Your forecast
Sunny, with a high of 22 C. UV index 6 or high.
A tree physiologist says that several years of repeated drought in British Columbia mixed with heat stress has increased the likelihood of branches breaking off, and this could even happen on a “perfectly calm day” without any breeze.
Peter Constabel, a professor in the biology department at the University of Victoria, says, “It’s the drought that specifically causes this, and somehow it stresses the tree and drops the branch, or the branch falls. If you get cumulative droughts, of course, it’s gonna weaken the tree overall.” The Canadian Press has more here.
Douglas fir trees that died as a result of insect damage following heat stress are visible in the Willamette National Forest, Ore., in 2023. (Amanda Loman / The Associated Press files)
What’s happening today
Negotiations between Canada Post and the Canadian Union of Postal Workers are set to resume.
A Canada Post spokeswoman says in a statement that the Crown corporation is committed to the collective bargaining process with CUPW and to reaching an agreement. The Canadian Press reports.
Canada Post vehicles at a delivery depot in Vancouver, B.C. (Darryl Dyck / The Canadian Press files)
Today’s must-read
Winnipeg School Division trustees have a habit of spending extensive periods of public meetings in private and publishing records with errors.
A Free Press review of 2024-2025 regular meeting minutes found elected officials repeatedly spent more time having closed-door conversations than talking openly.
They suggest trustees were in camera for 50 per cent or more of a regular meeting on at least seven of the 15 evenings they met. These pivots, which often happen mid-event, require attendees to leave the Wall Street board room indefinitely. The livestream is also cut. Maggie Macintosh has the story.
The Winnipeg School Division administration building in Winnipeg (John Woods / Free Press files)
On the bright side
Greg Agnew is one sharp-dressed historian. The Winnipeg resident wears a tailcoat and bowler hat for the roughly 50 presentations he gives annually that touch on various aspects of local history.
“Everybody’s got their signature thing they do or wear (and this) just happens to be mine,” Agnew says. “I’m comfortable wearing them.”
A lifelong history buff, Agnew has more than 50 topics he can present on. Aaron Epp has more here.
Greg Agnew has volunteered with Heritage Winnipeg for 30 years and has spent the last six as president of its board of directors. (Mikaela MacKenzie / Free Press)
On this date
On Aug. 25, 1984: The Winnipeg Free Press reported a record-high canola harvest, worth up to $2.5 billion, was anticipated to be a boon for Manitoba and western Canada. On the news wire, the Los Angeles Times reported O.J. Simpson’s lawyers decided to shut down a phone line they set up with a $500,000 reward — from Simpson himself — for information leading to the arrest of the “real killer or killers” of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Lyle Goldman. Simpson was acquitted of murder at trial but was later found liable in civil court.
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Today’s front page
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