Tag: lake ontario

Interview: Children’s Book Author on Great Lakes Woes

  • The new book outlines a cause of Great Lakes water levels dropping while entertaining kids with silly, though not entirely improbable outcomes. (Photo courtesy of Mackinac Island Press)

The Great Lakes were flowing with water
On every Great Lakes Day;
Until something frightful happened
And made the Great Lakes drain away.

That’s how the new children’s book, “The Day The Great Lakes Drained Away” begins. The author is Charles Ferguson Barker and he recently spoke with the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Charity Nebbe:

Transcript

The Great Lakes were flowing with water
On every Great Lakes Day;
Until something frightful happened
And made the Great Lakes drain away.

That’s how the new children’s book, The Day The Great Lakes Drained
Away begins. The author is Charles Ferguson Barker and he recently
spoke with the Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Charity Nebbe:


Nebbe: “Charles, in your book, all of the water disappears from the Lakes and you take us on a tour of all the lakebeds, so we see landforms and shipwrecks and a whole lot of mud… What gave you the idea to show kids what the Lakes would look like without water?”


Barker: “Well, actually, it was from looking at some maps that are put out by the National Geophysical Data Center that show, basically, what’s on the lake floors, and I, for one, had not given it much thought ’till seeing these maps. But these maps have some really cool features like ridges of rock and all kinds of neat stuff and I thought this would be a great idea for a children’s book.”


Nebbe: “What do you think some of the coolest features that you’ve been able to put into the book are?”


Barker: “Um, well, there’s a suspected meteor impact crater on the east side of Lake Ontario, and it’s not confirmed as a meteor impact crater, but a lot of other things it could be have been ruled out. So that’s pretty neat. There’s also, to me, what’s most exciting is the ridge of rock, or ridges of rock underneath Lake Huron, that, in some cases, have maybe four hundred feet of relief. And most of the maps we see of the Great Lakes are basically just a flat blue, so seeing what’s under the Lakes I thought was really exciting.”


Nebbe: “When I was reading the book, I thought, you know, if I were a kid, this would be pretty scary to me because all the water goes away from the lakes and, you know, there are fish dying in at least one picture. Why did you decide to show us the bottom of the Lakes in that way?”


Barker: “Well, actually, that’s pretty much how… the only way I could figure out how to show them, I mean, if we’re talking about features that are on the lake floors, then somehow we’ve got to get rid of the water to see those, and sort of… it’s a fanciful sort of draining away of the Lakes, if you will. The purpose of the book is almost twofold: one is to show that the lake floors are pretty cool, and there’s some neat features under there, but also to sort of reinforce that hey, we’d better make sure this never happens, you know, so it goes to the protection of the Lakes as well.”


Nebbe: “The culprit in your book is water usage among communities in the Great Lakes Basin and there are rules that govern water usage among those communities, one of them is that they have to return the amount of water that they use and that communities outside the basin can’t use the water without approval. Why did you pick that as the culprit?”


Barker: “Well, that’s a good question and it sort of goes back to the original manuscript draft, and I thought, well, gosh, the villain could be actually just everybody taking a little bit of water thinking that it doesn’t matter, but the cummulative effect of that mindset causes a problem, and I think that’s true, I work in environmental consulting, and I can attest that that’s basically how major contamination sites are created is that everybody thinking, ‘Oh well this one little thing won’t matter, this little drop of tetrachlorethyline won’t matter,’ but if everybody has that mindset, then, yeah there’s going to be a problem.”


Nebbe: “You’ve been talking to some of the kids who are reading the book, do you think that message is getting across?”


Barker: “Yeah, I think, you know, initially, they really kind of like to sort of see the pictures and hear and learn about the lake floors and whatnot, but I think it’s important to, you know, relay to kids that they’re actually going to be the ones making decisions down the road about Great Lakes withdrawals and whatnot, and recently, I was just talking to somebody and remembering back to when I was a kid, we used to sail a lot on the Great Lakes, and I remember being in the middle of Lake Erie, sort of out of the sight of land, and sailing through soap suds. It was terrible. I mean, Lake Erie was horrible. This was in the early seventies. And it was like you’re in a bath tub with soap suds. That’s more of a water quality issue, but I think it sort of became a problem because of nobody really, um, paying much attention. So, I think the more attention we pay to the Great Lakes, in terms of just making sure no wacky ideas about withdrawal go through, then that’s good. That’s what we need to do.”


Nebbe: “Charles Ferguson Barker, thank you so much.”


Barker: “Thank you.”


HOST TAG: Charles Ferguson Barker, author of The Day the Great Lakes Drained Away speaking with the GLRC’s Charity Nebbe.

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Saving the American Eel

  • Eel fisherman John Rorabeck near his home and fishery on Point Traverse, near Kingston on northeastern Lake Ontario. He says these waters were once practically boiling with eels. One night, he caught 3 tons of eels. Today he's lucky to catch one eel. (Photo by David Sommerstein)

For centuries, the American eel dominated the waters of parts of the Great Lakes. Only fifty years ago, the snake-like fish accounted for half of the biomass of Lake Ontario. Today, it has all but disappeared. Researchers and fishermen see the decline as a shrill warning about changes in climate and the environment. And they say now is the time to do something about it. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s David Sommerstein reports:

Transcript

For centuries, the American eel dominated the waters of parts of the Great Lakes. Only
fifty years ago, the snake-like fish accounted for half of the biomass of Lake Ontario.
Today, it has all but disappeared. Researchers and fishermen see the decline as a shrill
warning about changes in climate and the environment. And they say now is the time to
do something about it. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s David Sommerstein reports:


Before you say, who cares about a slimy critter like an eel, hear me out. Eels are
amazing.


They spawn in the Sargasso Sea – the Bermuda Triangle. But no one’s ever caught them
in the act.


“There is a mystery that we haven’t solved. We have never seen them spawn.”


After they’re born, they’re like tiny glassy leaves. They float thousands of miles north
and west on ocean currents. Then they wiggle up rivers and streams from Florida to
Quebec.


“The eel is a fish that we should be looking at very closely.”


They live up to 20 years in freshwater before they start the long journey to the Sargasso
to spawn.


The problem is their offspring are not coming back.


“A very important native species of the Great Lakes, that we’re at serious risk of losing.”


As you can hear, a lot of people are worried about the eel, and not just in the Great Lakes.
European eel young are down 99% from the 1970’s. The Japanese eel is down 80%. In
Lake Ontario, the fish is all but gone. And the people who rely on it feel like they’re
disappearing too.


(sound up of waves)


Just ask fisherman John Rorabeck. He grew up here by the lighthouse on Point Traverse,
a peninsula that juts out into northeastern Lake Ontario.


Rorabeck’s been fishing these waters for more than thirty years. Eels were his prime
catch. He points past the lighthouse.


“I remember when I started fishing there were nights on that south shore, the most fish
that was in there would be eels at certain times and there was literally tons of them on
that south shore. Now you could go back and you’ll find nothing.”


He stopped fishing eels three years ago because it just wasn’t worth it.


“That eel is telling man we better smarten up because this is happening all over the
world.”


Now Rorabeck dedicates his fishing time to science. He catches specimens for leading
eel expert John Casselman, who examines them in his lab.


“It is truly a crisis. A crisis of concern.”


Casselman’s a scientist at the Glenora Fisheries Station, run by the Ontario Ministry of
Natural Resources. In 1980, at a point on the St. Lawrence River in mid-summer, he
counted more than 25,000 eels a day. Last year, there were scarcely 20 a day.


Casselman ticks off a host of possible causes – overfishing, dammed-up rivers, erosion,
pollution, invasive species, and perhaps most troubling, a climactic change of cooling
ocean currents.


“There is an interrelationship between what’s going on in the ocean and the recruitment of
eels.”


And he says we’re mostly to blame. The problem is, Casselman and other researchers
don’t know exactly how all the factors relate or which is worse. And they say there’s no
time to find out. Last summer eel experts from 18 countries made an unusual statement.
In what’s now called the Quebec Declaration of Concern, they urged more action, not
more science.


“I’m a research scientist and of course, I love data. At this stage, you don’t want me.
Don’t ask me to explain what’s going on here because by the time I get it figured out, it
may be too late.”


The Great Lakes Fishery Commission has issued an emergency declaration of its own. It
represents commercial fishermen and anglers in the region. Spokesman Mark Gaden
says it’s calling on the U.S. and Canada to do everything they can to reduce eel deaths in
the Great Lakes.


“We’re committing ourselves, our resources to working to make the recovery of the
species a reality.”


Last month, the province of Ontario halted commercial eel fishing for the foreseeable
future.


(sound up at beach)


Fisherman John Rorabeck supports that plan. He stares out across the waters he’s trawled
for decades. He says he’s behind anything to bring the eel back to Lake Ontario for
future generations.


“And hopefully we can. But…I don’t expect to see it in my time. When I… (crying)
…when I think of all the times that we’ve had out in the lake and my forefathers and see
what’s happening here, it breaks you down.”


Rorabeck says when he thinks of the eel nearing extinction, he feels like he and his way
of life are becoming extinct too.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m David Sommerstein.

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Historic Lighthouse Lives On

  • The Selkirk Lighthouse circa 1860-1870. (Photo courtesy of Jim Walker)

Lighthouses often hold a special place in people’s hearts. They’re viewed as symbols of America’s maritime history. The beacons guiding sailors back to safe harbor are metaphors for guiding lights in our lives too. That might be why the idea of spending a little time living in one of the historic structures is so appealing to many people. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Skye Rohde talked with the owners of a lighthouse that’s now operated as a place to vacation:

Transcript

Lighthouses often hold a special place in people’s hearts. They’re viewed as symbols of
America’s maritime history. The beacons guiding sailors back to safe harbor are metaphors for
guiding lights in our lives too. That might be why the idea of spending a little time living in one
of the historic structures is so appealing to many people. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s
Skye Rohde talked with the owners of a lighthouse that’s now operated as a place to vacation:


The Selkirk lighthouse sits at the mouth of the Salmon River on Lake Ontario. It’s scenic,
although the area is not very well known – except to salmon fishers. But some people, once they
visit find they keep coming back. Jim walker was one of those people.


“I didn’t move to Pulaski to buy the lighthouse at all. I was living and working quite comfortably
with a family in a lovely location in Maine and came out here on a fishing trip. A friend of mine
got ahold of me and said, ‘We have to go to a place called Pulaski, New York.’ I said, ‘Pulaski,
New York. Now what’s a good reason for going there?'”


Walker came to Pulaski on Veteran’s Day weekend in 1986 with 10 friends. But when the time
came for them to leave, half the group didn’t want to go.


“They were just having such a great time. We were fishing in the snow in the river, catching
steelhead, having a ball. And none of us had had the chance to experience anything like this
before.”


A couple of the men started talking about investing in the area’s hospitality industry. They
looked at some properties over the winter, and when the Selkirk lighthouse came up for sale in
1987, walker made an offer.


Sixteen years later, walker has turned the old lighthouse into short-term rental housing. It’s
become a popular stop with a 98-percent occupancy rate and visitors from over 100 countries.


Since then the lighthouse has operated as a lifesaving station, private residence, resort and
“designated historic landmark.” In 1989, the coast guard reactivated the Selkirk lighthouse
lantern.


The lighthouse itself is a 3-story rectangular stone building with an octagonal glass lantern house
on top. Wayne Wheeler is President of the San Francisco-based U.S. lighthouse society.
Wheeler says the Selkirk lighthouse is one of a dying breed.


“It’s a unique structure in that it has the old-style lantern on the tower. There are only three or
four of those remaining in the country.”


Only 20 of the 600 lighthouses across the nation offer some kind of lodging, either in the actual
working lighthouse or in keepers’ quarters nearby.


Richard Moehl is President of the Great Lakes Lighthouse Keepers Association, which
encourages lighthouse preservation and restoration on the Great Lakes. Moehl says people
appreciate the uniqueness of spending the night in a lighthouse.


“People just love to be able to say ‘I did this, and at a historic lighthouse,’ versus a walk-through,
one-time light station. You have an opportunity to work there and live there, eat there, cook
there.”


And people will pay for the chance to do just that.


Nicole Paternaster is Manager of the Selkirk lighthouse and has worked there off and on for 15
years. Walking in through the kitchen door, she points out the building’s attributes.


Bathroom, stand-up shower and the kitchen area are mainly what make up the addition part of the
lighthouse. And here’s the stone wall that I just absolutely love. And all the amenities of home
away from home… (fades under)


It’s homey and relaxed. The floorboards in the first-floor bedroom are original. Paternaster and
walker are working to replace the windows with original-style ones, whenever the lighthouse isn’t
occupied.


The staircase to the third floor is blocked off right now, since a couple of stairs up to the
lighthouse are too rickety to use. But you can get to the top. Nicole Paternaster led me, creeping
past the roof rafters and around the spiral staircase, through a wooden portal and then up a metal
ladder leaned against the wall. At the top we popped up in the lantern room itself.


“You can see the river, you can see the lake, you can see what’s called Deer Creek Marsh. But it
is absolutely gorgeous. And of course, today it’s a windy day, so you can see all the waves
breaking out there. I just love it.”


The guests love it too. New Jersey resident Len Levonaitis and his family have fished in the area
for 15 years.


“When I go on vacation, I don’t want to be in the midst of the craziness, you know, downtown
Pulaski, where the salmon fishing is hot and heavy and there are hundreds of guys there. It’s nice
to be able to go out and find a place like the lighthouse. What’s nice about it is that it’s right
there, you know, on the lake. You can see the fish coming in.”


Like Levonaitis, many guests find themselves visiting again. Some have already booked their
stays for 2004 and even 2005.


Jim Walker says owning the lighthouse has been a valuable experience, but after 16 years he’s
ready to pass the torch on to somebody else and focus on other business.


“I’ve reached the hard conclusion of trying to recruit a replacement. No, that’s not just put a
piece of property on the market for sale, but it’s to recruit someone who basically has a younger
body, a lot of motivation and similar ideals to try to pick up and carry the ball from here.”


Walker has advertised the property in different lighthouse publications. It’s listed at one-and-a-
quarter million dollars. So far, there have been a few inquiries.


“It’s a very, very unusual place, one of the last of its kind. That’s, that’s the type of thing we
need to polish up and pass along to the best of our ability.”


Walker says he’s sure the right person will emerge to keep the light shining and the door open to
future guests at the Selkirk lighthouse.


For the great lakes radio consortium, I’m Skye Rohde.

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Some Relief for Low Lake Levels

The soggy spring has helped raise water levels in the Great Lakes. Lake Ontario is above average, but the upper lakes could still use more rain. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s David Sommerstein explains:

Transcript

The soggy spring and summer so far has helped raise water levels in the
Great Lakes. Lake Ontario is above average, but the upper lakes could still
use more rain. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s David Sommerstein
reports.

A few years of drastically low water levels have stranded boats and docks
and forced shippers to light their loads throughout the Great Lakes, but
Chuck O’Neill, of New York Sea Grant, says spring rains have come to the
rescue. Precipitation was 30% higher than normal in May region wide, 60%
higher than normal in Lakes Erie and Ontario:


“And when you put that much water into a basin that responds quickly like
the Lake Ontario basin, that’s reflected in the lake level quite dramatically.”


Lake Ontario is up more than 30 inches from March and is now four inches
above average. O’Neill says the rain has helped the upper lakes some, but
they’re still low, especially Lake Superior.


“That is such a huge lake even when they do have above average
precipitation, it takes an awful lot more above average precipitation to
push that lake up anything significantly.”


The rise and fall of the lakes is natural over time, but many experts worry
climate change is lowering the watermark for the long term.

For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m David Sommerstein.

Chretien Plan Calls for Transport Changes

The government of Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien recently outlined a new long-term political agenda. It includes a proposal for major changes to transportation that would affect traffic bottlenecks at crossing points like the Ambassador Bridge. The Bridge is the biggest trading corridor between Canada and the U.S. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Dan Karpenchuk reports:

Transcript

The government of Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien recently outlined a new long-
term political agenda. It includes a proposal for major changes to transportation that
would affect traffic bottlenecks at crossing points like the Ambassador Bridge. The
Bridge is the biggest trading corridor between Canada and the U.S. The Great Lakes
Radio Consortium’s Dan Karpenchuk reports:


Prime Minister Jean Chretien calls it part of his Kyoto plan, which is intended to reduce
traffic congestion on the main highway link along the north shore of Lake Ontario all the
way to the U.S. border for almost 24 hours a day that highway looks more like a moving
warehouse as goods travel by truck north and south of the border.


But the emissions from thousands of trucks each day are creating smog from Toronto to
Buffalo to Detroit.


Chretien’s plan is to shift more truck traffic to rail and water.


Ken Ogilvie of the environmental organization, Pollution Probe, says it’s a positive step
but it needs more government incentives similar to those in the U.S.


“What the United States is ahead of us on and should and could do a lot more is on the
policy side of tying some of this funding to make sure there is improved rail and transit
systems.”


Ogilvie says further study would be needed to determine whether the plan would simply
shift environmental problems to the Great Lakes and to rail infrastructure on both sides of
the border.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Dan Karpenchuk in Toronto.

Easier Start to Shipping Season

The Soo Locks and Saint Lawrence Seaway are opening to higher lake levels and mild ice conditions, making for an easier start to the commercial shipping season. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mike Simonson has more:

Transcript

The Soo Locks and Saint Lawrence Seaway are opening to higher lake levels and mild ice conditions, making for an easier start to the commercial shipping season. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Mike Simonson has the story:

Lake levels have been low for the past four years, and the latest numbers from the U.S. Army Corp of Engineers indicate this new season will start with three of the five Great Lakes below average.

February numbers show
Lake Superior is 6 inches below normal, Lakes Michigan and Huron are 7 inches below the average since they started keeping records in 1918. Those numbers are 6 inches better than a year ago. Duluth-Superior Port Director Davis Helberg hopes this is a trend.

“This is cyclical, they will rebound. History tells us that they always do. And I hope we’re at the bottom of the trough but so far this winter hasn’t showed much promise of starting to get back to have the pendulum swing the other way. We just have had such a wimpy winter.”

Lake Erie is at its normal level, while Lake Ontario is 3 inches above normal.

For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Mike Simonson in Superior, Wisconsin.

Winter’s Effect on Lake Levels Debated

There seems to be some confusion over how the mild winter will affect lake levels. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Amy Cavalier has the story:

Honoring a Fallen Activist

The Great Lakes Basin hosts 44 nuclear reactors, plus a variety of uranium mining and refining facilities and nuclear waste dumps. Their presence has been contentious and divisive, and critics of nuclear power have often been seen as extremists who have polarized the issue. But one remarkable Canadian activist managed to bring both sides of the debate together. Great Lakes Radio Consortium commentator Suzanne Elston says her recent death is a tragedy for all Great Lakes residents:

Nuclear Reactors in Harm’s Way?

Canadian environmentalists are concerned that nuclear power plants located on the Great Lakes are vulnerable to a potential terrorist attack. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Karen Kelly has the story:

Ijc to Monitor Lake Flows

A commission that oversees water bodies shared by the U.S. and Canada is expanding its study of water levels in the Great Lakes. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Karen Kelly has more:

Transcript

A commission that oversees water bodies shared by the U.S. and Canada is expanding its study of water levels in the Great Lakes. The Great Lakes Radio Consortium’s Karen Kelly reports.


The International Joint Commission recently announced it would review its regulation of water flowing in and out of Lake Superior. Any changes to Superior’s water flow could affect Lake Michigan and Lake Huron, as well. The commission is already studying similar changes in the regulation of Lake Ontario’s water. Officials say the studies were prompted by residents’ complaints about low water levels as well as the expected onset of climate change. Scientists predict this could also affect lake levels.


Peter Yee is the manager of the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence regulation office for Environment Canada.


“We have the opportunity to dialogue with the public so that we have a mutual understanding and appreciation of everybody’s needs and concerns, the benefits of regulation and also the limitations of regulation.”


Public hearings are scheduled to begin this fall.


For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Karen Kelly.