Rising seas, drought, famine, mass extinctions - the environmental and economic disasters that a consensus of scientists has predicted to occur by the end of the century as a result of climate change are well known.

Scientists, however, are only just beginning to understand what climate change will mean to North America's wildlife and to the sports of hunting and fishing.

As carbon dioxide in the atmosphere rises and the earth warms as scientists expect, in a matter of decades western states such as Wyoming will see their fish populations decline and will lose entire forest ecosystems that were once teeming with wild game, said University of Wyoming botany professor Steve Jackson.

"If you change the climate, you're changing ecosystems and that has an effect on wildlife," Jackson told a group of sportsmen and others at a dual lecture on climate change held at Casper College on Oct. 9 featuring Jackson and hunting advocate and author Jim Posewitz.

The lecture, "Impacts of Climate Change on Wyoming's Fish and Wildlife: A forecast from the past," was part of a series of discussions about climate change presented this fall at the college.

Both men are students of the past. And that past has important things to tell us about the future.

Grim predictions, a message of hope

As a botanist, Jackson has been drilling into tree rings and deep into the mud of swampy wetlands for the past 30 years. His work has revealed the devastating effects past climate changes had on North America's wildlife habitats centuries and eons ago. Based on that evidence from the past, he paints a frightening scenario for Wyoming's future: vanishing forest species and declines in fish populations as a result of a warming of the planet.

Despite such bleak predictions by science, Posewitz offers a message of hope. The longtime hunting historian has chronicled in his books and lectures what he calls the "conservation ethic" of North American sportsmen. It's that ethic that can help turn the tide to slow climate change and prepare for the environmental challenges that lie ahead, he said.

He described a hunter's conservation ethic as "what you do when nobody's looking" and said that kind of thinking just may save the planet as we know it.

According to Posewitz, American sportsmen, led by historical giants such as Theodore Roosevelt and hunting groups such as Ducks Unlimited and the National Wildlife Federation, saved the continent's wild game in the 20th century after one species after another had been driven to the point of extinction. Now, as the human race faces the biggest environmental threat in its history, he's calling on hunters and anglers to help save the planet.

"Why do we have deer in our neighborhoods, bears in our orchards and goose dung on every golf course? It's not an accident." It's because of hunters, he said, hunters who banded together at a time of environmental crisis to bring back the country's elk, deer, bison, waterfowl and other species.

Hunters "solved a problem of continental proportion. Whether we can do something like that and solve something of global proportions remains to be seen."

Posewitz is the founder and executive director of Orion: The Hunter's Institute, a hunting conservation and ethics group based in Montana. He is also the author of three books: "Inherit the Hunt: A Journey into the Heart of American Hunting," "Rifle in Hand, How Wild America was Saved," and "Beyond Fair Chase, The Ethic and Tradition of Hunting."

In his lecture, Posewitz told the history of American wildlife conservation, citing it as an example of how concerned citizens can rally for an environmental cause and come up with real, on-the-ground solutions: Hunters taxed their own equipment to provide funding for wildlife agencies. They bought duck stamps to pay for acquiring lands for national wildlife refuges. They contributed millions upon millions of dollars to non-profit sportsmen's groups to fund conservation easements, habitat restorations, scientific research and the reintroduction of fish and wildlife to their native habitats.

"There are 13 million acres of wetlands in America today so if you've got goose dung on your golf shoe, I say hooray," Posewitz quipped.

Now America and the world face an even bigger environmental problem.

The main event

The devastation of America's wildlife in the late 1800s and the dust bowl crisis of the 1930s were "just a warm-up for the main event" that the world faces today, Posewitz said. It's time for hunters to participate more in the environmental movement, while others can look to them as an example of how to fix an environmental disaster. For starters, it takes policy changes on a broad scale, something that takes some political courage a la Teddy Roosevelt's creation of national wildlife refuges, monuments and parks, for example. Then it takes the actions of each individual - a conservation ethic.

Based on their track record, hunters and anglers are the ultimate conservationists, he said, and they need to recognize the threat to their fish and game that global warming presents.

Jackson said immediate action is needed to reduce greenhouse gases to slow climate change, but bleakly added that it's probably too late to hold back much of the coming catastrophe.

"A year ago I advocated strongly for prevention and I still advocate for prevention but the cat's out of the bag," the UW scientist said, adding that with the environmental changes on the way to the world people will just have "to try to adapt as best as we can."

"Climate change is a running thoroughbred horse and climate change science is a quarter horse. Resource management (of policies and economies) is an aged draught horse. The thoroughbred has taken off, the quarterhorse is trying to catch up and the aged draught horse is just now leaving the barn," Jackson said.

A 2006 survey of sportsmen by the National Wildlife Federation showed that the majority of America's hunters and anglers believe they are witnessing the effects of global warming and believe immediate action should be taken to address the problem.

Traditionally, hunters tend to come from rural, conservative backgrounds so some might be hesitant to do something too "green," such as reducing one's carbon footprint by driving a more fuel-efficient vehicle, or lobbying lawmakers to address global warming. But hunters need to become more involved in the process or they run the risk of becoming irrelevant to the environmental debate and in policymaking decisions, Posewitz said.

"I think there's a new green tsunami coming because of this problem [of climate change] and I think it's up to hunters to renew their involvement."

Just as groups such as Ducks Unlimited have worked to conserve America's wetlands "one pothole at a time," hunters can do little things, such as hunting closer to home to save fuel for example, he said.

It's a tough sell sometimes, Posewitz told the Star-Tribune.

"Sure, you know how us hunters are. You've got to have an ATV and of course a big truck. A good segment of us is going to be in denial for a while."

Discussing climate change

The "Impacts of Climate Change on Wyoming's Fish and Wildlife: A Forecast from the Past" a dual lecture by hunting advocate and author Jim Posewitz and UW botanist and ecology program director Steve Jackson is available for download online at http://outreach.uwyo.edu/ocp/podcasting.asp.

The lecture was part of a free public series this fall at Casper College presented by UW Outreach called, "Climate Change in Carbon Central - Developing Strategies in Wyoming."

The central theme of the series is how climate change is part of almost every familiar issue in Wyoming, from affordable housing to hunting and fishing, said series organizer Anne MacKinnon. Ways Wyoming people can work to slow the course of climate change and to adapt to changes already under way are the focus of the talks.

Three more lectures are scheduled for this fall:

* Oct. 23, Paying the Bills, featuring speakers Howard Geller of the Southwest Energy Efficiency Project, and Mary Byrnes, member of the Wyoming Public Service Commission.

* Nov. 6, Kids, featuring speakers Scott Beall, an innovative 7th grade science teacher from New York, and Craig Sorenson, superintendent of Sweetwater County School District No. 2.

* Nov. 20, State Finances, featuring speaker Gov. Dave Freudenthal (schedule

permitting).

The talks each evening will be held from 7 to 9 p.m. in the Wheeler Auditorium, Room 103 of the Wold Physical Science Center on the Casper College campus.