Tuesday, June 1 at 6:30 pm on Zoom
Preregistration required by emailing Debra@saltspringconservancy.ca
Register for this free event by noon on Monday, May 31.
Please join us for an engaging conversation with prolific Seattle-based natural history writer, naturalist and educator, David B. Williams. This will be the Canadian launch of David’s new book, Homewaters, a rich cultural and natural history of Puget Sound and an urgent call to conservation. David will be interviewed by Salt Spring’s own Dave Secord, who will probe at comparative environments and histories between the US and Canadian sides of the Salish Sea, and why exactly David focused on the Washington side of the border for his book: Homewaters.
Not far from Seattle skyscrapers live 150-year-old clams, more than 250 species of fish, and underwater kelp forests as complex as any terrestrial ecosystem. For millennia, vibrant Coast Salish communities have lived beside these waters dense with nutrient-rich foods, with cultures intertwined through exchanges across the waterways. Transformed by settlement and resource extraction, Puget Sound and its future health now depend on a better understanding of the region’s ecological complexities.
Focusing on the area south of Port Townsend and between the Cascade and Olympic mountains, in his book, Williams uncovers human and natural histories in, on, and around the Sound. In conversations with archaeologists, biologists, and tribal authorities, Williams traces how generations of humans have interacted with such species as geoducks, salmon, orcas, rockfish, and herring. He sheds light on how warfare shaped development and how people have moved across this maritime highway, in canoes, the mosquito fleet, and today’s ferry system. The book also takes an unflinching look at how the Sound’s ecosystems have suffered from human behavior, including pollution, habitat destruction, and the effects of climate change.
This event is hosted by the Salt Spring Island Conservancy, in partnership with Transition Salt Spring and Salt Spring Books, which will have a supply of Homewaters in stock before the event. The event is free, there will be plenty of time for Q&A, and it will be a lively discussion open to all.