10/23 Western gray squirrel, kelp beds, Skagit battery storage, marbled murrelet, sardine hwy, BC flood, PFAS bans, Duwamish R

Western gray squirrel

Western gray squirrel Sciurus griseus
The Western gray squirrel is the largest tree squirrel in Washington, ranging from 18 to 24 inches in length. It has gray upper parts, a creamy undercoat, and its tail is long and bushy with white edges. This species is found in low-elevation oak and conifer woods in parts of western and central Washington.

Today's top story in Salish Current: FIFA’s green promise for Cascadia extends beyond the soccer pitch

A look inside Puget Sound’s declining bull kelp beds
.... The kelp collects in bunches near the surface, the bed hugs the shoreline of the island and sways with the current. This is just one of the many beds watched closely by the Samish Indian Nation and mapped out yearly using aerial footage and GPS data to show just how fast bull kelp is disappearing throughout the San Juan Island archipelago. The Samish are seeing perhaps a 30% decline over the past couple of decades, said Todd Woodard, executive director of the tribe’s infrastructure and resources. Move south, and the numbers for kelp get worse. Conrad Swanson reports. (Seattle Times)

Skagit County holds public hearing on energy storage moratorium
The Skagit County Board of Commissioners held a public hearing Monday about an interim moratorium on accepting permit applications for energy generation or storage facilities on county farmland. The moratorium is in place while the county works on a county code amendment that would exclude such facilities, which include battery storage systems and solar farms, on land zoned Ag-NRL. The moratorium began Sept. 23 and will last six months, but it can be extended. Emma Fletcher-Frazer reports. (Skagit Valley Herald)

Listening In on the Mysterious Marbled Murrelet
Applying machine learning to forest soundscapes helps researchers pinpoint rare and threatened birds. Moira Donovan reports. (Hakai Magazine)

Heat waves may have opened a sardine superhighway across Pacific
For millennia, two distinct species of sardine lived on opposite sides of the North Pacific Ocean. But climate warming could be mixing up where they live. Research published Wednesday in Molecular Ecology suggests the possibility that marine heat waves are opening up a new passage across the North Pacific. Isabella Breda reports. (Seattle Times)

How can B.C. protect itself from the next atmospheric river?
Three people are dead, and another person is missing after an atmospheric river washed over B.C.'s South Coast on the weekend. As officials deal with the aftermath of the weekend storm, some are considering what more needs to be done to plan for heavy rainfall as severe weather events become more frequent. (CBC)

More states ban PFAS, or ‘forever chemicals,’ in more products
Legislative momentum against PFAS has surged this year, as at least 11 states enacted laws to restrict the use of “forever chemicals” in everyday consumer products or professional firefighting foam. The legislation includes bans on PFAS in apparel, cleaning products, cookware, and cosmetic and menstrual products. Shalina Chatlani reports. (Stateline)

How the Duwamish Became the River of No Return
Of Native Americans and their world on Puget Sound, here ar the words of John, a Swinomish elder born in the 1880s, who said: “Every river has its people.”  In our tradition, a corollary would be, “Every city has its river.”  Think of Rome, Paris, London, New York, and…Tukwila.  Seattle also has the Duwamish river, but few in Seattle have ever seen it. David Buerge writes. (Post Alley)

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Here's your tug weather—
West Entrance U.S. Waters Strait Of Juan De Fuca-  246 AM PDT Wed Oct 23 2024    
TODAY  NW wind 5 to 10 kt, becoming W 10 to 15 kt this  afternoon. Seas around 3 ft. Wave Detail: W 3 ft at 5 seconds.  
TONIGHT  W wind around 10 kt, becoming SW after midnight. Seas  around 3 ft in the evening, then around 2 ft or less. Wave  Detail: W 3 ft at 5 seconds. A chance of showers.

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