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2/9/12

Humboldt State University Zoology Professor Dawn Goley will join with colleagues from the Yurok Tribe and a host of other agencies on Monday, Feb. 13 in a detailed backgrounder on last summer’s Klamath River gray whale saga.  

The debriefing will be presented at the Yurok Tribe’s headquarters in Klamath, CA from 6-7:30 p.m. and will address the biological, cultural and veterinary aspects of the multi-agency response.

“For those interested in the details of what happened during the gray whales’ stay, this will be a very informative meeting,” Goley said. “Those who attend will also have an opportunity to meet and talk with the diverse and dedicated team who worked with the cetaceans.”

The Humboldt State University Marine Mammal Education and Research Program, the Yurok Tribe, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Marine Fisheries Service, the federal Marine Mammal Stranding Network and the Marine Mammal Center partnered in a coordinated response to monitor the health of the whales, encourage them to return to the sea and to maintain their safety and that of observers. 

The gray whale cow is believed to have died from complications associated with its extended stay in fresh water. The calf left the river in late July, its fate unknown.

Yurok Tribe Headquarters are located at 190 Klamath Boulevard, just off U.S. Highway 101 in Klamath. 

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Adam Brown, White Shark Biologist with Point Reyes Bird Observatory, has been studying white sharks on Southeast Farallon Island since 2000. He will be Beth and Mike's guest on Coastal Currents on Feb. 8 at noon on KHUM, 104.3 and 104.7 FM.

White sharks (Carcharodon carcharias) are the ocean's largest predatory sharks. The occasional encounter with humans (and movie producers) has made them the most famous. Although they can grow to almost 21 feet (7 meters), the length of an average shark is closer to 15 feet (5 meters); they weigh about 1,500 pounds (700 kg). White sharks, like some other fish such as salmon sharks and tuna, are warm-bodied -- that is, parts of their bodies can be warmer than the cold water in which they swim.

In the eastern Pacific, white sharks can be found from Alaska to Mexico, but you don't often see them north of Washington State. They hang out near haul-out sites for marine mammals, their main food. People used to believe they roamed only along the California coast. But our tags show that they travel regularly from California to Hawaii. Juvenile white sharks are found in the Southern California Bight, which appears to be an important nursery ground.

The World Conservation Union lists white sharks as vulnerable. Concerns for white shark populations have led to their protection in Californian and Mexican waters. To ensure their long-term survival, we need much more information about where they go to feed and breed. The recent tagging results indicate how little is actually known about white sharks. Also, white sharks will also provide a valuable comparison to results from salmon and mako sharks that are also capable of elevating their body temperature.

To view the white shark tagging map by Tagging of Pacific Predators (TOPP), click HERE.

Tagging of Pacific Predators (TOPP) began in 2000 as one of 17 projects of the Census of Marine Life, an ambitious 10-year, 80-nation endeavor to assess and explain the diversity and abundance of life in the oceans, and where that life has lived, is living, and will live.

2/1/12

Watershed groups and other conservationists expressed concern Tuesday night with terms used to rank salmon population areas in the a long-awaited draft recovery plan in fear it would reduce efforts for populations not listed as a “priority.”

National Oceanic Atmospheric Administration' fish biologist Julie Weeder, the recovery coordinator, said the terminology was not meant to reduce any efforts, but the feedback was exactly the type of information the National Marine Fisheries Service was looking for. She said the agency is required to create the plan, a set of guidelines for the recovery of coho salmon in Southern Oregon and Northern California, but the implementation is voluntary. The coho salmon was listed under the Endangered Species Act in 1997 after habitat degradation, harvest and water diversion, drought, floods and poor ocean conditions led to its depletion.

”I firmly believe that this plan will not succeed unless it makes sense to people,” Weeder said, adding that she wants as much community input as possible to create a more accurate final draft and encourage community participation.

After 12 years of research, NOAA's National Marine Fisheries Service released its draft recovery plan in January. Clarence Hostler, a regional supervisor with NOAA, said the service recognizes that the draft still needs to be revised, and it will continue to be revised throughout the years. The plan is scheduled to be updated every five years.

”It's better to have an imperfect plan, rather than no plan at all,” he said.

According to the service, the plan will provide short term solutions and long term solutions to restore habitat, ranging from increasing channel complexity by adding woody debris, to improving the timing or volume of water flow by establishing statewide groundwater permit program. The plan also includes guidelines for monitoring and collecting data.

While several individuals at the meeting thanked the service for creating detailed profiles of each area, they were all concerned about the feasibility of the plan. In addition to wanting clarity on the ranking of areas and threats, concerns included addressing timber practices, including language specifying the ability to reassess areas that have been termed as not a “core” area, and extending the comment period for 30 days or longer. The service is holding several other meetings in the next month in Northern California, and the deadline for the comments is March 5. Weeder said she would be willing to meet with people in addition to the public meetings, and it may even be possible to hold another public forum. 

Electronic copies of the draft plan are available at www.swr.nmfs.noaa.gov/recovery or on a CD by contacting Cynthia Anderson at 825-5162 or by sending an email with “CD ROM request for SONCC coho salmon draft recovery plan” to This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. For more information, contact Julie Weeder at 825-5168 orThis email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. 

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1/24/12

To many, it’s a familiar scenario: a strip mall suddenly pops up in what was once a desolate quagmire or boggy boondock.

But people are coming to realize that these seemingly wasted plots where land meets water provide a valuable ecological service. In addition to nurturing biodiversity, wetlands purify water, produce fish, store carbon dioxide that would otherwise contribute to global warming, and protect shorelines from floods, storm surges and erosion.

Since the early 20th century, development has claimed over half the wetlands in North America, Europe, Australia and China. To repair the damage from those construction binges and regain the benefits of wetlands, restoration has become a booming business.

Yet new research calls into question whether manmade versions can ever compensate for wetlands buried beneath parking lots and subdivisions. In an article published on Tuesday in PLoS Biology, scientists write that restoration efforts often fall short of returning wetlands to their former biological complexity and functioning.

“In traditional restoration, people repair hydrology, put in some plants, and after a few years say the wetlands are good,” said David Moreno-Mateos, a wetland ecologist at the Jasper Ridge Biological Preserve at Stanford University and the lead author of the paper. “But if you look at what’s really going on down there, you see the processes are not recovering.”

“One of the results from this study is that we need to undertake more specific restoration measures focused on recovering processes, not just nice, beautiful wetlands with ducks,” said Dr. Moreno-Mateos, who conducted the research at the University of California, Berkleley.

Before the 1960s, many people perceived wetlands as dank places to be drained or avoided, Dr. Moreno-Mateos said. But in the last 20 years, the governments of the United States Canada, and Mexico have poured over $70 billion into restoring more than seven million acres of wetlands.

Some developers deploy the strategy of promising to create or restore wetlands in one location in exchange for getting permission to bulldoze wetlands in another location. In theory, this sounds fair, but the results fall short, Dr. Moreno-Mateos said.

To quantify the success of restoration projects, the researchers performed a meta-analysis of 621 restored and created wetland sites around the world. Most of the sites were in the United States, and some restoration plots dated back around 100 years. They compared the sites with 556 natural wetlands that served as reference points.

The researchers found that hydrology seemed to recover immediately after restoration, but results varied in areas like the recovery of animals, plants and nutrients. Even after 100 years of restoration, the wetlands recovered only 77 percent of their original flora and fauna, on average.

Within five years animals like birds and bats returned, as did flying insects like midges. Other macroinvertebrates like water fleas took a bit longer, around 5 to 10 years, and these communities usually did not reach their original levels of richness or abundance.

Plants were even slower to recover. On average, they took 30 years to return but still remained less biodiverse and abundant up to 100 years after restoration.

The plant lag may be related to recovering carbon, nitrogen and phosphorus storage. After 50 years, carbon levels were still below reference levels, and it took at least 30 years for nitrogen to return to normal. All in all, restored wetlands regained an average of 74 percent of their biogeochemical components by comparison with the reference sites.

“When we lose wetlands we’re losing something we won’t recover for years,” Dr. Moreno-Mateos said. “When people develop that huge shopping mall, it will take centuries to restore the functions we had before.”

Some wetlands did recover faster than others, depending on hydrology, size and climate. The more water flowing through a site, the more quickly it bounces back to reference values. Larger sites also fared better than smaller plots, and the warmer the temperature, the more rapid the recovery. “In some warm climates, things go fast, but cold climates take forever,” Dr. Moreno-Mateos said.

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Read Original Study: Structural and Functional Loss in Restored Wetland Ecosystems