4/18 Climate, Paris Accord, compost odor, Skunk Bay Weather, World Heritage Site, HI marine reserve, shipworm

"The view at 1800 hrs" [Laurie MacBride]

What a Difference…
Laurie MacBride in Eye on Environment writes; "To borrow from the old song, what a difference a day makes – or even just 12 hours! The photo was taken from our boat on an August evening at about 1800 hours (6 pm in land-talk). We were on our way home from a summer-long journey up the BC coast, and we’d just dropped anchor in a cozy cove at the mouth of Fish Egg Inlet. Before starting dinner preparations, I took a moment to savour and photograph the view: looking through one of the anchorage’s “windows” into adjacent Illahie Inlet, with hints of the Coast Mountain range in the background. (Read more to see what happened…)

Ooops: Rabbit's Guy points out that yesterday's news clip about the Skagit tulips was a year old: "On behalf of all us Skagitonians, I will point out that the lead story is from 2016.  I believe the Tulips are actually a bit slow this year and will be going strong for some time to come!!" Sorry for the haste and waste. Go, you tulips!

'It scares me': Permafrost thaw in Canadian Arctic sign of global trend
Canada is melting. Like a popsicle taken out of the freezer and left on the counter, the permanently frozen ground in the northern reaches of this country is thawing at an ever faster rate. Half of Canada is blanketed in some form of permafrost, including patches in the northern reaches of Ontario and the Prairie provinces. David Michael Lamb reports. (CBC) See also: Climate change causes glacial river in Yukon to change direction Glacier retreated so much that its meltwater switched course, in an event not documented in modern times. Brandie Weikle reports. (CBC)

Trump Policy Advisers, Split Over Paris Accord, Will Debate U.S. Role in Pact
President Trump’s divided policy advisers will meet Tuesday afternoon to hash over whether Mr. Trump should withdraw the United States from the landmark Paris climate accord of 2015, and the side pressing the president to remain in the deal enters the pivotal meeting with the upper hand. Mr. Trump plans to make a final decision on the fate of the Paris agreement before a meeting of the Group of 7 leading economies at the end of May, according to Sean Spicer, the White House press secretary. On the campaign trail, Mr. Trump vowed to “cancel” the climate deal, and his most politically conservative advisers, including his senior strategist Stephen K. Bannon, have pushed him to follow through. But Mr. Bannon’s influence has waned in recent weeks, while authority has risen for Mr. Trump’s daughter Ivanka and son-in-law, Jared Kushner, who advocate staying in the accord. Coral Davenport reports. (NY Times)

Everett composting company wins first of four odor lawsuits
Cedar Grove Composting has won a significant victory in a long-running civil lawsuit over what Marysville residents insist are intolerable odors coming from the company’s Smith Island plant. The case in Snohomish County Superior Court was one of four lawsuits brought in 2013 by more than 350 plaintiffs in Snohomish and King counties. Cedar Grove also operates a larger composting operation in Maple Valley. Chris Winters reports. (Everett Herald)

‘The Poet of Weather Cams’: How one man’s obsession for capturing nature’s drama on Puget Sound became a worldwide online hit
It’s not something you’d think of as visual poetry, but here they are, at the home of Greg Johnson. Weather webcams. He has four cameras in a wooden box nailed outside the second-story bedroom of his family home. He used shims to line up the cameras just so to have a straight-out view to Admiralty Inlet. Every container and cruise ship coming to Seattle goes through here. The main cameras — three Olympus SP-500s — are working 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. They take a picture every 20 seconds during the day, and at night about every 40 seconds because of the extended exposure time. Erik Lacitis reports. (Seattle Times)

Could the Salish Sea Become Canada’s Next World Heritage Site?
Initiative would help the world recognize ‘how special this place is.’ Phillip Vannini and April Vannini write. (The Tyee)

The Fight Over Papahanaumokuakea Just Escalated
Government officials from the United States and three of its territories are working to undermine President Barack Obama’s marine conservation legacy less than four months after he left office. Obama used his executive authority in August to dramatically expand protected areas in the Pacific, the largest being the four-fold expansion last summer of Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument, which now covers 583,000 square miles in the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands. But with the Trump administration taking over in January, commercial fishermen and others who vehemently opposed the expansion of that monument and other marine preserves have renewed the fight. Nathan Eagle and Kirstin Downey report. (Civil Beat)

Scientists find giant, elusive clam known as ‘the unicorn of mollusks’
For hundreds of years, biologists knew of the giant shipworm only from shell fragments and a handful of dead specimens. Those specimens, despite being preserved in museum jars, had gone to mush. Still, the shipworm's scattered remains made an outsize impression on biologists. Its three-foot-long tubular shells — the shipworm isn't technically a worm but a bivalve — were so striking that Swedish taxonomist Carl Linnaeus included the animal in his book that introduced the scientific naming system “Systema Naturae.” Ben Guarino reports. (Washington Post)

Now, your tug weather--
WEST ENTRANCE U.S. WATERS STRAIT OF JUAN DE FUCA-  301 AM PDT TUE APR 18 2017  

TODAY  SE WIND 10 TO 20 KT BECOMING SW. WIND WAVES 1 TO 3 FT.  SW SWELL 6 FT AT 9 SECONDS. RAIN IN THE MORNING THEN SHOWERS IN  THE AFTERNOON.
TONIGHT  S WIND 10 TO 20 KT. WIND WAVES 1 TO 3 FT. SW SWELL 6  FT AT 8 SECONDS. A CHANCE OF SHOWERS.

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