[NEWS] Twenty news links

• NOW Toronto looks at the Pickering nuclear plant and its role in providing fuel for space travel.
• In some places like California, traffic is so bad that airlines actually play a role for high-end commuters. CBC reports.
• Goldfish released into the wild are a major issue for the environment in Québec, too. CTV News reports.
• China’s investments in Jamaica have good sides and bad sides. CBC reports.
• A potato museum in Peru might help solve world hunger. The Guardian reports.
• Is the Alberta-Saskatchewan alliance going to be a lasting one? Maclean’s considers.
• Is the fossil fuel industry collapsing? The Tyee makes the case.
• Should Japan and Europe co-finance a EUrasia trade initiative to rival China’s? Bloomberg argues.
• Should websites receive protection as historically significant? VICE reports.
• Food tourism in the Maritimes is a very good idea. Global News reports.
• Atlantic Canada lobster exports to China thrive as New England gets hit by the trade war. CBC reports.
• The Bloc Québécois experienced its revival by drawing on the same demographics as the provincial CAQ. Maclean’s reports.
• Population density is a factor that, in Canada, determines political issues, splitting urban and rural voters. The National Observer observes.
• US border policies aimed against migration from Mexico have been harming businesses on the border with Canada. The National Post reports.
• The warming of the ocean is changing the relationship of coastal communities with their seas. The Conversation looks.
• Archival research in the digital age differs from what occurred in previous eras. The Conversation explains.
• The Persian-language Wikipedia is an actively contested space. Open Democracy reports.
• Vox notes how the US labour shortage has been driven partly by workers quitting the labour force, here.
• Laurie Penny at WIRED has a stirring essay about hope, about the belief in some sort of future.

[PHOTO] Twenty-four more photos of Ripley’s Aquarium

This is the third and final photo post from Ripley’s Aquarium, following Monday and Tuesday.

The last portion of the tour through Ripley’s was, for me, perhaps the most memorable. The clownfish, the lionfish, the cute cuttlefish (look hard!), the scarlet cleaner shrimp manicure and the bamboo shark petting, the complex life support technology, the glowing jellyfish—all stood out. Even the goldfish in their neat clean tanks inside the entry were worthy of attention, and memory.

[URBAN NOTE] Four community links: Newfoundland politics, goldfish, Grenfell tower, water disasters

• Politics in a small Newfoundland community seem to literally be a family matter, of Crockers and Blakes. The National Post reports.
• Goldfish are taking over the water systems of the Alberta city of St. Albert’s. The National Post reports.
• This BBC feature looks at the lives of the inhabitants, survivors and not, of the 21st floor of Grenfell.
• This Guardian feature looks at ways cities can protect themselves against disaster, especially with water.

[BLOG] Some Sunday links

• Language Hat reports on the Wenzhounese of Italy.
• Language Log writes about the tones of Cantonese.
• Lawyers, Guns and Money writes about the costs of law school. (They are significant, and escalating hugely.)
• Marginal Revolution reports on the problems facing the Brazilian pension system, perhaps overgenerous for a relatively poor country facing rapid aging.
• Neuroskeptic reports on the latest re: the crisis of scientists not being able to replicate evidence, now even their own work being problematic.
• Personal Reflections considers the questions of how to preserve the dignity of people facing Alzheimer’s.
• The Russian Demographics Blog notes a Financial Times article looking at the impact of aging on global real estate.
• Spacing Toronto talks about the campaign to name a school after Jean Earle Geeson, a teacher and activist who helped save Fort York.
• At Wave Without A Shore, C.J. Cherryh shares photos of her goldfish.
• Window on Eurasia notes growing instability in Daghestan, looks at the latest in Georgian historical memory, and shares an article arguing that Putin’s actions have worsened Russia’s reputation catastrophically.

[PHOTO] Giant silver koi, Allan Gardens

I love this guy.

[NEWS] Some Monday links

• Asahi notes the problems of Uniqlo.
• Atlas Obscura looks at the effort to restore the Old Spanish Trail, an early American interstate highway.
• Bloomberg notes the travails of the coal industry in the Czech Republic.
• Bloomberg View notes South Africa’s serious economic problems and looks at how the Panama Papers make centrism more difficult.
• CBC notes how a terrifyingly high suicide rate in Attawapiskat has triggered a state of emergency.
• Fusion looks at how default settings for online mapping services have left some people targets.
• The Boston Globe reports on how Boston cops can now be freely gay.
• The Inter Press Service notes the increasing alienation of Ethiopia’s Oromo in the face of the corporatization of agriculture.
• MacLean’s considers the future of the NDP, post-Mulcair.
• Space Daily looks at new research examining how neutron stars could, through mass accretion, become black holes.
• The Toronto Star looks at what happened to Mulcair at the NDP convention.
• The Weather Network notes the spread of goldfish into the lakes of Alberta.

[PHOTO] Eleven photos from Allan Gardens, Toronto

Visiting Allan Gardens last week with a friend visiting Toronto, I had the chance to see the greenhouse complex as it was being prepared for spring.

[PHOTO] On the giant silver koi, and other goldfish, of Allan Gardens, Toronto

Long-time readers of the blog may remember that, once upon a time, I had goldfish. I enjoyed them, with their happy swimming and their responses to me. Even now, I still own the empty tank that they once had. When I go to Allan Gardens, I usually head first to the south wing and its goldfish pond.

My favourite fish there is a standout, a great large and strong silver koi.

[BLOG] Some Wednesday links

• blogTO notes that yesterday morning’s transit crunch led Uber to introduce surge pricing.
• Dangerous Minds links to the Tumblr blog Vintage Occult, which has a vast collection of vintage occult.
• Languages of the World’s Asya Perelstvaig notes how the television show Castle badly misrepresented the Geordie dialect.
• Lawyers, Guns and Money notes a new archeological survey in Greenland.
• Marginal Revolution worries about the collapse of the Schengen zone.
• The Planetary Society Blog notes that Dawn has achieved its primary science work at Ceres.
• The Power and the Money’s Noel Maurer considers how Mexico might defend itself in response to a Trump administration. Read the comments.
• Shadow, Light and Colour’s Elizabeth Beattie shares a photo of a koi she found living in the sheltered pools of the Evergreen Brick Works.
• Torontoist examines Toronto’s civic tech community.
• Towleroad notes Ian Thorpe did not come out because of media pressure when he was a teenager and looks at a British television documentary about a gay sex club.

[URBAN NOTE] “Discarded goldfish are taking over Hamilton’s harbour”

The descendants of abandoned goldfish, CBC’s Samantha Craggs notes, are populating Hamilton’s harbor.

Researchers at the Royal Botanical Gardens (RBG) have counted as many as two million large and small goldfish this year, fish that are likely descendants of people dropping unwanted pets in the water.

Now there are so many that they’re throwing another wrench into attempts to rehabilitate the bay.

This year, the RBG team has counted as many as 2,500 large goldfish and two million young, said Tys Theysmeyer, head of natural lands with the Royal Botanical Gardens (RBG). They seem to be thriving thanks to climate change, and poor water conditions that have discouraged native species from flourishing.

RBG spotted handfuls of them dating back to the 1990s, Theysmeyer said. But lately, the problem has worsened.

“People used to actively release goldfish into the bay a lot,” he said. “In the last five years, their numbers have been rising and rising.”

[. . .]

In Hamilton, the numbers are rising from a perfect storm of water conditions. Warmer water temperatures mean that new fish species such as the goldfish can survive, where decades ago it might not have. Theysmeyer says pressures on water quality in the bay, such as contaminated overflow from the city, have also caused a decline in native fish species, leaving more room for goldfish.

Native fish such as northern pike, freshwater drum and several sunfish and minnow species are in short supply, Theysmeyer said. He estimates that only two species — namely yellow perch and blue gill — are showing up in greater numbers.