The Center for Biological Diversity and the Audubon Society of Portland filed a formal notice this week of their intent to sue the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service to better protect the streaked horned lark, a rare bird found in Washington and Oregon.
In response to a lawsuit by the Center for Biological Diversity, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service agreed this week to a deadline of December 2024 to determine whether Suckley’s cuckoo bumblebees warrant protection under the Endangered Species Act.
Struggling salmon populations could get some help from the sky. A Washington State University study showed that drone photography of the Wenatchee River during spawning season can be effective in estimating the number of rocky hollows salmon create to lay their eggs, also called “redds.”
Gray whales that migrate along the West Coast of North America continued to decline in number over the last two years, according to a new NOAA Fisheries assessment. The population is now down 38 percent from its peak in 2015 and 2016, as researchers probe the underlying reasons.
The Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife is asking for public feedback to inform the development of proposed fish passage and screening rules intended to support salmon and orca recovery.
U.S. Sen. Maria Cantwell (D-WA) joined U.S. Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg last week as he announced the availability of $1 billion for Tribal, state, and local governments over five years from the new National Culvert Removal, Replacement and Restoration-Culvert Aquatic Organism Passage Program established by the infrastructure bill.
NOAA Fisheries has finalized a report that identifies actions that the agency says have the greatest likelihood of making progress toward rebuilding populations of salmon and steelhead in the Columbia River basin to “healthy and harvestable levels.” The agency had released a draft in July for limited comments.
A small invasive beetle that has decimated ash groves in the Midwest was found in Oregon earlier this summer, the first to be found on the West Coast. When – not if – it spreads in Oregon, it has the potential to destroy large swaths of ash trees in forests and along streams located on the west side of the Cascade Mountains. The loss of the trees could impact salmon and steelhead in the Willamette Valley.
Among the first cases to be heard by the U.S. Supreme Court for the October 2022 term is Sackett v. EPA, No. 24-454 (2022). At stake is the definition of “waters of the United States” and the area of land that is subject to Clean Water Act wetlands protection or land available to be developed – an issue of enormous environmental and economic consequence.
If it funds a quarter-million-dollar study, the Washington state legislature could kick-start a long-awaited dam removal project that would free up some 348 miles of habitat for steelhead and salmon in northeastern Washington and British Columbia.
NOAA Fisheries is nearing a deadline in determining whether it should consider listing as threatened or endangered Olympic Peninsula summer and winter steelhead. All populations of steelhead on the peninsula have continued to decline since 2017 and run sizes have been so small that Washington closed fisheries on coastal rivers early this year, according to a recent petition to list the steelhead.
The U.S. Department of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Laboratory has provided hydropower operators with new data to better prepare for extreme weather events in the Pacific Northwest and shifts in seasonal energy demands caused by climate change.
In response to litigation from the Center for Biological Diversity and Idaho Conservation League, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers plans to revoke its permit for a marina and lakeside housing development at the mouth of Trestle Creek on Lake Pend Oreille due to impacts on bull trout listed under the Endangered Species Act. The creek accounts for more than half of the annual bull trout spawning sites in the Pend Oreille Basin.
The Washington State Salmon Recovery Funding Board this week announced the award of nearly $76 million in grants across the state to help ensure the survival of salmon in Washington.
A report published today by a team of scientists from a dozen organizations provides a product designed to boost efforts by land and wildlife managers to restore and conserve the imperiled sagebrush ecosystem across the full extent of its range, which covers more than 165 million acres.
Nearly three-dozen Pacific Northwest organizations have sent a letter to the State Department and other federal agencies urging the Biden Administration to better inform the region on efforts to overhaul the 1964 U.S.-Canada Columbia River Treaty, add “ecosystem function” as a treaty purpose, and include Columbia River basin Tribes in treaty governance. The letter also expresses concerns about potential “called-upon” river operations if the treaty is not modernized by 2024.
The megadrought in the Southwestern United States is the driest—and longest—in the last 1,200 years, depleting water reservoir levels to critically low levels over the past 22 years. This persistent drought has policymakers and system planners concerned about the reliability of the electric grid under worsening drought conditions and climbing temperatures.
Plastics, now ubiquitous in the modern world, have become a rising threat to human and environmental health. Around the planet, evidence of plastic pollution stretches from grocery bags in the deep sea to microplastics in our food supplies and even in our blood.
Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife researchers wrapped up a project this summer that could have important implications for how fishery managers design future coastal steelhead fisheries and prioritize habitat restoration projects.
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency last week approved Oregon’s water quality report on temperature in the state’s waters. Also last week, a Washington federal court ordered the EPA to set in motion an update on that state’s water quality criteria for 17 toxins known to harm salmon and steelhead, as well as Southern Resident killer whales that depend on them.
A new acoustic receiver developed by researchers at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory sends near-real-time fish tracking data to the digital cloud, providing timely information to dam operators and decision-makers about when, where, and how many fish are expected to pass through dams.
The Portland City Council voted unanimously Wednesday to approve an ordinance prohibiting new or expanded fossil fuel terminals in Portland, Oregon. The move comes after a report earlier this year from Multnomah County and the City of Portland documented risks posed by existing fossil fuel terminals and found that the expected Cascadia Earthquake could cause 397 storage tanks to spill oil and other petroleum chemicals.
The Bureau of Reclamation and U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service are partnering to protect winter-run Chinook salmon in a crucial year of their life cycle at the Livingston Stone National Fish Hatchery at Shasta Lake during the third consecutive drought year in California.
The Owyhee River, a Columbia River basin tributary with headwaters in Nevada, where until 1928 salmon returned, is about to get attention from the Army Corps of Engineers, Walla Walla District. The Corps, along with the Shoshone-Paiute Tribe, is developing a plan to restore aquatic and riparian habitats on a section of the remote desert river.
Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack this week announced a strategy for how the Biden Administration will address a reforestation backlog of four million acres on national forests and plant more than one billion trees over the next decade.
An Earthwise Knowledge Initiative Publication
