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Article: LOOK AHEAD TO THE END OF THIS CENTURY AND CLIMATE CHANGE COULD DRAMATICALLY ALTER THE STATE'S SIGNATURE ROCKIES. BLAME IT ON GLOBAL WARMING, SCIENTISTS SAY.(News)
- Article from:
- Rocky Mountain News (Denver, CO)
- Article date:
- April 20, 2005
- Author:
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Byline: Jim Erickson, Rocky Mountain News
Photos by Judy Walgren, Rocky Mountain News
CRESTED BUTTE -- Physicist-turned-ecologist John Harte says he's glimpsed the future of Colorado's high country under global warming, and it's not a pretty sight.
Sagebrush will drive out wildflowers as the state's prized alpine meadows dry up, the ski industry will founder within 50 years, and property values in mountain resort towns will plummet, Harte predicts.
The Berkeley, Calif., researcher has spent the past 14 years using electric heaters to simulate a warmer world on a hillside meadow at 9,600 feet in Gothic. The former mining town is several ...