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About The daily Astorian. (Astoria, Or.) 1961-current | View Entire Issue (June 29, 2017)
7A THE DAILY ASTORIAN • THURSDAY, JUNE 29, 2017 Plant: ‘You start dreaming about pulling these things’ Continued from Page 1A Taking root Capital Bureau Legislators have less than two weeks to finish and vote on a transportation package. The plan includes new taxes and fees and increases in other taxes and fees to fund maintenance and improvements to roads, bridges, transit and sidewalks. Transportation: ‘There is bipartisan consensus’ Continued from Page 1A The agreement addresses issues that had previously threatened to undermine the future of the transportation plan. The plan still addresses about eight to 10 years of needs, according to the Gover- nor’s Office. Those included the over- all amount of taxes and spend- ing in the package, what the money went toward and cost controls on the state’s low-car- bon fuels standard, Brown said. “In terms of the low-car- bon fuels standard, that is being institutionalized to bring stability and certainty to the system. I think there is a consensus amongst stake- holders. You’ll see the con- sensus approach as the bill draft comes out,” the gover- nor said. Brown declined to say how the overall amount of the pack- age has changed but said she is excited “about the significant investment we will be making in public transit.” “Suffice it to say there is bipartisan consensus on the levels,” she added. Butterflies: Early blue violets are crucial to life cycle Continued from Page 1A This is the end point of a process called “augmentation” — an ongoing effort to reintro- duce the threatened silverspot butterfly to areas the species disappeared by 1980 by releas- ing caterpillars at specific sites across the state. Last week, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service announced it will release hun- dreds of caterpillars at two new sites this summer and next: the Nestucca Bay National Wild- life Refuge in southern Tilla- mook County and the Saddle Mountain area in central Clat- sop County. Pretty flowers Policeman’s helmet is here because it is pretty. Native to the Himalayas, it was introduced to North America as an ornamental garden plant. But Graeper would much prefer it if you planted something else. Consider columbine, she says, a native perennial that flourishes in the North Coast’s cool, wet climate and pro- duces intricate, brightly col- ored flowers. Policeman’s helmet chokes out native plants, fill- ing up empty spaces or tram- pling what’s already there. Native pollinators — think hummingbirds and honey bees — don’t like it. In addi- tion to reducing plant and animal diversity, police- man’s helmet also increases the risk of streambank ero- sion, according to the land conservancy. The effects of policeman’s Decline The small reddish-or- ange butterflies with their distinctive silver spots were once found on coastal grass- lands from Northern Califor- nia to southern Washington, but development, changes to the forest and invasive weeds and grasses reduced the silver- spots’ preferred habitat. The decline is linked primarily to a lack of early blue violets, “nor- mally the only plant on which the Oregon silverspot can suc- cessfully feed and develop as larva,” according to Fish and Wildlife. These plants are crucial throughout a silverspot’s life cycle. Their presence stim- ulates the female butterflies to lay eggs in the first place. Later, young caterpillars feast on the leaves. By 1980, the butterflies had vanished from at least 11 dif- ferent localities. That same year, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service listed the Oregon sil- verspot as a threatened spe- cies. In Clatsop County, the butterflies were noted at Clat- sop Plains, but the popula- tion has gone down since this discovery. No one has ever docu- mented a silverspot at the Nestucca Bay site, but this area is within the butterfly’s histor- ical range, according to Fish and Wildlife. Why silverspots abandoned Saddle Mountain is mystery. The violets are still there, and thriving. The butter- flies are not. They haven’t been seen there since the 1970s. Nestucca will be the first of the two sites to get this new influx of caterpillars. Next summer, it will be Sad- dle Mountain’s turn. If these sites are successful, as biolo- gists expect they will be, they will bring the overall popula- tion that much closer to recov- ery. Currently, silverspots are established at five sites; the ultimate recovery goal is 10 self-sustaining populations. Abraham Lincoln’s beard The caterpillars that biol- The land conservancy first began to notice the plant at its Circle Creek property, a hab- itat reserve south of Seaside near the Necanicum River. When land stewards and volunteers encoun- tered policeman’s helmet on the property, they pulled the plant up by the roots before it could spread seeds. The seeds are only viable for up to 18 months and regular pulling can easily eliminate police- man’s helmet from an area. But not this time. “It just kept coming back every year and it was get- ting worse and they couldn’t really figure out why,” said Melyssa Graeper, the Neca- nicum Watershed Council coordinator. Then they considered the plant’s unique characteristics. Like many invasive plants, policeman’s helmet is irritat- ingly resilient. Its seed pods can eject seeds up to 20 feet and these seeds don’t have to land in dirt. They can float down waterways until they find soil. The policeman’s helmet had to be coming from some- where upstream, the land con- servancy concluded. And if the plants were taking root at Circle Creek, they were likely becoming a problem along streambanks and properties upstream, too. The Land Conservancy works on property it owns. The Necanicum Watershed Council, by contrast, works with landowners on private property. To nip the growing problem of policeman’s hel- met in the literal bud, the two groups joined forces. The Nestucca Bay National Wildlife Refuge and Saddle Mountain National Estuary Pro- gram study areas. North Coast Land Conservancy Early blue violets grow wild in the Clatsop Plains. The violets are critical to the survival of silverspot butterfly caterpillars. Silverspot butterfly ogists, such as Walker, will release this summer come from labs at Seattle’s Wood- land Park Zoo and Portland’s Oregon Zoo. Scientists collect female butterflies from the large wild population at Mount Hebo in Tillamook County’s Siu- slaw National Forest and bring them to labs at the zoos. Here technicians coax the females into laying eggs. When lar- vae hatch from these eggs, they are so small you could put them next to a penny and they wouldn’t even be as long as Abraham Lincoln’s beard, Walker said. By the time they are released, however, the cat- erpillars are about an inch long. Adapted to the environ- ment, biologists are optimis- tic that caterpillars at Saddle Mountain and Nestucca will succeed, but they also know not all the caterpillars will live long enough to become adult butterflies. “We don’t expect them all to survive,” Walker said. But, she added, “Probably one of their functions within the eco- system is to be food for other things.” Biologists expect to release approximately 3,000 cater- pillars this summer; most will go to the Nestucca res- toration site. Some will seed established sites and the rest will go back to areas where their mothers were collected. helmet can be alarming and discouraging, said Reich, but compared to other invasive weeds Clatsop County deals with, it can be much less of a headache to address. Hope and caution Japanese knotweed is also prevalent here; the best way to deal with it is by using her- bicides. The billowing, enor- mous, yellow-blossomed Scotch broom is another scourge. It is nearly impos- sible to pull older plants by hand and seeds can persist in the soil for decades. Chil- dren not yet born will be car- rying on Graeper and Reich’s work to eradicate these nox- ious weeds. Policeman’s helmet is simpler. It is easy — even fun, say volunteers — to pull the plants out, and the seeds, though highly mobile in the right environment, don’t last as long. Regular land conservancy volunteer Jeff Roehm was out on Wednesday afternoon pull- ing policeman’s helmet with his teenage grandson. He was working in an area that took him six hours to clear last year; yesterday it only took him 10 minutes. To see that kind of progress is motivat- ing, he said. Roehm, who was born in Seaside and lives in Portland, is committed to the cause of maintaining Circle Creek as natural reserve filled with native plants. “You start dreaming about pulling these things,” he said about policeman’s helmet. All of this gives Graeper and Reich hope that after three years, the Necanicum River could be free, or nearly free, of policeman’s helmet. “We could really get in front of the control of this plant,” Reich said. “It’s really more possible to have an effect.” Constant vigilance is nec- essary, though, they caution. Recently, a patch of police- man’s helmet was spotted growing merrily on the side of U.S. Highway 26. Graeper theorizes a boat trailer might be responsible. Volunteers recorded thriv- ing policeman helmet plants all over a boat ramp near the Teevin & Fischer Quarry out- side Seaside. Perhaps, when a fisher- man backed his trailer down the ramp, some policeman’s helmet seeds stuck in the mud ended up clumped between tire treads. Maybe, on his way home after a day on the water, the fisherman pulled over to check the trailer or take a bathroom break. Maybe, Graeper says, those seeds dropped from the mud and found another place to spread. YMCA: Building is a work in progress Continued from Page 1A Weber’s sister, Anna Weber. The studio’s handiwork can be seen in signs and design elements for businesses around Astoria, from the painted sign for Reach Break Brewing on Duane Street to a 10-foot dimensional sign curving around the front cor- ner of Carruthers Restaurant on Commercial Street. Up until 1989, the build- ing was virtually intact. That fall, though, most of the origi- nal windows and lintel details were removed. “It is our goal to restore the entire facade to its origi- nal stature,” Noel Weber said. “It helps that we have his- toric photographs, original blueprints and a few remain- ing architectural sections as reference.” The YMCA is a work in progress, with more work on the interior and exterior coming down the road. Ulti- mately, the Webers hope to open the building up for workshops and a sign shop, among other plans. Joshua Bessex/The Daily Astorian Noel Weber hopes to restore the former YMCA building in downtown Astoria.
