A living laboratory: Responding to climate change on the Chequamegon-Nicolet

Background/Question/Methods

There is a clear and pressing need to bridge the gap between climate change research and actual management actions on national forests. The Chequamegon-Nicolet National Forest (CNNF), located in northern Wisconsin, has hosted an unusually large number of climate change-focused scientific studies in recent years.  The collection of findings from these studies, coupled with the early leadership shown by Forest staff, prompted the US Forest Service to recognize the CNNF as a “climate change model forest”, which would serve as a “living laboratory” for climate change research, response, and collaboration.   Results/Conclusions To set the stage for the subsequent papers in this session, we describe the northern Wisconsin landscape and the features of the CNNF, and briefly summarize the major climate science that has been conducted there.    Finally, we will discuss the transferability of the model forest effort to other national forests, and some of the lessons-learned thus far.