Kim Kalliber, Author at Tulalip News

Clarks Creek may provide clues to Puget Sound restoration

Source: Northwest Indian Fisheries

PUYALLUP – The Puyallup Tribe of Indians working to decrease sediment in Clarks Creek, an important salmon tributary to the Puyallup River.

“Clarks Creek is important because it supports several different species of salmon, some listed under the federal Endangered Species Act,” said Char Naylor, water quality program manager for the tribe. Clarks Creek also supports the highest salmon spawning densities in the Puyallup watershed as well as the most significant number and variety of spawning salmon within a city limits in the watershed.

“Its also important because it can be an example of how we can restore hundreds of small urban streams in Puget Sound,” Naylor said. The problems facing the Clarks Creek watershed are endemic to most Puget Sound lowland streams. The principal non-point pollutants causing degradation are excessive sediment, nuisance weed growth, nutrient enrichment and excessive bacteria loading.

“If we can tackle these issues in Clarks Creek, we can show other Puget Sound communities how to heal their streams,” Naylor said.

The tribe is leading a regional effort to clean up the creek by reducing the amount of sediment flowing into it. Too much sediment in a stream drives down salmon productivity because it impacts the fish’s ability to find clean spawning gravel in which to spawn or rear. The goal of the project is to reduce sediment loads by half and nutrient and bacteria by a third by lowering flows and stabilizing banks to reducing channel erosion.

The tribe recently finished a two-year study of sediment sources throughout Clarks Creek. The study found that if 23 major sources of sediment were repaired, over 50 percent of the creek’s sediment problem would go away. Yet by doing just the top eight bank stabilization projects, a huge amount of sediment can be removed from the stream very cost-effectively.

The tribe is putting together plans to restore two those major sources of sediment in the creek. The tribal projects would stabilize the banks of two Clarks Creek tributaries. “We would literally be changing the shapes of their banks and channels, adding gravel and planting vegetation along their banks,” Naylor said.

Other sorts of projects suggested by the study include stormwater retrofits, low impact development, and stormwater detention ponds.

Most of the creek’s sediment actually start with the river it flows into. “The Puyallup River is diked through most of its lower reach,” Naylor said. “This caused the river bed itself to drop, which means the creeks flowing into it also drop.” This down-cutting action puts more sediment into the creek than would be there otherwise.

Clarks Creek is just 4 miles long and flows through suburban neighborhoods of the city of Puyallup before joining the Puyallup River. Because it is largely spring-fed, the creek has a consistent level of water throughout the year, making it great rearing habitat for juvenile salmon. The Puyallup Tribe also operates a chinook hatchery on the creek.

“We have already begun working on implementing several of the identified sediment projects to restore the watershed almost before the ink was dry on the report,,” Naylor said. “It is satisfying to have changed the status quo, the way things have been done in this watershed over the last several decades.”

Health and Beauty Fair, Empowering Women of Color to Make Health a Priority

Facebook’s ‘Two Spirit’ Gender-ID Term a Positive Step for LGBT Natives

Sheena Louise Roetman, ICTMN

On February 13, Facebook added more than 45 custom gender-identifying terms, allowing users to choose from more than just “male” or “female” in order to identify themselves. Indigenous communities all over Turtle Island were pleasantly surprised to find that among those terms was “Two-Spirit.”

“When you come to Facebook to connect with the people, causes and organizations you care about, we want you to feel comfortable being your true, authentic self,” Facebook’s press office said in a statement to ICTMN. “An important part of this is the expression of gender, especially when it extends beyond the definitions of just ‘male’ or ‘female.’”

Additionally, Facebook has added the ability to select a preferred pronoun – male, female or neutral (they/their/them) – as well as allowing people to specify who sees the gender and pronoun they’ve chosen.

“We recognize that some people face challenges sharing their true gender identity with others, and this setting gives people the ability to express themselves in an authentic way,” Facebook said.

Facebook credited our Network of Support, a group of leading LGBT advocacy organizations as collaborators for determining which terms to include in the list. Some other terms included are agender, trans, intersex, gender fluid, gender questioning and CIS, among others.

Many Indigenous people who identify as Two Spirit were excited to see the changes.

“When Facebook added new gender options, I felt that it was an amazing step, one that was in the right direction,” said Gina Metallic, of Mig’maq First Nation, a Two Spirit community and Aboriginal youth protection activist. “I use the term Two Spirited because it is a hybrid of my culture and sexuality. It acknowledges both important pieces of my identity, being queer and being Indigenous. It’s also allowing people to see that there’s more than male and female, and that it’s okay and normal.”

Daugherty dies; lead archaeologist of ‘Pompeii of America’

In this undated photo, WSU archaeologist Richard Daugherty looks at the effigy of a whale fin found among thousands of artifacts at the Ozette site on the Olympic Peninsula.

By Eric Sorensen, WSU News, February 28, 2014

PULLMAN, Wash. – Richard Daugherty, a Washington State University archaeologist who led the excavation of the Ozette village site, “the Pompeii of America,” and numerous other key Northwest finds, died Saturday of bone cancer. He was 91.

Starting in the 1970s, Daugherty worked closely with the Makah tribe during the 11-year Ozette excavation on Washington’s Olympic Peninsula, setting a new standard for native and archaeological cooperation, said Allyson Brooks, state historic preservation officer.

“He really set the path for archaeologists and Native Americans to work together instead of in opposition,” she said. “That’s a big deal.”

“The way he involved elders in helping identify artifacts was very progressive,” said Janine Ledford, executive director of the Makah Cultural and Research Center, which houses 55,000 Ozette artifacts, all of which date from before Europeans arrived on the continent.

“Doc” Daugherty, as he was known to the Makah, had already surveyed the Ozette site and some 50 others along the coast when a winter storm in 1970 eroded a bank near Cape Alava, revealing five longhouses buried by a landslide, possibly from the magnitude 9 earthquake of 1700. The site had been occupied continuously for at least 2,000 years before it was abandoned in the 1920s when the federal government forced the last remaining inhabitants to move 20 miles to Neah Bay so their children could attend school.

Called to the site by Ed Claplanhoo, a Makah tribal leader and WSU graduate, Daugherty saw the first artifacts of an enormous trove preserved in the oxygen-free environment of wet clay: a canoe paddle, wooden halibut hooks, a harpoon shaft, wooden house planks. A village soon emerged as dozens of scientists, students and locals focused on three longhouses that yielded 1,424 arrow shafts, 103 bows, 110 harpoon shafts, 1,000 baskets, 13 looms, perfectly preserved cedar rope, whale bones and more.

It became the largest, most complex archaeological site in the Pacific Northwest.

“Anyone who takes a college class in archaeology covers the Ozette site,” said Ledford.

The site yielded numerous insights into Makah culture. The people had long been whalers, for example, and whale bones were everywhere in the dig. But the Makah also ate fur seal, sea lion, halibut, waterfowl and various berries. Many insights came in consultation with elders as the archaeologists tapped them to identify the meaning and uses of mysterious objects.

“If you work in partnership, you can’t have a better way of gaining the cultural side, because they”—the natives—“are the experts on the cultural side,” said Dale Croes, WSU adjunct faculty member and president of Pacific Northwest Archaeological Services. As part of the archaeologists’ partnership with the Makah, Croes had to learn basket weaving from the elders.

“I probably learned more in that semester than any graduate class here,” Croes said. His doctoral dissertation is one of nine produced from the site.

Daugherty was born and raised in Aberdeen, Wash. During World War II, he piloted blimps out of Lakehurst, N.J., to look for enemy ships and submarines off the East Coast.

He earned a B.A. in anthropology from the University of Washington in 1946 and spent four years as a WSU anthropology instructor until 1954 when he finished his Ph.D. in ethnography at UW and became a WSU assistant professor.

At various times over nearly 30 years, he served as department chair, director of the WSU Laboratory of Archaeology and History and director of the Washington Archaeological Research Center. Many of his graduate students were women, with “Daugherty’s Daughters” going on to serve in the National Park Service, the U.S. Forest Service and private archaeological services.

In addition to the Ozette site, he directed excavation of the Marmes rockshelter before it was inundated by waters behind the Snake River’s Lower Monumental Dam. The state’s only archaeological national historic landmark, it had the oldest set of human remains in North America when it was investigated.

Daugherty also was the principal investigator of a burial site at the mouth of the Palouse River where a Jefferson “peace medal” was found. The medal was one of fewer than 90 carried by Lewis and Clark on their journey to the Northwest in 1805. In 1971, at the request of the Nez Perce tribe and on Daugherty’s recommendation, WSU gave the medal to the tribe.

In 1977, Daugherty was co-investigator with Carl Gustafson of a hand-hewn projectile point in a mastodon bone found near Sequim, Wash. The artifacts turned back the clock on North American settlement as subsequent new research determined they were 13,800 years old, 800 years older than the Clovis people long regarded as the New World’s oldest culture.

Daugherty also left a legacy in how future archaeological research is done, working with Washington senators Warren G. Magnuson and Henry M. “Scoop” Jackson to bolster passage of the National Historic Preservation Act. The act requires federal agencies to consider the impacts of federally funded or permitted operations on archaeological sites and historic structures.

Daugherty is preceded in death by his first wife, Phyllis. He is survived by his wife, Ruth Kirk, whom he married in the replica of an Ozette village longhouse at Neah Bay in 2007. Other survivors include Melinda Beasley of Pullman, Carol Ewen of Pendleton, Ore., Rick Daugherty of Ellensburg, Wash., five grandchildren and six great-grandchildren.

The family is planning a gathering of friends, family and colleagues in the spring. Memorial donations may be made to the Phyllis and Richard Daugherty Scholarship for Graduate Student Excellence in Anthropology at WSU and the Makah Cultural and Research Center.

Animals see power lines as glowing, flashing bands, research reveals

UV vision help reindeers find plants in snow cover, but in the depths of winter their wide irises and sensitive eyes means the power lines appear particularly bright. Photo: Mark Bryan Makela/Corbis

By Damian Carrington, March 11, 2014. Source: The Guardian

Power lines are seen as glowing and flashing bands across the sky by many animals, research has revealed.

The work suggests that the pylons and wires that stretch across many landscapes are having a worldwide impact on wildlife.

Scientists knew many creatures avoid power lines but the reason why was mysterious as they are not impassable physical barriers. Now, a new understanding of just how many species can see the ultraviolet light – which is invisible to humans – has revealed the major visual impact of the power lines.

“It was a big surprise but we now think the majority of animals can see UV light,” said Professor Glen Jeffery, a vision expert at University College London. “There is no reason why this phenomenon is not occuring around the world.”

Dr Nicolas Tyler, an ecologist at UIT The Arctic University of Norway and another member of the research team, said: “The flashes occur at random in time and space, so the power lines are not grey and passive, but seen as lines of light flashing.”

He said the discovery has global significance: “The loss and fragmentation of habitat by infrastructure is the principle global threat to biodiversity – it is absolutely major. Roads have always got particular attention but this will push power lines right up the list of offenders.” The avoidance of power lines can interfere with migration routes, breeding grounds and grazing for both animals and birds.

Autopsies on dozens of mammals from zoos and abbatoirs showed their eyes were able to see UV, including cattle, cats, dogs, rats, bats, okapi, red pandas and hedgehogs. Also on the list were reindeer and further work published in the journal Conservation Biology showed these animals, whose eyes are specially adapted to the dark Arctic winters, are particularly sensitive to UV light. UV vision helps reindeer find plants in snow cover, but in the depths of winter their wide irises and sensitive eyes means the power lines appear particularly bright.

The avoidance of power lines had been explained in the past by the corridors cut through forests to accomodate them, where animals would be exposed in the open to predators.

But this explanation could not apply in the treeless tundra of northern Norway, where 220,000 reindeer are tended by 7,000 herders from the traditional Sami people. “Right now, there is a plan to build a 186-mile long power line in north Norway,” said Tyler. “This new work will encourage power companies to negotiate with herders about where they put the power lines.”

Around the world, Tyler said: “There are hundred of examples of animals avoiding power lines. Now we know that, not only do these clear-cut corridors mean exposure to predators, at the same time there is this damn thing flashing at you.”

Jeffery said burying all power cables would be unrealistically expensive but added that one idea would be to put a non-conducting shield around the cable to screen it from view. The UV light, which is caused by electricity ionising the air around cables, are a major source of inefficiency for electricity companies and also cause the hissing or crackling noises sometimes heard.

Power companies already use helicopter-mounted UV cameras to monitor power cables, because the flashes can be an early sign of conduction problems, but the cameras only record a very narrow range of UV. “Animals see across the range, so the intensity of light seen by them is much more than seen by the helicopter flights,” said Jeffery.

New McNary Dam Passage Gives High Hopes for Pacific Lamprey

U.S. Fish and Wildlife ServiceThe Pacific lamprey — U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service
The Pacific lamprey

Indian Country Today Media Network

The Pacific lamprey, culturally significant to the Umatilla and other tribes, now has a shot at making it past the McNary Dam to spawn.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is supplementing the fish ladder of the dam’s Oregon shore with an additional structure that offers water velocities more conducive to lamprey migration, the Union-Bulletin reported on March 8.

The structure would allow lampreys, which tend to move along the river bottom in water that flows more slowly than the upper levels preferred by spawning salmon and steelhead, to access the fish ladder and make it upstream, the Union-Bulletin said.

“We plan to conduct video monitoring to observe which velocity is preferred by migrating lampreys,” said Mark Smith, who managed the project for the Corps, to the newspaper. “We anticipate this prototype structure will help us learn quite a bit about what’s best for lamprey passage.”

Lampreys have been around for at least 450 million years, the oldest fish in the Columbia River system, according to the Columbia River Inter-Tribal Fish Commission (CRITFC). Though not in danger of extinction, they have declined from a former high of millions 30 years ago to just about 4,000 returning to the Snake, Clearwater and Salmon river drainages where they once teemed, said Aaron Jackson, lamprey project leader for the Confederated Tribes of the Umatilla Indian Reservation, to the Union-Bulletin.

Tribes in the Pacific Northwest use the lamprey for food and medicine, and the fish plays a key role in regulating inland aquatic systems. They spend their first four to seven years of life acting as filters in freshwater sand and silt, then move to the ocean where they become parasites, latching onto various saltwater prey, the Union-Bulletin said. After two to three years of that they return to their freshwater origins to spawn.

The Army Corps of Engineers work group that helped design and engineer the structure included tribal representatives, the newspaper said. Built by Marine Industrial Construction of Wilsonville, Oregon under a $336,542 contract, was completed in late February and is the first such installation in the mid-Columbia River, the Union-Bulletin said.

“We’re excited to see something like this put in the river,” Jackson said.

Journey Into Asian Cuisine at the Tulalip Resort Casino

Tribal employee, Andrew Gobin enjoys a Spicy Tuna roll and a California roll at the new Tulalip Resort Casino restaurant, Journey’s East. Photo/Monica Brown

By Monica Brown, Tulalip News

The new Tulalip Resort Casino restaurant Journey’s East is just that, a journey into Asian cuisine. The small menu encompasses a wide array of flavors and textures and lists peculiar items such as century eggs and sweet potato noodles. Most items will be familiar though like dumplings, Pad Thai, Chow Mein, Tempura and Mongolian beef.

When you are seated at Journey’s East you are given a menu and a pot of tea to enjoy at your leisure. The menu may have some complicated items to understand if you have never heard of them, but they are all derived from the Asian culture and may be a variation of something you have already enjoyed before. From the Sake (rice wine) to the noodles, many items on the menu contain some form of rice, which is a main staple in many Asian countries, the rest of the menu ingredients are simple variations of meats, vegetables and sauces.

One item on the menu that may have some intimidated is the sushi and should not be confused with sashimi, which is a type of sushi. Sushi is a generic term for vinegared rice that is combined with other toppings and fillings such as seaweed, vegetables and some sort of meat such as seafood or tofu and may be raw or cooked. There are many types of sushi, sashimi is a distinct type that has sliced fresh fish placed atop vinegared rice and is enjoyed raw.

If you have any questions about menu items, the wait staff is very knowledgeable and can explain everything about the food that you’d like to know more about, or you can always use Google. As for the sushi, some rolls do have raw fish, if that is not something you desire, check with your waiter about which rolls are raw and which are not.

The restaurant furnishing is minimalist, the décor geometric. Seating can be limited; if you have a party of 5 or more, making a reservation would be beneficial. To make a reservation visit the Tulalip Casino Journey’s East website and click the Reservations button or by calling during restaurant hours. Journey’s East has a to go option and the menu is available on the website at, http://www.tulalipresortcasino.com/Dining/JourneysEast.

Restaurant hours are 5:00 p.m. to 12:00 a.m. Wednesday – Monday (closed Tuesdays). For questions or reservations, call 360-716-1880. For cuisine to go call 360-716-1766.

Three Years Later, Where Did Japanese Tsunami Debris Go?

File photo of a fishing skiff found on the Washington coast in May 2013. | credit: Eyewitness photo / Wash. Marine Debris Task Force

Tom Banse, Northwest News Network

It’s been exactly three years since a huge tsunami in March 2011 took thousands of lives in Japan and washed whole villages out to sea.

Suspected tsunami debris started arriving on our shores the following December, but it’s been less than feared.

Nir Barnea, the federal coordinator for marine debris in the Pacific Northwest, says we may never know for sure where the majority of the tsunami debris went.

“A lot of the debris was made of wood. If you look at the photos from early after the tsunami, you see a lot of wood out there. Some of it — maybe even most of it — has sunk. Other debris may not have reached us. It has dispersed and may never reach us.”

Barnea is awaiting confirmation from the Japanese consulate whether a derelict skiff that washed ashore near Westport, Washington in January can be traced to the 2011 tsunami.

One other skiff with Japanese writing on it was found on the British Columbia coast this winter.

The Oregon Emergency Management division and governor’s office are currently considering whether to shut down the Oregon Joint Tsunami Debris Task Force because it’s no longer needed. Washington shut down its marine debris hotline at the new year because so few people were calling.

If you find something on the beach that looks like tsunami debris, you can still report it by email to: DisasterDebris@noaa.gov.

This was first reported for the Northwest News Network.

Fatter Wallets = Skinnier Kids: Casinos Associated With Lower Obesity Rates

Tanya H. Lee, Indian Country Today Media Network

New research shows that opening a new or expanding an existing tribal casino is associated with a reduction in childhood obesity. The finding is extremely important, according to researchers, because overweight/obesity is a significant problem among American Indian children and adults and because being overweight or obese in childhood has impacts that can eventually become life-threatening.

The research does not prove a causal relationship between casino development and fewer overweight/obese kids, but it does strongly suggest that such a relationship exists. Johns Hopkins’ Department of International Health’s Jessica C. Jones-Smith, lead investigator for the project, says, “This is a strong study that is not as methodologically rigorous as a randomized control trial but that offers better evidence towards causality than most other observational designs.”

The research also shows that the reduction in overweight/obese children associated with casino development appears to be long-lasting. Jones-Smith says, “In this time period of 2001 to 2012 different tribes opened their casinos at different times, and we did look at whether the time that you opened the casino had any impact on our estimate of the casino’s impact on obesity. It didn’t, so it looks like throughout this time whenever you opened the casino you still experienced a decrease in the risk for obesity.” Thus, a tribe that opened a casino in the early 2000s showed the same reduction in overweight/obese children as one that opened a casino five or six years later.

Researchers looked at a total of 117 California school districts that encompassed tribal lands, based on information from the U.S. Census Bureau. Of those school districts, “57 gained or expanded a casino, 24 had a preexisting casino but did not expand, and 36 never had a casino.” Then they looked at BMI (body-mass index) for the children in those districts based on information supplied by the California Department of Education. Forty-eight percent of the BMI measurements for children whose parents identified the child’s race as American Indian or Alaska Native were classified as overweight/obese.

In school districts that encompassed tribal lands where a new casino had been built or an existing casino expanded between the years 2001 and 2012, the risk of being an overweight/obese AI/AN child dropped 0.19 percent per new slot machine. Since there were on average 13 new slots per capita, the total reduction in the risk of being overweight or obese averaged 2.47 percent. Each new slot represented a per capita increase in annual income of $541 and a decrease in the number of people living in poverty. For the average of 13 new slots per capita, this would mean a 7.8-percent reduction in the number of people living in poverty.

The investigators concluded that the most plausible explanation for their findings is that opening a new or expanding an existing casino increased families’ and communities’ economic resources and that in turn led to a decrease in the risk of children being overweight or obese.

Jones-Smith is an assistant professor at the Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health. The other investigators on the project were William H. Dow from the School of Public Health at the University of California, Berkeley, and Kristal Chichlowska, an independent consultant in Sacramento. The paper, “Association Between Casino Opening or Expansion and Risk of Childhood Overweight and Obesity,” was published in the Journal of the American Medical Association in early March. The project was funded by the National Institute of Child Health and Human Development.

Native Advocates Ramp Up Support for Sen. Tester’s Language Bill

Rob Capriccioso, ICTMN

Just before Sen. Jon Tester (D-Montana) took up the gavel of the Senate Committee on Indian Affairs in February, he introduced the Native Language Immersion Student Achievement Act, which would amend the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) to provide increased federal financial support to Native American language programs at American Indian-focused schools.

If passed, the bill would establish a grant program to support schools using Native American languages as their primary language of instruction. The legislation would appropriate $5 million for fiscal year 2015, and “such sums as may be necessary for each of the succeeding 4 fiscal years.” The secretary of the Department of Education would be responsible for making grant awards to eligible institutions each of the years, and grantees would be required to submit annual reports.

“We are racing against the clock to save and revitalize our sacred Native American languages,” Tester said when he announced the bill. “Preserving Native languages will strengthen Indian culture and increase student confidence—leading to greater academic achievement and a stronger economy.”

Support from the National Congress of American Indians and many Native-focused organizations, which plan to hold a congressional briefing March 12 on Capitol Hill to heighten awareness of the bill, has been widespread.

“In introducing the Native Language Immersion Student Achievement Act, Sen. Tester has answered the call from Indian country to invest in Native language immersion schools,” says Brian Cladoosby, president of the National Congress of American Indians. “Not only are these unique schools our best hope to save and revitalize our sacred Native languages, but they offer Indian education the purest form of intellectual sovereignty, because no right is more sacred to Native peoples than the right to freely speak our Native languages.”

Native education advocates widely view the bill as an opportunity to influence ESEA reauthorization discussions that are ongoing in the Senate. While the ESEA, which includes the Indian Education Act, still faces some hurdles in passing this Congress, advocates are hopeful that Tester’s legislation can ultimately be included in that broader education legislation.

“Sen. Tester’s bill offers Indian country heightened ownership in its educational destiny and a lifeline in saving Native Languages,” says Ryan Wilson, president of the National Alliance to Save Native Languages, which is hosting the Capitol Hill briefing. “Just as important to Indian country it is good policy and reflects a sharpened focus and stronger Indian Education Act.”

Wilson says that tribal recommendations to enhance the Native language and education components of the ESEA have gone unheeded by the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, & Pensions (HELP) to date.

“Senate Committee on Indian Affairs recommendations from the 112th Congress that were contained in the groundbreaking Native Class Act and Native Build Act were not reflected as well,” Wilson adds. “Native language provisions published within the White House ESEA blueprint were also not included.”

Wilson says the Alliance is calling on Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa), chairman of the HELP committee, to include provisions contained within the Native Language Immersion Student Achievement Act when the committee ultimately moves its ESEA bill to the Senate floor.

As this policy discussion unfolds, tribal advocates are also noting ideas that they believe could strengthen Tester’s bill.

John Echohawk, executive director of the Native American Rights Fund (NARF), which provides legal counsel to the Tribal Education Department National Assembly, is taking the opportunity to advocate for a strong role for tribal governments in saving Native languages as part of this legislation.

“Many tribes now have Tribal Education Departments or Agencies (TEAs),” Echohawk says. “Under tribal law, under the laws of some states, and increasingly even under federal law, TEAs are in the best position to coordinate resources from tribal, federal, and state programs to focus on language immersion programs in schools and communities. Some TEAs are even developing and implementing the needed language preservation and immersion programs.

“As they grow in numbers and capacity, TEAs are consistently taking the lead in meeting the need for tribal language, culture, and history programs and curricula,” Echohawk says. “TEAs are very familiar with the link—as recognized in scores of federal reports—between culturally relevant schooling, including language immersion programs, and Native student success.”

Echohawk is scheduled to appear at the March 12 Capitol Hill briefing on the legislation.