North Carolina

In NC, a species of concern is threatened by the vagaries of climate change • NC Newsline

Published

2 years ago

July 5, 2024

In NC, a species of concern is threatened by the vagaries of climate change • NC Newsline

WATAUGA COUNTY—Ben Dalton broke the glassy surface of the Watauga River, spit out his mouthpiece and gasped for breath. All morning, Dalton, a state wildlife biologist, and two other snorkelers had been scouring the river bed, trying to rescue as many eastern hellbenders as they could.

So far, they had not saved a one.

“They just hunker down and press themselves against the sides of the rock,” Dalton said, in a nasal voice through his snorkeling mask. He wielded a “tickler,” which resembled a long, yellow pipe cleaner. “I’m going to try to goose the hellbender and see if it will shoot out the front.”

Glistening in a sleek wetsuit, Dalton is thin, lean and agile, much like the hellbenders he was trying to rescue. In early July, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, with support from American Rivers and MountainTrue, would begin staging heavy equipment nearby, the first step in dismantling the Shull’s Mill Dam, southwest of Boone in the Blue Ridge Mountains. The dam, which once powered a timber mill, has fragmented and degraded the giant salamander’s sensitive habitat.

Dalton is accustomed to the mercurial moods of amphibians. His biology career has taken him to Missouri, where he studied the Ozark Zigzag salamander, to Puerto Rico, where he observed Coqui frogs, and now to the mountains of North Carolina, where he’s trying to outwit a hellbender.

“If hellbenders don’t want to come out,” Dalton said, “it’s really hard to get them out.”

Throughout their range in the eastern U.S., the number of hellbenders is plummeting. In some states, like Ohio and Indiana, they are listed as endangered. North Carolina has the most hellbenders of any state in their range, but even here, they are classified as a species of concern: vulnerable, and without interventions, en route to becoming threatened or endangered. So precarious is the species in North Carolina that it is illegal to take, possess, transport or sell hellbenders or attempt to do so.

“They’ve survived millions of years,” said Lori Williams, a biologist with the state Wildlife Resources Commission. “Something has changed now.”

Ben Dalton (center) and Lori Williams (right) of the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission, together with a team from Appalachian State University, search for eastern hellbenders. (Photo by Lisa Sorg)

Williams has devoted much of her career to salamanders, especially the hellbender. The Wildlife Society named her Biologist of the Year in 2020 for her conservation and monitoring of their habitats.

She’s seen how in western North Carolina, extreme weather, the result of climate change, is altering the hellbenders’ habitat. When it floods, the force of the water can wash them out of the river. In 2021, after the catastrophic Tropical Storm Fred, Williams said, “we found dead hellbenders near Asheville.”

As recently as last fall, 15 mountain counties experienced severe drought conditions during a stretch that ranked among the top five driest periods on record, according to the State Climate Office. When stream levels drop, the hellbenders’ eggs are exposed to predators. Even full-grown hellbenders can be plucked from the water by river otters and bald eagles.

Dams, like the one at Shull’s Mill, compound the effects of climate change on aquatic habitats. Without a free flow of fresh water, oxygen levels drop and river temperatures rise; both are detrimental to the hellbender, which needs cool, oxygenated water to survive. Sediment accumulates behind the dam, covering and suffocating critical food sources and breeding grounds.

But now, the dam will be demolished.

“Some little ones will die,” Williams said, sounding resigned. “But it’s important to save the breeders.”

Williams had tucked her brown hair beneath a gray-and-white cap emblazoned with “NC Wildlife Resources Commission.” Wearing a black wetsuit, she, too, was prepared to join the search. She turned and asked the rescue team to prepare to return and dive that night, if necessary. That’s when the hellbenders, who are nocturnal, would come out to feed on crayfish, their preferred food.

“I don’t want to leave any animal behind,” Williams said.

Thwarted wanderlust

At midday, the scuba tanks arrived, which would allow the rescue team to remain underwater longer. With waterproof flashlights, the divers could seek out the hellbenders, which blend in with their surroundings: Rust-colored with black spots, stubby legs that end in padded pink toes and with a shovel-shaped tail, hellbenders appear prehistoric.

“Hellbenders are beautiful,” Dalton said. “They’re perfectly adapted to their environment. But what’s really fascinating is that they can help tell us about the health of the streams.”

Hellbenders are an indicator species. If climate change alters the river levels and temperatures, if trees are cut along the banks, if sediment enters the water from urban runoff, the number of hellbenders will decline.

underside of hellbender — Eastern Hellbenders have five toes on their rear feet and four toes on their front. Some lose their toes when they fight during the breeding season. (Photo by Lisa Sorg)

Dr. Mike Gangloff, a professor of freshwater conservation biology at Appalachian State University, has been monitoring the health and number of hellbenders in North Carolina for more than 15 years.

In the headwaters of the Watauga River, the hellbender density is the highest in the state, “like they were 500 years ago before we changed our rivers and the landscape.”

But the worrisome trend, Gangloff said, is “we’re not seeing as many middle-sized animals.”

The proliferation of exurban luxury housing developments is degrading the water quality. These communities often have their own wastewater leachfields that discharge into the river, Gangloff said.

Private fishing clubs with state permits are stocking the river with large fish, Gangloff said, which can prey on the hellbender larvae. “When we relocate the hellbenders, we put them where there are fewer ginormous fish,” he said.

And when it’s time to mate, hellbenders have wanderlust, which dams thwart. “They need to travel,” Dalton said. “They need large, continuous spans of river to breed.”

The rescuers donned their scuba tanks and plunged into the river. They split off, some swimming toward a boulder and others heading for the dam.

The Shull’s Mill dam has been abandoned since the Great Flood of 1940, which drowned and buried areas of western North Carolina in water and mud. Over the past 84 years, the dam has eroded and in one spot has been breached. A keyhole in the concrete allows some water to gush through like a firehose, while behind it lie slicks of sediment, a tangle of rebar and chunks of tree trunks and concrete.

“The hellbenders can’t make it through the dam, even though it’s been breached,” said Andy Hill, Watauga riverkeeper and High Country regional director with MountainTrue. “What we’re seeing is isolated thriving populations, but they’re not thriving throughout the system in a continuous way.”

There are more than 28,351 dams in North Carolina, according to the Southeast Aquatic Resources Partnership. Most of them are privately owned, and many have been abandoned. “A lot of these structures are remnants of the historical past,” said Erin McCombs, Southeast conservation director with American Rivers. Sixty-three dams have been removed in North Carolina, gaining 5,593 miles of reconnected rivers and streams—equivalent to two trips across the continental United States.

Dam removal won’t eliminate the effects of climate change, but it can mitigate them. Water temperatures decrease, and when stream banks are replanted with native trees and plants, they’re better equipped to trap sediment when the inevitable flood does occur.

Three years ago, the removal team dismantled the Ward Mill dam, also along Watauga. Unlike Shull’s Mill, the Ward structure was intact, and a tall, wide table of sand had amassed behind it. Now that segment of the river flows freely and its conditions are optimal for the relocated hellbenders.

“Rivers know how to be rivers,” McCombs said. “And when they are healthy, all life that depends on them benefits.”

‘I Got Him!’

The hellbender was cornered. But his removal required the rescue team to use pry bars to lift the boulder so Dalton could dive beneath it and retrieve him.

“Give me a foot of space,” Dalton told the rescue team. “Make sure you have a good hold. If you can’t hold that rock for 15 seconds or more, I won’t go.”

Dalton dove. The team lifted the rock. Other rescuers readied large nets.

After what seemed like an interminable length of time, Dalton bolted from the water.

“I got him!” Dalton said, hoisting the hellbender as if it were a newborn baby.

Hellbenders feel cool and wet, similar to Jell-O, yet tough and sturdy, like a well-toned bicep.

Dalton placed the hellbender in a mesh bag. Hannah Woodburn, a staff scientist at MountainTrue, gingerly removed him and placed him on a scale—about a pound in weight and a foot in length. A brief wave of a wand indicated he had never been tagged by biologists.

Meanwhile, Lori Williams of the state Wildlife Resources Commission counted his toes—he had all of them—and scanned his body for scars—he had none.

“He’s not yet mated,” Williams said. “This will be his first season to fight.”

Hannah Woodburn, a staff scientist and community organizer at MountainTrue, prepares a temporary home for relocated Eastern Hellbenders in a separate part of the Watauga River. (Photo by Lisa Sorg)

Williams injected a tag into his tail. And Woodburn placed him in an aerated cooler full of water until he would be relocated 12 miles to a different segment of the Watauga that afternoon. Scientists temporarily place hellbenders in wooden crates to allow them to calm down and get their bearings.

Near the dam, a diver yelled: “I got another one!”

It was a male, who had a bruised rear right foot and a missing toe on his back left.

And then another, and another. Over several days, the rescue team relocated eight hellbenders out of harm’s way.

U.S. Fish & Wildlife has begun chipping away at the dam and should be finished by mid-July.

“This will serve as a climate change mitigation measure,” said Hill, the Watauga riverkeeper. “The river will meander once and again and find its own path. You’re allowing the river to flow free.”

If you see an eastern hellbender in the wild, they should be left alone and reported to the N.C. Wildlife Resources Commission. Send the location, a photo if possible and other details to Lori Williams, a wildlife diversity biologist with the Wildlife Commission, at [email protected].

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North Carolina

WNC wildfire updates for Monday, March 30, 2026

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2 hours ago

March 30, 2026

Press Room

BUNCOMBE COUNTY, N.C. (WLOS) — Multiple wildfires continue to burn across western North Carolina on Monday, March 30, 2026.

A statewide burn ban is in effect across North Carolina amid increased fire danger and dry conditions.

NORTH CAROLINA ISSUES STATEWIDE BURN BAN AS DRY WEATHER FUELS WILDFIRE DANGER

POPLAR FIRE

The Poplar Fire in Mitchell County is about 350 acres in size and 80% contained, according to the U.S. Forest Service on Sunday.

The fire, located 1 mile north of the Poplar community, is burning in an area heavily impacted by Helene, with downed trees contributing to increased wildfire intensity and risk.

The cause of the fire is under investigation.

Closed: The Appalachian Trail near Indian Grave Gap (NOBO mile 352.9) is impacted by the fire. Hikers are asked to exercise caution and follow all instructions.

TARKILN FIRE

The U.S. Forest Service said Sunday that the Tarkiln Ridge Fire, burning 5 miles northwest of Hayesville, is 407 acres in size and 90% contained.

The fire is now in patrol status, and firefighters will check the perimeter today to ensure it remains secure, forest officials said.

The fire was caused by lightning.

Closed: Leatherwood Road is closed for firefighter and public safety.

BLACK BALSAM FIRE

The U.S. Forest Service said Sunday that the Black Balsam Fire, located 14 miles southeast of Waynesville, is about 5 acres in size and 75% contained.

The Blue Ridge Parkway from U.S. 276 (mile marker 411.9) to N.C. 215 (mile marker 423.2) was closed to public travel for a time Sunday but reopened after crews made progress on containment efforts, forest officials said.

The cause of the fire is under investigation.

JUMPING BRANCH FIRE

As of 10 p.m. Sunday, McDowell County Emergency Management says the Jumping Branch Fire is about 175 acres in size with 0% containment.

The fire is located off Locust Cove Road and is burning north of Locust Cove Road and south of Sugar Cove Road in McDowell County.

McDowell County Emergency Management said about 200 firefighters battled the fire Sunday, along with multiple aircraft.

The U.S. Forest Service said Sunday that firefighters are prioritizing protecting private property and structures along the Highway 80 corridor. As of 10 p.m. Sunday, McDowell County officials said no structures have been lost.

Closed: Highway 80 was closed from Toms Creek Road to the Yancey County line. Residents and motorists are asked to avoid the area.

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North Carolina

New ‘Orchid kingdom’ display takes center stage at North Carolina Arboretum Festival

Published

14 hours ago

March 29, 2026

Press Room

New ‘Orchid kingdom’ display takes center stage at North Carolina Arboretum Festival

ASHEVILLE, N.C. (WLOS) — As spring returns, so does the 25th annual Asheville Orchid Festival at the North Carolina Arboretum.

The annual show features world-class growers, curated displays, and thousands of orchids for sale.

NORTH CAROLINA ARBORETUM’S ‘SPRING INTO THE ARB’ RETURNS FOR YEAR 2

The event is part of “Spring Into the Arb”, a celebration of the return of spring featuring a series of activities. This year, a new and unique display takes center stage.

“We build this castle, and it’ll be a one-time thing, and we always create something special that goes with the theme. This year it was orchid kingdom,” said Graham Ramsey, president of the Western North Carolina Orchid Society.

This is an American Orchid Society-sanctioned judging event as world-class orchid growers and breeders present hundreds of carefully crafted displays.

NORTH CAROLINA ARBORETUM HOSTS BONSAI CARE DEMONSTRATIONS

Ramsey says growing orchids, while not a hard thing to get into, is an obsessive hobby.

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“I started out with one orchid that belonged to my wife and next thing you know, we’re buying more, and it’s a very obsessive hobby, and by joining the Western North Carolina Orchid Society, we invite all orchid growers to come because that’s what we do, we sit around and talk about how to grow our orchids,” Ramsey said.

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North Carolina

Disputes grow between NC Bar, legislative committee tasked with reforming it

Published

1 day ago

March 29, 2026

Press Room

Disputes grow between NC Bar, legislative committee tasked with reforming it

A North Carolina legislative committee is drawing passionate support — and criticism — as it pushes forward with recommendations to inject more secrecy and politics into a group tasked with disciplining lawyers across the state.

The committee plans to meet again this week, fresh off a dramatic hearing Tuesday, during which members of the committee sniped at one another, at least one appeared to have had no idea they’d be asked to vote on one particularly contentious item, and security had to forcibly eject a former state lawmaker who had refused to stop yelling accusations from a podium.

The target of that speaker, as well as the committee he was addressing: the North Carolina State Bar, a regulatory board in charge of licensing and disciplining North Carolina’s lawyers.

It’s the central focus of the State Bar Grievance Review Committee, which has tussled with the Bar and its supporters in the state’s legal community as it has sought to investigate allegations of cancel culture against politically outspoken lawyers and as it has recommended other reforms or demanded political inquisitions.

The committee, created in 2024, is a rarity in North Carolina: It consists of zero members of the state legislature. It’s led by Larry Shaheen and former state Sen. Woody White, two GOP insiders close with Republican state Senate leader Phil Berger. It can’t make changes on its own but can recommend them to the state legislature for approval.

Some previous suggestions by the committee have won broad and bipartisan approval at the state legislature, such as limiting who can report lawyers to the Bar.

But its most recent proposals — including making lawyer discipline a more secretive process, controlled entirely by political appointees — has raised concerns inside the Bar, as well as with some of the lawyers who make a living fighting the Bar on behalf of their clients.

Some of the new changes Shaheen and others on the committee are backing would ban non-lawyers from being involved in hearings of the Bar’s Disciplinary Hearing Commission, which is tasked with deciding whether — and how harshly — to crack down on lawyers accused of things such as stealing clients’ money, sleeping with clients or abusing drugs or alcohol.

The committee also wants to staff the Disciplinary Hearing Commission entirely with political appointees — almost all of them Republicans — and decrease transparency in the process, making more details confidential.

The Bar has deep reservations about those and other proposed changes, saying they’ll harm its goal of protecting members of the public from predatory or simply bad lawyers. The committee has not asked for the Bar’s input during this process, and relations between the two groups have become strained.

State Bar Executive Director Peter Bolac told WRAL he questions the need for these changes, which he said appear to have been put together “without broader input or a comprehensive understanding of the State Bar’s work.”

Bolac was at the most recent hearing on the changes, but he wasn’t invited to speak — whether to provide his own presentation, or to answer questions and concerns. He told WRAL the committee should attempt to learn how the Bar works, first, before trying to change it.

“Without a clear and shared understanding of how the current system functions, it is difficult to engage in a meaningful discussion about potential improvements,” Bolac said. “Nevertheless, we remain willing to participate in thoughtful, good-faith dialogue aimed at strengthening the system.”

Shaheen says he knows firsthand how the process works, having served on Disciplinary Hearing Commission he and his committee are now targeting. And he sees it as his mission to drastically change the way it operates, saying he has lost friends because of his association with it. “I have several lawyers, who have been long term friends of mine, who have come to me and, because of some of the things said to them, feel like I’m the devil,” Shaheen said.

‘Radical changes’

The committee’s most recent meeting was just the latest in the committee’s years-long attempt to make reforms to the Bar.

Alan Schneider, who has represented more lawyers facing disciplinary hearings than perhaps anyone else in North Carolina, often finds himself at odds with the Bar. He previously gave a formal presentation to this same committee on suggestions to reform it.

But he says the latest suggestions, to ramp up the political appointments, go too far.

“There were problems in the past in terms of maybe old cases weren’t heard as quickly as they could,” Schneider said. “But the changes were made. The State Bar heard, and the State Bar has acted. What I’d like this panel to understand is the necessity for all these radical changes. I believe it is unnecessary.”

White and Shaheen said the changes are necessary. Shaheen said increasing political control over the Bar would increase accountability, by making members of the Bar answer to politicians who ultimately answer to the people.

Under the new proposal, 19 of its 26 members would be chosen by various Republican politicians and the remaining seven would be chosen by Democratic Gov. Josh Stein.

“To have more folks appointed by public officials, we want to create more accountability, to make sure that the process is not weaponized against attorneys,” Shaheen said at the committee’s meeting on Tuesday.

White defended the push for less transparency.

“Nowadays when you can weaponize allegations in a nanosecond and publish them, put them out in a political context … that is unfair, for a lawyer to be accused of something before he or she is convicted of it,” he said.

‘Such sweeping reforms’

The committee is set to meet again Wednesday. The committee hadn’t released information on what issues it plans to discuss, but it’s expected to be closely watched by the state’s legal community.

The relative lack of public notice on what this committee is considering also raised the ire of interested parties at last week’s meeting.

Jane Meyer, a Tharrington Smith attorney in Raleigh who also chairs the Bar’s disciplinary group, questioned why the proposals voted on Tuesday were only made public a few days beforehand, and with no opportunity for the Bar — or the general public — to respond.

White had originally attempted pushing through a vote Tuesday without allowing members of the public to speak. But he relented after Andrew Heath, a conservative lobbyist who serves on the committee, urged him to allow Meyer and other members of the public to have two minutes each to give brief comments.

“That troubles me — that such sweeping reforms are being considered without much study, and without asking for input,” Meyer told the committee.

Given the sweeping nature of their recommendations, Wake County District Attorney Colon Willoughby suggested the committee should “do a little bit more study and maybe get a little bit more information.”

Willoughby specifically criticized the proposal to make it harder for members of the public to learn about accusations against attorneys.

“We should not be trying to restrict and make things more confidential,” he said. “We should make it more open. The public needs to have quicker and more complete access. I think people find their lawyers now, not from their Sunday school class or their bowling league or their Lions Club, but through the internet searches. They want information.”

They were among the passionate speakers at the hearing, but perhaps not the most passionate.

Two-plus hours into its most recent hearing on Tuesday, former state Rep. Edwin Hardy had his mic cut off and then was escorted out of the room by security. He was several minutes into speaking during the open public comment period as his comments turned into a rant involving former President Barack Obama, the late Gov. Jim Hunt, allegations of political favoritism, cocaine usage and more.

Hardy, a Republican who used to represent Beaufort County in the state House, was the only one ejected — even though he was also one of the few speakers who appeared to support the committee’s goal of major overhauls to the Bar. His comments were in line with the allegations White, Shaheen and others have been claiming for years about cancel culture.

“I got very vocal online because Obama won,” Hardy told the committee. “… Well guess what: I was very vocal, and the day after Obama won reelection, I got a phone call and the Bar told me I had been randomly picked for an audit.”

State records show that that 2012 audit found Hardy had been using poor accounting practices with trust accounts where he held onto money for clients — including taking actions that “allowed entrusted funds to be disbursed in a manner not authorized by or for the benefit of the client.”

However, the Bar found he didn’t steal any of the money, and that there wasn’t any evidence of his clients being harmed by his trust fund missteps. It allowed him to continue practicing law.

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