January 2013
- Pacific WildLife Foundation Director Rod
MacVicar was recognized by the City of Port Moody with the
2012 Port Moody Environmental Award for his long history of
environmental service to the community. Rod has shared his
interest in the marine environment with thousands of people
by taking them on to the water, co-directing the Mossom
Creek Hatchery with Associate Ruth Foster, responding to
marine environmental issues and serving on many
environmental committees for the City.
Important
Cetacean Areas - There
are over 80 species of whales and dolphins, inhabiting every
ocean (and some rivers) of the world. They all have one thing
in common: each species has specific areas that are especially
important to their wellbeing - including feeding grounds,
breeding areas and migratory corridors.
The Important Cetacean
Area (ICA) program aims to identify and map these areas.
Pacific WildLife Foundation Projects
for 2013
Annual Report for 2012
Since its inception in 2003, the Pacific WildLife
Foundation has stood for objective science in its
conservation work. We do not seek headlines although we are
sometimes quoted in the news media. Good decisions require
robust objective information and it is there that we operate.
We provide advice and influence through numerous international
and national scientific advisory panels and boards, the media
and the web. We hope you take a moment to read about some of
our activities in 2012. We welcome your comments and thank all
of our supporters and partners.
Read the 2012 Report.
November 2012 –
Pacific WildLife Foundation was recently interviewed by
ResearchMedia
based in the UK. Read the interview.
November 2012 – The 20th Annual
Marine Mammal Symposium will be held at the University
of British Columbia on November 24 between 9:30 and 5:30
at the Aquatic Ecosystem Research Laboratory (next to the
Beaty Biodiversity Museum and the blue whale skeleton
exhibit). It is open to researchers, educators and
businesses or anyone with an interest in marine mammals.
August 2012 -
The Vancouver Harbour Project aims to
sustain the marine life of the harbour and provide
opportunities to appreciate it.
Vancouver Harbour on Burrard Inlet is one
of the most photographed shorelines in the world. Along
its shores is highly developed real estate in the cities
of Vancouver, Burnaby, Port Moody, North and West
Vancouver, and wild areas with few inhabitants. Some parts
of the inlet have been transformed by development but
disconnected remnants of natural habitats remain and some
species are numerous. The challenge is to sustain and
restore the marine life of the harbour while also using it
as a port and a place to live. For more on this project
and to read about our plan for the harbour,
click here……
August 2012 –
Pacific WildLife has been exploring new ways to communicate
our science for many years. Our videos on this web site are
examples, some of which have appeared on television or are
linked to scientific journal articles. Rob Butler, President
of PWLF will present our approach at the North American
Ornithological Conference held at the University of British
Columbia later this month. The sold out workshop has a waiting
list, suggesting we are on the right track with our approach.
Rob will be joined by Drs. John Fitz-Patrick from Cornell
University and Simon Donner from UBC, two scientists with
plenty of experience in this field
June
2012 -
The Board of Directors welcomes Eric Anderson as a newly
elected Fellow.
Eric Anderson is an Instructor
in the Department of Renewable Resources at the British
Columbia Institute of Technology. His interests are in the
research of marine bird ecology and conservation, and in
teaching applied ecology.
May 2012 –
Read about the gray whale research by PWLF Director Jim
Darling and his colleagues in the
Vancouver Sun.
April 2012 –
Read about PWLF Director Jim Darling and Fellow Andrew
Trites's research in the
Vancouver Sun.
February 2012
–
PWLF Fellow Andrew Trites explains his sea lion
research on
BBC News.
January 2012 –
The Board of Directors welcomes Drs. Larry Dill and Alejandro
Frid as a newly elected Fellows. Dr.Dill is a Professor
Emeritus in the Department of Biological Sciences, and a
Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. He brings a lifetime of
research expertise particularly into the role of behaviour in
mediating animal interactions in marine ecosystems. Dr. Frid
is an ecologist whose research has included endangered South
American deer, industrial development and terrestrial
wildlife, and predator and prey behaviour in marine
communities.
January 2012 -
PWLF
joins WetlandsLiVE
an
exciting, FREE on line education program for students in
grades 4 to 8 and their educators. We are providing advice,
video footage and will be featured on the program when it goes
worldwide in October 2012.
December 2011 –
PWLF Director Rod MacVicar and President Rob Butler joined
PWLF Director Jim Darling in Hawaii where they photographed
humpback whale known as ‘Scooper’. Jan Straley in Alaska
informed us that Scooper was photographed by Chuck Jurasz over
30 years ago in Icy Strait near Juneau, Alaska.
The Pacific WildLife Foundation |
Nonprofits & Fundraising
This book is a compendium of projects being done by the marine
biologists of the Pacific WildLife Foundation.
Status and Distribution of Marine
Birds and Mammals in the Southern Gulf Islands, British
Columbia.
Follow PWLF President Rob Butler's
Blog
PWLF Fellow Dr. Andrew Trites
of the UBC Fisheries Centre will speak on November 12 at 8:15
in Lecture Hall 2 of the UBC Woodward Instructional Resources
Centre on 'The Puzzling Disappearance of Sea Lions in Alaska:
Is the North Pacific Ecosystem on the Verge of Collapse? " For
more information go to
http://www.vaninst.ca/VbTrites2.html
October 2011 –
The Board of Directors welcomes Dr. Richard Rawlins from the
Rush Medical Centre in Chicago as a newly elected Fellow of
PWLF. Dr. Rawlins brings decades of expertise in reproductive
physiology and marketing skills to PWLF.
More.
Aug 2011 –
The 4th Western Hemisphere Shorebird Research Group conference
concluded at Simon Fraser University earlier this month. About
150 biologists from the Western Hemisphere assembled for four
days of scientific presentations. The science surrounding
several conservation issues pertaining to shorebirds was
discussed. The PWLF was pleased to be a partner with the
Centre for Wildlife Ecology at Simon Fraser University for
this successful conference.
Aug 2011 –
Follow the Pacific WildLife Foundation's Twitter feed to learn
about the latest PWLF news, projects and videos.
Our Twitter Link
June 2011 –
PWLF has just finished an expedition to count seabirds and
songbirds among the northern islands of the Salish Sea. This
project is part of an on-going 5 year partnership for the BC
Breeding Bird Atlas. The expedition found a few new seabird
colonies and surveyed forest birds on four large islands. The
results of the expedition will be added to the growing data
base on line at the
Breeding Bird Atlas web site.
June 2011 –
PWLF's Director Jim Darling and his colleagues recently
published a paper on the genetics of gray whales.
You can read it by clicking here
April 2011 –
The mystery of migration by one of the Pacific coast iconic
sea ducks is beginning to unfold thanks to the work of Dan
Esler and Sean Boyd from PWLF. They fitted satellite tracking
radios to Barrow's goldeneyes that keep tabs on their
migratory movements in western Canada and Alaska. Read more
about this collaborative project by
clicking here.
April 2011
– The Board of Directors welcomes
Dr. Andrew Trites from
the University of British Columbia as a newly elected Fellow
of PWLF. Dr. Trites brings a wealth of expertise in marine
mammal research and public outreach that is a core value of
PWLF including the installation of the Blue Whale exhibit at
the
Beaty Biodiversity Museum
March 2011 –Dr.
John Reynolds, Fellow of PWLF and Morgan Hocking have just
published a paper in Science showing that salmon influence
which species of streamside plants live along streams in the
Great Bear Rainforest.
Read the
paper.
Some Recent PWLF Publications
Field Observations of
Gray Whales in Boundary Bay, British Columbia 1991-2012.
Annual Report for 2012
Pacific WildLife Foundation was recently interviewed by
ResearchMedia
based in the UK. Read the interview.
Butler, RW and TE Golumbia. 2008. Status of Breeding Black
Oystercatchers, Haematopus bachmani, In the Strait of
Georgia, British Columbia.
Northwest Naturalist 89:37-40.
Butler, R.W. 2009. Twenty years on: advances in ecological
understanding of globally important birds in the Strait of
Georgia, British Columbia, and Puget Sound, Washington.
Marine Ornithology 37: 2.
Butler, RW, RM MacVicar and JD Darling. 2010. Pacific
Wildlife. Pacific WildLife Foundation. A book celebrating
our 30th anniversary available at
blurb.com
Byington, J and JD Darling. 2009. Clayoquot Sound gray whale
fluke identification catalogue 2006-2007-2008. Pacific
WildLife Foundation.
View
Byington, J and JD Darling. 2010. Clayoquot Sound humpback
whale fluke identification catalogue 1995-2009. Pacific
WildLife Foundation.
View
Darling, JD. 2009. Hawaii’s Humpbacks: Unveiling the
mysteries. Granville Island Publishing, Vancouver, BC
Davidson, P., R. W. Butler, A. Couturier, S. Marquez and D.
LePage. 2010. Status and Distribution of Marine Birds and
Mammals in the Southern Gulf Islands, British Columbia. Report
from Bird Studies Canada and Pacific WildLife Foundation.
Esler, D., et al. 2010. Cytochrome P4501A biomarker indication
of oil exposure in harlequin ducks up to 20 years after the
Exxon Valdez oil spill. Environmental Toxicology and
Chemistry 29:1138-1145.
