A research-first approach is shaping how North America prepares for a bat extinction crisis BY QUINN BENDER | For The Narwhal Aaron Aguirre works against the darkening night in Vancouver’s Vanier Park, raising finely woven mist nets with two assistants on the edge of a large, still pond swarming with mosquitoes. As tonight’s first bat skims past, he rushes off for more equipment in the back of his Subaru, where he keeps a portable lab and mobile radio-telemetry tracker. A str

Isolated communities say lack of policing, cellular coverage continue to put lives at risk Security camera images recorded in Saskatchewan of Kam McLeod, 19, and Bryer Schmegelsky, 18, are displayed as RCMP Sgt. Janelle Shoihet speaks during a news conference in Surrey, B.C., on Tuesday July 23, 2019. THE CANADIAN PRESS/Darryl Dyck BY QUINN BENDER | For Black Press Media Bryer Schmegelsky, 18, and Kam McLeod, 19, told their families they had quit their night-shift jobs at Wal

Century-old Yukon Telegraph is collapsing into forest floors, snaring wildlife and leaving them for slow, agonizing deaths BY QUINN BENDER | For Black Press Media A forgotten relic of Canada's telegraph era is now posing a deadly threat to wildlife in the northern wilderness, says a B.C. veterinarian, who is calling for the removal of thousands of kilometres of century-old iron cable snaking through remote forests from British Columbia's south and into the Yukon. This moose

In a small mosquito infested Malaysian port the dengue is angry, and one man who thinks he is impervious, isn't BY QUINN BENDER | For The Globe and Mail Within a lining of emerald grasses, fists of sewage clot the stream that lies along my path. It’s a fetid route, wrought with litter, but in my nine months of living in Port Klang, Malaysia, it has never produced the surprises that travellers fear — such as snakes, predators or, worse, a tropical virus. The Aedes aegypti  mos

Bread of Life volunteers fear city's denial of tax exemption will shut their doors for good BY QUINN BENDER The operators of Terrace’s only downtown soup kitchen say a denied tax exemption from city council may be enough to shut their doors for good. Delphine and Ron Dame, who have run the Bread of Life Soup Kitchen from the All Nations Centre (ANC) since 2008, now owe nearly $4,000 in municipal taxes—after council voted down their appeal for full exemption as a non-profit. T

Federal officials are investigating a controversial salmon fishing trip on a closed northern B.C. river involving a Terrace-area lodge, prominent U.S. conservationists, and a First Nations permit critics say was misused. Conrad Gowell Photo Outrage grows after Chinook caught with First Nations permit during widespread bans along Skeena River BY QUINN BENDER | for Black Press Media The federal government is investigating what anglers in northern B.C. are calling a deceitful ac

Rob Tryon set out to revolutionize BC’s shellfish industry using social media, science and showmanship. A decade later, the tide turned — and he walked away. BY QUINN BENDER IT STARTED WITH A TWEET. For 13 years, Rob Tryon worked the quiet rhythms of his father’s oyster farm at NW Aquaculture, tucked into Effingham Inlet on Vancouver Island’s remote west coast. One day, standing in the aluminum harvester, he towed a processing hut across the cove to one of the many rickety wo

Stones on the Oregon coast point to a vast hidden treasure ... if it really exists BY QUINN BENDER | For the National Post Sir Francis Drake is just one of several historical figures pulled into a fantastic tale of lost treasure near Manzanita, Oregon. THERE'S SOMETHING UNUSUAL about Manzanita, Oregon. For any visitor who swims in a place called Smuggler’s Cove, or walks down roads with names like Windward, Spyglass and Treasure Cove Lane, the bearings in this town read like

The Blue Rodeo co-founder reflects on the long road from nowhere to here BY QUINN BENDER | For Fine Lifestyles Magazine It's a good year to be Jim Cuddy. Rounding off a two-stop solo performance in Saskatchewan, the 56-year-old Canadian icon is now migrating east with his Skyscraper Soul  cross-country road tour. This third offering from the Jim Cuddy Band is a dramatic, personal departure from the fiddle-and-roots sound for which he’s known—a risky move, but one that’s payi

After a failed foreign-backed purchase, Prince Rupert is left managing a hazardous industrial site no one can legally touch—or afford BY QUINN BENDER Water drips through the rafters of the gutted pulp mill on Watson Island. Inside, barrels of caustic chemicals, tanks of black liquor and crates of radioactive devices sit abandoned and decaying. Nearly 20 years after Sun Wave Forest Products promised to revive the site, Prince Rupert is left with a toxic liability—costing more

Deep in the South Pacific, the Lonely Planet co-founder reflects on his influence on how and why we travel BY QUINN BENDER Deep in the South Seas on the edge of the Great Atoll Valley, a peculiar archipelago rises just two metres above the lapping waves. At low tide, the tiny island nation ranks fourth among the world’s smallest countries, and at high tide falls to third. So removed are the atolls from regular ocean traffic, until a century ago even the London Missionary Soci

A visit by Chris Hadfield and an international research team marked the Tahltan village’s first major community gathering since last summer’s destruction. By Quinn Bender Months after wildfires tore through their village, residents of Telegraph Creek lined the gravel roads last week to witness something almost surreal: a sleek, all-electric polar vehicle crawling into town, flanked by astronaut Chris Hadfield, Prince Albert of Monaco, and Venturi president Xavier Chevrin. Th