Maggie says

Here are a few nuggets from the celebrated Margaret Atwood, who read in Tofino last Saturday from her new dystopic book, Year of the Flood. Still a lively and witty lady, and it was a good West Coast crowd that gathered to see her.

What most impressed me, though, was the co-reading given by her partner Graeme Gibson from his book, The Bedside Book of Beasts. What sounds from the title like a whimsical tour of the animal kingdom (real or imaginary) — and looks, at first blush, like a picture book of animals through the ages — is actually a meaty read, full of surprising thoughts and connections. There’s some deep thinking in it about the human characterizations of animals, and what that says about us. I came away wanting to buy a copy.

From my random, chicken-scratch notes of the evening:

Graeme:

Tree-hugger? Why not a tree-lover?!

Quoting someone: “The whole of Nature is a conjugation of the verb ‘to eat,’ in the active and the passive.”

“Forest bathing” (a.k.a. walking in the woods) … Nature Deficit Disorder…. Some interesting revelations about how time spent in wilderness eases behavioural disorders. People heal faster when they have a scenic view — even just a painting — as opposed to a relentless cityscape.

If you don’t have predators, you don’t have a forest. The predator-prey relationship informs everything about the forest.

Humans domesticate any number of other species, but we ourselves are the only evolved domesticate.

Some of Graeme’s recommended books: Thinking Like a Mountain (Otto Leopold); Last Child in the Woods (author?); Rogue Primate (John Livingston)

Maggs:

This is a book, and these are its covers. The advantage of a book is that you can close the covers and what’s in the book stays in the book. The job of everyone here today is to make sure what’s in the book doesn’t get out of the book.

Ecology as potential religion…? It’s here. Check out The Green Bible.

Once everything is owned by governments and corporations, there will be no neutral third party left to say “No, you aren’t allowed to do that.”

Do I have hope? Hope is built-in. Back in the paleolithic, if you were too bummed out to get out of bed in the morning to find something to eat, you weren’t around for long. We are evolved to hope.

Writing a book is a hopeful thing to do, in and of itself. You hope that you’ll finish it. You hope someone will publish it. You hope it will find readers, and you hope they’ll like it.

I want everyone here to make a pledge today. Coffee is the second most traded commodity worldwide, after oil. It has a huge impact. If you’re only going to do one thing, I want you to pledge that you’ll only drink shade-grown, organic, fair trade coffee from now on.

I’m about a third of the way through Year of the Flood. Tain’t timeless lit’ra’chure, but it’s interesting.

http://www.yearoftheflood.com/

Dear, dear salmon

Sent in reaction to a Westerly News article (Nov. 29) headlined Salmon crisis on West Coast:

Dear editor,

That was a grim article (Salmon crisis on West Coast), on the slide of our West Coast salmon runs into extinction. For the people who are, on paper, supposed to be dealing with this — various DFO and governmental bureaucrats — it must be something of an embarrasment.

For those of us who live here in Clayoquot and Barkley Sounds, however, it’s a little more personal. Salmon is the phenomenon that has made human life possible on the West Coast for several thousand years, sustaining us along with (directly and indirectly) the whole temperate rainforest and all of its denizens.
That I should be living here at the time when this huge, ocean-spanning “resource” declines precipitously into extinction … well, that makes me feel deeply ashamed.

I have come to expect nothing more than lip service on these matters from my federal and provincial governments, whose aims these days, it seems, are strictly economic, coddling everything job- and profit-creating at the expense of the troublesome natural world.

But it is time, and well past time, for vigorous action on this front. What we’ll get instead, I expect, is arm-waving: “Oh, we don’t know exatly what’s causing the decline.” But if we wait for sciencific “proof” before we act, we might as well just go poison all those salmon streams ourselves right now.

There is a growing body of evidence that fish farming is implicated in the decline of wild salmon. It happened in Norway, where every fjord that harbours fish farms is now devoid of wild salmon. It has been well documented in the Broughton Archipelago by researcher Alexandra Morton, who is now in the courts forcing the federal government to live up to its legal responsibility. And it has been happening here in the West Coast for years — more industrial fish farms, fewer wild salmon — during which little has been done.

It is time to invoke the precautionary principle, which mandates erring on the side of caution when dealing with permanent extinction. At the very least, fallow the Clayoquot Sound fish farms during the period when smolts are running past them to the sea, which should ameliorate the sea-lice infection problem.

In the meantime, we must get onto the science to better understand what is happening. And we must fund hatcheries as a stopgap measure.

This is not like the forest, where if an old-growth area is logged, at least a semblance of what was once there eventually grows back. This is extinction — no salmon in those areas ever again.

I no longer expect my governments to act out of a sense of responsibility anymore, even when it means enforcing their own laws. But it is no longer acceptable to me to stand by while they dither as our wild salmon die. I dearly hope my fellow West Coast residents not only feel the same way, but will call and write their elected representatives to express their concerns.

True North censured over climate stalling

Here’s a serious piece of leverage against Canada’s stalling and obstructing on climate change (emphases mine). If i were Stephen Harper i’d be in a bit of a sweat right now. Not only do three-quarters of Canada’s population poll as being embarrassed over his stalling on climate action, but this new censure adds potential economic teeth to the consequences of his government’s inaction — something the PM will understand.

So it seems he now will be personally attending the Copenhagen conference — at which both Obama and Chinese leader Hu Jintao will now be present. (I read that Jintao has pledged to cut Chinese carbon intensity almost in half.)

Poor Stephen. Think i’ll give him a call tomorrow to urge him to save his own ass. Not to mention the rest of ours, here on Planet Earth.

Scientists target Canada over climate change

Prominent campaigners, politicians and scientists have called for Canada to be suspended from the Commonwealth over its climate change policies.
The coalition’s demand came before this weekend’s Commonwealth heads of government summit in Trinidad and Tobago, at which global warming will top the agenda, and next month’s UN climate conference in Copenhagen. Despite criticism of Canada’s environmental policies, the prime minister, Stephen Harper, is to attend the Copenhagen summit. His spokesman said today: “We will be attending the Copenhagen meeting … a critical mass of world leaders will be attending.”
Canada’s per capita greenhouse gas emissions are among the world’s highest and it will not meet the cut required under the Kyoto protocol: by 2007 its emissions were 34% above its reduction target. It is exploiting its vast tar sands reserves to produce oil, a process said to cause at least three times the emissions of conventional oil extraction.
The coalition claims Canada is contributing to droughts, floods and sea level rises in Commonwealth countries such as Bangladesh, the Maldives and Mozambique. Clare Short, the former international development secretary, said: “Countries that fail to help [tackle global warming] should be suspended from membership, as are those that breach human rights.”

Full article at the excellent Guardian.

We suck!

Five toga-clad revellers pulled off a coup that stunned even themselves in the Oyster Slurping Contest at last Friday’s Mermaid’s Ball. — the costume-party element of the (in)famous annual Clayoquot Oyster Festival.

Left to right in the pic (which is one of the least scandalous of our slurp posted on Facebook by Ed Henley) are winning team members Kim, Josie, me, Katie and Lyndsey.

Josie was the organizational brain behind this … triumph? Spectacle? Debacle? Whichever, i’m sure we all take great pride in the victory, and comfort in knowing that what happened at the Mermaid’s Ball … stays at the Mermaid’s Ball. Right, townsfolk?

For those at the raucous event who did not hear Cameron reading our  explanatory speech (i.e. everybody), here’s the text:

Friends, Tofitians, countrymen … Centuries ago, the ancient Greeks instituted a festival of sport.

YEA, in the very shadow of noble Mount Olympus, home of the GODS, they held a yearly contest of physical prowess FREE of cheesy corporate sponsorship and obscene insider profit at taxpayer expense.

This ancient, shining civilization — the very birthplace of democracy itself — NEVER compromised its citizens’ civil rights as they enjoyed their traditional sports of naked wrestling and WOMEN’S SKI JUMPING.

NOW, in a tribute to their TRUE spirit, we present the long lost opening event to those ancient Games … the OLYMPIC OYSTER RELAY.

And the sign that Josie held up at the end read:

This Olympic relay cost taxpayers $0!

In a lovely touch, it was printed in the Coca-Cola font. We rest our case.

Dear council … about that sludge …

Thanks to local gadabout and tornado Jackie Windh and her public spirited Tofino Residents blog for the heads-up on this gross-looking and undoubtedly insalubrious slick that washed about in Tofino harbour last Thursday — apparently the result of some epic, industrial-style cleaning at a posh waterfront establishment that i will be delighted to name here when it is confirmed. (Click pic to go to her post, with more pics and video.)

Jackie urges concerned residents to ask council to get DFO looking into this, and i concur. If we can’t take even this much responsibility for our immediate surroundings, how can we think ourselves worthy of living in Clayoquot Sound?

Here’s my letter to council:

Dear Tofino Mayor and Council,

I am writing to ask that you vigorously look into the source, effects and punitive measures for the shocking discharge of sludge and trash that was dumped into Tofino harbour on Nov. 19.

If we are to take even a modicum of responsibility for our immediate surroundings, this incident cannot be dismissed or let slide. As Tofino’s elected guardians, I see it as your responsibility to invoke some action on this front. Because it happened on the ocean, it seems to me that DFO is the body responsible for looking into it. Please urge them to undertake an investigation.

If we do not — as individuals, as governing bodies, and as a town — bring censure or repercussion to this grossest form of industrial discharge, then anybody can get away with anything and we might as well write off the whole of Clayoquot Sound.

I suspect — I hope — the whole debacle was just a foolish mistake on someone’s part, rather than a deliberate act of irresponsibility. But even accidents have consequences, and it would be well for those responsible to know people are watching, and people care.

I look forward to hearing more about the cause of this egregious abuse.

Sincerely,

greg blanchette

UPDATE (26 Nov.): It appears i flew off the handle a little, and that the sludge is of natural origin: worm casings. Who’da thunk? That doesn’t explain all the beer cans, but the best biological minds in Tofino are pretty sure. Details at this blog post.

~greg (flying off the handle since … well … birth)

Oh, well that’s okay then

Recently received from the federal Liberal party (info@liberal.ca), in response to my email berating the party for not supporting the NDP’s bill C-311.

Dear Greg:

I would like to acknowledge receipt of your recent e-mail regarding Bill C-311, An Act to ensure Canada assumes its responsibilities in preventing dangerous climate change.

As this is a Private Member’s Bill it was a free vote for all members of the Liberal Caucus.  Those Liberals who voted for the motion did not vote against Bill C-311, but rather voted for a 30 day extension of hearings at the Environment Committee.  We continue to support Bill C-311 in principle but wish to examine it further in Committee to ensure that Canada actually achieves greenhouse gas (GHG) reductions.  Currently, Bill C-311 only focuses on emissions targets but has no mechanisms to achieve them.

The Liberal Party remains focused on actual ways to reduce GHGs.  That is why we have committed to the largest investment in clean energy Canada has ever seen.  We are also working with ENGO’s, to implement a strong cap-and-trade system with hard caps, with no loopholes, that will actually achieve real reductions.

The Liberal Party is committed to an ambitious result from Copenhagen, unlike the Reform-Conservatives whose sole objective is to sabotage international progress in the fight against climate change.  However, it is clear that no progress will ever be achieved so long as Stephen Harper is Prime Minister.

Thank you for taking the time to write.

Sarah Cloutier-Powell

Correspondence Officer/Agent de correspondance
Liberal Party of Canada/Parti libéral du Canada
Telephone/Téléphone: (613) 237-0740
Fax/Télécopieur: (613) 235-7208