from 2012 to 2013. Minnesota’s other population of about 4,000 moose in northwest Minnesota virtually disappeared over 20 years, with fewer than 100 remaining by the mid-2000s.

What’s Driving the Decline?

“This is a tragic collapse, but it isn’t a surprise,” says Dr. Doug Inkley, a wildlife biologist and the National Wildlife Federation’s senior scientist. “There are probably several factors affecting the population, but we know moose have trouble coping with hot weather, which has been on the rise in Minnesota. Stress factors, such as rising temperatures, can cause moose health to decline, making them  more vulnerable to disease and predators.”

The National Wildlife Federation highlighted the climate crisis’ impact on Minnesota moose just last week with the release of a new report, Wildlife in a Warming World:

Biologists attribute most of this decline to increasing temperatures: when it gets too warm moose typically seek shelter rather than foraging for nutritious foods needed to keep them healthy. They become more vulnerable to tick infestations, which have proliferated as the region has warmed. Ticks leave moose weakened from blood loss and with hairless patches where they tried to rub off the ticks. Without protective hair, these animals can die from cold exposure in the winter. Individual moose infested with 50,000 to 70,000 ticks—ten to twenty times more than normal—have been documented.

Signs of Struggle

Nationwide, it’s harder to get an exact gauge on the impact of climate change since moose have only recently returned to their historical range in some areas. Moose were once found as far south as Pennsylvania before over-hunting and habitat destruction wiped them out from much of the eastern United States. Populations in places like Massachusetts are still re-establishing a foothold.

But in New Hampshire, the impact of warmer temperatures on moose are clear and dire. Researchers say New Hampshire moose are literally being eaten alive by ticks. Moose there have to deal with 30,000 ticks at a time in a normal year, but in recent warm years, moose carry as many as 150,000 ticks. The moose die of anemia, a lack of healthy red blood cells. After the unseasonably warm winter in 2011, they think that it’s likely that all calves born the previous year were killed along with 40 percent of adults.

And then 2012 was America’s hottest year on record. In Michigan, where a moose have returned to the Upper Peninsula, efforts to count the population have been hampered by warm temperatures - without a covering of white snow, researchers can’t spot the brown moose from the air.

Time to Confront Climate Change

The climate crisis is already changing the playing field for wildlife and urgent action is needed to preserve America’s conservation legacy. Species that have spent thousands of years or more adapting to their ecosystems are now watching their homes transformed before their eyes. We must act now to cut carbon pollution, speed our transition to clean energy, and safeguard America’s ecosystems and communities.

Congress hasn’t shown much interest in tackling the climate crisis, but the Obama Administration can take a number of steps, like using Clean Air Act authority to limit carbon pollution from new and existing power plants, rejecting the dirty Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, and ensuring the budget fights ahead do not slash critical investments in clean energy.

Speak up for wildlife by urging President Obama to limit carbon pollution from coal-burning power plants.

Can’t be in Washington, DC for the “Forward on Climate” rally? No problem!

Thanks to a tool called Thunderclap, you can join this nationwide display of solidarity on social media by clicking here.

Your message will be compiled with thousands of others from across the country, and automatically delivered to the President as the rally begins at noon on February 17th. Together, we’ll echo the stream of signs people will be carrying down the National Mall with this clear and undeniable message, amplified across the internet:

“I call on @BarackObama to move #ForwardOnClimate. Pls RT & watch the largest rally for climate action live: http://forwardonclimate.org”

One of the most immediate actions President Obama can take is to reject the Keystone XL tar sands oil pipeline—a project that would drive production of tar sands oil in Canada, which has three to four times the carbon footprint of other oil produced in North America. In addition to fueling climate change that is melting sea ice for polar bears in the Arctic, the expansion of tar sands in Canada is pushing entire herds of caribou to extinction as their forest habitat is destroyed.

Rejecting the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline is the first step for the climate, but it must be followed by many more—including critical federal standards to limit carbon pollution from our nation’s dirty power plants. Together, we can deliver a clear message to President Obama that Americans from coast to coast are ready to chart the course for a cleaner energy future.

Join the “Forward on Climate” rally online to be the voice for polar bears, caribou and many more wildlife!

Note: When you get to the website, just click “Support with Twitter” or “Support with Facebook” and follow the steps to accept the permission request. The application will only post one message on your behalf and you can opt out at any time.

Hiking with Dad

The latest science on what we can expect if we don’t get serious about cutting carbon pollution that is driving climate change is daunting. Whether its wholesale transformations of ecosystems, species extinctions or more variable extreme weather events putting communities, people, and wildlife at risk, the realities of what we have done to our natural world is finally hitting home for people across the country.

Fortunately, we know what’s causing these changes and we know what needs to be done to chart a better course for the future.

Safeguard Natural Systems from the Impacts of Climate Change

A grizzly bear mom and her cub. Grizzlies are struggling to survive as climate change affects whitebark pine forests, an important food source. Photo by Jenny Grimm.

As we find ourselves in a new era of extreme weather, driven in large part by climate change, it is critical to prepare people, property, and communities for future climate extremes. Increasing resiliency to such extremes can benefit both people and nature if we make smarter development and infrastructure investments, rethink how and where we build, and utilize nature-based solutions to safeguard communities while benefiting wildlife.

If 2012 was a wake-up call for the American people — with devastating drought, intense wildfires, and destructive storms — then 2013 must be a wake-up call for policymakers to finally take swift, bold action to reduce the carbon pollution heating the planet and properly deal with the unavoidable impacts of an already changing climate.

Protect Wildlife from the Worst-case Climate Change Scenarios

It is time to adopt policies here at home that reduce the threat of catastrophic climate change while realizing economic opportunities in clean energy. We can do this by taking swift, significant action to reduce carbon pollution, invest in smart energy choices and restore our natural systems that absorb carbon from the atmosphere.

The choices we make today about how we approach energy development will have profound impacts on the future of our wildlife and our climate. Any serious effort to reduce carbon pollution will require smart energy choices that reduce dependence on fossil fuels and move America quickly towards a future powered by clean energy.

Only by taking the threat seriously — by rejecting dirty energy and embracing responsible, clean energy solutions — will we begin to alter the path we are on to catastrophic climate change.

Steps to Limit Carbon Pollution Using Clean Air Act Authority

President Obama’s Administration has already taken considerable strides to reduce carbon pollution from the country’s largest sources. In his first term, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) — in conjunction with the Department of Transportation — implemented the Clean Air Act to reduce carbon pollution from cars and trucks, the second largest source of carbon pollution in the United States. More must be done to reduce the threat of climate change. 

“We, the people, still believe that our obligations as Americans are not just to ourselves, but to all posterity. We will respond to the threat of climate change, knowing that the failure to do so would betray our children and future generations.”

-President Obama in his 2nd Inaugural Address

The Obama Administration can take a number of significant, near-term actions to live up to his commitment to respond to the threat of climate change.  He must use the authority of the Clean Air Act to limit carbon pollution from new and existing power plants, reject the dirty Keystone XL tar sands pipeline, and ensure the budget fights ahead do not slash critical investments in clean energy.

NWF is ready to take on the dirty energy interests here in Washington and across the country to confront this challenge.

Speak up for wildlife by urging President Obama to limit carbon pollution from coal-burning power plants.