By Alex Day, Marketing & Communications Director, and Lisa Drake, Donor Engagement Manager
Last summer, as part of our multi-year Together for the Parks campaign, Washington’s National Park Fund launched Restoring Paradise — a signature project that goes beyond our support of the park’s annual priority projects by addressing critical restoration and preservation needs at Paradise, the park’s most visited area.
One of the components of Restoring Paradise is dedicated to applying science to long-term restoration of the fragile subalpine meadows at Mount Rainier National Park. These wildflower-rich ecosystems have endured decades of degradation from off-trail travel and other human pressures, as well as changing weather patterns.
While the park’s ecological restoration program seeks to restore the meadows to their original condition through targeted replanting each season, the reality is that the program cannot keep up with the damage the meadows sustain year over year.
But thanks to your support, the “return-a-meadow” effort is now taking exciting steps forward in search of a long-term solution to keeping meadows healthy with the help of a passionate research team from the University of Washington.
Cascade meadows aren’t just beautiful — they’re essential. They host rare plant communities and provide food and habitat for pollinators and wildlife. They also play a role in water regulation and soil health, which have direct implications downstream, too.
But when trails spread and vegetation is lost, recovery is painfully slow. That’s where research comes in: to find ways to restore these meadows more quickly and more resiliently than ever before.
Key in this effort is Allie Howell, a graduate student and Research Scientist with the University of Washington’s Rare Plant Care & Conservation program, who is working under Dr. Jon Bakker, Denman Endowed Professor in Sustainable Resource Sciences. In collaboration with the Northwest Climate Adaptation Science Center and Dr. Beth Fallon, a Vegetation Ecologist with the National Park Service, they’re digging into the science behind meadow recovery.
The hope? That this project helps inform the park on how to adjust their approach to get a healthy and robust subalpine Cascade meadow to grow back in heavily disturbed areas, while utilizing park resources in the most effective ways. Long-term, this research will support the park’s efforts to preserve the ecosystem characteristics, so these meadows continue to exist and to support pollinators and other wildlife.
WNPF donors are making it possible for this research to move forward. Funding supports not only Allie’s graduate research but also undergraduate assistants and volunteers who spend their days sorting soil samples, entering data, and heading into the field to survey research sites. This summer, the team focused on:
Next, Allie will be digging into the data collected over the summer. Early results suggest that some restoration approaches, such as mulching, may not bear fruit, though it’s possible that the effectiveness of treatments may change over time.
Ultimately, Allie and her team are determined to follow the evidence to find what works. Their core question remains: What factors affect the growth of fragile meadow plants, and how can the park apply this knowledge to support faster, more resilient recovery?
The work isn’t just confined to labs and data sheets. Visitors often stop to ask Allie what she’s doing when she’s out collecting samples.
That spontaneous educational component — showing people that science is at work in the meadows and engaging them in conversation over the importance of staying on trails — may be just as influential as the research itself. As Allie puts it, taking steps to prevent future damage is “the first line of defense for recovery.”
Restoring Paradise is only possible because of donor generosity. Your gifts power the science, support the student researchers, and bring us closer to the day when Paradise’s trampled meadows are once again alive with lupine, paintbrush, and asters.
Restoration and studying the effectiveness of different approaches takes time, especially given the slow growth that occurs in the alpine environment. Implementation is only part of the puzzle; monitoring, learning from the results, and refining the approaches are all essential to long-term success — and that requires ongoing support from donors and research partners.
“You usually get one funding cycles’ worth of data for restoration efforts,” Allie explains. “These plants grow so slowly, so being able to see their growth over a longer time period is especially important to see the effects of the treatments.”
This work is made possible in part thanks to donors. Donate today to Restoring Paradise, and be part of the movement to return meadows to Mount Rainier National Park.
Washington’s National Park Fund is the official philanthropic partner of Mount Rainier, North Cascades, and Olympic National Parks. With your help, we raise private support to preserve and protect Washington’s national parks, funding scientific research, youth and family experiences, and projects that will keep these parks strong and vital now and forever, for everyone. You can support meadow research at Mount Rainier through the Together for the Parks campaign. Learn more at togetherfortheparks.org.
Questions about this research project? Allie Howell and Dr. Jon Bakker can be reached by email at amh75@uw.edu and jbakker@uw.edu.
Cover photo: Mount Rainier from the Lily Basin Trail in Goat Rocks Wilderness, by WNPF Creative Partner Andy Porter. All uncredited photos by Lisa Drake.