Nick’s Story

Title

Nick’s Climate Story

Name

Nick L.

Place

Eugene, Oregon, 97401

How are you sensing climate change?

As I have grown up in Southern California, heat has been normal for myself. Whereas for my dad, he grew up in the Pacific Northwest where it was a lot cooler than my experience. As I went to college I got to experience what my dad had, or so I thought. The last few years we have seen the wildfires in Oregon rage due to the heat increases which resulted in dry landscapes which are easy to spark. This in turn not only affects the thousands of animals, but the humans who have medical conditions that impair their breathing already. The increased heat in the Pacific Northwest has also impacted the salmon growth in the Columbia and Snake River to where they get infections and lesions on their body just from the slight increase in water temperature.

For my dad, he grew up camping in the Gorge where they would go hunting and fishing. During one of his trips during COVID quarantine, we had attempted to go to his old “spot” that his friends and himself had gone, but it had 1. been destroyed by the development of one of the many dams that had been built, and 2. had sparse amounts of fish on both sides of the damn with a fish hatchery attached on the bottom half.

How do these changes make you feel?

The changes that I have seen in temperature as well as what my dad has noticed in his years alerts me to what is to come for myself, and after. I thankfully do not plan on having children, but the thoughts of my nieces and nephews going through the hardships of floods, heat waves, and food shortages frightens me.