Olympia—Through­out August, the Wash­ing­ton Inva­sive Species Coun­cil and the Wash­ing­ton Depart­ment of Nat­ur­al Resources (DNR) are ask­ing the pub­lic to take 10 min­utes to check trees in their com­mu­ni­ties for inva­sive insects. August is the peak time of year that wood-bor­ing insects are most often spot­ted out­side of trees. “State and fed­er­al agen­cies do a fan­tas­tic  Con­tin­ue Reading

If you vis­it the Sculp­ture Park at Roche Har­bor on a warm sum­mer day you may feel drawn toward the shade of the for­est path. Should you ven­ture into the wood­ed path you may find some sur­pris­es. Island artists Ani­ta Bar­reca and Fran­cie Hansen joined by oth­ers includ­ing Beth Spadafo­ra and Jason Munkres have adorned  Con­tin­ue Reading

In the San Juan Update mail­bag this after­noon we have this let­ter from Tan­ja at the Land Bank… Hel­lo San Juan Update! I’ve been post­ing our week­ly “nature notes” on our face­book and Insta­gram accounts since April, and today’s post­ing fea­tures a pilot project to help the Island Mar­ble but­ter­fly thrive. I think it’s a great  Con­tin­ue Reading

Fri­day Har­bor Film Festival’s Sum­mer 2020 Vir­tu­al Cin­e­ma will present a FREE vir­tu­al on-demand screen­ing of The Sto­ry of Plas­tic any­time on July 16, 17, 18, and 19, fol­lowed by a host­ed Q&A on July 19 at 6 pm PDT.  To view the film and par­tic­i­pate in the vir­tu­al Q&A, RSVP at www.fhff.org. Once you  Con­tin­ue Reading

COVID 19 is cre­at­ing many unique chal­lenges for lit­er­al­ly every­one and the Land Bank is no excep­tion. The Land Bank typ­i­cal­ly uses a vari­ety of strate­gies to achieve stew­ard­ship activ­i­ties includ­ing vol­un­teer work par­ties, col­lab­o­rat­ing with part­ners, engag­ing spe­cial inter­est groups, and lever­ag­ing help from youth con­ser­va­tion corps type orga­ni­za­tions. At this time we are  Con­tin­ue Reading

By Louise Dus­trude A num­ber of peo­ple have been ask­ing one anoth­er what those bright yel­low flow­ers are that have appeared recent­ly at Island Rec’s LaFarge Open Space, aka the grav­el pit. So we checked with Eliza Habeg­ger, the land stew­ard at the Land Bank, whose respon­si­bil­i­ties also include eco­log­i­cal assess­ment, mon­i­tor­ing, and restora­tion on  Con­tin­ue Reading

This FHL Tide Bite was writ­ten by Jen Bur­naford… My first trip to UW Fri­day Har­bor Labs was in 1995. After com­plet­ing my under­grad­u­ate the­sis on fresh­wa­ter zoo­plank­ton and spend­ing a post-bac year chas­ing pri­mates through the jun­gles of Bor­neo, I had been accept­ed into the PhD pro­gram at Ore­gon State Uni­ver­si­ty in the Menge/Lubchenco  Con­tin­ue Reading

Your Con­ser­va­tion Land Bank turns 30 this year and is cel­e­brat­ing with a mul­ti-island explo­ration. Every pre­serve has a sto­ry – gath­er your fam­i­ly and get out­side this sum­mer to dis­cov­er what your pub­lic lands have to say! The San Juan Coun­ty Land Bank teamed up with the Lopez, Orcas, and San Juan Island libraries to  Con­tin­ue Reading