The Log | School News

Study to Examine Biodiversity In Little Tennessee Watershed

Norman L. "Norm" Christensen Jr., professor of ecology, and three Nicholas School MEMs will be walking the mountainous terrain of Western North Carolina this summer sampling vegetation and amphibian populations. They are participating in a large-scale, biodiversity project in the Little Tennessee Watershed in partnership with The Conservation Fund, the Land Trust for the Little Tennessee and Western Carolina University.

The partnership was funded by a $3.5 million grant from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation as part of its Southern Appalachian Forest Conservation Initiative. The initiative seeks to conserve ecologically significant lands and improve forest management in the Little Tennessee River Basin in North Carolina and the Cumberland Plateau in Tennessee and Alabama.

Christensen and his students will be working their way across five counties and some 50 locations in the watershed, one of the most pristine in the mountains, looking at the effects of different forest management treatments on elements of biological diversity.

"We will be looking at the herbaceous diversity-all the different plant species-and at amphibian diversity, particularly salamanders, which are a unique part of the biodiversity of the Southern Appalachians," said Christensen. A group from Western Carolina University, who will be studying bird populations, will join the Duke University team.

"We are particularly interested in forms of management that are intended to be sustainable, where landowners are managing in order to maintain forest cover and hopefully preserve the biodiversity of the area," said Christensen.

Christensen said that finding economically viable sustainable strategies is crucial for this very poor region where there is growing development.

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