Program on the Environment

A die-off of sword fern has been occurring for about 10-12 years in the Pacific Northwest. This specific die-off was first spotted in Seward Park, and while it did not seem like a big deal at first, the concern greatly rose when more than 400 sword ferns started to die. While regrowth attempts were put into place at the state park, a larger study was conducted to see if other state parks were experiencing the same issue.
Over this past summer, my partner and I went out to state parks to collect the data that we needed in order to prove that there is an ongoing die-off of the Pacific Northwest Sword Fern. We went to over 40 sites, gathering data and uploading it to an Excel sheet that would upload the data we collected into an interactive map. At the sites, we would count how many dead and 13 other factors, while also adding notes about the site. With the large amount of data collected we collected, we were able ot prove that there is an ongoing die-off of sword ferns. We then turned our attention to why they were dying off.
We conducted soil testing, but found nothing from it. We then looked at all of the data we collected and, one by one, eliminated factors that would have a correlation to the mortality of the sword ferns. We have not found any correlation to any factor we recorded. Further testing is needed and is currently in progress.