High-resolution future snowpack projections: applications to high-mountain snow-adapted species status assessments

Seasonal snowpack in high-mountain regions is critical for snow-adapted species, providing shelter for terrestrial species and spring runoff for fish populations (e.g., wolverine and bull trout, respectively). To support species listing decisions and habitat restoration efforts, it is important to understand how future climate change may impact future snow supplies. Although recent work highlights the importance of high-resolution (250m) hydrologic models in the projection of snowpack loss, many future projections of snow are coarse (>5km) in resolution, limiting their use in species status assessments (SSAs). This work, including study areas across the western US, will provide high-resolution estimates of snowpack changes in domains identified as vital to snow-adapted species . A physically based hydrologic model (DHSVM), which can represent the roles of topography, elevation, and aspect on distributed hydrology, is calibrated using baseline historical scenarios. Differences between the validated historical model output and estimated future climate output will be analyzed with respect to the needs of snow-adapted species. Outcomes from this analysis describe the role of a changing climate on future water supplies and the survival of snow-adapted species as a result.