Alaska Berry Futures
Preparing for a berry-filled future in a changing world
Alaska Berry Futures strives to provide current knowledge about northern berry species, expose gaps in our knowledge and inform Alaskans about how we can plan for changing berry resources.
Our Lowbush Cranberry booklet is now available!
AK berry futures_Cloudberry_09.18.23.pdfAK Berry Futures_Blueberry_10.24.23_2.pdfAK Berry Futures_Lowbush Cranberry_4.01.24.pdfWe now have three berry booklets available:
1) Cloudberry in a changing climate: Threats and opportunities
2) Blueberry in a changing climate: Threats and opportunities.
2) Lowbush cranberry in a changing climate: Threats and opportunities.
Click on the image of the cover (icon at top righthand corner) to download each pdf.
These booklets are aimed at community members and includes lots of basic plant biology, potential threats and opportunities from climate change, ways that we can mitigate negative impacts, human use, and some really gorgeous illustrations and photos (see examples of pages below).
We expect to update booklets with 1) more Indigenous Knowledge, and 2) new scientific information as it becomes available in the future. All updates will be available via this website. Learn more about our "berry booklets" in this story from KYUK Bethel reporter Emily Schwing.
To learn about the data underlying our booklets, go to the our GitHub repository
Check out some of the images inside the booklets:
Our goals:
Connect scientists, educators, resource managers and community members to expand our understanding of berries in a changing world.
Provide information about how important berries will respond/are responding to climate change to resource managers, policy makers, berry eaters and educators.
Work with researchers and community members to identify information needs and knowledge gaps.
Promote active research and spread citizen science projects, providing opportunities to students and others to monitor berries and contribute to science
Enhance understanding of berry ecology.
We expect to produce three types of resources:
Berry booklets for community members and resource managers. These are accessible, illustrated descriptions of each species, the threats it faces from climate change, and the opportunities for increasing berry production. Each booklet also includes a summary of knowledge gaps for current and future berry researchers. We hope this will serve as inspiration for future research projects.
First berry booklet: Cloudberry in a Changing Climate: Threats and Opportunities.
Second berry booklet: Blueberry in a Changing Climate: Threats and opportunities.
Third berry booklet: Lowbush Cranberry in a Changing Climate: Threats and Opportunities.
Species vulnerability indices for resource managers. These will be semi-quantitative assessments of the vulnerability of our focal berry species to climate change, similar to the approach taken for the "Invasiveness Ranking System for Non-Native Plants of Alaska".
A Zotero database for researchers that underlies all our other documents and can be filtered by tags. This database is in progress, and while it is not yet ready for public consumption, if you are studying cloudberry (Rubus chamaemorus), bog blueberry (Vaccinium uliginosum) or lowbush cranberry (V. vitis-idaea), we are happy to provide you with access to the database. Please send an email to cpmulder@alaska.edu to request access.
