Forests – Don’t Love Them To Death

James L. Cummins
from The Fishing Wire

Editor’s Note: James L. Cummins, vice president of the Boone and Crockett Club, has released an Op-Ed on the mistreatment of our public lands with special attention on the negative effects on our national forests. We felt the topic timely and appreciate B&C allowing us to redistribute it.

“Love It to Death” is the third album by the Alice Cooper band, which was released in 1971. Loving it to death is how we, as a nation, seem to be treating much of our public lands, especially our national forests.

Lolo Peak Fire near Missoula, Montana 2017
More people are engaging in and having a greater influence on natural resource issues than ever before. People want to do what is best, yet are not necessarily familiar with what that is. There is a growing belief that “letting nature take its course” with no human interference is the best philosophy for managing natural resources. Many people are mistakenly or intentionally calling this way of thinking conservation, though it is more closely aligned with preservation.

These misconceptions are helping to shift the management of wildlife and its habitat from a “hands-on” conservation approach to a “hands-off” preservation approach that has serious negative implications, such as the wildfires we are witnessing across the United States. Imagine if we approached health care for humans the same way as we approached the health of our natural resources. Our life expectancy would be cut by at least a third. Relatively simple surgeries would be no longer. So, our quality of life would suffer. Is that what we want? I certainly don’t.

Conservation and preservation are both concerned with the betterment of the environment. Conservation focuses on using and managing natural resources to benefit people. Preservation is a philosophy that generally seeks to keep natural resources in a pristine state by excluding management and limiting how they are used by people. Conservation is the overarching concept with preservation being one of many management options within a broad conservation approach.

Conservation was developed and nationalized by the Boone and Crockett Club and its founder, Theodore Roosevelt, beginning in the late 19th century. One of the Club’s founding members, Gifford Pinchot, also the first chief of the Forest Service, is credited with first using the term “conservation.”

One of the best-known advocates of preservation was John Muir, who founded the Sierra Club and fought for Yosemite to become a national park in 1890. He believed scenic forests and mountains were sacred, sublime places that should be used only for enjoyment and inspiration and not as a resource for goods. Muir and other early preservationists saw only one choice for saving awe-inspiring landscapes – keep people out unless they were there for appreciation and solitude. It was the beginning of a national controversy that pitted Muir’s idea of preservation against conservation. We are still having this national debate 125 years later.

Nationally acclaimed wildlife biologist, Dr. Bruce D. Leopold, once said, “Nature just can’t take its course because frankly, there is no location on Earth where humankind has not had an impact. From radioactive materials and dust in polar ice, to ever-expanding distributions of invasive species, the evidence is clear that disruption of natural processes is a global phenomenon. Humans are a significant component of natural ecosystems (contributing the good and the bad) and the notion of suddenly removing their influence is both illogical and impossible. Natural ecosystems are just too altered to be left alone.”

In August 2017, over 650,000 acres were burning in the Western U.S. Most of these fires were on public lands, particularly federal lands. By September 1, seven hundred wildfires raged in the state of Montana alone, ravaging some 1 million acres of public and private lands. The Club evacuated its own Theodore Roosevelt Memorial Ranch in Montana on September 12 as two wildfires were approaching the 6,300-acre property. Across the state, evacuations were taking place, structures were being burned, people were breathing hazardous air, federal and state resources were stretched thin and the state of Montana was out of money. Most tragic…two young firefighters lost their lives. And now, California is on fire.

What caused this wildfire phenomenon? Why, over the course of the last two decades, have wildfires intensified to the point of being natural disasters? What are the impacts on the people, landscape, wildlife, economies, and state and federal budgets and personnel? What can be done to correct this destructive situation going forward?

National forests comprise a large segment of the ecosystems in the western United States. Most have evolved with fires, insect and disease outbreaks and blow-downs to retain biodiversity and forest health. But, times have clearly changed. More people are living further out into wild-land urban interfaces. To protect lives and homes this has logically led to a forest policy of suppressing natural fires and insect outbreaks. This intolerance of fires combined with decades of relying on our forests for timber production and then dramatically scaling this back, have helped produce very “unnatural” conditions of fuel build up ripe for the wildfires we’re seeing today.

These unnatural conditions are resulting in wildfires that are destroying human lives, forests, wildlife habitat and homes and contributing to changing climate. Wildfires emit carbon that contributes to poor air quality. Healthy forests, as well as forest products, are a carbon sink, sequestering carbon that would otherwise be emitted into the atmosphere.

More than 60 million acres of national forests are at high risk of wildfire or in need of restoration. In the past 10 years, over 65 million acres have burned. Approximately 10 million acres burned in 2015, killing 11 firefighters. Federal foresters estimate that an astounding 190 million acres of land managed by the Departments of Agriculture and the Interior are at an unnatural risk to catastrophic wildfire.

On our national forests alone, since 2000, wildfires average 6.9 million acres burned annually. In 1995, fire made up 16 percent of their annual appropriated budget. In 2015, fire made up 52 percent of their appropriated budget. That is a decrease in 36 percent of their funds that would be used for other activities, including research, forest improvements and maintenance.

Conservation can reverse these conditions through a variety of actions, such as harvesting trees and using controlled burns to mimic natural disturbances. These disturbances reduce build-ups of forest litter (fuel) and overgrowth to encourage a variety of successional stages for wildlife, biodiversity and the prevention of larger, hotter, more devastating fires from occurring that can destroy even old-growth forests. Preservation takes the opposite approach. It seeks to halt management actions and multiple use on the mistaken assumption the forests can and will return to their former “natural” condition.

The conservation principles of sustainable use and active management has the greatest chance of producing the goods and services that people want, as well as retaining long-term ecological integrity. Conservation provides the means and knowledge to produce timber from the most productive growing areas to meet much of the demand for wood products while allowing less intensive management over the majority of the forested landscape. This enhances biodiversity while localizing the impacts of our demands for these products. We have the ability to locate and manage intensive industries (such as energy development) and urban growth so that it aids conservation — consolidating daily life and extractive industries in some places allows other places to produce the benefits of wilderness, scenery and wildlife habitat.

Managing forests makes them resilient and able to withstand fire, pests and diseases. Management eliminates or reduces the impact of catastrophic wildfire; protects riparian areas important for stream health (shade, filtering, etc.) and fish species such as trout; and protects water quality due to fires followed by rains sediments washing downstream and damaging important drinking water supplies.

Using 21st century techniques by land management professionals – and not direct mail specialists and litigators – we have the technology and know how to restore America’s cherished landscapes back to a healthy, natural condition. Through the use of environmentally smart thinning, prescribed burns and other scientifically validated management practices, overstocked forests can be returned to a natural balance, reducing the risks of catastrophic wildfire and insect and disease infestations along with the associated expenditure of dollars.

It is time we returned the management philosophy of Roosevelt and Pinchot – conservation that is – to our national forests. Pure preservation is not working in many places. In order to leave the next generation of Americans a national forest system that is in the best health possible, we need to make sure it has the best care possible. Right now they are running a pretty high fever from a spreading cancer because we are loving them to death. The time for treatment is NOW, not after we have lost another million acres of wild places and the wild things that live in them.

NOAA Reviews Recovery Plan for Atlantic Salmon
The Atlantic salmon is one of NOAA Fisheries’ Species in the Spotlight.
from The Fishing Wire

Background

Atlantic salmon (Salmo salar), also known as the “King of Fish,” were once found in north American waters from Long Island Sound in the United States to Ungava Bay in northeastern Canada. Atlantic salmon are anadromous fish, spending the first half of their life in freshwater rivers and streams along the East Coast of North America and the second half maturing in the seas between Northeastern Canada and Greenland.

Today, the last remnant populations of Atlantic salmon in U.S. waters exist in just a few rivers and streams in central and eastern Maine. These populations constitute the Gulf of Maine Distinct Population Segment (DPS) of Atlantic salmon, which is listed as endangered under the ESA.

To address the critical status of this imperiled species, we are marshalling resources and reaching out to vital partners to stabilize their populations and prevent extinction.

Threats

The final listing rule highlights the importance of dams and marine survival as causes of the current demographic plight of Atlantic salmon. A host of other threats also limit Atlantic salmon’s survival including aquaculture practices (which pose ecological and genetic risks), changing land use patterns (e.g., development, agriculture, forestry), climate change, degradation of water quality (e.g., contaminants, nutrient enrichment, elevated water temperature), non-native fish species that compete with or prey on Atlantic salmon (e.g., smallmouth bass), loss of habitat complexity and connectivity, water extraction, among others.

Recovery

Through recovery planning we understand the threats and have identified a range of management actions that must be taken to address their decline. Some of the efforts that we are involved in include:

Work with dam owners as well as state and tribal partners to find solutions that allow Atlantic salmon access to freshwater habitats.
Conserve and restore other species (e.g., river herring) that salmon may depend upon.
Negotiate with international partners to minimize impacts to U.S. origin fish in distant-water fisheries.
Invest in science to ensure we implement conservation measures that will be most effective in restoring salmon populations at the lowest possible cost.

NOAA Fisheries is working with dam owners and local interests to develop solutions at dams that will allow for salmon recovery. NOAA Fisheries provided significant resources ($22.5 million) for the oversight, funding, and monitoring of two mainstem dam removals on the Penobscot River, which were part of the Penobscot River Restoration Project.

In addition, NOAA Fisheries staff continue to work with hydropower owners to craft plans for effective downstream and upstream fish passage at nearly all major hydropower dams within the designated critical habitat area for Atlantic salmon. The ultimate goal is to restore access to all necessary habitats for Atlantic salmon so that the fish are able to complete their life cycle moving from marine to freshwater and vice versa.

What Can You Do?

Landowners and the general public can contribute significantly in Atlantic salmon recovery by implementing best management and land stewardship practices that afford protections to Atlantic salmon, native fisheries and their habitats, including riparian land and water quality. They can:

Remove or provide passage around blockages, including round culverts and dams that prevent or impair the movement of Atlantic salmon and Maine’s native fish community.
Maintain and protect forested riparian areas that provide shade, nutrients, and cover necessary to support Atlantic salmon and Maine’s cold water and migratory fish community.
Avoid removing wood from Maine waterways and their banks because wood provides important habitat for Atlantic salmon and Maine’s native fish community to feed and seek shelter.
Maintain native vegetation along waterways to minimize erosion of topsoil to maintain healthy forests while reducing inputs of sediment into streams. Sediments fill in spaces between rocks that are used by Atlantic salmon and native fish communities as sites for laying eggs and by juvenile fish as shelter from predators.Encourage or participate in programs to conserve land and water resources that promote abundant, suitable habitats for Atlantic salmon and also assure that water resources continue to provide recreational and fishery opportunities into the future.

U.S. Shark Fin Ban May Harm Shark Conservation
from The Fishing Wire

Two leading marine scientists say banning shark-fin trade in the U.S. will have little impact on protecting sharks: Here’s their take, from Mote Marine Labs in Sarasota, FL.

A new study in the scientific journal Marine Policy shows that banning the sale of shark fins in the United States can actually harm ongoing shark conservation efforts.

Study authors Dr. David Shiffman of Simon Fraser University’s Earth2Ocean research group and Dr. Robert Hueter from the Center for Shark Research at Mote Marine Laboratory say that the proposed Shark Fin Sales Elimination Act of 2017, a bill currently in committee in U.S. Congress, is a misguided and ineffective approach to protecting sharks.

To request a copy of the paper, “A United States shark fin ban would undermine sustainable shark fisheries,” journalists can contact Hayley Rutger: [email protected]. Here is the abstract and citation.

The proposed Act states that “no person shall possess, transport, offer for sale, sell, or purchase shark fins or products containing shark fins,” with a few very specific exceptions. If passed, the Act would make it illegal for U.S. fishers and businesses to sell or purchase shark fins.

The Act is not focused on shark “finning,” which has been illegal in U.S. waters since the 1990s. Finning is the inhumane, wasteful practice of removing a shark’s fins at sea and tossing the animal back to die. U.S. shark fisheries are managed carefully, based on scientific data, and fishers are permitted to harvest non-depleted shark species, transport the whole animal back to shore and detach fins afterward — which is NOT finning. However, in some other parts of the world, finning contributes to the global fin trade and sharks are less sustainably managed.

In their new paper, Shiffman and Hueter review scientific and economic data to understand the possible implications of a U.S. ban on fin trade, including fins legally harvested in U.S. fisheries. Their key findings include:

Insignificant global impact of U.S. fin-trade ban: “…banning the sale of shark fins in the United States would likely not result in a significant direct reduction in global shark mortality, because the United States exports approximately one percent of all the shark fins traded globally, and imports an even smaller percentage of the global fin trade,” paper authors note.
U.S. shark fishing is well regulated. Preventing sale of U.S. caught fins opens more market share for less sustainable fisheries that may practice finning. “Of 16 global shark fisheries identified as biologically sustainable and well managed, 9 involve United States shark fishermen, accounting for 76.3% of total landings from these 16 fisheries,” the authors note.
U.S. ban could cause waste without reducing shark mortality. “Moreover, banning the sale of shark fins would not make it illegal to continue catch and kill sharks in the United States. It would only regulate how the parts of dead sharks can be used. Forcing fishermen to discard fins from sharks caught in sustainably managed fisheries would contribute to wastefulness in fisheries and undermine the ‘full use’ doctrine that is a component of the UN FAO International Plan of Action for Sharks, without reducing shark mortality.”
Costs to law-abiding U.S. fishers: “The proposed fin ban would therefore eliminate about 23% of the ex-vessel value of legally caught sharks, causing economic harm to rule-following fishermen and undermining decades of progress towards sustainable shark fisheries management in the United States.”
Instead of ban, sustainable harvest sets more realistic example for other nations: “A ban on the trade of shark parts from a sustainable fishery would not only eliminate a model of successful management from the global marketplace, but would also remove an important incentive for other nations to adopt that model. A nationwide ban on buying or selling fins would tell international trading partners that the United States will not support their shark conservation efforts regardless of future improvements to their fisheries sustainability.”

If a fin ban is not a viable solution, what can be done to help sharks? Dr. Robert Hueter at Mote, who has more than 40 years’ experience in shark science and conservation, offers a five-point approach designed to benefit shark populations while strengthening the U.S. economy:

Increase the penalties for shark finning, which the Florida state legislature has recently done.
Stop the import of shark products from countries that don’t practice sustainable shark fishing, especially those that still permit finning. Some authority to do this already exists, and there are at least two efforts underway to legislate further authority on Capitol Hill.
Incentivize our domestic industry to process American-harvested fins here within the U.S., rather than ship them to Hong Kong for processing (as happens now), thereby improving traceability of legal fins and supplying the demand of our own Asian cultures here in the U.S. with products “made in America.”
Continue to monitor our shark populations, conduct regular stock assessments and support strict measures for sustainability.
Educate the public about the real problems sharks face and empower people to do the right things in supporting shark conservation.

In addition, both authors of the Marine Policy paper suggest focusing more attention on the overall shark meat trade, which is worth $550 million worldwide and has been growing, compared with the fin trade alone, which is worth $330 million worldwide and has been declining.

Detroit River Fishing – Some Good Environmental News for a Change
James D. Swan, Ph.D.
from The Fishing Wire

Mainstream media daily bombard us with tales of woe, corruption, scandal, crime, crises, conflict, and disaster. We need to hear some good news, and clearly the recovery of the Detroit River is some good news.

At an average rate of 175,000 cubic feet per second, the Detroit River surges through a strait less than a mile wide for 32 miles, passing five million people as it flows between Lake St. Claire and Lake Erie. As it enters Lake Erie, the river widens and the waters slip past two cigar-shaped islands. Along the Canadian shore lies 2.5 miles long Bois-Blanc Island, a former amusement park that today is a resort community. To the west in American waters is a 12 mile-long cigar-shaped island, Grosse Ile, the quiet home of more than 10,000 people.

A history of the Detroit River reveals how becoming “civilized” can influence water quality. In 1701 the French explorer Antoine de la Mothe Cadillac established Fort Pontchartrain du Détroit on the west bank of this strait. Within a couple decades, each winter the hay, straw, and manure from all the stables in Detroit were hauled out onto the frozen river and dumped on the ice. Spring thaws would then carry away downstream like one giant flush of the city’s toilet.

As Detroit grew from a trading post into a city, waste dumping increased. In 1823 Peter Berthelet was authorized to build a wharf from the shore out to deep water and install a pipe to supply water that would be free from contamination by the debris commonly dumped into the river.

By 1909 the pollution of the Detroit River had become so bad that an International Joint Commission of representatives from the United States and Canada was formed. Four years later the both countries admitted they were dumping untreated sewage into the river and they agreed to build sewage treatment plants. A 1929-30 follow-up study concluded the river was no longer polluted. My father, who lived nearly all his life on Grosse Ile, recalled how in the late 20’s he and his friends used to be able to see the bottom of the river when they dove off the bridge on the west side of the island.

As Henry Ford’s dream of creating the automobile manufacturing center of the world materialized, World War II drove Detroit into round the clock manufacturing of vehicles and the quality of water in the Detroit River again declined. A l946-48 International Joint Commission reported that the Detroit River was seriously polluted by some 1,739,120,040 gallons of municipal and industrial wastewaters that were flushed away on an average day! Oil slicks on the river were reported 1/3 of the time. Once abundant species, such as whitefish, blue pike, trout, and sturgeon, virtually disappeared from the Detroit River and Lake Erie, and those remaining often tasted oily. Major public-access sites displayed public health warning signs. You could still catch some fish from the bank, but not the same assortment of prime species as a few decades earlier, and they often tasted like oil.

A reminder of the bad old days for the Detroit River. James Swan photo.
Two decades later, in waste waters came an infusion of nitrates and phosphates from common household detergents stimulatong the growth of aquatic plants in the river and lake. These aquatic plants became so luxuriant that by mid-summer, boating was impossible in large areas. And as the plants died off in the fall, large amounts of vegetative material sank to the bottom, covering the bottom with a thick mat of rotting ooze. Starting in the late fifties, large areas of the river and lake became biological deserts for all but carp and goldfish.

In l964 an International Joint Commission report declared that the lower 26 miles of the Detroit River were “polluted bacteriologically, chemically, physically, and biologically so as to interfere with municipal water supplies, recreation, fish and wildlife propagation and navigation.” Wildlife biologist Dr. George Hunt estimated that as many as 10,000 ducks, geese, swans and gulls used to die nearly every winter from oil spills in the lower Detroit River.

Little wonder that in 1970 a cover story on Time magazine declared Lake Erie dead.

Earth Day 1970 finally drew focus on the serious pollution problems of that time, and an international movement began to clean up the Detroit River. So much progress has taken place in the Detroit River since then that in 2001 an International Wildlife Refuge was established in the lower Detroit River, with its initial offices on Grosse Ile.

Some examples of recovery accomplishments:

1) In the 1970s there was a nearly complete reproductive failure of bald eagles. In 2013, there were 18 active bald eagle nests in the vicinity of the Detroit River International Wildlife Refuge.

2) The falcon population in Michigan was decimated in the 1950s. Falcons were reintroduced in Detroit in 1987 and since the early 1990s falcon reproductive success has steadily increased. Falcons now nest under the Ambassador Bridge

3) In 2009, a pair of osprey built a nest in a cell phone tower adjacent to the Gibraltar Wetlands Unit of the Detroit River International Wildlife Refuge; the first time that osprey have successfully nested in Wayne County since the 1890’s.

4) Since the early 1960’s there’s been a 96% decline in nesting pairs of terns along the Detroit River. In 2012 two common terns fledged on restored Belle Isle habitat on Belle Isle; the first fledging since the 1960’s.

5) A hundred years ago, sturgeon were abundant in the Detroit River and Lake Erie. No sturgeon spawning was recorded in the Detroit River from 1970s to 1999. In 2001 sturgeon reproduction was documented on the U.S. side near Zug Island and in 2009 sturgeon reproduction was documented near Fighting Island on the Canadian side of the river

6) In 2006 whitefish spawning in the Detroit River was documented for the first time since 1916

7) The walleye population in Lake Erie was rated as in “crisis” in 1978. By 2012, fishery biologists estimated that 22.2 million walleye (age 2 and greater) were present in Lake Erie, resulting in a total harvest through sport and commercial fishing of 2.48 million walleyes. It’s estimated now that 10 million walleye ascend the Detroit River from Lake Erie each spring, The Detroit River and Lake Erie are now considered the “Walleye Capital of the World.”

8) Beaver were hunted to near extinction in lower Michigan during the “fur trade era.” During the 1940’s-1970’s, beaver couldn’t have survived in the Detroit River because oiled fur becomes matted and loses its ability to trap air to maintain body temperature. In 2008, two beaver built a lodge at DTE’s Conner Creek Power Plant. Beaver are now found in the headwaters of the Rouge River, and in 2013, beaver were seen at DTE’s Rouge Power Plant.

9) Steelhead and salmon are now found in the Detroit River and Lake Erie and some spawn in tributaries.

10) Wild celery (an important food for diving ducks) in the Detroit River declined 72% between 1950 and1985 because of oil and other pollution. It’s increased 200% since 1985.

11) The entire length of the Detroit River is now safe for water contact sports.

I’d add that when I was growing up on Grosse Ile, I saw one deer on the island before I left for college. There now is a deer season on the refuge.

The man to speak with about the current status and future of the Detroit River is Dr. John Hartig, Manager of the Detroit River International Wildlife Refuge. http://www.fws.gov/midwest/detroitriver/

A life-long resident of Southeastern Michigan, John grew up in Allen Park in the 1960s, and would pedal his bike down Southfield Road to fish the Detroit River. When he’d come back home, Hartig recalls “The neighbors would say, ‘You’re not going to eat that fish are you?'”.

According to Dr. Hartig, the Detroit River International Wildlife Refuge is the only international refuge in North America and one of only 14 priority urban refuges in the nation charged with bringing conservation to cities. It covers 48 miles of shoreline along the Detroit River and western Lake Erie – stretching from southwest Detroit to the Ohio-Michigan border and as far east as Point Pelee National Park in Ontario. The Refuge focuses on conserving and restoring habitats for 350 species of birds and 117 species of fish. USFWS currently owns or cooperatively manages 6,202 acres of unique lands and partners with Michigan Department of Natural Resource on conservation of 7,897 acres of state-owned land. A Canadian registry of lands includes 3,797 acres of Essex Region Conservation Authority lands and 981 acres of City of Windsor lands. In total, 18,877 acres of land in southeast Michigan and southwest Ontario are now being cooperatively managed for conservation and outdoor recreation for nearly seven million people living in a 45-minute drive.

The cornerstone of the Refuge is the 410-acre Humbug Marsh in Trenton – the last mile of natural shoreline on the U.S. mainland of the Detroit River.

As a result of considerable public outcry over potential development of Humbug Marsh, it was purchased by USFWS and preserved in perpetuity as the cornerstone of the Refuge. Humbug Marsh is considered an internationally important wetland because of its ecological importance in the Detroit River corridor and the Great Lakes Basin Ecosystem. Oak trees around the marsh have been aged at over 300 years old and were alive when Cadillac founded Detroit in 1701, and there’s a local healthy deer herd in that area.

Refuge Gateway Center (top) under construction will help educate the next generation while the 740-foot dock for the Great Lakes school ship (below) will also help teach them about conservation- and fishing. Photo by Tandem with permission.

An automotive manufacturing facility in Trenton that produced brakes, paints, and solvents for 44 years was located adjacent to Humbug Marsh. It was cleaned up to industrial standards and sat vacant as an industrial brownfield for over 10 years. In 2002, Wayne County Parks purchased this brownfield in Trenton to become the future home of the Refuge Visitor Center and to improve outdoor recreational opportunities including shore fishing, hiking, wildlife observation, kayaking, and more. It’s taken 10 more years to cleanup this former industrial brownfield and meet public use standards.

Through this restoration project there’s been: a net gain of over 16 acres of wetlands in an area that has lost 97% of its coastal wetlands to development; restoration of 25 acres of upland buffer habitat; control of invasive plant species on over 50 acres of upland habitats, including control of invasive Phragmites along 2.5 miles of shoreline. It’s also resulted in merging the 44-acre Refuge Gateway with the 410-acre Humbug Marsh into one ecological unit. Citizen involvement has occurred throughout the project, including public meetings, design charrettes, planting trees and wetland plugs, building trails, birding tours, and nature hikes to achieve local ownership/stewardship. It’s the only project in the world to successfully clean up an industrial brownfield to serve as an ecological buffer for a “Wetland of International Importance.”

At the Refuge Gateway under construction are: a 12,000 square foot LEED-certified, Visitor Center (two classrooms, a multi-purpose room, and one-third of the building devoted to hands-on and minds-on activities for children); a 740-foot dock for the Great Lakes school ship that will use the adjacent waters as a living laboratory for children; a universally-accessible 200-foot fishing pier; a canoe and kayak launch; three wildlife observation decks; and an outdoor environmental education classroom. There are three miles of hiking trails that will be connected to over 100 miles of greenway trails. When the visitor center and amenities open in 2018, it will attract hundreds of thousands of annual visitors, changing the image of the river and the refuge from a polluted “rust-belt” dump to a conservation treasure.

The International Wildlife Refuge Alliance and the Friends Organization for the Detroit River International Wildlife Refuge are currently leading a two-month, on-line fundraising campaign to complete the school ship dock and fishing pier at the Refuge Gateway in Trenton. See link

Their goal is to raise $50,000 in two months to complete this project by August 31. If they do, they’ll receive $50,000 in match funding from the Michigan Economic Development Corporation. Donations are welcomed.

One good example of conservation success like the Detroit River recovery can start a national, and international movement that can change the world, maybe even force the media to tell us more good stories.

Jim Berry called me last week to remind me that hunting and fishing license fees are increasing on July 1. The legislature passed these increases after having public hearings around the state and getting input from citizens and groups involved with hunting and fishing. There was little opposition to the increase from these sources.

The fees are small for what you get. You can hunt a full year for $15 now as opposed to $10 in the past, an annual increase of only five dollars. For fishing the increase is from $9 to $15, a six-dollar increase.

Other fees increased, also. One, the Hunter Information Permit, required of all hunting migratory birds like ducks and doves, was free in the past. You also had to buy a Waterfowl license if you hunted ducks or geese. That has been changed to a Migratory Bird License with a fee of five dollars, required of waterfowl and dove hunters.

The old Waterfowl license was $5.50 so, for duck hunters, that is a decrease, but it is a new fee for dove hunters. Landowners can get the license free for hunting on their land.

One of the biggest changes was the elimination of the free Senior Hunting and Fishing License. In the past, any Georgia resident 65 years old or older could get the license for free. It will now cost $7 for anyone who does not already have one on July 1. Lifetime license fees are increasing by quite a bit, too.

In addition to these fees you have to pay a service fee for getting the license, whether you do it yourself online or go to a store like Berry’s. By the way, don’t blame the folks at Berry’s or any other license supplier for the increase in fees – they have no control over it.

The increased fees collected are supposed to go to improving hunting and fishing opportunities and management in our state. If it really does go to those needs, it will be great. If the legislature dumps the money into the general fund and spends part of it on other things, they should be held accountable at election time.

One thing I long had a problem with in our system is the fee for hunters and fishermen using Wildlife Management Areas. The fee is not what bothered me. The fact hikers, bird watchers, horse and bike riders and others could use what hunters and fishermen paid for and they were not charged a fee. Everyone using the resource should be charged.

That changed five years ago. Now, anyone using a WMA for anything other than hunting or fishing is required to pay for a Georgia Outdoor Recreational Pass. Hunters and fishermen with a Wildlife Management License can use the areas any time.

Even more irritating, every year some of those non-paying users often complained when hunting season starts. They claimed they could not use those areas during hunting season. As my younger friends say, DUH. Hunters and fishermen paid for those areas from the beginning, not just over the past five years, so shut your mouth.

Hunting is allowed on most areas only during a small part of the year. The great majority of days are open to anyone. But if you want to use the areas during hunting season, take up hunting!

—

The lakes were wild last weekend. Memorial Day is the traditional start of boating season nationwide. The waters will be very crowded over the next few months. If you don’t remember anything else about driving a boat, remember that you stay to the right of oncoming traffic, just like in a car!

Something Fishy Is Going On Petaluma
What did high school mean to you when you were a kid?
James A. Swan, Ph.D.
from the Fishing Wire

School is reading, writing, and arithmetic packaged to teach kids how to pass tests, so they can get good grades and go to college and get jobs. School work used to be paper and pencil. Now it’s electronic on computers, but the basic principles and abstract concepts are still there and most have very little practical value.

How and what we force kids to learn is a weakness in our educational system, for as Harvard psychologist Howard Gardner has shown, there are at least nine different kinds of intelligence http://multipleintelligencesoasis.org/ including naturist intelligence which includes being able to appreciate nature, and recognize the difference between different kinds of animals, birds, plants, fish and stones.

We must educate kids about environmental conservation, not just giving kids facts, but getting kids outdoors as much as possible including, if possible, getting their hands dirty and maybe even bloody growing and harvesting some of their own food. This concept is catching on and Casa Grande High School in Petaluma, California, which is located at the north end of San Francisco Bay, is an example of what is possible who you bring fish into the classroom. High school fishing conservation is important.

Back in 1983 Tom Furrer, a biology teacher at Casa Grande High School, took his students on a walk along Adobe Creek that’s near the school. He told them in the old days salmon spawned there and showed them some pictures. The students volunteered to clean up the creek. They started by removing over 25 tons of trash. The following year a few spawning salmon did make it into Adobe Creek.

That inspired the kids to set a goal of raising $6,000 to convert an abandoned campus green house into a student-run fish hatchery with two 2×6 troughs. They began a campaign of car washes, cake sales, raffles, lawn mowing, and fund-raising dinners. The California Department of Fish and Game chipped in at least $50,000, and the community contributed materials, construction services, and manpower as well as dollars. In six years the United Anglers of Casa Grande raised over $510,000.

April 25, 1993, the United Anglers of Casa Grande High School opened the doors of their state-of-the-art, on-campus fish hatchery – one of 3 nationally with a federal permit – to raise endangered fall run Chinook salmon.

In the following decade the United Anglers of Casa Grande raised and released over 300,000 Chinook salmon and the entire seven miles of Adobe Creek have been restored.

In 2003, a Jr. United Angler program began to enable high school students to teach the younger generation about what they are doing in the community. The Juniors program allows the younger grades to also raise fish in their classrooms. At the end of the year, High School and Junior students release some of their fish together.

Tom Furrer retired in 2011. His place has been taken by Dan Hubacker, a former UACGHS student, who went off to college, got a teaching degree, came back and became a teacher.

Hubacker says, “The students have been averaging gathering between 20,000 and 40,000 Fall Run Chinook Salmon eggs a year, collected from either returning adult Fall Run Chinook Salmon in the Petaluma watershed, or they’re provided by Feather River Fish Hatchery out of Orville, which is managed by one of the United Anglers Alumni who we work closely with.”

Recognizing the kids progress, two years ago National Marine Fisheries said that they could use some help with research on Chinook salmon in the Petaluma River. So, the kids have learned to use electrofishing to collect tissue samples and tag fish, and then during the summer months, they count juveniles in pools in the river, and in drought years they may catch young fish and take them to the hatchery to raise them until they are ready for release into the Bay.

Hubacker says “We are currently tagging our Chinook Salmon with a Coded Wire Tag. This program allows our students to work side by side with professionals in this field. Students tag about 20,000 Chinook salmon fingerlings each year. These coded wire tags are placed into the cartilage in the snout of the fish and have a corresponding code with our site. The fish’s adipose fin is removed to identify those that are tags with the hopes that if they get caught when returning the commercial fisherman or angler will notify DFG so we can get some accurate stats of what is happening to our fish.”

Hubacker says, “One year we had a large group of adult Chinook Salmon come up Adobe Creek. This species is usually found in the main branches of the Petaluma River. On two separate occasions a Chum Salmon has been captured by the students.”

National Marine Fisheries was so impressed that they also said they would like Casa Grande to switch from raising fall run Chinook salmon to helping the Dry Creek Hatchery in Sonoma County, which is run by US Army Corps of Engineers, restore the Russian River steelhead run. Casa Grande High currently is raising 20,000 Russian River Steelhead trout in collaboration with the CA Department of Fish and Wildlife.

Do your kids really want to go school? There is intense competition to join the United Anglers elective class. To qualify, applicants must ace a written test and demonstrate an abundant concern for the environment. If they get accepted there definitely are payoffs.

Recently the University of California College System has approved Casa Grande High classes running the hatchery as being qualified to count for college admission credit. This is the only school program in California of its kind. According to Hubacker,

“A UC approved course means that the curriculum has been reviewed by the UC system and determined that this prepares students for entry level college lab sciences. In order for a student to be eligible for going to any State or UC they have to complete a minimum of 2 years if not 3 years of a lab science. Students would typically have the option of Biology, Physics and Chemistry or an Advance Placement course. With this advancement the hatchery classes become a class and our enrollment has doubled.”

And, if kids don’t want to go directly to college, the two-year hands-on program Casa Grande offers is also considered a Career Tech. Ed. class where on graduation kids are ready to go and work for hatcheries and as research assistants.

Nation-wide, there are growing number of schools who raise fish in classrooms and release them into the wild. Michigan’s Salmon In The Classroom has 35 participating schools — http://www.michigan.gov/dnr/0,1607,7-153-10369_50075—,00.html Atlantic Salmon in East Coast Schools has over 100 schools involved — http://www.fws.gov/northeast/atlanticsalmon/salmonschools.html And a number of schools in Canada who are raising and releasing salmon. http://asf.ca/main.html Similar classroom fish hatchery programs in other states include tilapia, perch, trout and paddlefish. The Casa Grande program sets the bar for what is possible.

The annual cost to run the Case Grade program was about $50,000 a year, but that has more than doubled to $130,000 due to new assignments. The prime sponsor is the annual USCG Pasta Feed, which has become the largest fundraiser in Petaluma, but donations are always welcome.

If you are interested in a tour or would like to receive more information regarding the United Anglers of Casa Grande High School, please call or write: United Anglers of Casa Grande High School, 333 Casa Grande Road, Petaluma, CA 94954. (707) 778-4703 (707) 778-4703, www.uacg.org.