Author:Deborah Carr
May 15 2016

Conserving Endangered Wild Salmon

Articles, Award Winners, Nature & Conservation
by Deborah Carr

(Saltscapes Magazine, Jul/Aug 2016; Atlantic Journalism Awards Silver finalist for Enterprise Reporting)

Volunteer efforts undermined by government apathy (Part 2 of 2)

The 129-kilometre-long Nepisiguit River flows north and east from Nepisiguit Lakes to New Brunswick’s Bay of Chaleur. Today, it’s a healthy river with more than 90 salmon pools, abundant gravel for spawning, and rapids that oxygenize the water.

It wasn’t always like this.

Back in the 70s, when the Nepisiguit was dead due to acid runoff and toxic waste escaping a nearby mining operation, Bob Baker of Bathurst walked every foot of the shoreline to the impressive Nepisiguit Falls and power dam marking the terminus of the salmon’s 28-kilometre journey upriver from the bay. He noted the pools and gravel beds that salmon might frequent.

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Mar 01 2016

Can we save our Salmon?

Articles, Award Winners, Nature & Conservation
by Deborah Carr

(Saltscapes Magazine, Mar/Apr 2016; Silver Atlantic Journalism Award  for Enterprise Reporting)

We’re losing a desperate race against time and long odds and government indifference (Part 1 of 2)

Spring sunshine warms my face as my kayak drifts down the Miramichi River. I pass riffles and salmon pools, downed trees, submerged rocks, and gravelly shallows. Occasionally I hear a splash, or encounter fishermen, braced thigh deep in the water, angling for ‘blacks’ or ‘kelts’ – salmon that, after spawning last fall, have overwintered in the river.

Meandering through this forested river valley, its shoreline peppered with fishing camps and signs posting private pools, it is hard to believe that a healthy salmon population cannot thrive here unaided, but without the dedicated actions of thousands of human caregivers, Atlantic salmon populations would have crashed decades ago due to human interference, negligence and exploitation.

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Aug 01 2015

A Tale of Two Women

Articles, Nature & Conservation, People & Places
by Deborah Carr

(Saltscapes Magazine, Jul/Aug 2015)

New Brunswick has been well served by two dynamic women who worked tirelessly for environmental justice.

In 1962, Rachel Carson’s seminal book, Silent Spring, which explored the links between pesticide use, wildlife mortality, and human cancer, sparked what became a global environmental movement. Educated as a marine biologist, Carson was a reluctant activist compelled by her sense of justice. She wrote to a friend, “Knowing what I do, there would be no future peace for me if I kept silent.”  Carson died of cancer just two years following the book’s publication. Although subjected to vicious attacks by the chemical industry and policy makers before her death, her conviction and work changed history and inspired generations of environmental voices.

New Brunswick’s Dr. Mary Majka and Inka Milewski are two of those voices.

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Mar 01 2015

Natural Learners

Articles, Nature & Conservation
by Deborah Carr

(Saltscapes Magazine, Mar/Apr 2015)

Four-year-old Gabriel Jesso squeals with excitement. He and Joy Munford have been spraying sunscreen in the air and dashing into the cloud. The spray has settled on the ground, revealing a lacy spider’s web. While sunscreen may not be ideal for the spider or its handiwork, Gabriel has made a fascinating discovery and is now spraying elsewhere to see if he can find more webs.

Meanwhile, Jesse Savoie scrambles seven metres up a pine tree, anxious to show off his agility. The lacquered look of the limbs tells the story of many small hands and sneakered feet gaining familiarity with the landscape of this stalwart friend in the forest.

This is Tír na nÓg, an outdoor classroom for pre-schoolers near Sussex, NB, where two days a week children spend their day climbing trees, wading creeks, hiking the hills and daydreaming in wide-open fields of wildflowers. This natural landscape is their teacher and their land of discovery…a playground of innocence and delight within the natural cycles of life and death.

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Nov 15 2012

The Write Stuff

Articles, People & Places, Travel & Tourism
by Deborah Carr

A New Brunswick writer travels to Haiti to help Haitians document their memories and experiences for future generations, and returns with a clearer understanding of the power of words to strengthen, and to heal.

My companions and I sat loose-limbed, our heads bobbing from side to side like dashboard ornaments, as our rental truck inched over rock-face that was more goat path than road. We were six hours into our journey to Mombin Crochu, a village in Haiti’s remote northern mountains, when the truck came to an abrupt halt at the bottom of a gully.

We climbed out and stood mute, regarding the front end. The tires looked cross-eyed.

“We’re done,” announced Rick, after crawling underneath. “This is the end of the road.”

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Aug 01 2012

Light Fantastic

Articles, People & Places, Travel & Tourism
by Deborah Carr

In 2010, Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) declared more than 970 Canadian lighthouses surplus. At the same time, the Parks Canada Heritage Lighthouse Protection Act came into effect, simplifying the process for groups to acquire—and assume responsibility for preserving—lighthouses in their communities. However, in the preceding decades, preservation pioneers often spent years wading through federal bureaucracy, testing their limits of faith, endurance and patience—and this simply for the chance of volunteering more hours restoring, maintaining and operating a lighthouse. But old structures have a way of tugging on heart strings, and...
Jul 15 2012

Free Fallin’

Articles, Nature & Conservation, Travel & Tourism
by Deborah Carr

I remember my first trek into Walton Glen gorge and falls along the Bay of Fundy coast, partway between Alma and St. Martins. In particular, I recall the magical sense of wonder and adventure as I navigated inland from the cobble and sand beach where we had camped for the night. Entering the impressive Walton Glen gorge with its 30 to 60m high walls, all sound save the brook’s gentle gurgle fell away. For a moment, I stood still in this cleft of rock, breathing reverence.

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Aug 16 2011

Falcons of Fundy

Articles, Nature & Conservation
by Deborah Carr

They’re called ‘the wanderers’, from the Latin peregrinus meaning ‘coming from foreign parts’.

So named for their lengthy migratory tendencies, the fascinating Falco peregrinus or peregrine falcon has once more resumed its wandering along the shores of the Bay of Fundy…thanks to a little help from some friends.

Making a slow, but remarkable comeback from the threat of extinction, the peregrine was upgraded by the Committee on the Status of Endangered Wildlife in Canada (COSEWIC) from an ‘endangered species’, so designated in 1978, to a ‘threatened species’ in 1999.  By the next review, the Canadian Wildlife Service is hopeful the status will once again upgraded, this time to ‘special concern’.

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Aug 16 2011

It’s in the Genes

Articles, Nature & Conservation
by Deborah Carr

excerpted from Atlantic Salmon Journal, Winter 2004 / photography and text © Deborah Carr 2004

Birthed in an era that predates the Ice Age, the waters of the Upper Salmon River in Fundy National Park have tumbled over massive rock outcroppings, carved deep pools, then meandered along more gentle grades to the Bay of Fundy for untold millennia.

Standing on the bank of the river named for its once plentiful bounty, park eco-scientist Renee Wissink exhibits a curious mingling of sadness and optimism.  His quiet gaze traces the river’s current where clear water persistently polishes a riverbed of smooth multi-coloured rubble, the geological remnants of ancient mountains that once could rival the Canadian Rockies. The late summer sun filters through a canopy of green, casting dancing shadows on the rippled surface.

This should be salmon heaven.

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Aug 16 2011

A Symphony Takes Flight

Articles, Nature & Conservation
by Deborah Carr

There are defining moments in life, when one is truly humbled and finally able to grasp their place in the world as a participant, an observer, a protector…this one was mine.

Moving as if to the sweep of a conductor’s baton, they flow off the beach like a tide of liquid mercury, then swoop into the air, a darkly ribboned smudge against the August sky.

As if on prearranged cue, they bank as one and the flock metamorphoses, revealing the flashing white of ten thousand underbellies caught in the glory of the setting sun. A dance of precision and grace.

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