Variability and change of climate extremes from indigenous herder knowledge and at meteorological stations across central Mongolia

Abstract

In semi-arid regions, air temperatures have increased in the last decades more than in many other parts of the world. Mongolia has an arid/semi-arid climate and much of the population are herders whose livelihoods depend upon limited water resources that fluctuate with a variable climate. Herders were surveyed to identify their observations of changes in climate extremes for two soums of central Mongolia, Ikh-Tamir in the forest steppe north of the Khangai Mountains and Jinst in the desert steppe south of the mountains. The herders’ indigenous knowledge of changes in climate extremes mostly aligned with the station-based analyses of change. Temperatures were warming with more warm days and nights at all stations. There were fewer cool days and nights observed at the mountain stations both in the summer and winter, yet more cool days and nights were observed in the winter at the desert steppe station. The number of summer days is increasing while the number of frost days is decreasing at all stations. The results of this study support further use of local knowledge and meteorological observations to provide more holistic analysis of climate change in different regions of the world.

Keywords

climate change / climate extreme indices / indigenous knowledge systems / temperature / precipitation

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Acknowledgments

This research was supported by the National Science Foundation Dynamics of Coupled Natural and Human Systems (CNH) Program (award BCS-1011801 entitled Does Community-Based Rangeland Ecosystem Management Increase Coupled Systems’ Resilience to Climate Change in Mongolia?). The herder data were collected through contributions from the Center for Collaborative Conservation at Colorado State University, and the World Bank (award 7155627 entitled Understanding Resilience in Mongolian Pastoral Social-Ecological Systems: Adapting to Disaster Before, During and After the 2010 Dzud).

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