Nature & Conservation

(Saltscapes Magazine, Dec 2020)

Our thoughtlessness and ignorance costs wildlife dearly. (Part 2 of a 2-part series)

Jim Goltz enjoys walking along the edge of the Wolastoq (Saint John) River near Fredericton. Shadowed by the graffitied abutments of the Princess Margaret Bridge and bounded by the busy Lincoln Road, the riverside space where we meet is surrounded by urban development, a place representative of the human impacts on nature.

From here, one can follow the Salamanca Trail north to the spot where Wolastoqiyik elders and other First Nations representatives held a ceremony in 2018 to reclaim the river’s original name of ‘Wolastoq’, meaning ‘bountiful, beautiful river.’ Elders say reclaiming the river’s name is a step towards healing.

(Saltscapes Magazine, Oct/Nov 2020; International Regional Magazine Awards, Silver award winner, Nature & Environmental category)

When wildlife brushes up against human activity, it usually ends poorly for the animal. This dedicated duo of wildlife rehabilitators works to rewrite that ending (part 1 of a 2-part series)

The phone call from Canaport LNG came in at 10AM on September 14, 2013. Flocks of birds had flown into a gas flare the night before, the caller said. Can you help?

Barry Rothfuss, Executive Director of Atlantic Wildlife Institute (AWI), a wildlife rehabilitation facility in Cookville, NB, hung up the phone and kicked into high gear, initiating protocols he’d developed over decades of emergency response. By 2PM, he and a team of well-trained responders had arrived at the Saint John, NB facility overlooking the Bay of Fundy.

The scene was horrific. Thousands of dead and dying songbirds covered an area the size of two football fields. Some were flopping about unable to fly; others still tumbled from the sky. A feeding frenzy of gulls plucked up the helpless fallen. Traumatized workers were unsure what to do.

“In an event like this, your mind focuses on the task at hand,” recalls Barry. “You don’t have time to reflect on emotions, or the animals suffering. Your job is to remediate and respond as best you can.”

(Saltscapes Magazine, Jan 2018)

Is it time for tough questions on woodland management? Is an industrial softwood tree farm still a forest?

For as long as I can remember, an autumn drive on the rural roads surrounding Elgin, NB has been a feast for the eyes. It’s home for me, part of my heritage; a landscape of farmer’s fields, steep hillsides of brilliant sugar maples, clear boulder-tumbled rivers and waterfalls.

But just beyond the line of sight, I find a very different landscape. Single species tree plantations replace natural forest. Industrial clearcutting operations scrape every living thing from the soil my ancestors settled, leaving nothing but a scattering of chewed and dismembered limbs. Tractor trailers queue up, waiting for the next load of maple, birch, pine and spruce logs or chips.

Some of this is industrial freehold (company-owned), but some is Crown. This is ours. The people’s land; held in the public trust.

But has that trust been broken?

(Saltscapes Magazine, Jul/Aug 2016; Atlantic Journalism Awards Silver finalist for Enterprise Reporting)

Volunteer efforts undermined by government apathy (Part 2 of 2)

The 129-kilometre-long Nepisiguit River flows north and east from Nepisiguit Lakes to New Brunswick’s Bay of Chaleur. Today, it’s a healthy river with more than 90 salmon pools, abundant gravel for spawning, and rapids that oxygenize the water.

It wasn’t always like this.

Back in the 70s, when the Nepisiguit was dead due to acid runoff and toxic waste escaping a nearby mining operation, Bob Baker of Bathurst walked every foot of the shoreline to the impressive Nepisiguit Falls and power dam marking the terminus of the salmon’s 28-kilometre journey upriver from the bay. He noted the pools and gravel beds that salmon might frequent.

(Saltscapes Magazine, Mar/Apr 2016; Silver Atlantic Journalism Award  for Enterprise Reporting)

We’re losing a desperate race against time and long odds and government indifference (Part 1 of 2)

Spring sunshine warms my face as my kayak drifts down the Miramichi River. I pass riffles and salmon pools, downed trees, submerged rocks, and gravelly shallows. Occasionally I hear a splash, or encounter fishermen, braced thigh deep in the water, angling for ‘blacks’ or ‘kelts’ – salmon that, after spawning last fall, have overwintered in the river.

Meandering through this forested river valley, its shoreline peppered with fishing camps and signs posting private pools, it is hard to believe that a healthy salmon population cannot thrive here unaided, but without the dedicated actions of thousands of human caregivers, Atlantic salmon populations would have crashed decades ago due to human interference, negligence and exploitation.

(Saltscapes Magazine, Mar/Apr 2015)

Four-year-old Gabriel Jesso squeals with excitement. He and Joy Munford have been spraying sunscreen in the air and dashing into the cloud. The spray has settled on the ground, revealing a lacy spider’s web. While sunscreen may not be ideal for the spider or its handiwork, Gabriel has made a fascinating discovery and is now spraying elsewhere to see if he can find more webs.

Meanwhile, Jesse Savoie scrambles seven metres up a pine tree, anxious to show off his agility. The lacquered look of the limbs tells the story of many small hands and sneakered feet gaining familiarity with the landscape of this stalwart friend in the forest.

This is Tír na nÓg, an outdoor classroom for pre-schoolers near Sussex, NB, where two days a week children spend their day climbing trees, wading creeks, hiking the hills and daydreaming in wide-open fields of wildflowers. This natural landscape is their teacher and their land of discovery…a playground of innocence and delight within the natural cycles of life and death.