For the past 20 years, Syracuse University biologist Douglas Frank has studied climate change and herbivores at Yellowstone National Park. This June, he will return to study the effects of grazing animals, such as bison, on the park’s grasslands.

‘Working in Yellowstone for so many years has been an incredible experience,’ Frank said in an e-mail. ‘Ecologically, it has been an absolutely thrilling place to work. Personally, well, it’s a beautiful place to call my office.’

The new study will focus on how grassland processes respond to bison grazing and will take three years to complete, according to a Dec. 17 SU News Services release. The objective during the first year is to set up exclosures on study sites to fence out bison and create ungrazed grasslands so that researchers can compare naturally grazed conditions. Data will subsequently be collected during the 2012 and 2013 field seasons. 

While there, Frank will partner with the National Park Service to develop a long-term grasslands-monitoring system, according to the release. He plans to use ecological research techniques developed at SU.

‘We also intend to use this opportunity to better understand the complex and fascinating ways in which the interactions among plants, herbivores and soil organisms foster the stability of grassland systems,’ Frank said.

Bill Hamilton, a biology professor at Washington and Lee University, began the study that Frank will be continuing.

‘During the late 1980s, similar concerns were raised about the size of the park’s elk herd and whether the herd was negatively impacting grasslands,’ Frank said. ‘Rather than having a negative impact on the grasslands, we found that increases in elk grazing actually stimulated plant growth.’

Yellowstone is the ideal place for research because it is one of the last places where these bison herds are still intact, he said.

Many people consider the bison in Yellowstone National Park to be special because the park is the only place in America’s lower 48 states where bison have lived continually since prehistoric times, according to the National Park Service website. Yellowstone’s bison population fluctuates from 2,300 to 4,500 animals and is the largest in the country on public land.

But while Yellowstone’s bison are one of the most popular tourist attractions in the park, their increasing numbers and grazing habits have raised questions about the long-term stability of the park’s grasslands.

The bigger picture of the studies is how grassland ecosystems can sustain large populations of herbivores, Frank said. This was the norm throughout the Earth’s prehistory, and Frank said he thinks it is interesting that the grasslands have not become degraded because of constant grazing.

It is still unclear how the park will use the results of the study, Frank said. He said he thought it is unlikely that the study will change the way national parks and their grasslands are taken care of.

‘As a scientist, I only can do good science to answer questions well that, in this case, are relevant to park management,’ Frank said. ‘What the park does with that information is up to the park.’

kvdolins@syr.edu

Published on January 18, 2011 at 12:00 pm