Northern Michigan Conservation Network

“Ballast Water, Shmallast Water.”  Well, at least that’s what some in the Michigan Senate are apparently saying with the introduction of SB-1212.  We’re not sure that there’s much we can add to what has already been written by the Michigan League of Conservation Voters, Drew YoungDyke and others on the topic, but there has been […]

Many natural resource management and conservation services are now being delivered in an entirely different manner than they were just a decade ago.  Since most of these changes and adaptations seemed to happen so incrementally, it went largely unnoticed. What we mean by a “New Conservation Model” is the shift away from agency-driven natural resource […]

One website that recently attracted our interest was the Detroit District U.S. Army Corp of Engineers (USACE) website which tracks historic Great Lakes water levels. Our interest was due, in part, to the concerns and discussions taking place in recent years surrounding the levels of Lakes Huron and Michigan. There is no place where the […]

Although we originally intended to write about this year’s round of MDNR Forestry Open Houses and Compartment Reviews, the timelessness and inherent benefits of this public outreach process seemed to offer potential applications to the way many of our State’s natural resources are managed. During a time when calls for increased accountability, operational “transparency” and […]

Thanks to our friend and site content contributor Marc Smith, we have begun following the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers’ website out of the Chicago District through its Aquatic Nuisance Species Portal – link:  http://www.lrc.usace.army.mil/AsianCarp/eDNA.htm. As many likely know by now, there have been additional positive DNA samplings for Asian Carp in Lake Calumet which […]

Our thanks to Great Lakes Outdoors for this one. June 19, 2012 by greatlakesoutdoors link: http://greatlakesoutdoors.wordpress.com/2012/06/19/asian-carp-swimming-faster-towards-the-great-lakes/ “I just found out that new evidence of Asian carp has been discovered near Lake Michigan. The new test results came back positive for silver carp seventeen times in one day.  That’s right.  Seventeen times! This could be the […]

Our thanks goes to the Traverse City Record Eagle for its recent Editorial on what amounts to the latest shot across our conservation bow again from Senator Casperson.  This time, and pardon the pun, he’s dredged up an old bill but this time has repackaged it as “an effort to combat invasive species.” Right, Tom. […]

Detroit Free Press Editorial – May 19, 2012 Michiganders who love the Great Lakes shoreline will want to keep an especially close eye on their lawmakers as they debate a bill that would stop the Department of Environmental Quality from overseeing what happens on the beaches. This is the return of a battle that was […]

05/01/12 By Mark Spencley Cheboygan Daily News   INDIAN RIVER – The Inland Waterway, a famed walleye fishing destination, will enter the second year of a three-year study looking into all of the factors that affect the fishery’s walleye population. To track the movement of walleye within the waterway, DNR, Tribal and Michigan State University […]

It seems somewhat sadly ironic that at the same time states have struggled to get Federal officials to take the issue of Asian Carp seriously as a threat to the Great Lakes, the northern snakehead is now making its way up the Potomac River.  Let’s just hope that the Maryland DNR’s characterization of this “angling […]