Novelist Eyes A TV Deal

ALASKA’S MOST FAMOUS fictional detective may soon make a TV debut.

Alaska novelist Dana Stabenow, author of 17 Kate Shugak mysteries, is working with Anchorage-based production company Evergreen Films Inc. to develop a television series, the Anchorage Daily News reported.

Stabenow said she will make sure the series is as authentic as possible, including being fi lmed in Alaska.The 57-year-old, Alaska-born bestselling author has turned down six-fi gure offers to bring her Shugak books to the silver screen and had Kate Jackson and Demi Moore interested in playing Kate, the Daily News said.But she has turned down any offer that did not include filming in-state.

Movie and television producers do not like Alaska for fi lming because they say it is too remote, too rustic and too expensive.The cost barrier was reduced recently when Alaska began to offer tax breaks designed to lure filmmakers.

The deal with Evergreen is just the fi rst step in a long process that includes securing fi nancial backing, making a pilot episode, securing distribution rights, and hiring screenwriters and a cast, but Evergreen reports that it expects to start production by summer or fall, according to the Daily News. Stabenow will be heavily involved in the screenwriting end of the project, translating her books into hour-long television episodes.

COURTESY ALASKA SHOREZONE PROJECT

The Alaska ShoreZone Project plans to photograph the entire coast of Alaska. Halfway to its goal, the project has documented more than 28,000 miles of coastline in 33 million images.

Photos Document shores

The Alaska shore Zone Project is attempting to chronicle the entire Alaska coastline in photographs, and has already documented more than 28,000 miles of coast along Southeast Alaska, the northern Gulf of Alaska, Prince William Sound, Kodiak and Bristol Bay.With 33 million images on hand, it is more than halfway into its goal of videotaping and photographing all of Alaska’s estimated 46,882 miles of coastline, according to a report in the Dutch Harbor Fisherman newspaper.

Images are shot at low tide, and from low altitudes for a bird’s-eye view. Visitors to the ShoreZone Web site (www.fakr.noaa.gov/ maps) can watch video shot from aircraft flying along the coastline, and view and download high-resolution photographs—all free.

The ShoreZone project is being funded by a group of 41 entities that include industry groups, nongovernmental organizations, tribal groups and local, state and federal agencies.Organizers say they hope Alaskans and tourists will use the data for resource management, environmental hazard planning, recreation, education and trip planning.

The project was started in 2001 with the aim of improving oil spill response, but the potential uses for the photos are varied.Scientists are using the visual records to track invasive species and track beach debris, but the Dutch Harbor Fisherman article also suggested using the site to decide where to string a setnet, or to find potential camp sites.

The project is also making historical and archeological finds; while flying near Sitka, the ShoreZone team has discovered dozens of ancient rock walls erected by Natives to increase clam habitat, as well as stone fish traps and canoe runs where people once cleared away boulders so canoes could be dragged up the beach.

The project has cost $5.5 million so far, most of that from federal sources, and needs an additional $5.5 million, the Dutch Harbor Fisherman reported.

	SEAN MEADE/U.S. FOREST SERVICE
	Artificial nest island on the Cooper River Delta have been so successful at increasing dusky Canada goose populations, another 50 will be built and installed next summer.

Artificial islands boost goose numbers

ARTIFICIAL NEST ISLANDS on the Copper River Delta have been so successful in increasing dusky Canada goose populations there, 50 more of the structures will be installed this summer.

Goose numbers on the delta began to drop after the 1964 earthquake, when their nesting grounds—once saltwater marshes—were raised and dried out, making them more accessible to predators.Dropping population counts led wildlife managers in Alaska—and in Washington and Oregon, where the geese over-winter— to restrict hunting.

Hoping to boost dusky goose numbers, theU. S. Forest Service and Ducks Unlimited began installing artificial nest islands on ponds in the Copper River Delta, which allowed the birds to hatch eggs away from shore.The groups have put out 800 nests since 1983, and scientists estimate that 6,500 goslings have been produced on the artificial islands, which show a 60 percent hatching success rate, compared to only 26 percent at natural nesting sites.

Based on this success, another 50 islands are ready for installation this summer—funded by Ducks Unlimited, the Alaska Department of Fish and game, The U.S Fish and Wildlife Service, the Oregon and Washington state departments of fish and wildlife and the National Fish and Wildlife Foundation—and plans for a further 200 artificial nests are under way.

Erosion Outlook is Bleak

A section of Alaska’s northern coastline is eroding as much as 45 feet a year, according to scientists at the University of Colorado-Boulder’s Institute of Arctic and Alpine research.A recent study of the area, reported on the Web site www.upi.com, showed the erosion is being caused by declining sea ice, warming seawater and increased wave activity between Point Barrow and Prudhoe Bay.In some places, erosion has toppled 12-foot-high bluffs— consisting of up to 80 percent ice—into the Beaufort Sea.

Another study showed that arctic sea ice—measured in September when it is at its annual minimum—has been declining at a rate of 11.2 percent per decade.Only 19 percent of the ice cover in 2009 was more than two years old, which is the least ever recorded.

Scientists from the U.S. Geological Survey and the Naval Postgraduate School also participated in the erosion study, which was presented at the American Geophysical Union annual meeting.

Sea Lions Enjoy Growing Numbers

Alaska steller sea lion populations are increasing, according to the National Marine Fisheries Service.Pup counts at known rookery sites for the endangered western segment of the population have increased about 10 percent since the last count in 2005, the Seward Phoenix Log newspaper reported.

NMFS conducted adult and juvenile counts in 2008 in the western Steller sea lion populations and found numbers were stable or increasing in most of the region.Now a similar increase in pups has been found.

Most of the pup population increases were in the Western Gulf of Alaska, Prince William Sound, and in the Eastern Aleutians, where the majority of the Bering Sea fishery occurs, the Phoenix Log reported. Pup populations increased slightly in the Central Gulf, with significant increases in two large rookeries near Kodiak.Pup production continued to decline in the Western Aleutian Islands and in parts of the Central Aleutian Islands west of Adak, however, where adult populations have been declining as well.

Sea lion populations were determined endangered in the western segment in the 1990s, which led to severe restrictions on fisheries in 1998.Fisheries were later found to not endanger Steller sea lions or their habitat.

Rotting Village Homes are Unsafe

CCHRC
Cold Climate Housing Research Center President and CEO Jack Hebert tests the moisture content of the wooden foundation of a home in Quinhagak.

As Many as a third of homes in the Lower Kuskokwim village of Quinhagak are rotting and potentially unsafe, officials with the Cold Climate Housing Research Center in fairbanks reported.Researchers recently visited the village to examine 55 homes built in the 1970s and found that mold has made the majority of homes unsafe; their structures are dangerous and the air inside them is unsafe to breathe.

Floors are sagging, ceilings are rotting and entryways and staircases are falling away from walls in many homes.The region is damp much of the year and the walls and floors of homes in the village never fully dry out, the Arctic Sounder newspaper reported.Well-intentioned upgrades to the homes in recent decades have made the problem worse by creating vapor locks that trap even more water in the walls.

Overcrowding in the homes and poor insulation and condensation problems mean many people in Quinhagak—and in other villages on the Lower Kuskokwim Delta— suffer from respiratory illnesses.

The Cold Climate Housing Research Center plans to work on a prototype home for the village that will be affordable, energy-efficient and will resist moisture.