Earth Day was born out of a movement to improve the lives of people and nature, inspiring sweeping legislative action and investments. Today, federal infrastructure funding and WA Climate Commitment Act are a continuation of this movement, investments making a tangible impact locally. As an example, Washington’s historic funding of the Floodplains by Design program is contributing to nature-based floodplain management across the state to reduce flood risk, protect communities and protect salmon habitat. These state and federal dollars are just the start of local climate action that will improve the daily lives and the future of all Washingtonians.
Meet DeAnne Hamilton: Learn how the general manager of Tacoma’s KBTC Public Television and TNC in Washington trustee, uses the power of storytelling to engage people in conservation and create a better future for the next generation.
Nestled in the cliffs in Moses Coulee is an import desert water sources that every springs attracts thousands of Pacific Tree frogs. I came to Whisper Lake for a night concert. It was anything but quiet. The chorus of frogs was soothing, calming—the quintessential sound of spring.
The Cle Elum Wildlife Project is improving our understanding of how wildlife use and move through protected forest landscapes, providing us with an opportunity to test how forest management practices impact wildlife and building an evidence base for permanent protection.
How do you measure a year? For our Science Team, that evaluation often includes tallying up the articles that we helped get published in scientific journals.
Drones have emerged as a groundbreaking tool extending our reach beyond the limits of human exploration. While many are familiar with seeing the possibilities in adventure photography or package delivery, the use of drones in conservation has become increasingly creative for those both out in the field and in the lab.
Cassie Lumbrazo, a Ph.D. student from the University of Washington, is dedicated to understanding the relationship between forests and snow. Together with an interdisciplinary research team and support from the Washington Department of Natural Resources and the Nature Conservancy, Cassie investigates forest-snow processes near Cle Elum Ridge.
Through our GRIT work, we are finding that temperature declines linearly with tree canopy cover. Because this relationship is linear, it suggests that there is no threshold tree cover required to affect air temperature; instead, every bit of additional tree canopy seems to help reduce local air temperature on hot days.
Using dynamite for restoration may seem like a paradox, but at TNC’s Port Susan Bay Preserve, we explored dynamite as a way to create estuary channels. The inspiration behind this method was to see if explosives could reduce the ecological impact of channel creation in comparison to using heavy machinery.
This trip was part of an internal TNC fellowship with the Natural Climate Solutions Prototyping Network. Natural Climate Solutions (NCS) provide climate change mitigation via conservation, restoration, and sustainable management of forests, wetlands, grasslands, and agricultural lands in ways that are consistent with biodiversity conservation and human rights.
The Greening Research in Tacoma project (or G.R.I.T.) is an effort to understand more about how human
health and increased greening intersect in South Tacoma. This unique collaboration of the Tacoma Tree
Foundation, The Nature Conservancy in Washington, the University of Washington, and the City of
Tacoma is funded by an award from the Puget Sound Partnership and a grant from the U.S. Forest
Service.
