Kari Grover-Wier, Michele Crist and Pete Wier walk through lupine flowers in a fire-burnt forest near Red Moutain, Idaho.

On a hot summer day last week, a group of forest scientists and managers hiked up a cool Idaho mountain ridge to look at trees in trouble. Whitebark pines are hardy, gnarly and long-lived trees at high elevations across the Pacific Crest, western Canada and the Northern Rockies of Idaho, Wyoming and Montana. While these trees have long withstood wind, snows and freezing temperatures for millennium, on slopes from 5,000 to over 12,000 feet — today, a combination of conditions puts the species at risk. Read more