Air pollution and invasive species threaten Great Smoky Mountains

Thanks Jan, keep up the good work.

Sorry JanforGore, its really been one of those days. My webmaster actually picked up the phone to make sure I wasn't mad at them. I'll stop talking now, certainly a misuse of energy today.

If you're still waiting you haven't been paying attention.

You get over it. I'll continue to care thank you very much.

Jan...

Environmentalists are very good about trying to scare everyone with all these news articles. I'm still waiting to hear some practical, affordable solutions from an environmentalist as to how I should live my life. Please do tell...

I live in the area, it kinda irks me that people like to ignore stuff goin' on under their nose.

our children and there children will hate us so much for alllowing big corperations to poision and destroy our world. therre not gonna know why we decided to put money into finding new planets far far out of our reach instead of exsploreing right here on our home where the amount of diversity holds untold beauty and cures for any soul with a hangover.
invasive species was before most of our times, tho it still happens every now and then.
if we would have been makeing things out of HEMP 30 yearts ago the world would be a much cleaner place.

It never improves because people on the whole don't care it would appear. And unfortunately, it is still news as in this article climate change was also mentioned which is now causing invasive species of plants that are killing trees and disturbing ecosystems. I don't quite understand your desire to put the writing down or you obvious dismissal of the pollution there. Unless I'm just misinterpreting your comment.

Wow, this is still being written about as news? They've been talking about the bad air quality in the Smokies for as long as I can remember. Of course, somehow it never seemed to improve, which is just sad, since they've known about this for so long.

And, I could tell that was an Asheville Citizen-Times article on account of the fact that they said "the Japanese ornamental species once planted around cabins" but failed to actually mention that they're talking about kudzu.

Good to know the writing quality hasn't changed since I moved away, at least.

Little Cataloochee Valley still holds evidence of the more than 1,200 people who once called the remote section of what is now Great Smoky Mountains National Park home.

Visitors walking through the area might see an old church, a log cabin, or a stone wall amid the thickets of multiflora rose shrubs.

Red maples and tulip poplars have overgrown old settlements like Little Cataloochee Valley since the park's creation in 1934, as has the Japanese ornamental species once planted around cabins

A park crew now spends whole days in the valley cutting down the shrubs along with combating dozens of other nonnative species that have made their way into the park.

Exotic, invasive plants are just one threat the Smokies face as it celebrates 75 years as a national park. Invasive pests like the hemlock woolly adelgid are killing trees, air pollution has changed ecosystems and altered views, and the park is preparing for the effects of climate change on native species.

The park had some of the highest levels of air pollution in the country when it started its monitoring program in the 1980s.

The burning of fossil fuels — coal, oil and gasoline from power plants, industry and motor vehicles — causes most of the pollution that travels through wind currents from other areas of the Southeast. The park's location, combined with its high elevations, air stagnation and warm weather, trap these pollutants, causing high levels of ozone, haze and acid deposition.

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