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Land use, climate change and ecological responses in the Upper North Saskatchewan and Red Deer River Basins: A scientific assessment

Farr, D., Mortimer, C., Wyatt, F., Braid, A., Loewen, C., Emmerton, C., &Slater, S. (2018). Land use, climate change and ecological responses in the Upper North Saskatchewan and Red Deer River Basins: A scientific assessment. Government of Alberta, Ministry of Environment and Parks

The Eastern Slopes of Canada’s Rocky Mountains have been managed for headwater protection, natural resource production, recreation, and other land uses for over a century. To inform future land use planning in the Eastern Slopes of west-central Alberta, a review was conducted of key land use stressors and expected ecological responses. Altered fire regimes, forest harvesting, and linear disturbances are key stressors that, along with climate, and other environmental drivers, affect wildlife, hydrology, and other valued ecosystem attributes. The current status of each stressor in the study area was characterized from geospatial and other environmental datasets, expected ecological responses were summarized from reviews of the published literature, and future research and monitoring priorities were identified.