Taking a three-week break from posting

This shot of Cherry Lake was taken by a friend, Peta White

It's time to head out to Cherry Lake for an extended stay so I won't be able to post anything to the blog for a couple of weeks. So far this summer, my excursions out to the Strawberry Lake Community Pasture have been disappointing. On three trips I have yet to find a single Sprague's pipit. Upland sandpipers seem to be scarce too, but I have found good numbers of Baird's and grasshopper sparrows. They nest in the same fields and pastures in loose colonies. The sharp-tailed grouse lek had about 12 males dancing this spring. Farther south at the Kendal Wildlife Preserve I found at least one chestnut-collared longspur, and an orchard oriole singing nearby. This week I will make some last surveys of the area and see what I can find, though it is getting late in the summer to be listening for breeding birds.

Already the arctic shorebirds are heading south in small groups. Saskatoons are almost ready for picking and the warm season grasses are in flower.

Landmark court ruling on Canada's endangered species

Recently, I agreed to take a volunteer position with Nature Saskatchewan, an environmental organization that defends Saskatchewan's wild places and creatures. As the new conservation director, I help the organization on issues where we have to speak out against habitat loss or activities that threaten important ecosystems or species at risk. One of the more intreseting issues Nature Sask has been working on over the last year or more involves a cooperative effort with other environmental groups to get the Federal Government to follow their own legislation and take action to protect endangered species. Ever since the Species at Risk Act was passed in 2003, the Federal Government has been neglecting its legislated responsibility for endangered species, using the limitations of science as an excuse for their inaction as more and more critical habitat becomes degraded or destroyed.

Last year, Nature Sask joined an environmental umbrella group, along with the Alberta Wilderness Association, the Federation of Alberta Naturalists, the Grasslands Naturalists, and the Alberta Wilderness Committee to work with Ecojustice, Canada’s leading non-profit organization of lawyers and scientists devoted to protecting the environment. On behalf of Nature Sask. and the other environmental groups, Ecojustice took the Federal government to court for not protecting the Greater Sage-Grouse from habitat loss.

On July 9th, the court made its decision. A federal court judge in Vancouver ruled that the federal Minister of the Environment, Jim Prentice, broke the law by refusing to identify critical habitat in a recovery plan for the endangered greater sage-grouse.

Here is a recent article on the decision, posted on the CBC news website.

And here is the full news release from Ecojustice.

This is a clear and decisive victory for the protection of species at risk in Canada, forcing the government to take steps to stop the destruction of critical habitat for the Sage-grouse. By implication, the decision will also help groups argue for the protection of habitat for many other species in Canada. Good things like this happen when environmentalists work together. We should all be grateful for the work Ecojustice is doing and consider making a donation.

"Round-up" discovered to be deadly to human cells

It appears that we are getting closer to a smoking gun with glyphosate--a herbicide that is commonly used in Great Plains agriculture to kill weeds. Scientific American has published an article that shows that an ingredient of glyphosate (Monsanto's "Round-up")kills human cells, particularly embryonic, placental and umbilical cord cells.

For decades we have had to listen to the experts claiming that glyphosate is harmless, but a couple of years ago it was shown that amphibians are vulnerable to the surfactant used in the formulation. No matter, what's a few frogs and amphibians? Let's just carry on business as usual. Well now that there is evidence that it contains something that kills human cells--and likely therefore is affecting the reproductivity of other organisms in ecosystems where it is applied--are we going to re-visit its registration as an acceptable herbicide in Canada and the United States? What does it take to get a chemical like glyphosate banned or at least severely restricted?

Grass, Sky, Song Illustrated:"Pathways of Complicity"

this McCown's Longspur image courtesy of Alan MacKeigan

The McCown's is a bird of the open plains where grass is sparse at best. It flutters and teeters on the air like a small kite as it lets out it's jumble of tinkling notes. In the 1990s we still had a few of them near Regina on summerfallow but now their range has retracted severely to the south. This chapter of Grass, Sky, Song brings the narrative around to the question of who we can blame for what is happening to the birds of the this continent's grasslands. When I started writing the book, I was more certain of who to hold responsible, but that changed as I spoke to ranchers and biologists.

Part way into this chapter, I talk about our property and looking down on it from a hilltop view. Here is one view from a slightly different hilltop, looking down on the land in late fall. Click on it to get a larger view of the panorama.


This land, like other remnants of native grass throughout this region, is in better shape than the ploughed fields beyond, but it is still suffering, awaiting the day when the right mix of grass, grazers, and fire will restore it to health. If we want to participate in this restoration and stop the birds from dwindling away, we will have to set aside the question of who to blame and begin the honourable work of connecting our economies and agriculture to this ancient dance between soil, climate, grazers, and fire.

shot of plains bison in Grassland national Park, by James Paige, Parks Canada

Grass, Sky, Song Illustrated:"Vigil"

Greater Sage-grouse image courtesy of John Carlson

The "vigil" of this chapter of Grass, Sky, Song refers to the annual effort in Canada to count the steadilty declining number of greater sage-grouse at known "leks" or dancing grounds each spring. In April, 2006 I took part in the count by joining with volunteer Chris Reed to count the grouse attending leks in the East Block of Grasslands National Park.

Here are some photos I took during that visit to the park.

This is a shot of the Kildeer Badlands on the Eastern edge of the park.


This is Chris walking over the centre of the lek, an hour after the grouse had left in late morning.


Here is what sage-grouse scat looks like--the same grey/green as the sage brush they eat. Note the black, tarry goo in the middle--another kind of excretion that you find on leks.


Here is our campsite a kilometre away from the lek on open grassland.


We had to radio in each night to let park staff know we were ok, so this is Chris trying, and failing, to make contact with the nearest warden station.


And this last image shows Chris and I just before packing up to leave. The vigil over for that year.

Tracking long-billed curlews to wintering grounds

Here is a link to an article in the Great Falls Tribune.

Grass, Sky, Song Illustrated:"Lethal Dose"

Loggerhead shrike photo courtesy of John Carlson

This chapter of Grass, Sky, Song is about pesticides. The loggerhead shrike is an endangered species in Canada for a variety of reasons but pesticides have likely played a role. Farmers and naturalists first noticed their numbers thinning in the early 1960s after the new organochlorine pesticides (including DDT) came to the prairie. In the 1970s we banned DDT, but then started using Carbofuran for the next twenty years. It too has finally been banned, but the damage has been done. The prairie population of loggerhead shrikes has dropped by 80% in the last 35 years.


Doing the research for this chapter I went to the University of Lethbridge to meet Dan Johnson, Canada Research Chair in Sustainable Grassland Ecosystems, and one of the continent's foremost grasshopper researchers. Take a look at this web page where Dan shows some of his work on grasshoppers and grassland species at risk.



This lovely photo of burrowing owl eating a grasshopper was taken by Dan. Click here for a look at an great series of shots of this owl eating 'hoppers.

Dan sits on the recovery team for burrowing owls, in part because the owls eat a lot of grasshoppers and feed their nestlings on them. Dan does a lot of good by speaking to people in the world of agriculture who have trouble seeing grasshoppers and other insects as anything but pests. Here is a link to a lecture he gave on the subject at Simon Fraser university.