June 2004
Sound Bites
Bite-Sized Bits of News From Around Puget Sound
Compiled by Sally Hewitt
Killer Whales Shout Over Din of Orca-Watching Craft
Beneath the calm, sheltered waters around Washingtons San Juan Islands, local killer whales are trying to adapt to a new challenge: the overwhelming rumble of engine noise from a growing fleet of whale-watching boats. Researchers studying the whales have discovered an abrupt and widespread change in the length of the animals primary calls. It is the whale equivalent of shouting and repeating words to penetrate roaring background noise. (04/29/04), Oregonian. From Tidepool.org.
Salmon Pesticide Ruling Baffles Nurseries, Retail Stores
Homeowners who use chemicals in their battle against weeds, tent caterpillars and other pests might still be in the dark about a federal lawsuit designed to protect salmon. It wasnt supposed to be this way, given that a federal judge asked for warning notices in many Puget Sound nurseries and retail stores. In many cases, the word about seven specific pesticides is not getting to the retail shelves, although there is some debate about whose fault that is. The lawsuit by a coalition of environmental groups prompted a court order calling for 60-foot no- pesticide buffers for streams that contain threatened or endangered salmon, including portions of West Sound. (05/06/04), Bremerton Sun. From Tidepool.org.
Northwest Called Ideal for Green Power Push
With a concentration of technical know-how, entrepreneurial spark and abundant natural resourcesincluding wind, water, sun and cow manurethe Pacific Northwest stands perfectly positioned to ride the wave of a coming clean-energy revolution. That was the message delivered recently to labor activists, environmentalists, business people and others determined to launch a renewable-energy campaign with an intensity rivaling that of the Apollo space program, which put astronauts on the moon. The 10-year, $300 billion program would use tax credits, energy standards and other tools to drive increased research into energy-conserving technology and alternative energy sources. The goal: serving 15 percent of the nations energy needs by 2015 and 20 percent by 2020. It would simultaneously reduce the output of gases thought to unnaturally warm the Earths atmosphere. (04/14/04), Seattle P-I. From Tidepool.org.
Scientists Predict Gloomy Future for Coastal Marbled Murrelets
Leading scientists say the marbled murrelet, a seabird nesting in coastal forests, is sliding toward extinction in the Northwest, dealing a setback to a timber industry anxious to strip it of federal protections that block logging. The researchers project the elusive species will disappear in the next century from Oregon, California and Washington, except Puget Sound, where a mere 45 birds might remain. But timber groups quickly questioned the conclusions and the objectivity of scientists behind them. The stark findings are contained in a March report commissioned by the Bush administration after timber interests demanded a review of the murrelets threatened status under the Endangered Species Act. (05/05/04), Oregonian. From Tidepool.org.
Timber Giants Future Unsure
While Crown Pacific Partners LLC executives think at least one of its divisions will survive under the company name, other industry executives are not so certain. Timber prices and market demand may have bounced back, but they wont survive the bankruptcy as Crown Pacific per se, predicted Paul Ehinger, an independent forest products consultant in Eugene. They wont have anything left. The bankrupt wood products company last Wednesday reported a $171 million net loss in 2003, which reflected a revaluation of its remaining assets and paydown of $503 million in debt. Crown Pacific is down to its last remaining assets: its timberland, lumberyards and mills in Oregon and Washington. (04/28/04), Portland Tribune. From Tidepool.org.
Northwest Experts Praise, Fear Ocean Report
A presidential commissions proposal to finance ocean protection from oil and gas drilling drew concerns in the Northwest, where offshore drilling is not currently allowed. The report from the U.S. Commission on Ocean Policy, released recently in Washington, D.C., also drew praise from scientists and environmentalists for its focus on ecosystem-based management that incorporates every aspect of ocean healthfrom inland estuaries to marine fisherieswhile acknowledging that peoples needs must also be met. (04/22/04), Longview Daily News. From Tidepool.org.
Pretty Invader Almost Impossible to Kill
The bullies that swagger along the shoulders of Western Washingtons highways look innocent as any herald of spring, cloaked in bright yellow, pea-like flowers. But Scotch brooms seasonal masquerade belies its year-round mischief. Scotch broomsome call it scots broomis one of Washingtons most destructive weeds, an aggressive outsider (native to Europe) that dominates its sunny surroundings. So much of Western Washington is now overrun with broom that the states noxious weed control board only requires landowners east of the Cascade Mountains to control it. The evergreen shrub is notorious for crowding out fragile South Sound prairie flowers and grasses, habitat for rare butterflies and birds. (05/11/04), Tacoma News Tribune. From Tidepool.org.
Office Landlord Offers Perks for Commuters
During hardball lease negotiations, office-building managers usually offer prospective tenants money for new carpets, paint, wiring and the like. Now tenants in Equity Office Properties 54 Seattle-area buildings can elect to use part of that allowance on something new: subsidized transit passes for their employees. Equity, the regions largest office landlord, and King County unveiled the initiative in May. King County Executive Ron Sims hailed it as a small but important step in a campaign to get people to stop driving to work alone. (05/11/04), Seattle Times. From Tidepool.org.
Saving Lives of Elk and Deer
When elk amble across Highway 101 on the Olympic Peninsula of western Washington, radio collars around their necks set off flashing lights up and down the busy road. A continent away, when moose wander across Route 4 in the mountains of western Maine, their hulking bodies break an infrared beam that triggers flashing lights on moose warning signs. On reengineered highways between the wireless elk and the beam-breaking moose, there are underpasses for tortoises in California, vibration-detectors for deer in Wyoming and a 52-foot-wide overpass for deer, foxes, coyotes and opossums on Interstate 75 in Florida. At an accelerating pace, federal and state highways across much of the United States are being tricked out with critter-crossing technology, high and low. (05/03/04), Washington Post. From Tidepool.org.
Fish-Farm Firm Accused of Violating Law
A Redmond company whose owner was once sentenced to prison for illegally selling chemicals has been accused of more than 300 new violations of pesticide-handling laws. The EPA is seeking up to $1.7 million in civil fines against Redmonds Argent Chemical Laboratories, which manufactures and sells products for fish-farming operations around the world. In one of the largest cases of its kind, the EPA says that between 1999 and this year, the company made hundreds of sales of unregistered chemicals for use in rivers and streams, sold chemicals without proper warning labels and sold particularly hazardous chemicals to people not legally trained to use them. (05/07/04), Seattle Times. From Tidepool.org. §