<< Back 12/4/02 Finding new life in the Smokies Researchers will discuss latest ATBI discoveries this week By Don Hendershot ATBI is the short name for a big project — an attempt to identify and catalogue every living specimen in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. It stands for All Taxa Biodiversity Inventory, and it was undertaken in 1998. Scientists and others involved in the project are meeting this week in Gatlinburg for the annual review of their findings. Keith Langdon, the GSMNP biologist who is coordinator of the ATBI, sees the ongoing project as an integral part of the park’s mission. “We’re mandated to manage the park’s resources, and like any wise manager we need an inventory of those resources,” Langdon said. Knowing the park did not have the resources to conduct such an inventory in-house, Langdon helped create a wide consortium of partners including universities, individual scientists and researchers, park staff, educators, students, naturalists and scores of other volunteers and organizations. Discover Life in America (DLIA) was created to help the park handle all the logistics of the ATBI. DLIA administrative officer Jeanie Hilten said the purpose of DLIA was to oil the wheels of the ATBI. “When the Smokies began the ATBI, they saw the need for a clearing house. Someone to help with PR, fund raising and to help identify and develop resources and partnerships,” Hilten said. DLIA helps recruit, train and coordinate volunteers, raise funds and supports the efforts of scientists working on the ATBI as well as educating the public about the importance of the ATBI. DLIA partners with the ATBI to provide educational experiences for schools, nature centers, environmental learning centers and adult and youth organizations. Langdon said primary ATBI sampling was being conducted at 11 sites, representing the major forest types found in the park, but “we need to sample hundreds of plots.” He said funding was a constant dilemma because of the scope of the project. Langdon said the ATBI has been operating on about $200,000 per year but that more was needed to really launch a full-scale investigation of the biodiversity in the park. He praised Friends of the Smokies and the Great Smoky Mountains National History Association for their unflagging support. When the ATBI began, park biologists estimated that the nearly 10,000 known species in the park represented only about 10 percent of the actual total species. To date, the ATBI has added over 2,500 species to that list plus 300 species new to science. The ATBI is expected to last another decade or so. One innovative and exciting approach employed by the ATBI in its taxonomic quest is the “bio-blitz.” A bio-blitz entails a group of researchers scouring the park for 24 hours in an attempt to document as many species as possible from a particular group of organisms. There have been bat-blitzes, snail searches, moth and butterfly blitzes and protozoan pursuits. A recent moth and butterfly blitz produced more than 700 species including 300 new park records. Langdon is happy with the progress made so far and believes the process will become smoother and more efficient as time goes on. “We’re basically writing the book at this time. Prototyping takes time,” he said. DLIA’s Science Committee has created a Science Plan for the ATBI to help present the rationale for the project and help organize the objectives and protocol. The Science team believes the ATBI is of great importance to the park and to the scientific community as a whole. According to the Science Plan, the ATBI helps develop the idea that parks are protectors and storehouses of biodiversity as well as recreational areas and vacation destinations. The knowledge and information gained from the project will enable park managers to better protect natural resources from threats like air pollution, acid rain and the influx of exotic species. According to DLIA’s Science Plan, “Ecosystem and species provide for an early warning system for the health of the biosphere and human habitat...Understanding biological diversity supports our understanding of environmental change.” The ATBI, because of its scope, is of great importance and interest to the scientific community. It will invent and test new paradigms for large-scale, long-term scientific investigation. The Science Committee believes the ATBI can also stimulate the training of taxonomists by drawing attention to the importance of taxonomy and systematics as fields of human knowledge. Education is another facet that dovetails with the ATBI project. The GSMNP has constantly sought to integrate science and educational opportunities and the ATBI is great vehicle for this. DLIA has been able to work with the Appalachian Highlands Science Learning Center at Purchase Knob, the Great Smoky Mountains Institute at Tremont and the Twin Creeks Learning Center to create programs and opportunities that educate teachers, students, park visitors and community members about biological diversity while generating useful scientific data for the ATBI. Scientists share the park’s enthusiasm for the ATBI. Chris Carlton is associate professor of entomology at Louisiana State University and leader of the ATBI coleoptera (beetle) TWIG (Taxonomic Working Group). “This is really interesting grassroots science. A scientific community of all different levels from lay naturalists to professional volunteers to regional, national and international scientists,” Carlton said. “It is a fluid project being driven by scientists. There is an individual passion for getting this done in the recognition of the need to understand the biological diversity of unique areas in our own backyard.” Of course scientists are not discovering new mammals or birds. There has been no documentation of bigfoot. Insects, fungi, slime molds and microscopic organisms are the bulk of the ATBI. “As you go down in size there is a dramatic increase in diversity and difficulty,” Carlton said. And the micro-organisms are important. “It’s the little things that run the environment,” Langdon said. “It appears that a small fungus is responsible for retarding the spread of the gypsy moth south into our region. It’s the little organisms that are most susceptible to environmental factors like acid rain,” he said. Langdon likened the smaller organisms in the environment to the rivets in the wing of a jet liner. “If you look out the window and see a rivet missing you don’t think much of it. But what if five are missing or 10? At what point do we begin to see the danger?” Carlton’s TWIG has recorded 1,278 species of beetles in the park, including a new genus. Much of Carlton’s research has been in the Purchase Knob area. “The Purchase is a great thing. It’s a trend you see more and more — governmental and non-governmental entities working together. The Purchase is a perfect example of that, and it’s greatly enhancing educational opportunities in the region,” he said. To find out more about the Sixth Annual ATBI Conference at the Glenstone Lodge in Gatlinburg Dec.4-7, contact Jeanie Hilten at 865.430.4752 or email Jeanie@dlia.org.