The most comprehensive online source of conservation news and events in Maine and beyond, edited by Jym St. Pierre
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Sincerely,
Jym St. Pierre
Editor, Maine Environmental News
MAINE MONITOR • September 21, 2025
When a campfire jumped its ring near a remote northern Maine lake last month, it took Maine Forest Rangers five days of ferrying resources by boat and digging away vegetation around the resulting four-acre blaze to stop its spread. Just a few weeks later, rangers returned to the area by helicopter, canoe and foot to douse a cluster of escaped campfires before they reached the surrounding 100 Mile Wilderness. Campfires and open burns were two of the primary causes of wildfires this August, when Maine saw more wildfires than in any other August over the last 20 years, according to the Maine Forest Service. What made the landscape more susceptible to wildfires might seem counterintuitive: a wet spring. Plenty of rain in May sprouted the growth of fine fuels such as grasses and shrubs. Then three months of severe drought dried them out, turning the Maine landscape into a tinderbox.
BANGOR DAILY NEWS • September 20, 2025
As visitation to Acadia National Park has soared over the past decade, social media has played a growing role in how people approach their trips. They often look to TikTok, Instagram and other sites for ideas, inspiration and travel tips. A decade ago, Facebook and Twitter (now called X) were the dominant platforms for people to share their photos and videos on social media. But in recent years, user-produced videos have exploded on other apps such as Instagram Reels, TikTok and YouTube, both from casual travelers and professional influencers. A spokesperson for the park declined to comment on what sort of impact social media might be having on visitation to Acadia, saying that park officials do not track or otherwise have data on it. Warm weather certainly is a factor in how busy the park is, but it’s unknown what other factors might contribute to high numbers at Schoodic or in the park more generally, the spokesperson said.
MAINE SUNDAY TELEGRAM • September 21, 2025
Stefanie Damron walked into the woods on the family’s property in New Sweden on September 23 of last year and has not been seen since. Federal and state authorities have mounted a massive rescue effort for Stefanie in the last year, combing through more than 4,500 acres of thick backcountry forest between Caribou and Canada with searchers on horseback, packs of trailing dogs and a half-dozen helicopters. It’s easy to get lost in Maine’s vast wilderness. It’s much harder to be found. There are about a dozen active missing persons cases in the area.
MAINE SUNDAY TELEGRAM • September 21, 2025
As Maine charts increasingly hotter and longer summers, businesses across all industries are planning for more weather extremes — and its impact on their bottom lines. Some are already feeling the effects of hot days on worker productivity and customer demand. Extreme heat manifests in higher energy bills at food banks, art museums and movie theaters. It can mean lower blueberry crop yields, but also longer growing seasons and new opportunities. It brings the dangers of uncomfortable — or unsafe — working conditions for those most exposed to the sun. And while Maine’s temperatures largely remain workable, business leaders say they are watching the thermometer, and their electricity bills, in ways they never needed to before.
MAINE SUNDAY TELEGRAM • September 21, 2025
This is in response to the column “Are Maine summers losing their magic?,” by Leslie Bridgers. The real magic in Maine is not found at water parks, but in the nature this great state provides. Ticks are a problem, but they are a problem for most woodland areas, and that’s why it’s important to take the proper precautions. The waters are as safe as ever. What’s more, this column also referred mostly to the Portland area. Portland is only a small piece of Maine, and other areas don’t share its problems to the same extent — like the heat. Maine summers have attracted visitors from all over since I was a little kid. There is something magical about them. That isn’t going away anytime soon. ~ Joe Lazaro, Vinalhaven
PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • September 20, 2025
We spend two nights and three glorious days at the Martin Ponds Lean-to, one of three shelters in the Katahdin Lake sector of Baxter State Park. The others are located on the south side and north side of Katahdin Lake. The shelter at the southerly of the two tiny Martin Ponds is a 2.3-mile hike from the Avalanche Field trailhead on the Roaring Brook Road. Katahdin Lake is a relatively new addition to Baxter State Park. In late 2006, after a long and complicated conservation deal involving a host of public and private entities, 4,100 acres around the lake were gifted to the park, finally fulfilling a long-held dream of Percival Baxter. Since that time, several other small private inholdings around the lake have also been acquired. ~ Carey Kish
PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • September 20, 2025
The U.S. Coast Guard is seeking public input on proposed changes to buoy placement in Maine waters as its works to modernize its system of navigational aids across the Northeast. The Coast Guard previously announced in April that it would be removing more than 300 buoys in New England, prompting confusion and concern among mariners. U.S. Sens. Angus King and Susan Collins, along with eight of their fellow coastal New England senators, wrote a letter to acting Coast Guard Commandant Kevin Lunday in June calling for the agency to hold off on the changes. The Coast Guard said last month that it would pause and adjust its plan. It announced Saturday that it is reopening public comment through Nov. 15.
PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • September 20, 2025
On Sept. 21, the autumnal equinox, events will be held all over the country to celebrate that clean energy revolution. And one of those events will be held right here in Portland’s Lincoln Park. In a nod to Earth Day, the day is called Sun Day. The event is sponsored by Third Act, an organization founded by Bill McKibben to support old hippies like me in their attempts to preserve a safe and flourishing home for their children and grandchildren. Earth Day was a bipartisan day of protest to protect the health and well-being of our lands and waters. It is my hope that Sun Day will also be a day that unites us as a community over our shared concerns for the future of our oceans, our forests and our children. ~ Kathleen Sullivan, Freeport
PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • September 19, 2025
Nearly half a million Mainers are drinking tap water containing amounts of cancer-linked chemicals that, while complying with state and federal limits, still pose a public health danger, according to a new study from a national public health advocacy group. The Environmental Working Group is calling for stricter regulatory standards for hexavalent chromium, arsenic and nitrate, and urging public water systems to invest in technology that could filter them all out at once. “The public health benefits are undeniable,” Melanie Benesh, an Environmental Working Group spokeswoman, said Wednesday when the findings were published, adding that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency “is moving too slowly.” She said: “Our laws haven’t kept pace with the risks from our tap.”
BANGOR DAILY NEWS • September 19, 2025
Once upon a time, wildlife photography was the domain of professionals with outrageously expensive gear. Then the world changed. Cameras became affordable. Digital replaced film. Big name manufacturers began an arms race to see who could develop better features faster — more pixels, higher resolution, quicker autofocus. The trend of birding through cameras continues to accelerate. The newest technology — mirrorless cameras — is rapidly replacing digital single lens reflex cameras (DSLRs). Many of these new cameras have autofocus so precise it can lock onto a bird’s eye. Use whatever camera you have — even your smartphone. After all, you probably paid more for it than I did for my old Canon. ~ Bob Duchesne
BANGOR DAILY NEWS • September 19, 2025
Gov. Janet Mills used visits to two businesses in Belfast on Friday to highlight various priorities her administration has set for responding to climate change in the state. She used a visit to a waterfront restaurant to highlight the damage that it and other places faced from devastating coastal storms that hit the state early last year. Her second stop was at Logix, a growing company that installs solar panels and heat pumps around Maine. Storms and flooding are generally expected to become more severe as human consumption of fossil fuels warms the planet. At Logix, located on Searsport Avenue, Mills expressed concern about disruptions to federal funding for solar energy projects under the Trump administration.
MAINE PUBLIC • September 19, 2025
Health officials in Maine say they are working with water utilities to stay below maximum contaminant levels for hexavalent chromium. That's after a report from the Environmental Working Group, or EWG, pointed to thousands of public utilities nationwide that had traces of the compound, along with arsenic, nitrate or a combination of the three. Exposure to these chemicals at high levels can cause harmful health effects in humans including cancer. But according to publicly available water quality reports, Maine water utilities that were flagged in the EWG report are in compliance with federal standards.
BANGOR DAILY NEWS • September 19, 2025
Plans to spend a half-million dollars removing toxic materials from a recreation building at the former Naval base in Cutler are underway, and more work may be needed before the building can be put to use again. The Washington County Development Authority was awarded the $500,000 grant through the Environmental Protection Agency’s Brownfields Program in 2021.
CENTRAL MAINE • September 19, 2025
115,000 fewer people crossed Maine’s border with Canada in August compared with the same month a year ago. That’s a drop of 28%. August’s numbers are in line with a growing trend established around the time President Donald Trump began to make disparaging remarks about the country, calling for it to become America’s 51st state, and threatened the country with a volley of tariffs. For months, Maine’s elected officials, tourism experts and business owners have wrung their hands in anticipation of how the president’s actions and rhetoric might impact the state’s economy, which relies heavily on tourism. “It feels like half our community is gone,” said Sarah, a Calais resident who declined to provide her last name.
MAINE PUBLIC • September 19, 2025
State biologists and game wardens pulled off an unusual feat this week when they rescued a young bull moose that got stuck in an old well in Pembroke. When Steve Dunham, a regional wildlife biologist with the state Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife, got a call about a moose trapped in a well in Pembroke on Wednesday evening, he says he wasn't sure what to expect. When he arrived on scene, he found a young bull moose he estimates to weigh around 500 pounds sloshing around in the bottom of an eight-foot-deep, hand-dug stone well that was hidden in dense vegetation on private property. Using a syringe on a long pole, Dunham dosed the animal with a sedative, then climbed down into the well, which had a few feet of water in it. With help from a crew above, he placed straps under the moose's body, and within an hour, an excavator had pulled it safely to the surface. Dunham said he then gave the moose an immobilization reversal drug, and off he ran.
PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • September 19, 2025
Three of Maine commercial fishing’s biggest players have purchased a former sardine canning factory in Prospect Harbor to launch a new seafood processing business. Curt Brown, Betsy Lowe and Pete Daley — all former coworkers at lobster processor Ready Seafood in Saco — started Bold Coast Seafood to expand Maine’s seafood processing capacities and bring jobs to the small Gouldsboro village. Building on Brown’s decades at the Gulf of Maine Research Institute and Ready Seafood, the company will also run a research lab “to improve our understanding of lobsters and the lobster resource,” Brown said.
PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • September 19, 2025
Native plants build climate resilience, expand wildlife habitat and support biodiversity. They provide essential food and shelter for pollinators, birds and other wildlife — benefits that far outweigh those of most cultivated plants commonly sold at nurseries. Native plants also help to protect our lakes, rivers and streams. Their interwoven root systems provide an anchor for the soil. When the current drought breaks and intense rain events return (remember the 14 straight weekends of rain this past spring?), native plants will absorb some of that rainfall, slowing the flow so it has time to infiltrate into the ground and keeping phosphorus, the nutrient that drives algal blooms, out of our waterways. ~ Tyler Refsland, Wild Seed Project, and Susan Gallo, Maine Lakes
PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • September 19, 2025
Although nothing official has been announced, Portland Pipe Line Corporation is expected to sell its holdings any day now, a development that would end its long and sometimes fraught relationship with the city and open up new possibilities to reimagine the land. The pipeline, a subsidiary of the Canadian oil company Suncor, owns more than 200 acres scattered across several parcels and is among the city’s largest landowners. Its assets include a 100-acre tank farm near the high school and four tanks and two piers by Bug Light Park that have been viewed both as eyesores and environmental hazards. The assessed value of the land is $38 million, but the city estimates it could be worth more than $100 million if the tanks were removed and the land cleaned up.
PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • September 19, 2025
In 2018, the Allagash Wilderness Waterway Foundation published “Storied Lands & Waters,” a document designed to honor the cultural and ecological legacy of the Allagash River. It was a chance to recognize those who carved out lives of meaning and permanence along its banks — Scots-Irish and Acadian-Québécois families who endured isolation, brutal winters and hard labor to build something lasting. But the document fails to recognize the hundreds of immigrant families, including mine, whose sacrifices and labor built a lasting treasure. ~ Greg Jalbert, writer and former Maine Guide who grew up along the Allagash River
