- [Steven] It has little round ears,
which is a little surprising
because they're member of the rabbit family.
They're about the size of a baked potato.
90% of the time I hear them and don't see them.
If I go out to a place where they live
and I hear eee! eee!
I look for them,
I think that'll be a pika.
(pika squeaking)
(upbeat music)
They are adapted for high elevation life,
meaning that they can tolerate cold.
If the temperatures get too warm they'll die.
They live up where there's plentiful rocks and snow
and they don't live in low elevation.
Except the lowest elevation
population of pikas in North America
happens to be in the Columbia River Gorge.
Why are they living down here?
It turns out we have this Goldilocks situation
that if you get underneath the rocks
the temperature is fabulously cool.
So you'd have an animal that's heat sensitive
already in a weakened position.
And every impact on that environment is magnified
when you have this underlying condition
of climate change.
Well if climate gets warmer and warmer
aren't those guys going to suffer first?
- [Katie] It was particularly impactful
because there's communities in the Columbia River Gorge,
but also it's the backyard of Portland, right?
Like I grew up hiking in the Columbia River Gorge.
- [Steven] And I stood on the Washington side of the river.
And I looked I thought of all the animals trying to flee.
I knew a pika couldn't flee.
It was a horrible thought.
- [Katie] I think we have to recognize that
wildfire is this really important process in our forest,
and it's a natural thing.
Oregon forests have had fire for thousands of years.
Both through lightning and also with indigenous peoples.
It's kind of a reset switch
when fire goes through
it can clean out the buildup of dead vegetation
and it can start a new cycle.
Fire creates homes and habitat for wildlife.
One example is woodpeckers.
They live in dead trees,
often created by fire.
Deer and elk need open areas to bed down
and graze and sleep,
and fire can create those areas for them.
Fire burns the shrubs and the grasses
and revitalizes them makes them more nutritious
for those animals.
Every forest in Oregon has a natural fire cycle
that it needs in order for it to stay healthy.
In the wetter forest in Western Oregon
you would see fire naturally occurring
every 100 to 500 years.
On the Eastern part of the state,
East of the cascades.
The forest there don't have as much moisture.
You also have warmer temperatures on that side of the state.
So those forests naturally burn more frequently,
every three to 30 years.
What has happened
is that humans have tampered with that system.
Warmer temperatures and drought
often equal larger more intense fires,
especially if they're in areas
that have missed the natural fire cycle.
And it's something that we're going to need
to be really proactive about addressing.
We have a group of experts
that can make a very specific plan
on how to intentionally reintroduce fire to that forest
to mimic what the natural fire would have looked like.
We prioritize the Eastern dry forests
for controlled burning that sets that reset switch
and it makes it so that when you have future fires
it's going to burn more in tune with the natural fire cycle.
- [Steven] The most fundamental question
is how many survived?
It looks like they're coming back and reclaiming territory.
(upbeat music)
60% survived,
a year later it's up to 70%.
In ecology we call that resilience.
They were impacted,
but they've seemed to be bouncing back.
That's nice to see.
- [Katie] We are part of these forests too.
We have homes in these forests.
We recreate in these forests.
And so there has to be a balance there.
Over the last few years,
I have seen people
learning more about the natural role of fire
in our forest in Oregon
and when the people that live in our state
and start to demand that we care for the health
of our forests,
it gives me hope
that we're going to be able to make progress
and actually affect change.