RANGELEY — Searchers returned empty-handed Thursday after resuming their search for three snowmobilers missing in Rangeley Lake since winter. Throughout the day, Rangeley residents gathered in small groups at the bars and restaurants, along the lake and on the sidewalks, asking each other whether any of the bodies had been found. Cheryl Burkee, a server at Parkside & Main restaurant, said the residents want the family of the missing men to get a sense of finality after their ordeal, which has so far lasted just over four months. “We feel for the families and that they haven’t had closure,” she said. The search by the Maine Warden Service began Tuesday with the use of sonar in the area where the snowmobilers are thought to have fallen into open water on the partially frozen lake in late December. (read more at Kennebec Journal)
Greenwood selectmen and Planning Board officials recently discussed ideas for a proposed wind power ordinance to be crafted for a vote next year. Plans originally called for an ordinance proposal from the Planning Board for next month’s annual town meeting, but selectmen earlier this month decided to postpone it to allow more research and to study Woodstock’s recently-approved wind ordinance. Planning Board Chair Dave Brainard and Vice-Chair Larry Merloni offered some thoughts on how to proceed. Merloni expressed concern that an ordinance that is too restrictive might prompt lawsuits from a wind company wanting to develop a project. Woodstock’s ordinance requires a one-mile setback from neighboring property lines to minimize noise, which is the most common wind turbine-related complaint. Merloni said setbacks of that magnitude could be “a recipe for disaster.” (read more at Bethel Citizen)
PORTLAND, Maine — Portland city officials are hoping to finally overcome the century-old ailments that stripped the Forest City of some its most prominent trees. The latest and perhaps most high-profile step in the fight back came as Portland became one of the first to plant the latest version of blight-resistant American chestnut trees, the results of 30 years of backcross breeding and more than $30 million in nationwide research, according to the city. American chestnut trees were nearly wiped out by an Asian bark fungus introduced to the country in 1904, and scientists have spent much of the last century trying — until recently with little success — to proliferate trees immune to the blight. “What was once a plentiful tree has all but disappeared,” said Portland city arborist Jeffrey Tarling. “There are just a handful left.” (read more at Bangor Daily News)
PORTLAND — The Island Times, a 10-year-old, monthly community newspaper covering Peaks Island and other Casco Bay islands, is ceasing operation, publisher Kevin Attra announced last week. Shrinking ad revenue, distribution and readership accounted for Attra’s decision to close, he wrote in the free newspaper’s final issue. “(The Island Times) was quite self-sustaining until last year, when ad revenue started disappearing,” Attra said on Sunday. He noted that the paper was “an all-volunteer enterprise” with about a dozen people helping. Revenue was used to cover printing costs and other operating expenses. “Several large ads dropped out … some regulars stopped paying as well,” Attra said. “Then I also noticed circulation was shrinking. People just weren’t reading it.” Circulation usually ranged from 3,000 during off-seasons to 5,000 during the summer, according to Attra. He printed just 2,000 copies of the 12-page final issue. “It was a bittersweet moment when I sent the last file to the printer,” he said. A carpenter, environmental chemist, musician, and since 2007, a Peaks Island resident, Attra began writing for The Island Times as a volunteer without previous journalism experience. He took over as publisher after co-founders Mary Lou Wendell and David Tyler left the paper in 2008. (read more at The Forecaster)
If you’re a white-footed mouse, 2 feet of snow might be a welcome forecast, but if you’re a black-capped chickadee or a white-tailed deer, it’s bad, bad news. The bitter cold, deep snow and, now, rain and warmth are for birds and animals extremes in the battle for survival, from which some emerge in spring as winners. Others lose. It’s nature’s way of keeping things in balance and ensuring that the strong survive, wildlife biologists and rehabilitators say. “The strategies are really diverse,” said Mike Windsor, of Maine Audubon Society in Falmouth. The first and most obvious is the one humans often embrace. “A lot of animals are really just hunkering down,” waiting for the worst to blow over, said Windsor. In this recent round of exreme weather, “a lot of factors (were) coming together,” he said. That meant animals had to use “multiple strategies” to get through. (read more at Morning Sentinel)
Citing the continued purchase of property by the U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service and the difficulty in finding people to serve in leadership roles, Upton Selectman Bob Pepler has recently been informally surveying residents on whether the town should de-organize. Upton has fewer than 100 year-round residents. It has been plagued in recent years with difficult political issues. The buy-up of private properties to add to the Umbagog National Wildlife Refuge is one of them. Some residents worry that because such land can no longer be taxed by the town, other property owners’ taxes will increase as the tax base shrinks. “With the tax base eroding, I don’t see the future being bright,” Pepler said recently when he was contacted by the Citizen. (read more at Bethel Citizen)
A winter storm is expected to dump a foot or more of snow in much of Maine on Thursday. The National Weather Service on Tuesday upgraded its storm watch to a storm warning beginning around 10 p.m. Wednesday and ending around 4 a.m. Friday. Snow will fall all day Thursday, with heavy snow during some parts of the day. “We’re expecting around a foot for most of interior Maine and New Hampshire,” NWS meteorologists Margaret Curtis said late Tuesday. (read more at Lewiston Sun Journal)
BANGOR, Maine — When Josh Plourde of Bangor saw a van parked on Harlow Street around midnight on Tuesday, he noticed the flashing hazard lights and saw that all four doors of the vehicle were open. What he saw when he stopped to offer assistance was a bit of a surprise: A bobcat was hiding under the van. “I guess what happened was a woman was driving in Veazie on Route 2 and she hit what she thought was a house cat,” Plourde said. “It was still alive and was kind of hurt. So she pulled over to the side and scooped it up and put it in the car, thinking that it was hurt and was out in the wild. She wanted to help it.” The problem: The animal was not only in the wild. It was wild. “By the time she got to downtown Bangor she realized what she had put in her car was not in fact a house cat,” Plourde said. (read more at Bangor Daily News)
After much analysis of new data on the sound generated by the Spruce Mountain Wind turbines, the final judgment may come down to one non-scientific observation. “’Loud’ isn’t a defined term,” said Todd Presson, chief operating officer for Patriot Renewables LLC, the company that built the turbines. “It may be some people are more sensitive. It’s all perception.” This past summer camp owners on Concord and Shagg ponds in Woodstock complained about noise from the 10 SMW towers about a mile away. SMW’s state permit calls for noise limits of 55 decibels during the day and 45 at night, at either the property boundary or 500 feet from a residence (or “receptor”). (read more at Bethel Citizen)
HEBRON — A contest to find the largest trees in Oxford County may have uncovered the tallest American Chestnut tree in the state and perhaps the country. “We’re really excited about all of this,” Jean Federico of the Oxford County Soil and Water Conservation District, sponsor of the annual contest, said. She came to Ann Siekman’s property recently to look at an American Chestnut tree Siekman submitted for the contest. What she and others found was unexpected. The 95-foot tall tree is not only believed to be 20 feet taller than any other recorded in the state, but is perhaps the tallest of its species in the country. It measures 78 inches in circumference, Federico said. (read more at Lewiston Sun Journal)
RANGELEY — Searchers returned empty-handed Thursday after resuming their search for three snowmobilers missing in Rangeley Lake since winter. Throughout the day, Rangeley residents gathered in small groups at the bars and restaurants, along the lake and on the sidewalks, asking each other whether any of the bodies had been found. Cheryl Burkee, a server at Parkside & Main restaurant, said the residents want the family of the missing men to get a sense of finality after their ordeal, which has so far lasted just over four months. “We feel for the families and that they haven’t had closure,” she said. The search by the Maine Warden Service began Tuesday with the use of sonar in the area where the snowmobilers are thought to have fallen into open water on the partially frozen lake in late December. (read more at Kennebec Journal)
