September 21, 1998 - Pollution that that has killed tens of thousands of fish in a southern Minnesota creek is spreading slowly downstream toward the Minnesota River. The Minnesota Pollution Control Agency is investigating to see if a pipe leak reported September 14th by a vegetable processor in Montgomery is the main cause of the fish kill. Minnesota Public Radio's Mary Losure reports. Around 15 miles of Sand Creek-- a tributary that flows north to the Minnesota River--are now contaminated. What DNR officials describe as a "black slug" water has moved downstream from Montgomery and is now a few m
September 28, 1998 - Over the weekend the largest windfarm in the world was dedicated in Southwestern Minnesota, and started feeding electricity into the power grid. However if you want a smaller wind generator just for a house or a farm, you have to look further north. A Duluth company is one of only a half a dozen in the world which manufactures small wind generators intended to power single households. World Power Technologies is finding new markets for it's tower-mounted generators after riding a wild boom and bust cycle in the United States for 20 years.
September 29, 1998 - This summer as many as 150 thousand fish died in four major fish kills in southeast Minnesota. Contamination from area farms was blamed for two of the kills and a spill from a local packing plant for a third. While news of the kills attracted lots of media attention, Department of Natural Resources officials don't even think they're finding all of the kills that take place. They're forming a group of scientists to try to figure out why fish kills occur and how to prevent them.
October 1, 1998 - The Federal Environmental Protection Agency has negotiated a 32 and a half million dollar settlement for environmental violations by Marathon Ashland Incorporated. The company operates refineries in Kentucky, Ohio, and St.Paul Park. THe Minnesota Pollution Control Agency says only a small portion of the fine is for violations at the St. Paul Park refinery.
October 2, 1998 - The corn and soybean feilds of southern Minnesota might seem an unlikely place for a a national gathering of anti-logging activists,but that's where a group called the Ruckus Society is holding its training camp. In a park outside the small town of Geneva, activists are learning techniques for timber road blockades and other so-called "direct action" tactics.
October 7, 1998 - A Mainstreet Radio special broadcast from the Prairie Wetlands Learning Center in Fergus Falls. In this first hour of program on Minnesota's wetlands and waterfowl, Rachel Reabe interviews Tim Bodeen, director of the Prairie Wetlands Learning Center; Kevin Brennan, member of the U.S. Fish and Wildlife; and Dr. Jay Leitch, economist at North Dakota State University. The group discuss Minnesota's vanishing wetlands, actions being taken to protect them, and educating the public about the wetlands.
October 7, 1998 - A Mainstreet Radio special broadcast from the Prairie Wetlands Learning Center in Fergus Falls. In this second hour of program on Minnesota's wetlands and waterfowl, Rachel Reabe hosts a discussion on hunting in the wetlands with Doug Wells, wildlife manager at the Fergus Falls office of Natural Resources; and Tom Brimhall, chairman of the local Ducks Unlimited. Reabe then interviews John House, wildlife artist, and winner of DNR duck stamp contest.
October 12, 1998 - Recovery from a natural disaster takes time. Months and years can go by before life seems normal again. Minnesota Public Radio's Lynette Nyman returned to Saint Peter to see how people are doing just six months after the tornado disaster. She met with Saint Peter resident and business owner Nancy Jordett . Nancy Jordett is busy these days. She's rebuilding her life. Her home has a new roof. Her business...more than six months after the storm, is still in the basement of an employee's home. Her family? She says they're fine, but she says summer was a challenge.
November 5, 1998 - Although the cause of the split limbs, extra legs, missing eyes and other frog deformities reported from Minnesota and many other states is still unknown, evidence linking deformed frogs and farm chemicals continues to mount. Researchers will discuss those findings and others in San Diego this week at a conference sponsored by the National Science Foundation. Minnesota Public Radio's Mary Losure reports. When researcher Martin Ouellet first began finding deformed frogs along the St. Lawrence River in Quebec in 1992, he suspected a link betw
November 6, 1998 - Farmers and producers around the nation are competing for more than one-billion dollars in cash payments for land enrolled in the Conservation Reserve Program... The program, created in 1985, protects fragile farmland by paying selected farmers to stop growing crops on highly erodible land...as Mainstreet Radio's Hope Deutscher reports, the program is particularly tempting to some farmers during the current farm crisis... Around the nation, thousands of farmers are sitting through meetings such as this one in Barnesville...they are learning the r