Ashley Ahearn

Two dams blocked the river for more than 100 years. The lower dam is completely gone and the last 30 feet of the upper dam were blown up this week. Now, the river is returning to life.

Earlier this month, China imposed a ban on shellfish imports from most of the U.S. West Coast after finding two bad clams. The move is hitting Washington state particularly hard. State agencies estimate businesses there are losing as much as $600,000 a week.

The Cascades frog used to occupy alpine zones from California to the Canadian border, but its range is shrinking as global temperatures increase and snowpack declines. Scientists are hiking deep into the mountains of the Northwest to study the tiny frog, which makes a call that has been described as a "chuckling" sound.

New life is coming to Washington State's Olympic Peninsula. Two dams along the Elwha River are being removed, bringing a rush of sediment downstream and exposing hundreds of acres of once-submerged land. The dams were built in the early 1900s to power nearby timber mills. But they blocked salmon migration and their power is no longer needed, so they're coming out. This story originated as part of the public media collaboration, EarthFix.

Scientists are worried about the elusive members of the weasel family that live in parts of Olympic National Forest in Washington state. To see whether martens are endangered, volunteers are installing remote camera traps to take photos of the animals.