The Environmentalists' Paradox

This column was published in the Cranbrook Daily Townsman Tuesday September 21, 2010.

A long standing environmentalist tenet holds that humans are living beyond our global means. It states resource depletion and ecosystem degradation will, sooner or later, bring about our ultimate demise. There is no lack of data available to support evidence of ecosystem decline. Be it salination or drying of water bodies such as the Aral Sea, collapse of fisheries (think Atlantic cod), musings on peak oil or deforestation, many argue that we’re destroying our home and native planet.

Yet rumours of our imminent demise are greatly exaggerated. Recent measures suggest the average human condition has not only avoided decline in the face of such ecological troubles but is actually improving. Estimates of a Human Development Index (HDI) based on life expectancy, literacy, education and gross domestic product indicate that the average human condition in every major region of the world has increased over the past thirty years.

Estimated "Human Development Index" as calculated by United Nations Development Programme in 2006. Source: Raudsepp-Hearne et al. 2010.

A paper (abstract available here) in the September issue of BioScience terms this “the environmentalist’s paradox.” The authors, scientists at Montréal’s McGill University led by Ciara Raudsepp-Hearne, ask “How is it that human well-being continues to improve as ecosystem services decline?” They offer four hypotheses to explain the paradox:

The four hypotheses are:
1. Critical dimensions of human well-being have not been captured adequately, and human well-being is actually declining.

2. Provisioning ecosystem services, such as food production, are most significant for human well-being; therefore, if food production per capita increases, human well-being will also increase, regardless of declines in other services.

3. Technology and social innovation have decoupled human well-being from the state of ecosystems to the extent that human well-being is now less dependent on ecosystem services.

4. There is a time lag after ecosystem service degradation before human well-being is negatively affected. Loss of human well-being caused by current declines in services has therefore not yet occurred to a measurable extent.

The authors cite sufficient data to reject the first hypothesis, stating “Most well being indicators… [show] that human well-being is, on average, growing.” Agree with it or not, global human condition is better. Turns out the “good ‘ol days” weren’t so good. No doubt some human populations are worse off, but the authors examined whether data lumping might mask key declines. Not so: the HDI is increasing across the board.

The second hypothesis is generally supported. Our ability to produce food currently outweighs declines in other services provided by ecosystems, such as water quality and quantity and forest cover. Again, measurements are at the global scale so localized impacts that directly affect human well-being should be considered. Examples include losses coral reefs that support fisheries and wetlands that provide flood protection.

For the third hypothesis, the authors conclude there is not enough evidence to suggest a de-coupling of humans from nature. Rather than replacing ecosystem services, technology has tended to extend them. We’re still dependent on natural products from ecosystems but more generally efficient in their use.

But our prospects are not propitious, for technology and resources both have limits. One report estimated that 40% of all protein in human diets depends on nitrogen fertilizer produced from fossil fuels. We are largely living off the capital of millions of years of biological accumulation on Earth.

The fourth hypothesis is perhaps the most intriguing. Are we experiencing a lag between ecosystem degradation and its potential to affect human well-being? Can we expect a visit from the “ghost of collapse-yet-to-come”? Here, the authors waffle. Theory strongly supports the existence of a lag, but they could find little actual evidence. Instead, they caution that “changes present new challenges to humanity” but admit actually measuring this is crazy difficult.

They conclude that we are having “an unprecedented effect on the biosphere,” but only “weak evidence” suggests that such impacts are “reducing aggregate human well-being at the global scale.” The paradox stands for now, but the authors don’t seem convinced that it will hold up long-term.

Stink Bugs: An Autumn Ritual

This column was published in the Cranbrook Daily Townsman, Thursday October 21, 2010. 
 
Autumn. Time for one of those Kootenay traditions that celebrates warm afternoons and cool nights. That’s right, it’s the season again to patrol the outside of the house and flick stink bugs off the deck, chairs, door, walls and apparently every other possible surface. Those that find their way indoors need to be gently evicted. Careful moving them, they’ve got a loaded rear end to make any warthog or skunk jealous.

For good fun, watch the dog catch one, get a mouthful of the bug’s foul discharge then try to clean it out. A smart pet will only do that once. One of our own spring rituals is to open the deck box that holds our outside chair cushions and shake out the dead stink bugs that have lain entombed and frozen throughout the winter. Deck boxes make a poor hibernation choice for insects.

Stink bugs are more properly called Western Conifer Seed bugs (Leptoglossus occidentalis) and are native to the western United States but have been increasing their range through the last century. They are now found throughout eastern North America as well as accidental introductions into Europe (and probably elsewhere), hitching rides on Christmas trees and other forest products.

They move through a single life cycle each year, overwintering as adults before emerging in the spring to feed on developing seeds in green cones. Females then lay neat rows of eggs on conifer needles as their final act. The eggs hatch and successive larval stages continue to feed on the cones and needles of the trees until the adult stage is reached by late August.

And then the fun begins anew. South and west-facing walls and homes make welcoming places to adult stink bugs looking to keep warm. As the nights cool, the bugs will push farther in their search for warmth. No crack or opening seems to narrow for them to fit through. Their body seems almost two-dimensionally thin and they are able to squeeze through any seal not quite air-tight. Think of them as friendly reminders to check your door and window seals.

There is no need for alarm if they are found inside. They do not bite, for their mouth parts are adapted to sucking tree sap from cones, not biting or chewing. Their only downside, apart from those squeamish about insects in the home, is the foul odour they emit if disturbed. Thus the ‘stink bug’ moniker, one well earned. Crushing them is not advised, even picking them up can result in an unfortunate olfactory experience. Encourage them to move onto a piece of paper, then release them back outside.

The insects are entirely harmless, unless you’re running a tree nursery and trying to gather seeds from conifer trees. They can cause significant losses in seed production by adult trees by feeding on developing cones and occasionally killing the tree itself.

How they find these cones was described by Simon Fraser University biologist Stephen Takács. His team found that growing conifer cones are much warmer than the surrounding vegetation, up to 15º C! (see paper here.) To infrared sensors, a conifer with growing cones appears like a Christmas tree, with each cone brightly “lit” relative to the adjacent greenery.  

Turns out, stink bugs have highly sensitive infrared sensors in their abdomens, directly connected to their brain. When biologists blocked these sensors, seed bugs could no longer find the trees. This attraction to high intensity infrared radiation also explains why the bugs are so drawn to warm, sunlit walls during the autumn.

Ultimately, all the bugs are doing is looking for a place to spend the winter where they won’t freeze to death. As the weather cools and winter looks to set in, that’s something we can all relate to.

Conifer tree under visual and infrared light showing warmer temperature of cones

Appreciating the Urban Wild

This column was published in the Cranbrook Daily Townsman Tuesday October 12, 2010.

Confessing to being a Toronto native to those beyond the 416 area code can be dangerous. Admitting you’re from the city the rest of the country loves to hate, with its smug self-importance, can still elicit reactions from surprise to disdain.

But as time increases from my Toronto address, I’m comfortable enough to go public: I am proud to be a Toronto native. In one of those rites of aging, I recently returned to the big city for my 25th high school reunion.

I had not previously thought of myself as the high school reunion type. I wasn’t exactly the school social coordinator. Most of my youth was spent trying to escape the city in search of a more rural, if not outright backwoods, existence. Summer jobs took me to bush camps across northern Ontario from Algonquin Park to Lake Abitibi, Moosonee and beyond.

So returning to Toronto to reconnect with a few friends and classmates long since forgotten was not something I would have predicted even ten years ago, let alone when I finished high school.

One product of my youthful dreams of a northern idyll was the belief that the only natural world worth experiencing was true wilderness. What exactly constitutes “wilderness” is debatable, but most conclude that it involves a lack of immediate human presence. More strident definitions also require an ‘untouched’ quality where one might indulge the illusion that few, if any, humans have previously visited.

For me, wilderness lay at least two portages removed from overcrowded canoe routes or well off the main hiking trail. Certainly, wilderness wasn’t to be found in suburban Toronto or any other city. But closing one’s eyes to natural areas within urban cities is to miss many wonderful places.

While in Toronto, I found myself with an hour’s wait at my nephew’s high school in the city’s west end. A large old brick school that his grandfather attended set in a typical Toronto neighbourhood of narrow lots on streets lined with mature hardwood trees.

I happened across the “Hillside Nature Garden” at the adjacent Runnymede Public School. Students restored a narrow slope around the school with native trees, shrubs and wildflowers. A trail runs through the strip of natural cover, maybe fifty metres wide at best.


 

Hillside Garden Project (outlined in red) at Runnymede
Public School, Toronto. Ursula Franklin Academy & Western
Tech High Schools are in upper right corner. from Google Earth



Hardly wilderness by anyone’s definition, it likely supports little more than a few bird nests, the odd raccoon and a few voles. But here, sumac, sycamore and sassafras trees provide shade and cover to a piece of ground that otherwise be mowed lawn, a weed source or a cement retaining wall littered with lunch wrappers and unfinished homework.

More importantly, it provides a wonderful natural classroom to the school’s young students. To many, that small patch of green likely serves as an introduction of the world beyond concrete and computers.

Statistics Canada state that 80% of Canada’s population lives in an urbanized centre of more than 1000 people. By that measure, Sparwood, BC, (population of roughly 4000) is as urbanized as Toronto. But nonetheless, the measurement indicates the degree to which our population lives in developed centres. Urban-rural splits are becoming major political wedges (witness the recent longun registry ballyhoo) with the main complaint of the rural and small community dwellers being that urban folk don’t understand the non-synthetic world beyond city limits.

Natural areas, even small ones like the Hillside Nature Garden can serve as an introduction to city children who may not otherwise have an opportunity experience nature first hand. Through planting and caring for native species rather than nursery-bred exotics, hopefully a better appreciation for our natural world may also be sown and fostered.

Even in smaller urban centres like Cranbrook, with true wilderness at our doorstep, many children have no introduction to the natural world. School programs like Wild Voices for Kids and trips to the Blue Lake Centre should be required curriculum components. The objective isn’t to turn everyone into a wilderness loving environmentalist, but broaden overall experience and appreciation of our world.

Trouble for the Food Supply

This column was published in the Cranbrook Daily Townsman Tuesday September 21, 2010.



So how did your garden do this year? Generally cool temperatures have kept many tomatoes green and not helped many crops, especially berries. On the other hand, cool and regular showers has our lettuce still going strong when it is normally virtually toasted by early August. We’re enjoying a second go-round of peas and were enjoying a bumper crop of beans until the frosts of early September took them out.

But more than just good weather and careful tending is required to pull off a successful garden. Many crops, wildflowers and other plants are reliant on insects for pollination in order to successfully bear fruit and viable seeds. Bees provide the vast majority of these pollination services to agriculture and natural ecosystems. Honey bees can increase yield in 96% of animal-pollinated crops and insect pollination in general (mostly bees) is necessary for 75% of human crops worldwide. If you like berries, coffee, nuts and other foods, you want bees.

But recent declines in bee populations around the world raises significant concern for the future for both agricultural productivity and wild plant communities. The majority of agricultural and apicultural (bee keeping) scientists now agree that significant declines have occurred in honey bees world wide. Some estimates suggest a 59% loss of honey bee colonies in the USA between 1947 and 2005.

And domestic bee populations decline, what is going on in wild bee populations are also thought be suffering widespread losses. Recent work in Illinois found half the bumblebee species there were either extirpated (no longer existing in certain areas, but present elsewhere) or had suffered declines. The trouble is we don’t know much about wild bees. To document a decline you need both current population estimates and from some time in the past. We just don’t have much of that data. Where the data are available, the news is not good.

A recent review of pollinator declines, published in the journal Trends in Ecology and Evolution, reports on evidence of the decline and what is driving it. Habitat loss is indicted as a key driver of wild bee declines. As natural ecosystems are urbanized or otherwise altered, most native bees suffer along with other wildlife species. Hand-in-hand with bee declines are losses of plant diversity. In some cases this becomes a chicken-and-egg scenario. Many plants rely on bees for pollination and reproduction and vice-versa. If one is removed from the ecosystem the other also fails. Trying to figure out which declined first is difficult and not always

Electron micrograph of Varroa destructor mite on a honey bee

Intensified agricultural activity is another driver. Insecticides in particular kill bees directly, while herbicides and fertilizers are implicated as reducing food availability to bees and other pollinators.

One cause of bee declines that has received media coverage is the introduction of a parasitic mite from Asia. The Varroa mites latch on to bees and feeds on the insect’s hemolymph (essentially insect blood). Further weakening the bee are various viruses transmitted by the mite so that entire bee colonies can be wiped out. Some estimates suggest that all feral honey bee colonies in the Europe and the United States have disappeared as a result of Varroa mites.

Varroa mites on honey bee pupae.

Climate change may also impact bees. Mismatches in bee emergence and plant flowering can result in reduced productivity for both bee and plant. All these drivers may act independently or in an additive effect that combine to drive local declines farther and faster. The consequences for agricultural and food production are significant, though they can rent travelling honey bee colonies at the time when pollinated is needed most.

Most home gardeners can’t justify that level of cost. Worrying about late and early frosts is enough of a challenge. Adding in doubts about whether your garden will be pollinated is just one more uncertainty.  

Wildlife Migration and the Green-Up

This column was published in the Cranbrook Daily Townsman Tuesday September 14, 2010.


Last week, I wrote about the trade-off that elk and other ungulates make between predation and forage. Many animals are forced to make decisions between accessing high quality food and exposing themselves to higher predation risk. Ungulate species around the world have evolved migration as a strategy to lower predation risk and access higher quality forage.

The issue of non-migratory or resident elk living year-round in the valley-bottom Trench has vexed wildlife managers and ranchers alike. The number of elk migrating to the high country each summer has declined significantly. As efforts continue to encourage elk to resume their seasonal wanderings, new challenges may arise in this effort.

Migratory ungulates in the Rockies follow a spring wave of green-up into the mountains, feeding on nutritious and highly digestible emergent vegetation. But constraints on food availability may hinder elk in the high country compared to their non-migratory cousins who stay put in the Trench. It all ties into plant growth.

Dr. Mark Hebblewhite at the University of Montana notes recent research that suggests changes in historical vegetation growth patterns may further disadvantage migrating elk. He notes that “climate change might potentially lead to reduced benefits for migration” (emphasis his).

If plants grow too quickly, forage quality is reduced. Slow-growing, cool springs keeps grasses lush, digestible and highly nutritious. Conversely, short, rapid-warming springs quickly dry out vegetation with a loss of nutritional value. Research on bighorn sheep and mountain goats in Alberta has shown that compressed green-up can directly reduce lamb and kid survival. It’s not a long stretch to other species using similar habitats and diets: elk and mule deer.

Evidence suggests changes are occurring in high elevation vegetative growth patterns. Global land plant growth increased 6% between 1982 and 1999, with the increase accredited to higher temperature, more rain and solar radiation; all key ingredients to plant growth. When University of Montana scientists Maosheng Zhao and Steve Running set out to update the research, they were astonished to find the same global terrestrial plant growth rate declined, albeit slightly at 1%, between 2000 and 2009. Their research, published in Science last month, found that drought has outpaced temperature increases, particularly in the southern hemisphere, and led to net declines in plant growth in many areas of the world. Elsewhere, including most northern latitude forests such as Canada, net plant growth is still increasing. But the work issues a warning that climate change can cause unexpected and rapid shifts in ecological systems.

A third issue is termed the “trophic mismatch hypothesis,” first described by Penn State’s Eric Post and colleagues for caribou in Greenland. There, changes in green-up time are creating a mismatch between calving times and food availability. In a harsh arctic or high elevation ecosystems where food is often scarce outside a short growing season, timing of birth is very important.

Some estimates place the energetic costs of lactation at some 200% more expensive to mothers than pregnancy. So having an abundant, nutritious food source while young are nursing is essential. Even slight shifts in forage availability is enough to lower calf survival. Whether the same phenomenon is occurring in alpine ecosystems is unknown. It’s a question Dr. Hebblewhite would like to test in the Rocky Mountains.

Timing of ungulate migration is a complex adaptation to various clues. Their ability to respond to change lags well behind plant growth responding to seasonal climate shifts. If changes are indeed occurring in high elevation montane forests, migrating local ungulates will be at a significant disadvantage compared to resident elk feeding on irrigated alfalfa fields in the Trench. Encouraging elk to vacate that food supply and resume traditional migrations from valley bottom to the high country faces its own uphill battle.

To eat or Be Eaten

This column was published in the Cranbrook Daily Townsman Tuesday September 7, 2010.

It’s that time of year again: men wear camo, wives are lonely and elk are nervous. Yes, elk season is open, this year with a twist. Anterless elk are in the sights in some parts of the Trench, a move to try to reduce their numbers in agricultural areas and convince them to hike for the high country come spring.

Ungulate migration has long been viewed as an evolutionary strategy to avoid predators and access good forage. For most animals, life is a trade-off: eat or be eaten. You can hide as long as you want, but eventually you’ll get hungry enough to venture out to that really tasty patch of grass. Biologists have tried to answer the question “when does predation risk outweigh foraging opportunities?” to identify a trigger point for migration. The answer isn’t easy.

Mark Hebblewhite is a Canadian biologist at the University of Montana who studiesthe movement of ungulates, especially elk in the Rocky Mountains. Recent work looked for differences between overlapping migratory and non-migratory elk populations in Banff National Park and the adjacent Ya Ha Tinda winter range.

In this system, wolves (elk’s main predator) are more numerous at low elevation, so the urge to migrate was driven by an understandable desire to avoid being eaten (especially strong for soon-to-be-moms). This strategy was effective: migration lowered predation risk by 70% compared to elk who chose to stay in the valley bottom. Freed from the threat of wolf predation, migratory elk’s movement decisions were based on finding quality feed. They were successful at that too, averaging 6% better forage than their non-migratory cousins. Better food was available to resident elk, but the high predation risk kept them from accessing it.

The question then is why would any elk in the Bow Valley choose not to migrate? Why stay and run a wolf gauntlet to access poorer food? Dr. Hebblewhite and his colleagues found that human activity “effectively decouples” the forage – predation risk trade-off. By selecting areas of high human activity where wolves fear to tread, resident elk lower their predation risk from 70% to 15% higher than migratory elk. The food around human activity may not be the best, but that’s more than compensated by volume: there’s lots of it.

Are there applications for this research to the resident vs migratory elk issue here in the East Kootenay? The Banff-Ya Ha Tinda situation is different. Here, elk predators (especially wolves) are in greater numbers at higher elevations. Lower predation rates in the Trench has likely helped drive the shift over the past 20 to 30 years into separate migratory and resident or homesteader elk populations, with the latter stubbornly refusing to leave the Trench in the summer.

Add in wide swaths of tasty alfalfa forage and one wonders why any elk would leave the Trench come spring. With elk now fenced out from many of those hay fields, if the predation risk side of the equation can be shifted to again favour the high country, perhaps elk will return to their migrations.

That predation is not likely to come from four-legged animals, unless we Trench-dwelling humans suddenly decide to co-exist with wolves and other predators. Increased hunting pressure is hoped to be a predation surrogate to help encourage elk to leave. This is part of the decision by the BC government to open an anterless elk season in the Trench. The hunt is based on sound science like Dr. Hebblewhite’s that increased predation risk may convince elk that the Trench is not such a safe place after all.

A life in nature: Ian McTaggart-Cowan.

This column was published in the Cranbrook Daily Townsman Wednesday September 1, 2010.

There was a quiet passing earlier this year that marked the end of a era in Canadian and British Columbia ecology. Dr. Ian McTaggart-Cowan died April 18, 2010, just a few months shy of his 100th birthday. There has been no greater contribution to our knowledge of nature in British Columbia than Dr. McTaggart-Cowan.

His parents emigrated to North Vancouver from Scotland with him as three-year old. Rod Silver, former head of the provincial Habitat Conservation Trust Fund, has written a thorough biography of Ian McTaggart-Cowan recounting his youth spent in the Lower Mainland of the teens and twenties, exploring the forests and haunts of what was a much wilder place. 
 
There is a link to Dr. McTaggart-Cowan in almost everything we know today about birds and mammals in British Columbia. His list of accomplishments could well be unmatched in Canada: some 300 publications, definitive books on BC mammals and birds, approximately 100 graduate students (and influence on countless others who studied at UBC and elsewhere), including scientists who themselves went on to become internationally recognized experts in their field: Val Geist, Maurice Hornocker and C.S. (Buzz) Holling. Through his own work and those on whom he had direct influence, there are few areas in wildlife science today that cannot be traced directly back to Ian McTaggart-Cowan.

His awards are equally impressive: Officer of the Order of Canada, Officer of the Order of British Columbia, Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada, Leopold Medal of The Wildlife Society (the highest honour bestowed by the major international society for wildlife biologists) and others. For years, he was the honourary president of the Federation of BC Naturalists in recognition of his passion for and commitment to natural environment of this province.

The University of British Columbia was to become his second home. An undergraduate degree in 1932, followed by a brief sojourn abroad to complete his PhD at Berkley before returning home to Vancouver. His tenure took him from Professor to Department Head to Dean of Graduate Studies for the entire University.

As television emerged as a new medium in the 1950’s Ian McTaggart-Cowan was one of the first to embrace it as a means of public education. His CBC series, Fur and Feathers sought to introduce children to the wonders of nature and was followed by other television series, The Living Sea and The Web of Life.

I never had the honour of meeting Dr. McTaggart-Cowan. But I certainly knew of him. You can’t be a wildlife biologist in Canada without knowing. I recall the first time I came across one of his scientific papers as a young undergrad, deep in the depths of the University of Guelph library, far removed from the rainy west coast. I can’t remember what the paper was on, but the hyphenated name (as well as our common first name) struck me. I then soon found that for almost any topic I researched, be it bears, birds or mice, papers by the same McTaggart-Cowan would be discovered. He was the only Canadian to be so widely encountered.

There are few among us who can not only lead by example, but also inspire and raise others to levels not attainable on our own. The legacy of Ian McTaggart-Cowan, the museum collections named for him, the scholarships in his honour and numerous other awards speak of the unmatched contribution and selfless commitment of one man’s life to help us better understand the natural world, and British Columbia in particular.

Celebrating Kootenay Biodiversity

This column was published in the Cranbrook Daily Townsman Tuesday August 17, 2010.


Biodiversity is one of the more popular terms bandied about in support of conservation. It is generally seen as something that is good, often threatened and critical to be protected. However it is one of the more complex aspects of ecology. At its very basic, biodiversity is analogous to the number of species present within an area. But that can be very misleading. The abundance of each of those species is also key.

There’s more. Within a species, the genetic diversity is important. Maintaining a gene pool deep enough to adapt to changing environments is critical. At a much larger scale, maintaining a diverse landscape is also key. Diversity at this level ensures different habitats are available, which generally means more species, but is also a way of hedging against environmental loss. Just as a diverse financial portfolio is important to avoid fiscal ruin, so is a diverse environment necessary to fend off broadscale catastrophe.

In recognition of the importance of biodiversity, the United Nations has declared 2010 as International Year of Biodiversity. Let’s celebrate with a short list of unheralded East Kootenay species, numbered in no particular order, that usually go unnoticed. These are species that either occur nowhere else in the world, or within Canada, or are otherwise exceptional.

1. Trilobites: Ancient crustaceans, trilobites are among the most commonly fossilized animals in the world. And the Rocky Mountains of the East Kootenays are a wealth of fossils dating from the Cambrian period which centred on 500 million years ago. Numerous sites around Cranbrook are well known by fossil hounds, especially the Lower Cambrian Eager Formation near Fort Steele . Samples from these sites have made significant contributions to our knowledge of that part of the earth’s history.

2. Rocky Mountain Tailed Frog. In Canada, these unique small frogs are found in only two drainages, both in the East Kootenays. No pond lover, this unique amphibian prefers undisturbed, clear-running montane streams. Only males have a tail, which is actually a copulatory organ. Initially thought a subspecies of the more abundant coastal tailed frog, genetic work in 1990s demonstrated it to be a unique species. 

3. Pygmy Slug. This sometimes brilliant blue small gastropod was first discovered in 2003. It’s scientific name, Kootenaia burkei celebrates its local origins from the Kootenay River region of Idaho panhandle, NW Montana and the Moyie River area north of the border. Barely a centimetre long, they’re found in wet forest floors in leaf litter.

4. Elk River Cottonwoods: along the banks of the Elk River near Morrissey, 400 year old black cottonwood trees provide abundant shade and structure to a host of other plants and animals. Some of the largest, oldest cottonwoods in the world, these trees were already 200 years old when David Thompson first passed through the Kootenays. A new trail established by the Nature Conservancy of Canada just across the Morrissey bridge offers a wonderful chance to witness these marvels.

Mottled Sculpin

5. Rocky Mountain Sculpin: Sculpins have stymied fish biologists for a long time. Sorting out separate species has thwarted many, and the Rocky Mountain Sculpin is no different. This is small, sedentary fish is found in only a few locations within the Flathead River drainage. So confusing, scientists have yet to figure out exactly which species it is, referring to instead as a generic Cottus sp. They know it is different from other sculpins in the area, but not quite sure yet just how different.

6. Southern Maidenhair Fern: Another mystery. In Canada, this fern grows in just one location: Fairmont Hot Springs. Some 1000 km north of the species’ range limit across the southern US, it is found nowhere else in this country. The fern grows delicate green fronds more like a buttercup leaf than a typical fern. It requires the constant humid warmth of the hot springs and the limestone substrate on which it grows.

There is much more to the vaunted Kootenay wildlife than elk, deer and bears. Habitats range from inland forests of cedar and devil’s club to semi-arid grasslands; from valley bottom wetlands to alpine heather. This close proximity of so many different ecosystems can’t help but support a broad diversity of life.

Reflections on Solar Panels

An earlier version of the following was published in the Cranbrook Daily Townsman, Wednesday June 2, 2010. 

Renewable energy sources have been touted as essential alternatives if we are to wean our power-hungry society from petroleum based sources. However, these sources are not always as ‘green’ as they initially seem, often coming with unforeseen side-effects.

Wind energy has tremendous opportunity, but people next to wind farms report they are not ideal neighbours. Initial concerns over the effects of rotor blades on migrating birds may not be as severe as feared, but bats around wind farms in the Pincher Creek, Alberta area are highly susceptible to the microsite low pressure zones created by the wind mills and their lungs literally explode under certain conditions.

Ethanol was praised as a renewable gasoline saviour. Then someone did the math and found that six times more energy is required to grow the corn and process the ethanol than comes out the other end. A net cost to energy is not sustainable.

More recently, research out of Hungary, published in the journal Conservation Biology* raises concerns over solar panels emitting “polarized light pollution.”

The researchers examined the effects of solar panels on aquatic insects that are attracted to polarized light. These include mayflies, stoneflies and others that lay eggs in water where their larval stages develop. To the eternal glee of fly fishermen everywhere, the adults then emerge from the water, mate and lay their eggs back in the water to start the cycle anew.

The insects rely on smooth water to reflect polarized light as an indicator of suitable habitat to lay eggs. Previous work has shown that other surfaces reflecting horizontally polarized light, such as dry asphalt, dark coloured cars and even shiny black tombstones, are mistaken as suitable locations for insects to lay eggs.

This creates an “ecological trap,” a situation where novel (usually human-caused) environmental conditions lead an animal into situations that are counter-productive before evolution has a chance to catch up. Ecological traps are usually a behavioural phenomenon, where an individual makes a poor choice based on a long legacy of adaptation through natural selection. Nevertheless they can result in severe threats to animal populations.

The paper found that black surfaces of photovoltaic solar panels emit near total polarized light, much more polarized than water. This can lure aquatic insects to select these artificial surfaces over adjacent natural water bodies. The result is reproductive failure of eggs laid on artificial surfaces, death from exhaustion as the female tries to lay her eggs in “water” and increased risk of predation.”

However, the good news is that solutions can be found. Mortality in bats at the Pincher Creek wind farms has been reduced by up to 60% if the turbine blades are slowed to almost motionless during times of low wind. 

For the solar panels, the researches found that framing and partitioning the black solar panels with a white non-generating surface significantly reduced the attractiveness of the panels to insects.

Although gridding reduced the energy generation capacity of the solar panel in proportion to the amount of panel area lost, the benefits far outweigh the cost. A 1.8% reduction in generation capacity significantly reduced the attractiveness of the panel to susceptible insects 10 to 26 fold. The researchers noted, “the cost of effectively eliminating the attractive effect of polarized light pollution… amounts to a relatively small drop in performance of solar panels.”

Neither I nor the researchers are suggesting we scrap solar panels. Their potential remains vast. Further, not all solar panels need to be modified. Only where large solar farms are deployed in areas with limited water or where rare insects susceptible to "polarized light pollution" occur should precautions be likely necessary.

A better lesson is that keeping an open mind toward unintended consequences is important.

* A review of the paper in Conservation Biology was posted on Conservation Maven, May 5, 2o1o. Here.

Hey Ma, Pass the Jellyfish

The following was published in the Cranbrook Daily Townsman in the fall of 2009.

“I wish I was a jellyfish, floating on the sea
Riding on the currents sailing along so peacefully.” 
~ Bobs & Lolo

One of the most stunning natural history exhibitions I have ever seen was at the Monterey Bay Aquarium. Their jellyfish display featured a dark room with various sized aquaria back-lit such that their inhabitants glowed. Floating effortlessly, I could have sat entranced for hours watching, just going with the flow.

 According to recent work by marine biologists, we may have a lot more opportunity to ponder jellyfish. A review by four scientists published the June, 2009, issue of the scientific journal Trends in Ecology and Evolution cautions that “a more gelatinous future” is clearly in the offing unless we take steps now to change the way we treat and manage the oceans. Jellyfish outbreaks are being reported worldwide, often with disastrous effects.

Of course jellyfish are a natural part of ocean ecosystems. Fossil evidence suggests they were they dominated the Cambrian seas some 500 million years ago, long before other vertebrate and invertebrate life forms we know today had evolved. They remain important as food for not just other sea creatures, but humans as well. Many Asian cultures eat jellyfish – some 425,000 tonnes each year by some estimates.

More often, they are viewed as a nuisance at best and hazardous risk to human life at worst. The list of deleterious consequences is long: closed beaches, blockage of cooling intake pipes for coastal power generators, fouling fishing nets, killing farmed fish, reducing commercial fisheries. Most often, human interference with marine systems has led to great increases in jellyfish numbers around the world, and the potential consequences are not pleasant.

The causes of jellyfish increases are not surprising: overfishing, eutrophication, climate change and accidental introductions from ship ballasts. The largest problem seems to come from a reduction in small filter feeding fish populations. Two examples cited are the sardine fishery off the coast of Namibia and anchovies in the Black Sea. Both of these fish play key roles in suppressing local jellyfish numbers, largely by eating their larval stages. With the fish gone, the jellies quickly multiply and the adults assume the plankton-eating niche that the sardines and anchovies occupied. Jellyfish biology is such that a self-enhancing feedback system sets up leading to rapid increase in jellyfish numbers.

Increased runoff of fertilizers and sewage has also benefited jellies. Increased nitrogen and phosphorus is advantageous to phytoplankton (including red-tides). This comes at the cost of more silicon-based diatoms. Jellies prefer phytoplankton, while most fish, marine mammals, turtles and other species prefer diatoms. Jellyfish win again. Phytoplankton blooms can lead to low oxygen levels, something jellyfish deal quite well with, while other animal species cannot tolerate.

Climate change has similarly favoured jellyfish. Warmer waters have allowed potentially fatal species of jellyfish, such as the box jellyfish of northern Australia to expand southward toward more populated swimming beaches. Warmer temperatures lead to nutrient-poor surface waters, a condition, like eutrophication example above, that favours jellyfish.

Finally, the commercial shipping industry has played a role in inadvertently introducing jellyfish to new areas. Like many other species, they can become invasive and without natural predators or other forms of regulation they rapidly increase in numbers to the point of greatly altering native ecosystems. The Black Sea, Caspian Sea and Gulf of Mexico have all witnessed introduced jellyfish problems in recent years.

The concerns are significant. Our current actions are potentially driving the seas away from those dominated by diatoms and fish to one of phytoplankton and jellies. Some scientists have suggested that if current trends continue, our oceans could soon more resemble the warmer, more eutrophied Cambrian seas of 500 million years ago.

No one is suggesting that jellyfish are driving fish and whales to extinction. It’s just that jellies and their ancient, time-tested adaptations are able to quickly take advantage of the opportunities that have been provided to them.

Thankfully, there are several options available to us. Mostly, these involve reversing the actions that have allowed for the recent proliferation of jellyfish: over-fishing, eutrophication and climate change. If we don’t, the seas may well be a vastly different place than what we are familiar with today. And instead of singing the children’s song quoted at the top, we’ll be following the advice of fisheries scientist Daniel Pauly, “My kids will tell their children: eat your jellyfish!”

Springtime out of tune

This column was published in the Cranbrook Daily Townsman Friday May 14, 2010.

Yellow bird, yellow moon
You've arrived while the spring is out of tune
- Justin Rutledge, from "Jack of Diamonds"
 

The un-spring like view of our driveway

I confess I've never heard Justin Rutledge's music, but a review of one of his concerts included this lyric. Though out of context for a late-season snowfall, it seemed fitting for recent East Kootenay weather. A week ago our spring was badly out of tune.

Quite a difference a week can make. Last Friday we awoke to a winter wonderland with Christmas carols the most appropriate lyrics. Pretty enough, I suppose, but winter weather occurring during winter (where was this snow in February?) seems a better idea.

So what happens to the yellow birds and when they arrive from their tropical winter paradise only to find that spring is "out of tune"? We don't find piles of dead birds under trees, so how are they able to cope with such weather anomalies?

The unfortunate answer is that some don't. Late cold snaps (or early autumn ones like last year's Thanksgiving weekend's -15°C) take their toll on wildlife, particularly pint-sized songbirds. However, most adults are able to withstand brief periods of unseasonable cold.

That the cold and snow occurred before most species had young in their nests is very helpful in avoiding widespread mortality. There may have been some egg failure among early nesting species such as robins, but snow at the end of May it is far more damaging.
 

Most songbird nests are highly exposed to the elements and baby birds, often still featherless, are very susceptible to cold, snow and heavy rain. Cool springs or one freak storm can wipe out a large percentage of a year's songbird production across many species. Some may lay a second clutch of eggs, but many pack it in and wait for another year.
 

Hummingbirds, having returned for the summer nesting season, instead met with a big white surprise. But the physiological adaptations of these tiny marvels are astounding. Their small body size and highly active lifestyle means they have incredible energy demands which would otherwise leave them vulnerable to cold temperatures. However, the advantage of small body size is that warming up and cooling down are easy and efficient. Even most nights in summer, they slip into a torpor of slowed metabolism and lowered body temperature. Normal temperature for most birds, including hummingbirds, is in the 40ºC range. But in torpor, that can drop close to below 15ºC. The advantage is that their metabolic energy demands drop by 50%.

In fact, the greatest danger to endotherms (animals which can regulate their internal temperature - birds and mammals) is overheating. Normal body temperature is very close to the point of irreversible cellular damage. Living on the edge like this may seem dangerous, but speeds metabolism and movement of nutrients across membranes as well as optimizing nerve transmissions. Maintaining a high brain temperature may also assist in learning and memory.
 

Many so-called cold-blooded animals (more properly termed ectotherms) rely on behavioural adaptations to survive the cold and snow. Snakes just emerging from their underground winter hibernation sites will quickly retreat to their subterranean warmth. Frogs either stay submerged in water or seek refuge under forest floor leaf litter and rely on their ability to withstand some freezing.
 

So while spring may occasionally be "out of tune", it's certainly not entirely out of character. And as for the older song that waxes poetic about "Springtime in the Rockies", I doubt the author ever spent many springs in the mountains. It can be the cruelest of seasons.

The Sound of Spring

The following was published in the Cranbrook Daily Townsman, Tuesday, May 4, 2010.

For most, the sound of spring is the clamour of bird song. After the long silence of winter, hushed by layers of snow (or maybe not, this year!), the return of songbirds from their lush tropical dreamland brings a welcome music to the early morning sunlight. The gathering chorus, added to daily by new arrivals, grows earlier as dawn heads steadily north. In the evening, the robin, soon joined by other thrush cousins, sings a vespers to the enclosing darkness.

But if you are lucky enough to live close to a pond or wetland, that evening song is soon joined by another voice. This one more rhythmic than melodic. Steady. Emphatic and determined. The steady krek-ek… krek-ek… of the Pacific tree frog is as much a sign of spring in the East Kootenay as any crocus or bluebird.

Pacific tree frogs are one of the more common amphibians in southern British Columbia, occurring from the coast east to the Rocky Mountain Trench. Highly variable in colour as a species, we here in the East Kootenay get the drab olive variety, with a black triangular mask behind their eyes. They’re small in size – rarely more than 5 cm long. Their range ends as the Lizard and Galton ranges climb from the valley into west slope of the Rockies. But many small ponds, sloughs and wetlands throughout the Trench are the site each spring of a ritual pilgrimage for the tiny amphibians.

For an animal that is reliant on the whims of fickle spring weather, frogs are remarkably adapted to cold. Some nights when the temperature battles hard to remain above freezing, we can still hear the frogs croaking away in late April.

As the snow melts and frost eases from the ground, tree frogs emerge from their hibernation – a winter spent under the chilly blanket of dead leaves and other forest floor cover. Many frogs have an physiology adapted to super-cooling that allows them to virtually freeze during the winter. Provided they are not disturbed, they literally thaw out the next spring and start their year anew.

They return to ponds each spring only to breed and lay eggs. As all amphibians, their larval stages are fully aquatic. Tree frog tadpoles or pollywogs develop rapidly, metamorphosing into terrestrial adults within two months. They have to grow quickly, for their pond is often ephemeral and dries out under the summer sun.

Like most tree frogs, their toes have suction cups on the end to facilitate climbing into their eponymous lair of small trees and shrubs where they spend most of the season, often quite distant from water. Here they feast on a typically froggy diet of insects, spiders and other bugs caught from their not-so-lofty perches. Unlike most frogs, which only call during the spring breeding season, Pacific tree frogs often just can’t hold back. Any particularly glorious night of rain and damp misery may elicit a song of apparent joy from a tree frog’s throat.

However, ours is not a particularly joyful time for amphibians. Species the world over are in decline, and BC is by no means sheltered. Chytrid fungus, originally from Africa, has been unwittingly spread worldwide with devastating effects on our frog populations. Reducing transmission by not handling frogs and not visiting different ponds is the best way to restrict the disease. Any mass die-offs of frogs should be reported to the British Columbia Ministry of Environment.

This year, the pond in our neighbourhood is dry. The water table lowered from lack of snow and too long without rain. We have not yet heard the frogs, though I know they are singing elsewhere. I miss the call, lying in bed with the window open at night listening for their spring ritual. Species fated to the whims of climate are well adapted to adjust to a occasional dry years. We just hope this is an anomaly and not a portend of conditions to come. A spring without tree frogs is far too silent.

Water: making waste hurt.

The following was published in the Cranbrook Daily Townsman, Wednesday April 21, 2010.

Congratulations to Cranbrook City Council for their recent signing of the Columbia Basin Water Smart Charter. Setting a target of reducing domestic water use by 20% by 2015 is an admirable start, one that everyone should support. Just drilling a new well to get at even more water is not the answer.

Extra kudos to Mayor Scott Manjak for having the cahones to go further and suggest he’s willing to look at water meters. To say that’s not a popular political move is a vast understatement. However, there is simply no other way to reliably reduce water consumption. A study from Ontario found an average reduction in water use of roughly 30% after meters were installed. There’s your target and then some, right there.

We are water hogs. A report out of University of Victoria in 2001 compared Canada with 28 other countries in the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD). For water consumption, Canada came in 28th, ahead of only the United States. From 1980 to 2000, water consumption in Canada rose over 25%, more than 5 times the combined OECD rate.

The daily amount of water needed for consumption, basic sanitation, food preparation and bathing is estimated between 60 and 80 litres per household. Let’s be generous and round that up to an even 100L. Average Canadian household water use is well over 300L. Per day. (figures sourced from the Program on Water Governance at the University of British Columbia.)

Meters should be seen more as incentive than tax. I would not support a move to metering strictly for cash grab. In fact having them installed for 6 months or so before any charges would help people learn about their consumption and find ways to reduce it.

Most importantly, I suggest that a certain base volume, rated on a daily average, would carry no charge. Don’t call it free – there most certainly is a cost to all of us for any water use. But in recognition of our requirements for health and sanitation, a basic daily allotment should be provided. Given the numbers above, 100L might be a reasonable domestic number. The number of people per residence would also be factored in. Above that, charges start applying and rise steeply to curb waste.

Marq de Villiers wrote the highly acclaimed book Water in the late 1990s. On the topic of meters, he wrote, “It is important to signal water’s value and to price it so that waste hurts.”

But are water meters just another tax grab? I wouldn’t support them if they were. And here we need to be careful. de Villiers notes bad experiences from Great Britain where cost of water rose over 100% following privatization of water companies. Corporate profits rose almost 700%, with little re-investment into infrastructure. Privatization of our water (and it most certainly is our water) should not occur. I envision a non-profit structure where water charges cover incurred costs of managing the accounts, but any surplus should be re-invested into community environmental programs that encourage water conservation and rehabilitate local waterways.

Domestic water use is not the only issue. For meaningful conservation, industrial use also must come down. Thermal power (generation by fossil fuel and nuclear) is far and away the largest industrial consumer in Canada, followed by manufacturing, according to the Program on Water Governance at UBC. But what we can individually control is a good place to start: our own taps and toilets. Measuring just how much is going down the drain would open many eyes.

Disclosure: I am an Area C resident so would not be directly affected by a requirement by City of Cranbrook to install water meters. However, like most Area C dwellers, I work in the City of Cranbrook and have a vested interest in the city, its environment and its economy. Though my home is on a private well, I support water meters for rural residents such as myself. Whether we draw water from city treatment reservoirs or underground aquifers, it’s all water, it’s all connected and it all needs to be used judiciously and wisely.

The Flathead Conundrum

The following was published in the Cranbrook Daily Townsman.

And they called it Paradise, I don’t know why.
Call some place Paradise, kiss it good-bye.
- The Eagles, from The Last Resort.

A couple trips to Calgary lately have taken me past the main road leading to the Flathead valley. If you don’t know which road it is, find yourself a map and look it up. I’m not going to tell you.

I half expected a large sign to be erected at the turn-off from Highway 3 directing travelers to nirvana. The news lately seems to have been all Flathead, all the time.

Wildsight has been targeting the valley for a while now. Not content with a moratorium on mineral and petroleum exploration and development, their intent remain firmly set on a National Park.

National Geographic has added to the siren call of the Flathead, highlighting the area in its Crown of the Continent campaign encouraging people from all over to come visit the Serengeti of the North.

Is a national park really in the valley’s best interest? While there may be merits to that extent of formal protection, I have trouble supporting it. The Flathead is advertised by park proponents as ‘wild’ or an ‘intact watershed,’ implying there is no significant development within the river’s drainage basin in Canada.

At times, forestry activity has been heavy – chasing beetle epidemics in the 1970s and 80s – but trees grow back much quicker than mountains ripped apart for coal or minerals. Even a giant geezly clearcut looks all soft and fuzzy from a distance within a few years of replanting.

Ultimately, it’s the Flathead’s wildness that appeals to so many. And if the Flathead is still considered wild after a century or more of being ‘unprotected’, then clearly something is going right.

What is going right is there are few people there. There are no towns and the few roads are unmarked, largely unknown and often in miserable shape.

A National Park could very well bring pressure from Ottawa to plant a large brown road sign with a stylized beaver on it somewhere in the Elk Valley (watch for one pointing out Waterton Lakes National Park heading into Pincher Creek). Will there be pressure to pave the road? Put in formal campsites or a visitor centre? Why take the chance?

The shifting sands of Parks Canada Agency management adds little security. In the early 1990’s, Parks was moved to Heritage Canada with the slogan ‘Parks are for People.’ The notion of environmental protection was a distant whim. Then later in the decade, the tide turned. Parks were moved back to the Department of Environment and a national panel on Ecological Integrity shifted the focus back to environment. More recently, Parks Canada Agency operates almost entirely as its own entity and has swung back to the Parks are for People focus with environmental emphasis downgraded. A new park arising under this mandate is very likely to have significant pressures to be marketed for its vast recreational opportunities.

The Flathead is often cited as supporting the greatest density of inland grizzly bears in North America, one result of long-term research by Dr. Bruce McLellan with BC Ministry of Forests and Range. One of Dr. McLellan’s key findings of what limits grizzly bears? Traffic volume. Not so much the road itself, but how much traffic is on it. Gravel’s better than paved, but the best thing for grizzly bears is lack of human presence. Advertising the Flathead as a destination will not help the local grizzly population.

To me, the best option for protecting the Flathead is designating much of it as a Wildlife Management Area (WMA). This would restrict development, but maintain most, if not all the activities currently taking place in the valley.

One the best examples of selecting a WMA over a National Park is the Columbia Wetlands WMA running from Canal Flats to Donald. Local proponents for the WMA wanted to retain hunting and fishing opportunities and felt the full protection of a National Park was not only unnecessary, but unwanted. The leader of that push was the late Ian Jack of Invermere. His job? Chief Naturalist with Kootenay National Park.

So to those seeking greater protection of the Flathead, I ask that you consider more broadly accepted options that may well achieve the ultimate goal most of us want for the Flathead: a wild valley. And please, stop advertising paradise before we kiss it good bye.

The Plight of the Pika

The following column was published in the Cranbrook Daily Townsman February 18, 2010.

Most hikers who frequent the local alpine crags are familiar with one of the more endearing mammals of our area. Pikas are more often heard than seen, giving their short, shrill alarm distinct to the high mountains. If you stay still long enough and have keen eyes, you’ll find them looking out from talus pile hideouts watching nervously for trouble.

Pikas are lagomorphs, kin to rabbits and hares, and not rodents. They probably reached their zenith as a family sometime in the Pleistocene, aided by the cooler northern temperatures. They are well adapted to survive frigid mountain winters, but are highly susceptible to heat stress in temperatures over 27ºC. Today, the few species remaining are found mostly in Asia. Two are here in North America. The American Pika is found from central California and northern New Mexico, north to the Prince George area. The Collared Pika is farther north throughout most of Yukon and eastern Alaska. While there may be few species of pika, there have been 18 sub-species of American Pika identified. This reflects their highly isolated populations and minimal dispersal abilities.

Pikas are strongly associated with talus slopes, where they make their homes and seek refuge from predators, that are adjacent to grassy meadows where they forage for food. This specific habitat requirement limits them to alpine areas and crossing the forested landscape between their preferred habitats is not an easy task. Life as a dispersing, juvenile pika is not easy.

Their habitat is best viewed as ‘islands’ in a sea of inhospitable forests which isolates one group of pikas from the neighbouring alpine area. Their population ecology is an excellent fit of Island Biogeography theory that I discussed in my last column. Rather than number of species however, the question is the number of individuals. Smaller alpine ‘islands’ will support fewer individuals, which will leave them susceptible to random environmental effects such as poor weather which may wipe out an entire year’s reproduction effort. Smaller populations are more vulnerable to disease, genetic inbreeding and other impacts.

Once a population is lost, the empty habitat can only be recolonized by other pikas that manage to cross the inhospitable forested sea. The more isolated a population is from other pikas, the less likely it is to experience successful immigration.

Their patchy distribution today is a remnant of the last ice age, when more continuous populations are thought to have occurred throughout western North America. Research backs this up, with evidence of pikas from the late Pleistocene in areas where they no longer exist. The average elevation of now extinct pikas 8 to 10 thousand years ago was 1750 m, while today pikas in the same area of the US Great Basin occur at an average elevation of 2530 m.

Research on prehistoric pika populations suggests their extinctions were driven by increasing temperature, decreasing moisture and changes in plant communities. These three conditions are all key predictions of current climate change models, which does not bode well for pikas. However, last week the US Fish & Wildlife Service released their review of the American Pika in the USA in which they determined that, though climate change may impact the small lagomorphs, they are not currently at risk under US Endangered Species legislation.

Hopefully the same holds true here in BC. If American Pikas do decline under predicted climate change conditions, their populations will likely contract toward the cooler north. This would make BC responsible for an increasing proportion of the species’ global range.

Farther north there is more concern. Biologists have documented significant declines in Collared Pika numbers in the Yukon leading the committee responsible for assessing status of endangered species in Canada (COSEWIC) to launch a review of the species and whether it merits listing under our federal Species at Risk Act.

Hopefully pikas will continue to find a way to persist should their alpine habitats continue to shrink upslope and northward. Talus slopes can be barren, unfriendly grey places. A little company is always welcome.

The pika picture above is by Dave Sindholt, a Cranbrook naturalist, who sent me the picture after reading the column. Thanks Dave! Great shot!