2016 IRMA Awards
Precious metals!
Lake Superior Magazine earned a couple of precious metals – two bronze awards and one award of merit – at the annual gathering of the International Regional Magazine Association (fondly called “IRMA”) in Florida this year. While we are very proud of any honors we receive, the IRMA awards are particularly sweet because the international competition with other fine regional publications is tough.
A package of stories by former WDIO news anchor Dennis Anderson and former Great Lakes sailor Rick Fowler called “A Night to Remember,” which gave their personal stories on November 10, 1975, the night the Edmund Fitzgerald sank, earned a Bronze in the Historic Feature category. Judges called it “a very interesting story that has the feel of a good storyteller reminiscing.”
The other Bronze, for Annual Publication, was earned by the 2015 Lake Superior Travel Guide, edited by Managing Editor Bob Berg. The magazine is updated annually as a guide for the full Lake Superior Circle Tour. Judges noted, “This magazine covers a wonderful part of our nations.”
In the category of “Nature & Environment,” writer Cheryl Lyn Dybas earned an Award of Merit for her story on the dwindling caribou herds in our region. Judges called “The Last of the Gray Ghosts,” which appeared in the October/November 2015 issue, “an excellent and important piece deserving recognition.”
A big thank you, congratulations and a hearty “Woo Hoo!” for our correspondents and staff.
Difficult wild rice season comes to a close
The “wild” wild rice harvest nearing conclusion proved to be a challenge this year, with most areas around the region reporting seriously low yield, even abysmal in some areas.
“For our on-reservation lakes, we harvested about one-tenth of what we normally do,” reports Thomas Howes, manager of natural resources for the Fond du Lac Band of Lake Superior Chippewa. “This same scenario played out in much of the eastern half of Minnesota. The Brainerd/Aitkin area as well as down south toward Sandstone all suffered from too much rain. The Arrowhead region was slightly better, but still on the lower end of productivity.”
“Our season here in Wisconsin essentially is over now. We’re doing harvest surveys,” says Peter David, a biologist with the Great Lakes Indian Fish & Wildlife Commission in Odanah, Wisconsin. “By all reports, it was below average … probably about half of an average season.”
Some blamed heavy, late-season rains, such as those that caused major flooding around the Bayfield, Wisconsin, peninsula in July, as a cause for the low harvest, which overly saturated the beds and may have contributed to plant disease outbreaks in some areas.
A fluctuation of good and bad years is not unusual, Peter adds, but he worries that climate changes may put the delicate plant at risk. Although not actually rice, wild rice, called manoomin or “the good berry” in the Ojibwe language, is an aquatic grain. The plants reseed every year and have adapted for northern conditions. Heavy rainfall events, like those this summer, can cause disease outbreaks; warm weather, including more mild winters, contributes to fungal flare ups and gives other competing plants advantages over wild rice.
In all three states by Lake Superior, reseeding of wild rice has been taken on by various agencies. Wild rice only grows naturally in the north-central region of the continent, but California has become a powerhouse for commercial growing of the popular grain along with Minnesota. The commercially harvested crops may not suffer the same dramatic fluctuations as wild, but some fear cross-breeding of genetically modified versions with the natural plants. Many, including Martha Stewart, praise the naturally grown and harvested rice as superior in taste.
Find recipes like a Wild Rice Quiche and Glorified Wild Rice (with marshmallows, pineapple and Maraschino cherries – how Midwest is that?) through the manoomin.com website.
Lakes and rivers “In a New Light”
Water can be healing in so many ways – and a new program may have discovered yet another one.
Wisconsin Sea Grant plans to introduce a version of a program titled “In a New Light” that pairs at-risk or troubled youth with underwater photography to aid science research and education. The program started as partnership between the National Park Service and Northwest Passage, a Wisconsin residential treatment program “blending traditional mental health treatment with arts and nature based therapy.” Through New Light, young people with mental health issues were taught diving and photography techniques that they then used to document plants and critters in inland lakes and rivers.
The program has received high praise, both of its helpfulness and for the great photography and chance to teach water science.
When Toben Lafrancois, an aquatic scientist at Northland College in Ashland, Wis., came across the program about four years ago, he says, “I thought, this is what’s missing from getting people to care about the freshwater ecosystem. People need to see under the surface. Scientific presentations and data are fine, but it’s not all that effective in getting people to care about water.”
Sea Grant funding will help to expand the program to Bayfield High School and to the Red Cliff and Lac Court Orielles reservations. The hope is to add Lake Superior to the photo list. Read more about the program on the Sea Grant website and see a YouTube video about New Light.
Coast Guard ends search for missing boaters on Lake Superior: The three boaters never returned from a fishing trip last Saturday. Coast Guard teams searched more than 14,000 square miles around the Keweenaw Peninsula.
Surrender, don’t release, your unwanted non-native pets: Jana Hollingsworth writes in the Duluth News Tribune, “To help solve the problem of people disposing of unwanted fish, reptiles and other aquarium and water garden critters into local lakes, several groups are offering a humane ‘surrender’ event Saturday where the critters can find good homes and stay out of trouble.”
Repowered freighter starts sea trials: Herbert C. Jackson was converted from steam to diesel power at Superior’s Fraser Shipyards. Brady Slater has the story in the Duluth News Tribune.
Nipigon River Bridge report released: The cable-stayed bridge, a critical link on the Trans-Canada Highway, split last winter shortly after opening. According to the province’s official report, repairs and retrofit design work will add $12 million to the cost of the $106 million project, reports Carl Clutchey of theThunder Bay Chronicle-Journal. The bridge’s second span is slated to open next year. Having dual spans should keep traffic flowing should construction or failure limit access to one twin.
New power for Marquette: Three huge natural gas engines arrived in town via barge, reports WLUC-TV. They are part of a plan to reduce the local utility’s reliance on coal.
Thunder Bay group hopes to acquire museum ship: “The Lakehead Transportation Museum Society is trying to bring the former Canadian Coast Guard icebreaker Alexander Henry back home to Thunder Bay,” says Jeff Labine of the Chronicle-Journal.
Backpacker magazine gives props to Northland College: The northern Wisconsin school was named the second-best college for outdoor enthusiasts (just behind the University of Alaska-Fairbanks).
... and Outdoor Photographer featured the Upper Peninsula: Its latest issue has Munising Falls on the cover.
Duluth Pack and Stormy Kromer team up: The northern gear companies collaborated on a collection of bags, caps and mittens. Duluth Pack has been in business since 1882; Stormy Kromer, based Ironwood, Michigan, was established in 1903.