The Rise of the Salmon People

I tended to picture wild salmon as swimming the oceans - and they do. Just as important is that they swim our rivers too - an iconic and important part of the life, and balance for ecosystems and the creatures, people and cultures that grew up with them.

This movie by Jeremy Williams, released in 2011, documents the time a couple of years ago when thousands were galvanized to respond to "a drastic decline in the Fraser River Sockeye Salmon in 2009". It describes the coming together of long-time salmon advocate, Dr. Alexandra Morton, First Nations communities and other concerned groups to protect the salmon. A large rally was later followed by a group canoeing down the lower Fraser River in the “Paddle for Wild Salmon . . . arriving in Vancouver, along with hundreds of supporters, to address the Cohen Commission, a federal judicial inquiry into the collapse of the Fraser Sockeye".

Rise of the Salmon People from jeremy williams on Vimeo.

Controlled burns help restore Cariboo-Chilcotin grasslands

Chilcotin grasslands, near Farwell Canyon

BC grasslands have been shrinking for various reasons, encroaching "civilization" being one of them. Less obvious, because it happens more slowly, is the encroaching of trees. In the era of maximum fire-prevention, fires were extinguished and the trees steadily move into the grasslands. In recent years, realizing this, fire-fighting authorities have allowed selected controlled wildfires to burn themselves out; and deliberately started others, to help the restoration of more natural grassland. This is happening today in the Cariboo-Chilcotin grasslands.

Burns planned to restore Cariboo-Chilcotin grasslands

by BC Forest Fire Info on Thursday, October 18, 2012 at 9:05am ·

WILLIAMS LAKE – Prescribed burns are planned in the Ward Creek, Becher’s Prairie, and Farwell Canyon area west of Williams Lake between now and Nov. 16, 2012, weather conditions permitting.

The burns are planned for ecosystem restoration purposes. Individual burns will be between 10 and 600 hectares in size.

The largest burn, expected to be about 600 hectares, is in the Ward Creek area north of Gang Ranch. This burn will decrease sagebrush and Douglas-fir encroachment on critical California bighorn sheep habitat along the Fraser River.

Historically, the grasslands in the Cariboo-Chilcotin were renewed through frequent, low-intensity ground fires. Such fires prevented tree encroachment, rejuvenated under-story plants and maintained more open grasslands and forests with large trees. The reintroduction of managed, low-intensity ground fires to these grasslands is intended to restore and maintain the traditional grassland plant communities that are natural for these areas. These fires are part of an ongoing ecosystem restoration program administered by the provincial government in consultation with First Nations, local ranchers, the B.C. Wildlife Federation and the Cariboo-Chilcotin Conservation Society.

More Chilcotin photos by Stanton Newman

Great Bear Rainforest: Art for an Oil-Free Coast

"This past summer, fifty of BCs most celebrated artists took a journey up the coast, into the heart of the Great Bear Rainforest. Five-hundred kilometres north of Vancouver is a wild coastline: home to the Spirit Bear and whales, wolf packs and grizzlies, First Nations and coastal communities. With the looming threat of a proposed oil pipeline and hundreds of oil tankers a year, it is a magical place on edge."

Art for an Oil Free Coast - Film Trailer from StrongHeart Productions on Vimeo.

 This is the film trailer for the 22 min documentary, Art for an Oil-Free Coast.  . . . the story of a Raincoast Conservation Foundation expedition into a stunning and remote landscape, weaving together the artists’ work and their emotional response to a people and a region at risk.

Art for an Oil Free Coast (22 min. 2012. Canadian doc.)
Produced by Raincoast Conservation Society & StrongHeart Productions
With Robert Bateman, Ian Reid, Raincoast & friends.
World Premiere Announced: Vancouver International Film Festival, October 3rd 2012

Help permanently protect B.C.’s spectacular Flathead River Valley

A spectacular and environmentally exceptional area needs protection. This movie records a lot that has already been done - and there's more needed. Watch some of the best wildlife photographers do what they do - and see the Flathead Valley like few have.

Flathead Wild ReEdit from EP Films on Vimeo.

"Help permanently protect B.C.’s spectacular Flathead River Valley. We need a National Park in the south eastern one-third of the Flathead and a Wildlife Management Area in the rest of the valley and adjoining habitat - to complete Waterton-Glacier International Peace Park and preserve one of North America’s richest wildlife corridors."

David Suzuki on the Site C dam, population, power and asking critical questions.

David Suzuki is liberated since he resigned from the board of his non-profit. He is speaking his mind and his heart at every opportunity. With all the political bafflegab, it's a pleasure to hear straight talk, based on some real understanding and experience. In this case, he focuses on the Site C dam in northern British Columbia as an example of excess.

We've disconnected ourselves from the real economy and elevated the market as an object of worship. "What's an economy for?" "Are there no limits?"

Coastal first nations are 100% against the Enbridge pipeline. "There are things more important than money." We're out of touch with the planet, largely because of the shift to city life.

More evidence that First Nations leadership is against the Enbridge Pipeline

It's becoming increasingly clear that Enbridge optimism about support is on pretty shaky ground. In case there's any doubt, here's what Union of B.C. Indian Chiefs' Stewart Phillip has to say on their opposition to the Enbridge pipeline:

 CBC Television, July 30, 2012

Stone circle in the Chilcotin makes the news

Client of mine, Chris Czajkowski, is in the news about an unusual feature at Nuk Tessli, her alpine eco-adventure place in the Chilcotin.

What's caught the media attention is the stone circle in Mammary Meadows:

"The circle is 40 paces across.  The most curious thing about it is that the rock of which it is composed is finer-grained, lighter-coloured, and sharper-edged than the rocks either inside or outside the circle." - Chris Czajkowski, Nuk Tessli web site.

• Two scientists from Canada and Britain were sufficiently intrigued by the "unusual, near circular ring of stones" and its "uncertain origin" that they probed the strange feature and have just published their findings in the Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences. - Victoria Times Colonist
• Debris is known to slide down cones of unmelted ice to form a circle on the ground, according to EarthSky, although the circle in British Columbia is unusually large. - Our Amazing Planet
• The mystery was enough to inspire a British and a Canadian geologist to investigate. The pair's findings have just been published in the latest Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences. - Yahoo News

Chris tells me she has an interview with the CBC this afternoon.

Stay in touch via Chris' blog: Wilderness Dweller

More on Big-Beaked birds

Jim Sims picked up the story of my backyard big-beaked Hairy Woodpecker, writing about it in the October issue of Muskrat Express, the newsletter of the Williams Lake Field Naturalists.

Read on at   http://www.williamslakefieldnaturalists.ca/newsletter/Muskrat%202011-10.pdf

Shale gas: Sound the fracking alarm

NEW: A Fractivist's Toolkit

The evidence is being reported across the continent: first-hand reports, scientific studies . . . fracking may get more gas but it is very bad for people and the planet. Here are some reports from British Columbia and beyond:

• France looks at America, says non to fracking France’s energy minister looked at the destruction being wrought on America’s environment by hydraulic fracturing and said “non, merci” to the latest push by her country’s business lobby to make fracking legal. Grist, 7 June 2013.
• B.C. should cap gas sector growth, report says
  The report describes B.C.'s pursuit of shale gas development, including exclusive access to water and lax regulations for greenhouse gas emissions, as 'reckless.'


UPDATES:

• Andrew Nikiforuk tackles top claims fracking industry uses to reassure public.
• Is there really 100 years’ worth of natural gas beneath the United States?
• REPORT: Will Natural Gas Fuel America in the 21st Century?
• Shale gas subsidies threaten BC water supply: CCPA report
• A Fracking Disaster in the Making: Report
• Fracking tests near Blackpool 'likely cause' of tremors
• France Cancels Shale-Gas Permits Over Fracking Impasse
• Albertan, Tired of Her Tap Water Catching Fire, Sues
• Natural gas fracking reviews launched
• BC gov must rein in shale gas industry, says enviro group
• Critics slam B.C. government plan to report on fracking activity
• Fracking Operations Cause Thousands of Earthquakes in Arkansas
• Unlike BC, Wyoming Won't Allow Fracking Secrets
• Down the Drain Goes Public's Right to Know about Fracking
• The U.S. has one-fifth the shale gas once projected

Big-beaked Hairy Woodpecker

I'm no bird expert but for 12 years I've been watching and photographing the birds in my (Cariboo) back yard. Among our most frequent visitors are the hairy woodpeckers. I'm not sure I could tell one from another, except that the males have a red flash on their crown.

So, when I saw this one, I did a double take, thinking it was probably a variety I'd never encountered. But other than a beak three times as long as all the other Hairy visitors (see inset), he was the same. Nothing like this in the bird guide and our local bird guy, Tom Godin, agreed.

He's a regular visitor, gets on well with the other Hairys and seems to manage OK with his long beak. I think he even has a bit of an advantage getting deep into the suet cage, though my impression is that getting food down his beak and into his body is a little more time-consuming.

Have you ever seen a Hairy woodpecker like this? Either way, I'd welcome your comments.

For more about my birds: Birds from a Backyard Deck.