May 17, 2010

Bears, Bhutan and Biomass: 3 events involving NwC

Spring Bear Wake Up Social
by Adam Lieberg and Erika Edgley

Annual Spring Bear Wake Up Social Photo by Erika Edgley

On the evening of April 22nd Swan Valley Bear Resources hosted is 3rd annual Spring Bear Wake Up Social at the Condon Community Hall. After a short introduction by Swan Valley Bear Ranger, Mark Ruby and Northwest Connections' Adam Lieberg, the floor was turned over to guest speakers Jeff Stetz and Tim Manley. Jeff Stetz is a research biologist for the U.S. Geological Survey and gave a presentation on the current Grizzly Bear DNA trend monitoring study. Tim Manley is a bear conflict management specialist for Montana Fish Wildlife and Parks, and gave an update on local and regional bear management activities. Part of Tim's presentation included showing a bleached skull of a local grizzly bear that was trapped and put down last fall due to management reasons. This particular bear, which managers and local community members referred to as the "Albino Bear" (named after the basin in the Bob Marshall Wilderness where this bear was first detected on a prior bear DNA study), had made quite a name for himself due to his habit of breaking into vacant cabins with white refrigerators and helping himself to the food contents inside.

Tim Manley does a “show and tell” with the Albino Bear skull at the 3rd Annual Spring Bear Wake Up Social at the Condon Community Hall. Photo by Erika Edgley

Over 60 people showed up for the event which was catered by Pat Smith from the Swan Valley Café. Notable members from the audience included: legendary bear biologist Chuck Jonkel and staff from the Great Bear Foundation; Jamie Jonkel, bear biologist from FWP region 2; and bear researchers Tonya Chilton and Laurie Roberts from FWP region 1.

Bhutan comes to the barn
by Melanie Parker

We had a great time meeting these four conservation professionals from Bhutan. Three of them are graduate students under Steve Siebert and Jill Belsky at the University of Montana. Jill and Steve have worked in Bhutan and felt that Northwest Connections was well aligned with the wildlife and forest conservation work that is occurring in that Himalayan country and ventured a guess that we would have much to discuss. They were right. We could have spent many more days sharing stories about how rural communities deal with wildlife conflicts, sustainable wood uses, and other conservation challenges and what the right role of government is and how we are all influenced by history, language, culture, media, markets, etc. We plan to weave our new friends and their work into our course curriculum in the months and years to come. Many thanks Jill and Steve for brokering this relationship.

Sangay, Choden, Melanie, Ugyen and Wangchuk

Emerging markets in biomass
by Mo Bookwalter

On  May 7th Northwest Connections coordinated and co-hosting a meeting with our regional partners on "Emerging Markets in Biomass" at the Double Arrow Lodge in Seeley Lake. Over the past 2 years we have been working with our partner organizations in the Clearwater and Blackfoot Valleys to expand our conservation work at the regional level—realizing that the Blackfoot, Seeley and Swan communities are facing similar social, economic, and ecological challenges – so we should collectively work on finding solutions together! The biomass event last Friday was successful in exploring the challenges and opportunities for small diameter wood utilization and kick started localized and regional efforts to expand our market and business capacities to utilize this wood in ecological sustainable and economically viable ways.

Nils Christoffersen and Ben Henson talk about their biomass efforts in Wallowa County Oregon	Bill Wall, Clearwater Resource Council board member moderating our first panel

Much of the event's success stemmed from the folks that participated in the summit. We had a diverse group attend – each who brought very thoughtful, practical and varied perspectives that helped to inform where regional action can be taken in the coming year. Participants included logging contractors, local businesses, community groups, congressional staff, environmental organizations, economic development organizations, state and federal agencies, industry and landowners. Together, we made a great team in moving the discussion and opportunities forward!

Craig Rawlings, Montana Community Development Corporation discussing biomass funding	Participants hard at work discussing biomass opportunities for the Seeley, Swan and Blackfoot
Stan Nicholson, Clearwater Resource Council board member talking about local finance options for biomass	Anne Dahl, Kvande Anderson, Nathan Richardson and other participants discussing the potential for converting public facilities to wood heat

We also owe much of the event's success to the amazing speakers who participated and shared their expertise throughout the day. Three of our speakers hailed from Wallowa County Oregon and Elk City Idaho. They drove hundreds of miles (in a snowstorm) to share their stories on how their rural communities have worked to utilize biomass to meet ecological, economic and social goals. Their stories were not only inspiring but have led us to actionable next steps!

Thanks to everyone for the participation in making this event so successful… we look forward to moving this conversation forward with you.

For more details on our summit – outcomes and how to get involved please visit: http://www.northwestconnections.org/stewardshipsummit2010.html