PNAMP

Greetings PNAMP Participant,

PNAMP is hosting the following meetings during the months of November and December 2010:
o November TBD - PNAMP Steering Committee Meeting

Please check the PNAMP calendar for recently added meetings as well as meeting updates, agendas, directions, and contact information.

Other meetings of interest for November and December 2010:
o November 2 - SalDAWG 2010 Meeting, Juneau, AK (see below for more information)
o November 5 - Analysis of Linkages and Trends in Climate, Stream Flow, Vegetation, Salmon, and Ocean Conditions Webinar (see below for more information)
o November 16 - Upper Columbia Habitat Adaptive Management 2010 Science Conference, Wenatchee, WA (see below for more information)
o November 17 - 18 - Northwest Power and Conservation Council Meeting, Portland
o November 18 - Oregon Invasive Species Council Summit, Salem (see below for more information)
o November 18 - 19 WABC Chapter AFS Special Workshop on Salmon Escapement Goal Science, Portland (see below for more information)
o December 1 - Washington Forum on Monitoring, Olympia, WA
o December 9 - 10 - Salmon Recovery Funding Board Meeting, Olympia, WA
o December 14 - 16 - Northwest Power and Conservation Council Meeting, Portland

If you would like your meetings posted on the PNAMP calendar or if you would like to be removed from this email list, please reply to jschei@usgs.gov.

Additional information. See below for the following conference information:
· SalDAWG 2010 Meeting (November 2)
· Analysis of Linkages and Trends Webinar (November 5)
· Upper Columbia Habitat Adaptive Management 2010 Science Conference (November 16)
· Oregon Invasive Species Council Summit (November 18)
· WABC Chapter AFS Special Workshop on Salmon Escapement Goal Science (November 18-19)

November 2 - SalDAWG 2010 Meeting (ADFG Headquarters, Juneau, AK)
http://us1.campaign-archive.com/?u=0b9d4588acdc0629c7898388c&id=a5d758fa20&e=4211064a37

Join us for the third Salmon Data Access Working Group Meeting. We've partnered with the Alaska Department of Fish & Game's Computer Services group in the Commercial Fish Division. They're holding their annual conference and we get to be a part of it. It's a great chance to learn more about data management, web application development, and much more from near and far. ***PNAMP will be presenting information about the Monitoring Methods Project at this meeting.***

November 5 - Analysis of Linkages and Trends in Climate, Stream Flow, Vegetation, Salmon, and Ocean Conditions Webinar
Space is limited.
Reserve your Webinar seat now at:
https://www1.gotomeeting.com/register/252582201
Daily, seasonal, and decadal variation in abiotic drivers (e.g., precipitation, fog, stream flow, and temperatures of air, ocean, and streams) regulate many ecological processes. However, the exact nature of the linkages between abiotic drivers and the direct and indirect effect of these drivers on species of concern and their habitat are not well understood. Specifically, abiotic drivers are commonly analyzed as individual elements and the linkages between drivers are poorly defined. In addition to understanding the basic linkages between abiotic and biotic ecosystem elements, the question of climate change is of increasing concern to land managers in the national parks. They need to understand how climate change has already affected natural resources and whether other changes may be looming. Without this understanding it is increasingly difficult to judge the effects of management efforts (e.g., stream restoration), evaluate the resilience of existing habitats, or plan future management actions. Climate change has been linked to more rain and less snow in the Sierras, identifying the need for management to address long-term water storage. In contrast, there has been a paucity of information depicting the effects of natural climatic cycles and anthropogenic climate change, aside from sea level rise, in coastal California and Oregon. Complicating a manager’s ability to respond to climate change effects is the common assumption of stationarity – the idea that natural systems fluctuate within an unchanging envelope of variability. The stationarity assumption is being compromised by major shifts in background environmental conditions.

In this webinar we will present our progress to date in assessing trends in climate, stream flow, stream temperature, and salmon populations in the San Francisco Bay Area and Klamath I&M Networks. For example, we are examining the linkages among air temperature, stream flow, stream temperature, and a documented fish kill in Redwood Creek in Redwood National Park.

November 16 - Upper Columbia Habitat Adaptive Management 2010 Science Conference (Wenatchee Convention Center, Wenatchee, WA)

Status of Spring Chinook, Steelhead & their Habitat
Please join the Upper Columbia Salmon Recovery Board (UCSRB) and the Upper Columbia Regional Technical Team (UCRTT) as we host the first Upper Columbia Habitat Adaptive Management Science Conference. The Adaptive Management Science Conference is an opportunity for stakeholders from the public, project implementers, local government, state and federal agencies, and tribes to learn about and discuss the UCRTT 2010 Analysis Workshop Synthesis Report, which evaluates the current status of spring Chinook salmon and steelhead, and the implementation of actions to sustain and improve their habitat.

Register now! Free registration at uchabitatconference.eventbrite.com
For more information, please visit www.ucsrb.com

November 18 - Oregon Invasive Species Council Summit (Chemeketa Eola Viticulture Center, Salem, OR)

The Oregon Invasive Species Council is hosting a statewide invasive species summit on November 18, 2010 at the Chemeketa Eola Viticulture Center on Doaks Ferry Road in Salem from 8:30 am to 4:30 pm. The purpose of the summit is to share and discuss the recent results of Oregon's statewide management assessment of invasive species, develop and identify high priority strategies to address invasive species management issues as part of a statewide strategic plan, and introduce and discuss invasive species legislative concepts that will be proposed during the 2011 Oregon legislative session. Your presence and active participation at this one-day summit is needed to ensure the discussion is representative of local issues around the state, but moves Oregon towards articulating the highest priorities to monitor and manage invasive species.

Please RSVP to OISC Coordinator Lisa DeBruyckere at lisad@createstrat.com if you are attending the summit. Thank you.

P.S. Lunch will be provided, and an agenda is forthcoming.

November 18 - 19 WABC Chapter AFS Special Workshop on Salmon Escapement Goal Science (Hotel Monaco, Portland, OR)
http://www.wabc-afs.org/?s=Salmon+Escapement

Trout Unlimited will host this scientific workshop as part of a project funded by the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation and several other collaborators. The workshop will assemble technical experts who are working toward finding innovative ways to estimate the number and diversity of salmon that would fully utilize all available spawning, rearing, and migration habitats.

Estimating salmon escapement goals in the 21st century has become very different than in the past. We now understand that escapement goals are multi-dimensional and should include habitat capacity, salmon life history, biological diversity, ecological values, and environmental variation, as well as the simple number of spawners. Further, computational and simulation techniques are rapidly evolving. Researchers are engaged in a variety of technical investigations that are advancing understanding of the number and diversity of salmon needed to fill their various habitats.

There are three goals for the workshop:

· To briefly identify and summarize current methods used to set
escapement goals.
· To identify emerging research and modeling tools that can help improve
the scientific basis for establishing escapement goals.
· To identify opportunities to coordinate research and modeling efforts
for a new approaches to setting escapement goals that are
scientifically rigorous and address diversity as well as abundance.

The format of this workshop will include one day of overview and technical presentations on the state of the science of salmon escapement goal estimation under the topic: Current methods and recent developments in modeling techniques for advancing escapement goal estimation. This will include how escapement goals are currently set, but will emphasize emerging tools that could be used to incorporate the latest scientific information in the establishment of escapement goals. The second day will consist of a facilitated brainstorming session on the topic: What is the most promising course for further development of capacity- and life-history-based escapement goal estimation?

We plan to document the findings and conclusions of the workshop. The results will be used to formulate a research plan for the research project. Additionally, some of the findings will feed into a publishable manuscript about the past, present, and potential future
of escapement goal estimation and its importance to wild salmon recovery.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Jacque Schei
5501A Cook-Underwood Road
Cook, WA 98605
office: 509.538.2299 x282

Good News

Finally some good news from Burma

"Burma has said it plans to release Aung San Suu Kyi, the imprisoned opposition leader, after it stages widely derided parliamentary elections next month ... Burma has kept the opposition leader under confinement or arrest for almost all of the two decades since her National League for Democracy (NLD) won a landslide in the elections in 1990 that were later annulled."

Of course she will be released after the elections, but hey, that is a start.

In other good news the wife of the Nobel peace prize recipient was able to tell her husband (who is in jail for speaking out against the human rights policies of China) of the award.

Finally "Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, president of Liberia and the first woman ever elected head of state on the continent of Africa...She has a master’s degree in public administration from Harvard and a reputation for fiscal vigilance dating back to her rise through Liberia’s financial ministry in the late 1960s and ’70s. By the ’80s, her stances against dictatorial repression and official plundering earned her a sentence to prison and years in exile. " http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/24/magazine/24sirleaf-t.html

Although well-behaved women rarely make history, they rarely go to jail.

Gulf Oil Still Present

Large swaths of oil were discovered floating toward Louisiana marshes earlier this month. Follow the link to read more.

Global Food Crisis and Food Security

From the Guardian ".. opinions are sharply divided over whether these prices signal a world food crisis like the one in 2008 that helped cause riots in 25 countries, or simply reflect volatility in global commodity markets as countries claw their way through recession... A food crisis on the scale of two or three years ago is not imminent, but the underlying causes [of what happened then] are still there," said Chris Leather, Oxfam's food policy adviser... Prices are volatile and there is a lot of nervousness in the market. There are big differences between now and 2008. Harvests are generally better, global food stocks are better... But other analysts highlight the food riots in Mozambique that killed 12 people last month and claim that spiralling prices could promote further political turmoil."

Food is very expensive on the coast, if you want to eat well. There is, like most of America, an abundance of cheap, nutrient poor foods, or foods from around the world, but local garlic can run from $1-2 a head!!! Local, sustainable, filling, is really expensive.

2 cents

Disclaimer* - We are an a-political organization!!! The following is meant for information only. Please don't take offense, and if you are join the discussion and have your say :)

I ran across two interesting pieces regarding the tea-party. The first from the wall street journal basically stating that the tea-party movement is fundamentally American the other from a small newspaper in Louisiana basically stating that the tea-party movement is racist.

From the Wall Street Journal, 'Why Liberals Don't Get the Tea Party Movement - Our universities haven't taught much political history for decades. No wonder so many progressives have disdain for the principles that animated the Federalist debates... the tea party movement is inspired above all by a commitment to limited government. And that does distinguish it from the competition... Those who doubt that the failings of higher education in America have political consequences need only reflect on the quality of progressive commentary on the tea party movement. Our universities have produced two generations of highly educated people who seem unable to recognize the spirited defense of fundamental American principles, even when it takes place for more than a year and a half right in front of their noses."

From the Louisiana Weekly, "The TeaParty.org faction is led by the executive director of the Minuteman Project, a nativist organization that has in the past been associated with the murder of migrant Mexican workers as part of its vigilante "border operations." Roan Garcia-Quintana, "advisor and media spokesman" for the 2010 Tax Day Tea Party and member of ResistNet, also serves on the National Board of Directors of the Council of Conservative Citizens (CofCC), the lineal descendent of the Council of White Citizens. In Texas, Wood County Tea Party leader Karen Pack was once listed as an "official supporter" of Thom Robb's Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, a modern-day white supremacist organization."

I guess Peter Berkowitz (author of the WSJ article) is unfortunately right. The desire to limit government has always been there from the beginning. American's wanted to limit the power of a foreign government to subjugate its citizens. Then they wanted to limit the vote to only white men with land, then black men were allowed but they were only worth 3/5 of what white men were worth. And of course they wanted/want to limit women for being the weaker sex.

I can't get behind a party that doesn't believe that all people are born equal and that the government should protect these freedoms. Racism is not something I support. Maybe not each person in the tea-party is a racist, but they are complicit in their parties support of racism.

I think the only reason to have big government is to protect our human rights: the right to a good education, good health care, good food, and good shelter. I also believe that we all have to work hard to secure these rights. Sometimes we have to work hard to secure these rights for others, but at the end of the day, do unto others. Thank you Berkowitz, I get the Tea Party, I even share some views, but at the end of the day it doesn't matter if I understand them, what matters is if I, and others join them. I may get it, but I won't buy it.

www.tea­party­tracker.org
http://www.louisianaweekly.com/news.php?viewStory=3451
http://theweek.com/article/index/208573/why-liberals-dont-get-the-tea-party-movement
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704631504575531913602803980.html

Finally, I think the US government could use a little shake up. Maybe increase the senate to 400 and the house to 1000? With a larger congress more voices would be heard which might or might not be better.

NOAA Video on Climate Change

Religious Law vs. Secular State ... in New Jersey?

This is really sad. A woman was denied the restraining order she requested against her husband in New Jersey. She sought legal protection after he beat and raped her for a period of weeks. The judge denied the request and protection citing that the husband couldn't be held accountable for his actions (which are illegal in all 50 states mind you) because they were permitted in Islam (which they are NOT mind you), the religion which the couple practiced. This is crazy, obviously, and was corrected later. I don't know what law school this judge went to but I hope this judge is an outlier in our criminal justice system and not the standard.

Oklahoma is poised to ban courts from citing Sharia (Islamic) law (I don't know if that includes only Islam or if they included all religions). Here is the real kicker: England already has five of these courts!!! I had no idea. It is amazing what you learn in a day.

I personally feel that religion and law have to be separate. Law is convoluted so that there is no misinterpretation, and there is still a huge grey area, people argue about what the word "it" means. Religion is black and white which is okay so long as we don't enforce it on others. Religion is most beautiful when it allows a person private communication with the devine which by definition is unique to each individual. This disappears when it becomes prescribed by the government, or any group of people for that matter.

I think western law works, mostly ... there is a lot of room for improvement. If we enforce the laws we already have in place then we don't have to make constitutional amendments like the one Oklahoma is about to make.

See the original article here http://www.gopusa.com/theloft/2010/10/go-ahead-beat-your-wife-just-dont-leave-a-mark.php

Mining Site Restoration

From the AP and KATU News,

RE: Restoration of an old mining site in the Applegate River Watershed.

"...the goal this year is to "weatherize" the operation before winter weather begins ... Rock catch basins have been built immediately downhill from where mining debris once lay... Those have rip-rap, then high density polyethylene liner and a couple feet of limestone ... We've drilled holes into the liner. As the water sits in the basin, it will percolate through and get the acid neutralized by the limestone. Each basin is intended to catch the sediment while neutralizing the water ... Original plans had called for a clay liner to be placed under the repository as well as on top, but it was decided the tough plastic liner would do a better job of enveloping the toxic material ... Slash is being used to provide erosion control in many areas. However, native grass seed has been broadcast in areas where soil remains. They also plan to plant some 15,000 young, native trees and shrubs at the old Blue Ledge Mine. "

Check out the entire article here http://www.katu.com/news/local/105523478.html

A to-do for the Columbia Slough

Save the date! The Slough Celebration will be held on Friday, February 4, 2011 at the Melody Ballroom. Help us celebrate our 2010 Slough Award winners in style, with a sit-down dinner, drinks, silent auction, and special entertainment. Reservations will be available for purchase in November.

But there is something we need your help with today - nominating people and projects for a 2010 Slough Award. Do you know of someone who has shown an extraordinary committment to the Slough? Or a project in 2010 that significantly improved the watershed? Please nominate these people for an award so we can recognize their excellence. All nomination forms are due on November 17th at 4pm.

Upcoming Events

Brew on the Slough
Thursday, Nov 4th, 6 - 7:30pm

Groundwater 101
Saturday, Nov 13th, 8:45am - 1:30pm

Time for some good news?

Finally - some good news for the Appalachians: Blowing Big Coal's Top on Mountaintop Coal Mining

Let's hope the same for those beautiful yellow aspen: Killer of Aspen Slows, but Worries about a Beloved Tree Remain

Text-based communication control for personal communication device

The company on Tuesday was approved for a patent for technology that would prevent people from sending or receiving text messages with objectionable content. Apple applied for a patent in 2008 that would allow for the censorship of text messages. Messages containing information deemed inappropriate would be altered or removed.

Find the patent here, http://www.freepatentsonline.com/7814163.html. Via Apple, either "a message will be blocked (incoming or outgoing) if the message includes forbidden content," or, "the objectionable content is removed from the message prior to transmission or as part of the receiving process." WOW!

Who defines objectionable? I am assuming this will be primarily used by parents, schools, the government, China (ha ha ha). Apple lost my business. I know that we are censored everyday but really? Censorship is a dark path to tread, a missed step or stumble and we are jailing people for speaking out against tyranny, I think this falls into the first definition found on dictionary.com , 1. arbitrary or unrestrained exercise of power; despotic abuse of authority. Now, in no way am I saying that the actions of a true tyrant are in anyway comparable to the censorship of text messages, but I am saying that all of the tyrants in the world are tyrants for many reasons, one of which is that they censor others.

Although one can clearly not say that Apple's actions are in anyway tyrannical, they do remind me to post the following:

The wife of the nobel peace prize recipient was disappeared by the Chinese police. Supposedly she was taken to the jail where her husband is kept, excuse me, serving an 11-year sentence for subversion in order to tell him he won. "Liu, the first Chinese citizen to win the Nobel peace prize, is a writer, 54, imprisoned since December after authoring Charter 08, a manifesto signed by thousands seeking greater democratic rights. His selection as this year's winner has enraged the government, which called him as a criminal and said the award was a violation of Nobel ideals and a discredit to the peace prize." From http://www.smh.com.au/world/mystery-over-peace-prize-winners-wife-20101010-16dzo.html

Dam Removal

River Design Group (a firm we are partnering with during a river restoration plan development in Baker County) are working to remove the last remnants of the Gold Ray Dam. What did they find when they removed the dam? Boats, a boat dock, unmentionables, and more mosquitoes than area residents care for. State and federal permits mandate that work in the water must be finished by Oct. 15 so that spawning fish are confused or hindered by sediment plumes and so that redds aren't buried as they are created. The deadline is for practical reasons as well for work in a river that can easily transport several full size Caterpillars during moderate flow is not safe during high winter flows.

From the AP "Gold Ray is the third dam in the past two years to be removed from the Rogue River to help salmon and steelhead runs. Its removal opened 157 miles of free-flowing river below Lost Creek Dam near Trail. 'It should make for a more stable, fish-friendly area," said John Vial, roads and parks manager for Jackson County. "Frankly, I think that stretch of Bear Creek and the Rogue River will look better than anybody's memories.'"

"When confronted with the idea of Microsoft acquiring Adobe, my visceral reaction was not that of an analyst or a journalist, but as a user personally and professional dependent on a variety of Adobe applications. That reaction? "PLEASE. NO. DON'T."

Read more: http://news.cnet.com/8301-17938_105-20019036-1.html#ixzz11zRChopT"

That pretty much sums it up for me as well. If Adobe were anything like Microsoft I wouldn't use it. Next thing you know MS will allow for direct editing of and track changes in pdfs. NOOOO!

I avoid MS like the plague, even when it makes doing business a little harder. My bread and butter comes from Adobe. This would be an unfortunate collaboration.

Now if Adobe bought MS, did away with all their sillyness and made MS more intuitive, that might be ok, but why rock the boat? What would the advantage be?

Habitat Restoration in the Coquille River Basin.

"This week, helicopters were used to put large logs in 16 miles of streams to create fish habitat in the Coquille River basin."

Check out the rest of the article at, "http://www.theworldlink.com/sports/outdoors/article_7a1ed880-d372-11df-bdec-001cc4c002e0.html"

Danube Update

From the Associated press "Monday's reservoir break at an alumina plant dumped up to 700,000 cubic meters (184 million gallons) of sludge onto three villages, government officials said, not much less in a few hours than the 200 million gallons the blown-out BP oil well gushed into the Gulf of Mexico over several months. The red sludge devastated creeks and rivers near the spill site and entered the Danube on Thursday, moving downstream toward Croatia, Serbia and Romania. Monitors were taking samples every few hours Friday to measure damage from the spill but the sheer volume of water in the mighty Danube appeared to be blunting the red sludge's immediate impact.

Test results released by Hungary's disaster agency show the pH level of the water where the slurry entered the Danube was under 9 — well below the 13.5 measured earlier in local waterways near the site of the catastrophe. That is diluted enough to prevent any biological damage, Interior Minister Sandor Pinter said.

Despite the apparent good news, the risk of pervasive and lasting environmental damage remained at the site of the spill, with Greenpeace presenting laboratory tests that it said showed high concentrations of heavy metals in the sludge."

We need to find an alternative to this way of life.

From Reuters "Crews were working to reduce the alkalinity of the spill, which poured out of the burst containment reservoir of an alumina plant on Monday and tore through local villages, killing four people and injuring over 150. Three are still missing. The spill's alkaline content when it reached the Raba, the Mosoni-Danube and the Danube itself, was still around pH 9 -- above the normal, harmless level of between 6 and 8. Fresh data from the water authority on national news agency MTI showed pH levels peaking at 9.65 in the Mosoni-Danube river at the city of Gyor. They were measured at 8.4 in the Danube. Crews were pouring hundreds of tonnes of plaster and acetic acid into the rivers to neutralize the alkalinity. In Gyor, a city in the northwest of Hungary where the Raba flows into the Mosoni-Danube, a Reuters reporter saw white froth on the river and many dead fish washed ashore." Check out the full article at http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE69415O20101007.

Also see the Christian Science Monitor http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Global-News/2010/1007/Hungary-s-toxic-sludge-reminiscent-of-2000-Romania-disaster-but-much-worse

"Removing the sludge, let alone beginning to rehabilitate the area, will take years, says Szegfalvi, adding that drinking water could become polluted as the toxins seep into the ground and into the water table. Agriculture will likely be impossible for many years."

New building for the Columbia Slough

The Columbia Slough Watershed Council has moved to a new building! Though still on the same parcel of land with great access to Whitaker Ponds, it was originally a private home that had sat vacant and boarded up for years. Thanks to a lot of work, several donations, and a furniture grant from Ikea, the council has been able to renovate the home into a much more functional working space. The largest improvement is a spacious flexible area for hosting workshops or other educational seminars.

Elemental Accounting

I heard an interview with professor Saleem H. Ali the other day, and was intrigued by his article on elemental recycling. He asks, "Many of us know what is inside our cereal boxes and other food items thanks to labeling guidelines, but how many of us know what elements are inside our computers or our clothes?" I certainly count myself among those who don't know how much boron is in their non-stick cookware.

A message from the president...

of Demeter Design (ha ha).

After almost 6 years, I feel it is important to thank all of the people who have contributed to the success of Demeter Design. Although there are certainly more people than space, I think one big "Thank You" sums it up. To our clients who work hard *every day* to make the world a better place, thank you. To our staff, THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU :) We couldn't have done it without you. I hope y'all feel it's worth it!

To our blog readers (there are over 400 now!), thanks. I am shocked you keep coming back ;>

Sincerely,

Cara Mico
CEO - Demeter Design