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Articles on Mountains

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Heat and dryness are leaving high mountain areas more vulnerable to forest fires. David McNew/Getty Images

Western fires are burning higher in the mountains and at unprecedented rates as the climate warms

As the risk of fires rises in areas once considered too wet to burn, it creates hazards for mountain communities and for downstream water supplies.
Snow melts near the Continental Divide in the Bridger Wilderness Area in Wyoming, part of the Greater Yellowstone Area. Bryan Shuman/University of Wyoming

Yellowstone is losing its snow as the climate warms, and that means widespread problems for water and wildlife

The area’s iconic national parks are home to grizzlies, elk and mountain snowfall that feeds some of the country’s most important rivers. A new report show the changes underway as temperatures rise.
Colorado’s East Troublesome Fire jumped the Continental Divide on Oct. 22, 2020, and eventually became Colorado’s second-largest fire on record. Lauren Dauphin/NASA Earth Observatory

Rocky Mountain forests burning more now than any time in the past 2,000 years

Scientists studied charcoal layers in the sediment of lake beds across the Rockies to track fires over time. They found increasing fire activity as the climate warmed.
Heat and dryness are leaving high mountain areas more vulnerable to forest fires. David McNew/Getty Images

Western fires are burning higher in the mountains at unprecedented rates – it’s a clear sign of climate change

As the risk of fires rises in areas once considered too wet to burn, it creates hazards for mountain communities and for downstream water supplies.
Col de Port, in the French Pyrenees. Author provided

Mountains, a fragile source of life

We think of mountains as remote and little affected by human activity. Unfortunately, the negative impacts of what we do has important implications for nature, wildlife and human society.
The Perito Moreno glacier in Patagonia. The sheer number of seracs gives the impression that the glacier’s surface is covered in dragon scales. Olivier Dangles/IRD

In praise of glaciers, those dragons of ice viewed with concern and fascination

The parable of the dragons underlines the need to apprehend glacier disappearance in a transdisciplinary way, to create a dialogue between the physical, ecological and philosophical sciences.
Han Yuanyuan

How midnight digs at a holy Tibetan cave opened a window to prehistoric humans living on the roof of the world

Early humans called Denisovans lived in a remote mountain cave between 100,000 and 60,000 years ago, and possibly longer still, raising intriguing questions about their relationship to modern humans.
Montse Barado, casa Armengol (Sorpe). In summer, once a week, cattle ranchers and shepherds climb to the communal lands to have a look at the animals and give them some salt. David Tarrasón i Cerdá,

Taking back the hills: a tale of women rights and lands in the Catalan Pyrenees

In the Catalan Pyrenees, women shepherds and cattle ranchers try to valorise the ancestral agropastoral culture to save the mountains from climate change.

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