The human bones lay baking in the sun. It wasn’t the first time Hetereki Huke had stumbled upon an open grave like this one.

For years, the swelling waves had broken open platform after platform containing ancient remains. Inside the tombs were old obsidian spearheads, pieces of cremated bone and, sometimes, parts of the haunting statues that have made this island famous.

Centuries ago, Easter Island’s civilization collapsed, but the statues left behind here are a reminder of how powerful it must have been. And now, many of the remains of that civilization may be erased, the United Nations warns, by the rising sea levels rapidly eroding Easter Island’s coasts.

Many of the moai statues and nearly all of the ahu, the platforms that in many cases also serve as tombs for the dead, ring the island. With some climate models predicting that sea levels will rise by five to six feet by 2100, residents and scientists fear that storms and waves now pose a threat like never before.

Similar fates are faced by islanders throughout the Pacific Ocean and along its margins, in places like the tiny Marshall Islands that are disappearing under the sea and the sinking megacity of Jakarta, where streets become rivers after storms hit. Kiribati, a republic of coral atolls north of Fiji, may be uninhabitable in a generation. Their residents may become refugees.

Read full story…

The Fourmile Canyon Fire, sparked by a backyard burn west of Boulder, Colorado, in 2010, caused $220 million in damage and destroyed 168 homes. It also scorched nearly a quarter of a watershed that supplies water to the nearby community of Pine Brook Hills. The problems didn’t end there: Long after the blaze was put out, intense rainstorms periodically washed sediment and other particles downstream, disrupting water treatment and forcing the local water district to stop pulling water from Fourmile Creek, leaving it reliant upon water already collected in its reservoir.

In forested watersheds — the source of 65 percent of the West’s water supply — trees, soil and leaf litter soak up precipitation like a sponge, then slowly release it to aquifers, streams and rivers. But wildfires can sear the soil, making it water-repellent, and incinerate stabilizing plant roots. “Then, when it rains, all that water gets transported right off the surface,” ferrying sediment, nutrients and debris downstream, says Jeff Writer, a hydrologist at the University of Colorado Boulder. Sometimes precipitation triggers deadly mudslides that destroy homes and bury highways. Sediment can also shroud streambeds and reservoirs, forcing managers to dredge or conduct other costly fixes.

Now, new research suggests that such water-quality problems might become more frequent across the West. Climate change is already causing a surge in wildfire activity. As a result, scientists expect to see a rise in erosion in most of the region’s watersheds in the coming decades. Sediment and ash running off burned hillsides into streams can clog reservoirs, smother fish and disrupt municipal water supplies.

In many places, however, water managers and other officials are already taking steps to prepare for both wildfire and its long-term aftereffects. For communities that rely on forested drainages for their water, “It is a key aspect of water supply and watershed protection to plan for a wildfire.”

Read full story…

Walking through the mud can cause ruts where water can build up and cause damaging erosion to the topsoil. “And a lot of these plants in the high desert need a lot of that nutrient rich top surface level, when that’s washed away the erosion continues,” Hitchcock said.

Another issue is making the natural paths wider than they should be. “As you widen those trails by going around, all of the sudden you have compromised the beauty of the single track, you’ve increased human foot print if you will on the natural environment,” Hitchcock said.

In order to stop the decay, people should avoid hiking paths that are muddy. But if you’re already on them there are a few things you can do to help preserve the trail.

Learn more…