Michigan Lake and Stream Leaders Institute, Frogs, and Endangered Bumblebees: this week in environmental news

Michigan Lake and Stream Leaders Institute (MSU Extension): The Michigan Lake and Stream Leaders Institute (LSLI) provides a unique and intensive leadership development opportunity for citizens, local leaders, and water resource professionals who wish to develop technical and people skills needed by leaders who can effectively protect Michigan’s lakes and streams. Participants take part in classroom and field-based sessions designed to help them better understand local water resource management planning and program implementation. Expert presenters from academia, natural resource agencies, and local communities cover topics including watershed management, lake and stream ecology, environmental education, leadership, and working with local and state government. The Institute is conducted through five in-depth sessions held across Michigan. The sessions will be held:

• June 2-3: Kettunen Center, near Cadillac
• August 18-19: Kellogg Biological Station, near Kalamazoo
• October 6: Michigan State University, East Lansing

Bullfrog ready for dinner. Photo: Martin Hejzlar/Shutterstock

Supernatural spit is the frog’s secret weapon for catching bugs (Mother Nature Network): Frogs are famous for the long sticky tongue they use to snag prey. But what is it about this tongue that allows a frog to nab an insect, pull the insect back to its mouth with lightening speed, and eat it — yet the stickiness doesn’t glue the frog’s mouth shut? The secret is super sticky saliva that’s reversible. A new study demonstrates that the saliva can turn from a honey-like viscosity to one more like water and back again, and all within a few seconds. Super-special spit and a trippy tongue make capturing insects a snap.

National Park Service starts keeping track of park disturbances (Great Lakes Echo): For the first time, the National Park Service is collecting concrete data to monitor and find patterns in what affects national park landscapes. The data on how park landscapes are affected by various disturbances both inside and outside the parks will help park managers maintain them for the ecosystem and for the visitors. Fire and beavers, for example, play key roles in developing habitat by changing the structure or composition of the landscape. Similarly, some human-induced disturbances are better for the environment than others. Sustainable forest harvest can aid the regeneration of a forest, while land development for things like new parking lots do not. Cataloging the disturbances will help with assessing if the impact is beneficial or recoverable.

The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service designated the rusty-patched bumblebee as endangered in early January, a first for any bee species. Image: Dan Mullen.

Fight invasives or protect pollinators: Neonicotinoids present tough choice (Great Lakes Echo): Neonicotinoids, a class of insecticides frequently used in agriculture, gets plenty of bad press for killing pollinators like honeybees. But they’ve also emerged as an important combatant of the emerald ash borer, an invasive insect that has devastated ash populations all over the United States with the highest risk localized to the American Midwest and the northern half of the Eastern seaboard. For pollinator protectors in Michigan, that’s a problem. With the recent designation of the rusty patched bumble bee as endangered by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service – the first time any bee species in the U.S. has landed on such a list – the race for effective conservation tactics has accelerated. The Michigan Pollinator Protection Plan Committee will have a draft of the plan available for public comment between March 10 and April 14.

Pacu Fish, Endangered Butterflies, and the Common Loon: this week in environmental news

Pacu Fish. Image: Thinking Humanity.

‘Human-toothed’ Pacu in Michigan waters, endangered species running out of time (Great Lakes Echo): The Michigan Department of Natural Resources recently reported finding fish with “human-like teeth” in southeastern Michigan lakes. Anglers spotted red-bellied pacu in Lake St. Clair and near Port Huron. These unusual fish sport teeth eerily reminiscent of humans’ so they can eat seeds and nuts. While they’re not native to Michigan, DNR said they’re not invasive.

 

Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore. Photo: Joshua Stevens, NASA Earth Observatory

Celebrating 100^th anniversary of parks system with a great Great Lakes view (Great Lakes Echo): The U.S. National Park Service celebrates its centennial in 2016, commemorating 100 years of stewardship of America’s natural and historic treasures. Many of those monuments, scenic rivers, parks, and historic sites are visible from space – where the views are just as compelling.

 

Mitchell’s Satyr. Photo: Bill Bouton

Endangered butterflies released by Kalamazoo Nature Center (WMUK 102.1): The Kalamazoo Nature Center released 18 rare butterfly caterpillars. The Mitchell’s Satyr butterfly is a nationally endangered species. There are only 11 groups of the butterfly left in the entire United States. The Mitchell’s Satyr has been called a “canary in a coal mine” for America’s wetlands. Almost all of the butterflies live in the southernmost counties of Michigan because they live in a rare habitat – fens.

 

Common loon. Image: US FWS.

Loony for a diving bird (Great Lakes Echo): Great Lakes common loons are a barometer for water and habitat quality since they’re sensitive to pollution and very particular about where to nest. Listen to the podcast to learn more about the common loon.

Michigan Historic Places, North Trail Hikes, and Wildlife Inventions: this week in environmental news

Rice Bay on Lac Vieux Desert. Photo: National Register of Historic Places

National Register adds Michigan’s Rice Bay, historic Ishpeming building (Great Lakes Echo): The National Register is the official list of the nation’s historic places worthy of preservation. Two sites in Michigan’s Upper Peninsula have been added to the National Register of Historic Places – one culturally important to members of the Lac Vieux Desert Band of Lake Superior Chippewa Indians and the other related to a strike important to labor and women’s history. The first site is Rice Bay in Gogebic County, which is a wild rice-growing area covering a square quarter-mile on northeastern Lac Vieux Desert. Wild rice is an aquatic grass that is culturally important to the tribe. The second site is the 128-year-old Brasstad-Gossard Building in downtown Ishpeming, which started as a factory and later renovated into an interior mall and offices.

Snowshoeing the North Country National Scenic Trail near Petoskey, Michigan. Photo: Dove Day

North Trail hikers set 100-mile centennial goal (Great Lakes Echo): Veteran hiker, Joan Young of Scottville, Michigan, has prepared to commemorate the National Park Service centennial in a 100-mile hike challenge sponsored by the North Country Trail Association, headquartered in Lowell, Michigan. The longest of 11 nationally designated scenic trails, North Country wanders between North Dakota and New York, following the Great Lakes through 12 national forests. The challenge is 100 miles for the 100 years of national parks. It’s a way to celebrate an important anniversary and to prepare a new generation for the next 100 years of national parks.

Secret MSU location is site of world’s longest running scientific experiment (Great Lakes Echo): The world’s longest running scientific experiment has been in operation for the past 137 years, and it’s been happening on a secret spot on the MSU campus. 137 years ago, MSU botany professor William J. Beal filled 20 bottles with seeds from common plants covered by sandy soil. Then he buried them all in a secret spot on campus. That was the beginning of what would become the world’s longest running scientific experiment and W.J. Botanical Garden. They only dig up one of the bottles every 20 years.

5 student inventions that help wildlife (Mother Nature Network): Wildlife conservation is an equal-opportunity field. With a little ingenuity and technical know-how, a person of any age and educational level can make a valuable contribution. Thanks to these five impressive student creations, many endangered species will be getting a much needed leg up on survival. The creations include an electronic scent dispenser, mushroom water filter, drones to keep an eye in the sky on poachers, squid-jet, and a hoglodge: a hedgehog haven.

National Parks, Species Studies, and Solar Energy: this week in environmental news

A view of the beach below a dune from the Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore. Photo: carfull

Great Lakes national parks prepare for centennial (Great Lakes Echo): The Great Lakes region units of the National Park Service are celebrating its centennial this year, after its creation in 1916. The national parks are publicly owned treasures of environmental and natural resources, historic and cultural wealth, recreation and national identity.

More harm than help? Antibacterial hand soaps threaten fish (Great Lakes Echo): The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) reports that many consumer products, including antibacterial soaps, contain triclosan. That’s a chemical added to prevent and reduce bacterial contamination. Although it has not been found hazardous to people, scientific studies found that it alters hormones in animals. This may cause a population of fish to have a much smaller number of reproducing adults and that would lead to a much smaller population of fish in general. A lot of other animals, including humans, eat fish, but with a smaller population of fish, fewer fish will be available to eat.

Binational efforts target bird-bashing buildings (Great Lakes Echo): According to a recent report by the University of Toronto, somewhere between 365 million and 988 million birds die annually from window collisions in the U.S. and Canada. A member of Congress from Illinois has proposed a bill to bird proof the windows of federal buildings. Bird-safe glass has an ultraviolet pattern within the glass that is invisible to the human eye, but gives birds a heads up.

In Japan, work kicks off on the world’s largest floating solar farm (Mother Nature Network): Japan, a nation that’s big on solar but short on space, is constructing the world’s largest floating solar farm. The solar power plant will be located at the Yamakura Dam reservoir in Chiba Prefecture, outside of Tokyo. The facility will produce enough juice to power about 5,000 homes while offsetting 8,170 cubic tons of CO2 emissions annually – a figure that’s equivalent to the consumption of 19,000 barrels of oil.

Kyocera has done floating solar installations before. But this one, a 13.7 MW facility due to go online in 2018, will be by far the largest. Photo: Kyocera