The once-a-decade conservation blueprint will weigh climate change threats, include plants as well as animals and emphasize habitat protection.
Penelope Overton
Staff Writer
Penny is excited to be the Portland Press Herald’s first climate reporter. Since joining the paper in 2016, she has written about Maine’s lobster and cannabis industries, covered state politics and spent a fellowship year exploring the impact of climate change on the lobster fishery with the Boston Globe’s Spotlight team. Before moving to Maine, she covered politics, environment, casino gambling and tribal issues in Florida, Connecticut and Arizona. Her favorite assignments allow her to introduce readers to unusual people, cultures, or subjects. When off the clock, Penny is usually getting lost in a new book at a local coffeehouse, watching foreign crime shows or planning her family’s next adventure.
Posted inMaine, News
Maine tree spraying will kill any caterpillars, not just forest pests
While not toxic to people or most animals, pesticides to protect spruce and fir trees against budworm could also hurt the caterpillar form of two threatened butterflies. Spraying supporters say plans call for a targeted approach.
advertisement
Posted inMaine, News
Tracking Maine’s wild mussel beds: Declining or retreating into the deep?
The Gulf of Maine Research Institute would like the public to help hunt for wild mussel beds below the low-tide line.
Posted inArts & Entertainment, Maine, News
Artists use midnight performance to draw attention to rising seas
A group of painters, dancers and sculptors gathered on the Portland waterfront in the middle of the night as an unusually high tide flooded parking lots and piers.
Posted inMaine, News
Peregrine falcons show signs of national decline, but not in Maine
The deadly avian flu killing falcons in other states hasn’t hit here, but biologists still worry about Maine’s peregrine population because it’s so small.
Posted inMaine, News
After hailing them as important, EPA cancels PFAS research grants
Termination notices to Maine grant recipients said the work was ‘no longer consistent with EPA funding priorities.’ At least 2 of the 3 Maine recipients plan to appeal the termination.
Posted inMaine, News
Plan to loosen federal habitat protection seen as threat to iconic Maine wildlife
Maine has its own state endangered species law, but environmentalists say a proposed change in federal law could hurt some Maine species the state has worked to protect.
Posted inMaine, News
Maine Sea Grant funding restored
NOAA reinstates the full $4.5 million it yanked from the program that supports coastal communities and marine industries shortly after President Trump threatened to cut all funding for Maine.
Posted inMaine, News
Maine announces record $8M in state climate resilience grants
More than 150 communities across the state are included in the latest round of state climate resilience grants announced by Gov. Janet Mills in Kennebunkport, which was heavily damaged by back-to-back storms in January 2024.
Posted inBusiness, Maine, News
USDA cancels $35M climate grant to Freeport demonstration farm
The termination letter said Wolfe’s Neck Center for Agriculture & the Environment failed to pay at least 65% of its climate-smart agriculture grant directly to farmers.