McFarlane’s Four O’clock is an endangered plant that makes its home in ecological niches in Hells canyon.

I appreciated the recent Chieftain article on the effects of climate change in Hells Canyon and the insights shared by these experienced biologists. The variety of opinions about evidence of climate change in Hells Canyon, as described in the article, provides us with an excellent opportunity to understand why large, intact ecosystems, like those of Hells Canyon, harbor resiliency to climate change.

Some researchers don’t see signs of climate change in their data and observations. Others do. Some ranchers have noticed changes, including in springtime freeze-thaw cycles. Others, not so much. Ironically, all of these statements can be true. The vast diversity of ecosystems that comprise the greater Hells Canyon area provides a resiliency that buffers the ecological shifts that inevitably result from climate change.

Hells Canyon’s ecosystems vary from low-elevation grasslands to high-elevation forests, knit together by a vast network of rivers, streams and riparian corridors. In this large, diverse, and connected landscape with a protected area at its core, wildlife and plants can move and respond to the changing environment. Steep gradients create short-distance dispersal opportunities., so that species with unique niches can find more favorable sites for survival.

Hells Canyon’s rugged slopes are home to many plant species found nowhere else that have long occupied this geologically unique region. Places where these unique, and often rare, species flourish are often associated with historically stable climates. These “safe harbors, provide a refuge for these very localized species during climatic oscillations. For example, McFarlane’s Four O’clock is narrowly endemic to the Hells Canyon region. It is thought to have found refuge in the warm, dry low elevations of the Snake, Salmon, and Imnaha river canyons.

To make a long story short, Hells Canyon is a geologically distinct, biologically diverse, ecologically intact landscape that provides unique niches and microclimates. It offers abundant opportunities for species to move and adapt to changing conditions all wrapped up into one area.

New data on resilient landscapes, mapped by the Nature Conservancy, give Hells Canyon high marks in terms of its diversity. On these maps, wilderness and roadless-undeveloped lands clearly are areas of relatively high resilience. The whole canyon system, from Hells Canyon to Joseph Canyon, forms an interconnected network of resilient lands, an irreplaceable web of habitats and wildlife corridors linking some of the wildest and most remote lands in all of Oregon.

Earth’s remaining intact landscapes are gaining a lot of scientific attention for their holistic conservation values, resilience to climate change, and importance to people. In 2017, R.T. Belote said, in a paper published in Ecological Applications, “Lands that are relatively ecologically intact, connected to existing protected areas, and representative of ecosystem and species diversity, may provide the greatest degree of adaptive capacity in the face of global change.”

David Mildrexler is a systems ecologist with Eastern Oregon Legacy Lands, and holds a Ph.D. in ecology. He lives in Joseph.