Recovery Priority Specialist
BC Ministry of Environment – Mountain Pine Beetle Action Team, Prince George

Adrian Batho has been working as a Mountain Pine Beetle Biologist with BC Environment in Prince George for the past year.  Adrian has a BSc in Natural Resources Management – Forestry from UNBC, and is also a candidate for a Master of Science degree in Natural Resources and Environmental Studies at UNBC.  His Master’s degree research is related to “Site Index Modeling for Interior Lodgepole Pine in the Sub-Boreal Spruce Zone.”  Prior to joining BC Environment, Adrian worked in forestry and wildlife inventory consulting, and more recently in mountain pine beetle related consulting.

 

Adrian’s climate change-related projects with BC Environment include:

 

Alpine ecosystems have been highlighted as one of the most threatened ecological communities in light of climate change.  The effects of climate change on alpine ecosystems are analogous to maintaining a fixed ceiling (of maximum altitude) with a rapidly rising floor (habitat for some species moving higher in altitude).  The invertebrate species that inhabit these areas are, for the most part, niche specialists that reside in spatially disparate populations.  Butterflies are being used as indicators of change in these systems to provide relatively simple-to-measure surrogates for the biological community, as they tend to exhibit high spatial fidelity, rely on phyto-synchrony, and are ectotherms.  These characteristics make for very sensitive bio-indicators of the changes anticipated to occur in light of climate change.

 

Ensuring that the 5 R’s (Resilience, Resistance, Response, Re-Alignment, Reduce) are adequately reflected in the Ministry of Environment’s prioritization tools should help in determining which species, communities and ultimately landscapes are further at risk due to climate change.  sed in combination with local professional knowledge.

 

Educating professionals within government concerning the biophysical changes associated with climate change and their anticipated impacts for the coastal, northern and southern interior, and parks and protected areas is a priority, especially if we are to translate the theorized effects of climate change into specific actions on the ground.  The adaptation strategies document Adrian is working on will help identify the anticipated impacts, regional sensitivity and associated strategies structure for each of the identified regions.