Salish Sea Communications: July 2022

Friday, July 29, 2022

Salish Sea News Week in Review July 29 2022

Aloha Tiger Friday!
International Tiger Day, also known as Global Tiger Day, takes place annually on July 29. It is a day to celebrate tigers, to raise awareness for the need for their preservation, and to promote the protection and expansion of their habitats.

Seattle chapter of the Audubon Society dropping "Audubon" from its name to be more inclusive
The Seattle chapter of the Audubon Society announced that it is dropping "Audubon" from its name because of its association with white supremacy.

Terry Williams, Tulalip’s ‘champion of climate issues,’ dies at 74
The bolo tie-wearing elder shaped state and national environmental policy. He was both soft-spoken and a powerful advocate.

'Murder hornets' officially named Northern giant hornet
Asian giant hornets, commonly referred to as "murder hornets," officially have a new common name: the Northern giant hornet.

As waters warm, Alaska experiences salmon booms and busts
Chaotic salmon returns leave some Alaskans with an abundance of salmon, and others with none. Victoria Petersen reports.

Human Pathogens Are Hitching a Ride on Floating Plastic
Studies show that various human pathogens cling to microplastics in seawater. Michael Allen reports.

From mountaintops to ocean bottoms, scientists are discovering just how pervasive plastic is
With a rising interest in microplastics research over the last decade, scientists are starting to understand where those pollutants come from, which can help guide decision-making and inform policy change.

Extreme heat a strain for birds already burdened by habitat loss
Habitat conservation and action on climate change are needed to lessen the threat to at-risk species.

These news clips are a selection of weekday clips collected in Salish Sea News and Weather which is compiled as a community service by Mike Sato. To subscribe at no cost to the weekday news clips, send your name and email to mikesato772 at gmail.com. Your email information is never shared and you can unsubscribe at any time.

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Friday, July 22, 2022

Salish Sea News Week in Review July 22 2022

Aloha Spooner Friday!
William Archibald Spooner was born in 1844. He studied at Oxford University and went on to lecture there for 60 years, focusing on philosophy, divinity, and history. He also was an Anglican priest. An albino man of small stature with bad eyesight, he was sometimes absent-minded, but also had a strong intellect. Because of his intellect, his speech often did not keep up with his thought process. That, along with his bad eyesight, contributed to him often saying phrases that were different than the ones he intended. With these slips of the tongue, which became known as "spoonerisms," the initial consonant sounds in some words are reversed. One of his most famous was "It is kisstomary to cuss the bride," which he apparently said while performing a wedding ceremony for a couple.

Climate change prompts a push away from natural gas
What's an effective way to reduce greenhouse gas emissions? Heat pumps, advocate say. And new building codes could require them.

How Indigenous Sea Gardens Produced Massive Amounts of Food for Millennia
By focusing on reciprocity and the common good—both for the community and the environment—sea gardening created bountiful food without putting populations at risk of collapse.

How a conservative U.S. network undermined Indigenous energy rights in Canada
A U.S.-based libertarian coalition has spent years pressuring the Canadian government to limit how much Indigenous communities can push back on energy development on their own land, newly reviewed strategy documents reveal.

The U.S. plan to avoid extreme climate change is running out of time
In 101 months, the United States will have achieved President Biden’s most important climate promise — or it will have fallen short. Right now it is seriously falling short, and for each month that passes, it becomes harder to succeed until at some point — perhaps very soon — it will become virtually impossible.

Trudeau announces expanded oceans protection plan
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has announced new details of the federal government's $3.5-billion plan to protect the oceans and boost coast guard facilities on the world's longest national coastline.

Washington tribes to get $50M to restore Puget Sound
Tribes in Western Washington will receive $50 million in federal funding from the infrastru

Vancouver council agrees to spend up to $660,000 to fight 'Big Oil' in court
Vancouver mayor Kennedy Stewart breaks tie with vote in favour of fighting the world's five largest oil and gas companies to help cover climate-change related costs. David Carrigg reports. (Vancouver Sun)

North Island event celebrates 20 years since Springer reunited with pod
Springer, the orca orphan returned to her pod in a dramatic rescue two decades ago, is being celebrated this week as an example of what humans can do when they co-operate.

WA Supreme Court rules on multiple benefits of trust lands
The Washington state Supreme Court on Thursday ruled the Department of Natural Resources can continue to manage state trust lands for the financial benefit of schools and other institutions, but can also look at other ways to ensure that such lands are managed to benefit all residents.

Intalco restart: can ‘green’ aluminum get ‘clean’ power?
Options for a clean-power source are narrowing for a buyout firm with a sustainability ethos that wants to restart and upgrade the Intalco aluminum plant near Ferndale.

B.C. government, First Nations ban hunting to protect spirit bear
Scientists and First Nations hope a ban on killing black bears will protect the gene that codes for the existence of the spirit bear, the rarest subspecies in the world.

Friday, July 15, 2022

Salish Sea News Week in Review July 15 2022

Aloha Orange chicken Friday!
Orange chicken is a Chinese-American dish beloved at Chinese restaurants in North America, particularly at Panda Express, where it is claimed to have been invented by Chef Andy Kao in Hawaii in 1987. The secret to the sweet and sour taste of the dish—at least when it comes to Panda Express—is a contrast of brown sugar, honey, and oil from orange peels with soy sauce and Chinese black vinegar. Orange chicken is similar to some sweet and sour dishes in China and is often considered to be a Chinese food in America, but it is not regularly found in China.

First foods: How Native people are revitalizing the natural nourishment of the Pacific Northwest
Five or six generations ago, Native people of this region ate a complex diet that changed with the seasons.

Researchers name newest baby orca spotted in B.C. waters The Center for Whale Research (CWR) based in Washington state says it has dubbed the latest addition to the K pod as K45.

A distillery is fighting invasive crabs by turning them into whiskey
Tamworth Distilling's Crab Trapper whiskey gets some of its flavor from green crabs caught off the coast of New Hampshire.

B.C.’s sea life is bouncing back, slowly, after the 2021 heat dome
Barnacles are making a return, but one scientist says his early estimation that a billion creatures died from record-high temperatures was too low.

Supreme Court threw a ‘punch to the gut,’ PNW Native leaders say
Native leaders and Indigenous rights lawyers in the Puget Sound region and beyond are raising the alarm about a recent decision by the U.S. Supreme Court, saying it threatens tribal sovereignty with regard to criminal prosecutions and beyond.

White House weighs in on Lower Snake River dam breaching in unusual power play
The Biden administration released two reports finding dam removal is needed on the Lower Snake to recover salmon to fishable levels in the Columbia and Snake rivers and that replacing the energy produced by the Lower Snake River dams is feasible.

A Day in the Life of a Big-Tree Hunter
On the afternoon of June 19 in the foggy depths of old-growth forest, Colin Spratt finally found what he was looking for: a 2,000 year-old western red cedar.

A ‘revolt’ against the court may be why B.C. is prosecuting 19 arrested on Wet’suwet’en territory
Defence lawyers say the province’s decision to pursue criminal contempt charges against land defenders opposed to the Coastal GasLink pipeline could be tied to concerns that the integrity of the court is at risk.

Friday, July 8, 2022

Salish Sea News Week in Review July 8 2022

Aloha Math 2.0 Friday!
Math 2.0 Day celebrates math and technology, specifically the intersection between the two. On this day, mathematicians, educators, innovators, and policymakers come together to celebrate and also to raise awareness about math literacy and education. Mathematics and technology are part of everyday life—the symbiosis between them benefits our lives in areas such as transportation, construction, and entertainment.

New land trust creates a rare climate zone ‘backbone’ that stretches Saturna Island
The Nature Trust of B.C. has purchased 143.5 acres for the Money Creek conservation area on the southwest corner of Saturna, which falls in the moist maritime Coastal Douglas Fir bioclimatic subzone, part of the smallest and rarest of the province’s 16 ecological zones.

A race to stop a kelp crisis, with impacts far beyond local waters
Underwater forests that support shellfish, fish, crabs and everything up the food chain are disappearing, and scientists don’t have clear answers why.

WA’s deadline for no more fossil fuel impossible if Snake River dams breached, study says
The four lower Snake River dams are essential to meeting the Northwest’s climate goals to decarbonize the electric grid by 2045, says a new analysis commissioned by Northwest RiverPartners.

NOAA Fisheries issues new recommendations for Makah whale hunt, the long-awaited decision will come within a year
A long-awaited decision on the Makah tribe’s application to conduct a whale hunt will come within a year, according to federal regulators who issued a supplemental environmental impact statement on July 1.

Green crabs in Hood Canal raise questions about invasion; further response is coming
The discovery of a green crab in Central Hood Canal was fairly shocking for those involved. Despite an extensive trapping effort, green crabs had never been spotted in Central or South Puget Sound, and this green crab in Hood Canal was more than 30 miles by water to the nearest confirmed sighting.

State approves proposal to rename San Juan Islands channel after Indigenous leader
The proposed name, Cayou Channel, would honor one of the first Indigenous elected officials in Washington state, Henry Cayou.

Earthquake would trigger 20-foot tsunami in Seattle within 3 minutes, state report says
A tsunami triggered by a major earthquake beneath Puget Sound would arrive at our shores sooner and reach farther inland than previously understood, according to a study published Thursday by the Washington State Department of Natural Resources.

Friday, July 1, 2022

Salish Sea News Week in Review July 1 2022

Aloha Canada Friday!
On July 1, 1867, Canada became a self-governing Dominion of Great Britain, after the passage of the British North America Act. It also became a federation with four provinces: New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Ontario, and Quebec. These provinces were made from the British colonies of New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, and the Province of Canada (previously Upper Canada and Lower Canada). The Act allowed for other provinces and territories to join the country in the future. Canada now consists of ten provinces and three territories. O, Canada!

Dam politics: Why public power utilities are pouring cash into the campaign to support Lower Snake River dams
Northwest power utilities have poured more than $2 million into a public relations campaign to convince the region’s residents that breaching four hydropower dams on the Lower Snake River is a bad idea.

Will the mighty spring Chinook rise again?
Given a clear path upstream after dam removal, Chinook salmon in the Elwha wasted no time swimming past the first dam and later the second.

West Moberly First Nations reach partial settlement over Site C Dam
The West Moberly First Nations have reached a partial agreement with B.C. Hydro and the provincial and federal governments over a lawsuit that says the massive Site C hydroelectric dam in northeastern B.C. would destroy their territory and violate their rights.

‘They beat us into submission’: West Moberly’s decades-long fight against Site C dam is over
West Moberly First Nations reluctantly signed a settlement seven years into construction on the beleaguered hydroelectric project on the Peace River in northeastern B.C.

Southern resident killer whales not getting enough to eat: UBC study
A new study shows the endangered orca pods were underfed in six of the last 40 years — including the final three years of the study.

In ‘emergency acquisition,’ 226 acres of Whidbey Island’s farmland, forest saved
The beachside Keystone Preserve, south of Coupeville, is the Whidbey Camano Land Trust’s largest purchase at $9.1 million.

Sockeye among 'biggest unknowns' for Elwha salmon recovery
hen discussing the future of the Elwha ecosystem, many scientists have advanced the exciting possibility that ALL species of Pacific Salmon — including the lake-dwelling sockeye — could make their home in the watershed.

Podcast | The future of climate activism
Iconic environmentalist Bill McKibben discusses the history of climate change, as well as the challenges and opportunities of the environmental movement.

Lessons learned in the Pacific Northwest from the deadly 2021 ‘heat dome’
A year ago, Washington state experienced a meteorological phenomenon known as a 'heat dome' that lasted for more than a week and killed hundreds across the region. Temps spiked as high as 110 degrees in Olympia and Quileute on the coast; SeaTac recorded an all-time high of 108.

Opening the door for coho, chum, and pink salmon
Restoration managers are hopeful that populations of coho, chum and pink salmon will rebound on the Elwha River as the fish take advantage of newly accessible habitat.

PNW hatcheries aren't saving salmon, investigation finds
After two decades and $2 billion in spending, the U.S. government's promises to Native tribes to boost fish populations in Oregon and Washington haven't held up.