Sea Turtle Emergency in the Gulf

Right now, threatened and endangered sea turtles are fighting their way through oil coated waters in their annual migration to their nesting grounds – fighting for their very survival because of reckless drilling off our coasts.

The Gulf oil disaster couldn’t have come at a worse time for sea turtles. It started just days before they must return to shore to nest and lay their eggs.

Please help save sea turtles threatened by the massive offshore oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico.

Like humans, sea turtles will die from ingesting too much oil. And like us, they can drown. Sea turtles need to surface to breathe, which is hard to do when the ocean’s surface is coated with oil.

It doesn’t take a wildlife expert to know that sea turtles need oil-free beaches and waters to survive…especially during nesting season and immediately after, when their hatchlings must return to sea.

Defenders of Wildlife President Rodger Schlickeisen and I have already directed our staff to make emergency response to the offshore oil crisis our immediate priority.

Your tax-deductible donation today of whatever you can afford will help support Defenders of Wildlife’s emergency three-point strategy to address this crisis:

Point 1. Emergency Response for Sea Turtles
Threatened and endangered sea turtles are in waters off the Florida Panhandle right now. And females are expected to begin laying eggs within the week.

Our Florida staff is heading to some of the Sunshine State’s most important nesting grounds to assist with the clean-up and rehabilitation of oil-soaked sea turtles and other wildlife impacted by the spill. In the weeks ahead, we will recruit and train more volunteers to assist with these efforts.

The response to this disaster could well determine the fate of the next generation of loggerhead, Kemp’s ridley and other threatened and endangered sea turtles, so it’s vital that we act now.

Help save sea turtles…

Point 2. Prevent the Next Offshore Oil Disaster.
On July 1^st, Shell Oil plans to begin offshore drilling operations in the remote and harsh waters of the Chukchi Sea off the coast of Alaska – setting the stage for America’s next great drilling disaster.

Since Monday, we have mobilized more than 51,000 Defenders supporters to urge President Obama to reinstate the ban on offshore drilling that protected our coasts for 27 years and to rescind Shell’s permits to conduct exploratory drilling in this vital habitat for America’s threatened polar bears, bowhead whales and other wildlife.

Yesterday, we joined with Native Alaskans and other allies to challenge Shell’s permits at a federal court hearing in Portland, OR. This week, we called on Congress to stop promoting offshore drilling. And next week, we will urge the U.S Senate to pass legislation that moves America away from its dangerous dependence on fossil fuels and addresses the impacts of climate change on wildlife like our vulnerable sea turtles without sacrificing our coasts.

Help prevent the next offshore oil disaster…

Point 3. Document the Crisis and Educate the Public.
Working with people like Defenders Board member and world-famous wildlife biologist Jeff Corwin, photojournalist Krista Schlyer, and others, we’re helping to highlight the terrible implications of the Gulf offshore oil spill through compelling images and informed first-hand accounts… so that a tragedy like this never happens again.

Defenders Senior Marine Policy Advisor Richard Charter is working with some of the top data analysts in the country to predict the spill’s trajectory, providing expert analysis on the technical perils of offshore drilling in the media, and working with policy makers to address the crisis.

This week, we launched a new blog, where we will provide up-to-the-minute news and analysis on wildlife impacted by the spill.

Help us document the crisis and educate the public…

The massive gulf oil spill is now just a few miles from Bon Secour National Wildlife Refuge and other critical nesting sites for threatened and endangered sea turtles. And the toxic tide could hit other vital nesting sites on the Florida Panhandle as early as next week.

The annual cycle of sea turtle reproduction leaves no time for delay! We must act now to save these sea turtles. To do so, we – and the sea turtles – desperately need your help.


Please make your tax-deductible contribution today.

With Gratitude,

Jamie Rappaport Clark Executive Vice President Defenders of Wildlife

P.S. We need your support to respond to this crisis. Please make a secure donation online now or call 1-800-385-9712 to contribute by phone.

Laysan Albatross & Plastics

The remains of a Laysan Albatross chick which was fed plastic by its parents resulting in death.

In the middle of the North Pacific Ocean, on a tiny island 1,000 miles from the nearest big city, many Laysan albatross chicks die each year because their bellies are full of bottle caps, toothbrushes and other plastic. One study found that 97.5% of chicks had plastic in their stomachs. Many people think that the biggest source of pollution in the oceans is oil spilled from ships, but most marine pollution is litter that starts out on land. By making changes now, we can reduce the amount of plastic that gets into our oceans in the months and years to come.

Albatrosses fly hundreds, sometimes thousands of miles in search of food for their chicks. They look for squid and fish eggs floating on the surface of the water. Unfortunately, plastic floats, and Laysan albatross are particularly attracted to it. They eat it, mistaking if for food, then they fly back to the nest and feed bottle caps, lighters, fishing lures and other pieces of plastic to their young. The chicks starve to death, with stomachs full of plastic.

Trash that's dropped on the ground doesn't stay put. Even hundreds of miles from the ocean, trash is washed by rain into city storm drains and out into streams and rivers that lead to the ocean. From there, wind and currents carry our trash far out to sea. Scientists estimate that around the world, up to one million seabirds and 100,000 marine mammals and sea turtles die each year from eating plastic. We can help keep trash from traveling by recycling and putting trash in trash cans.

Only Jelly Fish by 2040

Get Ready to enjoy the tasty slime of Jelly Fish...

According to researchers, there will be no seafood left to catch by 2048, except for jellyfish, which will thrive in the new, collapsed ecosystem. Luckily, they say that jellyfish have the same nutritional content as shrimp, which is pretty darn good.

You can't make the claim that all fish species will collapse -- "collapse" meaning the species has fallen to 10 percent of its highest known numbers -- by 2048 without a lot of people raising an eyebrow. How can that be? Our supermarkets are chock-full of cod and salmon and shrimp and tuna and every other big, slimy, underwater delicacy. Sushi restaurants are multiplying exponentially.

The authors of the study might say that's part of the problem. Overall, what they see as the looming eradication of marine life would be the result of a lack of diversity in ocean ecosystems that comes from the overfishing of particular types of fish.

Endangered Animals Why would there be no more fish in 40 years? What brought bison back from the brink of extinction? How did the bald eagle get delisted as an endangered species?

To arrive at the conclusion that there will be no more fish by 2048, the scientists looked at a number of data sources, including global fishing data from the U.N. Food and Agriculture Organization, fishing data from all 64 major global marine ecosystems between 1950 and 2003, results from individual studies of marine areas by local scientists -- including a study of the San Francisco Bay and its surrounding rivers -- and data from 48 marine areas protected by conservation measures. What they found isn't pretty. In the case of the San Francisco Bay and its surrounding rivers, as reported in a San Francisco Chronicle article on November 2, scientists looked at population data going back a thousand years and discovered that "... more than 90 percent of of the original water-dwelling species in those waters have lost at least half of their populations." In addition, 30 percent of those species had collapsed at one point but recently came back into safer numbers. It seems that with loss of even a few species, the rest of the marine environment degrades more quickly. Diversity seems to play a key role in keeping marine ecosystems alive.

The research points to a number of practices as contributing to the vulnerable state of marine ecosystems worldwide. Overfishing and destructive fishing practices like trawling, where fishers drag a weighted net along the sea bed and just grab up everything down there, whether they can sell it or not, deplete some species to point of collapse. When certain species no longer play their role in the ecosystem, the imbalance makes the ecosystem more susceptible to harm, for example in the form of an overgrowth of toxic life like algae blooms that deplete the oxygen content in the water. This depletion of oxygen content leaves other species of fish less likely to thrive. And then, of course, pollution and climate change play a role in the lack of marine diversity, as well.

Sockeye salmon may be off the menu within our lifetime.

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Critics of the study point out several flaws that call into question the 40-year estimate for the fall of fishing. First, they say that none of the data in the study reflects a direct cause-and-effect relationship. It's all based on drawing correlations between trends recorded in separate collections of data. They also note that U.N. fishing data is considered by many experts to be unreliable because some countries use questionable methods to report their fishing numbers. Also, other organizations including the NOAA have seen opposing trends in marine populations. According to at least one NOAA scientist, diversity in several marine populations in the United States is on the rise. Finally, skeptics point out that the study's findings don't take into account the protective measures already in place to conserve ocean biodiversity and prevent species collapse. While the study's interpretation of data from protected environments shows that conservation methods are working, the study appears to set that aside in predicting a 2048 absence of fish.

Whether the short track to fishlessness is accurate or not, the study's finding that nearly 30 percent of fish species are already collapsed due to overfishing is at the very least a warning signal.

To prevent the end of marine life as we know it, the study suggests that world act quickly -- in a couple of decades, they say, the damage will be too far gone to undo. Experts promote enacting global protections and increasing current conservation efforts while ocean life is still diverse enough for the ecosystems to recover.

New Job!

I've just now finalized the contract for a new Webmaster position working for NAMEPA, which is the North American Marine Environment Protection Association!

Yey its always been my dream to help save the oceans and marine animals which I love!

So excited <3>

Native American Poems

I Am Spirit Singing Earth Song

I am spirit singing earth song

I am a child
Of mountains and stones
    Forests and trees
         Waters and lakes
Earth is my mother

She holds me in her gentle embrace
She fills me with strength
She envelopes me with love

My heart beats her profound rhythm
My ears hear her wondrous song
My feet touch her sacred skin
My eyes know her great beauty
In wild places... and in tamed

Silent joy stills my tongue of words
But when she sings, I sing

I am spirit singing earth song

That's really beautiful. I love native american poems. I have one also that's just as lovely:

Don't stand by my grave and weep
For I'm not there, I do not sleep
I am a thousand winds that blow
I am the diamonds glint on snow
I am the sunlight on ripened grain
I am the gentle autumn's rain

When you wake in morning's hush
I am the swift uplifting rush
Of quiet birds in circle flight
I am the stars that shine at night
Do not stand at my grave and cry
I am not there, I did not die.

Evening Primrose

I am creating a beautiful new garden, full of love and light. This lovely flower, Evening Primrose, is going to be added soon. It is the one that Martha Graham used to go meditate to, in her yard, as a child. It blooms at night...

Young roots can be eaten like a vegetable (with a peppery flavour), or the shoots can be eaten as a salad. The whole plant was used to prepare an infusion with astringent and sedative properties. It was considered to be effective in healing asthmatic coughs, gastro-intestinal disorders, whooping cough and as a sedative pain-killer. Poultices containing O. biennis were at one time used to ease bruises and speed wound healing. One of the common names for Oenothera, "Kings cureall", reflects the wide range of healing powers ascribed to this plant...