Climate Change Science

The USGS strives to understand how the earth works and to anticipate changes in how the earth functions. To accomplish this, USGS climate science aims to understand the interrelationships among earth surface processes, ecological systems, and human activities. This includes understanding current changes in the context of pre-historic and recent earth processes, distinguishing between natural and human-influenced changes, and recognizing ecological and physical responses to changes in climate.

The UMESC contributes scientific information to the USGS climate change program, decision makers, and natural resource partners on the impacts of a changing climate on terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems, including fish and wildlife.  The following are UMESC activities related to this issue:

• Modeling the Response of Imperiled Freshwater Mussels to Anthropogenically Induced Changes in Water Temperature, Habitat, and Flow in Streams of the Southeastern and Central United States
  
  
• Forecasting and managing for effects of climate/global change on habitat and biodiversity at landscape and ecoregional scales - Terrestrial Wetland Global Change Research Network (TWGCRN)
  
  
• Potential effects of climate change on inland glacial lakes and implications for lake-dependent biota in Wisconsin
  
  
• Strategic Habitat Conservation in the face of land use and climate change: Bridging the research-implementation gap and accounting for interactions of conservation threats.
  
  
• Increases in water temperatures in the Upper Mississippi River: Effects of climate change.
  
  
• UMESC scientists are members of the Wisconsin Initiative on Climate Change Impacts (WICCI). WICCI is a statewide collaboration of scientists and stakeholders whose goals are to: (1) access and anticipate climate change impacts in Wisconsin, (2) evaluate risks and vulnerabilities, and (3) recommend practical adaptation strategies and solutions.
  
  
• Climate Change:  Ecosystem Impacts and Management Strategies for the Midwest U.S.
• 68th Midwest Fish & Wildlife Conference in Madison, Wisconsin December 10-11, 2007