UA News

Paleoecologist Julio Betancourt will describe how invasive grasses threaten the fragile desert ecology and suggest a course of action.

The School of Geography and Development at the University of Arizona is launching an annual lecture titled "My Arizona."

The first lecture is "Can We Save Arizona's Sonoran Desert?" given by noted paleoecologist Julio Betancourt. The presentation will be augmented by the work of Pulitzer Prize-winning photographer Jack Dykinga.

The lecture is Friday, Dec. 4, from 3:30 to 5 p.m. at the Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering Building, Room S202, located at the northeast corner of Speedway and Mountain. Refreshments will be served following the lecture.

Betancourt will talk about large-scale invasions by Eurasian and African grasses, brought in by chance or to feed cattle and control erosion, that have introduced frequent and extensive fires into American deserts that supported little or no burning in the pre-European era.

Betancourt said he believes we are standing on a threshold and must now choose between saving the desert or resigning ourselves to these novel and combustible grasslands. What decisions must we make, who makes them and how will they be implemented across complex physical and cultural landscapes?

"My own take on these issues is that of a federal scientist with a sense of place and an ongoing crusade to engage the private and public sectors in southern Arizona, where buffelgrass now threatens to convert a beautiful Sonoran Desert into a burning savanna," Betancourt said. "My presentation will be equally divided between defining what we stand to lose – the natural history of the Arizona Upland of the Sonoran Desert – and what we must continue to do to prevent its rapid demise."

Betancourt, a senior scientist with the U.S. Geological Survey, also is an adjunct professor in the UA School of Geography and Development, the department of geosciences, the Laboratory of Tree-Ring Research, the Office of Arid Land Studies and the School of Natural Resources and the Environment. He investigates how climate variability and climate change affect floods, fires, droughts and ecosystem dynamics to inform management of natural hazards and natural resources.

His work has earned him several prestigious awards from the American Water Resources Association, the Ecological Society of America and the U.S. Department of Interior. In 2009, he was honored by the White House with the prestigious Presidential Rank Award, and was elected a fellow of the American Geophysical Union.

The School of Geography and Development initiated the new series to showcase interesting places and people in the state. New graduate students and faculty from across campus are especially encouraged to attend. Members of the community are also welcome.

"The idea behind this lecture series is to draw from on-campus resources – from such areas as the humanities, the social sciences and the sciences – and have faculty speak, from a personal vantage point, about some aspect of Arizona that is near and dear to them," said J. P. Jones, director of the school.