Tuesday, October 27, 2020

Plant a Wildflower Habitat for Pollinators this Fall

fall wildflowersFall-blooming asters and goldenrods provide important habitat for pollinators. Many of these beautiful flowers thrive in sunny fields, roadsides, and woodland openings while a few prefer partial shade.

At home, simple changes to your lawn, garden, and landscaping can help increase and improve fall pollinator habitat.

In the garden, try planting native seed mixes or leaving a few goldenrod stems instead of weeding them out. In the yard, choose to be pesticide-free and consider leaving no-mow edges or patches in your lawn to grow over time.

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Saturday, October 24, 2020

Pupdate: Wild Center releases rehabbed otters

The Wild Center has released two female North American River Otters to the Shingle Shanty Preserve and Research Station (a 15,000-acre biological field research station in the Western Adirondacks) after 5 months of rehabilitation.

The Otter Rehabilitation was as first for The Wild Center and began last May after receiving two phone calls from residents of separate areas within the North Country that had each spotted a five-week-old abandoned otter pup in the wild. Leah Valerio, Wild Center Curator and the rest of the Animal Care staff then worked with local veterinarian Dr. Nina Schoch to retrieve the otter pups and transport them to the Center’s Tupper Lake facility.

» Continue Reading.


Saturday, October 24, 2020

Green Power and more of the week’s top stories

YouTube video

 

GREEN POWER, GREEN PARK: All this week on Adirondack Explorer’s website we’ve been digging into renewable/clean energy issues, highlighting recent Explorer stories. Each day focused on a different topic:

Here’ a look a those and more of the week’s recent stories:

Note: A version of this post first appeared in my weekly “Adk News Briefing” email. Click here to sign up.

Wednesday, October 21, 2020

The EPA, a gorilla in the closet

I’ll have more reporting that involves the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), but here are a few key concepts:

The first head of the EPA, a Nixon appointee named William Ruckelshaus, said the newly-created agency was meant to be a “gorilla in the closet.”  As he explained in an oral history:

The belief was that the states had enough interest and infrastructure to enforce these laws. If they also had this “gorilla in the closet”–that is, the federal government, which could assume control if the state authorities proved too weak or inept to curb local polluters–the states would be far more effective. That’s the theory. Prior to EPA, there was no federal oversight. There was no “gorilla in the closet.” Absent that, it was very hard to get widespread compliance.

» Continue Reading.


Tuesday, October 20, 2020

$300,000 Challenge for the Future of Lake George

lglc logoManning and Virginia Rowan Smith, with the Lake George Land Conservancy (LGLC), have announced a public challenge to raise $300,000 by Thanksgiving. This challenge is to encourage those who support the protection of Lake George to join LGLC’s Land and Water Society.

The Land and Water Society is the LGLC’s legacy society and celebrates those who choose to include the LGLC in their estate planning. You can include them through a bequest, or by naming the LGLC as a beneficiary in a life insurance policy or retirement fund, or through many other options that are available.

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Tuesday, October 20, 2020

Adirondack Groups Urge Lawmakers to Invest in Environment

A coalition of Adirondack conservation organizations is calling on Gov. Andrew Cuomo, Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins and Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie to support environmental agency spending and capital investments that protect clean water, preserve open space, fight climate change, and ensure visitor safety during the Covid-19 pandemic and resulting economic downturn.

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Monday, October 19, 2020

Wild Center partnership nets $449K to grow youth climate program

A $449,278 grant from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Environmental Literacy Program will support The Wild Center as it helps empower young people to respond to climate change in their communities.

The three-year project builds upon a collaboration of The Wild Center, the Finger Lakes Institute at Hobart and William Smith Colleges and the Alliance for Climate Education (ACE) as they support the development of leadership skills for rural youth by creating programming that demonstrates best practices for students and teachers to engage and partner with local municipalities on climate resilience planning. The project, called Empowering Rural Youth for Community Climate Resilience in New York State, will also increase awareness of the New York State Climate Smart Communities (CSC) program.

» Continue Reading.


Sunday, October 18, 2020

Enjoying our environment

We’re wrapping up production of our November/December magazine issue, and we think Mike Lynch’s photography and writing in it should alert a lot of readers to recreational and environmental aspects of the Adirondacks that they hadn’t previously considered. For one thing, it seems that a lot of people who enjoy our mountains weren’t aware that they were home to salmon — either historically or right now.

Well, they are, and Mike made a number of trips to the Boquet River to see and photograph them running there. (Above is a long exposure he snapped of a landlocked Atlantic salmon cresting in the river.) Those fish, which the state has stocked but in some years will also reproduce naturally in the river, offer hope for a thriving wild salmon fishery in the park.

» Continue Reading.


Thursday, October 15, 2020

Council notes progress on Adirondack community water system upgrades

Boreas River headwaters. Photo by Phil Brown 9/5/16.The first five rounds of state clean water grant programs have provided more than $58 million directly to Adirondack communities, plus another $94 million in State Revolving Loan Fund low-interest loans, for a total economic boost of $152 million in clean water and drinking water infrastructure improvements since 2015, the Adirondack Council announced today.

The Adirondack Council applauded the fact that, in total, 72 NYS Clean Water and Drinking Water Grants have gone to 36 Adirondack communities, totaling $58,068,291, according to the Council’s report Adirondack Clean Water 2020: Success Made/Wastewater Treatment Needs Ahead.

» Continue Reading.


Tuesday, October 13, 2020

In-Person Hunter Education Courses Resume, Online Courses Extended


The DEC reported record-breaking sales of hunting and trapping licenses for upcoming seasons, nearly tripling prior years’ sales on opening day for big game hunting and trapping licenses, as well as Deer Management Permits. More then double were sold on the second day, and close to double on the following first two weeks.

The DEC has reopened in-person Hunter Education Courses, including Bowhunter Education, and Trapper Education courses, granted they will be following strict social distancing guidelines along with other precautions to limit the spread of COVID-19. The DEC turned the Hunter Ed program into an online certification course once Covid-19 began, which resulted in a dramatic 105-percent increase in participants completing the course compared to their traditional in-person courses offered the previous year.

Both Bowhunting and Hunter education courses are available at the DEC’s website by clicking this link. Or, if you would like to find more information on a traditional field-based course, you can visit the DEC’s website by clicking this link.


Sunday, October 11, 2020

Reporting for the future

I recently marked my first anniversary at the Explorer.

One of the interesting things about working for a magazine is thinking about how to tell stories that will stick around and still be news for a while. Since the magazine comes out once every two months, the stories in it ought to last at least as long as the time between issues.

A lot of journalism gets a bad rap as “clickbait” and transitory. This isn’t a new complaint — Schopenhauer compared journalists to barking dogs — nor is it particularly accurate, since most people I know are trying to work on something they can stand back and admire at the end of their careers. But it’s certainly true that much of what gets our attention, especially these days, is something that changes from one day to the next, or from one hour or one minute to the next.

» Continue Reading.


Sunday, October 11, 2020

DEC Seeks Public Input on Proposed Endangered Species Protections

The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) is accepting public comment on a revised regulatory proposal to strengthen protections for threatened and endangered wildlife in New York.

The proposal promotes sharing information between landowners and DEC staff during permit reviews for projects on lands where endangered or threatened species may be located, helping improve the pace of permit decisions and to better avoid negative impacts to vulnerable wildlife populations.

» Continue Reading.


Sunday, October 11, 2020

Green Power, Green Park

Join a conversation about clean energy initiatives across the region. 

The Explorer’s Policy Reporter Gwendolyn Craig will serve as moderator with the following panelists: Noah Shaw, partner and co-chair, Renewable Energy Practice, Hodgson Russ LLP; Conrad Karsten, project developer for Sunvestment Energy Group (Saranac Lake Community Solar); Emmett Smith, founder of Northern Power & Light.

The webinar is set for 9 a.m. October 20 on Zoom. Click here to register

Adirondack Almanack file photo of solar panels in Tupper Lake.


Thursday, October 8, 2020

DEC forms partnership to bolster invasives efforts


Hemlock with HWA egg masses_Connecticut Agricultural Experiment StationAgreement Targets Invasive Species Research, Control, and Mitigation

The New York State Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC) has announced new partnerships with the New York Invasive Species Research Institute (NYISRI) and Cornell University to develop and support projects and research to help limit the spread of invasive species.

» Continue Reading.


Monday, October 5, 2020

Young people play important role in Climate Smart Community achievements

The Village of Saranac Lake and the Village of Homer in the Finger Lakes region were awarded a bronze level certification in the New York State Climate Smart Communities (CSC) program. The awards came during NYS Climate Week.

The efforts of young people mobilizing for climate action and resilience, inspired by the Wild Center’s Youth Climate Program and its annual Adirondack Youth Climate Summit, is seen as a key contribution to this designation. The climate program has brought together over 180 students from over 30 NYS schools to increase their climate literacy and leadership abilities since 2008.

Cedar Young, a youth leader in the Village of Saranac Lake says the following about the certification: “By receiving bronze certification, Saranac Lake has shown leadership in raising public awareness of climate change and lowering our community’s carbon footprint.”

» Continue Reading.



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