"EAST SAND ISLAND, Wash. — It's been a dozen years since the federal government moved thousands of black-capped squawking seabirds here to reduce their diet of endangered fish. Things haven't exactly gone as planned."
On Washington's Olympic Peninsula, the nation's largest dam-removal project to day is poised to restore ancient salmon runs.
Founded in 2006 by SEJ member Alison M. Jones, No Water No Life photography teams document historic, current and potential management issues of six case-study watersheds: North America’s Columbia, Mississippi and Raritan River Basins and northeastern Africa’s Nile, Omo and Mara River Basins.
Greater sage-grouse are at just 3% of their historical numbers, and warrant protection, according to the Bureau of Land Management. But since other species are in even more dire straits, the birds haven't been declared a threatened or endangered species. The US Dept. of Agriculture money is a work-around aimed at saving the birds and their habitat.
USDA continues to expand its Biomass Crop Assistance Program that provides financial incentives for producers of various biomass products with the latest selected project areas for growing camelina in CA, OR, WA, and MT, poplar trees in OR, and switchgrass in KS and OK.
"As long as American Indians have lived in the Pacific Northwest, they have looked to a jawless, eel-like fish for food."
"For over 75 years, Blau Oyster Co. has relied on Washington state's cool clean waters to grow the plump oysters that are as prized in the Northwest as salmon and orcas. But too much pollution from animal and human waste has been washing into Samish Bay in north Puget Sound, prohibiting shellfish harvests 38 days already this year."
"Oregon's Environmental Quality Commission [Thursday] adopted the strictest standards for toxic water pollution in the United States."
"The Elwha River on Washington's Olympic Peninsula once teemed with legendary salmon runs before two towering concrete dams built nearly a century ago cut off fish access to upstream habitat, diminished their runs and altered the ecosystem." Now the dams are being removed.
"The states of Oregon and Washington agreed on Wednesday to suspend euthanizing sea lions caught feasting on endangered Columbia River salmon until September while the courts consider a lawsuit challenging such killings."
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