Inconvenient Truths About "Renewable" Energy

Inconvenient Truths About 'Renewable' Energy By MATT RIDLEY--Wall Street Journal What does the word "renewable" mean? Last week the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released a thousand-page report on the future of renewable energy, which it defined as solar, hydro, wind, tidal, wave, geothermal and biomass. These energy sources, said the IPCC, generate about 13.8% of our energy and, if encouraged to grow, could eventually displace most fossil fuel use. [Ridley energy] John S. Dykes It turns out that the great majority of this energy, 10.2% out of the 13.8% share, comes from biomass, mainly wood (often transformed into charcoal) and dung. Most of the rest is hydro; less than 0.5% of the world's energy comes from wind, tide, wave, solar and geothermal put together. Wood and dung are indeed renewable, in the sense that they reappear as fast as you use them. Or do they? It depends on how fast you use them. One of the greatest threats to rain forests is the cutting of wood for fuel by impoverished people. Haiti meets about 60% of its energy needs with charcoal produced from forests. Even bakeries, laundries, sugar refineries and rum distilleries run on the stuff. Full marks to renewable Haiti, the harbinger of a sustainable future! Or maybe not: Haiti has felled 98% of its tree cover and counting; it's an ecological disaster compared with its fossil-fuel burning neighbor, the Dominican Republic, whose forest cover is 41% and stable. Haitians are now burning tree roots to make charcoal. You can likewise question the green and clean credentials of other renewables. The wind may never stop blowing, but the wind industry depends on steel, concrete and rare-earth metals (for the turbine magnets), none of which are renewable. Wind generates 0.2% of the world's energy at present. Assuming that energy needs double in coming decades, we would have to build 100 times as many wind farms as we have today just to get to a paltry 10% from wind. We'd run out of non-renewable places to put them. You may think I'm splitting hairs. Iron ore for making steel is unlikely to run out any time soon. True, but you can say the same about fossil fuels. The hydrocarbons in the earth's crust amount to more than 500,000 exajoules of energy. (This includes methane clathrates—gas on the ocean floor in solid, ice-like form—which may or may not be accessible as fuel someday.) The whole planet uses about 500 exajoules a year, so there may be a millennium's worth of hydrocarbons left at current rates. Contrast that with blue whales, cod and passenger pigeons, all of which plainly renew themselves by breeding. But exploiting them caused their populations to collapse or disappear in just a few short decades. It's a startling fact that such "renewable" resources keep running short, while no non-renewable resource has yet run out: not oil, gold, uranium or phosphate. The stone age did not end for lack of stone (a remark often attributed to the former Saudi oil minister Sheikh Ahmed Zaki Yamani). Guano, a key contributor to 19th-century farming, was renewable fertilizer, made from seabird dung harvested off Peruvian and Namibian islands, but it soon ran out. Modern synthetic fertilizer is made from the air and returns to the air via denitrifying bacteria, yet few would call it a renewable resource. Even fossil fuels are renewable in the sense that they are still being laid down somewhere in the world—not nearly as fast as we use them, of course, but then that's true of Haiti's forests and Newfoundland's cod as well. And then there is nuclear power. Uranium is not renewable, but plutonium is, in the sense that you can "breed" it in the right kind of reactor. Given how much we dislike plutonium and breeder reactors, it seems that the more renewable nuclear fuel is, the less we like it. All in all, once you examine it closely, the idea that "renewable" energy is green and clean looks less like a deduction than a superstition.

Nice Quote

"Water - the ocean - is our most natural environment. We are born naked from the miniature ocean of the mother's womb." Jacques Mayol, 1927-2001

Alien attack leaves 500 dead in Fort Worth

This was just too newsworthy not to post, even though it's not directly important to the environment.

Thoughts on Sharks Dying

This story caught my eye. Sharks are such timeless creatures and have existed for so many millions of years and yet, mortality catches up with them just like it does us. Of course, with sharks, most die at the hands of humans that want their fins or meat, not from mysterious diseases. Even in their evolutionary mastery, the shark remains a vulnerable life form. Was this pollution, some form of red tide phenomena? If so, it's new. Shark deaths from water quality are rare.

From the Oakland Tribune

Dead sharks found in Redwood Shores were suffering from internal bleeding, necropsy shows

By Bonnie Eslinger

Daily News Staff Writer
Posted: 05/12/2011 12:17:37 AM PDT
Updated: 05/12/2011 06:48:52 AM PDT

Officials have completed a necropsy on one of the dozens of leopard sharks found dead in Redwood Shores last month but aren't any closer to pinpointing the cause of the sudden die-off.

The necropsy performed by a California Department of Fish and Game pathologist found "inflammation, bleeding, and lesions in the brain, and hemorrhaging from the skin near vents." Bleeding was also detected around the female shark's internal organs.

Additional tests, such as a bacterial study and microscopic tissue analysis, may provide an answer, according to a statement released by Redwood City. Results could be available by the end of the week.

"The ... pathologist is not drawing any conclusions until more examinations and all tests are performed," the statement said.

About 50 leopard sharks have been found dead in Redwood Shores since mid-April, according to the city.

Hundreds of the creatures have washed up on the shores of other Bay Area communities in recent weeks, said Sean Van Sommeran, executive director of the Santa Cruz-based Pelagic Shark Research Foundation. They have been reported in Foster City, Tiburon and as far north as Marin, but the highest concentration has been in the waterways of Redwood City.

"I suspect we're only seeing a tiny fraction of what's going on," he said.

Van Sommeran called the Department of Fish and Game's necropsy results "startling." He suspects a change in water quality may be to blame, but there
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has been no evidence of a large toxic spill in the area.

Tests of the Redwood Shores lagoon waters have revealed nothing unusual, according to Redwood City spokesman Malcolm Smith. The city is paying for the additional tests to determine the cause of the die-off.

Redwood City resident Catherine Greer was one of the first people to discover the dead sharks. She and her 13-year-old son Lorenzo Fernandez were fishing April 18 at the Redwood Shores lagoon when they spotted several of the creatures beached.

"I was really concerned to see one dead shark on the side of the water," she said. "Then what really concerned me is when I saw many more."

Greer said she and her son tried to push some of the sharks back into the water, "and they'd swim right back, thrashing their heads against the shore ... as if they were trying to commit suicide."

"I go fishing with my son," Greer added. "I know what their normal behavior is like, and what I saw was generally alarming."

According to Van Sommeran, the slender-bodied leopard shark, which typically grows to about four feet long, is a "pretty resistant" species.

Email Bonnie Eslinger at beslinger@dailynewsgroup.com.

Rachel Graham Honored for Whale Shark Conservation!

Scientist awarded for helping to make people love sharks
A scientist who has saved whale sharks in Belize from extinction has been honoured by the Princess Royal as the third woman in a row to win a prestigious prize for conservation.

Louise Gray
By Louise Gray, Environment Correspondent 8:30PM BST 11 May 2011


Dr Rachel Graham was awarded the Whitley Gold Award by Her Royal Highness Princess Anne at the Royal Geographic Society in central London.

The £60,000 award, supported by Sir David Attenborough and the World Wildlife Fund (WWF), will go towards further conservation work to try and save sharks and rays from overfishing off the coast of the Central American country.

Dr Graham has dedicated 20 years of her life to saving endangered species like the whale shark, a ‘gentle giant’ measuring up to 40ft long that feeds mostly on plankton.

The 43-year-old Director of the Wildlife Conservation Society’s Gulf and Caribbean Sharks and Rays Programme, has won legal protection for the species in Belizean waters.

She also led innovative schemes to encourage people to protect rather than fear sharks by letting schoolchildren, students, planners and decision-makers see the gentle animals in the wild.

Dr Graham’s success is a further boost for women conservationists with last year’s Gold Award having gone to Angela Maldonado of Colombia for saving night monkeys and the 2009 prize to Dr Gladys Kalema-Zikusoka of Uganda for her work with gorillas.

The same ceremony also saw the presentation of Whitley Awards worth £30,000 each in project funding to six other conservation leaders from Argentina, Croatia, India, Indonesian Borneo, Russia and Uzbekistan.

A short video about the work of each winner has been made with voice over from Sir David.

Georgina Domberger, Director of the Whitley Fund for Nature (WFN), the UK-based charity behind the international awards scheme, said an increasing number of conservation projects in Eastern Europe are being rewarded for their efforts to help protect animals as the area develops.

Cave systems in Croatia, saiga antelopes in Uzbekistan and bats in Russia are being protected thanks to the award.

"The aim of the Whitley Awards is to identify and applaud inspirational conservation leaders, and support their efforts to make even greater use of their scientific expertise and local knowledge to deliver real and lasting benefits for people and wildlife and the places both share,” she said.

The Whitley Awards scheme is an annual competition, first held in 1994. In the 18 years since the scheme began, it has given grants worth more than £6m to support the work of conservation leaders in 70 countries.

The Gold Award 2011 is, for the first time, being sponsored by WWF-UK to celebrate its decade of support for the Whitley Awards, and acknowledge the golden jubilee of WWF-UK’s formation in 1961.

Complete story here.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/8508097/Scientist-awarded-for-helping-to-make-people-love-sharks.html

Nutrients in Mississippi is a Complex Subject--Not All Just Fertilizer

Our environmental problems are frequently complex and recalcitrant to simple solutions. It's not as simple as sinking the Japanese whales ships in "Saving the Whales--A Bwana Doc Adventure. How do you save the Gulf of Mexico and stop the growth of the dead zone?

Study Probes Sources Of Mississippi River Phosphorus; Don't Blame Cow And Over-Fertilization
by Underwatertimes.com News Service - May 9, 2011 17:13 EST

MADISON, Wisconsin -- In their eagerness to cut nitrogen and phosphorus pollution in the Mississippi River and Gulf of Mexico, people have often sought simple explanations for the problem: too many large animal operations, for instance, or farmers who apply too much fertilizer, which then flows into waterways.

But according to new modeling research that examined phosphorus loading from all 1768 counties in the Mississippi River Basin (MRB), the true causes aren't nearly so straightforward. Livestock manure is widespread in many MRB counties, for example, but it shows little relationship to water quality, say researchers at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign and Cornell University in the May-June 2011 issue of the Journal of Environmental Quality.

Moreover, areas that load the most phosphorus into the Mississippi are also places where farmers add less phosphorus to the soil than they remove each year in crop harvests, suggesting that overzealous fertilizer use is not the issue.

"If it were that, it would be easy to solve. But it's not that," says Mark David, a University of Illinois biogeochemist who led the research. "It's much more complex. So I think in that sense addressing the problem is harder."

Soil erosion and tile drainage contribute large amounts of phosphorus to the Mississippi and Gulf of Mexico each year, helping fuel a "dead zone" of oxygen-starved water in the Gulf that reached near-record size last summer. Local water quality may also decline due to phosphorus-driven algal blooms.

In an effort to pinpoint the most important sources of phosphorus across the entire MRB, David's team calculated the yearly phosphorus inputs and outputs for every county in the basin from 1997 to 2006. After aggregating these and other data within 113 watersheds throughout the MRB, they then estimated the river load of phosphorus from every county between January and June for the same time period.

Not surprisingly, counties with intensive row crop agriculture, such as those in the Upper Midwest Corn Belt states of Iowa, Illinois and Ohio, contributed the most phosphorus to rivers. However, these same counties often showed negative phosphorus balances, meaning that phosphorus outputs in crops exceeded inputs by farmers.

In other words, farmers in these regions are actually mining stored phosphorus from the soil, rather than putting more into the system, David says. "But that negative balance doesn't have much to do with the phosphorus that gets in the river." Instead, the overall intensity of agriculture seems to matter most. "When I'm sitting here in Illinois in a watershed that's 95% corn and soybeans, it's going to lose some phosphorus," he says, "whether the balance is negative or positive."

In addition, although animal manure is considered a major phosphorus source to streams and rivers, it was relatively unimportant to phosphorus loading across the entire MRB. David suspects the reason is that most large-scale animal farms have moved to western states in the basin, such as Colorado, where there's less precipitation to carry manure nutrients into the Mississippi.

Phosphorus from human waste did prove significant. Counties encompassing Chicago and other major metropolitan areas "showed up as hot spots," David says, because most municipalities don't remove phosphorus from the otherwise clean sewage effluent they discharge into streams. The team further found that about half of the variation in phosphorus loadings was not explained by their models, suggesting that other factors also contribute, such as stream bank erosion and phosphorus deposits in river sediments.

Overall, the findings suggest that reducing phosphorus pollution will require broad adoption of practices that limit nutrient runoff, such as cover crops, buffer strips, and incorporation of fertilizers. It will also require limits on phosphorus discharge from cities.

Achieving these objectives across the entire MRB won't be easy, but David hopes the study helps people move beyond common assumptions about causes to focus on the real issues.

"To me the value of the study is that it helps shift the debate," David says. "The problem is not as simple as two things. It's not as simple as too much fertilizer or manure."

The research was funded by the National Science Foundation's Biocomplexity in the Environment/Coupled Natural-Human Cycles Program.

Thoughts on Bin Laden's House and Environmental Consciousness

I was struck by how dingy and colorless Bin Laden's supposed "mansion" was. A grimmer house one could not imagine. Gray, no paint, no stucco, only his marijuana plants were green. I was struck by the similarity to the old Soviet Zone in East Berlin. In West Berlin there were lights, colorful billboards, painted buildings--in the East-everything was gray. People that rejoice in life like color. It makes us feel alive. People that appreciate the natural world and respect it likewise rejoice in color. The green of the forest, the many blues and grays of the seas, the extravagant palettes of animals and flowers. When people don't appreciate nature, everything is gray in their souls. Just like Bin Laden's house.

Sharks can't see in color very well, but still are awesome predators

Fascinating research that may cut bycatch of sharks by commercial fishing operations.

http://www.livescience.com/animals/color-blind-sharks-110124.html

Fire and Ice

Nowadays when I think about global warming, I think about that Robert Frost poem, "Fire and Ice".
Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I’ve tasted of desire
I hold with those who favor fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To say that for destruction ice
Is also great,
And would suffice.

Reef Revelations: Saving Corals from Hotter Oceans

Written by Rod Salm
Published on August 4th, 2010
ShareThis | Discuss This Article

In 1990, I was living a conservationist’s dream.

While developing conservation plans along the coast of Oman, I found a place with great reefs and no people. It looked like protecting the reefs was going to be easy… until the waters heated, and heated, and heated.

This year, things are once again heating up, and we fear that we may witness the worst global coral bleaching event since 1998. But back in 1990, temperatures reached 95°F, hovering there for over a month and killing 95% of the corals through a process called bleaching. It raised a worrying question: how could we conserve coral reefs in the face of climate change?

This dilemma challenged me for a decade. I was based in East Africa when the 1997-’98 El Niño—and the following 1998-’99 La Niña—caused the greatest mass coral bleaching in recorded history, killing off 16% of the world’s coral reefs.

When I joined the Conservancy in 1999, I suddenly had access to a new range of project sites where I could study how climate change hastened coral bleaching. And the clear patterns in bleaching resistance and coral mortality in Palau helped me piece together a possible solution that could reduce bleaching caused by the current warming.

Bleaching is a stress response in corals caused by a number of factors, particularly hotter water temperatures and intense sunshine. So, it stands to reason that reducing the heat or light stress on corals will diminish the intensity of bleaching and reduce mortality.

The importance of this conclusion finally struck me when I was snorkeling around Palau’s Rock Islands. As I swam into the shade provided by one of the island’s rocky overhangs, I noticed live corals under my facemask of the same species that were dead under my swim fins. It all fell together: corals were alive and healthy when protected by cooler water or by shade.


Coral reef scientists were at their wits’ end about what to do regarding coral bleaching. But our observations of factors that help corals survive—and our knowledge of how to design networks of marine protected areas (MPAs) to protect and expand natural refuges—resonated with people around the world and prepared us for the impending bleaching event.

We have waited more than 10 years for another mass bleaching event to be able to test and refine the resilience hypotheses and the principles that Stephanie Wear and our Global Marine team have helped popularize. So, we are mobilizing our field teams and partners to track the current bleaching event in Indonesia and Palau as well as the Caribbean. This new information will allow us to better design MPA networks and ensure that they protect the most resilient corals that will repopulate and heal more vulnerable reefs.

While it’s tragic to witness another major bleaching event, this one can help us improve our methods and the prospects for global coral reef survival. Reefs provide fish, diving and coastal protection: hopefully, we can ensure that enough of them remain to fulfill any conservationist’s dream.

Rod Salm is the Conservancy’s director of marine conservation programs in the Asia Pacific.

(Image 1: Shaded corals with no bleaching. Credit: Rod Salm/TNC. Image 2: Fantasy Reef pale corals with early heat stress. Credit: Rod Salm/TNC.)
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Dr. Seuss for 2010

Dr. Seuss for 2010...


I do not like this Uncle Sam, I do not like his health care scam.

I do not like these dirty crooks, or how they lie and cook the books.

I do not like when Congress steals,

I do not like their secret deals.

I do not like this speaker Nan,

I do not like this 'YES WE CAN'.

I do not like this spending spree,

I'm smart, I know that nothing's free,

I do not like your smug replies, when I complain about your lies.

I do not like this kind of hope.

I do not like it. nope, nope, nope!

The Witches Chant over an Oil Spill...

Drdiverspeare. Apologies to Bill and MacBeth.
A dark Gulf. In the middle, an oil well spewing, Thunder.
1 WITCH. Thrice the BP corpse hath cried'd.
2 WITCH. Thrice and once, the Obama whin'd.

3 WITCH. Harpier cries:—'tis time! 'tis time!

1 WITCH. Round about the oil well go;
In the junk, steel bolts throw.—
Oil , that under cold stone,
Days and nights has thirty-one;
Swelter'd venom sleeping hell,
Boil thou first i' the charmed well!

ALL. Double, double oil and trouble;
Fire burn, and methane bubble.

2 WITCH. Fillet of a dolphin ,
In the spewing oil and bake;
Eye of turtle, and fin of mullet,
Feather of pelican, and oil in gullet,
Moray eel’s mouth, and fire worms sting,
Gator’s leg, and egret’s wing,—
For a charm of powerful trouble,
Like a hell-broth boil and bubble.

ALL. Double, double oil and trouble;
Fire burn, and methane bubble

3 WITCH. Scale of gator; tooth of snake;
Tuna’s mummy; maw and gulf
Of the ravin'd salt-sea shark;
Root of turtle grass digg'd i the dark;
Liver of Goliath grouper;
Gall of frigate, and slips of snapper
Sliver'd in the moon's eclipse;
Nose of wrasse, and parrot fish lips;
Fin of Jack Crevalle
Beach found by a crab,—
Make the gruel thick and slab:
Add there to a tiger shark,
For the ingredients of our caldron.

ALL. Double, double oil and trouble;
Fire burn, and methane bubble.

2 WITCH. Cool it with a politician's blood,
Then the charm is firm and good.

A poem to the Gulf Walrus courtesy of BP's Spill Response Plan

Who has seen the Gulf Walrus?
Neither I nor you.
But inhale enough BP dispersant
And you can see one too.
He's quite a fellow.
...He's green and yellow.
And he's beyond petroleum too.

copyright Bwana Doc Adventures

1st thoughts on my oil spill visit

I’m an environmental scientist and author that works for a private company that produces natural biological products for the bioremediation of crude oil among other things. I have worked in environmental cleanup for over twenty years in locations all over the world. We were invited to send our products to one of the parishes in Louisiana to carry out a test of its effectiveness in cleaning up oil damaged beaches and wetlands. The opportunity to visit the oil spill area was a life changing experience.

We were struck by the overwhelming beauty of the Louisiana wetlands. They are vast. We drove for hours through a diverse habitat of grass and water that supports huge populations of fish, crustaceans, shellfish, and all of the other organisms that make this area of the world an environmental treasure to be protected. A living treasure house that nourishes a rich culture of hardworking people that make their living from the sea and that fills our grocery stores and restaurants with a sustainable bounty of seafood.

Or it used to.

I can tell you we didn’t see a single walrus, sea otter or sea lion in Louisiana. There might have been some at the Audubon Zoo in New Orleans, but we didn’t make it there. Those animals were listed in the BP spill response plan for the Gulf as “sensitive biological resources” even though they are not found in the Gulf. That shows you how much they care about the wildlife of the Gulf of Mexico. But maybe they were planning for an even bigger spill that would reach all the way to the Arctic. Who knows, with the success they’ve had in plugging the leak, the oil may make it to the North Pole before the year is out.

Now that’s planning ahead.

The fear and anger of the local people toward BP can be felt in any conversation that you have with them. We heard over and over, “BP is calling the shots, we’re helpless to do anything.” In the words of one local woman working in a restaurant, “We don’t know what we’re going to do. All we know is fishing and shrimping. If we can’t do that, what will we do?” For the fishermen, shrimpers and oystermen, a way of life they have known for generations may be lost forever. BP’s response has been to pay them not to fish or to hire them to run boom boats and skimmers.

The extent that BP controls all aspects of the spill on land is terrifying. I attempted to get samples of the oil for research purposes in Grand Isle and was stopped by police. When I went to the Port Authority of Port Fourchon to get permission to enter the spill area I was told that permission would have to come from BP. The duly appointed law enforcement of the region was apparently powerless to give us access. To quote law enforcement, “BP controls access to the spill—we can’t let you go in without their approval.” A foreign corporation has taken control of part of America…one of America’s most fragile, beautiful and productive regions. Think about that.

The U.S. military is everywhere; Humvees, and Amphibious vehicles. We even saw a Stryker armored personnel carrier. We felt like we were in a wetland version of Iraq. An enormous amount of our taxpayer money is being spent on this military presence.
Our armed forces are apparently there to support BP’s security effort to control access to the spill; so much for the administration’s claim that they are in control of the spill. It is BP’s show 100% except for the Coast Guard skimming and boom setting operations. All the clean up we saw was from private contractors running bulldozers and other equipment scraping up contaminated sand or positioning booms.

Have you gotten tired of hearing, “It’s never been done in 5000 feet of water.” during the repeated failed efforts to stop the leak? Maybe that means we shouldn’t use a technology until we know we can take care of the consequences of its failure. What do you think?

I have to say a boycott is not enough. We must reduce our demand for petroleum based hydrocarbons through the use of electric cars and trains and alternative sustainable technologies. We need to DEMAND that our government begin work immediately on a nationwide network of high speed electric trains to replace aircraft, auto and truck transport. We need a Manhattan Project for trains and electric cars. We need to change our lifestyles to emphasize sustainable technologies that minimize the use of oil based hydrocarbons. Only when we do that will the victory finally be won.

From Alex Hofford's Website.

Yet More Endangered Species On Sale In Hong Kong, This Time The 'Large Croaker' Fish...

Sat, 13/03/2010 - 7:12am

This is getting tiresome. Yesterday I found swim bladders from the 'large croaker' family of fish on sale in Hong Kong's Sheung Wan district.

of fish on sale in Hong Kong's Sheung Wan district.

This guy is looking at a large croaker swim bladder that has been labeled 'King Of Swim Bladders' in Chinese. According to Yvonne Sadovy, a marine biologist at the University of Hong Kong, "most of the large croakers that we know about are over-fished". And the 'Chinese Bahaba' (bahaba taipingensis), otherwise known as a 'Giant Yellow Croaker' is teetering on the verge of extinction. This fish's native habitat is in estuarine waters along the coast of southern China, so over-fishing and loss of habitat are the major challenges it faces in its daily struggle to survive. Click here to find out more about how last month one of these huge fish, a 135 kilogram, fifty year old 'Chinese Bahaba', was caught in China's Zhejiang Province, and sold for over US$500,000.00. That's right, half a million dollars. Half a million U.S. dollars, not Hong Kong dollars.

So it's not just the sharks who are in trouble. Unfortunately for the 'Chinese Bahaba', the fish is listed as critically endangered on the United Nations (UN), International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), Red List. Professor Sadovy and her team at the University of Hong Kong help put it there in 2006.

Amazingly, a croaker swim bladder is worth, quite literally, more than its weight in gold. Old ladies in Hong Kong have been known to hoard them in safes. Sometimes know as fish maw, they have historically been used as speculative investment vehicles in uncertain times, even being used during the last century as a form of currency in times of civil strife and war. The reason being that, according to Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) practitioners, a croaker swim bladder contains proteins and collagen that are supposed to be highly effective in combating heart disease and glandular problems.

According to this study by Professor Sadovy's research team at the University of Hong Kong, all species within the large croaker family of fish are heavily over-fished, with no sustainable fisheries management plans in place.

Some of the smaller swim bladders for sale in the many and various shops around Hong Kong are mostly farmed through mariculture, as wild stocks have been almost completely depleted.

What's more, Hong Kong does not currently have any legislation to protect threatened marine fish species. This is despite the fact that in mainland China, in theory at least, the 'Chinese Bahaba' is protected as a 'Grade II State Protected Species'.

But whenever one is caught there, it always makes a big splash in the media. These photos are of undated newspaper clippings proudly displayed in the window of the shop in Hong Kong which is at ground zero of the 'large croaker' problem, Kam Fat Sea Products Retail Ltd. This Google Street View image shows where the shop is located, at the corner of Wing Lok Street and Cleverly Street, Sheung Wan.

The odd thing is that despite the Chinese Bahaba's alleged Chinese state protection, whenever one of these magnificent beasts is caught and sold on the mainland, there never seem to be any arrests...

Footnote: It's really difficult to drum up support in Hong Kong for the sharks, but slowly good things are starting to happen. And even though the bluefin tuna campaign is still pretty much in its infancy in Hong Kong, awareness of the problem is increasing too. But unfortunately, the plight of the large croaker family is very much at the bottom of the priority list when it comes to local marine conservation awareness issues. And it looks likely to remain there for quite some time.

ALEX HOFFORD : HONG KONG CHINA PHOTOGRAPHER

Advice from the Master

Survival Skills from Jimmy Buffett

Killing a whale shark

Killing a gentle giant for food. I think I don't I need to add any commentary.

		Mon, Aug 24, 2009 AsiaOne
Whale shark caught and hacked into pieces in Johor
A quiet lunch affair at a seafood restaurant turned awry and bloody when a whale shark, size of a pick-up truck, was hauled onto the jetty and hacked into pieces. A Singaporean eye-witness who was having his meal at the restaurant, south of Johor, Malaysia, at that time wrote this account: "I was there having lunch with some friends at a seafood restaurant when a local walked in and told the boss that a big shark was caught. "I did not give much thought to it until the workers who went there to see came back and told their fellow colleagues that the shark was as big as a pick-up. "This caught my attention. We paid for our meal and went over to the jetty to have a look. "When we reached the jetty, it was already quite crowded. I managed to squeeze in some photos as the poor shark was being sliced by a hack saw. Click on thumbnail to view (Photos: STOMP) According to the eye-witness, the catch could have been the joint efforts of three fishing boats which had brought the big fish in from the South China Sea, as he had overheard conversations from the crowd. "As you can see, the shark was being chopped up, did not stay long to watch as we had to catch our ferry. "Seeing the poor guy being chopped up, I was quite sad. "What you see in picture is very different from the actual situation. There was the noise from the hack saw, blood flowing out etc."

Salon People Feature | The 7 vices of highly creative people

Salon People Feature | The 7 vices of highly creative people

The 7 vices of highly creative people

Came across this on Stumble! today and found it simply so charming and very true.

salon.com > People Feb. 9, 2000
URL: http://www.salon.com/people/feature/2000/02/09/sevenvices

The 7 vices of highly creative people

If you go through life free of bad habits, you won't live forever, but it will feel like it.

- - - - - - - - - - - -
By D.A. Blyler

It all starts one quiet afternoon at the brew-pub. I'm sitting with my associate Bobby, enjoying a pint of the house ale, when Stephen Covey (author of "The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People") suddenly appears on the bar television. I can't quite describe the level of annoyance that the bald business guru brings to a room of gentle drinkers, trying to enjoy themselves while the rest of the populace is at work, but a sudden wail from a man in the far corner, similar to that of a small dog yanked forcefully by the tail, alerts everyone that something is terribly wrong. In a matter of moments all eyes are fixed in distress upon the television.

Soon customers with clenched fists start to share horror stories of managers who force-fed Covey's book to them. And of group leaders who scurried around the office pasting up signs like: "Synergy!" or "Be Proactive!" or "What would Covey do in your situation?" Rage and desperation had finally forced our fellow drinkers to leave their professions and find solace in the thick, rich ales fermented by the pub's microbrewery.

Bobby and I are amazed. Having spent 10 years carving out lives as professional grad students, we've been oblivious to the rising tide of worker despair. I remember seeing a Covey infomercial several months back; it seemed harmless enough. Watching employees become automatons spouting Covey's catch phrases at every opportunity was the funniest thing I had seen on television in quite a while. But now, as the man in the corner begins weeping, Bobby and I realize that larger issues are at hand.

Covey is no business guru, but rather the result of a world gone awry -- the world of work made worthless. Gone are the large expense accounts. Gone are the smoke breaks and three martini lunches. Gone are the innocent office flirtations. Good lord, who would want to work in an environment like that?

I slam my fist on the table. "We need a book about the 7 Vices of Highly Creative People before the whole country ends up in a straitjacket!" Bobby agrees enthusiastically, grabs a stack of napkins and begins writing. All the years we've spent studying history and literature are finally paying off. It isn't easy. But after six hours and five pitchers we finish the job. The pub closes so we gather the napkins and head for a late-night bar to celebrate. It isn't quite a book, but what the hell. We have better things to do than write another damn self-help book.

Vice one: Be a drinker

Winston Churchill, a great fan of the martini, once said that it must always be remembered that he has taken more out of alcohol than alcohol has taken out of him. For Churchill, like many other great drinkers, alcohol was a tool used to feed creativity and social discourse. For others, like Ernest Hemingway, alcohol was a way to place the mind on a different plane after writing all day at a desk. This is what old Papa had to say:

I have drunk since I was 15 and few things have given me more pleasure. When you work all day with your head and know you must again work the next day, what else can change your ideas and make them run on a different plane like whiskey?

Some people might say that this is to use alcohol as a crutch, but that's always been the case. Mark Twain, who drank from morning until night, would periodically abstain from drink and smoke just to silence the critics who said he was a slave to his vices. And on his feistier days, he would give them a severe tongue-lashing. "You can't get to old age by another man's road!" he'd scream. "My vices protect me but they would assassinate you!" His critics would then shuffle away to their 12-step programs and the organizing of their sock drawers.

To be a drinker means, of course, to be social. Sure, it's all right to drink by oneself on occasion. But because the highly creative live so often in the private world of ideas, they also need to mingle with their friends at a good party. That's why F. Scott Fitzgerald threw his fantastic "Gatsbyesque" parties on Long Island, inviting such other besotted artists as Gloria Swanson, Sherwood Anderson, John Dos Passos and Dorothy Parker. Remember, though, that when entertaining the highly creative some ground rules need to be set. Fitzgerald's were posted at the entrance to his home in Great Neck:

Visitors are requested not to break down doors in search of liquor, even when authorized to do so by the host and hostess ... Weekend guests are respectfully notified that the invitation to stay over Monday issued by the host-hostess during the small hours of Sunday morning must not be taken seriously.

It's always good to think ahead.

Lastly, something should be said for the occasional weekend bender, that is as long as your head is in the right place. If a person is suppressing problems or going through severe emotional distress, alcohol can bring out bad tendencies ... like singing karaoke. But if you're secure with yourself, the occasional bender can be a rather helpful mystical experience. As Henry James once wrote, "Sobriety diminishes, discriminates and says no, while drunkenness expands, unites and says yes!"

Vice Two: Begin with a Smoke

In today's climate, smoking might be the most unpopular of all the vices. To say that the furor over its ill effects has reached irrational levels is an understatement. Let's accept the guidance of journalist Fletcher Knebel, who keenly observed as far back as 1961 that smoking is the leading cause of statistics. The fact is that most people who smoke don't die of lung cancer. But all people who don't smoke do die of something. Marlene Dietrich, who had her own special love of cigarettes, put it into proper perspective:

People who quit smoking think that they have made a pact with the devil and believe they will never die. In reality they die from other illnesses: intestinal cancer, stomach cancer, cancer of the pancreas. Cancer forever gropes around for further victims.

So let's not place blame on the lowly cigarette for the infirmities of the world. Yes, smoking has its risks. So does getting out of bed in the morning. But a good smoke is often a lovely affair worth pursuing.

Take the great Spanish filmmaker Luis Bu�uel, an ardent lover of tobacco and life's pleasures. He elevated cigarettes to the level of poetry:

If alcohol is queen, then tobacco is her consort. It's a fond companion for all occasions, a loyal friend through fair weather and foul. People smoke to celebrate a happy moment or hide a bitter regret. I love to touch the pack in my pocket, open it, savor the feel of the cigarette between my fingers, the paper on my lips, the taste of tobacco on my tongue. I love to watch the flame spurt up, love to watch it come closer and closer, filling me with its warmth.

Makes you want to light one up right now, doesn't it?

Smoking has often been linked with creative genius. For example, French philosopher Albert Camus is well known to have savored his smokes though his lungs were withered by tuberculosis. And who can imagine Albert Einstein without his pipe, George Burns without his cigar or Jackson Pollock without a cigarette dangling from his lips? Though a stimulant, smoking has a relaxing influence and allows the mind to empty itself, enabling new thoughts to enter. Following the wisps of smoke as they leave one's mouth might actually be thought of as a creative exercise or, at the very least, as Oscar Wilde once observed, smoking a cigarette is "a perfect pleasure, because they are exquisite and leave one unsatisfied."

Vice Three: Put Gambling First

Gambling is at the heart of every worthwhile accomplishment in life. Consequently, vice three is essential for the success of your creativity. Instinctively, the highly creative person knows that nothing matters except the throw of the dice. As the French say, "There are two great pleasures in gambling: that of winning and that of losing." Or, in the words of Mark Twain, "There are two times in a man's life when he should [gamble]: when he can't afford it and when he can." These are vital lessons.

The world is full of stories of highly creative people whose success was based on the big gamble. A young Steven Spielberg sneaks into a Hollywood film studio, sets up an office and proceeds to act like an employee, thus beginning the most lucrative directorial career in history. Thirty-year-old Henry Miller moves to Paris with little money and no prospects, determined to become the most talked-about American novelist of his generation, and does. Hugh Hefner boldly walks into the offices of John Baumgarth and acquires the rights to reproduce the photograph of a nude Marilyn Monroe, a little known starlet, for his yet-to-be-published magazine.

Certainly, there are horrifying stories of those who gambled and lost heavily, whose compulsive involvement in games of chance, often played out in the arena of big business, nearly ruined them and scores of others. But it's not until the end of life that we truly know what we've won or lost. French philosopher Denis Diderot summed it up eloquently:

The world is the house of the strong. I shall not know until the end what I have lost or won in this place, in this vast gambling den where I have spent more than 60 years, dicebox in hand, shaking the dice.

Vice Four: Think Oysters

The hysteria concerning eating habits has nearly reached the grotesque levels granted smoking. Fat or non-fat? Cholesterol free? Salt or no salt? Most eaters, as long as they exercise a modicum of restraint, don't have to worry about dying from their diet. And all those critics who have tried to convince us that food is poison should be taken behind the shed and whipped with a massive slice of uncooked bacon.

Let us bow to the wisdom of the marvelous chef Julia Child, now an octogenarian. When asked about so-called health foods and non-fat products, she gnashed her teeth and stated emphatically that she never would buy such crap, that they have nothing to do with the enjoyment of life.

Make no mistake, the highly creative do enjoy life. Sure, sometimes there is a suicide among the group, and many are often prone to fits of depression. But when they finally decide to stop wallowing in their suffering, they embrace life with passion. And when it comes to food, they want to eat well, and eat properly. In other words, foie gras, fresh asparagus and filet mignon will always win out over a plate of french fries and greasy burgers. At least it will for those who are truly creative and whose imaginations permeate their lifestyles as well as their art. Something that sadly can't be said of lesser creatives -- Rosie O'Donnell and Tom Arnold come to mind.

Certain foods are frequently associated with highly creative people. None more so than the oyster. The inspiration of this shellfish can be traced throughout the canon of English literature. From Geoffrey Chaucer to George Bernard Shaw, it reaches its zenith with a tribute by Saki, who wrote, "The oyster is more beautiful than any religion, nothing in Buddhism or Christianity matches its sympathetic unselfishness."

I'm not sure I would describe them in such exalted terms, but I do know I have had more invigorating conversations with writers and painters over a plate or two of fresh oysters than any other food. The elegant bivalves inspire a level of discourse often missing in our quick-meal culture -- yet one that any dining experience should never be without. And for many people there is the added pleasure of oysters being the next best thing to sex. After all, we don't eat for the good of living but the enjoyment of it.

Vice Five: Seek Fashion First, Then seek to be Understood

In these days of dressing down and "casual Fridays," it's prudent to remember that the highly creative have always known that communication with words is secondary. When winning friends and influencing people, the primary concern is your attire -- your own peculiar fashion statement. It is through the impact of this image that both friends and enemies will initially come to know you. What is more gratifying than having everyone stop and stare, wondering why they feel so drab and ineffectual, when you enter a room? If you've got a stylish wardrobe, the battle to be understood is merely a stroll in the park.

One of the inevitable consequences of dressing down is that everyone today looks the same -- and those with designer logos like Hilfiger plastered on their clothes look plain stupid. The highly creative always choose their wardrobes with a more consistent flair. Whether it be Picasso with his striped sailors' tops, which he imagined gave him an eternally boyish edge; or Hugh Hefner with his classic pipe and silk pajamas, which he believed gave him a kind of worldly nonchalance (and could be stripped off quickly when opportunity knocked); the creative spirit picks a style and sticks with it.

Today there is a growing demand for comfort without any regard for style that numbs the mind. Comfort is, at times, a worthwhile consideration. But simply because your clothes aren't comfortable doesn't mean you can't enjoy them. In the days of Mozart, fashion was notoriously uncomfortable. Yet in a letter to his sister he once gushed, "We put on our new clothes and were as beautiful as angels." Sure, he sounds like a twit, but the important point is that the beauty and style of Mozart's wardrobe overshadowed any discomfort. And it is this attitude that inspired our own Benjamin Franklin to proclaim, "We eat to please ourselves, but dress to please others."

Vice Six: Sex

The sexual appetite and prowess of those possessed by creativity can't be argued. Anecdotes abound regarding the bedroom antics of famous writers, artists and actors. But why is it that sex yields such power over these individuals?

Perhaps Omar Sharif summed it up best when he remarked, "Making love? It's communion with a woman. The bed is our holy table. There I find passion and purification." This sense of purification is extremely important, because such an experience is needed to begin the whole creative process anew, and is a state difficult to achieve now that religious rituals have fallen by the wayside.

The catharsis that comes from this experience often leads highly creative people to pursue several lovers. And many are venomously referred to as philandering Don Juans. But it isn't for lack of affection that a Don Juan goes from woman to woman, as Camus explained: "But rather because he loves them with equal enthusiasm and each time with all himself, that he must repeat this gift and this exploration. Why must one love rarely to love well?"

Richard Burton's lovers would agree. They proclaimed it made no difference if he were with another woman the following week because when he was with them they were his whole world (try finding a woman that understanding these days). But it's not surprising that Burton found so many willing lovers. This is how he described his lovemaking: "When you are with the only woman -- the only one you think there is for that moment -- you must love her and know her body as you would think a great musician would orchestrate a divine theme." (Today most men maneuver themselves the way a line cook orchestrates a three-minute egg.) Consequently, Burton felt that in many ways he was monogamous, because when he was with one woman, he never thought of another. Needless to say, the highly creative are highly creative at rationalizing their behavior.

Lastly, something need be said with regard to the highly creative who are lovers of the same sex. Writer and historian Gore Vidal is quoted famously as stating, "There are no heterosexuals or homosexuals, only homo- or heterosexual acts. Most people are a mixture of impulses." Maybe. But before the days of George Michael and public toilet rendezvous, sex for those driven by a desire for their own gender often took an even more mystical form than heterosexual love. In the mind of American poet Walt Whitman, sex encompassed:

all bodies, souls, meanings, proofs, delicacies, results, promulgations, songs, commands, health, pride, the maternal mystery, the seminal milk, all hopes, benefactions, bestowals, all the passions, loves, beauties, and delights of the earth.

Heckuva list.

Vice Seven: Abuse the Card

To nurture the previous six vices resources are needed. Because most highly creative people never fully enter the work force, nor make a salary sufficient to their needs, credit is a necessity. Hunter S. Thompson cut to the chase nicely when he declared that the first and most important rule of a writer is: abuse your credit for all it's worth. The highly creative travel an expensive road, and the best way to stay between the yellow lines, or at the very least keep food on your table, is to Abuse the Card. And the larger the debt the better the bet. As the essayist Samuel Johnson observed:

Small debts are like a small shot -- they are rattling on every side and can barely be escaped without a wound. Great debts are like a cannon, of loud noise but little danger.

Which must be the reason I feel so safe and secure when my card authorizes another round of drinks for the table.

Don't fear if your creditors come closing in on you. When the highly creative find themselves in financial straits, they skip town. For example, in 1891 Mark Twain took a much-deserved vacation in Europe, which lasted nine years, leaving his legion of creditors to antagonize the less fortunate along the banks of the Mississippi. Today, it is even easier to take a long, literary holiday. And don't forget, bankruptcy is an option always worth considering. In fact, some highly creative people find utter destitution spiritually enriching. Novelist John Updike once wrote:

Bankruptcy is a sacred state, a condition beyond conditions, as theologians might say, and attempts to investigate it are necessarily obscene, like spiritualism. One only knows that he has passed into it, and lives beyond us, in a condition not ours.

Having nearly reached this "sacred state" several times already, I can't say I would describe it in such lofty terms. I prefer the more pragmatic view Shakespeare took: "He who dies pays all debt." Or Oscar Wilde's strangely sentimental one, "It is only by not paying one's bills that one can remain in the memory of the commercial classes." For my part, I'm doing all that I can to be remembered for a very long time.

In the end, everyone should remember that the highly creative always have expectations of great things. Their accumulated debt should thus be viewed only as an advance on their future earnings. But it's not an easy life. One should never underestimate the amount of distress caused by overzealous creditors. Especially when they bear down on poor debt-ridden artists, for these harassed souls are often the true visionaries of our time, or any time. When approached yet again by one of his many creditors, Lord Byron implored, "It is very iniquitous of you to make me pay my debts. You have no idea the pain it gives one." I feel his pain.

Conclusion

If anyone should still be left unconvinced on the benefits of pursuing these vices, let us remember these sage words of Abraham Lincoln: "It has been my experience that those with no vices have very few virtues."

Keep that one in mind during the next presidential election.
salon.com | Feb. 9, 2000

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About the writer
D.A. Blyler is the author of two collections of poetry, "Shared Solitude" and "Diary of a Seducer." He is also the author of "The Expatriates," a screenplay and "The Pillars on Horseback," a play. He lives in the Czech Republic.

Healthcare and the Marine Crisis

Andrew Sullivan's blog on Healthcare, Sarah Palin and Obama's Death Panels gave me pause to reflect on healthcare and the marine crisis. If you missed, it's here.

http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2009/08/palinapproved-death-panels.html

Whether or not Obama really plans death panels or not, or whether it's all just economics that determines whether you get healthcare or not, it's an absolute fact that the destruction of the marine ecosystem is driven by government policies, overpopulation and economics. We humans have outgrown our planet, we have the technology to harvest the oceans down to the last coral polyp and amphipod for food and we are gonna do it. In the U.S. neither political party wants to address the issue of overpopulation. The Democrats don't because they see the high birth rate demographic groups like Hispanics to be likely future voters and the Republicans don't because they don't think government should have anything to do with it.

Where it leaves us is every day more hungry mouths to feed--and we want to feed them healthy with, what else? sea food. But the real future if something isn't done is more like the movie Soylent Green (oops we're back to the death panels again aren't we).