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The Source: Utah Public Radio's Year of Water Series

As a way to recognize the efforts made by its water scientists and engineers, Utah State University is celebrating 2015 as the Year of Water. Tune in throughout the year as UPR’s Jennifer Pemberton and a team of reporters follow scientists into the lakes, streams, and snowfields that are the source of our drinking water, our agricultural industry, our stunning scenery, and our world-class recreation.

When Trees Talk Researchers Listen

Utah Public Radio

Published February 27, 2015 at 8:33 AM MST

Inside every tree there’s enough information to keep researchers around the West busy for their entire careers. This week on the program, a look at dendroclimatology -- using tree rings to re-construct what the climate was like in Utah hundreds of years ago. Because looking at the state’s climate past is the best way to understand the future.

Jennifer Pemberton talks to plant and climate scientists about how they interpret the thousands of tiny rings that make up a tree’s life history into a full picture of the cycles of wet and dry Utah has seen over the past thousand years.

Part 1 - Hard to Reach Places

Utah Juniper lives in hard to reach places, but it's well worth the effort to sample them in their natural habitat. Tree ring scientist Justin DeRose collects core samples from all over Utah and brings them back to the tree ring lab at Utah State University. He tells us why he needs thousands of samples from thousands of trees to understand the big picture of water in the West.

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Part 1 - Hard to Reach Places

Part 2 - The Oldest Weather Instrument on the Planet

Weather guy Simon Wang and plant guy Roger Kjelgren belong to the Wasatch Dendroclimatology Research Group or WADR (sounds like "water" on the radio). They look at the pencil thin cores that come out of trees and study the climate chronology of the region. There were no satellites until the 1970s for climatologists to use to see weather patterns; thank goodness there were trees.

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Part 2 - The Oldest Weather Instrument on the Planet

Part 3 - Recreating Snowpack...Carrying a Big Stick

Danny Barandiaran's friends told him he's not a very good weather forecaster, so he decided to start looking into the past to get the most accurate ski report. Historically, snowpack has been measured with a big stick...Danny's going one step further and using trees. He explains how knowing how much snow there was in 1850 in Utah's mountains is probably the best way we can know if we'll always have the Greatest Snow on Earth.

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Part 3 - Recreating Snowpack...Carrying a Big Stick

WATCH: Brigham Young University Professor Matt Bekker explains the work of the Wasatch Dendroclimatology Research Group.

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