Climbing to Extremes: Tracking High-Elevation Jeffrey Pines in the Sierra Nevada

The research team, led by Hugh Safford and his students and collaborators, were surprised to find Jeffrey pines at elevations above 11,000 feet—which is several thousand feet higher than where the species has long been documented. 

To find them, the team hiked rugged terrain: over 240 miles, 24 peaks, and multiple weeks of fieldwork including off-trail boulder fields and high alpine slopes. 

Why is this important? These “out-of-place” trees may be early indicators of how forests are responding to climate change. As temperatures rise and snowpack dynamics shift, tree species may appear in new zones, or their seed-dispersal systems (e.g., via the Clark’s nutcracker) may shift in surprising ways. 

The team emphasizes the value of on-the-ground field validation: satellite or drone data might miss small, isolated trees in complex terrain. Field crews recorded precise coordinates, measured tree conditions (many were stunted or damaged) and logged data directly in custom apps built for the task. 

For our Safford Lab community: this aligns with our focus on vegetation, fire, and forest-ecosystem dynamics at elevation extremes. Understanding how tree species respond to shifting climates complements our ongoing work on wildfire resilience, vegetation treatments, and boundary-spanning ecology.

We encourage all lab members, students and field-crew aspiring folks to check out the full UC Davis article (“An Extreme Tree Hunt in the Sierra Nevada”) and consider how these findings might inform our own projects. For those interested in alpine tree dynamics, seed dispersal, forest transitions or climate response in sub-alpine zones, this offers a compelling case study.