PLANET IN PERIL

Manitoba Co-Operator The massive storms that have steamrolled through parts of Manitoba are causing significantly higher than average hail damage claims, according to the Canadian Crop Hail Association. Story here.

THE WESTERN PRODUCER If crop insurance data is an indicator, flooding may now be the most common plague in Saskatchewan. Story here.

THE WESTERN PRODUCER Prairie hail adjusters are busy earlier than usual this year following several recent storms. Story here.

CBC News The challenge is to extinguish fire before it moves underground. Story here. RELATED: "These Fires Are Huge, Hidden and Harmful. What Can We Do?"

MotherJones 2016 is shaping up to be another epic fire season. Story here.

CBC News ‘I’ve been waiting for this for 12 years,’ says 18-year-old Rikki Houle.  'This is how we're going to remember our grad.'  Story here . RELATED: Easterville, Chemawawin Cree Nation in Manitoba Evacuated Due to Forest Fire

GOV'T. OF MANITOBA Manitoba Sustainable Development advises a voluntary evacuation is underway in some areas of the Whiteshell following heavy rains as resulting high water has caused deteriorating road conditions. A number of roads will wash out leaving cottage owners stranded.  Officials are contacting cottage owners in the following areas and recommending they evacuate: • Block 5, Caddy Lake; • cottage owners east of Block 9 on PR 312; and  • no vehicle access south of the ambulance garage on South Shore Road in Falcon Lake. The road to Florence and Nora Lakes is also washed out, and the Mantario Trail is closed until further notice. Residents and cottage owners only can call 1-204-349-2201 for information between 8 a.m. and 4 p.m. today and tomorrow. 

InsideClimateNews Forty-four of West Virginia’s 55 counties are under a state of emergency as severe weather and devastating floods have killed at least 14 residents and left hundreds of thousands without power. A spokesperson for West Virginia Governor Earl Ray Tomblin told ABC News that the floods, in some areas, had the potential to be “the worst in 100 years.” Story here.

CBC News First wave of evacuees expected to arrive in Winnipeg tonight. Story here. RELATED:   Climate Change and Life on Earth. When Will the Treadmill Stop?

NATIONAL OBSERVER Chinook salmon. U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. As Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO) announced new federal action to bring back struggling Atlantic salmon on Canada's East Coast, a panel of DFO scientists on Canada's West Coast said the outlook for Pacific salmon has declined from previous years. Story here.

INTER PRESS SERVICE Almost half of the country’s population is facing hunger this year due to no or low harvests, resulting from the effects of El Nino which hit most parts of the southern and northern regions late last year. Story here.

Eco Watch Vietnam  has a fish problem and the government isn’t talking about it. Since April, millions of  dead fish have been washing up on Vietnam’s shores. Story here.

WORLD RESOURCES INSTITUTE Fires are a natural part of many boreal forest ecosystems, but…. Story here.

The New Yorker Though it’s tough to pin any particular disaster on climate change, in the case of Fort McMurray the link is pretty compelling. Story here.

CBC News 2,800-hectare fire still spreading; 50,000 hectare fire north in Nopiming Provincial Park rages on. Story here.

CBC News Alberta has had many severe wildfires over the years. While none has been quite as bad as Fort McMurray, the smoke from this one in 2011 near the Alberta-Saskatchewan border, could be seen from space. (NASA photo.) Thousands of people are fleeing Fort McMurray as wildfire leaps highway and into city. More here.

Manitoba Co-Operator Report points to provincial shortcomings as possible reasons for large annual expenditures. More here.

by Larry Powell As governments everywhere, including Canada's, sleep walk through the gathering storm - another epic tropical typhoon (hurricane) is poised to slam into Fiji.  Those we depend upon as "dot-connectors," who should be viewing everything through the prism of our climate crisis, continue to act like negligent criminals, believing that our survival depends, not on whether we steer our economy away from one that's addicted to fossil fuels, but how big the deficit should be, whether we should bomb a distant enemy overseas in yet another useless war, or bail out some deadbeat corporation which may or may not need it.  No deep-thinkers here.  How about this? 

by Larry Powell ‘Twas the night before Christmas and all through the land  global warming was here.  It was grand!  It was grand!  Cars would start!  Ice would melt!  Folks wore their light clothes! While up through their chimneys mere wisps of smoke rose! On the air one could hear mindless broadcasters say, "It's seven degrees. Hope this thaw lasts 'til May!"  But up at the pole it was not Santa's day. Two of his reindeer had just passed away. Dasher and Dancer  had sadly drowned while playing with mates confined to the  ground.  There was a river they could normally cross but its ice had grown thin in the tenuous frost.  So the two were not helped by the fact they could fly  and the deep, clear water is where they did die.  The Great Bears of the north met similar ends just as learned scholars did portend.  Christmas day dawned - but alas, 'twas not white! Lawns were brown - fields were black. I t just didn't seem right!  The skis and toboggans the kid

World Resources Institute While fires in Indonesia may be making headlines recently, unprecedented forest fires have also scorched the Western United States this year… Story here.