Author

Chris Wood

  • From the President Dam Removal

    The tipping point for salmon and steelhead

    These remarks were delivered yesterday at the 2021 Environmental Conference at the Andrus Center for Public Policy at Boise State University. I want to begin my remarks today by talking about SARs—not the viral respiratory disease, but the percentage of juvenile salmon or smolts that survive the ocean, and their trek through the dams, and return to spawn. Experts call this the “smolt to adult…

  • From the President

    From Red Brook to Bristol Bay: scaling conservation

    A few days ago, the people of Wareham, Mass., delivered a victory for conservation. They voted overwhelmingly against the wishes of their town administrator, and four of their five selectmen, and denied a 775-acre development in the headwaters of Red Brook. The development likely would have harmed one of the relatively few remaining populations of…

  • From the President

    Saving salters and saving New England

    Brook trout in the Northeast have taken a beating over the decades. Scientists estimate that brook trout—indicators of clean water and healthy lands—have lost more than half of their historic habitat to development, dams and urbanization. The brook trout of southeastern Massachusetts are particularly vulnerable, and worthy of protection.   There, a unique form of sea run brook trout, called “salters,” persists. The late…