50,000 Years of Ecosystem Change in the Northern Snake Range, Nevada

This project is being conducted by the Ely Ranger District, Humboldt-Toiyabe National Forest working through partners at the University of Utah, University of North Carolina Wilmington, the Mammoth Site in Hot Springs South Dakota and the United States Forest Service. The project is surveying, excavating and protecting fossil and cultural materials, stabilizing intact sediments, and protecting cave resources from future loss or damage at one of the most important and unique cave localities in the western U.S. located within the North Snake Range in White Pine County.

Through the Late-Pleistocene and early Holocene, the eastern Basin and Range underwent many climatic and geomorphic changes. Montane glaciers descended from craggy peaks and pluvial Lake Bonneville filled valley floors. This era was dominated by more mesic conditions than today. As the distribution of species is driven by environmental conditions, such climatic variations impacts the presence and abundance of a variety of species, both faunal and floral. In order to reveal these long ecosystem changes, test pits were excavated and packrat middens were collected from Ladder Cave, one of many cave resources in the Snake Range. Samples were transported to the RED Lab at the University of Utah for analysis. Researchers in RED Lab are processing the materials, picking critical fossils from the matrix, and analyzing remains. Because of the abundance of plant macrofossils and faunal remains, very fine scale reconstruction of ecosystem change through time will be possible. RED Lab will contribute to the final publication of this important study in scientific journals.