Kwiaht
Your local laboratory in the San Juan Islands for the science to support good stewardship. Posts by @arbutocrat.bsky.social
- Tick activity is starting in the islands. Send us any you find theorcasonian.com/its-time-for...
- We are honored to co-host the Food Sovereignty and Thriving Indigenous Plant Communities session at the 2026 San Juan Islands Agricultural Summit, alongside Protecting Knowledge of Land and Sea (PKOLS) and the Indigenous Plants Forum on Saturday February 28th.
- Some of what we're working on to support food security, cultural landscapes, and agricultural biodiversity in the islands.
- Want to learn more about our research in the marine waters around the San Juan Islands? Kwiaht director Russel Barsh will tell you all about it at our Marine Matinee on Sunday January 25th at Lopez Center.
- We have a new book out! A guide to the moths and butterflies of the San Juan Islands. Available at the Lopez Bookshop (and on its way to other local booksellers) or by donation to Kwiaht www.kwiaht.org/donate.htm
- You can support @arbutocrat.bsky.social's work on heritage and locally adapted seedling apples on Orcas through the Orcas Island Community Foundation. oicf.fcsuite.com/erp/donate/c...
- The islands have a deep history of apple growing, and that means there are many, many seedling apple varieties waiting to be documented, evaluated, and shared
- The apple industry in the San Juans developed earlier, and separately, from the now dominant industrial apple production in central Washington
- We are working with WDFW and the Washington State Department of Health to monitor avian influenza in wildlife in the San Juan Islands. If you find dead wild waterfowl, raptors, or scavengers, do not handle them, contact us info@kwiaht.org.
- Old orchards have remarkable stories to go with their unique seedling varieties.
- "[T]he photogenic foxes, brought to the island a century ago by fur farms, play a complex and as-yet poorly understood role in both changing and maintaining the landscape." www.islandssounder.com/life/life-an...
- You can support our work Protecting People, Pets, and Foxes in a Wildland–Urban Interface through the San Juan Island Community Foundation sjicf.fcsuite.com/erp/donate/c...
- Tonight! Kwiaht ecologist Russel Barsh at the Lopez Library with Shining a Light on Local Moths starting at 6pm. And while you are there you can see local high school artist (and Kwiaht lab tech) Sophie Citro's moth art and buy a ticket (or many) for her moth sculpture raffle.
- Learn about the research on herring that we are doing with Long Live the Kings and the Nisqually Indian Tribe www.youtube.com/watch?v=khz1...
- Residues of home and garden pesticides sold and used on Orcas Island have been found in local wildlife, with some of the highest concentrations in bats and hummingbirds. www.sanjuanjournal.com/news/househo...
- Everyone is invited to our 7th annual camas festival!
- Join us for our 7th annual Camas Festival! A potluck featuring camas (Camassia leichtlinii) based dishes and presentations and discussion of camas cultivation. Saturday October 25th 12-3pm at the Stevens Center of the Padilla Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve. www.kwiaht.org/calendar.htm
- "To recover the islands’ Julia Orangetips, could we simply plant more of their preferred host plant? Tower Mustard is native to the San Juan Islands, easy to grow and a part of meadow restoration projects being carried out elsewhere."
- Our Camas Festival is moving to Padilla Bay this year! Save the date: Saturday October 25th for a camas focused potluck including a presentation by Sam Barr of the Coast Salish Youth Coalition on the revitalization of camas culture by Coast Salish youth.
- More heritage apple events coming up in October! Our third annual apple tasting with the Orcas Museum is Saturday October 4th (12:30-2:30), and on October 11th we're joining the San Juan County Land Bank, apple ID expert Lori Brakken, and master orchardist Marguerite Greening for Apple-Palooza
- The tasting scores for this year are in: Twenty Ounce was the favorite, followed by Esopus Spitzenburg and Glowing Coal. Our next tasting is Saturday October 4th at the Orcas Museum (12:30-2:30).
- Some of the apples that will be at tomorrow's tasting with the Lopez Island History Museum: Belmont Esopus Spitzenburg Fameuse Gloria Mundi Glowing Coal Golden Ball Gravenstein (including Olga Red Gravenstein) King (of Tompkins County) Greensweet Northern Spy Twenty Ounce Wolf River
- Can rediscovering heritage apples and sharing unique local seedlings help change apple culture in a way that values island orchards?
- Western leafcutter bee (Megachile perihirta) taking off from a Cirsium vulgare (bull thistle) inflorescence near Cattle Point (San Juan Islands National Monument).
- We have been working with the San Juan Islands Youth Conservation Corps to address noxious weeds in the National Monument.
- In disturbed landscapes, such as Cattle Point, during late summer weeds such as thistles and Jacobaea vulgaris (tansy ragwort) may be some of the only pollen and nectar sources available to bees, flies, and wasps.
- And so to meet the needs of native pollinators, like this bee, we are also propagating native wildflower seeds to replant where weeds are removed.
- Do you need more ways to enjoy this years abundant crop of t’áqa7? We have added recipes to the Food Security section of our website.
- We're raising funds through the San Juan Island Community Foundation to fund more apple genetic fingerprinting. To see some of the apples that grow in the islands take a look at this thread by our botanist @arbutocrat.bsky.social To donate to the project: sjicf.fcsuite.com/erp/donate/c...
- Look for our apple table in the Ag Tent at the San Juan County Fair, and in the catalog of projects in the San Juan Island Community Foundation’s SJI Cares County Fair Program.
- Kwiaht botanist @arbutocrat.bsky.social presents on local apples and community resilience for the San Juan Grange on July 17th theorcasonian.com/heritage-app...
- Our 2nd annual Hummel Lake fishing derby starts at 8am on Saturday June 28th. Weigh-in ends at 4:30 and prizes are awarded at 5pm. Register at the WDFW boat launch on the day of the event. Contact brett@kwiaht.org with questions.
- Join Kwiaht herpetologist Christian Oldham at the Orcas Island Public Library at 1pm on Saturday June 28th to learn about ongoing snake research and the sharp-tailed snakes on Orcas and San Juan Islands theorcasonian.com/orcas-librar...
- Kwiaht's hard working lab technician Matilda Twigg gets some well deserved recognition as she heads off to college www.facebook.com/100064773128...
- Dasysyrphus intrudens, a common and widespread North American hoverfly, enjoying a meal of Fragaria vesca (woodland strawberry) nectar. Syrphid hoverflies like this one should be welcomed in Northwest gardens; their larvae eat aphids voraciously.
- It's too windy! We're rescheduling the seine for Sunday June 1st.
- We're seining at Watmough Bight this evening (4pm). Everyone welcome to help pull the net and sort fish.
- Community science volunteer Anita Holladay documented an extensive Noctiluca scintillans bloom around Indian Island. Noctiluca is a native, non-toxic dinoflagellate; blooms are triggered by warm weather and nutrients in runoff.
- Today is our first beach seine of the 2025 season with our Lopez Community Salmon Team. We'll be at Watmough Bight (Bay) around 4pm and everyone is welcome to help. Yesterday our community team at Cowlitz Bay counted over 2,000 juvenile Chum and Pink salmon and lavaged 5 juvenile Chinook.
- Our juvenile salmon research season starts this coming week. The Lopez Community Salmon Team will be beach seining at Watmough Bight on Wednesday (May 14th) starting around 4pm. Everyone is welcome to help pull the net and see what the fish are up to
- Reposted by Kwiaht[This post could not be retrieved]
- Orcas Middle School student Solomon Ross has been selected as this year’s Indian Island Youth Steward! Solomon is enthusiastic about marine biology, but he says that his real reason for seeking this particular position is his interest in people. theorcasonian.com/middle-schoo...
- You can support Solomon and our Indian Island Marine Health Observatory through the Orcas Island Community Foundation oicf.fcsuite.com/erp/donate/c...
- We are asking for donations to support our stewardship and research program at Indian Island -- in particular, our 2025 Youth Steward, who will begin looking after Indian Island on minus-tide days next month! You can donate through the Orcas Island Community Foundation May 6-15
- There are a lot of other great things happening on Orcas that also deserve your support! GiveOrcas will be "live" through May 15 and you can access the entire catalog by using this link: oicf.fcsuite.com/erp/donate/l...
- Reposted by Kwiaht
[This post could not be retrieved] - Today (May 1st) is our first beach seine of the season with our Indian Island Marine Health Observatory! We use an 80ft net to sample fish in the eelgrass meadows. Fish are transferred to chilled aerated buckets, counted, measured, and then returned to the eelgrass as the tide comes back in.
- The eelgrass meadows around Indian Island in Fishing Bay support bay pipefish, plainfin midshipmen, shiner perch, snake pricklebacks, and abundant sculpins and gunnels.
- We found two Kennerly clams (Humilaria kennerleyi) during the first day of our annual bivalve census with at Indian Island. These distinctively ridged clams are named in honor of C.B.R. Kennerly (1830-1861), the naturalist who surveyed island wildlife for the boundary commission in the 1850s.
- You can find out more about our Indian Island Marine Health Observatory (and how to volunteer) at www.indianisland.org
