Turns out sea otters do much more than just explain discount rates with aplomb: The adorable little buggers also clean up our oceanic messes. Nitrogen and phosphorous runoff from agricultural pollution creates algal blooms that choke the life out of estuaries — unless these thoughtful, fuzzy Dysons are around. With sea otter populations expanding into California habitats like Elkhorn Slough, where they haven’t been seen for 100 years or more, scientists are watching sea grass and kelp ecosystems return, even though humans are still proverbially shitting the proverbial waterbed. Sci-blogger-genius Ed Yong has more:
Sea otters grab shellfish and other prey from the sea floor and smash them open on the surface, using rocks as hammers and their own bellies as anvils. This makes it very easy for scientists to record what they’re eating, and Hughes used decades of such records to show that the Eklhorn sea otters are crab-specialists. “We estimate that they can easily remove 400,000 crabs per year in an area the size of 7 football fields,” he says. “That’s a huge effect, which cascades down to affect the seagrass.”
The crabs eat other animals including an orange sea slug and a shrimp-like isopod, both of which graze on algae. So by killing the crabs, the otters inadvertently protect the slugs and isopods, which in turn protect the seagrass by nibbling away at encroaching algae. This complicated four-part chain reaction (or “trophic cascade”) is what keeps Elkhorn Slough in its current healthy state.
To make sure the otters were responsible, researchers ran otter simulations — which sadly did not include grad students in discount otter suits bought from the local Furry-in-a-Hurry outlet. Ahem:
His team ringed off small areas of estuary and added fixed amounts of seagrass, slugs and isopods. Then, they added either the small crabs you find when sea otters are around, or the large ones you get when the otters are absent. The bigger crabs did indeed eat more grazers, leading to more algae and less seagrass.
Sea otters are near the top of their food chain, and it’s not surprising that they exert a strong top-down influence upon other local animals. In iconic studies during the 1970s, James Estes established them as classic examples of keystone species – those that are disproportionately influential for their numbers. They protect kelp forests by eating the sea urchins that would otherwise raze them down. With otters, you get underwater jungles of wavy green kelp. Without the otters, you get bare “urchin barrens”.
“The really interesting discovery here is that otters counter the detrimental impact of eutrophication,” says Estes. In other words, their top-down influence is strong enough to nullify the bottom-up effects of nutrients entering the slough.
As sea otter populations expand into their historic range, their tidy aftershocks could help rehabilitate ecosystems all the way to Baja California. If this also means I can get to Mexico by hugging one ultra-plush otter belly after another instead of waiting behind grinding I-5 traffic, I fully support redirecting the entire federal budget to an emergency militarized otter reintroduction plan. (What? It just makes fiscal sense, people.)
Aww, you adorable sea otters — you shouldn’t have. (Wait, no, you should!)
All that combustible fuel being produced by America’s fracking boom has federal transportation safety officials on edge.
Inspectors have started scrutinizing train manifests and tank car placards on trains departing from North Dakota’s Bakken region. The region is producing copious quantities of fracked oil, which is being carried to refineries in railway cars — many of them in a railcar model that’s prone to explode.
Operation Classification, aka the Bakken Blitz, was launched last month, just weeks after one such train carrying Bakken oil derailed and exploded in Quebec, killing 47 people and leveling much of the formerly scenic town of Lac-Mégantic. The U.S. Department of Transportation says it began planning the inspections in March after officials noticed discrepancies between the contents of rail cars and the hazardous warnings they bore. From Reuters:
“We need to make sure that what is in those tankers is what they say it is,” Cynthia Quarterman, administrator of the Department of Transportation’s Pipeline and Hazardous Materials Safety Administration, told reporters.
Highly combustible, light crude from the Bakken region is particularly dangerous, Quarterman said, and inspectors will make sure the fuel is properly labeled and handled with care.
Officials want to make certain that those responsible for the shipments know how dangerous their cargo is.
“The flashpoint needs to be taken into account,” Quarterman said, referring to the combustibility of flammable liquids that can vary according to the type of crude.
The Obama administration is also mulling new safety rules to address the boom in oil hauling; a draft version should be released within weeks. On Friday, the administration introduced temporary emergency rules designed to prevent a repeat of the Lac-Mégantic disaster on American soil, including a ban on leaving vehicles unattended if they are carrying hazardous materials.
Sitting in her teepee on Ottawa’s Victoria Island in December 2012, Attawapiskat Chief Theresa Spence was officially starting her hunger strike, breathing fire into the Idle No More movement and setting off a chain reaction that would eventually force Ottawa into talks on the nature of Canada’s relationship with First Nations. Meanwhile, five blocks away as the crow flies, the federal government’s security and emergency nervous system was ramping up its efforts to keep tabs on the movement. Just how extensive, and often ham-handed, the surveillance was is only now coming to light with the release of thousands of new documents.
The little-known Government Operations Centre ran that surveillance program from Ottawa’s Laurier Avenue West. Half of the program included public “situational awareness reports” on the protests. But the government also prepared secret “restricted distribution addendums” that were forwarded to CSIS, the RCMP and the Defence Ministry’s Canadian Joint Operations Command. They included exclusive information on proposed economic disruptions, such as bridge and rail blockades. One classified report released Jan. 2 noted the joint American-Canadian-operated Blue Water Bridge “would not tolerate any bridge closures/slowdowns.”
CSIS’s involvement is revealed in other ways. On Jan. 17, representatives from Aboriginal Affairs, the RCMP and the spy agency’s Integrated Terrorism Assessment Centre (ITAC) met to discuss the “potential for escalation” for the movement. The centre, created in 2004 and housed within CSIS, does threat assessments for domestic and foreign terror attacks. According to a CSIS spokesperson, ITAC was only involved due to a threat against Idle No More itself. “ITAC does not monitor Idle No More, as they do not meet the definition of terrorism from the Criminal Code of Canada,” the spokesperson says. Meeting notes suggest officials feared that outside groups were attempting to infiltrate Idle No More. “Non-Aboriginal movements [are] starting to move in,” the notes stated, including “anarchists” and the “black bloc.” CSIS would not comment on the specifics of their concerns.
Charlie Angus, the NDP MP for Timmins-James Bay—which includes Spence’s Attawapiskat reserve—is not surprised at the resources Ottawa poured into its response to the protest. “The message was always that these manifestations of outpouring of First Nations were something that needed to be managed, something to contain and possibly a threat,” he says. He accepts there may have been more radical elements in the movement. “Of course there are other left-wing groups that might join, but there was never any sense, as far as I can see, of menace or threat.”
Emails to and from Aboriginal Affairs staffers cite social media and “open-source reporting” as main sources of information—something Pamela Palmater, a political science professor at Ryerson University and a First Nations activist heavily involved in Idle No More, saw first-hand. She’d suspected government staffers were watching her social-media profiles. “They’re easy to pick out on Facebook,” she says. They’d add her as a friend and offer counterpoints to her posts that bore a striking resemblance to departmental talking points. “Who is it they’re watching? They’re watching people like me, who have no criminal record, doing nothing violent.”
Palmater says that at one talk she gave about Idle No More, she jokingly said that if any government staffers were in the audience, they were obliged to come forward. By the end, three staffers from Aboriginal Affairs and Justice had lined up to out themselves.
At one point, a group of developers created an Idle No More app that allowed activists to share information and plan protests, flash mobs and round dances. Deputy Minister of Aboriginal Affairs Michael Wernick contacted his communications director to see if the office could surreptitiously piggyback on the app to get its own message across. “Is it in any way feasible to get our backgrounders into the flow of this app without the appearance of [government] ringers calling into an open-line show?” he asks in one document.
Whether the government actually followed through is not clear. However Steven Bryant, who co-created the app, says, “We definitely did wonder when we had some of our signups.” He says a slew of the addresses came from downtown Ottawa, and he suspected that government staff were using his app.
Media lines from the department stress that the federal government does not operate as Big Brother to First Nations: “[Aboriginal Affairs] does not perform any type of ‘surveillance’ of any individuals, groups, or communities,” says one communiqué. Palmater scoffs at that, citing the case of Cindy Blackstock, a First Nations child rights advocate who was under surveillance by the government’s own admission. With Idle No More, it’s snooping, not spying; still, “I don’t think they should be treating us like domestic terrorists,” says Palmater.
Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission A dike is removed from Illabot Creek to restore its historic channel, one of several initiatives under way by Northwest tribes to bring back salmon habitat. This effort is by the Swinomish and Sauk-Suiattle tribes under the auspices of the Skagit River System Cooperative.
As Indigenous Peoples of the Northwest work to restore salmon habitat and with it lost culture and treaty rights, they are grappling with the reality that continued development is undoing their efforts as they go. In September 2012 the Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission released a report, “State of Our Watersheds,” documenting the results of local and state planning that have been in conflict with salmon habitat-recovery goals. Below are the principle findings as to what salmon habitat faces.
1. Estuaries are losing functional habitat because of population increases in lower portions of watersheds. “In the Suquamish Tribe’s area of concern, there has been a 39 percent loss of vegetated estuarine wetland area and a 23 percent loss of natural shoreline habitats, particularly small ‘pocket’ estuaries,” the report states. “Moreover, there are now 18 miles of bulkheads, fill and docks armoring the shoreline and degrading near-shore salmon habitat.”
All told, some 40 percent of Puget Sound shorelines have some type of shoreline modification, with 27 percent of the shoreline armored.
2. Rapidly increasing permit-exempt wells threaten water for fish. Since 1980, there has been an 81 percent increase in the number of new wells being drilled per 100 new Puget Sound residents moving into the area. The number of exempt wells in the Skagit and Samish watersheds since 1980 has increased by 611 percent, from an estimated 1,080 exempt wells to approximately 7,232.
“When more water is extracted from an aquifer than is being recharged, aquifer volume is reduced and the natural outflow from the aquifer decreases,” the report states. “This reduces the amount of fresh water available to lakes, wetlands, streams and the Puget Sound nearshore, which can harm salmon at all stages of their life cycle.”
3. Degraded nearshore habitat is unable to support forage fish. “In the Port Gamble S’Klallam Tribe’s focus area, according to studies since the 1970s, herring stocks have decreased from a status of healthy to depressed,” the report states. “In Port Gamble and Quilcene bays, which contain two of the largest herring stocks in Puget Sound, approximately 51 percent of spawning areas inventoried by [the] Port Gamble [S’Klallam] Tribe have been either modified or armored.”
4. Timber harvest has removed vast amounts of forest cover throughout all watersheds. In the Stillaguamish watershed, only 23 percent of the 1,777 acres of riparian area currently have any forest cover. In the Snohomish River basin, the Salmon Conservation Plan recommends that 150-foot buffers on both sides of fish-bearing streams be at least 65 percent forested. In 2006, those buffers were just 41 percent forested, with no gain since 1992 and little increase since that time.
5. Streams lack large woody debris. Large woody debris plays an important role in channel stability and habitat diversity. Estimates of large woody debris in the Green and Cedar rivers are 89 to 95 percent below the levels necessary for “properly functioning conditions” for salmon habitat.
6. Barriers cut off vast amounts of fish habitat. Despite extensive restoration efforts, many fish passage barriers, such as culverts, tide gates and levees still block salmon from accessing many stream miles of habitat. In the Quileute management area, culverts fully or partially block more than 168 miles of stream habitat. Most of these culverts are located on private forestlands. Culverts in the Chehalis basin block or impede salmon access to more than 1,500 miles of habitat.
7. Agricultural practices negatively impact floodplains and freshwater wetlands. Diking, draining and removing trees have resulted in a loss of stream buffers, stream channels and wetlands, and resulted in increased sediment and polluted runoff from agricultural activities.
In 1880, the Nooksack basin contained 4,754 acres of wetland to 741 acres of stream channel. By 1938, nearly 4,500 acres (95 percent) of off-channel wetland area had been cleared, drained and converted to agriculture. As of 1998, the lower mainstem retained less than 10 percent of its historical wetlands.
As of 2006, riparian areas of the Skagit River delta region are 83 percent impaired. Of that amount, only 12 percent are developed; the remaining 71 percent of impaired lands support crops and pasture.
8. Sensitive floodplains are being overdeveloped. In the Lower Elwha Tribe’s area of concern, 37 percent of the Morse Creek floodplain has been zoned for development — from utility rights of ways to single-family homes. Downstream of Highway 101, nearly half of the floodplain has also been zoned for similar development.
9. Puget Sound-area impervious surface increased by 35 percent from 1986 to 2006. It is projected that by 2026, the amount of impervious surface will increase another 41 percent.
“The Puget Sound Salmon Recovery Plan (2007) lists ‘Minimize impervious surfaces’ as a key strategy for protecting habitat,” the report states. “Impervious surface causes increases in stream temperatures; decreases in stream biodiversity, as evidenced by reduced numbers of insect and fish species; and contributes to pollutants in storm-water runoff, which can contaminate local aquatic systems.”
10. Loss of forest cover continues. From 1988-2004, Western Washington forestlands have declined by 25 percent—a loss of 936,000 acres of state and private forestland converted to other uses. Recent research from the University of Washington indicates that nearly one million more acres of private forestland are threatened with conversion.
The Skagit River System Cooperative—operated by the governments of the Sauk-Suiattle Tribe and the Swinomish Tribe, in partnership with the Bureau of Indian Affairs, U.S. Forest Service, Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission, Environmental Protection Agency, Pacific Salmon Commission and the state—recommends no new construction of riprap without mitigation. However, since 1998, at least one mile of riprap has been added to the existing 14 miles of riprap shoreline along the middle Skagit River.
“Shoreline armoring contributes to river channel degradation by impeding natural bank erosion and river meandering, and disconnecting terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems, directly impacting salmon habitat,” according to the NWIFC’s report, “State of Our Watersheds.” “Young juvenile chinook have been shown to use river banks modified with riprap at densities five times lower than natural banks.”
Dennis Banks, cofounder of the American Indian Movement, has issued a Declaration of War on Diabetes.
LEECH LAKE BAND OF OJIBWE TERRITORIES – Dennis Banks, 77, a cofounder of the American Indian Movement, has announced a 18,000 mile motorcycle run across America with hundreds of American Indians participating to “declare war on diabetes.”
His announcement was distributed through a news release Sunday from his foundation, the Nowa Cuming Institute. The news release states:
“The Nowa Cuming Institute has issued a Declaration of War on Diabetes.”
“Diabetes is at an epidemic state in Indian country and must be halted,”
said Banks, who was diagnosed with diabetes four years ago and has reversed his diabetes through a strong diet.
The motorcycle run will have four staring locations in Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles and San Diego on August 11 with the final destination of the nation’s capital, Washington, DC on September 10, 2014.
Throughout the various routes across America, motorcyclists will stop at various American Indian reservations and communities as they journey to Washington.
Once in Washington, the group will visit members of Congress and present them with a national diabetes policy, according to Banks.
This will be the second endeavor by Banks to draw attention to the ill-effects of diabetes in Indian country. In 2011, he led the “Longest Walk 3 – Reversing Diabetes” that took the long walkers to 72 American Indian reservations and communities before they arrived in Washington.
“If we don’t address this medical issue now, there will no one in the seventh generation who will be healthy and if we don’t take action now to stop diabetes, they will condemn this generation,”
said Banks.
The Nowa Institute released the announcement so that tribes and others who want to be part of the pre-planning of this historic motorcycle run can do so now.
We are asking people of interest to aid in this “War on Diabetes.” said Banks.
Those interested in assisting and supplying diabetes materials may email Goody Cloud at ndn_queen_bee@yahoo.com.
According to Native lore, the constellation of stars is a fisher that jumped into the sky while chasing its dinner. A professor in Minnesota is helping tell the story of Native stars and stories.
Ann Wessel of the St. Cloud Times has the story about Annette Lee’s work.Lee, assistant professor of astronomy and physics, explained to a room full of teachers attending a summer conference at St. Cloud State, that in Ojibwe culture the fisher is a clever, fierce and brave animal and a good fighter. It climbed a pine tree and jumped through a hole in the sky to bring back the birds and, therefore, the spring. Fishers are constantly on the move, sleeping for only a few hours before returning to the hunt. Like the fisher, the Big Dipper is constantly on the move in the sky.
On the Dakota star map, the Big Dipper contains the Blue Spirit Woman, who helps newborns pass from the star world to Earth and back again.
Through the Native Starwatchers Project, Lee has introduced audiences in Minnesota and throughout the U.S. to some Dakota and Ojibwe constellations and the stories they carry. Minnesota teachers are tuning in because state science standards require instructors to show how people from other cultures, including the state’s American Indian tribes, have contributed to science.
“I think it’s important for people to understand that although the mainstream science uses European and Greek (constellations), it’s important to know it comes from a certain culture,” Lee said later. “There are many ways of knowing, and that’s just one way.”
Lee said she hoped her efforts would give native people a better sense of their own history — a history that is being lost in a culture where stories were spoken, not written.
“Part of it’s recognizing all different cultures. We all have our connection to the stars, and that’s one of the few things in this day and age that connects us,” Lee said.
Roberta Conner of Tamastslikt Cultural Institute benefits from audience participation as women from the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla showcase traditional dances on the last day of the Oregon State Fair. / Thomas Patterson / Statesman Jou
The Confederated Tribes of Umatilla Indian Reservation took center stage on the last day of the Oregon State Fair today.
Four members of the tribe, wearing traditional clothing such as eagle feathers, moccasins, shell earrings and braids, performed their native dances on the Americraft Cookware Stage.
Roberta Conner, director of the Tamastslikt Cultural Institute who led the dancers, described the dances before each demonstration.
Conner said the tribes have been in Oregon for 10,000 years and have always been welcoming to visitors. When visitors would reach the tribes they would be offered food and water along with a performance of the welcome dance.
Kirke Campbell, of Corvallis, said his daughter wanted to be at the fair today to see the Umatilla dancers.
Campbell was randomly selected from the audience to participate in the owl dance.
“I was honored to be picked,” he said.
At the end of the performance, all of the audience members were asked to join in a circle dance. About 50 took advantage of the opportunity.
“(This) has been the best turn out for the three performances we have done,” Conner said.
By Billy Frank, Jr., Chairman, Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission
OLYMPIA – A crumbling 103-year-old fish-blocking diversion dam and inadequate fish passage system on the White River near Buckley need to be replaced because they are leading to injury and death for hundreds of threatened salmon, steelhead and bull trout, slowing salmon recovery efforts in the river system.
It’s common for some adult salmon to display a few cuts, scrapes and scars by the time they complete their ocean migration and return to spawn. That can take two to six years depending on the species.
But more and more fish are now being found at the foot of the diversion dam with gaping wounds and other injuries caused by exposed wooden boards, steel reinforcement bars and other parts of the deteriorating structure. Many of those fish later die from their injuries.
At the same time, an explosive revival of pink salmon has overwhelmed the inadequate trap-and-haul fish passage system operated by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. At two years, pink salmon have the shortest life cycle of all salmon and are abundant in the Puget Sound region. Pink salmon returns to the White River have shot up in the past decade from tens of thousands to close to a million.
That’s led to massive crowding of returning adult spring chinook, steelhead and migrating bull trout at the foot of the diversion dam where salmon continually try to leap over the structure – injuring themselves in the process – in their effort to move upstream and spawn. All three species are listed as threatened under the Endangered Species Act.
The diversion dam, constructed in 1910, sends water from the river to Lake Tapps. The dam prevents adult salmon from reaching the Mud Mountain Dam farther upstream, which is also impassable to salmon. Instead, fish are collected in a 73-year-old trap just below the diversion dam, then trucked upriver and released above Mud Mountain Dam.
There’s been a lot of talk but no action to fix the fish passage problem in the river.
Back in 2007, the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS) issued a biological opinion under the Endangered Species Act requiring the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to upgrade the fish trap. So far, the Corps has ignored the order, claiming that it doesn’t have the money. NMFS, meanwhile, has turned a blind eye to the Corps’ documented illegal killing of ESA-listed salmon.
In 1986, only a handful of spring chinook returned to the White River, but today those returns number in the thousands because of the cooperative efforts of the Muckleshoot and Puyallup tribes, state government and others.
The Corps and NMFS need to step up to the plate and do their jobs. When they don’t, what they are really saying is that salmon, treaty rights, and years of effort and investment by so many of us here in Puget Sound don’t really matter.
Salmon Homecoming is all about the people of the Pacific Northwest, whoever they are and whatever they do. That means we’re here for you, because your health, spirit and even your sustainable economy is most certainly about the salmon.
The Salmon Homecoming Alliance is a 501 (c) 3 non-profit foundation, established to organize, plan, develop and facilitate programs and events associated with Salmon Homecoming. Board members represent a variety of governments, associations, foundations and industries. Our objectives are to provide opportunities for tribal and non-tribal communities to come together in a positive atmosphere, learn from one another, and explore ways to support cooperative spirit in salmon restoration and protection.
We are happy to continue the tradition by celebrating the 21st annual Salmon Homecoming ceremony. The celebrations have always included cultural presentations, such as Northwest traditional gatherings, Pow Wows and Cedar Canoe events. We’ve sponsored environmental fairs, educational outreach activities, salmon bakes and even salmon runs. We present “Seventh Generation Legacy Awards” every year to people who have made important contributions to natural resources and Indian/non-Indian relations. We have accomplished much, but our Salmon Story has just begun.
“Salmon are the measuring stick of well-being in the Pacific Northwest.”
-Billy Frank, Jr., Chairman, Northwest Indian Fisheries Commission
Youth involved in the University of New Mexico’s Honoring Native Life initiative want to be heard. The Native American Suicide Prevention Clearinghouse, a resource to tribes in New Mexico for suicide prevention and suicide response, today helped their voices reach far and wide with the release of a video directed toward tribal leaders and policy makers.
“What we need from our tribal leaders and policy makers is more sympathy towards the different generations that exist in our communities—the elders, parents, adults, youth, adolescents,” says a participant in the video. “Something that will bring those groups together but also recognize their differences.”
The video, which can be viewed at http://honoringnativelife.org, is meant to direct attention to the needs of Native American youth and strengthen tribal leadership and tribal policy makers’ involvement in suicide prevention.
The video was created at the recent Honoring Native Life Summit, an event specifically focused on addressing suicide in Indian Country. The Summit included involvement from the Pueblos of San Felipe and Zuni; Navajo Nation; Mescalero Apache Nation; Albuquerque Area Indian Health Service; New Mexico Indian Affairs Department; White Mountain Apache Tribe of Arizona; and several other tribal communities throughout the State.
“The message that we are hearing from tribal youth is that they want a voice, and in that respect, they want to feel like a priority to leaders and policy makers,” said Sheri Lesansee (Pueblo of Zuni), UNM, Department of Psychiatry, Center for Rural & Community Behavioral Health.
More than 30,000 people in the U.S. die by suicide every year. It is this country’s 11th leading cause of death. New Mexico consistently ranks among the top five states in the U.S. for its suicide rate, which is 1.5 to two times the national average. Suicide is the 9th leading cause of death for New Mexicans.
