- Stavis Natural Resources Conservation Area (NRCA) completely surrounds the existing Kitsap Forest Natural Area Preserve, which protects the best quality known example of the Douglas-fir-western hemlock/evergreen huckleberry forest community, and one of the only extensive mature and old growth forests in the Puget Sound lowlands. The combination of Stavis and Kitsap Forest protects a landscape that is similar in composition to the historic forest matrix of the Kitsap Peninsula. The site provides long-term protection for three forest plant associations prevalent to the Puget Trough Ecoregion: Douglas-fir-western hemlock/evergreen huckleberry forest, Douglas-fir-western hemlock/Pacific rhododendron forest and the Douglas-fir-western hemlock/swordfern forest. The site was also established to protect high-quality freshwater wetlands and an estuarine wetland and lagoon system.
- Venus (Wikipedia)
Venus is the second planet from the Sun. It is a rocky planet with the densest atmosphere of all the rocky bodies in the Solar System, and the only one with a mass and size that is close to that of its orbital neighbour Earth. Orbiting inferiorly (inside of Earth’s orbit), it appears in Earth’s sky always close to the Sun, as either a “morning star” or an “evening star”. While this is also true for Mercury, Venus appears much more prominently, since it is the third brightest object in Earth’s sky after the Moon and the Sun, appearing brighter than any other star-like classical planet or any fixed star. With such a prominence in Earth’s sky, Venus has historically been a common and important object for humans, in both their cultures and astronomy.