Membership Meeting
Sunday December 7, 2008
Safeguarding ANWR & the Tongas
Strategies by Lauren Hierl
1:30 pm – 3 pm Pearsall Building 2109 Sumner Avenue, Aberdeen
TheSandpiper
November/December 2008
Snowy Plover HabitatRestoration ProjectUpdate
By Ann Muche,Willapa Hills Audubon
Strenuous walking throughsand, extremely early starts re-quiring alarm clocks to jangle attimes like 3 a.m., and many hoursof mist, rain and wind were re-warded with occasional alternatehours of glorious sun and viewsof pelicans, eagles, peregrine fal-cons, and a variety of shorebirds.Some of us were lucky enough tosee Snowy Plovers, both adults
and young uff balls, north of
the restoration area in the federalrefuge.What was it inspired all this ac-tivity? Willapa Hills and GraysHarbor Audubon continue to co-operate with state agencies to cre-ate additional habitat at Leadbet-ter Point for the Western SnowyPlover and the Streaked HornedLark. Both of these birds wereonce more abundant along our coasts. South of the federal Wil-lapa Wildlife Refuge at the tip of the Long Beach peninsula, withinLeadbetter State Park, our effortsinvolves creating and monitoringten smallish plots which followthe land contours. Here the exotic,densely-thatch-forming Europeangrasses (brought in originally byhumans for erosion control) are being removed and native plantsretained and enhanced (by plant-ings of natives grown from localseed.)During 2007, Jan McMillanof Grays Harbor Audubon co-ordinated volunteers in several plant-related work parties at thesite. This year, I am the coordina-tor of our efforts. Last year andthis, Washington Dept. of Fishand Wildlife (WDFW) hired thetalented, encouraging and veryknowledgeable expert, KathyGunther, part of whose duties isto survey the LHRA for animalactivity, especially birds. Our
volunteer efforts this nal grant
year have shifted to doing surveysalong with Kathy and recently, onour own.Our March training, conducted by Scott Pearson and CyndieSundstrom of WDFW, was de-tailed, informative, and includ-
ed eld observations. In May, I
gave a brief introduction aboutthe project on the peninsula for Nina Carter, executive direc-tor of Audubon Washington andBoard of Stewards member, John Narver. Since then our volunteer group has conducted or helpedwith one survey in June, two inJuly and one in August. DuringSeptember we held a work day,in cooperation with Dave Haysof WDFW, to physically cover native plants on the site in prepa-ration for staff to spray herbicideon the exotic beach grasses. This
last was a magnicent day, though
my knees told me for many hoursafterward just how many dozensof times I had sunk down on themand struggled back up!Many, many thanks to the vol-unteers who have taken part inour efforts in 2008, often under the adverse conditions describedabove: John and Margaret Green,Carolyn Norred, Tom Finn,Alan Richards and myself fromWHAS, Susan Clark of Shoal-water Birders, and Jan McMillan,Ann Haarer, Carol Sunde, JanStrong and Diane Schwickerathof Grays Harbor Audubon.Our total was 279 hours donatedto this project in 2008!
Adult Male Snowy Plover
Snowy Plover Clutch
Snowy Plover Chick all photos this page by Jack Haverty
The President’s Perch
By Arnie Martin
page 2
GHAS Mission
The mission of the GraysHarbor Audubon Society isto seek a sustainable balance between human activity andthe needs of the environ-ment; and to promote enjoy-ment of birds and the naturalworldBy now, you know whichcandidates won the November 4th election races, but this waswritten before the results wereknown. Please hold the winnersto their promises that will ben-
et the environment, and make
your voices heard in our govern-mental forums against policiesthat will continue to degrade thefragile bit of our planet’s outer skin that we inhabit.Here in Grays Harbor County,many of us live very close to sealevel, so global warming and sealevel rising are of great concern(or should be). There are manystudies on the relationship be-tween atmospheric CO2 levelsand temperature, which you maygive greater or lesser credenceto, but as a former engineer witha physics background, I believethat increasing CO2 levels willlead to increased average globaltemperature. There is no doubtthat increased temperatures willlead to glacial melting and in-creased melting of the polar ice-caps.Like most people, I wish thatwe were sending less money tothe OPEC countries, but nearly70 percent of our energy nowcomes from outside the US.Additional drilling for oil andgas, both offshore and on land,may eventually reduce the per-centage we derive from foreignsources. Without alternativesources of energy and additionalefforts toward conservation andre-use, the consumption of oiland gas will increase and there-fore the releases of CO2 willalso increase.Putting our major efforts into
nding signicant additional oil
and gas reserves in the US doesnothing to reduce carbon emis-sions, even though it may helpour balance of payments. Somecandidates suggest using “cleancoal” and nuclear power. The problem with “clean coal” isthat disposing of CO2 removed
from coal-red power plants is
un-proven technology, and po-tentially risky if the CO2 is se-questered in underground rock strata at high pressures. Nuclear power has made improvementsin reactor design and safetysince the 1980’s but we stilldon’t have a federal waste re- pository (or repositories).These concerns should lead usto power sources that are carbonneutral, or better yet, carbon-free, such as wind and solar.These carbon-free technologiesare subject to the weather atthe generation site. The winddoesn’t always blow and thesun only shines during the day.These weather and daylight is-sues should lead us to have mul-tiple generation sites across thecountry as it’s not cloudy every-where at the same time. Havingdispersed generation sites willrequire vastly improved region-al and national power inter-ties,and power storage devices tostore solar-generated power for use overnight.Unfortunately, even these car- bon-free technologies are notwithout environmental costs.Wind power generation is haz-ardous to migrating birds andalso to bats. Solar generationstations, which would be locatedin sunny, seldom-cloudy sites,take great areas of land, and cancause loss of habitat for desertand arid-dwelling species, both plant and animal.My take on the subject is that,neglecting cellulosic ethanolmanufacture and energy de-rived from algal growth (both of which take large areas of land or water), we need to concentrateon wind and solar power in or-der to stop or drastically reduceCO2 emission. We have alreadydammed most of the power-pro-ducing rivers during the 19thand 20th centuries, so we needto derive most of our power from the direct capture of thesolar energy and wind energy.Now we need to keep remind-ing the election winners to im- plement policies that will bene-
t, not destroy the environment.
Our earth can’t take continuedreleases of greenhouse gasesand pollutants while keeping theenvironment suitable for our de-scendants and all of our fellowinhabitants of this blue dot onthe outskirts of our local galaxy.Keep working to reduce our dependence on oil reserves for heating and transportation; wewill need it to lubricate the bear-
ings of our most efcient mode
of transportation: our bicycles!Are you interested in receiv-ing
The
Sandpiper
online?Send us your email addressand we can forward the latestissue the moment it is readyto publish or visithttp://ghas.orgto view the newsletter as
a color pdf le.
page 3
December MembershipMeeting
By Dianna Moore
Our December 7th program isa special event featuring Audu- bon’s new Alaska LegislativeAssociate, Lauren Hierl. She has
just returned from a fact-nding
trip with news of Audubon’swork to safeguard ANWR and protect the last best habitat of theTongass National Forest, one of seven temperate rain forests leftin the world. This work, a col-laborative effort between Audu-
bon’s policy ofce and Audubon
Alaska, has brought Audubon’sunique brand of science, policy,and education tobear on someof the most critically important bird and wildlife habitat in theworld. In order to reach as many people as possible, Lauren istraveling around the country tolocal chapter meetings, so weare fortunate to have a chanceto hear this up-to-date infor-mation from her. Please join usand show your support for your chapter and for these importantissues.The meeting is on Sunday, De-cember 7th from 1:30pm until3pm at the Pearsall Building,2109 Sumner Ave. The entranceis on the east end of the building.We will serve refreshments.
New coordinator joinsGHNWR
by Megan Johnson
I am the new Education andOutreach Coordinator for theGrays Harbor National Wild-life Refuge. I am excited to beworking with the community tostrengthen our relationship withthe natural environment we livein. I am grateful to be work-ing with such wonderful peopleincluding the members of theShorebird Committee and theemployees and volunteers at theGrays Harbor National WildlifeRefuge. This year GHNWR staff has decided to focus on3rd and 4th grade classroomvisits due to the expansion and popularity of the Education Pro-gram. This change will bringmore clarity to the curriculumand lead to a stronger education program.I grew up watching the beautifullandscape in the Mojave Desertof Southern California amongthe coyotes, cacti, MountainLions and Joshua trees. I wasdrawn up north through San
Francisco, Portland and nally
to Olympia where I have mademy home.My passion for environmen-tal conservation started young
when my fth grade teacher
introduced me to anthropogen-ic impacts on the earth. Sincethen I have been discoveringthat I can create movement andchange in simple and complexways.I am honored to be serving TheGrays Harbor National WildlifeRefuge through AmeriCorps.The opportunity to educate chil-dren about Shorebirds and theimportance of GHNWR to theconservation of migrating birdsgives me great pleasure.
Concerned about GlobalWarming?
Here is what
your State Ofce is doing...
Audubon Washington staff areoften asked what the State of-
ce is working on in regards to
Global Warming. Right now, weare focusing on a national cam- paign, the C-Change GlobalWarming Campaign. The pur- pose of this campaign is two-fold: to generate pressure ontargeted swing congressionalmembers and to create climatechange champions among our senators to ensure stronger con-servation legislation from thenext Administration.There are three primary compo-
nents to this campaign. The rst
is pre-election tasks. We have been seeking opportunities todiscuss climate change at publicforums, local candidate debates,and other public meetings. OnOctober 15th, the “Feeling theHeat Report” was also released.Audubon Washington collabo-rated on this report focusing onrising global temperatures andwhat implications temperaturetrends might have for our state.Another component of the cam- paign is ongoing tasks. Our of-
ce has been sending letters to
three target audiences: grass-tops leaders within our state,state university presidents, andlocal businesses. Through theseletters, we are urging participa-tion in this campaign to encour-age Congress to reduce carbonemissions, invest in clean en-ergy, and protect communi-ties from the impact of globalwarming.
continued on page 4
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