Special UW Harlow Speaker Series Event in Grand Teton National Park Aug. 31

After a nearly three-year halt in programming, a special Harlow Speaker Series event will return Wednesday, Aug. 31, at the renovated University of Wyoming-National Park Service (UW-NPS) Research Station. The facility is located at the AMK Ranch in Grand Teton National Park.

The free public “Lunch and Science at the UW-NPS Research Station” is from noon-2 p.m. in the Berol Lodge. Featured will be an “Imagining the Future of the Tetons” presentation by UW geology and geophysics Wyoming Excellence Chair Bryan Shuman, the current research station director. A suggested $10 donation will be accepted for the lunch.

“The effort to envision the future of the Tetons is coming together” through the WY-ACT project, Shuman says. The project is part of a five-year, $20 million grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to UW that allows researchers to work with Wyoming’s communities to deal with expected significant and lasting changes in water availability.

The project’s official name is WY-ACT: Wyoming Anticipating Climate Transitions. It will include establishment of a Laboratory for Regional Earth System Modeling; the launch of a Center for Climate, Water and People; and investment in new capabilities centered at the UW-NPS Research Station. Five new faculty positions initially will be supported by the NSF grant.

The new research initiative at the research station, funded by NSF, will focus on anticipating the future of the Teton landscape and how declining snowpack, increased drought and fire risk, and other changes will affect the ecosystem and the people connected to it, Shuman says.

Participants will have the opportunity, after the presentation, to tour the research station grounds along scenic Jackson Lake.

Renovation at the research station began in 2019 when a new pumphouse and water system were installed. Over the past several summers, the historic log buildings have been the focus of work, including a significant effort to replace and repair many of the large structural logs and beams. Roofs, porches and decks also have been updated throughout the grounds. The next phase of the ongoing project, beginning this fall, will focus on the dock and lakefront areas.

“Visitors will have a chance to see these updates as well as the refurbished wood floor of the great room in the Berol Lodge,” Shuman says.

The research station, a cooperative effort between UW and the NPS for the past 65 years, supports research in Grand Teton National Park and surrounding areas. The research station is located on the AMK Ranch historic district on a peninsula extending into Jackson Lake near Leeks’ Marina.

The last Harlow Speaker Series talk at the AMK Ranch was held in 2019, before closure due to the COVID-19 pandemic and the renovation project. The 2021 talks were held at the UW Extension facility in downtown Jackson.

The UW-NPS Research Station provides a base for university faculty members and government scientists from throughout North America to conduct research in the diverse aquatic and terrestrial environments of Grand Teton National Park and the greater Yellowstone area.

Formerly called the AMK Ranch Talk Series, the Harlow Summer Seminars program is named after retired UW Department of Zoology and Physiology Professor Hank Harlow, who helped make the UW-NPS Research Station a significant center for research and community outreach. Harlow began the popular weekly public seminars during the summer months.

For more information, email Shuman at bshuman@uwyo.edu.

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