Agriculture

Thousands celebrate bats at festivals

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By MORGAN LINN
Capital News Service
LANSING — Bat enthusiasts hope to see festivals celebrating the web-winged mammal in every Great Lakes state. The original Great Lakes Bat Festival started in Michigan, founded by the Organization for Bat Conservation, a nonprofit group to protect bats and teach about them. The festival celebrated its 15th anniversary two weeks ago and drew more than 3,000 people to Clinton Township. “We started the bat festival because we realized that it was really important to get all the agencies and bat experts together to educate the public and reach out to the media about how important bats are in the Great Lakes region,” said Rob Mies, the executive director of the Organization for Bat Conservation, based at Cranbrook Indtitute of Science in Bloomfield Hills. This weekend his group, the U.S. Forest Service and the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources  are putting on one of the biggest bat festivals in the region: the Wisconsin Bat Festival.

Environment

Grants awarded to tribes in Michigan, Wisconsin and Minnesota

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By MORGAN LINN
Capital News Service
LANSING — Native American tribes will be able to survey and protect plants and wildlife in Michigan, protect bats from logging and place sturgeon in school aquariums as part of a recent round of federal grants. The Tribal Wildlife Grants program was established by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in 2003. More than $68 million has gone to tribes since then, said Christie Deloria, the agency’s Native American liaison for Michigan. This year, $5 million was awarded to 29 tribes, three from Great Lakes states. In Michigan, the Saginaw Chippewa tribe based in Mt.

Environment

Spiny water flea clouds lake and its future

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By MORGAN LINN
Capital News Service
LANSING — The spiny water flea is a small invader of lakes in Michigan that could cause big and expensive problems.
A recent study of a Wisconsin lake reveals what may be in store for inland lakes throughout the Great Lakes region. The crustacean has clouded that state’s Lake Mendota after boaters transported it there from Lake Michigan, said Steve Carpenter, director of the Center for Limnology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. The damage it has done to water clarity could cost millions of dollars to restore, according to a new study co-authored by Carpenter and published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. The research has implications for other lakes in the region, such as inland lakes in Michigan. The spiny water flea was introduced into the region in the 1980s and has proliferated through all five of the Great Lakes, according to the study.

Environment

Flame retardant problems linger in Lake Erie smallmouth bass

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By MORGAN LINN
Capital News Service
LANSING — Levels of hazardous flame retardants in most Great Lakes fish are declining – or at least researchers thought they were. But a new study shows that this isn’t the case for Lake Erie smallmouth bass, an important game fish. And the contaminated fish threatens the health of some people who eat them. Smallmouth bass: Credit: U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service. Polybrominated diphenyl ethers (PBDEs) are flame retardants that were commonly used in furniture, electronics, construction materials and textiles, said Michael Murray, a staff scientist for the National Wildlife Federation’s Great Lakes office in Ann Arbor.

Environment

Senate opposes EPA-funded BBQ study

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By MORGAN LINN
Capital News Service
LANSING — Is the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) trying to regulate one of America’s favorite backyard pastimes? Yes, according to Sens. Tom Casperson, R-Escanaba, and Phil Pavlov, R-St. Clair, who cite citing a recent EPA project has them fearing barbecue regulations. Here’s what happened: EPA awarded students at University of California Riverside $15,000 to study ways to reduce barbecue emissions.

Energy

LNG-powered Great Lakes freighters could cut greenhouse emissions

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By: MORGAN LINN
Capital News Service
LANSING — Great Lakes shipping has the potential to go green. Liquefied natural gas (LNG) could replace oil as the fuel of choice for the freshwater ships, according to a recent study published by the Transportation Research Board. But conversion costs, declining fuel prices and processing capacity are barriers. To examine the feasibility of conversion, researchers studied the S.S. Badger, a coal-burning ferry that runs across Lake Michigan between Ludington and Manitowoc, Wisconsin. “It was a good platform for us to take a look at and model,” said Carol Wolosz, an author of the study and the executive director of the Great Lakes Maritime Research Institute.