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Anna W. Schoettle

Anna W. Schoettle
Research Plant Ecophysiologist
Rocky Mountain Research Station
Forest and Woodland Ecosystems
240 West Prospect Road
Fort Collins, CO 80526-2098
United States
Phone
970-498-1333
Email
Current Research
  1. Physiological response of high elevation pines to multiple stresses and implications on population resiliency in a changing climate.
  2. Ecological genetics of Pinus aristata: geographic patterns in population structure and adaptive traits.
  3. Development of a population genetic infection model for high elevation five-needle pines to evaluate efficacy of management strategies to sustain pine population in the presence of a non-native pathogen.
  4. Identification and characterization of white pine blister rust disease resistance mechanisms and frequencies in Pinus flexilis, P. aristata and P. longaeva.
  5. Regeneration and colonization dynamics of high elevation five-needle pines.
  6. Ecological and economic trade-offs of proactive vs reactive management strategies in high elevation pine ecosystems impacted or threatened by an invasive non-native disease (white pine blister rust)
  7. Development of management strategies to sustain ecosystem function under multiple stresses.
Past Research
Our natural ecosystems are being challenged by new and interactive stresses more and more as we move into a global economy and continue to transport organisms into new ecosystems, pollute the atmosphere and alter land use. The old paradigm of crisis management in which no action is taken until ecosystems are impaired and then restoration efforts are initiated will not ensure ecosystems sustainability into the future under multiple novel stresses. There is a need for development of new management approaches that provide early intervention to increase ecosystem resiliency before ecosystem function is compromised. A small investmnet now to increase ecosystem resiliency will save funds later and sustain delivery of ecosystem services. The high elevation pine ecosystems are a perfect system to promote this change in management approach because these ecosystems are already showing impacts of non-native invasives, elevated insect outbreaks caused by climate warming and direct growth effects from global changes in the physical and chemical climate. There are still ecosystems that have not been impacted heavily and therefore opportunity to alter the trajectory of those healthy but threatened ecosystems to one that retain sustainability in the future. We know from our research that people value and are willing to pay to see that the high elevation pines persist on the landscape for future generations of people.
Research Interest
My research interests are to continue to provide a solid scientific foundation for proactive management to facilitate a shift from crisis management of natural resources to proactive management for sustained ecosystem function and resiliency. I want to continue to use an integrated interdisciplinary approach to further the scientific knowledge and inform land managers.
Why This Research Is Important
  1. Participated in some of the first studies that quantified the effects of air pollution on tree and crop growth and physiology and contributed to refinement of predicting impacts from pollutant uptake rather than pollutant exposure. Applied this prospective to predict pollutant loadings that could impact plants in Class 1 Wilderness areas for use in evaluation of permits for new pollutant sources.
  2. Quantifies the ecological significance of variable leaf longevity on tree carbon gain and demonstrated the interactions of physiological traits, light capture and crown architecture.
  3. Quantified the effects of environmental gradients on plant physiological traits among species with different ecological amplitudes to assess adaptive significance.
  4. Quantified the spatial pattern of colonization of large stand replacing burns in P. ponderosa, P. flexilis, P. albicaulis. and P. aristata ecosystems. Characterizes the preferred regeneration sites for each species.
Education
  • Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, B.S., Biology - botany and biochemistry, 1978
  • Cornell University, Ithaca, NY, M.S., Seed physiology and crop science, 1982
  • University of Wyoming, Laramie, WY, Ph.D., Botany - ecophysiology and biophysics, 1990
Professional Experience
  • Research Plant Ecophysiologist,  USFS Rocky Mountain Research Station,  1985 - Current
  • Research Specialist,  The Boyce Thompson Institute for Plant Research,  1982 - 1984
Professional Organizations
  • Deputy Coordinator,  IUFRO Working Group 2.02.15 Genetic Resources of Five-Needle Pines,  2012 - Current
    Host and co-organizer of the Joint International IUFRO Conference: Genetics of Five-Needle Pines, Rusts of Forest Trees, and Strobusphere. June, 2014. Fort Collins, CO
  • Secretary - Rocky Mountain Chapter,  Ecological Society of America,  2002 - 2009
Awards & Recognition
  • Science in the Media Award - RMRS, 2015
  • National Forest Systems 2011 Invasive Species Award Winner for Innovative Control and Management. , 2012
    For her leadership of a program to integrate research, strategic planning, &management activities to sustain Rocky Mtn bristlecone & limber pine populations & mitigate the impact of invasion by the invasive pathogen that causes the white pine blister rust
  • Nominated for "Best National Invasives Success Story, Disease Category" by Region 2 FHP, 2006
    FHP for development and application of the Proactive Strategy in the Rocky Mountain Region at USFS Nat’l Conference on Invasive Species. Denver CO. June, 2006.
  • Certificate of Merit - RMRS, 2006
    “outstanding efforts to facilitate the serious consideration of common shared function space in the Prospect new laboratory design” from Lab Coordinator RMRS. Shared space concept was adopted as the foundation of the new Fort Collins lab design.
  • Certificate of Merit - RMRS, 2004
    RMRS, “for participating in the Region 2 Chief’s Review and representing Rocky Mountain Research Station programs”
  • Certificate of Merit - RMRS, 1999
    RMRS, for “extra effort in synthesizing the impacts of human-caused air pollution on resources within the Interior Columbia River Basin”
  • Best Scientific Publication Award - RMRS, 1999
    For the publication “Interrelationships among light, photosynthesis and nitrogen in the crown of mature Pinus contorta ssp. latifolia.” Tree Physiology 19:13-22
  • Certificate of Merit - RMRS, 1995
    RM Forest & Range Experiment Station, for “your efforts to bring to fruition the vision of a multicultural organization within the Rocky Mountain Forest and Range Experiment Station”
  • Certificate of Merit - RMRS, 1988
    RM Forest and Range Experimental Station, for "development of a screening method to identify vegetation sensitive to air pollution"
  • Sigma Xi, for research achievements, 1987
    Elected to full membership
  • Cornell University Honor Society, 1978
    Top 5% of the graduating class
Featured Publications
Other Publications

  • Expanding adaptive capacity through natural hybridization

    Year: 2021
    A series of studies suggest that the northward range expansion of Pinus strobiformis is facilitated by the natural hybridization of this species with P. flexilis. While hybridization is sometimes viewed as degrading biodiversity, particularly for threatened species, transfer of genetic information between forest tree species is a natural feature of their evolutionary trajectory.

  • Management of high-elevation five-needle white pines

    Year: 2020
    White pine blister rust (WPBR), a disease caused by the fungal pathogen Cronartium ribicola, has spread rapidly through moist forests in the northwestern and eastern United States, killing many five-needle white pines, a crucial subalpine forest species. WPBR continues to spread more slowly through the drier habitats of the southern Rockies, Great Basin, and Southwest. RMRS scientists, in collaboration with other researchers and forest managers...

  • Back From the Brink: Framework to Sustain Resilience to Species at Risk

    Year: 2019
    The Regeneration for Resilience framework provides a decision structure to prioritize limited resources and utilize seedling planting and natural regeneration management. The resulting decisions offer the best likelihood of success in positioning stands and landscapes to support resilience self-sustaining tree populations that are threatened by invasive pests. Effective management of forest regeneration dynamics can increase forest resilience and adaptive capacity to mitigate impacts of invasive species.

  • Conservation of bristlecone pine: proactive management today and resources for tomorrow

    Year: 2017
    Rocky Mountain bristlecone pines are long-lived, exhibit delayed maturation, have low genetic diversity, and inhabit cold, high-elevation environments. They are threatened by the non-native disease white pine blister rust, warming temperatures, changing precipitation patterns, and altered disturbance regimes. This is the first proactive coordinated range-wide seed and tissue collection and forest health assessment for a threatened, but not yet impacted, tree species and offers a model for other species at risk.

  • Restoration Planting Options for Limber Pine in the Southern Rocky Mountains

    Year: 2016
    Successful restoration planting of limber pine (Pinus flexilis) is essential to sustain healthy populations in the wake of native insect outbreaks (mountain pine beetle) and the spread of a non-native lethal disease (white pine blister rust). Forest Service scientists developed and tested planting guidelines, a first for limber pine in this region, and will facilitate the effective introduction and establishment of seedling genotypes resistant to white pine blister rust and adapted to future climates.

  • Potential for Maladaptation During Active Management of Limber Pine

    Year: 2016
    Active management is needed to sustain healthy limber pine (Pinus flexilis) forests in the southern Rocky Mountains as they are threatened by the interaction of the mountain pine beetle (Dendroctonus ponderosae) epidemic, climate change, and the spread of the non-native pathogen that causes white pine blister rust disease (Cronartium ribicola). Appropriate source material for restoration and proactive introduction of disease resistance needs to be developed taking into account background genetic differentiation that could hamper management success. The Forest Service’s Rocky Mountain Research Station is working on ways to prevent planting failures.

  • A Proactive Strategy To Control Invasive Species in Mountaintop Ecosystems

    Year: 2012
    High-elevation pine forests, under the threat of multiple stressors, serve as an excellent flagship to lead the shift away from crisis management and toward proactive management for ecosystem resilience
https://www.fs.usda.gov/research/about/people/aschoettle