vignettes the ocean is very sick

8/9/2019 Vignettes the Ocean is Very Sick

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The Ocean Is Warning Us. Its Very Sick.

Yet We Continue to Pollute and Over-fish. Is Armed Force the Only

Alternative?


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This is a survey of the literature on major marine die-offs from the late 1950s to

present. Ive edited, in some cases heavily, but only to improve readability. Ive donemy best to maintain accuracy.

Caution. If youre depression-prone, this isnot recommended reading. Inwriting this, I all but gave up hope.

The Bad News in short-form

From late 1950s to 1990, western Alaska Steller sea lion population plummets from140,000 animals to 30,500 by 1998 its down to 20,000

1960s to present, Steller eiders virtually disappear from YK-Delta (Yukon--KuskokwimDelta, Alaska, one of worlds largest river deltas) did they go elsewhere? no record

Early 1970s to 1990, estimated Alaskan harbor seal populations drop from 270,000 to80,000 animals

1974-1983, northern fur seal numbers fall by 373,000 animals

1976 to1994, numbers of common eider in northern Alaska and western CanadianArctic drop by 54%

1970s to 1992 sees a greater than 90% decline of spectacled eider in YK-Delta

Sea otters in Aleutian Islands decline from an estimated 55,000--74,000 animals in mid-1980s to less than 10,000 by 2000

1983, on Florida's Gulf and Atlantic coasts more than 13,000 wintering loons may have

died over three months

1987-88: 750 bottlenose dolphins die along beaches from New Jersey to Florida pneumonia and severe skin lesions -- blubber has very high concentrations of PCBs

1987: 10,000 seals in Lake Baikal, Siberia die of distemper virus

1988: white-sided dolphins (number & location unknown) experience a mysterious


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2000: 355 gray whales strand along Baja Peninsula

2002: 2,239 marine mammals, all with severe neurologic signs, strand in southernCalifornia

2005: scores of bottlenose dolphins, manatees and turtles wash up dead alongsouthwest Florida coast

2005-2006: tens of thousands of starving birds wash up on West Coast beaches attimes of year when the birds should be healthiest

2006: since 1991, 34 marine mammal mass die-offs reported in U.S. coastal waters 29% involve bottlenose dolphins -- causes include phytotoxins and infectious diseases dolphins also show repeated chronic exposure to toxic aqua-blooms and high levelsof PCBs and fire retardants, among other manufactured toxins

2006-present, about 2,000 Eider ducks dead in five Cape Cod mass die-offs

2007: 800 greater shearwaters die along Atlantic coast (birds may die en masseduring summer migration, when they leave breeding grounds in South Africa and cross

Atlantic enroute to New England most of these birds are severely underweightjuveniles with empty stomachs and no fat stores)

Present: For 5 years, Washington state oyster larvae nearly wiped out cause thoughtto be acidic (corrosive) water from great depths oyster industry in deep trouble

Present: disease all but exterminates black abalone from California Channel Islands,spreads to populations on California mainland

Present: Sea otters fall victim to toxoplasmosis, a brain disease conveyed by abooming population of pet and feral cats, whose feces are swept into the ocean bystorm run-off cat litter also is highly toxic

As if this werent enough, marine creatures are dying at sea by the millions, ofstarvation, because expected upwellings arent bringing the usual food to the surface.This is thought to tie into climate change and wind-shifts in the jet stream.

Present: BP oil spill Gulf of Mexico no conclusions, but death toll will be staggering

The Bad News in long-form


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In the average year, no dead humpbacks used to be sighted in the Gulf of Maine.Then came the unprecedented. During late 1988 and early 1989, fourteen humpbacks(and two minke whales) turned up dead in Massachusetts waters. All seemed in goodphysical condition -- no bruises, lesions or signs of emaciation. All deaths seemed

sudden.The official conclusion: the whales had died of paralytic poisoning caused by

red tide toxins contained in mackerel. Oddly enough, this happened in a year whenalmost no red tide toxin had shown up in shellfish along the New England coast. Andit seems highly unlikely that there was a red tide bloom offshore in December, for thisis generally a summer phenomenon. Some scientists speculate that the mackerel hadpicked up the toxin elsewhere, at some earlier time. That is, the fish may haveacquired low doses over time, not enough to kill them but enough to kill any animalthat ate large numbers of them, say a humpback whale that might eat half a ton ormore. But were this the case, I should think we would have seen numerous otherdeaths -- large fish as well as cetaceans -- along the southbound migration route of thetoxic mackerel. Then again, anything much smaller than a whale would likely bedevoured by scavengers and never come to our attention.

Whatever the cause, it seems that no whale die-off this large had ever beforeappeared in the annals of coastal events. Yet toxic dinoflagellates (microscopicorganisms -- variously identified as animals, plants and plankton -- that carry the redtide toxin) have probably been around for a long time. Why have die-offs this large notbeen reported before?

[In place of red tide some writers use HAB (Harmful Algal Blooms). I preferred tide. See first photo for a dramatic example.]

(The following paragraph is edited, but semantically unchanged, from the

abstract of a paper written by Julie Siler during her Master's research at SUNY. Julie isa certified veterinary technician with extensive experience rehabilitating wild birds.She currently works withsalmonella at Cornell. The paper was written at least asrecently as 2001.)

Like synthetic toxins, natural toxins from marine algal blooms can kill wildlife.A variety of species are affected because of trophic transport and bioaccumulation inthe pelagic food web. Detecting phycotoxins at concentrations low enough to allowdetection in field populations of zooplankton - the primary entry point to the food web- has been the biggest obstacle to the study of vectorial intoxication of higherorganisms. As analytical techniques improve, algal toxins can be detected, identified,and monitored more accurately. This may be particularly important if harmful algalblooms are increasing in frequency or expanding their range. Effects of algal toxins onmarine wildlife should prove to be similar to those of toxicants already known to affect

wildlife populations.End of Siler abstract. Still, some controversy seems to persist regarding the

lethality of algal blooms. When scientists, especially those with federal connections,first began blaming die-offs on red tide, most independent scientists and reporterscried foul, suggesting that the red tide scenario was a dodge to avoid confronting


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synthetic chemical pollution issues such as PCBs. The preceding paragraph suggeststhat techniques for measuring the impact of red tide have improved, and that algalblooms can kill various species of marine life, even whales.

This seems to remain contentious. Even in die-offs involving major skin lesionsand organ damage, some investigators do seem inclined to downplay the role of

pollutants such as PCBs.Between June 1987 and March 1988, 750 bottlenose dolphins washed up dead

along the Atlantic seacoast from New Jersey to Florida. The animals had horriblelesions and ulcerations of the mouth and skin, dark fluid in their lungs, and theirinternal organs had degenerated. Theres no way of knowing how many deaddolphins were eaten by scavengers or for other reasons never drifted to shore.Greenpeace cited estimates that the death toll may have topped 2,500, and that thiscould represent fifty percent of the Atlantic coast bottlenose dolphin population.

J.R. Geraci, a Canadian specialist on wildlife diseases, was assigned to the caseby the National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), a division of the National Oceanicand Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Seventeen months later, after testingsixteen of the dead dolphins, with varying amounts of toxin showing up in eight ofthem, Geraci and his team concluded that red tide poisoning had weakened thedolphins' immune systems and left them vulnerable to bacterial infections. (Geracireached the same conclusion regarding the 1987-1988 deaths of the fourteenhumpback whales in MassachusettsBay.)

Independent scientistsdisagreed. These naturally occurringtoxins have never been shown to

weaken an animal's immune system

or to cause lesions, whereas PCBsare known to do both. NMFS/NOAArefused to make public all data on

which Geracis red-tide conclusionwas based, but the report wasleaked to Greenpeace, and thence tothe scientific community. Levels oftoxic PCBs were so high in some ofthe corpses that the animalsconstituted hazardous waste. Onedolphin's blubber had the highest levels of PCBs ever found in a marine mammal --6,800 parts per million. (The government prohibits the sale of fish containing morethan two parts per million.)

Criticism mounted. Congress held a hearing. Little hard evidence was foundthat implicated naturally occurring toxins, and remarkably little had been done toinvestigate other possible causes for the die-off. NOAA promised to reopen theinvestigation and conduct a broadly based study. This was never done.

Red tide algal bloom, New Zealand. Photo by M. Godfrey.


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In the summer and fall of 2005, scores ofbottlenose dolphins, manatees and turtles

washed up dead along the southwest Floridacoast. Assigned to investigate this was the

Working Group on Marine Mammal Unusual

Mortality Events, which Congress had charteredafter the large dolphin and whale die-offs in thelate 1980s. This group includesepidemiologists, clinical veterinarians,immunologists, and ecotoxicologists. So far,theyve studied 39 incidents. One of them isRandall Wells, who heads the Sarasota DolphinResearch Program at the private Mote Marine

Laboratory. After taking samples from 130 stranded dolphins, they concluded that redtide caused the massive die-off. But he and his colleagues are still trying to figure out

whether contaminants or other factors might have weakened the animals. "It is sohard to do the detective work to pick all those things apart," he said. Experts believe arange of factors contribute to the algae blooms and viruses linked to the die-offs.These contributing factors include nutrient runoff from farming, rising oceantemperatures, and discarded waste such as cat litter.

The Working Group on Marine Mammal Unusual Mortality Events now has 12permanent members and enlists a transient group of volunteer experts from theUnited States and overseas to help diagnose each die-off. The working group hassupposedly evolved into the federal government's top detective team for these events,but its budget is absurdly tight. Between 2001 and 2007, it received just $1.3 million indesignated federal funding. It relies heavily on volunteers, as many as forty per

incident.In a later study, The Armed Forces Institute of Pathology implicated morbillivirus

infection as a primary factor in the deaths of 750 bottlenose dolphins along the U.S.mid-Atlantic coast in 1987-1988, some 25,000 harbor (gray?) seals in the North Sea in1988, and more than 1,000 striped dolphins in the Mediterranean Sea in 1990-1991.Researchers also discovered a strain of morbillivirus in bottlenose dolphins in the Gulfof Mexico.

Morbillivirus is a class of virus that suppresses immune functions and leads tosecondary infections. Its a major killer. Measels (rubella) is a morbillivirus. Duringthe 1500s, measles, smallpox and influenza carried by the Spanish conquistadorskilled one-half to two-thirds of the New World native population. (Some estimatesexceed 90%.) Distemper in dogs and rinderpest in cattle are also morbilliviruses.Much of the canine population died when distemper invaded Europe 200 years ago,and rinderpest has decimated cattle populations the world over. (I got most of thisdata from Dolphin Research Center.) So its a matter of grave concern when marinemammals are found to be infected with morbilliviruses. Who knows, maybe theyrecontracting these viruses from us.

DeadWhales (2002). www.kidcyber.com.au


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In 1994 independent studies conclusively showedthat the New England die-off, once blamed on "redtideby Geraci et al, was caused by morbillivirus.Furthermore, some scientists now suggest that thefrequent morbillivirus outbreaks may result from

immune suppression linked to coastal pollution.Researchers have also found butyltin

compounds, including tributyltin (TBT), in the liver, kidney and muscle tissues ofbottlenose dolphins stranded along the southeast US Atlantic and Gulf coasts between1989 and 1994. Scientists speculate that TBT and its breakdown products may haveled to the deaths by suppressing the dolphins' immune systems.

Tributyltin (TBT) is an active ingredient in many products, and is used to kill abroad range of organisms. One common use is in marine paint to prevent barnaclesand algae from growing on the hulls of boats. TBT compounds are also used asdisinfectants, wood preservatives, textile disinfectants and stabilizers in PVC resin.

In a 1997 study, published inEnvironmental Science & Technology, scientistsexamined the remains of 19 dolphins. The butyltin concentrations in these dolphins

were 50 to 100 times higher than concentrations found in a captive adult.The sixteen dead whales and 700 dead dolphins of the late 1980s werent the

only unusual die-offs during that period. In 1985 twenty-seven dead bottlenosedolphins that washed ashore in California were found to contain extremely high levelsof DDT and PCB in their blubber. In 1987 10,000 seals were killed by a distemper virusin Siberia's Lake Baikal.

During early 1998 at least 1,600 Hooker sea lions (from a total population of only12,500) perished in a mysterious mass die-off in the Aukland Islands. This isapparently the same event reported as killing thousands of Hooker sea lions in New

Zealand, of which the Aukland Islands are a part. The die-off was blamed on lack offood due to the harsh El Nino conditions.

Also in 1988 a distemper virus killed 18,000 (variously reported as 25,000) grayseals (variously reported as harbor seals) in the North Sea, the worst wildlife epidemicin history. This was an estimated 40% of northern Europe's gray seal population.(Unlike the NMFS/NOAA closed-door investigation of dolphin deaths in the USA, thegray seal die-off in Europe resulted in 200 scientific papers on the subject.)

In 1989 an unusually high number of sick harbor seals showed up along theAtlantic coast of the USA. Geraci et al concluded that these deaths and those of theNorth Sea gray seals were caused by a morbillivirus infection. In the first four monthsof 1990, 400 dolphins washed up dead on beaches in the Gulf of Mexico. Later in thatsame year, hundreds of dead striped dolphins washed up on beaches in France, Italyand Spain (total mortality estimated to be as high as 10,000 striped dolphins). FromFebruary to April 1994, 220 bottlenose dolphins died on or near Texas beaches, with 67found in one ten-day period. (From 1985 to 1995, nearly 3,000 dead bottlenosedolphins have been found.) In 1997 a die-off of highly endangered Mediterraneanmonk seals off the western Sahara coast reduced that population by over fifty percent.

All the animals mentioned in the two preceding paragraphs were reported


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killed by a virus (morbillivirus) similar to the one that killed the North Sea seals.However, necropsies have also revealed high levels of chemical pollutants which mayhave weakened the animals' immune systems. Some chemicals, called endocrinedisruptors, have devastating effects on the animals hormone systems.

In the spring of 1999, 273 gray whales stranded along the west coast of North

America, nearly ten times as many strandings as in the previous five years. In the year2000, 355 gray whalesstranded along the BajaPeninsula. During theprevious ten years, thehighest number of strandingsreported for any one year

was 87. One reasonsuggested is nutritionalstress, but this seemsunlikely; most of the strandedanimals looked well fed.

Some of the worstdie-offs over recent decades

have occurred in Alaska. Northern fur seal numbers fell from 1.25 million in 1974 to877,000 in 1983. Thats a loss of 373,000 animals. (Their population has since risen toan estimated million, about 50% of pre-exploitation size.) Harbor seal populationsdeclined sharply during the 1980s, primarily in the Gulf of Alaska. Current overallpopulation is about 80,000 animals, far below the 270,000 estimated for the early1970s. The western stock of Steller sea lions numbered approximately 140,000 in thelate 1950s, but was down to 30,500 by 1990, when the species was declared

endangered. Numbers have continued to decline, and were estimated at slightly over20,000 in 1998. Sea otters in the Aleutian Islands have declined from an estimated55,000--74,000 animals in the mid-1980s to less than 10,000 by 2000.

By no means are die-offs restricted to marine mammals. Various populations ofAlaska sea ducks have suffered heavy losses, including:

~ from 1976 to1994 a 54% decline in common eider in northern Alaska and thewestern Canadian Arctic;

~ from the 1970s to 1992 a greater than 90% decline in spectacled eider in theYK-Delta (Yukon-Kuskokwim Delta, Alaska, one of the largest river deltas in the

world);~ since initial surveys in the 1960s, Steller eiders

have virtually disappeared from the YK-Delta.Theres little consistency in Alaska sea duck

trends, though; some species have remained stable orincreased slightly, while species whose populationshave declined in one or more areas have remainedstable or increased in others. Causes of declines areunknown.

Mass stranding of Pilot Whales shore of Cape Cod, 1902 W ikipedia

Dead Eiders on Cape Cod Oct. 2007


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Since 2006, about 2,000 Eider ducks have died in five mass mortalities on CapeCods beaches. Scientists and conservationists rallied to learn why. People have seenand reported mass eider deaths before. On Cape Cod beaches, mortalities have beenannual or semi-annual since at least the 1980s, but this year the die-offs seemed tohappen more often. It turns out that the ducks were infected with intestinal parasites

known as acanthocephalans (spiny-headed worms). Such parasitic infections arecommon in sea ducks, and these worms cause eider mortalities in other regions.

In the late1990s fall surveys in greater Seattle found a startling death rate amongmigratory coho salmon females that were still ocean bright and had not yet spawned.

Adult coho from various streams showed similar symptoms (disorientation, lethargy,loss of equilibrium, gaping, fin splaying) that eventually led to the death of the affectedanimals. Pre-spawn mortality (PSM) has been observed in many lowland urbanstreams surveyed to date, with overall death rates ranging from 20% to 90% of the fallruns. By comparison, the rate of die-offs in non-urban (forested) streams appears low.The precise cause of PSM is unknown, but evidence suggests pollution. Coho thatenter small urban streams after fall storm events are acutely sensitive to storm-waterrunoff originating from urban and residential land use.

(2006) According to Teri Rowles of NOAAs National Marine Mammal Strandingprogram, since 1991, 34 marine mammal mass die-offs have been reported in U.S.coastal waters. 29 percent involved bottlenose dolphins. Causes include phytotoxinsand infectious diseases. The dolphins also show repeated chronic exposure to toxicaqua-blooms and high levels of PCBs and fire retardants, among other synthetic toxins.

In late 1999, hundreds of thousands of lobsters were estimated to have died inan apparent disease-related event in Long Island Sound. (A paramoeba infection issuspected.) Disease has all but exterminated black abalone from the CaliforniaChannel Islands, and has since spread to populations on the California mainland. In

1983, on Florida's Gulf and Atlantic coasts, over 13,000 wintering loons may have diedover a three-month period.

The resident Puget Sound population of orcas fell from 99 to 84 between 1995and 2000. PCB contamination may be an important factor in their decline. PCB levelssampled from live orcas exceed levels found to induce immuno-suppression andendocrine disruption in harbor seals, though the toxicological significance in orcas isnot known.

In 2002, 2,239 marine mammals stranded in southern California. Fourorganizations and NMFS investigated the situation. The strandings were clusteredfrom April to June and consisted primarily of California sea lions (Zalophuscalifornianus) and long-beaked common dolphins (Delphinus capensis). All hadsevere neurologic signs. Intoxication with domoic acid, a marine neurotoxinproduced during seasonal blooms ofPseudo-nitzschia spp., was suspected. Butdefinitively linking harmful algal blooms to large-scale marine mammal mortalities stillposes a substantial challenge, as does determining the geographic extent, speciescomposition, and potential population impacts of marine mammal die-offs. For thisreason, time series cross-correlation analyses were performed to see whether thetiming ofPseudo-nitzschia blooms related to strandings along the southern California


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coast. Such correlations between strandings and blooms were identified for Californiasea lions, long-beaked common dolphins, and short-beaked common dolphins(Delphinus delphis). Similar correlations were identified for bottlenose dolphins(Tursiops truncatus) and gray whales (Eschrichtius robustus), but small sample sizesmade these associations more speculative. The timing of the blooms and strandings of

marine mammals suggested that both inshore and offshore foraging species wereaffected, and that marine biotoxin programs should include offshore monitoring sites.

Also, the group concluded that the monitoring of California sea-lion strandings,apparently a very sensitive indicator of domoic acid in the marine environment, shouldbe included in public health surveillance plans.

In 2005 and 2006, tens ofthousands of starving birds

washed up on shore at timesof year when the birdsshould be healthiest. Andscientists trying to predictsalmon runs have recordedlarge swings in oceantemperatures at a muchhigher frequency than in thepast, a change that signalslarge shifts in the amount offood available for salmon,birds, and marine mammals.Scientists link the low oxygenzones and animal die-offs to

changes in the timing andstrength of up-welling, a usually reliable and regular wind-driven process that bringscold, nutrient rich waters up from the depths of the ocean and fuels productive coastalecosystems.

For five or more years, Washington state oyster larvae have nearly been wipedout every year. The cause is thought to be acidic (corrosive) water from great depths,stirred up by offshore winds. No one knows what to do about it, short of installingmore sophisticated equipment to monitor the oceans pH, and given that, what canthey do about it? It all suggests that significant ocean changes are coming fast, ifthey're not here already. The oyster industry is in deep trouble, and is appealing toCongress for help.

In summer of 2006, the most severe low-oxygen ocean conditions everobserved on the West Coast of the United States turned 3,000 square kilometers (anarea larger than Rhode Island) of the Oregon sea floor into a carpet of deadDungeness crabs and rotting sea worms. Worse still, this hypoxic zone took up two-thirds of the water column. Virtually all fish apparently fled the area. This is by far the

worst such event since the phenomenon was first identified in 2002, according toresearchers at Oregon State University (OSU). Levels of dissolved oxygen approach

The slow death of a stranded pod of sperm whales


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serious search is tantamount to giving up on our beautiful planet.

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Summary

Over the past twenty years, toxic algal blooms such as red tide have increasedsignificantly in oceans and seas worldwide. Also, brown tide algal blooms areoverwhelming large coastal areas, depriving the water of oxygen and killing sea life, as

well as producing a stench bad enough to send waterfront property valuesplummeting. Some researchers attribute the algal bloom problems to sewage andagricultural runoff, which add excess nutrients to coastal waters. Over the past twodecades the effects of harmful algal blooms in the United States have expanded froma few scattered coastal areas to virtually all coastal states.

In recent years, major disease outbreaks and die-offs have plagued marineanimals like otters, oysters, dolphins, manatees, and whales around the world. Theoverall health of the sea seems poor. Seals and dolphins are dying by the tens ofthousands. The great Alaskan fur seal population is down to a third of its 1956 level,and the prime suspect is pollution throughout the North Pacific Ocean. Along thecoast of Great Britain, where some seventy seacoast towns used to claim residentpopulations of bottlenose dolphins, only two populations are left. Mysterious diseasesare ravaging Chesapeake Bay oysters. Massive fish die-offs occur more and morefrequently. Large areas of ocean are mysteriously deprived of oxygen. And well overhalf of the coastal shellfish beds are closed at any given time, contaminated withbacteria.

At the American Association for the Advancement of Science meeting in 2007, itwas reported that unusual ocean conditions and marine die-offs are changing the wayscientists think about the future of ocean resources. According to the new synthesis ofdecades of atmospheric and oceanographic data, increasingly wild fluctuations in

winds and currents appear to account for a series of recent anomalous ocean events --from repeated low oxygen zones larger than Rhode Island to massive die- offs ofseabirds. Scientists say that underlying wobbles in winds and positions of the jet

Dead sperm whales


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stream are consistent with climate change predictions. "There is no other viablesuspect right now, no other obvious explanation," says Jane Lubchenco of OregonState University, "We've entered new territory. These arrhythmias in the coastal oceansuggest we're observing a system that is out of kilter."

But researchers stopped short of saying that climate change was the definite

cause. On the other hand, El Ninos are always major factors. You cant blame thoseon people.The sea is sending us a message. And governments the world over are either

ignoring this message or concealing it from their citizens. But even if we citizens knewand understood the message, what would we do about it? What couldwe do about it?Only a tiny percentage of us are activists. The rest of the concerned citizens amongus think we do our part by donating to earth-friendly charities and recycling waste.Most of us have never even seen the ocean, the main source of warning signs, nor anyof its creatures. So we leave everything to the movers and shakers, and business asusual ensures that little is done to disturb the status quo.

Meanwhile, those creatures not killed by toxins and starvation are being over-

fished, so not only our children but we, their parents, may see the day when the oceancan no longer feed us. All this at a time when the human population is reaching sevenbillion.

I think were next on the list for major die-offs.

The time for action is long, long overdue. Were over-populated with well-intentioned environmental groups, which are largely ignored by the violators. Andmany of these violators are countries, like Japan, which thumbs its nose at allconcerned while it slaughters whales and dolphins. Worse still, it promotes the sale of

the lethally contaminated meat to its people. The citizens of Japan seem nearly asgullible as their ancestors who attacked us in 1941.And despite Japans bloody slaughter of protected cetaceans, Sea Shepherds

are the only environmentalists confronting the Japanese at sea, where theyre killingthe whales. Other environmental groups, including Greenpeace, condemn SeaShepherds for their violence. My hats off to Sea Shepherds. I wish we had more likethem. And I wish they could escalate the violence.

Where are the Charlie Wilsons of the 21 century? Charles Wilson, a Texasst

congressman, almost singlehandedly helped the Afghan mujahadeen defeat Sovietforces, a major factor bringing about the collapse of the Soviet Union a few years later.If we had just a dozen Charlie Wilsons fired up about the state of Earth and the

people exploiting it, the planet might stand a chance. If we had a dozen CharlieWilsons in each of several key countries, the planet would definitely stand a chance.

South Africa has a civilian police force (CPF) comprising people of all colorswho have suffered at the hands of groups such as drug-gangs. With police consent,these people are armed and prepared to use lethal force if attacked. A number ofthem have been killed or wounded. Their courage in facing up to the drug-gangs ishighly admirable.


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How can we get courageous people like these to rally round one flag, torecognize that without a healthy Earth, their various causes mean nothing? How aboutMuslim extremists? Might they set aside their hatred of the West long enough to helpsave Earth and its oceans? Through M7YAP, muslims are coming to grips with thegreening of Islam. One thing I dont like is that M7YAP and its governing

organization, MACCA, are based in London, England. Wont Muslims, especially ouroil-rich friends the Wahhabis, look on this as just another case of the Westmanipulating Islam?

Here is the stated goal of M7YAP. We envision a world that is environmentallysafe for our children and the next generations; where all nations of all religions live inharmony with nature and enjoy justice and a fair share of Gods bounties. Nicelystated, but must (can) the imams be dragged kicking and screaming into a green

world while Islam and science are so at odds? Especially with everything based inLondon?

I fervently hope it works. We need to be cooperating with Muslims onsomething besides oil wells. Wouldnt it be splendid if a majority of Muslims and their

imams turned their wrath on eco-violators like the Japanese whalers?

Alternatives?

[A] A fully armed, fully equipped international force policing international waters to:~ impound drift-nets and long-lines,~ impound boats killing protected species or using illegal fishing gear,~ impound whaling ships (including ones killing whales for research),~ impound ships found polluting the ocean.

If this were a United Nations force, the measure would be strongly opposed by thosecountries most guilty of exploiting the sea, but the measure need not be subject tosecurity council vetoes. It could be enacted with a vote of the general assembly only.

[B] Ditto the above without UN connections. Perhaps a NATO operation. A multi-national Sea Shepherds with guns.

Crazy ideas? Come up with your own. Propose them to your elected representatives.

ABBREVIATIONS, ACRONYMS, DICTIONARY, GLOSSARY

Anoxia absence or deficiency of oxygen in a mediumBioaccumulate -- (of a substance) become concentrated inside bodies of living thingsHajj the pilgrimage to Mecca which all Muslims are expected to make at least once


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vignettes the ocean is very sick

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