Scattered to the Winds

Seagoing Northern Gannet: U.S. FWS

Sea birds and waterfowl are most exposed in hurricanes.  Songbirds and smaller woodland birds, by contrast, have less difficulty. They are specially adapted to hold on, lay low and ride things out. In very strong winds, their toes automatically tighten around their perch. This holds them in place during high winds or when they sleep.  Woodpeckers and other cavity nesters will, barring the destruction of the tree itself, ride out storms in tree holes.  Shorebirds, such as sandpipers, often move to inland areas. In a unique effect of cyclonic hurricanes, the eye of the storm with its fast-moving walls of intense wind can form a massive “bird cage” holding birds inside the eye until the storm dissipates.  It is often the eye of the storm that displaces birds, more than its strong winds.  Sandy’s eye was less well-defined when compared to other hurricanes.

Birds are not the only species affected by the winds.  Sea mammals can be harmed too.  While many can seek shelter in open water or in near shore shelter, some dolphins and manatees have actually been blown ashore during major storms.

Flattened Forests

The “tree toll” of Sandy has not yet been tallied but in 1992, Hurricane Andrew generated incredible wind velocities onshore and knocked down as many as 80 percent of the trees on several coastal Louisiana basins, such as the Atchafalaya. Tree loss during Hurricane Katrina in 2005 caused even more extensive damage. Loss of coastal forests and trees can be devastating to dependent wildlife species and migratory species. Many wildlife species have very specialized niches in these forests, and specific foods can disappear too. High winds will often strip fruits, seeds and berries from bushes and trees.

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Dune and Beach Loss

Sandy has clearly been tough on the Midatlantic’s sand shoreline. Storm surges, wave action, and winds cause beach and dune erosion and that can severely affect wildlife species. Many wildlife species live in ecological niches in the sandy areas and dunes of coastal barrier islands.  In some cases the storm can cause a beach area to fully disappear.  Sea turtle nests, for example, are dug right in to the beach and can be washed out, or a water surge, called a “wash over” can submerge these nests or nearby tern and plover nesting areas.

Saltwater in Freshwater Areas

The sustained and powerful winds of a hurricane will cause salty ocean water to pile up and surge onshore.  Sandy pushed water into lower Manhattan and that has gathered most of the headlines but coastal marshes and bays can litterally be poisened by too much salt.  These “storm surges” can be huge. Hurricane Irene’s surges, in 2011, brought water levels that were as much as 8 feet above normal high tide and Sandy’s peaked between 10 and 13 feet.  Katrina, in 2005, pushed a 30 foot high surge onto the coast.  In addition to the physical damage this causes, the salt contained in sea water dramatically shifts the delicate balance of freshwater and brackish wetland areas such as in the Chesapeake Bay and along the Atlantic Coast.  Creatures and vegetation that are less salt-tolerant will be harmed and many will not survive the influx of sea water. Marsh grasses, crabs, minnows, fish hatchlings, insects, and myriad creatures of freshwater and estuarine environments are harmed by a surge. The salt water intrusion in these some of these areas does not drain off very quickly and can even harm or kill off bottomland forests and other coastal trees.

Massive Flooding of Rivers, Bays and Wetlands

The reverse is true too.  The heavy rains generated by hurricanes will dump water in coastal area river basins (called watersheds) and this, in turn, can send vast amounts of fresh water surging downstream into coastal bays and estuaries.  This upsets the delicate and finely tuned freshwater/salt water balance that can be so vital for the health of these ecosystems.  In 1972, Hurricane Agnes sent such massive amounts of freshwater into the Chesapeake Bay.  A similar thing is happening with water from Sandy’s eight to 10 inches of rainfall.  The normally brackish (partially salty) water of the Bay was fresh for months following Agnes placing great pressure on the species living there.

Dark, Muddy Water

Heavy rainfall in upstream areas also washes soil, sediment and many pollutants into coastal and marine environments.  After Hurricane Agnes, the turbidly or cloudiness of the water became so severe in the Chesapeake Bay that the native grasses growing on the bottom of Bay died off in huge quantities.  These grasses provided critical habitat from crabs, fish spawning and many species.  It took the Bay years to recover. Similarly, sediment can wash over coral reefs, blocking needed sunlight and even causing algae to grow.

Violent Waters Everywhere 

Hurricane Irene, like other hurricanes, generated massive waves and violent action on the surface.  When hurricane Andrew hit Louisiana the government estimated that more than 9 million fish were killed offshore.  Similarly an assessment of the effect of that same storm on the Everglades Basin in Florida showed that 182 million fish were killed.  Hurricane Katrina also had a huge effect on dolphin species.  Many dolphins were hurt during the storm and were rescued and underwent rehabilitation.

Climate Change

The prognosis for wildlife surviving hurricanes can be hard to assess. There are many success stories and also accounts of major devastation. The question remains, however, about whether wild creatures will. like humans, be experiencing more catastrophic hurricanes in the future. Amanda Staudt, NWF’s climate scientist, posted a piece at Wildlife Promise a couple of days ago that looks at how continued warming through climate change may be fueling major hurricanes and may have been a factor with Sandy.

What Can You Do?

The forces of hurricanes, such as Sandy, are so immense that they deserve tremendous respect.  So the first thing you can do is to stay safe yourself. Heed public safety warnings, prepare your property by collecting and storing lose items outside, be prepared for power outages and use common sense. Following a storm, birders and wildlife enthusiasts can help by keeping their eyes peeled for unusual or rare species that turn up. It is useful for wildlife agencies to hear about rare appearances.  Wildlife rescue organizations should be contacted if someone sees a creature that was injured in a storm. It always recommended to avoid trying to handle and injured animal on your own unless you have had specific training.  If you usually feed birds at your home, the post storm calm is a good time to fill up those feeders. Your pals will probably be hungry and tired after waiting out the storm.

In addition, be wildlife friendly during this election and demand action on climate change. Urge our candidates to tell us their plans to address climate change now.

Flood damage in Bethel, VT after Irene (Flickr/US FWS)

The 2011 hurricane season may well be remembered most for flooding along the eastern seaboard, especially from Hurricane Irene and Tropical Storm Lee. The impacts were felt in places that typically don’t have to worry about hurricanes. That’s because some of the most significant damage and disruption was from inland flooding caused by heavy rainfall, rather than from wind or storm surge:

• During Hurricane Irene, floods ravaged communities from Puerto Rico, where one location recorded 22 inches of rainfall, all the way north to Vermont, where nearly every river flooded. Vermont’s roads were extensively damaged, with some communities cut off for days. Overall damages in the U.S. are estimated to range anywhere from $7 billion to $20 billion.
• Less than two weeks later, Tropical Storm Lee made its way across the country. Another large, slow-moving storm with heavy rainfall, Lee caused flooding from Louisiana to New York. Fairfax County, where I live and work in Virginia, sustained as much as $10 million worth of damages to roads and bridges. While my family made it through unscathed, the disaster made me feel like the impacts of global warming-fueled storms were hitting close to home.

It’s not unusual for tropical storms to bring inland flooding and many examples can be found from past years. What differentiates the storms this year is that the coastal impacts were somewhat less dramatic in comparison. It’s actually quite common for hurricanes and tropical storms to cause significant inland flooding. But that story often gets overshadowed by the spectacular images of wind and storm surge damages along the coasts.

Climate change could make inland flooding an even more prominent feature of future hurricanes. Climate models all project increased rainfall rates in hurricanes. This follows from the fact that warmer air can hold more moisture, so the atmosphere will have more water available for rain. And the projected increases by end of the century are nothing to sneeze at: on the order of a 20 percent increase in rainfall rates within about 60 miles of the storm center.

Let’s do a rough calculation of what that could have meant for rainfall totals during Hurricane Irene. Areas in North Carolina received 8 inches of rain. If the same storm came through in 80 years when the atmosphere is warmer, that total could be closer to 9.6 inches. Vermont had totals around 4 inches. Make that closer to 5 inches with a warmed over atmosphere.

The expected increase in hurricane rainfall rates is often overlooked in the debate about climate change impacts on hurricane wind speed or frequency. Yet the increased flooding potential should be on the radar screens of emergency managers across the eastern United States.

More broadly, factors like these should be a consideration as President Obama considers Environmental Protection Agency regulation of climate pollution under the Clean Air Act. And storms like this should serve as a wake-up call for Congress, which has yet to pass comprehensive climate legislation.

Learn more about the relationship between climate change and stronger storms at NWF.org/ExtremeWeather.

1. Highlight of the Week: Despite Flawed Review, Tar Sands Pipeline Receives Temporary Rubber Stamp
2. Quote: Mitt Romney
3. Economic Story of the Week: Cleantech Taking Off
4. Editorial of the Week: Irene Strikes a Nation Seemingly Content to Worry Less About Climate Change
5. CA Green Lights Cap & Trade
6. Come on Irene
7. Happening this Week

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Highlight of the Week

Despite Flawed Review, Tar Sands Pipeline Receives Temporary Rubber Stamp

Civil Disobedience protest at the White House via Chesapeakeclimate/flickr

The State Department, which is overseeing the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline permitting process, issued a final environmental impact statement (FEIS). The FEIS wraps up a highly controversial environmental review and starts the next stage of the permitting process referred to as the “national interest determination.” For opponents, the FEIS seems to confirm Secretary Clinton’s prejudgment of the result last year when the review was far from over.

NWF senior vice president Jim Lyon said,

“After two failed rounds of environmental review, this looks like strike three for the State Department. The document still fails to address the key concerns for landowners and wildlife. It is almost certain to be scrutinized in other venues, including a probable legal challenge. This only escalates the controversy in a process that is far from over.”

Protesters from across the country have been gathered daily in front of the White House in a major act of civil disobedience that has resulted in more than 380 arrests, as almost the entire environmental community condemns the FEIS and speaks up against dirty tar sands.

More on this: Washington Post, NWF Media Center

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Quote:

via Gage Skidmore/Flickr

“I think it’s important for us to reduce our emissions of pollutants and greenhouse gases that may well be significant contributors to the climate change and global warming that you’re seeing.”

- Republican Presidential candidate Mitt Romney.

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Economic Story of the Week

Cleantech Taking Off

via Michael O’Leary

According to Climate Progress, despite a spate of rumors in the media to the contrary, clean energy is creating large numbers of high quality American jobs in emerging industries. ‘Cleantech’ has seen “torrid growth” from 2003 to 2010, 8.3% per year which is almost double the growth rate of the overall economy during that period.

The government’s investment in clean energy jobs through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) and programs like the Better Buildings Initiative have helped stimulate the hardest hit sectors of the economy, increase U.S. competitive advantage in new clean energy industries, and increased both the quality and quantity of clean energy jobs even in the recession. For a more detailed analysis, click here.

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Editorial of the Week

Irene Strikes a Nation Seemingly Content to Worry Less About Climate Change

(New York Times)

The last time a hurricane landed on the shores of the United States, Americans’ belief in climate change was at its peak and House Democrats would soon begin their march toward passage of climate legislation. When Irene boils onto the East Coast this weekend, she will find a nation with degraded belief in global warming, a defeated climate bill, and the absence of a federal plan to address an ominously rising number of natural catastrophes.

It’s time to use current weather events, like Irene, as an analogy for future climate effects, says Frank Nutter, president of the Reinsurance Association of America… “You have to start looking at these things as indicative of the very scenarios that the scientific community say are likely to play out — increased precipitation, more severe storms, probably greater storm surge with rising sea level,” Nutter said. (More…)

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CA Green Lights Cap & Trade

Power plant in Morro Bay, CA via kafka4prez/flickr

State air regulators in California have affirmed cap and trade as their policy of choice to reduce greenhouse emissions from industrial sectors under California’s global warming law, A.B. 32.

All of the board members who approved the original plan in 2008 upheld their previous votes, but four members voiced preference yesterday for tax on carbon pollution instead of the cap-and-trade regulations.

The regulations are due to be released in final form in the next week or so, followed by a final commenting period before their approval in October. Agency staff stated they are also considering adding three new ways to reduce emissions outside the cap in order to increase the supply of offsets, including reducing the use of nitrogen-based fertilizers, reducing rice straw decomposition and methane generation from flooded rice fields, and replacing valves on oil and gas pipelines with ones that release less methane, said Edie Chang, head of ARB’s climate planning and management department.

More on this story: LA Times

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Come on Irene

Irene aftermath in the Bronx, via Edwin Martinez1/Flickr

Though here inside the Beltway we got off comparatively easy, Hurricane Irene’s wrath could cause more damage along the Eastern Seaboard than any other storm in decades, begging the question of whether climate change may be increasing the strength of hurricanes (not to mention other extreme weather events.) Coincidentally, Irene’s landing coincided with the 6 year anniversary of Katrina’s touchdown in the Gulf and came just a few days after the 5.9 earthquake that shook the east coast.

While scientists are still wary of attributing any single extreme weather event to climate change, according to Massachusetts Institute of Technology expert Kerry Emanuel, “the evidence for a connection between Atlantic hurricanes and global climate change is fairly compelling.” Given the apparent increase in both frequency and strength of these events and their impacts on people and wildlife, we should at least start taking this evidence seriously.

More on this story: NY Times, Huffington Post, Wildlife Promise

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Happening this Week

Tuesday, August 30

Business and policy leaders gather in Las Vegas, NV to discuss the future of renewable energy, efficiency, transportation, and the intelligent grid. Speakers include: Vice-President Joe Biden; Energy Secretary Steven Chu; Secretary of the Navy Ray Mabus; the Governors of California, Nevada and Washington; Federal Energy Regulatory Chairman John Wellinghoff; Nevada Senator Harry Reid; Center for American Progress President John Podesta, and more. Check out the live stream here.

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For more global warming news on Wildlife Promise click here.

But what happens to fish and wildlife during major storms? Here are a few of the ways species are affected and some things you can do to help them.

Wind Dislocation

Powerful winds from hurricanes and tropical storms can blow birds off course and push them hundreds of miles away from their home habitat. Last year, a North Carolina brown pelican was found on the roof of a night club in Halifax, Nova Scotia.   The news often covers the appearance of rare species after a major storm.  Sometimes younger or weaker birds become separated from their flock and many can take weeks to return home — if they can find the right foods on their way back.

During major storms, sea birds and waterfowl are most exposed. Songbirds and woodland birds, however, are specially adapted to hold on and ride things out. Their toes automatically tighten around their perch. This holds them in place during high winds or when they sleep.  Woodpeckers and other cavity nesters will, barring the destruction of the tree itself, ride out storms in tree holes.  Shorebirds often move to inland areas. In a unique effect of cyclonic hurricanes, the eye of the storm with its fast-moving walls of intense wind can form a massive “bird cage” holding birds inside the eye until the storm dissipates.  It is often the eye of the storm that displaces birds, more than its strong winds.

Birds are not the only species affected by the winds.  Sea mammals can be harmed too.  While many can seek shelter in open water or in near shore shelter, some dolphins and manatees have actually been blown ashore during major storms.

Tree Loss

In 1992, Hurricane Andrew brought incredible wind velocities onshore and knocked down as many as 80% of the trees on several coastal Louisiana basins, such as the Atchafalaya. Tree loss during Hurricane Katrina in 2005 caused even more extensive damage. Loss of coastal forests and trees can be devastating to dependent wildlife species and migratory species.  Many wildlife species have very specialized niches in these forests that are lost to heavy winds.  Specific foods can be taken away too.  High winds will often strip fruits, seeds and berries from bushes and trees.

Dune and Beach Loss

Storm surges, wave action, and winds can cause beach and dune erosion and that can have severe effects of species.  Many wildlife species live in ecological niches in the sandy areas and dunes of coastal barrier island.  In some cases the storm can cause a beach area to disappear.  Sea turtle nests, for example, can be washed out, or a water surge, called a “wash over” can submerge these nests or tern and plover nesting areas.

Saltwater Intrusion

The sustained and powerful winds of a hurricane will cause salty ocean water to pile up and surge onshore.  These “storm surges” can be huge. Hurricane Irene’s surges brought water levels that were as much as 8 feet above normal high tide and Katrina pushed a 30 foot high surge onto the coast.   In addition to the physical damage this causes, the salt contained in sea water dramatically shifts the delicate balance of freshwater and brackish wetland areas.  Creatures and vegetation that are less salt-tolerant will be harmed and many will not survive this influx of sea water. Marsh grasses, crabs, minnows, fish hatchlings, insects, and myriad creatures of freshwater and estuarine environments are harmed.   The salt water intrusion in these some of these areas does not drain off very quickly and can even harm or kill off bottomland forests and other coastal trees.

Freshwater Flooding

The reverse is true too.  The heavy rains generated by hurricanes will dump water in coastal area river basins (called watersheds) and this, in turn, can send vast amounts of fresh water surging downstream into coastal bays and estuaries.  This upsets the delicate and finely tuned freshwater/salt water balance that can be so vital for the health of these ecosystems.  In 1972, Hurricane Agnes sent such massive amounts of freshwater into the Chesapeake Bay.   The normally brackish (partially salty) water was fresh for months placing great pressure on the species living there.

Turbidity

Heavy rainfall in upstream areas also washes soil, sediment and many pollutants into coastal and marine environments.  After Hurricane Agnes, the turbidly or cloudiness of the water became so severe in the Chesapeake Bay that the native grasses growing on the bottom of Bay died off in huge quantities.  These grasses provided critical habitat from crabs, fish spawning and many species.  It took the Bay years to recover.   Similarly, sediment can wash over coral reefs, blocking needed sunlight and even causing algae to grow.

Marine and Aquatic Species

Hurricane Irene, like other hurricanes, generated massive waves and violent action on the surface.  When hurricane Andrew hit Louisiana the government estimated that more than 9 million fish were killed offshore.  Similarly an assessment of the effect of that same storm on the Everglades Basin in Florida showed that 182 million fish were killed.  Hurricane Katrina also had a huge effect on dolphin species.  Many dolphins were hurt during the storm and were rescuded and underwest rehabiltation.

What Can You Do?

The forces of hurricanes, such as Irene, are so immense that they deserve tremendous respect.  So the first thing you can do is to stay safe yourself. Heed public safety warmings, prepare your property by collecting and storing lose items outside, be prepared for power outages and use common sense. Following a storm, birders and wildlife enthusiasts can help by keeping their eyes peeled for unusual or rare species that turn up. It is useful for wildlife agencies to hear about rare appearances.  Wildlife rescue organizations should be contacted if someone sees a creature that was injured in a storm. It always recommended to avoid trying to handle and injured animal on your own unless you have had specific training.  If you usually feed birds at your home, the post storm calm is a good time to fill up those feeders.  Your pals will probably be hungry and tired after waiting out the storm.

Learn more about creating your own certified wildlife habitat to help animals survive in all kinds of weather!