by Mauricio De la Maza Benignos
Mauricio De la Maza-Benignos1, José Alfredo Rodriguez-Pineda2, Antonio De La Mora-Covarrubias3, Evan W. Carson4, Miroslava Quiñonez-Martínez3, Pablo Antonio Lavín-Murcio3, Lilia Vela-Valladares1, Ma. De Lourdes Lozano-Vilano5, Haydee Rossina Parra-Gallo2, Alberto Macías-Duarte 9, Jenny Zapata-López2, Toucha Lebgue-Keleng6, Eduardo Pando-Pando7, Margarita Pando-Pando7, Manuel Andazola-González8, Álvaro Anchondo-Najera6, Gustavo Quintana-Martínez6, Iris A. Banda-Villanueva1, Héctor Javier Ibarrola-Reyes10,
1. Pronatura Noreste, A.C.
2. WWF-Programa Desierto Chihuahuense
3. Universidad Autónoma de Ciudad Juárez, Instituto de Ciencias Biomédicas.
4. Department of Biology, University of New Mexico
5. Universidad Autónoma de Nuevo León, Facultad de Ciencias Biológicas
6. Universidad Autónoma de Chihuahua, Facultad de Zootecnia y Ecología
7. Amigos del Pandeño, A.C.
8. Balneario de San Diego de Alcalá
9. Rocky Mountain Bird Observatory
10. Estudios y Construcciones AKVO, S.A. de C.V.
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he planet's natural systems are increasingly affected by human activities including overexploitation of... more
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he planet's natural systems are increasingly affected by human activities including overexploitation of natural resources, pollution, habitat fragmentation, and introduction of invasive species. It is estimated that 60% of Earth's ecosystem services suffer degradation and are being overexploited.
In Chihuahua, in the Conchos River Basin, the presence of springs is essential for the preservation of environmental flows and riparian ecosystems; especially during the dry season and drought periods, when springs become the sole source of in-stream base flows through the system. The above requires a thorough understanding of hydrologic systems and their links with the surrounding vegetation and soil, which together generate the occurrence of springs, in order to develop viable conservation arrangements, including legal strategies and policies that promote spring recovery, restoration, and conservation. Depletion of permanent springs leads to drying of rivers, reduction of biodiversity, desertification, and in some cases extinction of endemic species.
In the Middle Conchos River Basin, there are two thermal spring systems with very special characteristics that have governed the evolution and adaptation of unique biological communities and associations. Both sites make up two remarkably similar, convergent ecosystems, which are fascinating for both its physical/chemical environments, as well as its macro-faunal components. Both systems harbor microendemic sphaeromatid isopods, cochliopid snails, mosquitofishes and pupfish, of which the latter show an exaggerated cephalic morphology, possibly an adaptation to the low levels of dissolved oxygen that prevail in both aquatic systems.
This exercise began on May 12 and 13, 2011. The Civil Association Amigos del Pandeño, together with its partners, called for an initial "Vital Signs" planning workshop with the participation of scientists, experts, natural resource managers and specialists from universities, NGOs and the private sector; in order to begin to determine baselines to implement monitoring strategies, and to define a preliminary list of "Vital Signs" that could potentially be appropriate for the springs of San Diego de Alcala and El Pandeño, in the Chihuahuan Desert. This was the first step toward developing this "Vital Signs Monitoring Program" that will allow management of these sites to safeguard its ecosystems, and the permanence of their threatened microendemisms, biodiversity, and the environmental services they provide to society, before the threats posed by climate change.
"Vital Signs" are biophysical indicators that are selected for their high degree of susceptibility to changes in the environment, allowing early detection of changes and alterations in the ecosystem. Vital Signs provide the technical / scientific elements, necessary for efficient management and to carry out restoration and mitigation works.
During the workshop, it was agreed that the purpose of a Vital Signs Monitoring Program would be the early detection of environmental changes, providing an overview of the ecological consequences thereof and hence, to determine whether these observations dictate the need for changes in ecosystems and natural resources management practices. To this end, throughout the exercise, we identified a set of environmental indicators or "Vital Signs", which were prioritized, and some of them were selected for the development of a Monitoring Program.
Additionally, in May 2011, a first bi-national "Vital Signs" workshop took place in Alamogordo, New Mexico. The workshop allowed specialists representing AMIGOS DEL PANDEÑO, A.C., PRONATURA NORESTE, A.C., WWF and CONANP a first contact with the U.S. National Park Service, in order to exchange experiences and knowledge that could be applied to ecosystems management within official and private protected areas and spring systems within the biological corridor encompassing Conchos River - Santa Elena Canyon - Maderas del Carmen in the Chihuahuan Desert; and to begin planning for the implementation and dissemination of a standardized regional monitoring system that could enable and enhance management decision making by taking adaptation and mitigation measures before climate change.
Based on the protocols for the "United States National Park Service Chihuahuan Desert Network Monitoring Program” and for the purposes of this Program, Vital Signs are defined as a set of physical-chemical, biological and ecosystem attributes and processes, inherent to the sites of interest, which are indicative of their overall state of health and the condition of their natural resources, or of those items that from an economic, social or cultural perspective are valued by the stakeholders and society as a whole; they can measure the effects caused by various stress factors, whether known or assumed, based on modeling.
Thus, Vital Signs correspond to any estimable or measurable environmental feature or attribute that reflects, and may allow diagnosing the state of health of the ecosystem. These can be "read and interpreted" at any level of ecosystem organization including landscape, biological communities, populations or genetic; and may be of the order of composition if they relate to the diversity of elements that make up the ecosystem, structural if they relate to the order and distribution kept within the ecosystem, or functional if they refer to successive stages, or natural or anthropogenic processes.
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