A Couple Just Gave Away Their Property For Free To Help Save Grizzly Bears In BC

A couple from Bella Coola, B.C., just donated their riverfront property to Nature Conservancy of Canada to protect the thriving wildlife in the area.

© Provided by Narcity

Morgan Leet 

The generous couple, Harvey and Carol Thommasen, bought their property a few years ago and wanted to make it a bird sanctuary, but have now chosen to give it away to help keep it safe.

The beautiful property, which is in the traditional, unceded territory of the Nuxalk Nation, spans 122 hectares and is now called the Snowshoe Creek Conservation Area, according to a press release from the Nature Conservancy of Canada.

Iris Siwallace, a councillor for the Nuxalk Nation said in the release that the area "could be destroyed by extractive industries such as logging and mining," which is why they worked with the couple and the NCC to help protect it.

The couple made the donation in the hopes of preserving all of the amazing wildlife there, which would be threatened by these industries.

They are now able to maintain a "thriving rainforest, floodplain and riverside habitat that supports an abundance of wildlife and plant diversity," said the release.

Grizzly bears are known to roam the area, as well as 15 different species that have been put on the federal Species at Risk Act. This includes wolverines, which are listed as a special concern in SARA's Schedule 1.

The area is within the Bella Coola Valley, which as a whole has an amazing amount of grizzly bears. There are actually so many that tourists will travel there to take grizzly watching tours, especially during the season when the salmon is running through.

Harvey Thommasen | Nature Conservancy of Canada

"Carol and I donated this land to the Nature Conservancy of Canada mostly to help forest birds, whose populations have declined by 30 per cent since the 1970s," said Henry Thommasen.

It will also "provide a secure travel corridor for animals like deer, grizzly bear and other large mammals moving through the Bella Coola Valley," he added.

Harvey Thommasen | Nature Conservancy of Canada

Not only is the land home to these animals, but it is also stunning.

The SEC wants to crack down on corporate insiders' big stock sales
prosen@insider.com (Phil Rosen) 

Securities and Exchange Commission Chair Gary Gensler. 

Evan Vucci/Associated Press

The SEC unanimously proposed an amendment to insider-trading rules that cover so-called 10b5-1 plans.

The new rules are meant to bring more transparency to the market and crack down on insider-trading abuses.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren and others have long been vocal in calling out the SEC to make changes to 10b5-1 plans.

The Securities and Exchange Commission proposed changes to insider-trading regulations that would limit how corporate executives — who are often privy to non-public information — can sell shares of their own companies.

Currently, executives are allowed to schedule stock sales days ahead of their actual execution, under so-called 10b5-1 plans. When they were conceived two decades ago, the plans were supposed to allow execs to sell stock without being accused of insider trading.

Morgan Stanley data showed that insiders at more than half of S&P 500 companies have enacted 10b5-1 plans, and doing so has grown increasingly popular. But critics say the plans have been abused, allowing insiders to dump shares ahead of big company moves or announcements. In addition, there's no requirement for executives to disclose they have such plans.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren and others have called on the SEC to overhaul 10b5-1 plans, claiming corporate chiefs can bag profits with privileged knowledge that everyday retail traders don't have, and that it undermines public confidence in the market.

SEC Chair Gary Gensler acknowledged the problems in a press release Wednesday. "Over the past two decades, we've heard concerns about and seen gaps in Rule 10b5-1 — gaps that today's proposal would help fill."

Under the amendments to Rule 10b5-1 that the SEC unanimously proposed, company insiders would have to wait about four months between scheduling a trade and shedding their stock.

The proposed amendments also would prohibit overlapping trading plans and limit single-trade plans to one per year. Additionally, executives would be required to attest that they were not aware of any non-public information when they made plans for trades.

The SEC will now seek public comment before finalizing its proposals.

Freakish fish with transparent head captured in mind-blowing viral video
Joshua Hawkins 

© Provided by BGR barreleye fish in the ocean

Researchers with the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute have captured video of a fish that can see through its own head. It’s known as a barreleye fish and has rarely been seen in the past.

The MBARI researchers managed to capture video of the barreleye fish earlier this month. The video was captured thousands of feet below the surface of Monterey Bay, off California. According to the institute, this is one of only nine times that it has managed to spot the species.

Footage of the barreleye fish is rare

© Provided by BGR a barreleye fish swims in the ocean

Looks at the barreleye fish are rare, MBARI says. When it managed to spot the fish, the institute’s remotely operated vehicle (ROV) was cruising at around 2,132 feet. The researchers were exploring the Monterey Submarine Canyon. The canyon is one of the deepest found on the Pacific coast (via Live Science).

Thomas Knowles, one of the senior aquarists at the Monterey Bay Aquarium told Live Science that he immediately knew what he was looking at. He says that he saw it in the distance at first, and it was very small. Despite the size, though, the fish was unmistakable.

Knowles also says that the control room buzzed with excitement as the ROV camera brought the barreleye fish into focus. In the video that MBARI shared, you can see how the barreleye fish’s eyes glow bright green in the light from the ROV. It’s a striking sight, especially against the calm blue of the ocean.
Eyes that see through a translucent head

Part of what makes the barreleye fish so intriguing is the way its eyes literally see through its forehead. The eyes can be moved straight ahead or directly up. There are two dark-colored capsules that sit in front of the eyes, too. These capsules act as the fish’s sense of smell.

Barreleye fish can be found in their natural habitat from the Bering Sea to Japan and in Baja California. Because they are found in the ocean’s “twilight zone”, which is roughly 650 to 3,300 feet, there’s no real number on just how many barreleyes there are in the world. MBARI has been getting lucky with its discoveries lately. Just earlier this month it captured footage of a massive phantom jellyfish.

Another scientist with MBARI told Live Science that they encounter barreleye fish less commonly than other twilight zone fish. Other fish found in these areas include the lanternfish and bristlemouth.

The post Freakish fish with transparent head captured in mind-blowing viral video appeared first on BGR.

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Rare monstrous-looking fish washes ashore on San Diego beach

Lynn Chaya 

A rare deep-sea creature was discovered washed ashore on Swami’s Beach in Encinitas, San Diego last week, the third incident of its kind in the past year.

© Provided by National Post

Lifeguards on duty alerted local scientists when a strolling surfer stumbled upon the 33 centimetre fish, said David Huff, a marine safety sergeant with the city of Encinitas. The pristine specimen was handed over to the collection manager of marine vertebrates at UC San Diego’s Scripps Institution of Oceanography, Ben Frable.

“I first found out about anglerfish from an educational video game on Windows ’95 back in elementary school, so it’s pretty exciting,” said the collection manager.

Scientifically known as Himantolophus sagamius, the Pacific footballfish, a rare species of anglerfish, swims between 300 and 1,500 metres beneath the surface. This particular species inhabits deep waters beyond the sun’s reach, the scientist said. The dangling bioluminescent light on top of its head acts as a lure to attract prey into its razor sharp tooth-filled mouth.

Frable said that only 31 anglerfish specimens are known to exist worldwide and the fish has never been observed in the wild. Curiously, however, the creature has has made three appearances on the shores of Southern California in the last year alone.

“It is pretty amazing that we’ve had three just in the past year and in Southern California alone because before that, the last time it happened in California, at least that we were aware of, that somebody saw and brought to scientists was 20 years ago today,” said Frable.

Jay Beiler, the man who stumbled upon the same species on Black’s Beach just a few weeks prior, told NBC “it’s the stuff of nightmares.”

Very little information has been collected due to its rarity, bewildering scientists. Basic data such as the fish’s diet, its reproduction systems or why they’ve been coincidentally washing ashore in Southern California are unknown.

“Unfortunately, we don’t really know why. We have such little information and so few data points that we can’t really make a determination,” Frable said.

“I’m chatting with colleagues who study coastal oceanography, talking to other colleagues that work on anglerfishes and other fish, and we’re having a little chat trying to figure out, to come up with any ideas. But with these three data points, we can’t really draw any conclusions.”

The deep-sea creature will be preserved in a jar of alcohol and stored with two million other fish specimens at the Scripps Institute.

B.C.’s ‘southern resident’ orcas have been wandering far from home. Could this be the end?

Bill Donahue 13 hrs ago

© Provided by Maclean's Orcas in the Southern Resident Killer Whale endangered J Pod play in the Salish Sea at sunset on Aug. 4, 2018, off Vancouver Island, B.C. (Richard Ellis/Alamy)

Orcas in the Southern Resident Killer Whale endangered J Pod play in the Salish Sea at sunset on Aug. 4, 2018, off Vancouver Island, B.C. (Richard Ellis/Alamy)

It’s one of the most jubilant rites of summer. When the world’s most famous contingent of killer whales, the J pod, comes swimming through the Salish Sea, off the southern tip of Vancouver Island, the animals churn along in a tight pack, the water frothing about them as they arc low under the surface and then vault skyward, their giant black-and-white torsos glistening and dapper, as though they’d donned tuxedos for the cotillion.There are currently 24 whales in the J pod, a group cohered by lifelong ties and led in procession, almost always, by its eldest females. Weighing over four tonnes apiece and still possessed of a Fred Astaire grace, these creatures chitter and call to one another as they ride the cold sea. Nearby, on sandy shorelines packed with tourists bearing binoculars, on docks and on ferries bound for Vancouver, the whales’ adoring public scans the water for rock stars. For each J podder has an almost human charisma. These whales are sociable like us, and they’re defined by their stories. According to legend, J2, also known as Granny, lived to the age of 105 before her 2017 death. (It’s a scientifically weak legend: she was actually more like 65, but still.) In 2018, J35, also known as Tallequah, grieved by towing her dead calf through the water for 17 days and 1,000 miles.

For decades, J-pod observers have relied on the whales to appear on the Salish almost daily from May through September. Last summer, though, the pod was absent from the area for an unprecedented 108 straight days, raising fraught questions: would they ever come back? Will we see the J pod plying the waters off Vancouver Island in 2022?

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The short answer to both questions is yes, the beloved whales will surely be back this coming summer. Late in the summer, that is—if Vegas were taking bets, you’d do well to predict an Aug. 31 arrival. But how many more years they’ll be around is in question, while another population of killer whales will be on the sea as well. To the uninitiated, the transient orcas look the same as the residents. They too are black-and-white giants, but half again as big, with pointier dorsal fins and a more sinister aura. They move in small packs of three to six, stealthily, making almost no noise so that they can swoop into coves and bays and catch seals and sea lions unawares. The transients are well-fed and thriving.

The J pod, meanwhile, faces an uncertain future. It seems unlikely that they’ll be on the Salish Sea 30 or 40 years from now, and the group may perish altogether by the end of the century. It is, in any case, perilously small these days, for reasons pertaining to diet. The J pod, which ranges as far south as southern Oregon, subsists exclusively on the Pacific coast’s most iconic fish, the oily, fat-rich salmon. Indeed, an average J podder needs to gobble about 20 chinook salmon a day, and the chinook—an anadromous fish that grows up in rivers, then migrates to the sea—is in steep decline.

The rivers the chinook live in, the veins of British Columbia and the U.S. Northwest, are bruised. Over the past century, intensive logging has robbed them of cool, shaded backwaters in which salmon spawn. Climate change has exacerbated the water’s warming and, worst of all, hundreds of hydroelectric dams, most of them built amid the mid-20th-century craze for taming nature, now choke the region’s river system, restricting the chinook’s movement to and from the ocean.

READ: What does it take to move a rotting whale carcass? Glute strength and Vicks VapoRub.

Since 2013, the J pod has been straying from the Salish Sea because its largest adjacent river, the Fraser, has all but gone dry of spring and early summer chinook. As other rivers likewise lose salmon, despair thickens amid the J-pod faithful. It settles most heavily on perhaps the whales’ oldest human advocate.

Ken Balcomb, 81, has been tracking killer whales on the Salish Sea since 1976. He founded the Center for Whale Research in 1985, and for 35 years the group’s headquarters was Balcomb’s ramshackle cedar-shingled house on Washington’s San Juan Island, just across the binational Salish from Victoria.

White-bearded and hulking, with a quiet, scratchy voice, Balcomb arrived on the Salish after the whales had endured carnage. Up until the 1960s, salmon fishers shot at the sea’s southern resident whales—along with the J pod, this includes their close cousins in the genetically distinct K and L pods. Marine parks rounded up the orcas for stunt shows. They employed chase boats to corral the whales into bays, and then drove them into nets by throwing underwater “seal bombs” behind them.

MORE: An abandoned U.S. dam is blocking fish from B.C.’s Similkameen River—and key spawning ground

In Balcomb’s early years on the Salish Sea, the combined population of the J, K and L pods actually climbed. It stood at 98 in 1995. Now it’s at 74. “We’re looking at the bottom of the barrel,” Balcomb says. “The whales are skinny now. Have you ever been around a horse that’s nothing but skin and bones? That’s how they look.”

It’s the gauntness that worries Balcomb most, not the J pod’s semi defection from the Salish Sea. As he describes it in his trademark plain language, J-pod fans are a bit misguided, nostalgically connecting the pod to the Salish Sea, for the animals have never carried any particular loyalty to that body of water. “They go there for the food,” Balcomb says, “not the sights.” Another whale researcher, Michael Weiss, also with the Center for Whale Research, explains the J pod’s early summer absence on the Salish this way: “If all the grocery stores and restaurants in your town closed, you’d probably move too.”

The J pod is now desperately improvising. Early last summer, it was spotted several times on Swiftsure Bank, a spot in the open ocean that straddles the U.S.-Canada border just west of Vancouver Island, and is aswim during the summers with chinook travelling to and from disparate rivers. The whales returned to the Salish Sea on Aug. 31 because the Fraser’s late-summer chinook run is still doing OK, and for a little over half of September, the Salish was able to float the J-pod meal plan.

© Provided by Maclean's The J-pod resident orcas gather in the Salish Sea ( Marli Wakeling/Alamy)

Over the coming years, the J pod could travel anywhere between northern Vancouver Island and southern Oregon in its search for food. In so doing, it would be emulating the K and L pods, which have always been less “resident” on the Salish Sea. And at least one cetologist thinks there could be hope in the whales’ adaptability. “They’re doing what they need to do to find fish,” says Monika Wieland Shields, director of the Washington-based Orca Behavior Institute. “We hope their new patterns help them to grow their population, but we don’t know if they have found something better to sustain them, and we’re waiting to see how effective their geographical shift will be at helping them increase the population.”


READ: The goldfish invasion of Hamilton Harbour

Meanwhile, a dark music plays in the background. In their current emaciated state, the J pod’s females are having great difficulty bringing calves to term. Roughly two-thirds of J pod pregnancies have failed since 2000, and of the 19 calves that have been born since 2010, only six have been female. The lopsided sex ratio may be caused by pollution. “There are PCBs in the food chain,” Shields explains, referencing a family of chemicals that still lingers in nature, even though it was banned in the late 1970s. “These toxins accumulate in whales’ blubber, and when they don’t have enough food, they survive on the fat stores in the blubber. That affects the endocrine system, so the whales have a bias toward male offspring.”

Shields continues: “We’re at the tipping point. If we fail to give these whales the fish they need to successfully reproduce, we will not get the next generation of breeders.”

In 2018, Ottawa pledged to spend $61.5 million to help the southern residents, and since then it’s been building chinook hatcheries, restoring habitat for the fish and hiring Coast Guard enforcement officers to make ships slow down on the Salish Sea to mitigate whale stress as well as ship strikes on these marine mammals. “They’re spending a lot of money,” Shields says, “with very little results.”


MORE: At the Calgary Zoo, the camels watch the people

Whale experts concur that the optimal fix for the J pod’s woe? is a radical one: widespread dam removal, a freeing up of rivers so that chinook can once again gush into the sea. In his wildest dreams, Ken Balcomb envisions the detonation of all 14 of the hydroelectric dams constricting the region’s mightiest river, the Columbia, where up to 16 million salmon and steelhead once spawned every year.

But the Columbia’s dams are fixtures of the U.S. Northwest economy. They’re not moving anytime soon, so the J pod’s hopes lie upstream, on the Columbia’s largest tributary, the Snake River, whose lower reaches are home to four aging concrete dams, all of them situated in the high desert of eastern Washington state. In 2019, Idaho Republican Congressman Mike Simpson joined environmentalists in calling for their removal. Simpson released a $42.7-billion demolition plan.

Shields says, “I can see those dams coming down in 10 to 20 years.” But a freed Snake River is far from inevitable, and it wouldn’t bring the J pod back to the Salish Sea anyway. It would shift these whales south, toward where the Columbia River meets the Pacific; it would also leave them hungry, if it happened in isolation.

READ: A B.C. mountain goat was the unlikely champion in a match against a grizzly

The J pod needs many more miracles to happen before it can fatten up and flourish. It needs other rivers to shed their dams, too, and it needs rivers like the Fraser to somehow shrug off the scars of development—the vast parking lots by the banks, the car washes trickling toxic suds down into what was once salmon habitat.

For now, this storied pod of whales, once the Salish Sea’s home team, has become a lean and hungry gang of freelancers searching the ocean for food that, increasingly, may not be there. And last September, as the days became shorter and the nights cooler—and as the J pod’s fans scooped up their binoculars and took to the seashore—a sad question lingered: could we be nearing the end for the J pod? Have these vaunted whales already commenced their long goodbye?

Surgeons in New York Successfully Transplant Pig Kidneys to Two People


Scientists are inching closer to a major breakthrough in organ donation. This week, researchers at New York University announced that they transplanted a pig kidney to a human for the second time with no short-term issues, following their initial success two months earlier. Clinical trials of this technology are likely still a while away, though.

© Photo: Nicolas Asfouri/AFP (Getty Images)

The procedure was performed in late November by a surgical team at NYU Langone Health. As with the first procedure, the doctors transplanted a kidney from a genetically modified pig into a living human body. The kidney wasn’t attached to its normal position in the body, but to blood vessels in the upper leg. It was then covered with a protective shield as the researchers observed it for 54 hours. During those hours, the kidney seemed to function as normal and no signs of rejection from the person’s body were detected.

The first transplant, performed in September, involved a human recipient considered to be brain-dead who was about to be taken off life-support; the recipient’s family agreed to help with the research. This time, according to the team’s announcement, the recipient was a functionally dead organ donor who was being maintained on a ventilator. The donor was found with the help of LiveOnNY, a nonprofit group that has reportedly enrolled 6.5 million organ donors in the greater New York City area.

“We have been able to replicate the results from the first transformative procedure to demonstrate the continued promise that these genetically engineered organs could be a renewable source of organs to the many people around the world awaiting a life-saving gift,” said lead surgeon Robert Montgomery, director of the NYU Langone Transplant Institute, in a statement from the university.

Animal-to-human transplantation, or xenotransplantation, has been a long-sought goal in medicine. One of the many challenges facing these transplants is that the organs of even closely related mammal species can have subtle but important differences that would quickly lead to rejection by the host body. One major limitation of donated pig organs is that pigs (and many other mammals) naturally produce a sugar called alpha-gal, which humans do not. But the pigs used by the NYU team were genetically engineered by Revivicor, a subsidiary of United Therapeutics Corporation, to not produce alpha-gal—in theory making them safe for human use.

Though xenotransplantation is controversial, opinion polls have suggested that most would accept the technology if it became widely available. For now, though, that possibility is still far off. Both surgeries were part of an ongoing research project by NYU to test the feasibility of their approach, and further studies will be needed to justify the leap to trials involving actual patients who would benefit from donation. But should all this work pay off, xenotransplantation could save the lives of many Americans who die annually while languishing on the transplant waiting list.

“With additional study and replication, this could be the path forward to saving many thousands of lives each year,” Montgomery said.

UCP TREATS ADDICTION AS A CRIME

Edmonton outreach groups to come together to stand in solidarity with people who use substances

NOT A MEDICAL CONDITION

Edmonton community outreach groups, families, people with lived and living experience, and health care providers are coming together Thursday afternoon to stand in solidarity with people use substances.

© Provided by Edmonton Journal Pedestrians make their way past a sticker raising awareness about opioids in an alley near 81 Avenue and Calgary Trail, in Edmonton Friday May 28, 2021.

Attendees are aiming to send a message that as drug poisoning deaths continue to increase and the illegal drug supply becomes more toxic and unpredictable, current drug laws continue to amplify suffering and more harm reduction services are needed.

“In light of the reality on the ground, it is absolutely necessary for us as Community Outreach groups to come together to support the community to collaborate and provide support for people affected by this poisoning crisis to help keep people safer and healthier, but most importantly alive,” said Shanell Twan, of Canadian Association of People Who Use Drugs in a news release.

Between 2 p.m. and 6 p.m., volunteers will be on hand to provide warm clothes, drinks, and food for attendees on the northside of 106 Avenue between 96 and 95 Street N.W.

Experienced volunteers will also be on standby to respond to overdoses and promote safety. Overdose response training will also be provided and naloxone distributed.

Following the event, outreach teams will go into neighbourhoods to provide safer use supplies and distribute naloxone.

According to the latest provincial data, between January and August of this year, 1,026 Albertans died of a drug poisoning. A total of 378 Edmontonians have died so far this year from a drug poisoning.

“By adopting a robust community response including outreach, harm reduction, and advocacy, we can end the drug overdose and poisoning claiming far too many of our neighbours,” the release states.

National modelling suggests Canada's opioid overdose crisis could worsen through 2022

OTTAWA — The latest data from a federal special advisory committee on opioid overdoses shows that opioid-related deaths could remain high and even increase in the next six months.

In a statement released today, co-chairs Dr. Theresa Tam and Dr. Jennifer Russell said that the number of deaths and hospitalizations related to opioids remained high in the first half of 2021.

On average, 19 people died and 16 people were hospitalized due to opioid-related overdoses every day.

They added that more than half of opioid-related deaths also involved the use of a stimulant like cocaine or methamphetamine, which underscores how the overdose crisis is tied to the consumption of more than one drug at once.

The data suggests that the people most affected by the overdose crisis are men, people aged 20 to 49, and those who live in Western Canada and Ontario.

Tam, Canada's chief public health officer, and Russell, New Brunswick's chief medical officer of health, said current projections suggest that between 1,200 and 2,000 people could die during each quarter through to June 2022.

They said the modelling projections highlight the importance of working collectively to prevent harms from substance use and help people who use drugs to access supports.

Actions that can address this problem include improved access to naxolone, supervised consumption sites and safer supply programs, said Tam and Russell.

"While harm reduction interventions are essential, we must not lose sight of the importance of the broader conditions that impact substance use," they said.

They pointed to the broader context in which substance use takes place, saying that efforts like ensuring affordable housing for all, fostering social connection within communities, and supporting positive child and youth development can help prevent substance use-related harms.

Tam and Russell called on jurisdictions to work together on improving how they share and compare data, so that decision-makers have the evidence needed to inform policies and programs.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 15, 2021.

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This story was produced with the financial assistance of the Facebook and Canadian Press News Fellowship.

Erika Ibrahim, The Canadian Press

Alabama judge surprises civil rights pioneer after clearing her arrest record

David Begnaud 


Judge Calvin Williams of Montgomery, Alabama, wasn't born yet when 15-year-old Claudette Colvin was arrested for refusing to give up her seat on a bus. But he says he benefited from the civil rights pioneer. And it's not lost on him that he is now the one – 66 years later – who was able to expunge the record of that incident and clear her name. 

"I want to thank you for your courage. Your courageous act. I want to, on behalf of myself and all of the judges in Montgomery, offer my apology for an injustice that was perpetrated upon you," Williams said sitting next to Colvin in an exclusive interview with "CBS Mornings."

"What Miss Colvin did has such great significance. And that's because it holds such great symbolism," he continued.

"When she did this in 1955, there were no African American judges in Montgomery. And now, I'm one of several African American judges in Montgomery. And so, the remarkable thing is that I sit in a position to look and do something judicious in a judicious way to correct an injustice that was perpetrated against her so long ago that never should have happened. That's the uniqueness of this whole circumstance. That she stood up for right, and now I'm the beneficiary and byproduct of that and I can correct the wrong that was done to her. That's the significance of it."

© Provided by CBS News Judge Calvin Williams meets Claudette Colvin after he had her arrest record expunged. / Credit: CBS News

Colvin knew of the ruling that her name had been cleared. But she didn't know Judge Williams — and had never seen him.

"I'm so glad I'm sitting next to the judge. And he's colored," said Colvin. "No, it doesn't matter what color you are. Righteous is righteous."

Asked if she didn't know the judge was African American, Colvin replied, "No, I thought he was Caucasian."

She told Williams that she wants to ensure that Black children aren't treated unfairly because of their race.

Williams responded: "Thanks to you they won't. They will be treated fairly."

Williams told Colvin, "You are a hero. To all of us."

Judge stays prosecution of man accused of trying to spy for China

OTTAWA — A judge has stayed criminal proceedings against a man accused of breaching Canada's secrets law because of an unreasonable delay in bringing the matter to trial.

 

Ontario Superior Court Justice Michael Dambrot delivered the ruling in a brief hearing Wednesday, ending Qing Quentin Huang's long-running case unless the Crown decides to appeal.

It has been eight years since Huang was arrested in Burlington, Ont., following an RCMP-led investigation called Project Seascape.

Huang, an employee of Lloyd’s Register, a subcontractor to Irving Shipbuilding Inc., was charged under the Security of Information Act with attempting to communicate secrets to China.

Police said the information related to elements of the federal shipbuilding strategy.

The engineer's trial in Ontario court was delayed by disputes over disclosure of information in the case that played out in Federal Court, the venue for deciding how much sensitive material can be kept under wraps.

"Eight years is too long to bring a person to trial. We repeatedly asked the government to speed up the case. We could not get the government to treat the case with urgency," said Samara Secter, a lawyer for Huang.

"The only one who was in a hurry to have his trial here was Mr. Huang."

Through Secter and her colleague Frank Addario, Huang said Wednesday it was "a big relief for me that the case is over."

"I felt very alone during the case, no one was on my side except my lawyers."

The Public Prosecution Service of Canada said it was awaiting Dambrot's written reasons for the decision and would review them once they are released.

In Federal Court, Huang had pressed for release of additional portions of a heavily redacted affidavit and warrant that authorized the Canadian Security Intelligence Service to intercept telecommunications at the Chinese Embassy in Ottawa.

Huang was not a target of the warrant and had never been under CSIS investigation.

However, the spy service advised the RCMP of phone calls Huang allegedly made to the embassy and claimed he "offered to provide Canadian military secrets" to the Chinese government. That prompted the police investigation resulting in Huang’s arrest.

Huang contended the warrant opened the door to a breach of his charter guarantee against unreasonable search and seizure.

In September 2020, the Crown dropped part of the case against Huang by staying two of four counts.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 15, 2021.

Jim Bronskill, The Canadian Press

Hay West [program saves 17,000 cattle, but herds still being culled due to drought

CALGARY — A program that helps farmers in Eastern Canada ship hay to drought-affected farmers on the Prairies has saved 17,000 head of cattle, but a national farm organization said even its best efforts won't be enough to mitigate all the losses from last summer's extreme weather.

Mary Robinson, president of the Canadian Federation of Agriculture (CFA), said on Wednesday that 5.6 million pounds of livestock feed so far have been shipped from the Maritimes, Ontario and Quebec (where growing conditions were good this year) to struggling Western ranchers and farmers.

A total of 75 farms have received the donated or supplied-at-cost feed, through what is called the Hay West program.

However, Robinson said last summer's drought — the worst in 60 years on the Prairies — shriveled crops and dried up pastures so extensively that estimates place the total shortfall of hay for livestock in Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba at four million tonnes.

"The deficit of hay in the West is huge," she said. "The shortage well exceeds our capacity. We're never going to be able to move enough hay to save every animal in Western Canada."

Already, some farmers have been forced to cull their herds due to fears they won't be able to feed them through the winter. Robinson declined to comment on how many animals across Canada may have been culled so far due to drought, but said there will be long-term ramifications.

"As herds take years to build up, this culling has the very likely potential to have long-term effects on Canada’s food production," she said.

The CFA, which administers the Hay West program, has up to 100 million tonnes of hay on offer from Eastern farmers that is available to be shipped. But Robinson said the organization hasn't shipped any hay at all in the last month, due to a lack of funding to cover the freight costs. She said the organization is actively seeking more corporate and private donations to the program in order to speed up shipments.

Robinson — whose voice shook as she described stories she's heard of "bony animals at auction marts" across the Prairies — said the CFA is prioritizing farms that have valuable breeding stock as well as "farms that have water" when it decides where to ship the hay.

Last month, Canadian Cattlemen's Association president Bob Lowe said having feed is of no benefit if farmers don't have water for their animals. A recent report from the government of Saskatchewan warned that dugout, slough and well levels are low" across that province and that "there are concerns about livestock water supplies."

“It gets pretty emotional. It’s difficult for people to talk about," Robinson said

On Wednesday, the federal government announced it is pledging an additional $3 million to Hay West, after committing $1 million earlier this fall. The CFA had previously requested up to $6 million in federal funding for the program.

At a news conference in Ottawa, federal Agriculture Minister Marie-Claude Bibeau said she visited farms and ranches this year where crops had withered where they stood and fields were infested with grasshoppers.

“It is heartbreaking to hear the stories of grave loss and hardship experienced by these farmers," Bibeau said, adding the federal government "will not rest until our farmers are back on their feet."

Hay West is also exploring the possibility of shipping hay to B.C., where recent rainfall and flooding have impacted producers there. Bibeau said the federal government expects to have an agricultural disaster relief program available for farmers in that province within weeks.

The report by The Canadian Press was first published Dec. 15, 2021.

Amanda Stephenson, The Canadian Press

UNESCO puts Haitian soup on cultural heritage list

PARIS (AP) — The United Nations cultural agency on Thursday placed a traditional Haitian soup widely seen as a symbol of the nation's independence on its prized intangible cultural heritage list.

Joumou soup is “so much more than just a dish,” said Audrey Azoulay, the director-general of UNESCO. “It tells the story of the heroes and heroines of Haitian independence, their struggle for human rights and their hard-won freedom.”

The squash-based soup became a symbol of things long forbidden to slaves under French domination until Haiti gained independence on Jan.1, 1804, as the first nation created by insurgent Black slaves.

They celebrated their freedom by finally consuming the soup and Haitians traditionally serve it on New Year’s Day to commemorate the anniversary of liberation from slavery.

UNSECO said its Intangible Cultural Heritage Committee awarded Joumou soup protected status at its meeting on Thursday.

The intangible heritage list aims to improve the visibility of traditions and know-how of communities around the world, ranging from Arabic calligraphy to Italian truffle hunting.

Other Caribbean traditions honored include Jamaica's reggae music, recognized in 2018 because it represents “a vehicle of social commentary.”

The Associated Press

History of the Stone Soup Folktale from 1720 to Now

https://stonesoup.com/.../history-of-the-stone-soup-story-from-1720-to-now

The Stone Soup story revolves around a clever man with a charismatic personality who can get people to help him when their first instinct is not to. This is the aspect of the story that folklorists have focused on. Folklorists place the Stone Soup story within the “clever man” category of the Aarne-Thompson-Uther folklore classification system that they use to organize the entire folkloric tradition.