The Puget Sound Partnership’s Leadership Council is slated to vote tomorrow on the adoption of a series of human wellbeing indicators for Puget Sound. The indicators were developed in part through research conducted by PSI Lead Social Scientist Kelly Biedenweg, and are meant to monitor some of the ways that humans benefit from the Puget Sound […]
July 24, 2015
Auklet recordings featured on Living on Earth
The Puget Sound region is home to one of the largest nesting colonies of rhinoceros auklets in the world. Each summer tens of thousands of these puffin-like birds raise their chicks on Protection Island in the Strait of Juan de Fuca. You can listen to the sounds of this summer ritual on PRI’s Living on Earth this week. The […]
July 8, 2015
Vital statistics and vital signs: Getting the facts
What do the following facts have in common? The coastline around Puget Sound is 1,332 miles long—2500 if you extend to its islands and straits. It would take about 18 days to walk it if it were passable (or legal) everywhere. Up to half of all the freshwater flowing into Puget Sound comes from the Skagit River. […]
June 23, 2015
PSI’s Tessa Francis co-leads Ocean Modeling effort
The University of Washington Tacoma News & Information website features PSI’s lead ecologist Tessa Francis and her work at the Ocean Modeling Forum. POSTED BY: John Burkhardt June 23, 2015 Tessa Francis at Center for Urban Waters Co-leads Ocean Effort UW Tacoma research scientist Tessa Francis has been named the managing director of the Ocean Modeling Forum, a […]
June 23, 2015
Wastewater study looks at Seattle marijuana use
One of our collaborators made news this week for his pilot study quantifying marijuana use in Seattle and Tacoma. Dan Burgard, a chemist at the University of Puget Sound, is analyzing wastewater from sewage treatment plants to identify levels of metabolized THC. The study is designed to determine if new recreational marijuana laws are leading to an increase in marijuana […]
June 18, 2015
Trade journal features Center for Urban Waters green roof
The June 2015 issue of Professional Roofing features the Center for Urban Waters green roof. Read “The beauty of a project,” by Chrystine Elle Hanus for a detailed account of some of the research led by our collaborators at the University of Washington Tacoma.
June 4, 2015
Ocean Modeling Forum to hold Pacific Herring Summit June 8-10
Puget Sound Institute lead ecologist Tessa Francis is co-chair of an upcoming summit to examine the human dimensions of Pacific herring fisheries in the Salish Sea. The forum brings together “social and natural scientists, tribes and First Nations, and federal and state managers” to identify new approaches to ecosystem-based management, including the use of traditional ecologic knowledge […]
May 4, 2015
Is there a shift in the Puget Sound food web?
A Seattle Times story features a recent paper in the Marine Ecology Press Series about shifting baselines in the Puget Sound food web. Forty years of data from the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife reveal a trend toward more jellyfish and less of some forage fish species in the region. High amounts of jellyfish can […]
April 22, 2015
2016 Salish Sea Ecosystem Conference now accepting proposals for special sessions
The 2016 Salish Sea Ecosystem Conference is now accepting proposals for special sessions. This year’s conference theme is “Strengthening Connections around Changing Times,” and the deadline for proposals June 30, 2015. The conference will be held in Vancouver, B.C. from April 13-15, 2016. Read more at the conference website.
April 21, 2015
New book focuses on the natural history of the Salish Sea
The Salish Sea: Jewel of the Pacific Northwest brings together more than 230 extraordinary images of the Salish Sea. But don’t call it a coffee table book. Its lush photos are backed by a serious scientific perspective on this complex and fragile ecosystem. Read an interview with the authors in the Encyclopedia of Puget Sound.