The most comprehensive online source of conservation news and events in Maine and beyond, edited by Jym St. Pierre
PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • June 26, 2023
The runaway ram who eluded capture in Cape Elizabeth for weeks is finally back where he belongs. The ram escaped from Ram Island Farm on June 11 and was later spotted in local neighborhoods and near Crescent Beach State Park and Two Lights State Park. The 150-pound ram bolted when it was being placed in a pen after being relocated from its home on Richmond Island so it could be shorn. The ram was caught over the weekend by a team of volunteers.
MAINE PUBLIC • June 26, 2023
What are the factors that shape the forests, mountains, wetlands, and streams around us and how do we recognize their importance? Ecologist and author Noah Charney helps us learn important clues to the ecological history of different sites and also how to apply them to the stewardship of Maine's land and waters—including our own backyards. Panelists: Noah Charney, author and Assistant Professor, Department of Wildlife, Fisheries, and Conservation Biology at University of Maine; VIP Caller: Susannah B. Lerhman, Adjunct Research Professor / Research Ecologist, USDA Forest Service Northern Research Station.
BANGOR DAILY NEWS • June 26, 2023
Last week ended with a fight between Gov. Janet Mills and organized labor over the fate of a crucial offshore wind measure. She is now being pushed and pulled by different interests as a final decision looms. The bill in question began as an initiative from the Democratic governor to change environmental standards in a way that will allow for the development of offshore wind ports. But the Senate passed a version tacking on language from another bill that would require project labor agreements, a type of collective bargaining deal between unions and companies. That led to a veto threat from Mills. Her making good on it would either push the sides toward a compromise or delay things further in the nascent energy sector.
WASHINGTON POST • June 26, 2023
In some areas of the country, devastating precipitation is becoming more common as the world grows warmer, according to new data released Monday by the nonprofit First Street Foundation. As climate change fuels more extreme rain events, including in the Northeast, the old assumptions are no longer sufficient.
MAINE PUBLIC • June 26, 2023
Forecasters say Maine has recorded nearly 5 inches of rain this month so far, making June one of the wettest on record. The National Weather Service says the last wet June was in 2019 with 5.85 inches. Meteorologist Jon Palmer said despite the very dry conditions the state experienced during the last few years, a wet fall and winter and a healthy snowpack make drought unlikely any time soon.
PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • June 26, 2023
Of all the urgent problems House Republicans could be tackling – gun violence, voting rights, climate change – they are using some of their power to fan the flames of a cultural war over gas stoves. The Republican-controlled House recently passed legislation that purports to respond to a nonexistent problem: The unfounded fear that the feds are trying to seize people’s gas stoves (which they’re not) or ban them (they’re not doing that, either). This move is part of a broader Republican-led push to restrict government’s power to protect people from pollution while propping up the fossil fuel industry. As Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) put it earlier this year, “God. Guns. Gas stoves.” Those priorities are wildly misplaced and should be laughed out of the chamber. ~ Los Angeles Times editorial
PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • June 26, 2023
By now it should be obvious that climate change will not spare any human, plant or animal on Earth. Mainers are already experiencing warming of the Gulf waters (jeopardizing the lobster industry), shorter periods of snow cover (jeopardizing winter recreation) and smoke from faraway wildfires (jeopardizing health). We must tackle this problem differently than we have so far, and soon. The world’s scientists and engineers must step up where governments have not or cannot. Scientists and engineers must stop the ship from sinking, not just tell us repeatedly how much it is sinking. They must discover and deploy the technological solutions we need to avoid devastating climate change. ~ Arthur B. Weissman, former president and CEO of the environmental certification organization Green Seal
PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • June 26, 2023
The recent rate hikes granted to Central Maine Power and Versant really hurt when we reflect that both of these companies charge us 49% more than the consumer-owned utilities, now serving 97 towns in Maine, charge their customers. For-profit, investor-owned utilities CMP and Versant not only siphon off our dollars to enrich foreign corporations and the emir of Qatar, but also overcharge us $156 million per year for inferior service. We can do better (and cheaper!) than this. Please consider voting “yes” on the ballot initiative this November to replace CMP and Versant with Maine’s first statewide, consumer-owned utility, Pine Tree Power. Get the facts at ourpowermaine.org. ~ Bill Hammond, Barters Island
PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • June 26, 2023
Small-business owners are always worrying about work. We appreciate any degree of certainty and consistency. If voters approve Pine Tree Power’s referendum to create a state electric utility, we’ll be faced with even more uncertainty and far less consistency. We’ll be subjected to an untried, untested idea fraught with many unknowns. The biggest unknown is cost. Estimates are all in the billions of dollars. It’s unknown, too, how long it will take for the courts to finalize what will be an unprecedented takeover of two existing private utilities. All that time, businesses will have to keep operating without knowing what to expect next. We certainly can’t afford to take a multibillion-dollar risk on a bad idea. ~ Marcia Feller, Falmouth
BANGOR DAILY NEWS • June 26, 2023
It was a long, wet, cool spring across the state. The unusually poor weather is likely to impact hunters in the fall. Grouse living in areas of Maine that experienced considerable rain and colder temperatures in late May and early June, when the females are sitting on eggs, are likely to have suffered losses. Unlike other species, which may not reach a suitable size during the first five months of life, ruffed grouse are big enough to be “harvested” in the fall of the year in which they are born.
BANGOR DAILY NEWS • June 26, 2023
With nearly 90 percent of the state covered by forests, Maine has the highest rate of forest coverage in the country, and most of Maine’s 1.3 million residents live outside densely developed urban centers, meaning their homes could be at risk of damage or destruction from a forest fire that spreads into their neighborhoods. Large-scale forest fires — which in recent years have attracted a lot of attention in the western U.S. and Canada as climate change has helped millions of acres go up in flames — have happened in Maine before and could happen again. Mainers battled widespread forest fires in 1825, 1908 and 1947, but a good example of the potential Maine now faces occurred less than a month ago in Nova Scotia, less than 100 miles away from Maine. Wildfires there in late May and early June destroyed hundreds of homes, temporarily displaced thousands of people and burned tens of thousands of acres.
MAINE MONITOR • June 25, 2023
Housing matters. “We can’t beat the climate crisis without rethinking land use,” said the authors of a 2021 report from the Brookings Institution. At a workshop in Bar Harbor last month, the word of the night was “density.” “Build up, not out!” one participant shouted excitedly. Heads nodded and a murmur of agreement swept through the room. The density advocates in Bar Harbor may get their wish. A law signed last year by Governor Mills, LD 2003, essentially bans single-family zoning, requiring municipalities to allow two to four units per house lot, depending on certain conditions, and allows developers to build 2.5 times the number of units allowed under local zoning if they meet affordability criteria.
KENNEBEC JOURNAL • June 25, 2023
While many residents and officials in the communities along an unused rail corridor from Brunswick to Augusta have said they would like to see trains return, a vast majority of the dozens of people who spoke at a recent public hearing believe it would be so costly it could never happen. So they want the state to pull up the railroad tracks and replace them with a 10-foot-wide trail to provide what many believe would bring significant recreational and economic benefits to the communities through which the tracks now pass. An advisory council formed by the state in November 2022 has until the end of August to make a recommendation.
MAINE PUBLIC • June 25, 2023
The Department of Environmental Protection reports that smoke began to move into northern Maine early Sunday morning and was expected to move south and west during the day. Martha Webster, Air Quality Meteorologist with the DEP, says areas of Maine away from the coast will have some degree of smoke and it may be heavy at times. Monday's forecast is expected to improve with moderate particle pollution throughout the state.
MAINE MONITOR • June 25, 2023
The US Fish and Wildlife Service is exploring the creation of a new national wildlife refuge in the High Peaks area of the western Maine mountains, a proposal aimed at protecting wildlife and preserving access to recreational areas — but also one raising concerns among some area residents. The agency is studying roughly 200,000 acres straddling the Appalachian Trail, with an eye toward creating a refuge of between 5,000 and 15,000 acres. The refuge would not necessarily be made up of contiguous property, but instead could be made up of individual tracts of land whose owners would be “willing sellers.” Bob Carlton, one of the county commissioners, has been an outspoken critic. He said much of the land is already protected by the state and various land trusts, and he doesn’t want an additional layer of federal control.
MAINE SUNDAY TELEGRAM • June 25, 2023
One helpful thing when communicating about birds is that we generally have an agreed-upon set of names for each species, set by the American Ornithological Society. Bird names can also lead to befuddlement, though, and it’s usually because of the colloquial names we use. Take the term “sea eagle.” 99.99% of the eagles that we see in Maine are bald eagles. But people also refer to bald eagles as sea eagles, and in fact, that is actually what their scientific name, Haliaeetus leucocephalus, means. There is, of course, one other sea eagle we need to discuss: the Steller’s Sea-Eagle. This enormous eagle from eastern Siberia made headlines the last two winters. This lone individual strayed to Maine, spending subsequent seasons around Georgetown. This species is actually in the same genus as bald eagle, though its name, Haliaeetus pelagicus, means it is the “sea-eagle of the sea.” ~ Maine Audubon Staff Naturalist Doug Hitchcox
MAINE SUNDAY TELEGRAM • June 25, 2023
Paddle in the wake of Kennebec River history on a 3-mile trip up to Augusta from the beautiful riverside town of Hallowell. You will be plying waters sailed on by Benedict Arnold on his 1775 journey to Quebec City, and waters gazed out over by General Winfield Scott in 1838. Scott was sent to the Augusta Arsenal to deescalate the heated border dispute between Maine and Canada. ~ Michael Perry
PORTLAND PRESS HERALD • June 25, 2023
The U.S. is averaging twenty billion-dollar weather events per year, causing an estimated $149 billion in damages annually. Among those most at risk are our small businesses, which often operate on thin margins. In Maine, small businesses make up 99% of all businesses. For these businesses, climate change isn’t an abstract problem. It is a present-day threat. Climate change has had, and will continue to have, significant effects on some of our state’s heritage industries: fishing, forestry, and agriculture. “Blue economy” businesses that want to better understand their risk exposure and develop action plans to become more resilient can also seek technical assistance and support from ClimateWork Maine, the Gulf of Maine Research Institute and a network of other organizations around the state. ~ Jared Wildwistle, Gulf of Maine Research Institute and Jeff Marks, ClimateWork Maine
MAINE SUNDAY TELEGRAM • June 25, 2023
Thanks to Kathleen Sullivan for her excellent June 18 column (“Commentary: Action is the antidote to despair over climate change”), a call to action that all of us can personally use to change the climate direction that our planet is careening toward. I would add two more actions we can all consider: 1. When you need a new car, consider an electric vehicle, and 2. Support climate fee and dividend legislation, which charges the folks profiting from pollution a fee for their mess, and returns the money to citizens. ~ Barbara Bowling
Oakland
KENNEBEC JOURNAL • June 25, 2023
Hallowell won big with L.D. 230 being signed into law. The bill allows the sale of Maine National Guard land that is within the Hallowell Recreation Area, “the Res,” to the City of Hallowell. This will allow this parcel of land to be managed in harmony with the rest of the Res area and it will be protected in perpetuity. The acquisition of this parcel will also provide trail users from Hallowell, Manchester, and beyond, contiguous open space for enjoyment and recreation. ~ George Lapointe, Mayor of Hallowell
