Winter: The other growing season

Written February 27, 2014, published March 20, 2014. All photos by Kathleen Sayce.

As hardwoods break bud in late winter, the winter-growing season for a different biotic group winds down. These species grow all winter in faint light and ample moisture, and will be going dormant soon. These include mosses, liverworts, lichens, some ferns, algae and bacteria. All share a counter-season lifestyle––they grow and reproduce during the fall-spring period, and are dormant during the spring-fall period.

Orthotrichum lyallii is a dark green moss that lives on hardwood trees and shrubs, and forms distinctive loose tufts. In some old orchards, every branch supports multiple tufts of Orthotrichum lyallii.

Our area is part of the coastal temperate rainforest, a place that has so much rain that smaller plants live on bigger plants and other elevated surfaces and thrive with no connection to soil. The coastal temperate rainforest stretches from southeast Alaska south to northern California, in a long narrow band along the coast, with a smaller parallel band in the Cascades of Washington and Oregon.

Bigleaf Maple, Acer macrophyllum, is often covered with epiphytes, as seen here at Ft Columbia State Park. Ferns, mosses, lichens and liverworts cover the main branches and trunk of this maple tree.

The largest member of this winter-growing group is Polypodium glycyrrhiza, licorice fern, which puts out new green fronds every fall, and dries down in spring. In other parts of the world, species in this genus are often called 'resurrection ferns' because most put out new fronds in fall, and go dormant in spring. Licorice fern has sweet, anise-flavored rhizomes, hence its specific name, glycyrrhiza, which means 'sweet root'.

Licorice fern, Polypodium glycyrrhiza, grows new bright green fronds each fall. This luxuriant clump grows on big-leaf maple at Ft. Columbia State Park.

Equally striking are a group of epiphytic lichens, light green in color, which wither down to nubs and twisted brittle fronds in summer, and in winter burst into luxuriant growth. Common on hardwoods, especially fruit trees, maples and alders, they light up the garden as they reach maximum size in late winter. They aren't parasitic, just opportunistic, looking for a supporting tree to live on. In my yard, the supports are plum trees. Lichens are combined organisms, a fungus and an alga growing together.

Many clumps of Usnea spp. grow on a plum branch. In late winter this lichen festoons Pacific crabapple, apple and plum orchards, alders, willows, and other hardwoods. 

The light, bright green mosses that grow in lawns spend the summer being shredded and spread around lawn areas by mowers. Those tiny bits are ready to take hold and grow as soon as the days grow wet and cool. By spring, these mosses have grown into thick loose mats of fine green foliage, burying turf grasses under their luxuriant growth. Give them a few years to grow unchecked, and all the grass plants are gone, shaded out by the mosses. Last year I cleared mosses out of a lawn area by rolling up sections like carpet, and found that for every square foot of moss cleared, one or two scrawny grass plants remained. I reseeded, but it's a futile action. This area of lawn is too shady even in summer, too wet in winter, for anything but mosses to thrive. Likewise, the roofs that looked clean last summer now sport green clumps of mosses and the occasional gelatinous algal mass.

Homalothecium aeneum is a distinctive bright copper-gold color; it lives on trunks and branches of hardwoods, such as the trunk of an apple tree. 

In the dunes by late winter are luxuriant soil crusts, a mix of lichens, algae and mosses. They wake up and grow each fall, in dense multi-layered multi-species carpets that can be more than four inches thick. By summer, all that will remain is a thin, brittle blackish crust that will snap when you walk on it. Likewise, mosses that prefer open soil start growing in fall, and what you thought was bare ground is a green carpet by midwinter. Sometimes it seems like it happens overnight, but the young mosses were there all along, ready to spring into growth as soon as the air temperatures cooled off, the rain came back, and the light levels dropped.

Porphyra rediviva lives in salt marshes during the winter months, anchored to the tips of marsh plants. Brownish red in color, it is related to several seaweeds grown for nori. 

In the salt marshes there is an alga, a seaweed, that grows in winter and dies back each spring. This seaweed is Porphyra rediviva; it looks like an olive-brown-black mass, not alive let alone photosynthetic. For decades it was thought to be flotsam, loose and dying Porphyra fronds that had drifted in on high tides and stranded in salt marshes. A few years ago a botanist realized it was living, that its preferred habitat was salt marshes, and that it grew only during the winter months. Other red Porphyras live on rocks, such as at Waikiki Beach during the winter months, and disappear as spring approaches.

Neckera douglasii is very light green with undulate [transversely pleated] leaves; it grows on trunks and branches of trees and shrubs. This clump is growing on an old lilac trunk. 

As the days lengthen, while wet weather continues into spring, the mosses and lichens are actively growing. In a few weeks the sun will be strong enough and the weather drier. These cryptic small organisms will go dormant for another dry season. When fall rains and short days return, they will begin growing once more, the small plants that live on a schedule that runs counter to flowering plants and trees.

Ulota megalospora grows in tiny clumps, and its leaves twist into distinctive tips. Like Orthotrichum, this Ulota prefers twigs, stems and trunks of hardwoods.

Ramalina tufts often mix with Usnea on branches. Ramalinas have flattened branches, where Usneas have rounded branches. This tuft is growing on wood fence slats; other smaller lichens also grow on the slats, including Parmelia and Physcia.

Limestone outcrops, fossil clams and calcium

Written February 16, 2014, published in late February, 2014

Waters that flow to the Pacific Ocean from the Coast Range, Cascades and Columbia River basin tend to be low in calcium. Columbia River waters are high in some heavy metals, several nutrients, any number of pollutants and several radioactive isotopes. These are not a surprise. With numerous dams, cities, thousands of acres of irrigated farmland, mining, and other activities upriver, and parent rocks from seafloor basalts and the Columbia Plateau flood basalts, opportunities for all these compounds and elements to enter the water is very good. But why so little calcium?

Calcium accumulates in oceans as calcium carbonate in shells when water conditions are basic, with a pH above 7.0, which is considered neutral. One of the three most common biopolymers on the planet (cellulose and chitin are the other two), calcium carbonates are formed by several groups of invertebrates into durable, protective outer walls to shield softer bodies.

Common invertebrate groups that make carbonate shells include mollusks, barnacles, corals and brachiopods. Vertebrates also use calcium carbonate to make bones which support bodies internally instead of protecting them externally. Calcium is important to plants, which use it to form healthy cell walls, and produce fruit. It's mobile in water, which is another way to say it washes out of the soil easily.

Mollusks are one of the most successful body types on the planet, and include snails, clams, oysters, limpets, slipper shells, and several shell-free forms. Species in this large and very diverse phylum live in almost all wet to damp habitats on earth, including deep in the ocean, in shallow saltwater and in freshwater, on land and trees. In some species, the external shell is reduced or absent, as with land-living slugs, as well as squid and octopus. More about land-living mollusks later, which include snails, jumping slugs, voracious garden-living slugs from around the world, and others.

Numerous small fossil clams can be seen as circles to ovals on this limestone rock, photographed at an old quarry on Bear River. The fossil clam in the middle of this image is 20 mm long. Photograph by Kathleen Sayce

Carbonates form masses of limestone when shells accumulate in channels, or grow together in large reefs, and then later are heated, subjected to pressure, and turn from individual shells into rocks. The more heat, pressure and time, the harder the rocks that form, going from fairly soft limestones to quite hard marble over millions of years. In geologic time, this area was a enclosed and increasingly shallow sea from around 55 mya (millions of years ago), to around 10 mya, as the Cascades and then Coast Range/Willapa Hills rose. There was a lot of volcanic activity, lava flows, flood basalts, ash falls, which buried the reefs and shell beds under layers of other rocks, often under very acidic conditions.

There's one thing calcium carbonates can't resist (sorry for the pun), and that is acid. Air or water with a pH of less than 7.0 is acidic, and gets more acidic as pH goes from 7 towards 1; if the pH is above 7, then it is alkaline. Acids break down the carbonates, release calcium and carbon dioxide in the carbonates, and dissolve the material, no matter if the carbonate is an oyster shell, a marble statue, or a limestone wall. When conditions are acidic, as is often the case during volcanic activities, or with high levels of pollution (think 'acid rain'), or with ocean acidification, then limestones or shells dissolve more quickly. All that volcanic activity in geologic time helped dissolve limestones when the reefs were young; the present climate of long wet winters with acidifying conditions also promotes dissolving.

A few outcrops remain in the Willapa Hills from those extensive reefs of millions of years ago. Tom Horning, geologist, who lives in Seaside, Oregon took me to see a small limestone outcrop on the Bear River a few months ago. I wanted to see the shells and distinctive color of the local limestone, which is a muddy yellow, very different from black-gray-brown basalts, the most common local rocks. We walked down to the river through a recent clearcut, and found the remains of a limestone quarry on the banks of Bear River. With Tom's help, I was able to photograph several patches of clam shells. This outcrop is less than one hundred feet wide along the river bank, and was mined decades ago to make cement. A bit of it still remains visible, a long gouge out of the hillside where the rocks are softer, yellowish in color, and if the moss and soil are scraped away, where fossil clams shells can be seen.

It's one thing to read a geology map and fossil books, and learn that extensive reefs were found in the shallow sea over our area in the Eocene to Miocene periods. Or to learn that oceans were so alkaline then that the water had a pH of 10 to 14, which is very alkaline. It's something else to hold a rock in your hand as a relict of those past eons. In generally acidic conditions on land or in water, limestones survive when they are protected from those acids, well elevated above fresh or saltwater, protected from rainfall by other sediments. In low calcium conditions today, we see the past, where a long parade of acids wore away those reefs and shell beds.

It matters now how much calcium is where on local lands and in waters, because our estuaries are acidifying along with the Pacific Ocean. Local scientists are studying how to boost calcium around shellfish beds, to protect young clams and oysters, and enhance growing conditions for fish and other species. We already know that upwelled water from the deep ocean is acidic and low in oxygen. If it's also low in calcium, then the mollusk larvae in our estuaries have a triple whammy to face in their first few days of life: low pH, not enough oxygen, not enough calcium to build or rebuild their new shells.

Willapa Bay's waters can oxygenate well with the tidal cycle, and if the water can be buffered with additional calcium, then the young oysters and clams may make it past the critical first couple of weeks, and have a chance of surviving. We can't solve ocean acidification for the Pacific Ocean, or the world. But perhaps we can buffer it for our shellfish industry. Finding the right way to do this starts with knowing all the local calcium sources.

A sense of place in time

Two years ago I began writing a natural history column for the Chinook Observer, often called with some familiarity the 'fish wrapper'. Readers immediately began asking me when I was going to publish, or repost, each article. The day has finally come. Here it is, starting with the first article, about black sands and gold placers, early in 2012.

Citizen Science, come rain, wind or shine: Christmas Bird Counts

Written January 22, 2014, published in late January 2014

In mid December, I took part in two bird counts on the South Coast of Washington. The Christmas Bird Count organizes thousands of people in the Americas to count birds in well-defined geographic areas, called 'count crcles'. These circles are fifteen miles across. Our local circles are centered, respectively, near the Columbia River and Willapa Bay entrances. There are thousands of count circles in North America, from above the Arctic Circle into Mexico, and in the past couple of decades, new ones have been defined in Central and South America, as well as just upriver in Skamokawa.

Robert Zimmerman, Mike Patterson and Kathleen Sayce look for birds on Willapa Bay at the Port of Peninsula, photo by Jackie Ferrier

Christmas Bird Counts began 114 years ago in New York City, as an alternative activity to the tradition of the day, which was to shoot as many birds as possible on one day. Not kidding. A local group decided to visit Central Park and see how many bird species they could see, rather than shoot, after Christmas 1899. It has metamorphosed into two continents-wide tracking of bird populations, and is now the longest running citizen science project on Earth. Sponsored by the National Audubon Society, you can read more about the history of Christmas Bird Counts at http://birds.audubon.org/christmas-bird-count . Recent reports on counts are also posted on this site.

Mike Patterson at dawn with spotting scope, Nahcotta, Willapa Bay, photo by Kathleen Sayce 

As with plants and other biotic groups, bird species diversity (the number of species found in an area) is higher closer to the Equator and lower towards the poles. We are lucky here to see one hundred twenty species in each count circle, and have not quite reached one hundred fifty species in especially salubrious years. In subtropical south Texas, a typical count includes more than two hundred species, and there are circles in South America that average more than four hundred. Above the Arctic Circle, one count circle celebrated when they finally saw one bird, a raven, after years of watching and seeing no birds at all.

Black Turnstone on shell pile, Port of Peninsula on Willapa Bay, photo by Mike Patterson

Looking for birds is chancy in late fall and early winter in this area. Days are short, with fewer than eight hours of daylight, and air temperatures are rarely above 50 F. Usually it rains, often it also blows. Some years, it snows. In storms and strong winds, birds hide, and we are lucky to get forty species and two hundred birds in one section. As the pressure drops ahead of a storm, birds seek shelter, so even in fairly nice weather if the barometer is falling, the birds hide. About one year in ten the weather is dry and more or less sunny, though some sunny count days can be very windy. Birders layer up in warm clothing, wear rain gear, waterproof boots, warm hats, and often snack all day long. They carry binoculars, cameras, cell phones, and spotting scopes, with field guides and notes about where to see certain rare species.

And then the fun begins: Each circle is divided into several sections, because no one can traverse the area of a circle fifteen miles wide and see all the birds, even on flat land with roads everywhere. Eight to ten sections per circle are typical, each one covering several square miles. In more densely populated circles, sections may be as small as a few blocks. In the local circles, much of the area is over water, which must be surveyed by boat.

Mike Patterson and Kathleen Sayce birding with spotting scopes south of Oysterville on Willapa Bay,  near noon during the count day, photo by Jackie Ferrier

This year I worked the Chinook section of the Astoria Circle, which starts at the bottom of the north side slope over the shipping channel on the Astoria-Megler Bridge with two other people. Starting just after daylight, our task was to count as many individual birds as we could, and sort all of them into species. We can't stop on the bridge to do this, so we had a designated driver and a note taker, and everyone focused on how many birds of which species were seen on each side of the car crossing the bridge. Some years it's less than twenty gulls; some years it's more than five hundred, along with cormorants, eagles and ducks. And that's the first five minutes, just after sunrise. It can be quite a rush to bird this intensely all day.

The highest numbers of birds and species for any area are always seen in sunny calm weather. It helps to have local bird feeders to visit during the day. Even a few days of putting out bird seed will draw in birds in winter. Walking or bicycling rather than driving helps, though hybrid cars are so quiet when running on batteries with all the windows down that we can hear birds almost as well as when walking. Both local circles include a lot of open water, so in calm weather some birders go out in boats to count on the water. Owls are active before dawn, so a birder skilled in birding by ear often starts around four or five a.m., hunting for owls late at night. Having more birders looking helps too; the more eyes looking means more birds are seen.

Routines have changed over the years. In past decades, sketches and field notes on rare birds were submitted by mail, and then argued over weeks later. With cell phones, uncertain bird identifications can be discussed quickly, and spectacular sightings of rare birds or unusually high numbers of common birds are shared during the day. Digital photos help too; photos sent around during the count day can usually resolve identification problems quickly.

From year to year, the species with the highest number of individuals changes for each circle and each section. One year, there were more than fifteen thousand birds in Bakers Bay––gulls, ducks, cormorants, including seventeen Bald Eagles––all eating fish after an unusual fish kill occurred. Another year, all the loons and grebes were upriver of the Astoria-Megler Bridge instead of spread throughout the count circle. This year, in five miles along Willapa Bay, there were more than nine thousand Northern Pintail ducks. Some years Black Brant have not arrived on Willapa Bay by the day of the count, but there were several thousand brant on the bay this year, arriving just a few days earlier.

In the past decade, the Eurasian Collared Dove arrived in eastern North America, and a few years ago, made it to the West Coast. It crowded out Rock Dove populations everywhere, which was until then an ubiquitous urban bird. In urban areas, several species of parrots have escaped and established viable populations. An occasional winter visitor a decade ago, Anna's Hummingbird is now a common year round resident. Likewise, Western Scrub Jays have gone from occasional visitors, driven down out of the mountains in bad winters, to common at sea level. We saw all these species in both count circles this year. No parrots, however.

There are other Citizen Science projects to participate in: Around the 4^th of July is an annual butterfly count (http://www.naba.org/butter_counts.html ); backyard bumblebee tracking goes on spring through early fall (http://www.bumblebeewatch.org ) ; bud break of common yard plants each spring goes on across North America (http://budbreak.org ). I've participated in butterfly counts, and plan to track bumblebees in my yard during the next growing season.

The winter bird count is special, however, because weather is such a strong determiner of what it will be possible to see. If we are lucky, it's a quiet day of great natural beauty with active birds to see all day long. This year, the weather was mild on both days and no one got hypothermia. Next winter, when you see a slow moving car or group walking down the road around Christmas, bristling with binoculars and spotting scopes, wave and know the CBC is underway for its 115^th year.

Save the Best, Restore the Rest

Originally written December 19, 2013, and published in early January, 2014

'Save and Restore' summarizes the practice of many land conservation organizations. Here in Pacific County, hundreds of fish-passage barriers, including undersized culverts, collapsed culverts, un-swimmable fish ladders, other structures, and streams devoid of shade and large woody debris, have been located and replaced or replanted over the past decade. Many structures were installed several decades ago, using best available ideas at the time, but the times have changed. We have learned a lot about what does not work, and what does work, with decades of applied science. The easy projects have now been completed, which is good news. Today the focus is on the remaining, larger, more expensive barriers, many of which are low in these river systems, and run along or under highways. Fixing these will open up more miles of access for salmon, and in some cases reduce flooding and restore historic stream capacity.

Headquarters Stream, Willapa NWR, where a tide gate was replaced with a fixed weir to allow salmon to move upstream from Willapa Bay more easily. Coho and Chum salmon now breed in this stream. Photo by Kathleen Sayce

Low Elevation Barriers

In early December I saw a proposed restoration site in the Willapa basin on Forks Creek, one of four county projects proposed by the Washington Coast Sustainable Salmon Partnership (www.wcssp.org), and supported by local stream habitat and fish groups. This low elevation fish-passage barrier is an old weir, located near the main stem of the Willapa River that keeps salmon out of 28 miles of streams. Above this weir, there were many other barrriers, but those are now gone. This is the last, and biggest, barrier left on this stream. The stream was home to five species of salmon, and those species are still in the main river and ready to return. In terms of breeding habitat alone, there is room for thousands of redds (gravelly nests where salmon lay eggs) in those 28 miles. Restoration will cost two million dollars, including the planning, permitting, and engineering. There are several streams like this in Pacific County, where one big, low elevation barrier remains, and continues to block access to miles of streams. These projects not only improve fish habitat, they provide weeks to months of work for restoration crews, who live in our county.

Weir on Forks Creek, off the Willapa River, photo by Kathleen Sayce

Orders of Magnitude More Fish

Low elevation barriers can keep a surprising number of fish out of their historic feeding and breeding areas. When the tiny culvert at the south end of Chinook on Highway 101 was replaced in 2011 with a 12 ft by 12 ft box culvert, the number of young salmon feeding in the south end of Chinook marsh leaped by two orders of magnitude. In just a few weeks, the numbers went from under one hundred to over one thousand fish in net surveys. Even better, those salmon came from all over the Columbia basin, including the upper Columbia in north central Washington, and the Snake River, not just from lower Columbia tributaries. The Chinook marsh is tiny, 96 acres; but because of its position near the Pacific Ocean, it's important feeding habitat for all the juvenile fish that come downriver from higher streams. The project cost $750,000, and was led by CREST with USFWS and LCREP as partners.

New channel downcutting at a private hydrology restoration site, photo by Kathleen Sayce

Flood Reduction and Fish Habitat

A large marsh restoration on Highway 101 west of South Bend on Potters Slough took place several years ago. A couple miles of the highway west of Potter Slough was raised and widened to become a levee, then the old dike along the Willapa River was removed, including tide gates and other water control structures. The purpose of this restoration was to open up several hundred acres to tidal activity, to improve flood holding capacity and salt marsh habitat along the Willapa River. Over the next several years, the marsh began to function again, like a giant sponge; it takes in and stores inches of new sediment every year. This site includes a couple hundred acres on the south side of the highway, totaling 580 acres.

The salt marsh is still partly bare, because plants grow from seeds each spring, and are buried by freshly deposited sediments each winter. Meanwhile, during major floods, the river level isn't as high as it used to be in South Bend and Raymond. Bird use, including ducks and shorebirds, is impressively high: More than fifty thousand shorebirds and thousands of ducks may feed at one time in this marsh in the spring. Young fish also use the marsh, as evidenced by attentive herons and gulls along the channels.

HIgh tide behind new box culvert, Chinook Marsh, on Hwy 101, photo by Kathleen Sayce

The Waits Are Worth The Time

The culvert flowed under a highway; the levee was built on the footprint of a highway. Replacing culverts, bridges, and raising sections of highways are expensive. The money comes from an agency's budget, often through a competitive evaluation program. Traffic has to be rerouted or flagged for months. Weather can hold up work for weeks, including windstorms, high storm tides, heavy rain, and cold fronts. Insects can grow out of control for the first few years while the new ecologies establish. Yes, it's annoying to sit at an automated light and wait for it to go green. Yet all these small changes in our landscape add up to more resilience for local communities, and over their lifetimes as landscape structures, improved survival for millions of fish.

When the Weather Changes Again

Remember the warmer, drier weather of past decades, starting in 1976 and ending in the late 1990s? There were El Nino-Southern Oscillation events every few years, adding to the warmth. It was glorious for beach visitors and gardeners, great for sitting out on warm summer nights, but terrible for salmon. Our local salmon species had lost hundreds of miles of breeding and rearing habitat by 1976, and when the weather dried and warmed, the number of fish returning to breed dropped off dramatically. Habitat restoration projects were implemented to improve fish access to streams, including in-stream wood, stream-side vegetation, barrier removal, side channel habitat, increasing culvert sizes, gravel beds for redds, and the replacement of fish ladders that did not work as planned. Hatchery management methods were overhauled, along with genetic evaluations of wild and hatchery populations. Salmon numbers slowly came up in the 1990s. Then the weather shifted to wetter and cooler, and populations really rebounded, with all the links from redds to ocean conditions working in unison. Returns of Chinook salmon to the mid Columbia River were higher this year than at any time in the past seventy years, due to this combination of habitat improvements and ocean conditions.

The problem is we don't know how long the present weather will last. There's a saying that the best time to plant a tree was twenty years ago; the second best time is now. The same is true for salmon streams. Now is a great time to open up the last remaining barriers in the streams and help all the salmon populations swing up. Right now, the weather is cool and wet, and ocean conditions are good, but the future is uncertain. With global climate change (for this area, ocean warming and acidification), and the normal PDO shift due in a few years, salmon will soon have two or more decades of poor conditions to cope with. The more habitat our salmon regain now, the better their chances will be to survive future warmer and drier weather, and make it to the next cool, wet shift, when they can thrive once more.

Many habitat improvements are simple: Put nature back in charge of streams. Where humans have to interface with streams, such as along and under roads, we have learned how to do this better, and it's our task now to use the best possible science with each restoration. Which means, I suspect, that a few decades from now, we'll be stopped again on the highway during the installation of newer and better fish-passage structures, bridges and culverts. But let's get it done, and keep doing it well, so that we have salmon in abundance in the future. 

Local Biotoxins and Toxic Bacteria

Written September 30, 2013, published in October 2013, all photos by Kathleen Sayce

With the next razor clam season approaching, this is a good time to review biotoxins and bacteria that are health hazards. First, a historical perspective:  Commercial razor clam digger Ed Chellis routinely dug hundreds of pounds of razor clams per tide, 1930-40s. He said the clam cannery kept pigs and chickens to eat the leftover clam parts. Sometimes the chickens and pigs walked funny or staggered around for days, and sometimes they all died. He did not take clams home for his family when the animals fell ill. 
Bottom line:  Biotoxins have been here for a long time. 

Prorocentrum species are associated with biotoxins in some areas. This genus is common in local waters. On the south coast of Washington, it has not been associated with water-borne toxins. 

PSP:

At the top of the list of locally common toxins is Paralytic Shellfish Poisoning (PSP), caused by saxitoxin, which is produced by species in the dinoflagellate genus Alexandrium, other dinoflagellates, cyanobacteria, and at least one species of pufferfish. Shellfish may store these toxins to reduce predation; it remains in animal tissues for weeks to years. Poisoning occurs by eating the shellfish. Saxitoxin is water soluble, and is heat and acid-stable, which means that cooking makes no difference to its toxicity.  Alexandrium species are seen regularly along the Pacific Northwest coast, and are common in local waters during warm weather, spring through fall.  Otters, seals and whales have died from high doses of PSP. 

The symptoms of PSP appear soon after eating, and include tingling or burning of lips, tongue and mouth, or other skin surfaces (face, neck, arms, etc.), nausea, vomiting, abdominal pain, diarrhea, shortness of breath, dry mouth, a choking feeling, confused or slurred speech, and loss of coordination. Cooking does not affect this biotoxin. I once took a bite of steamer clams that were high in PSP; it felt like fireworks went off in my mouth. I spit them out, rinsed my mouth and dumped the meal; my mouth was numb for a few minutes. 

In extreme cases of PSP poisoning, respiratory arrest shuts down the breathing system, hence the word paralysis in the name. Recently campers on the Olympic Peninsula ate PSP-contaminated mussels, and after one mouthful, one of them went into full respiratory arrest. His companions gave him mouth to mouth until help arrived, and he recovered. If people survive the initial poisoning event with respiratory support, they usually make a full recovery.

Pseudo-nitzschia species produce domoic acid, and locally were responsible for many closures in the 1990s in local waters. 

ASP:

Amnesiac Shellfish Poisoning (ASP) is caused by domoic acid, a small protein produced by diatoms in two genera, Pseudo-nitzschia and Nitzschia. Domoic acid concentrates in fat cells as it moves up the food chain from diatoms to zooplankton, shellfish, crabs and small fish to larger fish; this is called bioconcentrating. Birds, marine mammals and humans are neurologically affected by ASP. Domoic acid is unaffected by heat or other food preparation methods, and can persist in animal tissues for years following large blooms. This biotoxin may be a relatively recent arrival, reaching the West Coast after WWII in ballast water on commercial ships. In some years it has been a dominant species outside the surf zone in local waters. 

Symptoms of ASP show up some hours to days after eating shellfish, and include gastric upset (nausea, vomiting, diarrhea) followed by neurological problems (headache, seizures, dizziness and other symptoms). Death can result; in survivors the most serious problem may be short term memory loss. Recovery from this is so slow that the memory loss is effectively permanent. 

DSP:

Diarrhetic Shellfish Poisoning (DSP) is generally not life threatening, though profoundly uncomfortable to victims. Caused by okadaic acid, and found in two genera of dinoflagellates, Prorcentrum and Dinophysis, the result is diarrhea, which begins within an hour of consumption and lasts about one day. No fatalities have been recorded from known cases of DSP. These dinoflagellates are common in local waters each summer, but are rarely dominant in blooms. 

Dinophysis species are common summer phytoplankton in local waters. This dinoflagellate genus causes DSP in warmer waters, such as in Florida. 

Cyanotoxins:

Cyanotoxins are a group of biotoxins produced by cyanobacteria, and include some of the most potent neurotoxins on the planet, found in both freshwater and saltwater. Following exposure, the most common form of death is by respiratory failure. There are many other impacts; cyanotoxins can kill from just skin contact or inhaled fumes as blooms decay. Animals of all kinds can be killed, fish included, and humans. 

Cyanobacteria are widespread; blooms often occur during warm weather in areas where there are high concentrations of nutrients, such as at wastewater treatment plants or lakes. If you see water (particularly freshwater) so thick with plankton growth that it appears to be filled with light green to reddish liquid paint, stay out of the water, and keep your dog out too––it's likely to be full of cyanobacteria. 

Cholera:

Saltwater cholera or Vibrio gastroenteritis is caused by Vibrio species that live in saltwater. In our area, Vibrio parahemolyticus grows in warm saltwater, most abundant in late summer to early fall. Live shellfish held in waters warmer than 20 C (68 F) often have increased numbers of V. parahemolyticus. During cool summers and cool weather cycles, this bacterium is not usually a problem in our area, but when it's warm, then Vibro bacteria can be very abundant. On the east coast, a man died last week from wading in water with high concentrations of  Vibrio vulnificus. He had no skin lesions or cuts, but still took in enough toxins from this bacteria to shut down his internal organs. 

During El Nino-Southern Oscillation Events (ENSO), as for many years during the 1980-1990s, whenever warm subtropical waters reach our coast, Vibrio thrives. It has caused widespread closures in the past. When shellfish are undercooked or served raw, contaminated shellfish cause Vibrio gastroenteritis, or on the skin, infect open wounds and cause septicemia. As with other choleras, hydration support is important; choleras of all kinds can be deadly. Vibro gastroenteritis is a problem anywhere shellfish live in too-warm water. 

E. coli:

Fecal coliform bacteria, Escherichia coli, or E. coli, is found in mammals and birds, and is a common bacterium of human digestive tracts; it is not free-living. E. coli cells can persist for days to weeks in freshwater, but survive less than 48 hours in salt water. Contamination of salt water comes about due to failing septic systems, or from high rainfall events that overflow municipal sewage treatment ponds, or surface flushing of water from livestock areas, or areas of high wildlife concentrations. Normal run off from streams with exposure to oxygen, sunlight and salt water cause E. coli cells to die in estuaries and ocean waters. But high concentrations can occur, and shellfish do take up the bacteria. If raw or undercooked shellfish are consumed when concentrations are high, E. coli causes gastric illness and death. Areas near outfalls from sewage treatment plants are off limits year round due to this bacterium.

Regular sampling helps establish trends. It's common for particular shellfish beds to be closed for a few days after high rainfall events (more than 2 inches of rain per 24 hours) to let the shellfish clear their tissues.  Shellfish growers regularly sample their shellfish, and pay for the samples to be checked by Washington Department of Health. This is a chronic problem for inland marine waters, estuaries and rivers far more than for ocean beaches. Local closures of parts of Willapa Bay are common, for a few days each year, in specific areas. It's also a problem for freshwater rivers, and is one of the main reasons why it's unsafe to eat freshwater shellfish that are wild-harvested from local rivers.

We can all help keep our local waters clean by keeping our septic systems and municipal water treatment plants in optimal operating condition. For private septic systems, this means clean-out and inspection every 3-5 years. For municipal systems, stormwater runoff from streets should be separated from sewage, and inflows from cracks and breaks in sewage collection systems should be repaired to reduce the volume of water that flows to treatment plants during storms and when groundwater levels are high. 

There are two biotoxins, not yet known from our area, that live in the tropics: 

NSP:

Neurotoxic Shellfish Poisoning (NSP) is caused by brevitoxins, which are produced by Karevia brevis (a dinoflagellate formerly known as Gymnodinium breve and Ptychodiscus brevis), a common component of harmful algal blooms in warm waters. Gastric and neurological illness follows consumption of contaminated shellfish. Some people have been hospitalized with NSP, though no fatalities have been reported. NSP is common  in the Gulf of Mexico and around Florida, where it causes spectacular red tides in salt water. Species of Gymnodinium have been seen here in warm years. 

Ciguatera:

Ciguatera is a group of toxins produced by Gambierdiscus toxicus, a dinoflagellate of tropical and subtropical waters. Unlike plankton species, Gambierdiscus lives on corals and other reef surfaces, where it is eaten by herbivorous fish. Ciguatera bioaccumulates when those fish are in turn eaten by predatory fish.  This group of toxins include ciguatoxin, maitotoxin, scaritoxin and palytoxin.  These toxins are odorless, tasteless, heat-resistant and unaltered by cooking. Predatory fish at the top of the food chain around tropical reefs are most likely to bioaccumulate ciguatera There are both gastrointestinal and neurological effects; death is fairly common and long term neurological problems may persist for decades. Ciguatera is not yet known from this area. 

Closures:

When Washington Departments of Health and Fisheries and Wildlife announce beach closures during razor clam season, know that these agencies are monitoring for several toxic species. They close beaches and commercial shellfish beds to protect public health. Most harmful species are more common in warm weather, so spring through fall closures are more likely. The occasional biotoxin will pop up in mid to late fall, or even in midwinter, even in cold wet years. In ENSO years, all bets are off. Biotoxins can appear at any time during these years and persist for months to years. 

Messages go out on regional television stations and radio when closures are announced, including to newspapers and other media. The state agencies post seasons and closures for beaches throughout the state at http://ww4.doh.wa.gov/scripts/esrimap.dll?name=bioview&Cmd=Map&Step=1. While no one wants a clam season to be shut down suddenly, these closures come about because one of several biotoxins or bacteria has appeared, and is rising in concentration. 

Cows Save The Planet––Cows restore soils?

Written July 29, 2013, published August 2013

Several decades ago John McPhee wrote about the exposures of rocks along a highway by interviewing a geologist on a field trip near New York City. That article in the New Yorker magazine became a chapter in a book, Basin and Range, on geology of the eastern US. Later, the book became a section in Annals of the Former World, in which McPhee wrote his way across North America following Route 66. His interview style was effortless to read, taking complex ideas and presenting them easily through the medium of conversations with a series of people, in this case geologists. This remains one of the most powerful ways to write nonfiction, particularly when conveying complex ideas. 

Now another writer, Judith Schwartz, has done the same with carbon management, another complex subject, and in the same manner, in Cows Save The Planet, and Other Improbable Ways of Restoring Soil to Heal the Earth. Schwartz interviewed range managers, soil scientists, Conservation District staffers, ranchers and farmers, always with a focus on productivity, soil health and soil ecology. 

Large fields where cattle graze at will leads to some areas not being eaten at all, and others being munched very closely. In this field, grasses that have headed up will be left alone. At summer's end the rancher will mow the field to cut down the forage the cows did not eat.  Photo by Kathleen Sayce

Good writing presents complex subjects effortlessly to the reader, thus Cows Save The Planet leaves the reader with a better understanding of how to plow to improve soils instead of degrade them, why soil fungi are so important for soil health in many plant communities, how cows really can improve nutrient recycling and plant growth, why increased glomalin is important for soils (hint: it helps the soil keep a loose open structure, stores carbon, and stores large amounts of water), and how cows and other grazers can improve soil health. Along the way, she discusses the water cycle, the carbon cycle, artificial fertilizers, soil minerals, biodiversity, low-intensity long-duration grazing versus high-intensity short-impact grazing, and leaves the reader looking at the landscape in a completely different way. 

Schwartz makes important points about soil health:  better soil management leads to more carbon and water being stored in the soil, along with improved plant productivity. Today, worldwide, the reverse is happening. Roads, roofs and other impervious surfaces don't help; they block the world's soils from holding water, air and carbon. Not only is there too much carbon in the air instead of the soil, there's also too much water in the air instead of the soil. Most soils are degrading. Changing grazing and farming methods to keep and build up carbon in the soil reverses this trend, and improves plant growth at the same time. It could help moderate climate change if widely applied to the world's grasslands, farms and forests.  

Pacific County and nearby coastal counties are areas where industrial photosynthesis is key to economic health:  Forestlands, aquaculture, fishing, and agriculture are important economic sectors, and all depend on sunlight, healthy soils, and plants. There are many signs that soil health in forestlands is declining steadily. Constant large-scale cutting on shorter and shorter cycles results in increased soil damage, increased soil fungi losses, and reduced tree growth. Knowing that conifers in our area reach their maximum growth rates (as measured by the volume of wood a tree adds each year) at well over one hundred years of age, it's painful to see log truck loads where every single log is younger than our elders, and even those in middle age. 

There are many signs that soil health is degrading. Any time soils stand bare in summer, soil microbes, especially fungi, are hit hard.  When a soil is bare, the opportunity for photosynthesis is lost. In a typical replanted forest unit, it can take more than a decade for trees to completely recover the surface with leaf canopies.  Likewise there is lost photosynthetic capacity on a crop soil that is bare during the growing season. Erosion increases, soil carbon is lost, and soil function depleted.Over crop cycles, key minerals needed for plant health are lost. Add nitrogen to boost plant growth in the face of declining soil health, as has been the standard practice since WWII, and soil bacteria consume soil carbon, particularly glomalin, compost and other forms of carbon. The result is a downward spiral in soil biodiversity and water storage capacity, resulting in a steady decline in plant growth, AKA production, an increase in erosion, reduction in soil water and other nutrients, and associated loss of stream and estuary water quality. So how to reverse this?

Remineralizing with rock dusts is a good start. Use woody mulches over bare ground to protect soil fungi until the next tree crop emerges. Grow red alders and other broadleaved trees and shrubs to quickly cover and shade the soil, and share carbon compounds with mycorrhizal fungi. On grazing land, use high-intensity, short-impact grazing, where tight groups of cows are moved day by day to new grass, to improve forage growth and soil structure, reduce bare ground, stimulate grasses and other plants to grow deeper roots. Plow with a keyline chisel plow to loosen subsoil, instead of disking or turning over the top layer of soil; this preserves soil fungi and soil structure in the A horizon, the top soil layer. Plant a mix of forage species with different root patterns, instead of monocultures of one, to promote remineralization and deep soil structure. These methods have been shown to work again and again in a wide range of climates, from very dry 'brittle' grasslands to humid farms in climates with year round rains. 

How does this benefit aquaculture and related fisheries? Healthy soils have reduced erosion and nutrient loss, and slow steady water discharge. Streams have improved water quality, and downstream, estuaries are healthier. Instead of being hit with large pulses of soil particles and nutrients in high rain events, these materials slowly seep into freshwater, and flow downstream to estuaries. 

For industrial photosynthetic regions like ours, better soil management is a win all for all the industries that depend on sunlight to grow crops, cranberries, vegetables, oysters, fish, timber and cows.