Reporter Caleigh Wells:  

It can be difficult to make climate reporting resonate. You’re probably reading this in a climate-controlled room right now. It’s June when the weather usually rocks. That’s the tough thing about climate change: It makes itself known in spurts or disastrous events. Much of the time, it’s quietly changing the world, and while it’s still very relevant to your life, I have to work harder to prove it.

The task: Find the person whose life has been drastically altered, who is willing to share their life story, and whose life story is somehow relevant to the audience. Simple, but difficult. But sometimes that person falls into my lap.

Scott Hawkins is that person. He catches the albacore tuna you buy in cans at the grocery store, just as his father did, and his father’s father before him. Climate change has helped alter the course of his life and he’s got such a pragmatic, logical, matter-of-fact relationship with it. I mean, he has to. His family relies on him figuring out how to adapt to it. He’s a remarkable example of how high the climate stakes are, even on a picture-perfect day.

Climate change forces 3rd gen fisherman to rethink this year

Every June, fisherman Scott Hawkins and his small crew set sail from a marina in San Diego and travel hundreds of miles, scouring the water, hoping for a good catch of albacore tuna. It can take hours or days to stumble upon a school of them. 

“The temperature affects us huge,” Hawkins says. “You get a thermal warming on the surface, the fish don't like to come up and bite in that. It makes the fish lazy. We'll see huge schools of fish, but they're down 20, 30, 40 fathoms, and they don't come up and bite.”

It’s changed his life and the lives of his two sons, who started fishing with him as young as 10 years old. Wyatt, 21, is an engineer on a tugboat, hoping in a few years he’ll captain his own boat. Colton, 19, is in lineman school, learning how to repair and install power lines, setting himself up for a career on land.

“They both love the fish. They would love to have taken over the family business, but I think it's going to end with me,” Hawkins says.

Rare Palos Verdes blue butterfly gets lift from volunteers

A researcher discovered about 100 tiny cornflower blue butterflies on Navy land at the edge of San Pedro in 1994, then started a breeding program that Moorpark College Biology Professor Jana Johnson took over. Now Johnson’s Butterfly Project breeds thousands of the species in captivity and then releases them at various stages in their lives at several locations on the Palos Verdes Peninsula. 

The butterflies only live in the wild for a few days, flitting through the coastal sage scrub in the spring. Hopefully they will mate, lay eggs, and go through their life cycle all on their own.

The Butterfly Project is already seeing results. The Urban Wildland Group estimates there are hundreds of the rare flyers on the Navy land where they were first re-discovered. And they’ve been spotted in the wild at other sites, too.

Santa Cruz’s outlaw sea otter is back in action

An infamous surfboard-stealing sea otter, identified as 841, made headlines last year for chasing surfers and hijacking their boards, then disappeared in December 2023 when atmospheric storms came through the area. At the time, she had a baby with her. Then over Memorial Day weekend this year, Santa Cruz residents spotted her again.

Why is 841 so aggressive? She was born to a mom already in captivity, LA Times Reporter Susanne Rust tells KCRW. 

“That mom was a little too friendly with boats, so [she] hopped on surfboards, chased kayaks. And they think the mom started that behavior when she was fed by people who wanted to get the otter nearby, so [they] reached out and gave the otter food. And that may have cemented a behavior. But how otter 841 picked it up is not entirely clear because the mom stayed in captivity when 841 was put back in the wild.”

This otter has captured people’s attention much like Los Angeles’ mountain lion P-22 did. It largely has to do with her outlandish personality. 

“Here she is in Santa Cruz, which is known for its … offbeat folk people who don't like the law. Federal officials and state officials tried several times last year to capture her, and they couldn't do it,” says Rust. “So just everything she does, I think, has really tapped into the Santa Cruz psyche. I mean, she's a she's a celebrity. .. They've named ice cream flavors out for her.”

Bel Air homeowners vow to kill Westside commuter subway

The stretch of LA’s 405 Freeway that cuts through the Sepulveda Pass and connects West Los Angeles and the San Fernando Valley is beautiful from a bird’s eye view, but it’s also the stuff of traffic nightmares.

Now LA County's transportation agency, Metro, wants to get people out of cars, off the freeway, and onto a rail line connecting West LA and the Valley. Six rail proposals are in play. Three are subway alternatives and three involve above-ground monorail. Building one would cost between $9 and $14 billion, according to early estimates. 

Each rail alternative has its advantages. A subway would carry more passengers than a monorail and travel faster. But monorail supporters say an above-ground system could be built much faster and at a far lower cost than a subway. It would also, they argue, bring some mass transit eye candy to LA. 

However, Bel Air community members are fierce critics. They live immediately east of the 405’s Sepulveda Pass Corridor. Fearing noise, vibrations, and a possible decline in property values, many residents there, like former Ticketmaster CEO Fred Rosen, say they’re ready to use their wealth and lawyers to fight subway construction. 

Touring is ‘impossible’ for many musicians. LA’s Amo Amo is trying to make it work

Following the COVID-19 pandemic, the costs of touring increased 40%, according to Kevin Lyman, professor of music business at USC and the founder of the Warped Tour. 

Love Femme, the LA indie musician behind the band Amo Amo, observes, “The arts have become a babysitting service for rich kids. … Most people who can afford to tour are independently funded through intergenerational wealth.” 

Femme says the only way to tour sustainably is to use her Honda Fit to move from city to city, rely on friends’ homes for lodging, cut the number of band members from five to three, and schedule her own gigs (particularly in places where she knows folks will show up). 

“I'm not on a label. … I've been managing and booking my band for a few years now… People were reaching out to me by email to book me for festivals. And venues where I played before wanted me to come back. So I've actually saved probably 60% of my income by just managing it and booking it myself.”

She also relies on income from music festivals, which pay artists a flat rate guarantee that’s not tied to ticket sales. These payouts often total in the thousands of dollars per show. “I feel very blessed to be on the festival circuit,” says Femme. “I find that they take better care of the artists. Very often, it's a bigger group of people and a bigger team. I think there's more money involved. So people are professional, they feed us well, we get to ride around on those little go-karts.”