Paul Cipywnyk's Blog

Snow in South Burnaby, Jan. 15, 2012

Ron McLean Park

Trees are confused this year as these alders are prepared to pollinate,
only to be hit by snow

More budding plants in the snow

Heading down into the ravine

An old stump from logging many decades ago

Byrne Creek looks even more lovely, dusted with snow

Yumi checks out a pool in the creek

Trusty Taiga Gore-Tex Jacket Gets Deserved Wash

After some three months of patrolling Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby for spawning salmon, I gave my Taiga Gore-Tex jacket a thankful wash today. It was muddy, it was, um, a tish rank, but it's served me well for at least six or seven years now, if not longer.

Byrne Creek Spawning Salmon Data for 2011

Some good news!

Here are our final spawner numbers for Byrne Creek for 2011:

COHO

Female spawned         9
Female unspawned    4

Male spawned         5
Male unspawned    3

Total of 21 coho

CHUM

Female spawned         2
Female unspawned    1

Male spawned          5
Male unspawned    7

Total of 15 chum

Grand total of 36 spawners

Also noted 14 large, distinct redds (nests of eggs) spread between the artificial
spawning channel and the lower part of the ravine.

For comparison:

2010: 5 chum/8 coho total 13
2009: 6 chum/4 coho total 10
2008: 25 chum/8 coho total 33
2007: 15 chum/7 coho total 22
2006: 27 chum/8 coho total 35
2005: 17 chum/26 coho total 43
2004: 67 chum/24 coho total 91

NOTES:

1) We patrolled the creek 22 times between mid-October to the end of
December (average of ~2.2 times/week).

2) Fish arrived late this year, and the run extended later than usual.
Spotted our first fish (coho jack) on Oct. 24, and last fish, a spawned
coho female, on Dec. 30. Usually we start seeing fish from around
October 15-17, and rarely see anything past mid-December.

3) As you can see, we don't get an even match between spawned females
and "spawned" males. We realize it can be difficult to determine if male
fish have spawned or not, but if sacs are empty, or loose, we call them
spawned. If firm and full, not spawned.

4) I haven't got this all in Excel yet, so hard to do other comparisons,
but we had the sense that fish were smaller this year, both chum and
coho. If I flip through my notes, nearly all fish (eye to base of tail)
were in the 46-54cm range, with only a couple larger with the largest at
58cm. We certainly used to get larger fish of both species.

5) While of course we miss a few fish to predation and heavy flows, our
methodology is consistent from year to year. We patrol the spawning
stretch from Byrne Bridge up to the bottom of the stairs in the ravine
at least twice a week, and "process" every mort we find.

Looking forward to fry-spotting in a few months!

Total Environment Canada ‘Enforcement’ Over 2o Years Less Than Toronto Library Fines in 1 Year

Is this for real?

I ran across this article with some astounding figures regarding [lack of] Environment Canada enforcement of the the Canadian Environmental Protection Act.

In a single year, the Toronto Public Library levied more fines for overdue books ($2,685,067 in 2009) than the total amount of fines obtained by Environment Canada in more than two decades (1988-2011) of enforcing the Canadian Environmental Protection Act, ostensibly this country's most important pollution law ($2,466,352).

It's a powerful read.

http://www.ipolitics.ca/2011/12/20/its-time-to-start-cracking-down-on-environmental-crime/

PM Harper Worries About $ From Democratic Ally, Ignores $ from Dictatorship-Controlled Corp.

This Vancouver Sun story focussed on the FUD (fear, uncertainty and doubt) of US NGOs providing some funding for Canadian NGOs to oppose the Northern Gateway pipeline.

The story began thus:

Prime Minister Stephen Harper said Friday he is worried foreign cash is being used to stall the hearing process for the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway pipeline.

and after several hundred words, ended with the following paragraph:

Enbridge has said it has 10 industry supporters for the pipeline project, each of which is putting up $10 million to back it through the regulatory process. Identified supporters include China's second-largest oil producer, Sinopec.

Isn't that what we called "burying the lead" back in journalism school?

Industry, including a company controlled by the anti-democratic Chinese dictatorship, is putting up a total of $100 million to back the proposal. And this raises no concerns for our nation's leader?

Yet he's concerned about donations by citizens of a fellow democracy that is our greatest ally.

Does Harper really fear Canadian citizens, and citizens of the US, more than a totalitarian-controlled corporation committing $10 million to influence Canadian policy?

Good News Story on Salmon Spawning in Byrne Creek in Burnaby Now

The Burnaby Now interviewed me about spawner numbers in Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby, BC. In a nutshell, this is the first salmon spawning season in several years in which streamkeepers have counted in increase in salmon. After terrible combined chum & coho numbers of just 13 in 2010 and 10 in 2009, we found 36 this year. More details in this post.

And here's the Burnaby Now story.

Salmon Spawning Season Ends on Byrne Creek?

Happy New Year everyone!

It appears the salmon spawning season on our beloved Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby may be over. I found one dead coho female yesterday (unusually late in the year), and today Yumi and I didn't see any salmon, dead or alive.

It was a good season, though. Over the course of 22 creek patrols from Oct. 15 to Dec. 31, streamkeepers tallied 36 salmon, 15 chum and 21 coho - those are fish that have been found dead (salmon die when they return to fresh water to spawn), measured, sexed, and cut open to see if they have spawned or not. That's the first upturn in several years on our battered urban creek, and nearly triple the count of only 13 last year.

There are also at least 14 redds, or nests of eggs laid by salmon in the creek, so we can look forward to seeing baby fry in the spring, assuming the water stays free of pollutants.

Thanks to all the volunteers!

Note: streamkeepers are trained to monitor spawning salmon, and collect data on live and dead fish. It is illegal to interfere with, or harm, spawning salmon.

Soap Enters Burnaby’s Byrne Creek

Here's a simple video I made when I ran across soap coming into Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby via a street drain today.

Low Eagle Counts Near Squamish

Despite the rain, Yumi and I went up to the Squamish area to look for eagles today. Glad we went for while it was pouring in the lower mainland, it was only drizzling around Brackendale.

Unfortunately, the volunteers at the eagle run pavilion said numbers were low yet again so far this year, continuing several years of declines. The eagles depend on salmon that return to spawn, and while apparently spawner forecasts are up this year, the volunteers said that hasn't been reflected on the ground, or, er, in the water, so far.

Here's a shot taken today:

Unfortunately is was overcast and raining, so not much snap, tonally or colour-wise. Also had to juice the ISO on my Nikon to 3200 to enable handheld shots at 300mm (450mm equivalent on a 35mm film camera).

Huge Shelf Fungus Found in Byrne Creek

While we were patrolling for spawning salmon on Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby, Yumi came across this huge shelf fungus. It had fallen off, or been washed off, some tree it had been growing on, and was on a small gravel bar in the creek. After a few moments admiring its size, we placed it in the forest to continue what was left of its life cycle, and its contributions to the environment around it. It might be "dead", but no point in taking it home as a trophy, when its own decay will contribute to the riparian zone.

Byrne Creek Spawner Patrol Nov. 30

It was a glorious morning to patrol for spawning salmon on Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby today. Clear and sunny, with the air crisp and clean, the water clear. When you get focused on finding fish, you almost forget you're in the middle of a city.

A huge redd, or nest of eggs, laid by spawning salmon. It may be hard
to imagine, but three older farts in their 50s & 60s stood in awe at this
beautiful sight for a couple of minutes. This represents success-to have
salmon return to the creek against incredible odds, and lay the seed for
a new generation.

Autumn Colors Lend Poignancy to Dead Salmon Spawners

Late autumn is a visually glorious time. For many runs of Pacific salmon, it's also a time of death, and laying the seeds of rebirth, in a natural cycle.

While I accept death, it upsets me when salmon make it all the way back to where they were born, yet die before they can spawn, and lay the basis for a new generation in "my" creek, the creek that I and dozens of other streamkeepers devote thousands of volunteer hours to.

Today my wife and I saw nine salmon in the creek that flows through our urban watershed--Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby. One chum, spotted with fungus and near death, stolidly guarding her redd, the nest that she'd carved out of the gravel in the creek. Several expired coho, unfortunately most not spawned before death. And five live coho attaining their magnificent spawning colours, and still full of life, though they too, will expire soon.

I've got cans of salmon in my cupboard. I've got a couple of pink salmon in my freezer that I caught while fishing this summer. But I still hold a nearly reverent sense of wonder for these lovely fish that have travelled so far to come back to this struggling, oft polluted little creek in a big city.

Leaves and remnants of snow in Ron McLean Park near the tennis courts

A striking coho male

A coho female. We knew as soon as we pulled her body out of a pool
that she had not spawned. The bulge evident in her belly indicated
she was full of eggs

The stoic chum mum, nearly dead, but still watching over her redd

As always, I NOTE that it is illegal to interfere with spawning salmon,
and that streamkeepers have training, and permission from DFO, to
monitor and collect data on spawners.

Vestiges of Autumn Leaves, Dripping Water Along Byrne Creek

As I did a patrol for spawning salmon along Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby today, I kept stopping to take shots with my teeny Canon SD780Is pocket camera.

Coho Salmon Dying Before Spawning in Burnaby’s Byrne Creek - Again

The following photo shows a gorgeous male coho in full spawning coloration found in Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby this morning. There was a female coho, dead and full of eggs, just a few dozen meters away. Unfortunately, yet again we're seeing coho dying before they can spawn. Can't get the timing right? Urban pollution?

NOTE: It's illegal to disturb spawning salmon - volunteer streamkeepers are trained to patrol creeks and collect data for DFO.

It's so sad to see these lovely fish unable to fulfill their natural life cycle. They have travelled from creek to ocean, and back to creek, over several years and perhaps thousands of kilometers. They have overcome incredible odds - on the order of a thousand to one - to survive from egg to alevin, from alevin to smolt. To move out into the ocean as smolts and survive predation and fishing, and grow from perhaps 10cm to 60cm or more, and  make it back to the creek where they originated.

Remembering Burnaby Streamkeeper Jennifer Atchison

There was a ceremony of remembrance, dedication of a park bench, and a potluck gathering to honour Burnaby streamkeeper extraordinaire Jennifer Atchison today. Unfortunately, I and a couple of other folks were at a SEHAB (Salmon Enhancement & Habitat Advisory Board) meeting, and arrived late, but were generously excused, for Jennifer would have understood. She was active on the SEHAB board in her time.

I posted about Jennifer's passion and passing here, just over a year ago.

Here are a couple of shots of the bench overlooking Stoney Creek, which she loved so much.

Great Presentations on Rain Gardens & Stormwater Pollution at Salish Sea Ecosystem Conference

A few things that struck me today at the Salish Sea Ecosystem Conference in Vancouver:

Rain Gardens & Bioswales

The City of Delta has an agreement with its school board to build two rain gardens a year on school property, with kids doing the planting. The woman speaking from Delta said, "We're done with pilot projects. We know these things work. We want to make green infrastructure standard practice." Delta figures it spends around $15,000 per school rain garden.

Kitsap County over the border offers residents up to $500 in incentives to put rain gardens on private property, along with free technical consultations, and has a dedicated "rain garden program manager." How cool is that? She said a private homeowner can put in a rain garden starting at under $1,000. From a target of 100 private-property rain gardens this year, they've already signed up 76 homeowners. She also has a database with each rain garden in it, its location, how large an area it drains, what watershed it's in, what kind of soil it's in, GIS mapping data, estimates of how much each site can infiltrate, etc., etc. Yowza!

Various counties in Washington State are training and deploying "Rain Garden Ambassadors" and "Rain Garden Mentors" to educate citizens and encourage acceptance of rain gardens in neighborhoods.

The Puget Sound area has a target of 16,000 rain gardens by 2016: http://raingarden.wsu.edu/

PDF of a Washington State University "Low Impact Development" manual here:
http://raingarden.wsu.edu/documents/LIDManual_002.pdf

Effects of Copper Pollution from Road Wash on Fish

A researcher at WSU contacted me before the conference because she found stuff on my blog and on the Byrne Creek website about coho dying unspawned in Byrne Creek. She is researching that issue, and also the impact of pollution on coho smolts, and wanted to know if we could meet while she was in Vancouver for the conference.

I went to her session today and she's discovered that even minute concentrations of copper in water from road wash (brake lining dust, etc.) can impair or even destroy salmonid sensory organs including the lateral-line sensors, and the olfactory sense. The impairment happens quickly.

Back From Japan Trip Oct. 10-24

If any of my faithful readers are wondering at my silence, I was off in Japan visiting my wife's parents and doing some sightseeing for the last couple of weeks. There simply wasn't time to blog during the trip, but I'll slowly start catching up starting this week. Then again, I'm at the 2011 Salish Sea Ecosystem Conference in Vancouver for the next three days, so it may be a bit longer before this blog gets active again.

Paradise Valley Road

After spending the morning editing, I had to get out and clear my head, so I took a quick jaunt up to the Squamish area. I like checking out a few creeks and rivers up that way for spawning salmon, and sure enough, I could smell them before I could see them.

Spawner seen through the Tenderfoot Creek Hatchery fence

Paradise Valley Road

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers Assist in Edmonds Clean Sweep

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers participated in the biannual Edmonds Clean Sweep yet again. This event is sponsored by the Edmonds Business & Community Association in SE Burnaby the first Saturday in October, and the first Saturday in May every year. There was a bit of confusion this year as to organizational matters, but it all came together in a great event.

Thanks to Joyce Rostron, past prez of the Edmonds group, and Jim and Lindy McQueen of Gordon Presbyterian Church for pulling it together. The church did a great job of hosting the community with hot dogs, buns and condiments donated by Save-On Foods, and drinks provided by MLA Raj Chouhan.

At "our" end of the event, streamkeepers pulled in 37 volunteers! Thanks to all the Scouts Canada groups that participated.

And of course thanks to the City of Burnaby and its crews who provide this community cleanup with dumpsters and other support. Not to mention Burnaby RCMP and Community Policing volunteers who are always out in force for these events! And Translink security staff who help us out with our volunteer vehicles in the parking lot.

Signs pointing to our booth at the Edmonds Skytrain station

Filling the City of Burnaby provided dumpster to overflowing

Thanks to all the Scouts Canada volunteers!

Volunteers shoulder heavy loads to clean up the hood!

Streamkeepers and RCMP at the post-event social. No, the two
groups are not shunning each other, we get along great! Just didn't
grab a better photo. . .  The police know streamkeepers are eyes on
less-travelled parts of our wonderful parks, ravines, and creeks.
Burnaby has a great community policing program.

Edmonds Association past prez Joyce Rostron thanks sponsors and volunteers

Gordon Presbyterian Church volunteers feed the crowd

Moi center, with streameepers stalwarts Dave and Frieda

BC ‘Salmon-Safe’ Launch–PSF Invitation

I received the following from the Pacific Salmon Foundation today by email, and am reposting it here. The text and image are from PSF:

You're invited to the official launch of Salmon-Safe in British Columbia

Working with farmers to keep B.C.'s streams healthy for Pacific salmon to thrive

Wednesday | October 5 | 2011 | 3:00 - 4:30pm

At the Main Street Station Vancouver Farmers Market 1100 Block Station Street (along Thornton Park across from the VIA Rail Station and near the Main St Skytrain Station)

Complementary tasty creations generously prepared by Two Chefs and a Table, featuring seasonal produce from Salmon-Safe farms!

Salmon-Safe is a third-party certification program that recognizes farmers who adopt conservation practices that help restore Pacific salmon habitat in rivers and streams. The Pacific Salmon Foundation and Fraser Basin Council are the delivery partners for Salmon-Safe in B.C. The Salmon Safe initiative is funded in part by: Royal Bank of Canada Blue Water Project and the Living Rivers Trust Fund

Public Hearing on Condo Development & Byrne Creek Daylighting

I attended the Zoning Bylaw Amendments Public Hearing tonight at Burnaby City Hall regarding several rezoning & development proposals, including the consolidation of several single-family lots into a four-story condo development in the upper Byrne Creek watershed, including a proposal to daylight another 150 meters of the creek.

"Daylighting" means bringing a creek back to the surface from pipes it was buried in during urban development.

The plan looks good. I talked to a VP at Ledingham McAllister, the proponent, and he pointed out some creek-friendly features. A key one is that rather than having the usual concrete stormwater detention tank for a building of this size, they are proposing a wetland/rain garden between the building and the daylighted creek to slow and filter runoff. Cool!

I spoke to Mayor and Council that as streamkeepers we were pleased that the proponent and the City had come up with a progressive design that included higher density with daylighting and innovative stormwater management.

All in all it was great to come to such a hearing with praise. I think often environmental NGOs and various levels of government are viewed as being in conflict. Yes, sometimes that's true, and I will not shirk from some healthy criticism now and then, but I think it's also important to acknowledge when government and business get things right.

And I'm happy to say that this development/daylighting proposal looks right! This is all in the early stages, yet a lot of work has already been done, and kudos to all who thought about what was best for Byrne Creek during the process!

Burnaby World Rivers Day 2011

Note: the following information and images are from the Rivers Day organizers.

AT GUICHON CREEK

Sunday, September 25th, 11:00 - 3:00PM

You are invited to World Rivers Day,  a global event celebrating our planet's rivers. This year is the 6^th anniversary of World Rivers Day and the 31^th anniversary of Rivers Day in BC. Enjoy your time at BCIT's Burnaby Campus and learn more about Guichon Creek right here in Burnaby and the importance of our world's waterways.

Enjoy the following FREE activities (ongoing from 11:00 to 3:00 pm):

discover BCIT's latest stream improvements along Guichon Creek

help enhance the natural riparian habitat with Evergreen (and horse and buggy rides to the site!)

learn more about your local environment from a wide range of informative displays

browse tasty farmers market vendors

see live raptors with the Orphaned Wildlife Rehabilitation Society

enjoy a City of Burnaby ecosculpture exhibit

experience a portable climbing wall

Where is it this year?

This year the event is located at BCIT's Burnaby campus; between Canada Way and Deer Lake Parkway near Willingdon Avenue and Wayburne Drive in Burnaby (see map).

How do I get there?

Take transit, carpool or ride your bike!

Take the #25, #123, #130 or #125 bus (www.translink.ca). It's a short walk to the event site. Or ride your bike: the event is located on Burnaby's North-South Bikeway and near Willingdon Urban Trail. (www.burnaby.ca/cycling). Or you can car-pool! Visit the Jack Bell Ride-Share program website at www.ride-share.com to find your ride-match. Vehicle parking is also available and located nearby.

H2O

Drinking water will be available on site. Plastic bottled water is being discouraged this year in support of Metro Vancouver's Tap Water Campaign. Bring your eco-friendly bottle!

For more information visit: www.burnaby.ca/worldriversday

ALSO:

As part of World Rivers Day in Burnaby this year, help remove invasive plant species along STONEY CREEK with the Stoney Creek Environment Committee in North-East Burnaby. Go to www.scec.ca for more information.

A Slew of Salmon-Related Articles

East coast fishermen protest #Salmon farms, want to protect sensitive lobster habitat from pollution.: http://bit.ly/n5lW2Y

DFO not getting enough $ to properly study Fraser River salmon returns - Vancouver Sun: http://bit.ly/qtRcnW

Too many seals, sea lions shot at BC fish farms, say critics - Vancouver Sun: http://bit.ly/oRo69o

Fish caught in BC show no Fukushima contamination - Vancouver Sun: http://bit.ly/nQiplz

Salmon supported as BC Official Emblem - Vancouver Sun:http://bit.ly/o2ev0o

Article on coho salmon spawner mortality in urban streams. Similar issues on Byrne Creek in #Burnaby: http://bit.ly/o7nar3

Sockeye Feel the Heat - how rising temps affect salmon - Tyee: http://bit.ly/p9hHVl

As Feds slash Enviro Canada budget, international scientists worry about impact on climate research - CBC: http://bit.ly/pD2iLT

How does climate-change research relate to salmon? Heat. Salmon become prone to disease and exhaustion when water temperatures exceed around 20C.

And a good news story! Fish return to once-toxic dead zone near Britannia in  Howe Sound: http://tinyurl.com/5v4x3lr

Gray Day Fishing at Confluence of Fraser, Sumas in BC

Cousin Stacy took me fishing yet again. The day started out overcast and gloomy, and I got a few moody shots in the low light:

A heron competing with several boats

The day eventually cleared up somewhat and Stacy limited out on pink salmon, while I managed to land two.

A few more trips, and I'll be developing into a real salmon fisherperson : - ).

Seriously, as  I mentioned in a previous post, Stacy is a great coach, and he's a CMA to boot, so he takes continual improvement seriously!

Caught My First Salmon

I've never been an avid fisherman, but it's something that's always suited the camping / canoeing / hiking portfolio of activities that I love. I did some fishing as a kid growing up in Saskatchewan, mostly for perch and pike. I've lived in BC for over ten years now, and while my wife and I have done some lake fishing from shore and from canoe, we've never caught anything.

We've both volunteered as streamkeepers for around ten years, so we know and love salmon. We do eat them, though, so I figure there's nothing wrong with catching and killing a few salmon myself, given buying the license and having the opportunity.

I've been fortunate this summer that a cousin who is a focussed, experienced fisherman, and who has a boat, has taken us fishing several times on the Sumas and Fraser Rivers. Thanks, Stacy! He's also a great coach. I caught my first salmon, a pink, yesterday, and today I threw it on a cedar plank on the BBQ. Yum!

Me with my first pink.

Stacy with one of three he caught that day.

The other factor that makes such days wonderful, is that we both love to be out of the city, and on the water.

P.S. All you folks out there who buy salmon steaks, or beheaded & gutted carcasses, I encourage you to get a whole fish and have it bleed all over your kitchen sink while you eviscerate it. You can have your own "reality" experience without turning on the TV. Very educational for any kids around, too.

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers Society Holds First AGM

After over a decade of protecting and enhancing Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby, the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers became a registered BC society last year to fulfill volunteer insurance requirements. Today we held our first Annual General Meeting.

Here is the new board of directors as elected last night. Thanks to Abby Schwarz and Maho Hayashi, who stepped down, and thanks to John Sneep and Yumi Kosaka for coming aboard! Also thanks to all those continuing.

Paul Cipywnyk, President
Frank Williams, Vice President
Dave Burkholder, Treasurer
Yumi Kosaka, Secretary
John Sneep, Director at large
Joan Carne, Director at large

Here's my president's report as given to the AGM:

After operating for over ten years on an informal basis, the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers became the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers Society on June 11, 2010. We are breaking new ground here tonight with our first Annual General Meeting.

I am very pleased to have completed a year as president of the "new" society with everyone's support. I have to thank all who have volunteered with our group, and in particular I want to thank my mentor, Joan Carne, for teaching me so much about the creek, about cooperative community activism, and how to achieve things by bringing together as many people as possible, including all levels of government.

The inaugural board of directors for our first year:

Paul Cipywnyk, President
Frank Williams, Vice President
Dave Burkholder, Treasurer
Abby Schwarz, Secretary
Maho Hayashi, Director
Joan Carne, Director and Honourary Past President

As one of its first motions, the new board appointed Bert Richardson, Bob Fuller, and Lloyd Longeway as honourary lifetime members of the society in recognition of their founding roles in restoring and enhancing Byrne Creek. Joan Carne was also recognized with a Leadership Certificate for having chaired the informal group for over a decade.

Aside from gaining official registered non-profit society status, the activities of our group have changed little. We still paint yellow storm-drain fish, we still count bugs, we monitor returning salmon spawners, we remove invasive plant species, we do educational outreach at public events including creek tours, etc.

We also advocate for the preservation and restoration of the creek with all levels of government, and appreciate our good relations with the City of Burnaby Engineering, Parks and Planning departments, not to mention the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, and in particular our Community Advisor, Maurice Coulter-Boisvert. We also work closely with the Pacific Streamkeepers Federation, and other NGOs.

Rather than go through a long list of our activities over the last year in an Operations Report, I would simply refer people to our Byrne Creek Watershed 2010 Status Report (5.7MB PDF file) that is available for download from the website. I also have a copy here tonight should anyone like to view it.

I thank all the volunteers, and the folks who have said they will remain on the board of directors, and those who have put their names forward to join it.

Development Proposal in SE Burnaby Could Extend Byrne Creek 150 Meters

I came across some potentially exciting news for the Byrne Creek watershed in SE Burnaby, BC. A development proposal in the upper watershed in the Edmonds area could see as much as 150 meters of the creek brought back to life (in a process called "daylighting") from a section where it was buried and piped nearly 50 years ago. Thanks to ZoAnn Morten of the Pacific Streamkeepers Federation, who noticed the rezoning process mentioned in the Burnaby Newsleader, and who brought it to my attention. I got a copy of the report from City Hall today. It mentions ongoing efforts to restore and protect the creek by the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers. Here are a few highlights:

• Requirement for a detailed Sediment Control System during construction
• On-site stormwater management system for the new building
• Environmental review re daylighting the creek
• The report states that the creek was "enclosed in a storm sewer" in that area in 1962
• The creek would be daylighted for about an additional 150 meters from where it now exits the pipe. (That's more than I expected, but they are planning to close chunks of 17th St. and 16th Ave. and turn them into greenways, so I guess that adds more length.)
• The zoning is being changed from RM2 to RM3 to give the developer more height in exchange for the daylighting of the creek
• There will be "necessary riparian planting adjacent the daylighted Byrne Creek"
• Unfortunately, to allow for the daylighting, the underground parking and the larger building, all mature trees on the site will have to be removed

There will be a public hearing on Sept. 20, 2011, at 7:00 p.m. at Burnaby City Hall. If this is as good as it sounds, it would be a wonderful enhancement to our neighbourhood! I hope all goes well, and kudos to the City of Burnaby and proponent Ledingham McAllister Communities Ltd.

And if this daylighting could be extended further. . . : -). There's the huge Safeway property nearby up for development, and the ongoing enhancement of Ernie Winch Park, where the creek used to go. . . Yowza!

Final Summer Bug Count on Byrne Creek Reveals Some Beauties

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers finished a third and final summer weekend of bug sampling this morning, with samples from the last three of nine sites that we've been sampling twice a year for at least ten years.

These bug surveys give an indication of water quality, using a standard methodology in The Streamkeepers Handbook, which can be downloaded from the Pacific Streamkeepers Federation. Unfortunately, Byrne Creek rarely rises above the "poor" level, as it receives a lot of polluted runoff from its urban environment.

Here are a few of the more rare aquatic bugs (larval stage) that we found in the creek this summer:

Crane fly

Caddis fly

Dragonfly

Slew of Articles on Fish, Biodiversity, Environmental Assessments

I sometimes wonder why I put so much volunteer time into streamkeeping, when so much of the news is so bad so much of the time. Sigh. It's also so demoralizing when our federal government is not fulfilling its mandate when it comes to the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, and Environment Canada.

But what else can we do but keep trying?

Cuts to environmental assessments could lead to ecological disasters in Canada - Vancouver Sun: http://bit.ly/rsMoaY

Canada's Environment Minster warned that urban sprawl is hurting biodiversity - Vancouver Sun: http://bit.ly/pJLxO6

Ocean food chain threatened by overharvesting of small fish - Vancouver Sun: http://bit.ly/oCuLUl

Feds silence scientist over West Coast salmon study and the Cohen connection: http://ow.ly/5O35F

Coyote Kits in Byrne Creek Habitat

When I was down in the Byrne Creek habitat checking the sediment flow from the broken water main on Southpoint Dr. in SE Burnaby, I ran across a family of coyotes sunning themselves. The mom took off immediately, but the kits were curious until she called them away.

I continued home back up the ravine.

Southpoint Water Main Blowout Dumps Sediment in Byrne Creek

The City of Burnaby called me this afternoon to let streamkeepers on Byrne Creek know that a water main had blown out on Southpoint Drive in SE Burnaby, and that a significant amount of sediment had entered the creek through the storm-drain system. I went to check it out, and was relieved to find no dead or distressed fish. While sediment is not good for the creek, at least it's not toxic, and fish can usually find refuge in tributary creeks. When I got there, I'd missed the main action. Crews were doing a good job of cleaning the roads and patching holes.

I presume the above was the site of the break.

While much of the road had been cleaned up,
the flow down the hill was still evident.

It must have been quite the flow, because it deposited
gravel over the curb a hundred or more meters away.

Here you can see the flow where it had hit the new rain garden
at the Southpoint cul-de-sac.

The top of the rain garden looking downhill
toward Southridge Dr.

Some of the flow bypassed the rain garden
and caused some significant erosion along the path.

You could even see where water had flowed
along Southridge Dr. toward Byrne Park Dr.

This is the sediment pond in the Byrne Creek artificial spawning
habitat. The hole at the top is where the sediment flow entered the
creek through stormwater pipes.

A reverse view from the one above. As of around 4:00 pm,
the water entering the pond was clear.

Choices Supports Streamkeeepers Again

Choices in the Park will be having a by donation BBQ this Sunday, July 17, from 11:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. with proceeds going to the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers. Thanks to manager Greg Goossens and all the Choices staff.

Streamkeepers will have our booth set up, with great maps of the watershed, and lots of info on how you can make a difference to water health in your neighbourhood. Come on out, have a chat, and something good to eat! It's just steps from Edmonds Station on the Skytrain, and also just steps from the creek!

Photo from Choices/Byrne Creek Earth Day event earlier this year.

Firefighting Foam Enters Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby Again

Late afternoon today I saw an email from a fellow Byrne Creek Streamkeeper that there was a car on fire near his apartment and that firefighters were responding with foam. I had just come home from a walk around the creek and had not noticed anything. I pulled out my stormdrain map of the Byrne Creek watershed and noted that the area he referred to was right on the edge of the escapement. So I ran back outside and checked Griffiths Pond near the Edmonds Skytrain station. Sure enough, there was lots of foam coming down the fish ladder, spreading over the pond, and flowing downstream.

Here's how it looked at 5:15 p.m.:

Now we streamkeepers are a bit sensitive because runoff from a house fire in the watershed back in November 201o did kill a lot of fish in the creek. That was attributed to chemicals stored at the house, as firefighting foam is said to be non-toxic.

I did not see any dead fish at 5:15, and resolved to check again later in the evening. Here's how the pond looked at 7:15 p.m.:

Much of the foam had dissipated. I checked carefully in and around the pond again, and did not find any dead fish, or any in distress. I saw one alive, swimming just fine. I worked my way slowly down the creek about 75 meters, and also did not see any dead or distressed fish, and saw several darting about alive.

I'll check again in the morning, but, knock on wood, perhaps we have escaped yet another kill in our creek.

UPDATE [July 5, 2011]: I checked the pond this morning at 7:30 a.m. and it was clear. I am pleased to report that I did not see any dead or distressed fish. I also checked the sediment pond near Meadow and Southridge in the artificial spawning habitat, and again saw no dead or distressed fish. I did see several dozen live ones, ranging in size from about 8cm to 30cm. I should also acknowledge that I did not have time to backtrack the flow of the foam, so it is an assumption on my part that it was related to the fire in the upper watershed. I am assuming it was from the fire due to the timing of the foam's appearance, and its quantity.

Water for Life Benefit Concert on Global BC TV Sat. 6/25, 7pm

Don't miss this great show that combines the passion of BC and World Rivers Day founder Mark Angelo with the uplifting music of Holly Arntzen, Kevin Wright, and the Dreamband, along with a choir of 160 kids from Burnaby schools.

My wife and I caught this show live at the Michael J Fox Theatre in SE Burnaby, and are looking forward to viewing it again on Global BC TV.

Canada Day Bash in SE Burnaby at Ron McLean Park

Burnaby celebrates Canada Day on July 1 at a couple of locations, and the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers will be part of the SE Burnaby event. This year the bash will be in Ron McLean Park because the usual location at Richmond Park is under construction with the new & improved Eastburn Community Centre and Pool.

Streamkeepers will have our booth set up at the event, and will have bugs from the creek on hand for kids to view and identify. We will also be offering an approximately 1-hour tour of the creek and ravine park starting at 1:00 p.m.

Here's a view of the official City of Burnaby poster and you can download the full-size PDF here:

Two Byrne Creek Streamkeepers Receive City of Burnaby Awards

As president of the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers Society, I'm pleased to share that two of our members were recognized at the City of Burnaby Environment Awards today:

Louise Towell received an Environment Award for Communications for her work
as a founder of the Stream of Dreams Murals Society and spreading the word about
the importance of wetlands, creeks, rivers and oceans to the health of the world.
All Drains Lead to Fish Habitat.
Well done Lu and very deserving!

Denis Boko received an Environmental Star award for his work with Kaymar Creek,
for co-founding the Urban Forest Group, and for his work with Byrne Creek.
I'm sure we'll see more great things from Denis in the future!

In the two photos, Lu and Denis are receiving their awards from City of Burnaby
Councillor and Environment Committee chair Dan Johnston.

I'm also pleased that "fellow traveller" Alan C. James,
secretary of the Stoney Creek Environment Committee
also received an Environmental Star award.

Protocol for Reporting Dead Wild Birds in BC

I got an email from a member of the public who found me through the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers website, and who was concerned about having found 2 dead barred owls in Byrne Creek Ravine Park -- one about a month ago, and one today. So I found the following on the 'net and sent it to her, suggesting she call the number:

The British Columbia Interagency Wild Bird Mortality Investigation Protocol & the 2011 Avian Influenza and
West Nile Virus Surveys

An excerpt from this document, and link to it below:

Guidelines for reporting dead wild birds to Government Agencies

What to report to Wildlife Agencies:
1. Groups of 3 or more dead birds (any species) found in the same geographic location.
2. The following individual dead birds:
a) Species at risk (http://www.sararegistry.gc.ca/species/default_e.cfm)
b) Highly susceptible species (swans, ducks)
c) Raptors (eagles, hawks, owls)
d) Water adapted bird species (waterfowl in general, shorebirds, water-associated birds).

These wild bird mortalities should be reported by calling 1-866-431-BIRD (2473). Reports will be recorded, assessed to determine if further investigation is warranted, and if so, guidance will be provided on a case by case basis.

http://www.bccdc.ca/NR/rdonlyres/4158EACF-8CF5-493E-A19E-AB2EF6A99885/0/AI_1pager2011.pdf

I'm filing this away for future reference. Streamkeepers focus on fish, but are interested in any and all wildlife.

2011 Wild Salmon Music Festival

The 2011 Wild Salmon Music Festival looks like a blast! I may take in some of it, as I'll likely be up in the the Lumby area for the summer Salmon Enhancement and Habitat Advisory Board meeting the same weekend.

Why are Humans Rarely Included Among ‘Predators?’

Interesting article in the Burnaby Newsleader on predators being considered as impacting sockeye salmon populations at the Cohen Commission.

Salmon have coexisted with all the mentioned predators for thousands of years. I find it odd that there was no mention of the apex predator that's increased in numbers on the BC and US west coast from the tens of thousands to the tens of millions over the last century or two -- us.

Why are humans almost never considered to be predators?

Yes, of course human impacts are being presented to the commission, but I still think it's odd that we disassociate ourselves from other predators. We're fishers and farmers and managers, eh? We don't like to see ourselves as killers and eaters of other animals.

Burnaby Celebrates Environment Week

The City of Burnaby is celebrating Environment Week from June 5 - 11 with a series of events and activities on the theme "Waste Reduction - making a difference."

Schedule of Events here.

2011 Salish Sea Ecosystem Conference

Picked this press release up somewhere, and found it very interesting:

Announcing the 2011 Salish Sea Ecosystem Conference

Set for October 25-27 at the Sheraton Wall Centre in Vancouver, British Columbia, this not-to-be-missed event is the largest, most comprehensive research and policy conference in the region. The 2011 conference, co-hosted by Environment Canada and the Puget Sound Partnership, presents the latest scientific research on the Puget Sound Georgia Basin ecosystem.

This year's theme, "Many Voices, One Sea," provides a collaborative forum for discussing the latest environmental research and practices to protect this critical ecosystem. The conference brings together leading scientists, resource managers, government officials, business leaders, non-profit organizations, academia and other stakeholders. More than 1200 participants attended the last biennial conference in 2009. In 2011, we expect to include at least 800 participants, but hope for more.

The conference website www.salishseaconference.org, includes information on registration, sessions, the Call for Abstracts, sponsorship and exhibits. Abstracts will be considered for a range of topics, including water quality, air quality, climate change, species health, land use and restoration activities in the Salish Sea ecosystem. Abstracts are due May 27 and can be submitted online.

Sponsors will have ample opportunity to be recognized and demonstrate their commitment to a clean and healthy environment for our shared Salish Sea ecosystem.

Join us in furthering our collective understanding of Puget Sound and Georgia Basin. The program is packed with peer-to-peer interactions, field trips, cultural celebrations, knowledge transfer, and practical collaborations. Register now to secure your supersaver rate!

The SeaDoc Society will award its 2011 Salish Sea Science Prize at the conference (www.seadocsociety.org/ssp). Nominations for this award are due June 15. The $2,000 prize is given to highlight the importance of science in providing a foundation for designing a healthy Salish Sea.

We appreciate whatever you can do to help us spread the word about this important regional conference. If you have questions, feel free to contact Verney Conference Management, info@salishseaconference.org or Jennie Wang, Environment Canada, at secretariat@salishseaconference.org.

Mega Bugs, Cool Stones in Chilliwack River

The day being overcast and gloomy, I checked the weather up the valley, and it was supposedly sunny near Hope, BC, on this Easter holiday Monday. So we saddled up our Subaru and headed out. Unfortunately, we never got out of the rain, but we did have a great time looking at cool aquatic bugs and rocks with all sorts of permutations of colours at the Chilliwack River in the drizzle. When I see stones like these, I wish I'd taken a geology class or two. . .

Can you imagine what sorts of forces and processes created such patterns? Mind boggling. As I wrote to a geologist friend of mine:

It's so exciting to be out in nature and drinking in the sights. There is so much to see at every scale ranging from micro to macro... I dunno why so many folks are so oblivious and/or so uncaring! While I may feel ignorant, at least I also feel awed and intrigued, and am always eager to learn more :-).

 

Whenever we stop by a creek, stream or river, Yumi has to
start turning rocks over to see who is living underneath.

A caddisfly

A stonefly

Another stonefly, big and fat. We never get bugs this big
in our pollution-prone, urban Byrne Creek, where we
volunteer as streamkeepers

OK, now we get into the cool stones and rocks, which I
know nothing about!

And this was the coolest of the bunch. What looks
like water, or snow, or ice, is some kind of solid rock
"flowing" into the other rock

Sunny Earth Day BBQ with Byrne Creek Streamkeepers at Choices in the Park

Choices in the Park held another annual Earth Day by-donation BBQ, with some of the proceeds going to the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers among other community environmental groups. Thanks, Choices! It was a lovely, sunny afternoon, and we enjoyed being out with our display. We chatted with people who dropped by, and while walk-by traffic was a tad sparse, likely due to the four-day holiday weekend, a good time was had by all.

It was great to chat with Choices CEO Mark Vickars, Park location manager Greg Goossens, and all the helpful staff.

Several folks who dropped by asked about the upcoming community Clean Sweep on May 7, and said they were looking forward to participating.

2011 BC Endangered Rivers List Released

Kettle River tops BC's Most Endangered Rivers List for 2011 -

"Sacred headwaters" in second spot - list highlights issues such as the need for water policy reform and improved protection of northern rivers

The Kettle River has topped British Columbia's most endangered rivers list for 2011.

The Kettle River runs through BC's southern interior near the towns of Midway, Rock Creek and Grand Forks. This river, already suffering from excessive water withdrawals, seasonal low flows and high water temperatures, is threatened by significant new water extraction proposals near its source. The river is in dire need of a water management plan that recognizes there are clear ecological limits to the amount of water that can be withdrawn. Unless greater efforts are made to address this issue, the fate of this beautiful interior stream and its fish stocks may well foreshadow what many other streams in the region will confront in the face of ongoing climate change.

"Most importantly, the issues unfolding on the Kettle highlight the urgency of updating BC's century-old Water Act so as to ensure the needs of fish and river ecosystems are adequately considered before making decisions on water extraction for various industrial uses", said Mark Angelo, Rivers Chair of the Outdoor Recreation Council and an Order of Canada recipient. The province has just concluded seeking public input on Water Act reform, and new legislation is hoped for in the coming year. "Modernizing the Water Act creates a significant opportunity to improve the state of many waterways, including the Kettle", said Angelo.

In the second position is the area widely known to the Iskut First Nation as the "sacred headwaters" in that it nurtures the source not only of the Skeena, but also the Nass and Stikine, all great salmon-bearing rivers. Located on the southern edge of BC's Spatsizi wilderness, the sacred headwaters is home to an abundance of wildlife, including caribou, stone sheep, grizzly bears and wolves; to many, this area is the "Serengeti of Canada" said Angelo.

Yet, the sacred headwaters is also the site of a major proposal by Canada Shell to extract coal bed methane gas, a highly invasive process that would compromise the biological richness of the great rivers that flow from this area. If approved, a maze of wellheads, roads and pipelines would spread across the proponent's 400,000 hectare tenure. Given the intensity of such development, concerns include the likelihood of altered drainage patterns and increased siltation. Vast amounts of wastewater, high in salts and heavy metals, may also be generated in the extraction process. Current plans call for re-injecting this polluted water back into the ground but this is an untested method that could contaminate groundwater aquifers linked to surface flows.

While there is a temporary moratorium on coalbed methane development in the sacred headwaters, it is set to expire in 2012, at which point development could proceed. "There is widespread support for making this moratorium permanent, which would do much to protect the legacy of the great wild rivers that flow from this area", said Angelo. "The threats confronting this area highlight the need to be more proactive in protecting our great northern salmon rivers", added Angelo, who also chairs the Rivers Institute at BCIT.

Coming in at the number three position is the Peace River, currently in the midst of an environmental assessment relating to the proposed Site C dam.

In the fourth spot is the Fraser River, which for the 18^th time in 19 years, finds its way into the top half of the endangered rivers list. "Of particular concern this year are the development pressures facing the 'Heart of the Fraser' between Hope and Mission, one of the most productive sections of river anywhere in the world", said Angelo.

Coming in at number 5 is the Kokish River on Vancouver Island, southeast of Port Hardy. The river's salmon and steelhead stocks are jeopardized by a controversial run of river power project.

"As one scans this year's list, the issues and problems outlined are extensive and diverse, ranging from the importance of pro-actively protecting productive salmon rivers and ensuring that adequate water management regulations are in place to the need for improved riverside habitat protection," explains Angelo. "The list also helps to create a greater awareness of the various threats that confront our waterways", he added. "These issues highlight the fact that you cannot separate the health of our fish stocks from the health of our rivers; they are completely inter-dependent".

Each year, the Outdoor Recreation Council solicits and reviews nominations for BC's Most Endangered Rivers from its member groups, which total close to 100,000 members, as well as from the general public and resource managers from across BC.

For more detailed information on the rivers listed, please see the endangered rivers backgrounder at www.orcbc.ca

BC's Most Endangered Rivers of 2010;

1. Kettle River (water extraction, development)
2. "Sacred Headwaters" of Skeena, Nass and Stikine (coalbed methane)
3. Peace River (hydro-electric dam proposal)
4. Fraser River, "Heart of the Fraser"(urbanization, industrial development, habitat loss)
5. Kokish River (IPP proposal)
6. Morice (pipeline proposal)
7. Taku River (mining development, road proposal, leachate concerns)
8. Similkameen River (cross border dam proposal)
9. Elk River (development, increasing selenium levels, wildlife migration issues)
10. Coquitlam River (excessive sedimentation, urbanization)
11. Bute Inlet Rivers (IPP proposal)
12. Atlin River (impacts of dam and Whitehorse, Yukon energy proposal)

Media only: backgrounder details on each river is found at www.orcbc.ca

For more information, please contact:

Mark Angelo - (604) 432-8270                        Robert Gunn - (604) 451-6860                  

Edmonds Clean Sweep May 7, 2011

Come one, come all to the Edmonds Clean Sweep on May 7, 2011, in SE Burnaby. Sponsored by the Edmonds Business & Community Association, this event brings people in the community together to clean up their neighbourhood.

Meet in the parking lot of the Gordon Presbyterian Church at 7457 Edmonds St.

Registration: 9:45
Clean up: 10:00 - noon
BBQ (free for volunteers): Noon

Alternative registration site with the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers in the parking lot of the Edmonds Skytrain station - times the same.

See you there!

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers Release 2010 Watershed Status Report

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers in SE Burnaby have released their Byrne Creek Watershed 2010 Status Report. It's a 26-page document with lots of photos, maps, graphs and charts that depict the state of the watershed through several indicators in a format easy to read and understand.

You can download a PDF (5.6MB) for free from the home page of the group's website.

The report addresses lots of topics including monitoring of salmon spawning in this urban creek, resident fish populations, invasive plant species, pollution problems, etc.

Choices Supporting Enviro Groups with Earth Day BBQs

Choices Markets has been holding by-donation BBQs for several years now, with partial proceeds going to local environment groups. I see in the April Choices Newsletter that Byrne Creek Streamkeepers are again being supported by Choices in the Park. Thanks!

Earth Day
Saturday, April 23,12:00pm-4:00pm at all locations
Looking for products that are made by companies with earth-friendly practices?
Saturday, April 23, in recognition of Earth Day, Choices Markets will be showcasing
samples of environmentally safe household items and delicious local and/or organic
foods. We'll also be hosting donation barbecues and donating the net proceeds to
five organizations that are all lending a hand to help the planet:

Friends of Semiahmoo Bay Society
SOLEfood Farm
The World in a Garden
Byrne Creek Streamkeepers
Green City Acres.

Tree-Climbing Snails Appear Again near Byrne Creek

Though I've been walking the Byrne Creek trails in SE Burnaby for about ten years now, I did not notice tree-climbing snails until last year. Well, they're back at it again, with a tree-climbing slug thrown in for good measure.

All of the above were around 1.5 - 2 meters above the ground.

Trillium Crime Scene in Byrne Creek Ravine

I'm sorry to report that someone cut off one of the rare trilliums known to flower in the lower ravine. Cut it off clean and took it away, leaving just the stem.

I don't understand such selfish, inconsiderate behaviour. Even if someone didn't know that trilliums are protected in BC and are not to be removed from public or private land, wouldn't they notice that there was only ONE flower as far as the eye could see, not a whole field of them? Sheesh.

So much for the enjoyment of many who would have seen the flower go through its lovely colour stages...

The trillium starting to bloom on Tuesday, March 22

It was still there on Wednesday, March 23, when I led a tour of the creek
looking for salmon fry popping out of the gravel.

All that was left on Saturday, March 26

Video of Coho Fry in Burnaby’s Byrne Creek

Here's a rough video of coho fry born in Burnaby's Byrne Creek. The filming was done handheld at 640 X 480 with an old Canon S5IS digital camera, and edited with Windows Live Movie Maker.

Burnaby Marks 76 Trees for Removal, Trimming, Along Byrne Creek

The City of Burnaby has marked 76 trees for removal and limbing along Byrne Creek. This happens every couple of years, and is due to them being regarded as "danger trees" that could topple in a windstorm and potentially hurt people or damage property. While Byrne Creek Streamkeepers recognize the need to remove trees that are dead or dying along public trails, we also urge the City to exercise restraint. Perhaps not all the trees need to come down. Perhaps some of them could be topped, with partial trunks left standing as "habitat trees." The City has always been accommodating to our concerns, and a few years ago sent out a forester to explain why each tree had to come down. We may submit a request for another tour, since 76 trees in the riparian zone is a lot!

Yay! We Have Coho Fry in Byrne Creek!

Well, Mother Nature has snookered us again. Against all odds - a very low spawner return last autumn, no coho females found spawned, and fish kills from toxins flowing down street drains and into the creek - we have coho fry in Byrne Creek.

Yumi and I spotted and netted fry in several locations, and all were identified as coho. Please note that it is illegal to net salmon fry, and streamkeepers do so with the permission of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans for ID purposes only. All fry are returned unharmed to the creek.

I feel elated. I really wasn't expecting much this spring what with the lowest spawner return since streamkeepers began keeping records some 12 years ago after the creek was reconnected to the Fraser River. Plus we had a toxic spill in November 2010 that killed hundreds of fish, but obviously some redds (nests of eggs laid by salmon) survived.

Starving Eagles ‘Fall Out of Sky’ as Salmon Runs Collapse

This is so sad. I'd heard that eagles were flocking to municipal dumps and landfills the last couple of months, trying to survive on garbage, as chum salmon runs disappeared last autumn and winter on Canada's west coast. Now apparently some eagles are so starved they are literally dropping out of the sky, according to a Globe & Mail article by Mark Hume.

This is a horrific example of what happens when nature's food chain is compromised. While we can't point a finger at any specific cause for the collapse of chum salmon runs, you can bet your bottom dollar that human interference has got at least something to do with it, be it overfishing, destruction of habitat, anthropogenic climate change, or some combination of the above.

Burnaby Museum, Shadbolt Centre ‘Fishing for Stories’

Fishing for stories ...

Have you been involved in the fishing industry? We are looking for commercial fishers, shoreworkers, fisheries workers, and people who have been involved in the preservation of streams and fish stock.

Share your stories and memories at the Shadbolt Centre for the Arts on Thursday, March 3 at 1 :00 pm. The Curator from the Burnaby Village Museum and a facilitator from the urban ink theatre company will be on hand to collect your stories, and to weave some of the tales into a play about fishing that will take place at the Shadbolt Centre on Saturday, March 5 at 8:00 pm.

Collecting stories about people's experiences with the fishing industry helps to preserve information about this important British Columbia industry, and the unique ways it relates to Burnaby and the people who live here. It doesn't matter if your involvement has been in Burnaby or somewhere else...we would like to hear from you.

The conversations begin at 1:00 on Wednesday, March 3 and will likely last two or three hours, depending on the number of participants. Participants will be invited to return on Friday between 1:00 and 4:00 if they have a special object or memento they would like to contribute to an art installation about the fishing industry. They are invited to attend the performance of the "Women in Fish" play on Saturday, March 5 at 8:00 pm, free of charge.

If you would like to attend the discussion on March 3, please contact Lisa Codd, Curator at the Burnaby Village Museum by March 1. She can be reached at lisa.codd@burnaby.ca or by phone at 604-297-4542.

Excellent Byrne Creek Field Trip with BCIT Students

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers Rob, Joan, their streamkeeper mascot Toby, and I accompanied Robert Laird and a group of BCIT students from the Sustainable Resource Management (or was it Fish, Wildlife and Recreation?) program on a tour of Byrne Creek this morning. It was a lovely day to be out and about, and with our combined knowledge we had a fascinating walk. Between Joan's depth on the history of the watershed and streamkeeping efforts over the last decade, Rob's insights into geology, and Robert L's breadth of knowledge about creeks and riparian zones, biology and botany etc. it was a very educational walk. Dunno how much the students retained from the mass of information thrown at them today, but I learned a lot!

As streamkeepers, we are very appreciative of being included in such events to provide local knowledge and experience. And it's always fun to tag along and hear new perspectives on the watershed we volunteer in.

Hey, I’m ‘Blog of the Week’ at the Burnaby Now!

If you're reading this, it may well be thanks to the @BurnabyNOW_News "Blog of the Week" column written by  by Burnaby Now reporter @JenniferMoreau : http://bit.ly/hyZFAa

Thanks, Jennifer!

The Pipes of Byrne Creek

I heard the skirl of bagpipes on my ravine loop of Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby this afternoon. It was quite lovely to hear on the cool forest trail as a light rain began to fall. All that was needed was a mist and the clash of steel.

I thought it might be our friend Joe, a piper whom I've run across practicing out in the park on occasion, but it was another fellow. I introduced myself and we had a little chat. Said he was getting back into the pipes after a 30-year absence, but he sounded pretty good to me!

He noticed the "Think Salmon" button on my cap, and said he hoped he wasn't bothering the fish : -). I gave him a Byrne Creek Streamkeepers brochure. . .

Water for Life Benefit Concert in Burnaby

Join us on April 7 at 7:30 pm for the Water for Life Benefit Concert, a very special event at the Michael J Fox theatre in Burnaby, British Columbia.

A wonderful mix of inspirational stories, stunning images, film clips and music, the show features internationally renowned river conservationist, writer and speaker, Mark Angelo, who also chairs the Rivers Institute at BCIT. In addition, the program features the wonderful folk-pop music of Holly Arntzen, Kevin Wright and the Dream Band along with 160 youth singers from Brentwood Park Elementary School.

The evening will be a celebration of water, rivers and the natural world while also advocating the need to be good water stewards wherever we might live. The live show will be filmed for Global TV to be aired as a prime time special on June 25. Tickets for the live event are available through Ticketmaster at 1-855-985-5000 (charge by phone) or through the Ticketmaster website. Tickets are $35 plus fees.

Invasive Plant Workshops in Burnaby

Cut It Out
Invasive plant workshop series

Space is limited, so please register early. Cost: $5.00 per person, per workshop.
Register using WebReg at burnaby.ca/webreg
Burnaby Village Museum & Carousel | 6501 Deer Lake Avenue
Discovery Room | 10am-12noon
For more information, call 604-294-7690 or email invasiveplants@burnaby.ca

Invasive plants in Burnaby
Saturday, April 2, 2011
Presented by:
Greater Vancouver Invasive Plant Council
Learn to recognize local invaders in your garden and discover solutions to manage them using the latest tools and techniques. Barcode: 244473

Invasive plant removal and control
Saturday, April 9, 2011
Presented by: Evergreen
Learn techniques for removing and controlling invasive plants in your garden. Basic plant ecology, best timing for treatment and safety considerations are covered. Barcode: 244474

Garden without invasives
Saturday, April 16, 2011
Presented by: TLC, The Land Conservancy of BC
Learn to develop a sustainable urban garden that doesn't threaten surrounding natural areas.
Barcode: 244475

Information courtesy City of Burnaby poster

Stupid Mode = 1

Stupid Mode = 1. (1 meaning ON, 0 meaning OFF). Apparently that's a real Linux command option for an operating-system configuration file that controls communications with overly complicated modem negotiations.  Note that I am not a Linux guru, and I haven't independently verified this, but it sure sounds like the irreverent Linux approach to technology and freedom : - ).

I like it. I see endless applications in politics & life :-). New, needlessly complicated tax rules? I shall simply set Stupid Mode = 1.

Federal and provincial environment authorities fail to enforce pollution laws? Stupid Mode = 1, triggering an automatic barrage of letters to ministers, letters to MLAs, letters to MPs, letters to the editor. . . : - ).

I could go on. And on. And on. But I think I need give no additional examples of the beauty of

Stupid Mode = 1

Day 2 of SEHAB Meeting in North Vancouver Nice & Sunny

I've been attending my first meetings this weekend as a rookie alternate member of the Salmon Enhancement & Habitat Advisory Board that works with Fisheries and Oceans Canada on the west coast. The second day of meetings was sunny, cold and clear, a sharp contrast to yesterday's damp haze. I got a few more shots from Lonsdale Quay in North Vancouver on my way from the SeaBus this morning.

By the time I was heading home I believe I had volunteered
for a couple of SEHAB committees!

Foggy Vancouver on Day 1 of SEHAB Meeting

I was recently named an alternate on the Salmon Enhancement & Habitat Advisory Board that works with Fisheries and Oceans Canada on the west coast. The first meetings that I attended were held this weekend, and I got a few shots from Lonsdale Quay in North Vancouver on my way from the SeaBus on Saturday and Sunday morning.

The view looking south at downtown Vancouver from the quay.

My first full day of meetings proved to be educational and interesting. It's a great bunch of people and I look forward to working with them.

Salmon Hazard Sign at Walmart in Bellingham, WA

On a cross-border jaunt to Bellingham, WA, I was surprised, and heartened to see this sign in a Walmart:

I know some folks have issues with Walmart, and while I have my qualms about big boxes and rampant consumerism, I have to say that Walmart is progressive on many green & sustainability issues.

I don't know if this particular signage is a Walmart policy, or a State of Washington policy for any retailers of pesticides. Anyone know? You can reach me at paul@cipywnyk.com.

Oh, if you're having trouble reading it, it says:

Use in urban areas of pesticides containing the active ingredients 2, 4-D, carbaryl, diazinon, diuron, malathion, triclopyr BEE, or trifluralin may harm salmon or steelhead.

Help keep our water resources clean. Apply pesticides only to your lawn and sweep any product which lands in the driveway, sidewalk or street back onto your lawn. Rinse applicator over lawn or garden area only.

Stream of Dreams Starts Search for Executive Director

UPDATE, FEB. 3, 2011: Please note that the following search for an executive director is now closed. Thank you to all who responded.

The Stream of Dreams Murals Society is in the midst of major changes precipitated by the resignation of our Executive Director, and co-founder, Joan Carne. Her passion and commitment to the society for over 10 years have inspired many Canadians (over 120,000 participants!), young and old, to think about where their water comes from and how to protect it. While the board is sad to see her go, we understand her desire for change and how hard this decision was for her. We thank Joan and her family for their dedication to the organization, and wish them all the best in the future.

The Board of Directors is beginning to search for an entrepreneurial leader with a passion for the environment who would be excited about growing the organization, and perhaps expanding its programs. The position would focus on administration and fundraising, and we look forward to hearing from interested parties. If you, or someone you know, might be interested in working with this remarkable, award-winning organization, and guide its solid brand and sterling reputation into a new decade, please contact Paul Cipywnyk, President, Board of Directors at paul@cipywnyk.com

We are also looking to expand our Board of Directors. The board meets three to five times a year to discuss current SDMS activities, finances, program initiatives and future direction. Please contact Paul if you are interested in participating.

For updates on our recent projects you can find our December 2010 newsletter on the Stream of Dreams website at: http://www.streamofdreams.org/images/SDMSNewsletterDec2010web.pdf

Thank you to everyone who has supported Stream of Dreams over the years!

Elmer Rudolph Guest Speaker at Jan. 13 Byrne Creek Meeting

Elmer Rudolph will speak on the decline, cleanup and rehabilitation of the Brunette River at the Jan. 13 meeting of the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers at 7:30p at Clinton Elementary School.

Elmer has worked on the river for decades, and tells a fascinating tale of how a dedicated group of volunteers were instrumental in turning it from, what in effect had become an open sewer, back into a fish-bearing waterway again, working with various levels of government.

Come out and hear this positive and inspirational environmental success story!

Map: http://www.byrnecreek.org/member.htm

Byrne Creek Spawner Patrol Finds Female Coho

I've been streamkeeping for nearly a decade now, and of course I know salmon die after spawning. I regularly patrol my local creek, Byrne Creek, in the autumn looking for spawning and dead salmon. But sometimes it's still hard when you run across one that's near the end, probably because in the last few years we've gotten so few of them in our urban creek, and we are so appreciative of the ones that do make it back.

On spawner patrol today Yumi and I found a female coho flat on its side on a bar in the creek in the ravine. We thought it was dead. As streamkeepers we "process" dead spawners - measure them, cut them open to confirm sex and whether or not they've spawned, and then cut the carcasses in half so we don't double-count fish. It's illegal to interfere with spawning salmon. Streamkeepers do spawner counts under the auspices of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, and we report our results to them every year. The carcasses are returned to the creek to provide food and nutrients for the rest of the food chain.

Since it wasn't stiff yet, Yumi gave it a bit of shake to make sure it was dead, and it twitched, began visibly breathing, and remained upright, albeit motionless, when Yumi released it in a small pool. Nice size fish, dark red spawning colouration, abraded white tail, so it had been digging a  nest for its eggs. 

It's an odd feeling. Yeah, it's just one fish. Yeah, it's going to die in an hour or two. Yeah, I had canned salmon with mayo and diced green-pepper sandwiches for lunch the other day. Yeah, I'm defrosting a couple of sockeye steaks for our Japanese-style breakfast and homemade bento lunches tomorrow. Yeah, I like to go fishing now and then. But this fish was born in our struggling urban creek a couple of years ago, traveled thousands of kilometers during her years in the Pacific Ocean, and then made it back to the place of her birth against nearly unimaginable odds to try to start a new generation.

She was so close to death that I admit it was tempting to tap her on the head, and get the bloody assessment over with. But somehow we felt we ought to leave her be and let nature take its course. We'll find her stiff tomorrow. . .

P.S. It's also reassuring that we found at least one spawner since the recent fish kill.

P.P.S. And yes, I'm aware that over the course of this little narrative "it" became "she." That's the way it came out from my brain to my fingers, so that's the way I'll leave it.

UPDATE [Dec. 6, 2010]: Streamkeeper Frieda and I found this fish dead this morning, perhaps 10m downstream of where Yumi and I saw it yesterday. We are happy to report that she was completely spawned! We couldn't find any obvious redd (nest of eggs) in the vicinity, or a boyfriend, so it may be that she spawned somewhere higher upstream and gradually slipped downstream as she weakened. Glad that she successfully completed her lifecycle.

Fish Die in Byrne Creek

UPDATE [Nov. 29]: Just interviewed by Burnaby Now - Burnaby Firefighters say their foam is environmentally benign, and it appears other chemicals were stored at the site of the fire. Initial Burnaby Now story here. And a more detailed story now here.

A couple of Byrne Creek Streamkeepers called me just after 9:00 this morning about foam in the creek. They were down at the wooden footbridge in the lower ravine near Southridge Dr., and asked us to check out Griffiths Pond further upstream near our home (near Choices in the Park). Yumi and I headed over and the pond had lots of foam in it, and a steady stream of foam was coming out of the fish ladder. We counted about a dozen dead smolt-size trout and coho around the edge of the pond. An environmental services officer from the City of Burnaby arrived as we were there and collected water samples and some of the dead fish.

Three other streamkeepers were out in the lower creek patrolling for spawning salmon.  They noticed "stunned-looking" small fish in the lower ravine, and eventually joined the crew at Griffiths Pond.

Three of us backtracked upstream. Bubbles were evident all the way up to where the creek daylights (first becomes visible from the storm drain system) in SE Burnaby. Even that far upstream, if you stirred the water, it foamed readily. We continued further up the streets, and saw a fire truck, so we followed it up to Kingsway and 16th, where there had been a house fire. We asked the firefighters if they'd used foam, and they said yes, a full load from one of their trucks. The drainage flow from the site of the fire into storm drains was evident.

Obviously it is unknown if it was firefighting foam or if other chemicals at the house were also involved. And streamkeepers are certainly not going to question firefighters for doing an outstanding job in ensuring the safety of the community. It's just unfortunate if this is confirmed as the source of the kill.

We headed back to Griffiths Pond, and five of us began counting dead fish. At this point we discovered there were some still barely alive, so we scrambled to get buckets and fresh water, and tried to save some of them, but most expired even in clean water.

The count between Griffiths Pond and Tag 535, a distance of about 350 meters or so, was 80 dead, so nearly 100 were tallied today. Some were beauties: we found one dead trout 36cm long and one 29cm. When factoring in the entire length of creek, there must be at least several hundred dead.

I suspect we're looking at yet another total or near-total kill of the entire creek.

As of 1:30 p.m., the fish ladder at Griffiths Pond was still foaming heavily.

And, to make things worse, we're in the middle of spawning season, when salmon are returning from the ocean, up the Fraser River, and into Byrne Creek, to lay their eggs. Last year was our worst spawner count in over a decade, and this year was shaping up just as bad, even before this incident. . .

The fish ladder and Griffiths Pond near Edmonds Skytrain station

Trying to save some fish that were still barely alive. Most expired. . .

Streamkeeper Yumi with a gorgeous 36cm trout

Closer look at the big fish

The 29cm trout

Another streamkeeper lives near the scene of the fire and was awakened
at 4:00 a.m. this morning. She got this shot of the blaze. She was 
troubled by all the stuff going down the street drains and into the creek,
but of course didn't say anything for she knew the safety of the
community was paramount. Turns out she knew at least one of the residents.
So sad.

Musqueam Creek–A Story of Hope

The Vancouver Courier recently published an excellent story on the Musqueam First Nation working to restore Musqueam Creek, a salmon-bearing urban waterway that has struggled to survive over the years. I have had the privilege of attending a few events there, as a volunteer streamkeeper, and I am happy to hear of continuing positive efforts to preserve the creek.

Amazing Stream of Dreams Feedback!

As prez of the Stream of Dreams board, my heart glows to get this sort of response:

The Stream of Dreams presentation was a hit with our Grade Eights. The speaker clearly knew her stuff and the kids drank it in. Overall, a fun experience and a great cause.

Thanks!

I really enjoyed having Susan, Louise, and Joan from Stream of Dreams come out to our school.  They came very prepared to engage the students with their posters, stories, and models about protecting fish habitat and watersheds. This non-profit organization is doing amazing work and I hope they can share their important environmental message with children and adults everywhere.

"All drains lead to salmon habitat!"  We got it!  Thank you for your enthusiasm and for sharing your expertise with us.  My Grade 7's thoroughly enjoyed it, and we appreciate your passion.  Thanks for bringing our community on board this project.

The habitat connection was great for our grade 4's who will be studying this further during the year.  They really enjoyed the maps of the neighborhood surrounding the school.  However, their favourite part was putting their creative genius to work in painting the fish.  Thank you for showing us how we can be wise stewards of creation.

I totally love these school-wide  events.  Aren't those just the greatest and most creative fish you've ever seen!?!?! The whole school did a fabulous job painting them and a special thanks to those parents and others who helped string the fish.  It's good to know that when you say "All drains lead to"...the children all reply..."fish or salmon habitat." It was exciting to witness how enthusiastic the students were. I was renewed by how everyone used the gifts God has given them to praise and worship Him by doing their best work when they painted their fishes.
The people were really good. They really knew their stuff, and everything was so streamlined that my class was engaged the whole time. The fish look great and so does the fence now. Good work everyone involved.

Stream of Dreams staff and volunteers do amazing work. It's a privilege to work with them, even in a minor capacity.

Heron Stalks Byrne Creek

A heron has been hanging around the lower ravine in southeast Burnaby's Byrne Creek the last several days. I first surprised it while on a patrol for spawning salmon with the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers. It gave a Jurassic-like squawk and mightily flapped its way up into a perch in an evergreen.

The next day on another spawner patrol I saw it before it saw me, and so I hunkered down to observe it slowly Tai Chi its way along the creek, looking for lunch. It wasn't long before it struck, and swallowed a small cutthroat trout or juvenile coho salmon.

The linkages in nature never cease to amaze me. It's the season for spawning salmon to come up our creeks in the lower mainland of BC, and that attracts other animals like clockwork. The trout start gathering in expectation of stray eggs as the salmon dig their nests and spawn, various species of birds like American Dippers suddenly start frequenting the creeks also looking for stray eggs, and herons and other fishing birds come to stalk the trout who in turn are stalking the female salmon. . . Not to mention the increased number of paw prints of various sorts in the soft sandy or muddy banks: coyotes, racoons, skunks. I've seen even squirrels get excited about spawning salmon, though I've never seen them actually take an egg or feed on a carcass.

Metropolis Express Fundraising for Stream of Dreams

All aboard to save salmon!

The Stream of Dreams Murals Society is taking part in a charity event at Metropolis at Metrotown in which donations to ride the Metropolis Express train go to several charities. Today was the Stream of Dreams "challenge day" - - one day to try to raise as much $$ as possible to potentially receive a bonus donation from Metropolis.

Stream of Dreams founders Louise and Joan were out, along with a fantastic crew from the Byrne Creek Secondary Leos. Kids got to colour small foil fish that were attached to the train to create a "salmon run."

In addition, local elementary schools were encouraged to join another Stream of Dreams-sponsored competition to win blank Dreamfish to do an environmental education and community art project at their school.

Thank you Metropolis at Metrotown, and Byrne Creek Leos!

Dog Signs Go Up for Byrne Creek

Spawning salmon are expected back in SE Burnaby's Byrne Creek any day now, so Byrne Creek Streamkeepers posted several posters along the most-walked portion of the creek trail today to remind dogs to keep their owners out of the creek :-).

Salmon usually start arriving in the creek in mid-October, and spawners can show up as late as mid-December. They lay their eggs in pits they dig in the gravel, and cover them, and these redds need to remain undisturbed until April-May to ensure the eggs hatch and eventually swim free as fry.

As I was putting the posters up today, two joggers with dogs stopped to chat about the fish, with one whooping a "woo-hoo, the salmon are coming back!" It's great to get that kind of positive feedback from the community.

Credits: "Scream" and "Dog Paw" are by my wife, Yumi Kosaka, while the "Band-Aid" fish are by Maho Hayashi.

Adams River Sockeye Run – Day 1

The Adams River sockeye salmon spawning run is in a dominant year, as happens every four years. Yumi and I headed up to the Shuswap to take in a dominant run for the third time since we moved to BC. The event keeps growing and the Adams River Salmon Society's Salute to the Sockeye keeps getting bigger and bigger.

Yumi and I were glad that she had a Friday off so we could attend when the crowds were a bit thinner! :-) We drove from Burnaby up the canyon on the No. 1 to take in the autumn scenery:

Thompson River

Canadian Northern last spike

Kamploops Lake from the highway lookout

Yumi on the hill above the lookout

We arrived at Roderick Haig-Brown Park early in the afternoon
and spent hours wandering the trails. While the sockeye were not
quite "bank-to-bank" as we've seen them in other dominant years,
it was still a moving, beautiful sight to witness.

Viewing platform over the Adams River

A bridge on the loop trail

A male and female sockeye pair off

A female sockeye flips sideways to dig in the cobble with her tail

Closer view of these gorgeous fish

It's amazing to watch the sockeye congregate

Fins highlighted as the sun begins to set

This sockeye's journey is done

Byrne Creek Fall Colors

A ramble along Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby, BC:

Burnaby Board of Trade Proclaims Support for Rivers Day

The Burnaby Board of Trade is the first chamber in Canada to proclaim its support for World Rivers Day. Chair Dick Kouwenhoven read out the proclamation at the Rivers Day event in Burnaby, BC, today, shaking hands with Rivers Day founder Mark Angelo.

This is way cool! The BBOT is one of the most progressive boards in Canada, and I am proud to sit on its Environmental Sustainability Committee.

Rivers Day founder Mark Angelo, left, and Dick Kouwenhoven, BBOT chair.

Paint in Burnaby’s Byrne Creek?

A Byrne Creek Streamkeeper noticed a paint-like discoloration in the creek at Susan's Pond at 18th Ave. just east of Griffith's Drive around 2:15 p.m. today, and left me a message. I got the message around 3:00 p.m., and zipped over and checked, and sure enough it did look like paint. I called the City of Burnaby, and they had already received a report and were looking for the source.

Remember: All Drains Lead to Fish Habitat!

I checked another pond further downstream, and as of 3:30 there was no discoloration and no fish to be seen, alive or dead. With luck the amount of pollutant was not sufficient to kill.

UPDATE: As of 6:45 p.m. Griffith's Pond (near Choices in the Park), downstream of the original pollutant site, was full of a milky white substance:

And to add to the creek's woes, I ran across another, separate inflow of some sort of oily substance coming from a drainage that leads from the townhouse complex at 6770 Rumble St.:

UPDATE 2: Checked several areas of the creek Thursday morning Sept. 16 with another streamkeeper and the substance appears to have been diluted and washed away. Fortunately we did not find any dead fish, and did see several live ones.

Dreamfish Gala to Support Stream of Dreams Murals Society

It's coming fast! Just a couple of weeks to go, so get your tickets soon! The Stream of Dreams Murals Society is hosting a Dreamfish Gala on Saturday, Sept. 25 in Burnaby, BC.

Artwork by Stream of Dreams Artistic Director Louise Towell

Fantastic live music by  Holly Arntzen, Kevin Wright and the Dream Band. Yowza!

Silent auction, "fish pond", appies, deserts, wine. . .

Don't miss it!

(Disclaimer: I'm prez of the society's board of directors : - )

Come Celebrate World Rivers Day in Burnaby, BC!

World Rivers Day in Burnaby on Sunday, Sept. 26, will be held in Fraser Foreshore Park near Byrne Creek. This fun-filled family event will run from noon to 4:00 p.m. Details here.

The above is a portion of the event poster created by the City of Burnaby

Sockeye Salmon Dying Unspawned on Harrison River & Lake

Yumi and I went as far up the  Fraser Valley as Kilby today looking for spawning salmon.

We were surprised to see lots of dead sockeye on the banks of the Harrison River -- many of them just barely starting to show their spawning colouration, and looking good enough to eat. We could also see lots of big silver fish belly up out on the water. Strange.

On our way home we stopped in at Kanaka Creek to poke around the hatchery, and talked to the manager. He said he'd heard stories of people out fishing on Harrison River & Lake who said they'd seen lots of silver floaters.

I also found a thread on the Fishing with Rod website with similar reports, and plenty of speculation as to what the cause could be -- high water temps? disease?

The above had the most advanced spawning colouration that we saw.

The beach at Kilby.

In several shots I took of the water, you can count a dozen or more dead
floaters per picture, but I've not posted any here because at this size of photo
the fish are just white dots.

Met Ripple Relay Riders at Burnaby’s Byrne Creek

I met Ripple Relay/Wild Salmon Express cyclists Michelle Nickerson and Daniel Van der Kroon today. They have been cycling the entire length of the Fraser River watershed to highlight awareness of wild salmon and promote a shift away from open-net fish farming.

We met at Burnaby's Byrne Creek, and chatted about the challenges this urban watershed faces. It was great to meet them, and wish them on their way. Their goal is near!

Photo by my wife, Yumi.

Let’s Kill More Salmon Before They Spawn ‘Too Much.’ Huh?

Now that we've got a half-decent run of sockeye salmon on the Fraser River for the first time in several years, the "let's harvest more!" crowd are out in force. Gluttony and opportunism are reviving their old, baseless, self-centred, anti-social arguments.

As a society, we have the collective attention span of a two-year-old child. And a matching lack of historical awareness.

FEED ME! NOW!

The "over-escapement" letters to editors are starting to fly, accusing the Department of Fisheries and Oceans of not allowing more "harvest" (isn't that a nice, benign word?).

I've never understood the argument that us enlightened human managers of the world might make the apparently huge mistake of letting too many salmon reach their spawning grounds.

What?! Horrors!

The "over-escapers" say this will lead to "over-competition," disrupted redds, blah, blah.

The Fraser used to regularly, year after year, have salmon runs 3, 5, perhaps even 10 times the volume of what we have now in our best year out of five. And since there were none of us enlightened, scientific, white folks around to harvest them with vast nets and motorized vessels, or chew up their habitat with our housing and commercial buildings, or poison them with our sewage and chemicals, the bulk of those salmon got past the First Nations fishers who literally had a life-or-death dependence upon them for millennia.

So how is it that salmon managed to thrive and fill rivers from bank to bank without our scientific, commercial intervention, year after year for centuries?

And as for that "over-competition" argument, well, that's nature's way of ensuring healthy populations. The big, strong, healthy salmon get to partner, get to spawn, get to stir up and replace the redds of smaller, weaker fish.

Nature thrives on competition.

If I were a fisher truly looking forward to the future of this "resource," I'd say let *all* the sockeye through for several generations of fair natural selection until we get tens of millions of huge fish back again - - *on a regular basis*.

Instead of directing your anger at DFO for not allowing you to scoop the LAST FISH, you might focus your efforts on habitat preservation, a shift to tertiary sewage treatment. . .

It's only whining Canadian humans who demand self-centred changes to government regulations that happen to benefit and suit them in the short term. The fish have no voice, no party, no cabinet ministers. . .

UPDATE (Aug. 30): I was happy to see the Vancouver Sun's Stephen Hume tackle "over-escapement" on the front page of the Aug. 30 paper.

UPDATE (Aug. 30): Ernie Crey of the Sto:lo First Nation also warns against overfishing in CBC article.

Jennifer Atchison, 1938-2010, Passionate Burnaby Streamkeeper, Environmental Advocate

Jennifer was always swimming upstream, leading by example, pushing and prodding, collaborating and cajoling. She was the heart of the Stoney Creek Environment Committee, and was instrumental in that group achieving so much environmental restoration in her watershed in conjunction with many partners including the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, and the City of Burnaby.

As president of the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers Society, I extend our condolences to Jennifer's family and our fellow streamkeepers at Stoney Creek.

I am grateful I had the opportunity to work with Jennifer at least a little over the last ten years. She was always a joy to meet at streamkeeper events and activities. I was also fortunate to be present when she received two well-deserved awards: the City of Burnaby's Environment Award for Community Stewardship in 2010, and a BC Achievement Award in 2008.

City of Burnaby Environment Award 2010
L to R: Greg Bartle, City of Burnaby Long-Range Planner - Environmental Stewardship;
Jennifer; Burnaby Councillor and Environment Committee Chair Dan Johnston

BC Achievement Award 2008
L to R: MLA Harry Bloy, Jennifer, BC Premier Gordon Campbell

As you can see by the above photos, she was physically diminutive, but she'd latch onto my arm, tilt her head up, focus on my eyes nearly two feet above her own. . . and keep me fixed in her sights until she'd imparted a key message she wanted me to hear :-).

Many of us in the streamkeeper community, and I suspect many politicians and bureaucrats as well, will miss that arm lock, that intense gaze . . .

So let's remember and honour her unwavering message of watershed restoration and protection, and the right of every human being, fish, and animal, to live in clean water and a healthy natural environment, even in urban areas.

Rainwater and Sustainable Communities

This is an excellent website for sustainable stormwater management practices. I really like the "Who are you?" links that tune the perspective toward elected officials, municipal stormwater managers, developers, and the general public.

Thanks to Waterbucket for the link!

Speaking Streamkeeping at Mesa/Burnaby Sister-City Visit

I was invited to speak to a delegation on a sister-city visit today to Burnaby BC, from Mesa, AZ. The group was visiting Burnaby's gorgeous new Tommy Douglas Library, and I was asked to talk about the significance of the Stream of Dreams mural in the children's area of the library, and how the City and the library have collaborated over the years with local volunteers from the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers.

I quickly recounted some of the history of Stream of Dreams, and the original Dreamfish mural on a fence surrounding the property that the library was eventually built on. I spoke about the "fishy neighbourhood" around the library and the beautiful salmon sculpture and the "stream" and its aquatic animals inlaid into the path behind the library. I explained how all drains lead to fish habitat, and how streamkeepers and the City of Burnaby work closely together on keeping urban creeks and streams as natural and healthy as is possible in a developed environment.

While I'm not sure how much of the healthy watershed message I got across in a few minutes, I thank library staff including Chief Librarian Edel Toner-Rogala and Tommy Douglas Branch Manager Roberta Summersgill for inviting me. They are both wonderful to work with!

Burnaby Mayor Derek Corrigan (right) presents Mesa Mayor Scott Smith with framed memento of the tour.

Viewing the Stream of Dreams installation in the children's corner.

Touring the gorgeous library.

Southpoint Rain Garden in SE Burnaby Underway!

It's so exciting to see construction underway on the Southpoint Rain Garden in SE Burnaby, BC. The rain garden is being created on a dead-end cul-de-sac, and will bridge Taylor Park and Byrne Creek Ravine Park.

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers brought the site to the attention of the City of Burnaby's planning, engineering and parks departments, and all immediately understood the site's potential. It not only links the green space of the two parks, it will provide natural filtration of rainwater that comes down Burnaby's south slope and that roars unfiltered into Byrne Creek. Streamkeepers have noted for years the oily flow off the streets that accumulated into the rain drains (storm drains) along Southpoint Drive and was visible way down below, exiting pipes into the creek whenever it rained.

The site will also be a gorgeous outdoor nature lab for elementary school students from nearby Taylor Park School. The principal, staff and students have already been involved in discussions and developments. The school has also been so kind as to hold an event with streamkeepers, and everyone appears excited about monitoring the new rain garden and how it will affect local urban biodiversity.

And last, but not least, the site is right by Adera Development's "Green" townhouse development. As part of its ethos of sustainable development and giving back to communities, Adera provided a substantial donation to the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers several years ago. We thank Adera for its patience in waiting to receive full public acknowledgement for its efforts, as the streamkeepers decided to use the funds to support the rain garden - a project that took some time to come to fruition.

I can almost feel the earth heaving a sigh of relief as the asphalt is stripped away, allowing the soil to breath and to absorb rain again!

Way to go Burnaby! I hope this project stimulates more of its kind around our beautiful city.

You're doing good, we heartily appreciate it,  let's see more! :-)

Burnaby Library Honours Original Stream of Dreams Mural

In a great collaboration, the new Tommy Douglas Public Library in southeast Burnaby has incorporated a visual legacy of the original Stream of Dreams mural that used to grace the corner of Kingsway and Edmonds.

Before the new library and adjacent commercial/residential development went up, the original watershed mural had to come down. You can read & see about it here.

The original mural commemorated the deaths of thousands of fish after a toxin was poured into a street drain in 1998, killing everything in Byrne Creek. That first Dreamfish mural stimulated amazing collaboration between streamkeepers, schools, the local community and several City of Burnaby departments. It went on to spark so much public interest, that eventually Louise Towell and Joan Carne, who had instigated that first mural, formed the Stream of Dreams Murals Society to carry out watershed education and community art.

Politicians Tour Byrne Creek

Thanks to a passel of politicians who took the time to go on a tour of the Byrne Creek watershed in southeast Burnaby today!

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers Society board members Joan Carne and moi led MP Peter Julian, MLAs Raj Chouhan and Kathy Corrigan, and City of Burnaby Councillors Sav Dhaliwal and Paul McDonell down the ravine trail.

The goal of today's tour was to impart the importance of environmentally-friendly development to the health of urban creeks. The City of Burnaby was a trailblazer in implementing an "open creeks" policy several decades ago, but the creeks cannot survive in a constantly urbanizing environment without progressive development policies that require rain gardens, and roadside and parking-lot swales - anything and everything that helps get rainwater into the ground where it belongs, filtering out pollutants along the way.

SPONGE

That's the word of the day. Our cities must be developed as SPONGES, just like the forests, fields, and bogs that they've filled in. Get that water back into the ground, and you're way ahead in the fight against pollution, against flooding, against massive storm flows off of our streets, roofs and parking lots. . .

Getting oriented to the watershed.

Distracted by potential voters on the ravine trail :-)

A group of nature-loving daycare kids exploring the lovely
creek stole our hearts.

Checking out a simple swale that absorbs run-off from a parking lot
instead of draining it into the storm system - and then the local creek.

Observing a site that streamkeepers approached the City of Burnaby
about, suggesting it could become a large rain garden. The dead-end
street will be decommissioned and turned into a lovely, water-infiltrating
garden that will also bridge Taylor Park and Byrne Creek Ravine Park.

Taylor Park Elementary School just up the hill is already excited about the potential to use the rain garden as a nature-study site. After the pavement is ripped up, and water starts to flow again, and native plants are planted - what species begin to use the habitat? And how does that change and progress over the years. What a great, ongoing science project!

Thanks again to our elected representatives! We know you are very busy, and we appreciate your time and attention. I think another concept that was related today was the fact that streamkeeper groups are 100% volunteer. None of us get any financial compensation for what we do - including today's tour. . .  In fact we take unpaid time off from our day jobs to do events like this. . .

So, now, ahem, let's see some action for our tax dollars ! ;-)

Streamkeepers of the Language

A well-crafted blog post by James Harbeck, a fellow member of the Editors' Association of Canada, that uses the theme of streamkeeping, and in particular the March 2010 Byrne Creek kill, to frame an essay on living languages and etymology.

Thanks for the links, James!

Clearing Invasive Policeman’s Helmet along Byrne Creek

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers are tackling invasive Himalayan Balsam (aka Policeman's Helmet) in lower stretches of the urban creek, yet again. It's an endless battle. We've cleared this particular stretch of the creek three years in a row, but it still comes back.

The growth of this invasive plant can be so thick and rampant that it can literally suck sections of the creek dry if not battled back.

That's my wife, Yumi, and the pink blossoms
above her head are on one of the dreaded plants.
In a matter of several weeks it's gone from barely
noticeable to nearly 2 meters high!

And in places, pink is all that you see. . .
This is near the end of several hours of
back-breaking eradication.

Byrne Creek Bug Count Yields Baby Crayfish

Twice a year, Byrne Creek Streamkeepers count bugs - the fancy name is "aquatic invertebrate surveys" - to assess the quality of the water in the urban stream. We sample the same locations year after year so that we have comparable data. The bug counts usually run for three weekends in a row.

The crew hard at work - we are fortunate to have members
who let us use their china and dining room tables so that we
can  count in comfort after collecting the samples from the creek.

To our surprise, we found three baby crayfish in our sample.
Here's one of them next to a dime for size comparison.

Canada Day in Surrey

We decided to check out Canada Day in Surrey as part of our ongoing exploration of events on Canada's birthday. Last year we went to Canada Day in New Westminster and thoroughly enjoyed the cosy atmosphere in Queen's Park, the live music, etc. As Burnaby residents and community volunteers, we've been to many Canada Day events in Burnaby.

Our impression of the Surrey event was that it was much more corporate-sponsorship oriented than Burnaby events are. I'm not judging that as being either good or bad, but it was interesting to hear Surrey politicians lauding the corporate sponsors for enabling a "free public event." Hmm. Burnaby Canada Day events are free to the public, too, without all the banner ads, displays of cars and trucks, etc. . . Perhaps the Burnaby events are not on quite the same scale, but bigger is not necessarily better, eh?

I was impressed, however, with the strong environmental-sustainability presence at the Surrey event. Lots of displays on sustainable living, and booths on streamkeeping and preserving urban forests. Surrey actually hires university students over the summer to lead teams of hired high-school students to work on restoring urban streams, removing invasive plant species, etc. I have to admit that's way ahead of Burnaby initiatives. . .

Commercial Properties Still Using Pesticides in South Burnaby

I happened to cycle past the Ballard building on North Fraser Way down in the Glenlyon Development near Fraser Foreshore Park in south Burnaby over lunch today.

There was a guy applying something to the lawns on both sides of the street, so I asked him what it was: Weed 'n Feed. I asked him if he was aware that he was applying it right next to Sussex Creek (neither fertilizer nor pesticides are good for aquatic habitat), and he brushed me off saying it was an approved chemical.

I called the City of Burnaby, and staff confirmed that they couldn't do anything about it because it was commercial property and the City's Pesticide Bylaw does not apply to commercial properties. I also checked the Environment Canada website, and discovered that weed 'n feed (combined fertilizer/pesticide) products have been banned on a national level, effective 2012. So it seems a shame that landscapers are still applying the stuff.

It would be great if developers, property managers, and landscapers got ahead of the curve!

I've talked to people who say they've heard that landscapers are intent on using up stocks of products that face potential bans, or that have already been banned but the deadline hasn't been reached yet, and that seems morally reprehensible to me.

Perhaps chemicals manufacturers could be encouraged to take back such products with partial refunds, and governments could be encouraged to support such programs through rebates? Perhaps such programs are in place, but people don't know about them? There's a lot that could be done here!

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers Society Executive

The founding directors of the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers Society met tonight for the first time. We've incorporated as a British Columbia non-profit association after more than ten years of functioning on an informal basis.

The new executive is: President, Paul Cipywnyk; Vice President, Frank Williams; Treasurer, Dave Burkholder; Secretary, Abby Schwarz; Director at Large, Maho Hayashi; Director at Large, Joan Carne.

The board passed a policy to create the position of Past President to ensure continuity. This is not an official executive position, but more an honourary one. We designated Joan Carne as the founding Past President in recognition of her 10+ years of chairing the group to this point.

The society membership fee was set at $5.00 annually. Dues will be payable from the September 2010 regular monthly meeting.

The board passed a motion to designate Bert Richardson, Bob Fuller, and Lloyd Longeway as honourary life members of the society in recognition of their founding efforts with the Vancouver Angling & Game Association to clean up Byrne Creek and initiate restocking of its fish populations.

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers Incorporated as BC Society

After over 10 years of streamkeeping in which we've racked up close to 20,000 volunteer hours, the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers have incorporated as a registered British Columbia non-profit society.

While we've functioned very effectively as an unstructured "jazz band" in which different people have taken the lead on various activities and initiatives on an ad hoc basis, new volunteer insurance requirements were the final straw that pushed us to apply for society status. It'll mean more paperwork, but it also safeguards our well-respected "brand" and sets the stage for fostering a new generation of community leaders.

Born out of the volunteer efforts of several gentlemen from the Vancouver Angling & Game Association who began cleaning up the creek in southeast Burnaby around two decades ago, the streamkeeper group was formed when more people from the broader community became involved after a horrific toxic spill in 1998 that killed some 5,000 fish and other animals in the revitalized urban creek.

I must mention the leadership of Joan Carne, who has herded the group since its inception. I hope the newly established board can fill the huge gumboots she's leaving us! She's not really leaving, but is stepping down from an executive role because she's super busy with the Stream of Dreams Murals Society, which was also spawned from that 1998 kill on Byrne Creek, and has to this point taught over 100,000 kids across Canada about their local watersheds, how they function, and what every single person can do to protect clean water.

Thanks too, to the City of Burnaby, in particular Environmental Services in the Engineering Department, and the folks in Burnaby Parks who deal with environmental issues. Not to mention the Planning staff who work with community groups! Of course we also cannot do the work we do without the oversight and guidance of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans, and in particular Maurice Coulter-Boisvert, our DFO Community Advisor. And many of us volunteers got our streamkeeper training and ongoing support from The Pacific Streamkeepers Federation. Yay Zo Ann!

Byrne Creek has suffered several more kills over the last decade when people in ignorance have poured toxins down street drains in the watershed. But streamkeepers never give up!

Here's to the next ten years of streamkeeping!

Ugly Bug Ball 2010

DFO Community Advisors in the lower mainland of BC and the Pacific Streamkeepers Federation host a free volunteer appreciation event called the Ugly Bug Ball every two years. For the last several times, the event has been held at the A Rocha facility in South Surrey, a gorgeous old farm that's been turned into an environmental education venue.

A few photos of this year's event, with a concentration on the beautiful natural setting :-):

DFO Community Advisor Mark Johnson sets the stage

PSKF's Zo Ann Morten shows what it means to be a stakeholder :-)

Bribing volunteers with cake!

The wine/whine session where everyone gets to beef in good company!

One of the gorgeous salmon moulded at an Ugly Bug Ball several years ago.

Participants hang out in the orchard.

Looking up at the sun through the orchard trees.

The beautiful pond on the A Rocha property.

Another water feature with snails enjoying the spattering flow.

Some of the gyotaku (Japanese-style transfer images) people created.

It truly is a gorgeous property!

RBC Blue Water Day Hosts Byrne Creek, Stream of Dreams

I was happy to represent the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers and the Stream of Dreams Murals Society at the Kingsway/Walker RBC branch in southeast Burnaby for a couple of hours today for the bank's Blue Water Day. Several RBC branches invited streamkeepers and Stream of Dreams to participate, and we did our best to accommodate as many of them as we could, though it's tough to find volunteers during working hours.

Thanks to Veloy and the staff at the branch!

My Byrne Creek/Stream of Dreams display

All Drains Lead to Fish Habitat!

Serving clients cake!

Veloy and I - thanks!

Info on the RBC Blue Water Project here.

And thanks to the Pacific Salmon Foundation for matching our groups up with RBC!

Sometimes I feel a bit strange displaying front-page spreads of myself from the local papers, but I've discovered it's a great way to start conversations. People trundle by, glance at me, glance at the display, stop as recognition dawns, look at me again and blurt out: "Hey, that's you!" Yup, and now I've got you hooked for at least a minute :-).

USGS: Effects of Urbanization on Stream Ecosystems

An excellent series of videos on how urbanization affects local streams. Thanks to the Pacific Streamkeepers Federation mailing list for this lead. These videos are great resources for explaining the function of urban watersheds to the public.

Burnaby Environment Awards Lunch 2010

The City of Burnaby's 2010 Environment Awards were presented at a lovely luncheon today.

Councillor Dan Johnston, chair of the Burnaby Environment Committee

The Wildlife Rescue Association of BC received the Environment Award
for Communication

Jennifer Atchison of the Stoney Creek Environment Committee
received an Environment Award for Community Stewardship

Brentwood Park Elementary School received an Environment Award
for Youth

Coro Strandberg and Phillip Legg received an Environmental Star
for Planning and Development

And Candace LeRoy of Simon Fraser University received an
Environmental Star for Business Stewardship

Group shot of the awardees

The reception is always a fun event. I've attended four or five times over the past years, first as an award recipient with my wife Yumi for our volunteer work on Byrne Creek, and now as a citizen representative on Burnaby's Environment Committee. It's always a great crowd with opportunities to catch up with old friends and make new ones. City of Burnaby staff do an excellent job on coordinating the event.

Vancouver Sun: Remote Alaskan sockeye salmon offer clues to long-term survival

An interesting read, though I find the overall conclusion to be a "Duh" moment:

The study shows the key to the health of the Bristol Bay fishery is a 'diversified portfolio' of hundreds of discrete populations of sockeye. Some of the populations like it when the surface climate is hot and dry, while others like it cold and wet. Some spend just one year in fresh water before heading to sea, others spend two years.

Researchers for the study, which appears in today's edition of the journal Nature, liken it to a diverse stock portfolio that spreads the risk around.

While this is a great explanation for the layperson, uh, haven't we long known the importance of genetic diversity?

Anyway, a key statement was: "The hope for the Fraser is that the fish can adapt to these warmer conditions and to the diseases that they've seen," says Hilborn. "We just basically have to give them time. And that basically means not harvesting them very much until they can solve the problem."

How about not harvesting Fraser sockeye at all? For several generations? Lower-Fraser First Nations have agreed to a complete sockeye moratorium and are doing only selective fishing, what about everyone else?

UPDATE: Another take on the same issue by Mark Hume in The Gl0be and Mail can be found here.

Inspiring Quotations on Water, Rivers, Fish & Sustainability

Here's a bunch of quotations that I've collected. They focus on water, rivers, fish, nature and sustainability. I've likely shared some of them here before:

From Mighty River by Richard Bocking
"A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise." -- Aldo Leopold

"We are a restless, dissatisfied novice species, clamoring for rulership of a planet toward which we display not even a rudimentary form of allegiance." -- Robert Harrington

"It seems clear beyond the possibility of argument that any given generation of men can have only a lease, not ownership, of the earth; and one essential term of the lease is that the earth be handed on to the next generation with unimpaired potentialities." -- Roderick Haig-Brown

"This curious world that we inhabit is more wonderful than convenient; more beautiful than it is useful; it is more to be admired and enjoyed than to be used." -- Henry David Thoreau

"It is the salmon that expresses the force of our land. Without the salmon, the land and the rivers would only survive as a corpse survives the death of the nervous system and the departure of the spirit." -- Alan Haig-Brown

"The world was not created for people only, but for purposes that transcend the human race with its limited foresight and imagination; therefore it behooves all conscious inhabitants of this superb planet to nurture it as a garden, maintaining it in health, beauty and diversity for whatever glorious future its denizens may together share." -- Stan Rowe

"The care of the earth is our most ancient and most worthy and, after all, our most pleasing responsibility. To cherish what remains of it, and to foster its renewal, is our only legitimate hope." -- Wendell Berry

"Unlike our ancestors, those of us alive today comprise the generations running headlong into the limits of our use of natural systems while observing permanent loss of much of our natural heritage. The bottom line is that people have the freedom to change their behavior, whereas fish do not. If we are to save wild salmon, then some people will lose money or the ability to do things they wanted to do. But we all lose if we lose the salmon." (p. 245) -- King of Fish: The Thousand-Year Run of Salmon by David R. Montgomery

"...if we can silence our egos for a moment and set aside our preconceptions about who we think we are, we may begin to perceive some of the lessons that the rest of nature has to teach: lessons not of personality but of relationship, not of order but of complexity, not of private property but of shared responsibility, not of rationality but of mystery, not of the ultimacy of the human enterprise but of the interdependency of all life." (p. 47) -- Cathedral of the World: Sailing Notes For A Blue Planet by Myron Arms

"... is the story we've been telling ourselves about our 'progress' as a species during the last ten thousand years really upside-down? Have we actually regressed, psychologically, from a state of harmony with our natural surroundings to a state of boredom, contentiousness, and alienation?" (p. 122). -- Cathedral of the World: Sailing Notes For A Blue Planet by Myron Arms

"... we have learned to adapt, by increments, to the humanscapes around us until we can hardly remember what a natural landscape looks like any longer.... Most dangerous of all, we convince ourselves, perhaps because of the pervasiveness of the humanscape, that we are at the center of things -- that we are the controllers, the 'managers' of the planet." -- Cathedral of the World: Sailing Notes For A Blue Planet by Myron Arms

"... while engineers can reproduce fish, they cannot replace nature. Hatcheries are technological marvels and they may be a necessity in the modern world, but they are not signs of progress; they are monuments to our failure to protect rivers." -- The Run of the River: Portraits of Eleven British Columbia Rivers by Mark Hume

"A river is water in its loveliest form, rivers have life and sound and movement and infinity of variation, rivers are veins of the earth through which the life blood returns to the heart." -- Roderick Haig-Brown A River Never Sleeps

BC Lower Mainland Streamkeepers: Sign up for Ugly Bug Ball!

Ugly Bug Ball IV is coming on June 12 in South Surrey. DFO Community Advisors from the Lower Mainland of BC and the Pacific Streamkeepers Federation invite streamkeepers to attend this event, network, share information about your group, etc. This fun event in a beautiful venue is free for volunteers!

‘BC Waters Clean Up Challenge’ from Pacific Western Brewing

This is a good initiative by a key member of BC's corporate sector - Pacific Western Brewing.

"Proceeds from Pacific Pilsner and PWB will be used to support the clean-up of streams, rivers or lakes in beautiful British Columbia. We will be selecting one or more community water clean-up projects with funding and other tools this summer."

Community groups can apply here.

While I laud this initiative, I must also chide PWB for its tag line "Save Water Drink Pilsner."

While it's cute, and I do like my beer, brewing and bottling is a hugely water-intensive process in which far more water is used than in simply quenching your thirst from your tap, eh?

Bev Bowler of DFO Receives ‘Salmon Hero’ Award

Bev Bowler of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans received the Salmon Hero award at the 2010 Fraser Assembly of the Fraser Salmon & Watersheds Program. Bev received the award for her dedication to the Salmonids in the Classroom program, in which schoolkids receive salmon eggs to hatch and rear in their classrooms, and then release into local creeks.

Bev is very deserving of this award. Though I rarely get to meet her in person, I've had the privilege of helping several schools release their chum fry into Byrne Creek every spring. It's a great program that thoroughly engages kids, teachers, and parents, and I love the enthusiasm and excitement.

Ernie Crey Gives 2010 Fraser Assembly Keynote

Ernie Crey, Senior Policy Advisor for the Sto:lo Tribal Council gave a moving keynote address to the Fraser Salmon & Watersheds Program 2010 Fraser Assembly this morning.  These are my rough notes, so while the gist may be correct, they cannot be attributed to Ernie Crey as direct quotations . . .

We are undergoing profound, ongoing changes. Changes in the aboriginal community signal profound changes in the entire community, institutions, and policies.

Change is the constant that we all face and we can't hide from it.

Trying to hold back change doesn't work. Change is overwhelming and inevitable.

The best we can do and hope for is to flow with the change and see if we can direct it around the values that we have. That's all that we can do.

Get engaged, run for and hold public office.

People in Ottawa make policy for all aspects of our lives: the environment, taxation, health, etc. All those decisions are made there by a small cadre of males from the dominant community. Woman are largely absent. Aboriginals are absent. Policy is mostly made by white males.

It's best that we be the shapers of public policy in Canada. I've never been a believer in sitting it out.

We've entered a difficult place in the history of this province, particularly when it comes to fisheries.

120 years ago there were 100 million and more sockeye salmon coming back to spawn up the Fraser. We now consider a good year to be 10 million fish. Fish have been going missing from the Fraser for decade upon decade.

The DFO is not the saviour of salmon or its champion. This needs to change.

If we don't drastically change our ways, the chinook will all be gone. Will we allow that to happen? Will we sit it out?

What is the right thing to do? What is the ethical thing to do? For our children and their children, and the children of the white man.

Can't we respond to change?

The aboriginals have adjusted and have begun to fish selectively.

The Cohen judicial inquiry into missing sockeye salmon. I predict the hearing will transfix British Columbians. A good part of the world knows about the disappearance of the sockeye. Some say they are AWOL at sea. Nobody knows why. People blame different sources. Some say it's a scientific question. That may be the case.

Here's my take. It may be a question of science, to improve science, in-season management. But you know it's really a question for British Columbians like you and me. Post your opinions on the inquiry website.

I think communities should hold their own hearings. All of you together. In Merritt, in Kamloops, in Vancouver. Get the ordinary citizens to come forward with their observations and opinions as if they counted.

It's important not to be exclusive as scientists, politicians, and council members. We need to be inclusive.

Working together is what it takes.

We have a shot at not only preserving but enhancing salmon runs.

"Gramps and grandma restored the environment and the rivers." That's the vision that we can, and should, embrace.

First Fry Born in Byrne Creek Since March 4, 2010, Toxic Kill

A few days ago some Byrne Creek Streamkeepers reported seeing fry in the creek - - the first since someone poured a cleanser down a street drain on March 4, 2010, killing everything in the creek. Streamkeepers and local schoolkids have released chum salmon fry and coho salmon smolts provided by the Department of Fisheries and Oceans since the kill, but these are the first native-born fry we've seen.

They are likely cutthroat trout fry, spawned after the kill, incubated in the gravel for 7 - 8 weeks, and just starting to pop up now. It's great to see life coming back to the creek!

Exotic Fish Identified in Burnaby Pond

Several times over the last couple of years we've seen strange fish in a pond in Fraser Foreshore Park in Burnaby near Byrne Creek. I finally got some photos that were good enough to ID one of the species, though it's difficult shooting through the murky water even on a bright, sunny day.

Unfortunately, a biologist has identified them as pumkinseeds,  a species introduced to the lower mainland, likely by people who like fishing for them and eating the pan fish. Unfortunate, for several reasons: if they spread they can compete with native species, they may not have natural predators here, etc. City of Burnaby staff helped with the ID process and are aware of the problem. I have no idea how it can be resolved, but whoever is dumping alien fish in this pond, please stop! Native fish like coho and chum salmon, and cutthroat trout, have enough to contend with in our urban watersheds without having to compete with alien species.

Pond Life in Fraser Foreshore Park

I love this pond near the outlet of Byrne Creek into the Fraser River in SE Burnaby - despite its unfortunate populations of alien fish (see above entry). It's a magnet for all sorts of bugs, amphibians, reptiles and birds.

Clinton Schoolkids Release Coho in Byrne Creek

Kids from Clinton Elementary in southeast Burnaby helped streamkeepers, DFO community advisors, and City of Burnaby staff release coho smolts (yearlings) into Byrne Creek this morning. Clinton School has been involved in several Byrne Creek activities this year - - good on them!

Thank you DFO for bringing these young coho all the way from the Bell-Irving Hatchery at Kanaka Creek. All life in Byrne Creek was wiped out in March when someone unthinkingly poured a cleanser down a street drain, so we're rebuilding the creek from scratch, yet again.

Here are a few photos of today's uplifting event.

Setting the scene: the gorgeous lower reaches of the ravine park

Maurice of the DFO chats with the kids

Yep, that's how big the coho will be when they
come back to spawn in a year or two :-)
Maurice is passionate about his calling,
and we streamkeepers and kids love his style!

The kids' eyes light up as they see the fish they will release

There they go - thanks Clinton kids!

Giving a few confused laggards a gentle poke to move them on

Beautiful young smolts acclimatize to their new, temporary
home before they head out to the ocean soon.

Hope to see at least a few of you back spawning in our creek in
a year and half, when you're nearly as long as my arm!

Summit Logistics Hosts Streamkeeper Display

I had the pleasure of hanging out with staff at Summit Logistics in southeast Burnaby during a staff BBQ today, with the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers display. Thanks to Rick LeBlanc for inviting us to the company's Health and Safety Week event. I chatted with people about how all storm drains lead to local creeks, and about the watershed. Summit has extensive spill-prevention and containment measures in place.

DFO Must Act Now to Save Pacific Salmon

". . .anglers who care about their sport and the stocks that sustain it are already putting their rods away. Only the greedy and the stupid squabble over who gets to kill the last fish for fun."

Good article from Stephen Hume on how several first nations are moving to stop fishing completely, while DFO still dithers on recreational and commercial fisheries.

Edmonds Clean Sweep May 1, 2010 – Come make a difference!

The Edmonds Business & Community Association will hold its regular spring neighbourhood Clean Sweep from 9:45 to noon on Saturday, May 1.

Everyone is welcome to join in -- families, individuals and community groups! Help make our neighbourhood cleaner, safer, and more attractive.

Equipment provided, along with refreshments.

Meet at the Eastburn Community Centre, 7435 Edmonds Street, Burnaby.

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers will be participating with an alternate signup site at Edmonds Sktytrain Station, and will lead a cleanup of the southwest Edmonds area, including removal of invasive plant species from Byrne Creek Ravine Park.

Clinton School Releases ‘Salmon in the Classroom’ Fry in Byrne

Clinton Elementary School kids in SE Burnaby released their "Salmonids in the Classroom" chum fry into Byrne Creek today. My wife Yumi and I accompanied them, representing the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers. It was a gorgeous Earth Day!

Thank you to teacher Elaine Jaltema who had the kids very well organized. She also had a slew of additional science and observation activities lined up, so the kids were testing water temperature, pH, etc.

Getting everyone organized up near Ron McLean Park before
heading down into the ravine

Kids release the chum fry they raised in their classroom

A budding scientist records data

Chum Fry Released in Burnaby South Slope Creeks

Kids from Suncrest Elementary helped Kaymar Creek Streamkeepers, the City of Burnaby, and the Department of Fisheries and Oceans release chum fry (babies) in to Kaymar Creek in southwest Burnaby this morning, followed by a release with kids from Nelson Elementary into Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby.

DFO Community Advisor Maurice Coulter-Boisvert speaks to kids

Kids release fry into Kaymar Creek

Maurice speaks to kids at Byrne Creek. These fry will
help repopulate the creek after someone poured a
cleanser down a street drain on March 4, killing all
aquatic life

Holding a bag of chum fry

DFO, City of Burnaby staff and streamkeepers fill bags of fish

Bon voyage! With luck a few of these chum will survive
their trip down Byrne Creek to the Fraser River, down
the Fraser to the Pacific Ocean, and will return to spawn
in the creek in a few years.

Starting them Young

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers had our booth set up at Choices in the Park for the store's Earth Day celebration this afternoon. There was a by-donation BBQ, with proceeds generously being donated to care for Byrne Creek. Thanks!

We offered a tour of the creek, but the only takers on the cloudy, drizzly day were half-a-dozen 4-6 year olds from a nearby daycare and their parents, so the pace was slow. But  I was amazed by the kids - over the course of 2 - 1/2 hours they trundled through the entire ravine loop with nary a complaint, asking lots of questions along the way, and it seemed that all involved really enjoyed the tour.

The daycare teacher was great -- she encouraged the kids to try climbing a low tree (one at a time with helping hands nearby), get their fingers dirty looking at rocks and plants, etc. She was determined to be raising a bunch of nature-loving future streamkeepers!

Celebrate Earth Day with Streamkeepers at Choices in the Park

Come celebrate Earth Day at Choices in the Park near the Edmonds Skytrain Station tomorrow, Saturday, April 17 from noon to 4pm. Enviro-friendly foods & products on display/sale. Streamkeepers will have a display and will offer tours of Byrne Creek at 12:30pm and at 2:00pm. BBQ by donation, with proceeds to support healthy creeks.

South Slope Releases Chum in Byrne Creek

A class from South Slope Elementary School in south Burnaby released its "Salmon in the Classroom" chum fry into Byrne Creek this morning. As far as I know, these are the only fry in the system at the moment, everything else having been killed by a toxic spill into a storm drain in early March. Thank you very much to Gary Thompson, his intern Eva, the parents who drove the kids, and of course the kids themselves!

Stream of Dreams Society Elects New Board at AGM

As president of the Stream of Dreams Murals Society, I am pleased to announce our new board of directors as elected at our AGM tonight.

Paul Cipywnyk, President
Jennifer Lynton, Vice President
Rob Carne, Treasurer
Jane Burkholder, Secretary
Andrea Rozsa, director
Lynn Duncan, director

My President's Report to the AGM:

Stream of Dreams has an exciting year ahead of us in 2010 and many proud accomplishments to celebrate for 2009. Thank you to everyone for all the hard work over the last year.

We ended 2009 solidly in the black, and with many achievements to be proud of as we enter our tenth year. Unfortunately, this has also been a time of cutbacks in government grants, and a poor economy that has severely impacted several sources of revenue. The Society is being proactive in dealing with this situation, adding one staff member to focus on fundraising applications and promotion, along with handling some of the administrative work to free up some of the founders' time to focus on development.

Is 2010 the year of go big or go home? Those of you who have been with us for awhile know this has been a recurring topic over the years, due to the continually growing demand for our watershed education and community art program. We are also developing new methods of educating the public. The ongoing success of our programs, and our stable financial state to date despite economic fluctuations and the severe recent downturn, are testaments to prudent management both at the board, and operational, levels. I congratulate staff and volunteers again for their great work last year, and their efforts to ensure that 2010 will see continuing progress.

We have reached some amazing milestones: 10 years and 100,000 Dreamfish -- that are really something to celebrate! Stream of Dreams is also exploring partnerships with other artists with experience in combining art and music with environmental education.

The Stream of Dreams watershed education and community art concept grew out of a fish kill in Byrne Creek, which runs just a few dozen meters from where we are sitting here tonight. Sadly, Byrne Creek was wiped out again just ten days ago, when someone unthinkingly or unknowingly released a toxin into a drain in the upper watershed that flowed into the creek, killing well over 1,000 fish and likely other animals, in addition to impacting the entire watershed from the creek to the Fraser River, to the ocean. Our health, and the health of every living thing in the ecosystem is at stake.

It is clear that the need for education remains, that the need for our program is as important now as it ever was. I am personally saddened and angered by the loss, as I'm sure many of you are. But let us not despair, let us take this as a renewed call to action. I look forward to working with this amazingly talented and creative group for another year, and I hope some of the faces here tonight that we don't see quite as often will consider devoting a few more hours of their precious time to helping the Society's message spread far and wide.

Thank you, Paul Cipywnyk

And a big thank you to Stream of Dreams founders Louise Towell and Joan Carne, and to departing director and continuing Vancouver Island team leader Micqualyn Waldie for their passion, drive, creativity, and hard work that have grown a local community event into a multiple award-winning, cross-Canada watershed education and community art program. You are truly inspirational and it's been, and continues to be, a privilege to work with you.

Environment Canada ‘Responds’ to Streamkeepers

Here's what an Environment Canada spokesperson had to say to the Burnaby Now after yet another chemical dump into Byrne Creek that killed everything in the open watershed from top to bottom:

Raisinghani responded to recent criticism from streamkeepers that suggested Environment Canada was lax on enforcement of anti-pollution laws and failing in its job to protect fish and their habitat.

"Environment Canada takes its enforcement responsibilities very seriously," Raisinghani wrote. "If the source of contamination is found, an investigation may be launched."

WOW, Right!?

I'm sure polluters are shaking in their chemical-covered boots upon hearing that proclamation. IF. MAY.

How about WHEN. SHALL..?

Isn't action by default something that we should expect from those mandated to protect our health and our environment?

I feel for Raisinghani. He, she, is muzzled, handcuffed, and just spouting the "line" from someone higher up who doesn't have the balls to speak to the public.

What we need is swift prosecution, not purported tough talk. Hell, that ain't even tough talk. Them's bureaucratic-PR weasel words. IF. MAY.

I would like to point out that the IFs and MAYs have been spouted repeatedly in the past - and have never been addressed. That does not reassure anyone about Environment Canada's track record, eh?

There was a toxic spill on a tributary that feeds into Byrne Creek as recently as 2007  in which the "source of contamination" WAS found, and Environment Canada went into its usual "an investigation MAY be launched" mode, but ended up doing NOTHING.

So what gives us citizens, who pay Environment Canada salaries, and who trust you to protect us and our environment, any reason to believe this time will be any different?

This issue has been brought up again, and again, and again, and we don't need any more IFs and MAYs. We need ACTION.

The real sad thing about all this is that as volunteer streamkeepers we work with all levels of government: municipal, regional, provincial, and federal. We don't want to diss anyone, but . . .   We are giving up hundreds and thousand of hours of our time to volunteer. We are taking time away from our work. . . while we're paying through our taxes, for, apparently, nothing to be done by "our" government.

That's harsh..

Short Video on Fish Kill from Newsleader

Found this video on BC Daily Buzz, and am assuming that since it's got embed links, it's OK to reproduce. This was shot by Mario Bartel of the Burnaby Newsleader a couple of days ago. It's me at the pond near Edmonds Skytrain Station where the deadly spill was first noticed on March 4, 2010.

Media Interest in Byrne Creek Kill Has Legs

The strength and duration of media interest in the recent fish kill in southeast Burnaby's Byrne Creek after someone illegally disposed of a chemical, likely down a drain on a street, is intriguing. The kill happened late Thursday afternoon, yet I was still receiving multiple calls for interviews and tours on Monday. Usually three- to four-day old local news is as appetizing to mainstream media as, er, rotting fish, but somehow this story had legs.

And we didn't send out a single press release or email, we didn't make a single phone call - we simply tried to keep up with the requests that poured in. We have no staff, streamkeepers are 100% volunteer. If anyone still doubts the power of Twitter, well, that's how this story started. . .

Perhaps it had something to do with public outrage. This story struck a chord. The creek is in an urban area, it is surrounded by public parks, and I think people are really getting the message that it's not only fish,  it's about the entire ecosystem and our health, too.

I've been monitoring the online versions of stories, and people have been responding with anger and disbelief that such a tragedy could happen - yet again - in a beloved creek. People have also been scathingly skeptical that anything will really be done by the federal agencies that supposedly are tasked with protecting our environment and our health.

The outrage is palpable, and I think that's what has kept this story alive.

Streamkeepers are making lemonade from the lemons handed to us by the thoughtless polluter - we've been getting calls from concerned citizens reporting suspicious substances on streets and in ditches, we may have a few new faces at our monthly meeting tomorrow (Thursday, March 11, at 7:30pm - coordinates here), we've been getting requests from businesses to come speak to employees about the watershed and how we all connect to it.

I hope interest remains high, but I understand that we have to get on with our busy lives and attention will quickly fade. Unfortunately, I've seen this cycle several times on battered Byrne Creek, and I hope that my sense that this time the response is noticeably stronger isn't just wishful thinking.

Thank you to all the media who covered the kill! And thank you to the public for expressing your feelings. If you really want change to happen, if you want to see enforcement, I urge you to write your local MLAs and MPs, and the federal and provincial environment ministers - without strong policy direction agency staff's hands are tied.

Media Covers Byrne Creek Fish Kill

Some of the media coverage of the toxic spill in SE Burnaby's Byrne Creek a few days ago:

Burnaby Now article

Burnaby Newsleader article

CBC website

The press is already getting results - a gentleman phoned me today with a report about seeing Powerhouse Creek, a tributary of Byrne Creek, running very dirty in the area of Beresford St. about a week ago. The more eyes we have on our local creeks, the better!

Update March 8, 2010

Globe & Mail article

Metro article

Update March 10, 2010

Burnaby Now on lack of enforcement

Burnaby Now on Mayor, City Council Push for Education

Update March 11, 2010

Burnaby Newsleader followup

Sample Density of Fish Killed in Byrne Creek

Sometimes it takes death to reveal how much life there is.

Would you believe that on average there was a dead fish less than every 2 meters along a sampled section of Byrne Creek the morning after someone poured a toxin down a street drain in the upper watershed on March 4, 2010? Most people never see fish in the creek - it takes patience, stealth, and knowing where to look to spot them when they are alive. My wife and I counted 231 dead trout, coho smolts (yearlings) and coho fry (this spring's babies) in an approximately 400-meter section of the creek. For those interested, here's the breakdown:

182 - Small cutthroat trout (say less than 15cm)
20  - Medium cutthroat trout (say 15-20cm)
1   - Large cutthroat trout (over 20cm)
Total 203 cutthroat trout

16 small-to-medium dead fish visible inside the culvert, too dark to ID
1 - large trout, very dark, no cutthroat markings on chin, near footbridge

8  - Coho smolts
3  - Coho fry
Total 11 coho salmon

Grand total dead fish in that stretch: 231

And that's likely lower than the actual number due to several factors: dead fish get wedged under rocks and drop deep in pools, the tiny fry are difficult to spot at all and we know that before the kill there were schools of dozens in the area sampled. In addition, opportunistic predation starts almost immediately after the toxin is quickly flushed down the creek: we found several fish partially eaten, and only strings of guts and bits of flesh too small to ID here and there.

The coho were found around T518 to T516 (lower end of the lower ravine). The coho fry were found in the vicinity of T517 where we photographed live ones a few days ago... See the entry below "Video of 2010 Salmon Fry in Byrne Creek."

The above photo shows dead fish ranging from coho fry at the bottom left,
a coho smolt a the bottom right, and an adult trout above. There was a
surprise to come, as you'll see in the next photo. . .

The big trout had a fry in its mouth. It's not hard to imagine what
happened - it spotted a little fish in distress from the chemical,
thought it an easy meal, and then before it could even finish
swallowing its target, the bigger fish also died.

Counting the Dead

Imagine walking down a street, and every few steps that you take, you come across a body.

A few more steps, a cluster of bodies. Every step, another body. Another group of bodies.

You approach an area where yesterday you saw small children playing - and you find small, inert bodies.

Small bodies, ranging from babies recently born, to midsize ones -- kids going to school. Further on, large ones, adults.

All with bulging eyes, gaping mouths.

Staring. At nothing. For they do not see any more. They do not breathe any more, for they died gasping for breath.

They choked to death.

That's what it was like today, carefully walking down Byrne Creek, counting the dead.

The dead that died when someone unthinkingly, uncaringly, or, despite decades of educational efforts, perhaps unknowingly, poured a chemical down a storm drain.

The bodies were fish. Just fish.

But we'll drink what went in that water someday, too. Or perhaps swim in it. Those toxins don't just disappear.

If we eat fish or other seafood, we will eat what went in that water someday, too.

All drains lead to fish habitat.

People habitat.

Every living thing's habitat.

I fear I'll dream tonight about counting the dead.

The bulging eyes, the gaping mouths.

The horrifying, constricting feeling of being unable to breathe.

We found fish today that in desperation had thrown themselves into the air, up onto the banks of the creek - to breathe, please let me breathe!

That would be like me throwing myself under water to escape foul, poisoned air - to breathe, please let me breathe!

Yes, I'm emotionally attached, because for days recently I eagerly patrolled Byrne Creek, looking for baby coho salmon, baby chum salmon, hoping against hope that the few salmon spawners that made it back last autumn succeeded in creating a new generation.

I saw baby fry, and I rejoiced. My heart soared. I took photos. I took videos.

I blogged, I Tweeted, I Facebooked. I did all that social media, cyberspace stuff.

But real life intervened

And now they are all dead.

And all that I can do is

Count the dead.

Fish Kill in Burnaby’s Byrne Creek March 4, 2010

A chemical entered Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby in the mid-to-late afternoon today, killing fish. Someone called Environment Canada [CORRECT: in fact the City of Burnaby received the call from the BC provincial enviro ministry after a youth called the Provincial Emergency Program], who then called the City, and streamkeepers also noticed the kill around the same time. City staff took samples and worked on tracing the source, which likely came from a storm drain, while streamkeepers took photos for documentation and sampled pH in the creek at several points. Both City staff and streamkeepers plan to follow up tomorrow. Here are some photos:

The fish ladder at the pond west of Griffiths Dr.
Water is covered with foam and slick to the touch.
There was an ammonia smell coming out of the pipe.

Dead fish on bottom of pool.

Dead cutthroat with hazy water visible. That's a size 12 boot
toe beside it for comparison.

Just a few days ago, streamkeepers were excited to see baby salmon
fry popping out of the gravel. We are concerned that they may also have
been affected.

I find it hard to believe that after decades of education efforts, such
kills still happen.

Please, folks, remember that all drains on roads and parking lots lead to fish habitat!

Re-Inventing Rainwater Management

Ran across this study today (pdf doc): Re-Inventing Rainwater Management: A Strategy to Protect Health and Restore Nature in the Capital Region by the  Environmental Law Centre at the University of Victoria. While I have yet to read all of it, it appears to be an excellent take on issues that streamkeepers in Burnaby and all over BC have been concerned about for years. An excerpt from the introduction to the problem:

We don't normally think of rainfall as pollution. However, over the last 150 years we have built cities in a way that transforms rainwater into an agent of considerable environmental harm: urban stormwater runoff.

Changing pristine rainwater into pollution occurs in stages. The first step is the creation of pollutants from driving and fixing cars, using chemicals on houses and yards, and commercial and industrial processes. Heavy metals, PCBs, oils, grease, antifreeze, solvents, pesticides, herbicides, fertilizers, paint chips, PAHs, road salt, and detergents fall to the ground across the urban landscape.

The second step involves our construction of impervious surfaces such as roofs, paved streets, sidewalks, and parking lots. As a city develops, the vegetation and natural soils that absorb and filter rainwater are replaced by impervious surfaces. When we pave over nature's absorption and filtration system, the next heavy rain sweeps across the landscape's hard surfaces picking up pollutants.

In the final step, the storm sewer system rapidly conveys all this polluted water to the nearest water body and flushes it at high speed into a sensitive aquatic ecosystem. In addition to the pollutants from the landscape, the water often contains paint and motor oil that people have dumped into the storm sewer. To make things worse, in older municipalities, this stormwater often contains sanitary sewage.

Video of 2010 Salmon Fry in Byrne Creek

I shot this video at 640 X 480 resolution with my Canon SD780 digital still camera handheld with the zoom at max. I processed the file in Windows Live Movie Maker, a free download. Not bad for such a cheap, on-the-fly setup :-).

It's always great to know that at least some of the few salmon that managed to return to this urban creek in southeast Burnaby last autumn successfully spawned, and that their eggs survived through the winter.

Learn About Salmon-Friendly Gardening

From our friends at LEPS, via the PSKF message board:

Make your neighbourhood a better place and start something healthier for you and for salmon, in your backyard!

On Saturday March 13, join Langley Environmental Partners Society from 10am-3pm at the Fraser River Presentation Theatre, 4th floor, 20338- 65 Ave Langley, for the 3rd annual Salmon Friendly Gardens Seminar.

This workshop style seminar will have speakers present practical solutions for:

• Converting Lawn into a Vegetable Patch ~ Ward Teulon, City Farm Boy
• Rethinking Weeds as Wild Edibles ~ David Catzel, Glorious Organics
• Gardening for Wildlife ~ Jude Grass, Birds on the Bay
• Pesticide Alternatives That Work ~ Martin Harcourt, Mainland Landscaping and Gardening Ltd
  

Event includes refreshment break. Pre-registration is required, to register email kgreenwood@tol.ca

Why grow a salmon-friendly garden?

Every Langley home is located in the middle of salmon habitat. Each of Langley's twelve watersheds collects runoff from our backyards and directs it into one of our salmon-bearing streams. The Fraser River salmon run - the largest in Canada - depends on these small tributaries for spawning and the healthy development of young fish.

The upshot is that what we put on our gardens ends up in our streams, including pesticides and fertilizers. In addition, the majority of Langley's tap water comes from aquifers, meaning that our drinking water originates directly below our feet. When you consider that 95% of pesticides used on residential yards are considered probable or possible carcinogens by the US Environmental Protection Agency, there's good reason to cut back on the chemicals we use in our gardens.

This worrying evidence doesn't mean that your garden has to go to the bugs. LEPS presents this full-day seminar on how to grow a beautiful, healthy and productive garden without chemicals.

The event also launches the Township of Langley's pilot Grow Healthy ~ Grow Smart Program.

Salmon Saturdays are supported by the Fraser Salmon and Watersheds Program.

Dirty Discharge Passes Through Byrne Creek

At 4:00 p.m. today I noticed that the pond near Choices in the Park just west of the Edmonds Skytrain Station in SE Burnaby was a murky grey-green colour. Not good. Something likely had been dumped in the creek through a drain on a street or in a parking lot. I phoned it in to Environmental Services at the City, and was told it had already been reported and that staff were checking the situation.

This is the pond at 4:00 p.m.

And here it is at 5:00 p.m. The creek flow had cleared
out the "slug" of dirty water.

Didn't have time to check downstream for the possible
impact on fish. Hope to do a creek walk tomorrow.

The concrete structure at the bottom of the photos is a fish ladder to enable fish to get up to the culvert that was put in when the trail was built across the creek.

New Fry in Byrne Creek, Signs of Spring

Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby, BC, is sporting new babies! I spotted two salmon fry in pools in the creek today - not many, but it's a start. There were also lots of other signs of spring.

Hard to ID for sure, but it may be a coho, judging by
orange-ish colour.

This backlit strider was making explosive flashes of light
on the water with every step.

Warmest January on Record in Vancouver, Eh?

Well, look what I found outside our door today:

I also did a quick patrol for salmon fry in Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby. Didn't see any yet, but back in 2005 we spotted fry on Feb. 8, so with this year's warm winter they ought to be popping out of the gravel soon!

Wrestling Yellow Fish at Edmonds Skytrain

Several years ago, Byrne Creek Streamkeepers marked rain drains (aka storm drains) around Edmonds Skytrain Station (among other areas) in southeast Burnaby with yellow fish to remind the public that nothing other than rain should go down these drains because they lead directly to fish habitat.

The other day I met my wife at the station and took some shots of an apparent, ahem, pissing match. Excuse my language, but it really reminds me of territorial scent marking by canines and other beasties :-).

You can clearly see the cute original fish painted over by, to my eye, the rather blimp-like, mean-looking latecomer. From Translink? Why mark already marked drains?

Collapse of Soviet Union Put Danube, Dnieper Rivers on Diverging Courses

A sobering article in the Washington Post. While many countries have come together to clean up and revitalize the Danube, there has been little progress on the environmental devastation to Ukraine's Dnieper perpetrated under the communist regime.

Water Act Forum Stimulates, Educates

Thanks to Watershed Watch for putting on a forum yesterday "to discuss how NGOs can work together to move the Living Water Smart (LWS) agenda forward, and how groups can help to modernize the BC Water Act." I enjoyed the presentations, learned a lot, and was impressed with the knowledge represented by the people in the room.

The organizers are asking for input so here goes: I'm not sure if "getting groundwater in" came up much in discussion, and that's crucial, particularly in urban watersheds like the creek that I volunteer on as a streamkeeper. The focus seemed to be on sucking groundwater out, which of course is very important, but we shouldn't neglect the "letting it soak in naturally" part of the cycle.

I'm not sure if a water act can include things like impermeable vs permeable surfaces, swales, rain gardens, infiltration ponds, biofiltration, street-edge alternatives, etc., but rainwater infiltration > groundwater infiltration is crucial in urban watersheds. Otherwise too much water is dumped into creeks through rain drains (trying to reshape the debate by getting away from "storm drains") during moderate-to-heavy rains, and not enough gets into the ground to maintain base flows in long, hot, dry spells.

I know we don't want to get too detailed or prescriptive, so perhaps as part of the preamble, or guiding principles, there could be something about the permeability-groundwater issue in regard to promoting watershed-friendly development and redevelopment guidelines?

Salmon Return to Japanese River

From the The Yomiuri Shimbun

This article is about salmon returning to the Chikumagawa river as flows improved after East Japan Railway Co. was directed to stop taking illegal amounts of water from the river to power trains in Tokyo.

Wow, amazing how one's life can change. When I rode the Yamanote Line in Tokyo on a daily or weekly basis for well over ten years from 1985 - 1999 I had no idea that some of the power was coming from a dam that was impacting salmon. Mind you I knew next to nothing about salmon, and nothing about streamkeeping back then.

Coho Spawning in Byrne Creek

The day was dark and gloomy following a week of rain, but my wife Yumi and I decided to check out Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby for spawning salmon. We volunteer with the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers, and spawner returns have been low this year, but we're always hoping.

It's tough to see fish when the water is high and dirty, and the light is low, but to our surprise we ran across a pair of coho spawning. In fact, the poor conditions likely worked in our favor, for on a bright day with clear water, the notoriously shy coho would have quickly spooked and hidden themselves. While we never saw them that clearly, it was still a thrill when we'd catch a flash of these magnificently muscular fish, with their scarlet-streaked copper-green sides.

A swirl of dark green, brown-gold and red as one of the coho moves up the creek. They had chosen to spawn just above a fast riffle, and moved up and down, battling the current.

The female flips sideways and carves the gravel with her tail to dig a nest for her eggs called a redd.

Bird’s Nest, Spider, Claw Marks Along Byrne Creek

Today on a patrol of Byrne Creek my wife and I found one dead chum salmon, one live chum guarding a nest of eggs (redd), and three coho salmon, in addition to lots of cutthroat trout that gather this time of year hoping to snag a wayward salmon egg. Nature being unemotional and efficient, we've observed cutthroat poking female salmon in their bellies, hoping to pop eggs out.

Today Yumi found a nest on the ground. It looked like it had never been completed. We also ran across what I believe is an orb weaver spider. It was on the cycling/walking path on Southridge Drive, so Yumi shepherded it off into the grass, as she is wont to do with any sort of animal that she feels is in danger.

We also observed plenty of claw marks and tracks at various places along the creek as opportunists of all species gather to meet the returning salmon. That's why salmon are so crucial to the entire west coast environment - they are a key part of the food chain for all sorts of birds and beasts, in addition to fertilizing the forests.

Byrne Creek Paw Prints, Paint & Mushrooms

I ran across lots of tracks along Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby on a patrol looking for spawning salmon today. Dead spawners attract all sorts of hungry animals from skunks to raccoons to coyotes. I've even seen squirrels checking out carcasses - why not? A cousin of mine calls them "rats with bushy tails" :-). Someone also thoughtfully left a bunch of paint cans along the fence at the spawning habitat!

Prints leading toward the creek

Close-up

A rain-filled mushroom

Poster reminding people and dogs to stay out
of the creek during spawning season

What's with the paint cans? Someone even took the
time to nicely line them up, so why not the time to
take them to a recycling centre?

Burnaby Now Interviews Streamkeepers about Spawning Salmon

Thanks to reporter Christina Myers and photographer Larry Wright from the Burnaby Now. What was to be a quick photo op on salmon returning to Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby turned into a great front-page article after Christina and I "chatted" via email.

Dunno if this is a permanent link, but at least for now you can find the story here.

Face to Face with Coyote on Byrne Creek

I had a meeting at the Stream of Dreams office just off Byrne Road south of Marine Way in SE Burnaby this morning, so I dropped into the Byrne Creek artificial spawning habitat for a few minutes on the way back up the hill to check if the chum salmon I had seen on a spawner patrol the previous day were still around.

As I broke out of the path into the habitat and onto the vehicle access road, a coyote came scooting out of the bush just a few meters in front of me, trotted a short way down the road, and stopped.

A large coyote.

It was the biggest I've seen in some time. It looked at least the match of a mid-sized German Shepherd, and had thick, sleek fur, so it appeared well fed... (the above photo was snapped on the quick draw with a tiny pocket camera and enlarged dramatically, so the quality is middling. . .)

It stopped and stared at me, and I stared at it while regretting not having the long walking pole that I usually carry. It flinched first, and began loping down the chain-link fence looking for a way out, and finally wriggled under it.

Before I proceeded further, I got my knife out and then slowly walked in, making plenty of noise. (During spawning season I carry a sheath knife in my pack to process dead salmon with -- streamkeepers have permission from the Department of Fisheries to cut open carcasses to determine sex and to check if fish have spawned before they died).  The creek was still running high and dirty from the morning rain so I didn't bother searching very hard because water visibility was very poor. I have to admit I was also on edge moving through the bush, because the coyote was likely in the habitat because it was attracted to dead salmon.

Sure enough, on my way out, I found the remains of a chum the coyote had been eating on the bank at the southwest end of the overflow pond, near where I first flushed it out.

There wasn't much left, just head bones, and about five inches of body. I didn't linger, not wanting to be between a coyote and its lunch :-) . I did see salmon eggs that had spilled into the water, so it was likely an unspawned female chum.

I found the experience exhilarating, and it left me tingling all over. It's amazing how the sight of a predator sharpens your senses when you're alone in the bush -- even in an urban park.  Thank you, coyote, for that moment of clarity, focus, and connection to nature.

Silverdale Creek Wetlands

On the way home from Harrison Lake we took the slower route 7, and at one point before Mission saw trails and what looked like a spawning channel to the north of the road. We found an access road, and discovered the Silverdale Creek Wetlands. We'd heard about the project, so we set out to explore. There were "Mother Bear with Cub" warning signs all over, so we kept our eyes peeled, proceeded slowly, and made plenty of noise!

It was a beautiful area, with ponds, marshes, and a spawning channel. We found only one dead spawner in the wetland area, but saw several more dead, and one live one swimming upstream, from the bridge over the creek near the entrance.

Look closely - there, in the middle foreground, it's
a huge concrete salmon. Steamkeepers around the
lower mainland have been sharing the mold for
these beauties

Despite it being November, there were still lots of dragonflies about

Lots of bird boxes of various sizes adorn many erected perch "trees"

The only spawner we saw in the habitat

The same spawner can be seen in the foreground

And a close-up of a second concrete salmon in the habitat

Salmon Pumpkin for Halloween

My wife Yumi carved this salmon pumpkin for Halloween to celebrate the return of spawning chum and coho to Byrne Creek in SE Burnaby, just behind our place.

Later: She also made a cat pumpkin.

Spawning Salmon Return to Byrne Creek

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers spotted six chum salmon in Byrne Creek this afternoon, and several of them were already digging redds, or nests, for their eggs. It was a wonderful sight to see!

Byrne is an urban creek in southeast Burnaby, and salmon numbers have been declining for the last several years.

I took the above video using the video function on my Canon S5IS camera, which tops out at 640 X 480 at 30 fps. I then used MS Movie Maker, which came free with the Windows XP operating system, to do so some rudimentary editing, titling, etc. It's a far cry from a real camcorder and more powerful software, but it's still fun to play with.

Turning Cities into Sponges

I never thought I'd be quoting a publication called the Daily Commercial News and Construction Record, but I'm willing to learn from anyone. An article entitled Philly's bold stormwater management plan leads the way caught my eye - it's an initiative that I'd like to see in more cities, and promoted by ones like my own Burnaby.

I love the following quotation from the article:

The plan reimagines the city as an oasis of rain gardens, green roofs, permeable pavements, thousands of additional trees, and more. The idea is to turn the city into a giant sponge to absorb as much rainwater as possible and delay the rest in its journey to the nearby Delaware and Schuykill rivers.

Now that's vision! Or simply going back to what used to be . . . Most cities were once giant sponges, because that's what most land used to be before we built on it. So it makes sense to return to what worked for Mother Nature for millennia, eh?

How about this?

The new plan announced last month would "peel back" a lot of the city's concrete and asphalt and replace them with plants - rain gardens, green roofs, landscaped swales in parking lots, heavily planted boulevards, and small wetlands.

Yes! Streamkeepers and other concerned citizens have dreamed of this for years. The main issues dogging urban creeks are massive flows during rains because of all the water that goes shooting off of roads, roofs and parking lots straight into street drains, and pollution from oil, antifreeze, brake-lining dust, rubber, soap, other chemicals, etc., washing off our streets. Rain gardens, ponds, swales - they would all help with both problems, slowing peak flows and filtering out pollutants.

I believe all municipalities in British Columbia are required to produce ISMPs (integrated stormwater management plans) for all of their watersheds, and Burnaby is no exception. The City has been working on a Byrne Creek ISMP for some time now, and I have sat in on stakeholder sessions as a representative from the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers.

Unfortunately, I haven't witnessed much imagination in the process so far. I get the sense that there's more talk about more pipes, than there is about rain gardens, swales, street-edge alternatives, trees and plants. More pipes? That's so 19th and early-to-mid 20th century, eh? Let's be forward-looking!

Autumn Rains Coming to Lower Mainland

We're going to savor the sun today, because look what the Environment Canada Weather Office has in store for the Vancouver area for the coming week:

It's not all bad news, though. This is about the time of year when rain triggers spawning salmon to start coming up our local stream, Byrne Creek, in southeast Burnaby.

Missing Salmon – I Think I Know Where They’re Going

I've been eating them.

I've been to three events in the last week, two of them specifically aimed at raising consciousness about the environment and restoring waterways and salmon runs, and I've been served salmon, lots of it, at all three.

And I've shamelessly, well, OK, with a twinge of conscience, indulged at all three. Heck, I had seconds at one event, because the call kept going out that there was still fish to be served.

Wild? Farmed? Endangered sockeye? "Still plentiful" pinks? I dunno, but it all tasted great. Surely it wasn't farmed, at least at the enviro events, eh?

When people organize an event to preserve, say, the Vancouver Island Marmot, do the little beasts end up on the dinner plates? Do celebrants discretely poke at bits of fur stuck between their teeth instead of fish bones?

Yeah, I know, that analogy is full of holes, but. . . it makes you squirm at bit, doesn't it?

Autumn Colours Advance on Byrne Creek

The recent rains in the lower mainland of BC have cast a chill upon the land, yet warmed my heart with excitement. Salmon will return to Byrne Creek soon.

It's a bit early, the first spawners are usually spotted in this urban creek in southeast Burnaby around mid-October, but the fish follow the rain, so you never know - and I couldn't wait to start looking.

I didn't find any salmon today, but the rain had begun washing the vibrant greens into reds, yellows, golds, and browns.

Blog Mentioned in Burnaby Now

Thanks to Julie Maclellan who mentioned me in her Burnaby Now column this weekend. She called me a "streamkeeper, environmental advocate and blogger about all sorts of interesting things." The pressure is on now!

Silty Discharge Hits Byrne Creek

A "slug" of silty water hit Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby overnight or early this morning. As no dead fish have been spotted, it appears it was not toxic; however, any discharge into street drains is illegal, and City of Burnaby staff are checking for the source.

As streamkeepers repeat again, and again, all drains on streets and in parking lots lead to fish habitat.

Water in the sediment pond in the spawning habitat was still opaque many hours after the discharge, though the water running into the pond (at the lower end of the photo) is clear.

Water discharging downstream of the artificial spawning habitat was also still very murky early in the afternoon.

Canoing Fraser River at SEP 2009 Workshop

About 70 streamkeepers signed up for a canoe trip down the Fraser River to cap the SEP 2009 (BC Streamkeeper) Workshop, out of around 300 people attending. It was a gorgeous day for a paddle and we had a great time. We put in near the Mission bridge, and took out up Kanaka Creek, with a stop for lunch along the way.

The putting-in point near the Mission bridge.

Me in front, with my wife Yumi behind me, and Naomi from Campbell River.

Heading downstream.

Catching up in a bit of friendly competition...

Cool water, blue skies - a gorgeous day for a paddle.

Working up a sweat!

Looking east down one of most productive salmon rivers in the world, with Mt. Baker barely visible on the horizon.

Heading up Kanaka Creek to the landing site.

It was a great day with a fantastic outing with wonderful people. Thanks to all of the organizers and sponsors!

BC Streamkeeper Volunteers Paint Concrete Salmon

At the 2009 BC Streamkeepers workshop, volunteers pitched in to paint two huge concrete salmon in designs inspired by children who had taken the Stream of Dreams watershed education and community art program.

The original salmon sculptures grace the Alexandria Bridge in BC. DFO Community Advisor Joe Kambeitz found original mock-ups of the salmon in a junkyard and rescued them to make molds for use by streamkeepers across BC.

The following photos show the salmon arriving, and being painted by volunteers based on Dreamfish created by schoolkids who took the Stream of Dreams watershed education and community art program.

The last photo shows Joe with Stream of Dreams founders Joan and Louise.

Vancouver as 'World's Greenest City': How About Daylighting a few Creeks?

Is there any possibility of daylighting any of Vancouver's 60-odd lost and buried creeks as part of the mayor's plan to make Vancouver the world's greenest city?

How about a truly green city with salmon spawning in dozens of creeks running through neighbourhoods everywhere? That's what we used to have....

http://vancouver.ca/greenestcity/

Streamkeepers at Choices Earth Day, Saturday, April 18

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers will have our booth set up from noon to 4:00 p.m. at Choices in the Park for their Earth Day BBQ. We will also offer tours of Byrne Creek, so come and sign up! This is in southeast Burnaby, near Edmonds Skytrain Station. Last year's event was great fun, and kudos to Choices for sponsoring and collecting donations for streamkeepers' efforts to preserve and enhance this lovely, but struggling, urban creek.

Coho Fry Identified in Byrne Creek

Yumi managed to net a couple of fry in Byrne Creek today. To the best of our knowledge they are coho: sickle-shaped dorsal and anal fins with leading white/black rays, distinct parr marks, orange-tinged caudal, anal and adipose fins...

Definitely not chum, and do not have the white dorsal tip of cutthroat fry, and dorsal/anal fins definitely sickle-shaped, which cuts do not have...

NOTE: It is illegal to net fry and streamkeepers do so with the permission of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans for ID purposes only. Fry are returned unharmed to the creek.

Salmonid Fry Spotted in Byrne Creek

Yumi and I saw salmonid fry in Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby, BC, today. After checking ID books against the photos we took, they appear to be chum salmon fry.

It's always exciting to see fry in this urban creek, and know that the few salmon that came back the previous autumn were successful in spawning and creating a new generation.

Rainy Byrne Creek

I had to get outside despite the rain and shake my afternoon drowsiness. Byrne Creek was running high and dirty, but there were some beautiful scenes. I saw some varied thrushes -- a male and a female hanging out together -- on the ravine path, and some red-winged blackbirds at the overflow pond. Unfortunately my bird photos were all blurry today because of the low light in the woods. My Canon S5IS does not perform that well in such conditions and I didn't want to carry my DSLR in the rain.

Byrne Creek with high, dirty flow in the rain.

A mossy tree - I didn't realize there were raindrops on the lens until I viewed the photos at home!

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers Host Kerr Wood Leidal Presentation

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers hosted Crystal Campbell and Laurel Morgan from Kerr Wood Leidal at our meeting this evening. Crystal and Laurel spoke about stormwater control and amelioration methods, and integrated stormwater management plans, or ISMPs.

The City of Burnaby is currently working with consultants and streamkeepers on an ISMP for the Byrne Creek Watershed, so it was a timely topic. It was an engaging presentation followed by a lively question & answer period.

We had a great time discussing ways to better manage water quantity and quality in an urban watershed with high flows and pollution due to the spread of impervious surfaces, industrial and road (gas, oil, antifreeze, metals) sources of toxins, and the loss of forests and wetlands.

Can New Pollution Bill be Trusted When Present Laws Are Ignored?

Environment Canada News Release
New Enforcement Legislation Cracks Down On Environmental Offenders

Ottawa -- March 4, 2009 -- Cracking down on polluters, poachers and wildlife smugglers through increased fines and new enforcement tools are the main elements of the Environmental Enforcement Bill introduced in the House of Commons today by Environment Minister Jim Prentice.

I hate to be negative because overall this sounds like a great move; however, the problem is even present laws are not being enforced, so will this change anything?

One example: In October 2007, John Mathews Creek in Burnaby, BC, turned orange and fluorescent yellow after someone poured a toxic chemical down a storm drain. Here we are 17 months later, and apparently nobody has been charged.

John Mathews Creek runs into Byrne Creek and then into the Fraser River, so the contamination was widespread. It occurred just as salmon were returning to spawn in Byrne Creek. When streamkeepers recently called the Canadian Environment Ministry about progress in the case, they were told to file a Freedom of Information request if they wanted to pursue the matter. Apparently the City of Burnaby got the same response. This is our national government, using our tax money, "at work." Hah!

Now let's review a few points:

• Said "someone" was caught red-handed
• The pH of the creek was running 3
• Dead fish were collected
• City of Burnaby environmental staff were called in and were on scene
• British Columbia Environment Ministry staff were called in and were on scene
• Samples were collected

And here we are, a year-and-a-half later, and our designated national protectors of the environment have apparently yet to accomplish anything, and refuse to speak to the tax-paying citizens that they work for.

So I'll praise the "new and improved" enforcement bill when I actually see some enforcement.

Chilly School Tour of Byrne Creek

A couple of Byrne Creek Streamkeepers took a class of kids on a tour of the Byrne Creek watershed this morning. It was cold! I was glad I'd zipped home following a biz mtg to put on long underwear, a turtleneck and a fleece jacket.

We pointed out the lay of the land, how streets and storm drains connect to the creek, invasive plant species, found some aquatic bugs to look at, took some water samples.... Great fun with an eager group of "popsicles" as another streamkeeper called them :-).

Protecting the Blue Heart of the Planet

Passionate speech by Sylvia Earle on saving the ocean -- a prize-winner at the TED conference.

"We are facing paradise lost."

"We have taken over 90% of the big fish from the sea."

"Health for oceans means health for us."

"I hope that some day that we will find evidence that there is intelligent life among humans on this planet."

"Auden: Thousands have lived without love. None have lived without water."

"With every drop of water you drink, every breath you take, you are connected to the sea no matter where on earth you live."

"No water, no life. No blue, no green."

Byrne Creek Fry Search

Fry have been found already in some Burnaby creeks, so Yumi and I checked out parts of Byrne Creek today. While we didn't spot any baby salmon yet, it was a lovely day to be down by the gurgling waters.

Yumi checking the creek for fry.

Some lovely fungus growing on a fallen tree.

Death scene. Feathers trailing down a tall cedar and spread on the ground...

There were over a dozen bald eagles soaring above the ravine.

I wonder if the above feathers were remnants of an eagle lunch...

CNN: Fish Migrating to Cooler Waters

"(CNN) -- Climate-driven environmental changes could drastically affect the distribution of more than 1,000 species of commercial fish and shellfish around the world, scientists say."

http://tinyurl.com/dn9ksn"

This echoes some of the discussion at the recent State of the Salmon 2009 conference that I attended. Could the day come when the Fraser, the world's greatest salmon river, could no longer support runs?

That's Some Road Sweeping Job!

Crews working on a broken water main in our townhouse complex said they'd sweep up after themselves. Right. Here's what the road looked like after they went home for the day. See that drain? It goes straight into Byrne Creek, and baby salmon fry will be hatching soon.

Adopt a Legislator

One of the interesting ideas that came out of the State of the Salmon 2009 conference was "Adopt a Legislator". Unfortunately, I don't recall which speaker said it, so I can't give it proper attribution.

Anyway, delegates from several countries agreed that the only way to get change going, and action happening, was to educate politicians.

So here you go, some protocol and forms of address when writing to politicians in Canada, at various levels of govt., from the CivicNet BC website (thanks to editor Shaun Oakey for pointing this out):

http://tinyurl.com/as8o68

or

http://www.civicnet.bc.ca/siteengine/activepage.asp?PageID=250

Summary of State of Salmon 2009

The State of the Salmon 2009 conference over the last three-and-a-half days has left me stunned -- long days and lots of information to process. I documented it as best I could in a running collection of Tweets on my Twitter account, and I've posted that entire flow of jottings to my blog here.

First let me say that the conference organizers did a tremendous job. I don't know if there was ever any panic behind the curtains, but there was nary a glitch to be seen by the audience. And thanks to the simultaneous interpreters who mediated the flow in English, Russian and Japanese.

This was the second State of the Salmon conference, and my first. It's mostly aimed at scientists and bureaucrats, but we had a pretty good volunteer presence from lower-mainland streamkeepers and First Nations from the west coast and north. I think such broad representation greatly added to the conference, but of course I'm biased :-).

One of the threads that flowed throughout was the need for more research on how to protect and conserve wild salmon, and there was excitement about the new approach to science under the new Obama administration. The research dollars may start flowing again!

It was interesting to see the rifts occasionally bubble to the surface between the geneticists, the hatchery promoters and hatchery critics, the "stronghold, or protect the best" advocates and those who feel all habitat deserves protection. As a streamkeeper working on the ground, I was part of perhaps a minority that felt that any available $$ need to go toward action and habitat protection. We know what the problems are, yet we continue to study the patient while he's dying. Any knowledge we gain in the end is still, as one participant put it, "looking at a construction site through a hole in a fence -- and we're standing ten feet back from the hole."

There was also an underlying sense that perhaps with climate change leading to ocean warming and acidification, there is no way to prevent the loss of southern salmon spawning areas. Which to my mind made the groaning buffet tables laden day after day with salmon, halibut, shrimp, pork, bison, chicken etc. seem an indictment of the principles of having such a conference in the first place. Of course I ate everything, so I'm as guilty as anyone, but it never ceases to amaze me at how difficult it is for us humans to make our actions even approximate our pious thoughts. When it comes to human gatherings, feasting is so ingrained in all cultures that I doubt we'll ever get away from such behaviour.

At one point I was dreaming about future historians studying the progression of conferences and seeing that at the first one participants ate crab and lobster, at the second salmon and shrimp, at the third tofu and beans... and finally they were chewing on switchgrass because that was all that was left :-). Oh, rats, I've trapped myself in an illogical story -- by that point there would be, er, no point, in holding another salmon conference. I digress...

Something that was strangely absent from any discussion was pollution. I think it came up once in passing in a comment from the audience, and perhaps was glossed over by one of the speakers. Yet pollution is one of the biggest issues when it comes to habitat preservation, and is a direct and deadly killer of urban streams. And what's it doing to ocean survivability? We humans have been flushing all sorts of chemicals down our rivers and into the ocean for centuries -- surely that must have some impact on the "mystery" of declining biodiversity. Yet it was never addressed.

It was refreshing to hear from First Nations representatives who spoke from the heart, and who gave a breath of life to the proceedings. You can throw up all the PowerPoint slides full of as many charts and plots, and dense statistical calculations, as you like, but to hear the simple words "We have no fish anymore," provides much greater clarity and grounding.

Well, I have to get back to work, and perhaps I'll find time for more analysis and synthesis later.

I'm glad I attended.

Now, how about some ACTION!

Tweets From Day 3 Salmon Conference

Here are my Tweets from today's State of the Salmon 2009 conference sessions (third of three days), in last-to-first order:

Angelo: we all hope that future generations will be able to admire salmon as we have.

Angelo: we cannot forget the hope that salmon themselves represent.

Angelo: sustainability must be a primary guide.

Angelo: We need more political leadership.

Angelo: I worry about a younger generation that is drifting away from.

Angelo: need to do more to reconnect young people to the environment.

Angelo: Protecting salmon needs to be seen as a moral issue.

Angelo: need a precautionary approach to development.

Angelo: the unrelenting loss of salmon habitat is mainly due to rising human population.

Angelo: Heart of the Fraser is one of most productive stretches of river in the world.

Angelo: pollution, water extraction, development.

Angelo: but we also have to protect rivers that are still in good shape.
Angelo: urban habitat restoration leads to education.

Angelo: Protect, reconnect, restore.

Angelo: We need to better identify and manage key salmon watersheds.

Angelo: Need to incorporate local values so that people buy in.

Angelo: Instead of reacting to bad development planning, need to be proactive.

Angelo: Need to put a more preventive slant on habitat preservation.

Angelo: need to better understand and incorporate societal values into conservation.

Angelo: strive to develop ecosystem-based approaches to conservation.

Angelo: there is a need for new and fresh approaches.

Angelo: there is a pressing need for action.

Angelo: Most important is to move from discussion to being more action oriented.

Angelo: the theme for this conference was "Bringing the Future into Focus".

Angelo: Closing remarks.

Our problem is managing people, not fish.

Protected areas give society an excuse to ignore everything else.

Comment -- urban streams are so important, they bring fish to people's backyards.

Belyaev -- every citizen of every country is an integral part of the environment, their habitat.

Belyaev -- legislators won't get on side until they are informed.

Need to have an ongoing conversation with a legislator.

"Adopt a Legislator" Every scientist, every activist needs to adopt a legislator.
We're still talking about the same things we were 15 years ago -- how do get moving, doing?

We need a scale that people can relate to.

We need to change the paradigm as how we function as humans.

We need an informed public that votes differently and changes behavior.

Glaciers "make rivers work" in many places.

How long will glacier-fed watersheds continue to exist?

Groundwater flows are critical to spawning habitat and must be protected.

QA "we'll come to that later" -- later is now.

Every salmon stream must have a protected base flow throughout the seasons.

Alaska has strong laws for preserving flows in streams for salmon, but tough process.

Bristol: salmon are fun, they're food, let people define salmon for themselves.

Bristol: need to do outreach with political decision makers, and those who live off salmon.

Bristol: reframe the issue -- protected areas to pass on to future generations.

Bristol: Tongas has been a long and heated land battle in Alaska, but we're making progress.

Bristol: Grassroots concept -- bringing more and disparate people to conservation.

Bristol: what role do salmon play in modern society?

Bristol: Trout Unlimited Alaska

Belyaev: we can't accomplish anything in isolation, need all groups aboard.

Belyaev: criticizing is a favourite pastime of people.

Belyaev: different fishermen have very different opinions.
Belyaev: where can we find a compromise among all the groups?

Belyaev: salmon preservation is first and foremost human relations, scientists, fisherman, politicians.

Belyaev: How is Russia different -- no private property along rivers, so feds can protect areas.

Healey: must be thinking about salmon within context of global change.

Healey: the future is not going to be same as the past.

Healey: should we preserve Arctic areas as refuge for migrating salmon?

Healey: we have to start looking at Arctic as becoming suitable for salmon.

Healey: are there places where salmon habitat will continue to be suitable in face of warming.

Healey: In a very few decades most salmon habitat in southern range will no longer be suitable for them.

Healey: we really need to take a long-term view of conservation.

Kopchak: we are building an "electronic elder" to collate/share information.

Kopchak: Find common languages, cross jurisdictional systems.

Kopchak: H2O -- Headwaters to Ocean.

What are you going to do about long-term sustainability of salmon. YOU.

We who love salmon are not necessarily representative of the general public.

Rahr: we cannot succeed without preserving salmon strongholds.

Rahr: Russian far east has best opportunity for salmon habitat preservation.

Rahr: WWF study says 55,000 tons of salmon are poached for roe yearly in Kamchatka.

Rahr: We tend to react at the 11th hour -- we need to take the long view, get ahead of the curve.

Rahr: We don't proactively protect, we react, so good places get pounded, it's a losing strategy.
Rahr: Pacific Salmon Conservation Assessment.

Rahr: The time to be effective is before the threat is on top of you.

Rahr: we must save the best -- habitat etc.

Rahr: Pacific Rim population will double by 2050.

Rarh -- Wild Salmon Center http://www.wildsalmoncenter.

Fukushima: masu salmon are effectively protected but taimen are not.

How the heck do get an average from some of these scatter plots?

Fukushima: Japanese huchen/taimen -- http://tinyurl.com/cfo4tw

Fukushima: fish species richness falls due to damming.

Fukushima: Hokkaido protected drainages designed for salmon conservation.

Fukushima: Hokkaido has 574 watersheds of which 32 are "protected drainages"

Fukushima: Japan has thousands of dams.

Fukushima: National Institute for Environmental Studies Tsukuba Japan http://www.nies.go.jp/

Marxan: http://www.uq.edu.au/marxan

Reeves: Marxan -- a decision support system for systematic conservation planning.

Reeves: Concept of irreplaceability -- areas essential to meet conservation goals.

Reeves: We have long thought that nature can bounce back from any indignity we impose upon it.

Reeves: Livingston Stone was calling for salmon reserves in Alaska in 1892.

Salmonid Rivers Observatory Network

Do we need more vision or more implementation?
Skeena: kids learn to honour, respect and take care of the fishery.

Skeena -- these fisheries are also nurturing grounds for our children.

Skeena -- this is all for naught if we don't protect the habitat. Yes!

In-river native fisheries don't need boats, fuel, port infrastructure.

Skeena, we can catch fish in better ways, with more local benefits, while boosting biodiversity.

Russia -- we need legislation like Canada's Wild Salmon Policy, and we need more than that.

Kaev: Pink salmon need improvement of spawning conditions.

Kaev: chum salmon need further development of hatchery rearing.

Kaev: wild vs hatchery salmon in Sakhalin.

Russains are using Google Earth for some mapping -- what a change from the Cold War!

Semenchenko: Sakhalin test rivers -- Taranay, Kura, Naycha.

Semenchenko: move away from monitoring commercial fisheries to whole river monitoring.

Semenchenko: Monitoring salmon in Sakhalin.

Tabunkov: We are talking major devastation (poachers + ruthless companies).

Tabunkov: Companies will take maximum fish regardless of regulations.

Tabunkov: Poachers taking about 20% of salmon caught.

Tabunkov: I don't want to keep this photo on screen (fish gutted for roe only) -- too depressing.

Tabunkov: Problem of poachers taking roe only.
Tabunkov: problem of "heavily corrupt companies working with "heavily corrupt bureaucrats"

Tabunkov: we do not tag hatchery fish on Sakhalin so research "leaves much to be desired"

Tabunkov: hatchery chum pushed wild pink out of spawning grounds, so law was changed.

Tabunkov: these recently built hatcheries were destructive to wild fish.

Tabunkov: fishing companies are building their own hatcheries with no scientific input.

Tabunkov: Sakhalin has 15 federal hatcheries producing 900 million fish?/year.

Tabunkov: Sakhalin divided into over 700 fishing areas -- assigned to companies -- they care for enviro.

Tabunkov: no forestry, no mining, no drilling equals recovering fish.

Tabunkov: collapsing Russian economy (see prev Tweet) resulted in recovery of salmon.

Tabunkov: collapsing Russian economy some years ago impacted fisheries - no forestry, mining, drilling.

Tabunkov: Sometimes there were too many spawning fish that clogged the river - I don't get this.

Tabunkov: Fisheries Association of Sakhalin http://tinyurl.com/cegdgd

Tabunkov: I'm here representing concerns of fishermen.

Taylor: thanks to First Nations of the Skeen Fisheries Commission http://www.skeenafisheries.ca/

Taylor: looking for "fair trade" designation for Skeena salmon sustainable harvested by FN.

Taylor: all economic benefits of Babine/Skeen fishery stays local.

Taylor: conservation, biodiversity and ecological integrity paramount in all decisions.

Taylor: develop selective in-river fisheries that emulate what FN did.

Taylor: look back to move forward -- there are other ways.
Taylor: but increased abundance of "enhanced Sockeye" has led to overharvest of wild fish.

Taylor: says installation of spawning channels was a success.

BTW, by FN, I refer to First Nations, or "native Indians".

Taylor: We are trying to replicate something FN had in place for hundreds of years.

Taylor: FN principles -- reciprocal economic exchange, strict and transparent enforcement of rules.

Taylor: FN principles -- fishing property rights, sustainability, conservation for future generations.

Taylor: Babine River, FN used to harvest 3/4 million salmon a year.

Taylor: First Nations "managed" fisheries for hundreds and thousands of years – sustainably.

Taylor: there was a robust fishery on the Skeens thousands of years ago - a sustainable FN fishery.

Taylor: Skeena Wild Conservation Trust - http://www.skeenawild.org/

So LuLu says, yes we need a TV show or weekly newspaper column called "Fish Files"

Artist LuLu has a panel on her scroll called "Fish Files" -- I like that, sounds like a TV series.

Artist Lu is chronicling the conf with an art scroll.

Morning break is announced -- we now get to eat Skeena salmon with our coffee.

I'm feeling like the patient is dying and we're discussing better ways to monitor the decline.

DFO asked Tlingit to halve salmon take, elders said no fishing at all because there are almost no fish.

Tlingit have completely stopped fishing in the headwaters of the Yukon on advice from elders.

Peterman: we have data on Fraser sockeye "all the way back to 1938" - how is that "historical"?

Canada's Species at Risk Act - http://tinyurl.com/cdg9s6 9:31 AM

QA comment, no fish species has ever been listed as endangered under SARA, even the cod that 99% gone.
Holt: We suggest that risk tolerance be identified by fisheries management.

Holt: uncertainties are pervasive, but we can account for them in the model... Uh, OK

Mortality is depensatory when its rate increases as the size of the population decreases. (http://tinyurl.com/ccwwws)

Holt: depensatory mortality -- another term I need to learn

Canada's Wild Salmon Policy: http://tinyurl.com/bexba

Holt: speaking on Canada's Wild Salmon Policy

Zhivotovsky: there are some lake-spawning chum salmon in Russia - rare

Zhivotovsky: speaking about research on "south Kuril" islands - wonder how Japanese feel about this?

Thinking at the first conf they ate crab and lobster, now salmon and shrimp, next conf tofu and beans.

Tweets From Day 2 Salmon Conference

Here are my Tweets from today's State of the Salmon 2009 conference sessions (second of three days), in last-to-first order:

BTW. today's sessions wrapped up with a plea from octogenarian Pearl Keenan -- nice to have some heart instead of statistics. She's from the Tlingit First Nation in the Yukon. Her basic plea? Please stop taking all the fish at the mouth of the river -- she lives near the headwaters, and they're all gone up there. I had to find her later and thank her for speaking from the heart, and hoping we would listen to something other than "science" and PowerPoints.

Long: Washington State fisheries are dependent on hatcheries

Busack: Argument is now how serious is domestication (hatchery fish), not if it exists.

Busack: Concern that interbreeding between hatchery and wild fish reduces fitness.

Researchers find what they look for, and when you bring up other potential factors, they get defensive.

When issues arise, it's time to break for coffee. Sheesh.

One word I have yet to hear at this conference is "pollution."

Q&A: Beamish -- coho and chinook in St of Gerogia are critical and think will get worse.

Walters: But culling seals is no solution because they also keep down other predators.

Walters: Huge growth in harbour seal population in Georgia Strait.

Walters: Ocean mortality causes hypotheses - hatchery disease, ocean warming, predators??

Walters: We don't know what is causing coho and chinook ocean mortality.

Walters: South BC chinook continue to decline despite closing commercial fishing in 80s and sport in 90s.

Walters: coho spawning in south BC has collapsed even with hatchery supplementation.

Walters: Declining marine survival is the biggest hit to salmon.

Walters: there has been no substantial habitat loss since 1990. Huh?

What data? Historic salmon runs - data never goes back more than a century, so how is that "historic"?

Walters: severe coho and chinook declines in south BC - threats are other than fishing.

Some speakers really need to take a Plain English course! Jargon-itis puts the audience to sleep.

What the heck is a "mortality objective"?

Schindler: geomorphic variation in fresh water is reflected in ocean growth of salmon.

Schindler: spawning productivity of rivers changes over time -- me: so shouldn't we protect *all* rivers?

Schindler: Are doomsday scenarios the best way to get the message out to the public?

By the time this conference is over we'll have eaten all the fish in the sea.

Q&A - Hokkaido also has conflicts between agriculture and fisheries.

Q&A - salmon can quickly repopulate territory if habitat is cleaned up and access enabled.

Q&A - unfortunately, education on salmon preservation is weak.

Q&A - if policymakers would err on the side of safety, we'd have better monitoring.

Q&A - Japan considers 2nd-gen hatchery spawners to be "wild" as long as from same stock.

Walton: need to look at viability of salmon at local levels -- creeks.

Walton: hatchery reform will be crucial to the survival of wild salmon.

Walton: over-harvest and hatcheries impact wild fish.

Walton: if you want to keep salmon runs strong, don't ruin your rivers.

Walton: after a century of using salmon hatcheries, we still don't know if they benefit salmon.

Walton: challenge is to develop a concise story we can tell people about protecting wild salmon.

Walton: How are we going to change human behaviour in relation to wild salmon?

Walton: do we have a common vision for a wild salmon policy?

Walton: endangered salmon are a West Coast-wide issue.

Walton: we have been working on recovery plans for a long time, but need people's support.

Last US administration (Bush) gave little support to conservation.

Bowles: fish only care about action -- what are we doing to fix things?

Bowles: "plan" has become a four-letter word, but plans are essential for salmon recovery.

Bowles: hatchery fish are not a replacement for natural populations.

Bowles: key threat to salmon is apathy.

Bowles: public becoming more disconnected from fish and their watersheds.

Riddell: conservation of wild salmon and their habitat is the highest priority.

Riddell: in BC/Yukon there are 8300 combinations of streams/salmon species.

Riddell: diversity is key to preserving salmon.

White: all groups that harvest salmon have a sense of entitlement.

Kulikov: sounds like Russia also has jurisdictional and bureaucratic issues.

Kulikov: First protected area in Khabarovsk area was created in 1920s.

Nagata: Japan looking at zone management for coexistence of hatchery and wild salmon.

Nagata: Commercial and game fisheries in rivers are prohibited in Hokkaido.

Nagata: Hokkaido fishery needs to change to wild salmon management objectives.

Nagata: calls native salmon spawning "traditional management", hatcheries "modern management".

Nagata: Hatcheries in Japan were established in 1888 from US.

Rawson: Pogo - we have met the enemy and he is us.

Rawson: we can't be doing things the same way that we have been doing them.

Rawson: habitat protection is the key contributor to saving the salmon.

Rawson: there is little public confidence in process for protecting habitat.

Rawson: Spawner return in some Puget Sound rivers is less than 10% of historic figures.

Rawson: lost 75-90 % of estuary habitat in Puget Sound.

Rawson: Habitat loss is the key factor for decline of Puget Sound chinook salmon.

Rawson: Hatchery risks - genetic, ecological, disease, etc.

Rawson:hatcheries are our arrogant assumption that we can do better than Mother Nature.

Rawson: causes of chinook decline - harvest, hatcheries and habitat.

Rawson: Skagit chinook have declined dramatically over last 50 yrs.

Rawson: Puget Sound chinook listed as threatened.

Quinn: larger fish may enter spawning grounds ealier than small fish.

Quinn: in some cases, middle of run is fished hard, with early and late less exploited.

Quinn: so we might be hitting more "early" fish, and more "late" fish.

Quinn: human exploitation appears to affect timing of spawning runs to some degree.

Quinn: fishing rates (exploitation) vary widely during run timing due to management.

Quinn: fisheries are less size-selective than they used to be.

Quinn: intermediate sizes of fish are most vulnerable to being caught.

Quinn: expected that gillnet fishery is selective against large fish.

Quinn: salmon have been declining in body size -- selective effects of fishing?

Quinn: humans have an impact on evolution of animals through hunting.

Quinn: humans have a long history of affecting the evolution of animals.

First nations comment - science must work with first nations knowledge.

Audience comment - global warming is a symptom of overpopulation.

Williams: Aldo Leopold - humans must change from conquerors of land to members of it.

Williams: to save salmon - land ethic, multiple scales and political boundaries, restoration economy.

Williams: hatcheries alone cannot solve problem of declining salmon, declining biodeversity.

Williams: artificial species restocking is not biologically viable without addressing causes of decline.

Williams: impacts - rising temps, reduced snowpack, variability in flows, fires.

Williams: Stressors - human pop growth, resource consumption, invasive species, climate change.

Williams: reconnect rives to their floodplains, do not channel them.

Williams: Protect remaining habitat, Reconnect to other areas, Restore urban waterways.

Williams: we must protect remaining habitat.

Williams: 29% of Pacific northwest salmon stocks are extinct

Williams: Laws and regulations are not enough. We are destroying Earth -- ecological footprint.

How the heck do you "increase salmon resilience to climate change"? Isn't that evolution?

Sun: Canadian Fisheries Management 'A Mess'

Vancouver Sun: Canadian fisheries management a mess.

Tweets From Day 1 Salmon Conference

Here are my Tweets from today's State of the Salmon 2009 conference sessions, in last-to-first order:

Fedorenko: Pacific Rim nations release 5 billion hatchery salmon/year.

Fedorenko: Total value of Pacific Rim commercial salmon catch $1 billion/year.

Beechie: Dams are the big story in extirpation of salmon in US lower 48, along with development.

Irvine: 50% or more of all BC salmon species are red/amber status (ie not good) in conservation units.

Irvine: In Canada general catch declines for all salmon species, 2008 one of lowest years.

Disappointed that reports from different countries are measuring different things so can't compare.

Hilsinger: Alaska salmon catches for all species have been good in last thirty years.

Radchenko: Russia releasing over half a billion hatchery salmon into Pacific annually.

Radchenko: Russian sockeye and chum catches are way up in the last ten years.

Kang: Korean salmon returns in 2000s fell to a third of returns in 1990s -- also warming?

Nagata: Focus on biodiversity of wild salmon and restoration of freshwater environments.

Nagata: Japan chum returns have fallen dramatically in south, more stable in north (Hokkaido) - warming?

Nagata: Japan stocking hundreds of millions of chum and pink fry.

Vladimir Belyaev: Important to improve national and international reporting to set reserves for salmon.

Vladimir Belyaev: Protecting entire watersheds is crucial to protecting salmon.

Vladimir Belyaev: Ocean survivability is moot if we don't protect spawning habitat -- rivers, estuaries.

Vladimir Belyaev: Russia is looking at setting up protected areas for salmon.

David Anderson: Concerned that Canada will fall behind US under Obama on climate change.

David Anderson: Major uncertainties about the impact of hatchery fish on ocean survival of wild stocks.

David Anderson: Strong opposition to change. People understand existing systems and fear the unknown.

David Anderson: The dead hand of the past protects the status quo.

Nathan Mantua: Humans are the primary drivers of change in salmon ecosystems.

Looking at Ecology and Society journal website: http://www.ecologyandsociety

Resilience Alliance http://www.resalliance.org/

David Suzuki -- World Scientists' Warning to Humanity, back in 1992 - http://deoxy.org/sciwarn.htm.

Suzuki: State of Salmon -- we invented the economy, we gotta change it.

Suzuki: State of Salmon -- all that humans can do is manage themselves, not other animals.

Suzuki: The most important lesson we have is the extent of our ignorance.

Suzuki: The future of salmon is bleak as long as politics and economics are the major drivers.

Guido Rahr fate of salmon will be determined in our lifetimes.

First Nations start by pointing out that side channels and creeks in the lower mainland are being destroyed.

Muddy Byrne Creek

Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby, BC, looked pretty muddy this afternoon, even though the rain had stopped for several hours. I tracked it as high as near the Edmonds Skytrain Station, and the water up there was still muddy, so it wasn't erosion in the ravine. Hope nobody was pumping out a construction site into a storm drain -- all drains connect directly to the creek, and baby fish will be hatching soon.

City staff responded immediately and said they'd check it out.

Vancouver Sun on Threats to Fish

The Vancouver Sun published a story today on Water crossings pose serious threat to fish: report. While as a volunteer streamkeeper I'm happy to see coverage of threats to migration of fish, some of the conclusions raise a resounding "Duh!"

As in "Culverts and bridges are a little-known threat to migration." Right, as if we didn't know.

But now perhaps more people will know.

Question is whether anything will be done about it.

CBC Story on Invasive Plants in BC

CBC has run a story on invasive plants in BC. It's about time the mass media began covering this issue. Streamkeepers and other groups have been putting in thousands of collective volunteer hours battling these non-native plants that overpower and kill native species, leading to monocultures that destroy habitat.

Byrne Creek Patrol Jan. 18, 2009

Yumi and I walked the ravine portion of Byrne Creek this afternoon for the first time in over a week. As we suspected, there was some significant erosion following the melting of the heavy snow we've had over the last few weeks.

Heading down the stairs into the ravine.

Tree fallen into creek at eroded bank.

A closer view.

Wild looking fungus on a fallen log.

Appointed to City of Burnaby Environment Committee

I've been appointed to the City of Burnaby's Environment Committee as a citizen representative. Went to my first meeting last night, and was pleased to see several familiar faces among senior staff that I've worked with through my streamkeeping volunteering with the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers and the Edmonds Business and Community Association. I look forward to learning the ropes and contributing toward making Burnaby a great place to live, work and play.

Short Water Videos From CWF

The Canadian Wildlife Federation has a good series of short videos on water. Check them out!

Report Says DFO Not Monitoring Enough Salmon Streams

According to this Globe and Mail article, a new study shows that Canada's Department of Fisheries and Oceans is not monitoring enough salmon spawning streams to preserve salmon stocks.

Stocks may be even more depressed than previously feared, and without adequate monitoring, Pacific salmon could go down the road toward oblivion as have the Atlantic cod. It also appears that the DFO has a pattern of dropping monitoring of streams that are in trouble, potentially skewing results.

Mapping Multiple Benefits of Marine Ecosystems

Interesting article on a joint project between Stanford University's Woods Institute for the Environment, the Nature Conservancy, and the World Wildlife Fund to develop software to assist in mapping the economic benefits of marine ecosystems.

I like the following quotation:

"'People tend to look at nature in one of two ways,' added Michael Wright, managing director of the Natural Capital Project. 'We either ignore the values it provides altogether, or we focus only on one specific commercial value, such as fisheries,' he said. 'We see individual pieces, not the whole. As a result, the collective value of nature is diminished. Through this grant we want to develop tools that do not just maximize the fisheries but capture all of the interests that depend on the oceans.'"

Any effort to broaden the way we calculate the "value" of nature is to be applauded.

Informative News Video on Stormwater Management

The Newshour with Jim Lehrer on PBS had a good video on stormwater management in the northwest US.

It presents the problems with urban runoff and what can be done about it.

What I find interesting is that often Canadians feel that they are miles ahead of Americans when it comes to the environment, when in fact US legislation and *enforcement* put us to shame.

Western States Face Water Shortages

According to this article, increases in population and climate change are putting even greater pressure on the Colorado River, leading to potentially worse water shortages in the future.

What I found interesting is that there is no mention of fish or other wildlife in the article. Makes you wonder if any species other than humans have been written off already...

The history of our exploitation of water in the west is long and torturous. I recommend the meticulously researched and well-written Cadillac Desert by Marc Reisner on this topic.

The Tyee on Fraser Salmon

"All of BC has a stake in better managing once massive salmon runs. Third in a series."

Part of the Exploring the Fate of the Fraser River series in The Tyee.

Seattle Coho Dying Before Spawning

Coho are dying in restored streams in Seattle before they can spawn, according to this Seattle Post-Intelligencer article. The cause is speculated to be polluted runoff from roads. We have noted the same effect here in the lower mainland of British Columbia, with many coho dying unspawned in "our" stream, Byrne Creek in southeast Burnaby. While Byrne has received few coho in the last few years, it's even more tragic when the few that do come back do not spawn before they die.

According to the Seattle article, coho in rural creeks are fine, it's urban creeks and restored city waterways in which the fish are struggling -- precisely the creeks that suffer most from pollutants.

Thanks to streamkeeper Joan for pointing out the article.

Streamkeepers on CBC Radio

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers were interviewed by CBC radio reporter Terry Donnelly today. Joan Carne and I spoke about the trials and tribulations facing urban creeks, and the positive news that this year's run of chum and coho spawners in Byrne Creek had at least matched the new low set last year. Why is that good news? Well, it's the first time in several years that the numbers had not declined!

We covered some of the issues affecting urban creeks including scouring and erosion caused by massive runoff during rains due to the buildup of impervious surfaces (roads, parking lots, roofs) in urban watersheds, pollution from road wash that goes down storm drains including gas, oil, antifreeze, brake dust, rubber dust, etc. Terry was also curious about efforts to daylight creeks, or bring them back to life from the pipes that they have been buried in.

It was a great conversation, and I hope a decent portion makes it onto the air. I know that the vagaries and time pressures of journalism often result in at best a minute or two of a two-hour discussion actually being published...

The piece should air on B.C. Almanac on Friday, Nov. 28, 2008, and the latest we heard was that it was slated for 1:40 p.m.

You can monitor the show here.
(http://www.cbc.ca/bcalmanac/) Just look for the link near the top of the page under "Listen Live".

Female Chum Awaits Death in Byrne Creek

This female chum salmon was quietly awaiting death in a calm pool in Byrne Creek this morning. Her spawning mission accomplished, her life's purpose was done. In her deteriorating state she appeared to have gone blind, as she didn't react to my looming shape, but when I stepped in the water she sensed the movement, her shallow breathing accelerated, and she stirred her body -- battered from digging a nest for her eggs in the gravel. I snapped a quick photo and left her in peace.

Chum Spawn in Byrne Creek

Chum salmon have been returning to Burnaby's Byrne Creek over the last couple of weeks. You can check out the website for updated information on numbers as streamkeepers monitor the run.

I took a video of a few spawners today and posted it on You Tube -- my first YT contribution. The quality is not the greatest as I shot it with a digital camera, not a video camera, and I'm still experimenting with editing and processing techniques.

Autumn Signs Along Byrne Creek

A ramble down the Byrne Creek ravine revealed signs of autumn, though a holdout garter snake proved it wasn't too cold yet.

An empty bench in Ron McLean Park invites contemplation of changing colours.

The return of an American Dipper to the creek is a sure sign of the impending arrival of spawning salmon.

These bouncy little birds love to dive under the water for salmon eggs.

Not the best shot of a garter snake -- but I was happy to see they were still enjoying a bit of sun as the cold comes on...

Rivers Day 2008

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers had a booth up at Rivers Day on the BCIT campus in Burnaby today. It was a gorgeous day with lots to see and do.

Hanging a temporary Stream of Dreams mural for the event.

Byrne Creek display.

Rivers Day founder Mark Angelo and BC Environment Minister Barry Penner.

VIPs release cutthroat trout into Guichon Creek.

A curious ball of fluff watches the activities.

Touring Byrne Creek Watershed With MP, MLA

I had the pleasure of taking MP Peter Julian and BC MLA Raj Chouhan on a tour of the upper Byrne Creek watershed this afternoon. I appreciate the time these gentlemen took to listen to streamkeepers' concerns, learn about efforts to enhance the watershed, and view a couple of proposed project sites.

Peter and Raj have toured Byrne Creek ravine and the artificial spawning habitat previously, but this time we concentrated on the "creek beneath the streets" -- the upper part of Byrne Creek that has long been buried and piped into the storm drain system. I took the opportunity to talk about the possibility of daylighting (bringing the creek back up from pipes) in Ernie Winch Park, and creating a rain garden/biofiltration facility at the lower end of Southpoint Dr.

Thanks again, Peter and Raj!

Alternative Sidewalk in White Rock

I ran across a SEA (street edge alternative) street in White Rock today, but on taking a closer look, it appeared to be more of an alternative sidewalk. SEA streets do away with curbs and gutters, and replace them with vegetated swales to reduce the impact of rain into storm drain systems and filter out pollution. This street had small swales but it still had a curb... Hmm... There were openings cut into the curb here and there, with small guides to let street runoff in, but I don't think they would accomplish much.

As you can see, the regular storm drain is still in place, and the teeny street diversion would not move much water into the swale.

I'm not an engineer, and I'm scratching my head on this one :-). Most such projects attempt to capture the polluted water from streets... Not nearly as much pollution on the sidewalks...

Byrne Creek Sediment Pond Profiling

The sediment pond upstream of the Byrne Creek artificial spawning habitat is to be cleaned out next week, and streamkeepers decided to do a depth profile of the accumulated silt and gravel, so that we can learn how fast the pond fills after it's been cleaned.

Streamkeeper John W. told me about a method using a transverse line knotted at 1-meter intervals, from which a weighted line is dropped with tabs at 10cm intervals. The method worked like a charm; however, my wife Yumi had to go through some contortions to anchor the line on the side of the pond with a lot of growth next to it!

Yumi setting up the ropes.

Me checking out the drop line.

Streamkeeper John G. helps collect data.

Yumi burrowing through the bush.

Fish-Friendly Car Wash Kits

Having a car wash fundraiser? Make sure you're not polluting your local creek while you're at it -- all street drains lead directly to local waterways with no treatment. So what's the solution? A salmon-friendly car wash kit. I picked this up from the Pacific Streamkeepers Federation bulletin board and think it's a great idea.

Check out this info on the kits from our neighbours to the south in King County, Washington.

It would be great if the City of Burnaby would get a few of these kits and make them available at community centres!

Blame Mother Nature?

People on a mailing list were discussing the damage humans do to the environment, and the "damage" that Mother Nature does. Here was my two cents:

I suppose it depends on one's definition of "damage." A lot of what Mother Nature does could also be called "renewal" or "ecosystem change or development" or.... Nature is not static by nature :-).

The kind of damage that humans do is very different from the kind of damage that Mother Nature does. Our damage tends to be more permanent. Once we've changed something, we are loath to see nature reclaim or reuse it in any shape, manner or form.

As a streamkeeper, I like to use the example of rivers. In their natural, healthy state, rivers are alive. They shift, they move, they're full of snags that provide habitat, they carry and turn over gravel that fish need to spawn in. They are constantly changing. They flood, and floods are good because the silt and accompanying biota renew the land.

Then people come along and choose to build in the flood plain. Now suddenly for one species -- us -- the annual flooding isn't all that pleasant, so then comes the channeling, the diking, the building of dams. Those snags and other woody debris are dangerous for boaters, so they're pulled out. The river is dredged to provide safe passage. The spawning gravel is mined for more construction. The river is a shackled shadow of its former self.

In addition, we choose to take our bodily and manufacturing wastes and pipe them into rivers, often with little or no treatment.

And the irony is that it is we who make rivers "dangerous" through all of our construction. The forests are gone, the meadows are gone, the wetlands are gone, so when it rains the water has nowhere to go but into the storm-drain system and then directly into the river, instead of soaking into the ground. And all that diking and channeling ends up just collecting all the force that would have dissipated in a natural flood plain. So when the levee breaks and we suffer damage.... whose fault is it? Can we blame Mother Nature?

Adera Donates $10,000 to Streamkeepers

Today Adera Development Corp. handed a $7,500 cheque over to the Pacific Salmon Foundation that is designated for projects by the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers. Adera has already printed colour brochures for the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers, so the total donation is $10,000.

Thanks!

Photo by Cindy Sommerfield

Adera has built several developments in the Byrne Creek watershed, and wanted to give back to the community by supporting the efforts of the streamkeepers. Byrne Creek Streamkeepers plan to use the funds on stormwater management facilities such as rain gardens and biofiltration ponds that would naturally filter and slow flows into the creek, in conjunction with the City of Burnaby.

Canadian Govt Reclassifies Pristine Lakes as Toxic Waste Ponds

According to this CBC article, lakes across Canada are being classified as mining-tailings waste sites, using an obscure mining regulation to apparently trump the Fisheries Act that prohibits the dumping of toxins into any fish-bearing waters.

This is insane.

Both the government and the businesses involved must be confronted on this issue. The government for failing to protect the environment, wildlife, and everyone's health, and businesses for proposing this idiocy. I run my own business, belong to my local board of trade, my neighbourhood business association, and this sort of cavalier destruction sickens me. These companies are getting a free ride with no real accounting of the associated environmental and health costs. Where does the death of a watershed touch the profit-loss statement or balance sheet?

Minister of Fisheries and Oceans Loyola Hearn should resign for failing his department's mandate to protect our watersheds and fish.

[Counterpoint, June 17] OK, I was riled and while I stand by my post, I should acknowledge that without the mining industry, I wouldn't even be able to have a blog :-). Think of all the metals in my computer... the coax cable that connects me to the Internet... the server farm that hosts my site... The electricity plants that make it all run. Not to mention the pervasive use of metals in all sorts of items I use daily. Would I give up my watch? My cameras? My shower?

Yet I do believe there is a huge disconnect between what we pay for products and what their true cost is. Some inputs into the raw-materials production and manufacturing processes are not accounted for, and neither are most unacknowledged outputs such as garbage and toxins.

Streamkeepers Tackle Invasive Plants

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers tackled masses of invasive plants that had overwhelmed native plants and trees planted by the City of Burnaby on the sides of the access ramp to the creek off Southridge Dr. Unfortunately, the City has no invasive species plan or coordinator, or apparently any budget to maintain what it has planted.

Streamkeepers to the rescue!

Thirteen volunteers put in a total of 32.5 hours this morning unearthing conifers, ferns, salmonberry, and other native plants from the clutches of Himalayan Blackberry, Morning Glory, English Ivy, and Scotch Broom. We filled two heaping truckloads of invasive plants and took them to the City's recycling centre on Still Creek.

One of the areas we worked on. It was so overgrown that these conifers were not even visible. As we cut down 2-meter high blackberry we came across more stunted trees.

Hauling the invasive plants up the ramp.

Filling the truck.

Burnaby Environment Awards

Burnaby City Council and its Environment Committee held the 2008 City of Burnaby Environmental Awards Reception this afternoon.

Byrne Creek Streamkeeper and Stream of Dreams Murals Society co-founder Joan Carne was among the recipients.

Joan with Councillor Dan Johnston

Several Byrne Creek Streamkeepers attended the event, and were happy to see a Stoney Creek volunteer receive an award as well.

Streamkeepers Attend South Burnaby Rebel Fest

A few Byrne Creek Streamkeepers set up a miniature version of our booth at the South Burnaby Secondary Rebel Fest this afternoon. It was a beautiful day to be outdoors and it was fun talking to kids about streamkeeping. Volunteer Eleanor was a hit because she'd graduated from the high school the previous year and still new many kids.

Armstrong School Guides Mark Rain Drains

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers and Girl Guides from Armstrong Elementary marked rain drains (storm drains) with yellow fish this evening so people are aware that all such drains lead to fish habitat. We had gorgeous views of clouds building over the North Shore, but thankfully the rain held so we could complete our project.

Streamkeepers oversee the work.

Guides paint yellow fish.

Clouds gather on the horizon.

Armstrong school is quite a distance from "our" Byrne Creek watershed, but a drain is a drain!

Edmonds Clean Sweep

Community members participated in the Clean Sweep sponsored by the Edmonds Town Center Business & Community Association this morning. The main meeting site was the Eastburn Community Centre, whose staff were very helpful in coordinating the event. It was a rainy day, so we had fewer volunteers than usual. The City brought one of its salmon eco-sculptures and participants were invited to help plant it.

Mayor Derek Corrigan and Councilors Pietro Calendino and Dan Johnston helped out.

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers also participated in the event, setting up a sign-up booth in the parking lot of Edmonds Skytrain station. Thanks to the Horizontes Scouts for assisting!

photo by Joan Carne

Thanks to Burnaby Firefighters for supplying a hot dog BBQ and hot chocolate!

All in all, volunteers reported that the amount of garbage had diminished from previous events, which is a good sign. I did manage to fill a 5-gallon pail just patrolling around the community centre!

Two Schools Release Fry

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers were kept hopping today, as two schools released their chum fry from Salmon in the Classroom programs.

South Slope Elementary released their chum at 9:30 a.m.

Kenneth Gordon kids released their fish around noon.

Byrne Creek Chum Release With Clinton School

Students from Clinton Elementary School in south Burnaby released chum salmon fry into Byrne Creek this morning with the help of DFO and Byrne Creek Streamkeepers. This is one of my favourite annual events because the kids are so excited and happy, and it connects them a bit to nature.

DFO's Maurice Coulter-Boisvert talks salmon.

Kids get chum fry to release.

My wife Yumi assists.

Kids point and marvel as silver hatchery fry turn brown to blend into the creek.

Chum schooling in the creek.

Choices Earth Day BBQ - Byrne Creek Tours

Choices in the Park hosted a salmon BBQ for Earth Day, and once again Byrne Creek Streamkeepers had our booth set up for the event. We also did two tours of the creek for people interested in getting out in nature and learning a bit about what streamkeepers do.

Thanks again to Choices for having donations from the BBQ this weekend and last weekend going to help efforts to keep Byrne Creek clean and habitable for all the fish and wildlife that it supports.

We presented two hand-cut, hand-painted cedar salmon to Choices CEO Mark Vickars and Choices in the Park manager Dominic Uy in appreciation of their efforts.

Me, Dominic and Mark

Pointing out park features on creek tour.

Byrne Creek 1 of 10 Best!

According to the Newsleader, Byrne Creek Ravine Park is one of the ten best places in Burnaby for a bag lunch and a walk! The story also mentions the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers and asks walkers to help keep the creek clean and healthy.

Burnaby Parks Volunteer Dinner

The Burnaby Parks, Recreation and Culture Commission put on its annual Volunteer Recognition Night this evening, and Yumi and I attended representing the Edmonds Town Centre Business & Community Association, of which I am president. I have had the pleasure of attending the event in the past representing Byrne Creek Streamkeepers, and the Stream of Dreams Murals Society. Tonight our table was made up of representatives from Byrne Creek, Stream of Dreams, and the City's Parks department. It was an excellent event, as always, and the food provided by the City's Deer Lake Catering was fantastic.

Streamkeepers Push For Ponds At Translink Event

A couple of Byrne Creek Streamkeepers attended a Translink workshop this evening on the BC Parkway bicycle and pedestrian trail that links Vancouver, Burnaby, New Westminster and Surrey. Work is afoot to realign parts of the trail, provide better connections and crossings, add public amenities, etc.

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers are most interested in the parkway course through Burnaby, and in particular the section between Gilley and Griffiths just north of Rumble. We envision the addition of beautiful vegetated biofiltration swales that could intercept and treat stormwater flows before they enter Byrne Creek. The area north of the parkway in this section has a lot of light industrial and automotive businesses that historically have been problematic point sources of pollutants into the storm drain system that connects to the creek.

Our ideas appeared to receive a warm reception! Here's hoping....

Byrne Creek at Blue Cross Earth Day

A couple of Byrne Creek Streamkeepers put up a small version of our creek display at the Pacific Blue Cross Earth Day event this afternoon. It was a windy, sunny day out on the cafeteria patio and we enjoyed talking to people about the connection between roads, storm drains and creeks. People love our 3D relief map of the watershed.

Streamkeepers, Stream of Dreams Tame Lions

Joan Carne and I spoke to the Burnaby Host Lions club this evening. I spoke about Byrne Creek Streamkeepers and Joan spoke about the Stream of Dreams Murals Society. We were warmly welcomed to dinner, and our presentations got lots of questions. The Lions generously asked if there was anything they could do for us, and are willing to bring out their rolling BBQ gear and do hot dogs and burgers, or pancake breakfasts, if we do any fund raisers. Thank you! It is community volunteers pulling together within and across organizations that make Burnaby a great place to live!

Byrne Creek Habitat Looks Like Pea Soup

The spawning channel, sediment pond and overflow pond in the Byrne Creek spawning and rearing habitat in southeast Burnaby looked like pea soup around noon today. Yumi and I had gone down hoping to ID some fry (baby fish); however, visibility was zero. The creek was clean, so the sediment was likely coming down the stormwater pipes along Southridge Dr.

Fortunately, we did not see any dead fish, but we'll watch closely for the next few days. We called the incident in to the City, and an environment officer said the situation would be investigated.

The overflow pond.

The sediment pond.

Yumi and I checked several areas up the hill along Southridge Dr. but did not spot any smoking guns. Hope the City has better luck.

Choices - Byrne Creek BBQ Huge Success

The Choices BBQ today was an overwhelming success. I don't know how much money was donated by people today that will go to Byrne Creek Streamkeepers, but I imagine it must be several hundred dollars. We had a constant flow of people all day long. Choices also provided seven gorgeous gift baskets for prize draws along with several gift certificates.

The staff were incredibly responsive and did special orders on the BBQ for vegetarians or people who wanted chicken instead of beef, in addition to the burgers, European wieners, and bacon... Oh yes, there was also an apparently endless river of chocolate cake!

I was blown away. Thank you Choices managers and staff!

Setting up for the event -- it was a gorgeous day.

Prize baskets.

A happy winner receives her basket.

Join us for more fun tomorrow! Pancake breakfast from 9:00-11:00 and another BBQ from 12:00-3:00. Food and drinks by donation, with donations supporting the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers. Come and learn about Byrne Creek and streamkeeper activities. Our bug team will be doing a bug count of samples collected from the creek at the Choices site from around 10:00.

We will be back at Choices for an Earth Day event on April 20 from 12:00-4:00. Streamkeepers will lead tours of the beautiful ravine park and Byrne Creek starting from Choices at 12:30 and at 2:00.

Choices Weekend Celebration Benefits Streamkeepers

Choices Markets is putting on a breakfast and two BBQs this coming weekend, and Byrne Creek Streamkeepers are thrilled that donations from the events will support their efforts to restore and maintain the watershed. Wow!

The Choices location near Byrne Creek is on the park side of Edmonds Skytrain Station in southeast Burnaby.

BBQ at the Park: Saturday, April 12, 12:00 - 3:00
Breakfast at the Park: Sunday, April 13, 9:00 - 11:00
BBQ at the Park: Sunday, April 13, 12:00 - 3:00

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers will also have their booth set up at Choices in the Park for an Earth Day event on Sunday, April 20 from 12:00 - 4:00. Streamkeers will be offering tours of the creek and ravine park.

More Fry, Oil, Flicker in Byrne Creek

Yumi and I spotted more fry in Byrne Creek today, along with a flicker in the ravine park, but were dismayed by the amount of oil accumulating in the sediment pond.

Salmon fry in the sediment pond

Blue and purple oily sheen on water surface

I think this is a common flicker of the red-shafted race.

More Signs of Spring

Cherry blossoms, a plump robin, and a small school of salmonid fry (baby salmon) all pointed to signs of spring on our Byrne Creek ramble after lunch today.

Spring Salmonberry

I patrolled for fry this afternoon in Byrne Creek this afternoon and was happy to find several more spread in pools in the spawning habitat. As I was scanning one pool a curious chickadee flitted over and danced from branch to branch just a foot or two from my face. We had a little chat and then he bounced off as I moved on. More salmonberry bushes are beginning to blossom.

Baby fish spotted in Byrne Creek

Yumi spotted a salmonid fry in Byrne Creek this afternoon. While we were not able to ID the species, it was great to see baby fish in the creek following last autumn's disappointingly poor run of spawning salmon.

Upper Byrne Creek Needs Some Tender Loving

As streamkeepers, Yumi and I focus mostly on the fish-bearing part of Byrne Creek, and don't get out to check the area upstream of Edmonds Skytrain station in southeast Burnaby that often.

We'd gotten a heads up from city staff that some work was being done in the area, and also that they were hoping to tackle invasive plant species. We took a look, and there is certainly work to be done!

Here's a site that was replanted following the building of a new townhouse complex -- invasive plants including Morning Glory have overwhelmed the area.

A closeup of the sign declaring this to be sensitive habitat!

Abandoned pipe in the bush along 18th Ave.

Large metal junk in the bush along 18th Ave.

Signs of Spring Along Byrne Creek

It was a beautiful sunny day today and I took advantage of it for a long walk along Byrne Creek.

Sun splashing off the water.

Red alder -- I'm allergic to the pollen -- dominates the spawning channel.

Mayfly larva in a pool -- there's a photo of a hatched mayfly in yesterday's blog entry.

Pileated woodpecker in Byrne Creek ravine. I love these flashy birds.

This was a hand-held shot in a forested ravine with my Canon S5 IS at its maximum 432mm telephoto (35mm camera equivalent), so don't look too closely :-).

Foam in Byrne Creek

There was a suds event in Byrne Creek this afternoon. When I started on my walk shortly after 11:00 the creek was clear. I spent some time sweeping the lower reaches, the spawning channel, the sediment pond, and the overflow pond for fry, but saw nothing -- no fry, no smolts, no cuts, zip.

On my way home I took the upper ridge trail, and about halfway along I spotted a pileated woodpecker, and as I was lining him up in my camera, I noticed the creek way down below was quite foamy. Snapping a few shots of the woodpecker, I headed up the hill and found almost no sign of foam in Griffith's Pond near the skytrain station. When I went down the Ron McLean path, there was quite a bit of foam coming down from upstream of the Hell Hole at around 1:15. So the source was likely somewhere upstream of Griffiths.

Byrne Creek Mayfly Hatch

Mayflies were skipping along Byrne Creek this afternoon. Yumi and I didn't spot any salmon fry yet, but they should be popping out of the gravel soon...

We also saw many small apparent redds, or nests of eggs that fish deposit.

Premier Screening of Eagle Eye

The Fraser Valley Hatchery was the site of the premier screening of Peter Donaldson's Eagle Eye, a video based on his one-man show "of ecological intrigue about the ancient dance of interdependence between Salmon and Eagle, creating a classic teaching legend."

Donaldson is a breathtaking writer and performer, known for his Salmonpeople masterpiece. Tonight's event, hosted by the Freshwater Fisheries Society of B.C., was a "beta" run of the video, with Donaldson seeking input from the audience as to what parts really engaged people, what sections lost their interest, and how the project could be disseminated and used in secondary schools, colleges, universities and communities for environmental education dealing with biodiversity and systems thinking.

Donaldson's show was filmed during the Fraser Valley Bald Eagle Festival, and is an emotionally powerful performance that really gets you thinking about life and our interdependence with other species and nature.

Byrne Creek High School Global Issues Event

In the afternoon I represented the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers at a climate change workshop at Byrne Creek Secondary in southeast Burnaby. The Check Your Head group (Educating Youth for Global Hope and Local Action) facilitated the event, and I provided background on streamkeeping and how kids could volunteer on creek activities. I love working with students and getting their perspective on these sorts of issues.

Our 3D relief map of the Byrne Creek watershed was a big hit.

Environmentalists Roast Run of River Power Inc.

"We want our park, we want our wild salmon, and we want you to go away," said Burke Mountain Naturalists activist Elaine Golds, to rousing cheers from the crowd at a forum on multiple run-of-river power projects planned for several streams on the upper Pitt River.

The overflow crowd jammed into the much-too-small venue was spirited and angry, with cat calls often interrupting presentations by the BC Environmental Assessment Office, BC Parks, and the proponent, Run of River Power Inc.

Although I strongly oppose the projects and the accompanying proposal to cut a power transmission right of way through Pinecone Burke Provincial Park, I was dismayed at the uncivil attitude dominating the crowd.

Yet people had reason to be frustrated. Pinecone Burke is a pristine Class A park that people fought for many years to be declared off limits to logging, mining and hydro projects. To ask that the boundary be adjusted now is crazy.

To invade all the salmon-bearing streams in the upper Pitt is crazy.

To pay private producers 5 or more times the rate for power than the province produces is crazy.

Eventually the fire marshal showed up, and said the number of people in the room had to be reduced. At that point, several hotter heads began shouting "We won't leave!" OK, act like children having a tantrum in the face of logic and safety -- I thought it best to slip away.

As I was wriggling myself out of the room, people were demanding that the meeting be rescheduled in a larger venue. I'm all for that. And while I admire the passion, I think some of the behavior tonight was counterproductive. The mandarins in the room have to follow this provincial government's restrictive policies -- it's the politicians noted for their absence who should bear the brunt.

As the cry went up: "Where are you Environment Minister Penner?"

Nooksack Dace Recovery Strategy

The Nooksack Dace is a little fish found only in a few rivers and streams in the Lower Mainland of BC. It has been listed as endangered under the Species at Risk Act, and tonight I attended a Department of Fisheries and Oceans forum on steps being taken to identify and protect crucial habitat. It was an interesting presentation on the dace and its preferred habitat. Unfortunately, the ratio of audience to DFO staff was about 10:6 -- it could have been better publicized.

Something that I found interesting was that all remaining Nooksack Dace habitat is in developed/developing areas. That's going to make it really tough to preserve this species. I asked if in the future there would be attempts to transplant dace to other streams in their previous range. They're not at that point yet, but one of the biologists said that transplanting would certainly contribute to keeping the species from going extinct.

Here is the recovery strategy for the fish, and watch the SARA public registry for a 60-day comment period after the strategy is officially posted soon.

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers, DFO Tour Habitat

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers and several representatives from the Department of Fisheries and Oceans toured the artificial spawning habitat constructed as compensation when a major road was built over prime spawning habitat. Since the habitat was built around a decade ago, there have been some problems with siltation and flow. It was instructive to share our stream and salmon spawner monitoring observations with the DFO staff, and we discussed several potential ways to remedy some of the problems.

Getting the lay of the land.

Lower Fraser Coho Conservation & Enhancement Initiative

The Musqueam Fisheries Commission and the Pacific Salmon Foundation co-hosted Pulling Together, Making a Difference The Lower Fraser Coho Conservation & Enhancement Initiative today. The day-long workshop brought together First Nations, scientists, and stewards. It was a stimulating event with many excellent speakers, and the Musqueam were wonderful hosts.

Over the lunch hour, participants toured Musqueam Creek and then planted trees in the riparian zone.

Here I am with "my" tree.

Stream of Dreams Murals Society decorated the gym. Here are some fish lanterns, several made by my wife, Yumi.

Stream of Dreams Dreamfish.

Successful Byrne Creek Fish Trapping Survey

Byrne Creek Streamkeepers found 17 cutthroat trout in the Gee traps that they placed in the creek yesterday. While far off the record, we were happy to see fish at all as the creek has been hit by several toxic spills through storm drains over the last couple of years. One disappointment was the lack of coho salmon smolts (yearlings); however, we had not been expecting much as there have been almost no successful coho spawners in the last couple of years.

We handle the fish as gently and quickly as possible as we size and ID them, and then return them to the creek. NOTE: It is illegal to trap fish, and streamkeepers do so with DFO permission.

Measuring a cutthroat.

Streamkeepers head up the ravine.

Fish-Trapping Streamkeepers Find Herons

Members of the Byrne Creek Streamkeepers set traps in the creek today hoping to catch some fish to see what species are resident. We do this every year under the auspices of the Department of Fisheries and Oceans to gather data. (Note that trapping is illegal unless sanctioned by DFO). We weren't the only ones out looking for fish! We spotted herons several times -- likely repeat viewings of two birds.

This one was fishing the big pool where the stairs come down into the ravine from Brynlor.

This one was further up the ravine.

Streamkeepers bait Gee traps.

Greenwashing BC's Power Policy?

There's a lot of talk about "green power" in British Columbia, but are initiatives like privately developed "run of river" power projects really green? Few citizens seem to be aware that companies