5/9 Bank action, warm ocean, EPA science, WA carbon cap, Sea Grant, polluted oysters, clean beach, TV sales

Miner's lettuce

Miner's Lettuce Claytonia perfoliata
Claytonia is named for John Clayton (1685-1773), an American botanist who made an early collection in the eastern U.S. that contributed to Gronovius's Flora Virginica. The unusual upper leaves are fused around the stem, which appears to perforate them, hence perfoliata). It occurs from the Strait of Georgia-Puget Sound area south to California. It is called miner's lettuce because early miners and settlers used it as a salad green. Some still forge for it and eat it today. (Plants of the Pacific Northwest Coast)

Climate activists shut down Chase Bank branches in Seattle; arrests made
Climate activists disrupted business at 13 branches of JPMorgan Chase bank in Seattle on Monday in an effort to stop loans to tar-sands oil-pipeline projects. By late afternoon police had made 26 arrests of demonstrators, including activists who locked themselves together and refused to leave two bank branches, said Emily Johnston, communications manager for 350 Seattle, a nonprofit climate-action group that helped organized the demonstrations. Lynda Mapes reports. (Seattle Times)

Oceans losing oxygen as world warms
To the list of global problems the world’s oceans are facing, you can add another: They’re losing oxygen. The Pacific Ocean off the U.S. West Coast, from central California to Alaska, is one of the hardest-hit areas. Whether you’re looking at an ocean or a glass of beer, the same fundamental chemistry holds true. “When you warm up the water, it holds less gas,” University of Washington oceanographer Curtis Deutsch said. John Ryan reports. (KUOW)

E.P.A. Dismisses Members of Major Scientific Review Board 
The Environmental Protection Agency has dismissed at least five members of a major scientific review board, the latest signal of what critics call a campaign by the Trump administration to shrink the agency’s regulatory reach by reducing the role of academic research. A spokesman for the E.P.A. administrator, Scott Pruitt, said he would consider replacing the academic scientists with representatives from industries whose pollution the agency is supposed to regulate, as part of the wide net it plans to cast. “The administrator believes we should have people on this board who understand the impact of regulations on the regulated community,” said the spokesman, J. P. Freire. The dismissals on Friday came about six weeks after the House passed a bill aimed at changing the composition of another E.P.A. scientific review board to include more representation from the corporate world. Coral Davenport reports. (NY Times)

Washington businesses hope to kill Inslee's carbon cap
Can a state environmental-protection regulation be considered a “tax”? That’s a central question in a lawsuit by business interests against Washington’s regulatory cap on carbon-pollution emissions that went into effect on Jan. 1. The answer could determine whether Gov. Jay Inslee can make progress on reducing global warming emissions in the state, long one of his top priorities. John Stang reports. (Crosscut)

Trump's Budget Would Eliminate A Key Funder Of Research On Coastal Pollution
For 51 years, a small federal program has been paying scientists to keep American waterways healthy. It’s called Sea Grant — part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration — and President Donald Trump”s proposed budget for next year would eliminate it. Sea Grant funds support more than 800 projects around the country. Christopher Joyce reports. (NPR)

Poop in Puget Sound sickened customers but really hurt oystermen’s livelihood
John Hansen says there’s an easy explanation for why he can no longer sell his shellfish: There’s just too much poop in the waters of Puget Sound.... Shellfish farming is big business in Washington state, which ranks first in the nation in production and where 3,200 jobs are tied to the Puget Sound. And from Washington state to Washington, D.C., shellfish farmers and their allies want the government to clean up the nation’s second largest estuary and keep their operations running. While Hansen wants local officials to do a better job of treating the water, the shellfish industry and its allies are taking their case to Congress, hoping to convince members to kill President Donald Trump’s plan to cut cleanup funding next year for the nation’s major bodies of water, including Puget Sound, the Great Lakes and Chesapeake Bay. Rob Hotakainen reports. (McClatchy)

Volunteers clean beaches of about 15 tons of debris during annual cleanup
The results are in after 1,330 volunteers cleaned debris from more than 60 Washington beaches during the 10th annual Washington Coast Cleanup.Jon Schmidt, Washington CoastSavers coordinator, estimated that volunteers hauled away about 15 tons of garbage during the cleanup of beaches on the Pacific Coast from the Columbia River to Cape Flattery and on the Strait of Juan de Fuca from Cape Flattery to Port Townsend. Jesse Major reports. (Peninsula Daily News)

Sale of Tribune to Sinclair could put KOMO, KCPQ under same broadcast giant 
Sinclair Broadcast Group will pay $3.9 billion to acquire Tribune Media, expanding the largest chain of TV stations in the U.S. The deal means it will own two Seattle TV stations — ABC affiliate KOMO and Fox affiliate KPCQ — both of which Sinclair expects to keep. Dominic Gates reports. (Seattle Times)

Now, your tug weather--
WEST ENTRANCE U.S. WATERS STRAIT OF JUAN DE FUCA-  300 AM PDT TUE MAY 9 2017  

TODAY  LIGHT WIND BECOMING NW 10 TO 20 KT IN THE AFTERNOON.  WIND WAVES LESS THAN 1 FT BECOMING 1 TO 3 FT IN THE AFTERNOON. W  SWELL 7 FT AT 12 SECONDS.
TONIGHT  W WIND 5 TO 15 KT BECOMING 10 KT OR LESS AFTER  MIDNIGHT. WIND WAVES 2 FT OR LESS. W SWELL 5 FT AT 12 SECONDS.

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