No Impact Man

What fills you with awe?

Once in a while, even though it's trendy, these days, not to talk about other species when we talk about environmentalism, I like to reconnect with that about our planet that fills me with wonder.

And for me, one of those things is whales. The video below is a gift for you.

Meanwhile, what about our planet fills you with awe?

Save a chimp as a sustainable Christmas gift

First off, Annie Leonard of Story of Stuff and I will be doing a live radio interview on KPFA's environmental radio show Terra Verde today (Friday). You can listen at 4:00 PM EST by clicking here (I'll post the link to the recording later). Onwards...

As long as we've been talking a little about a non-consumptive Christmas here on the blog, I thought I'd introduce the idea of sponsoring baby chimpanzees orphaned by the bush meat trade as a really neat charitable gift for a loved one. You can make someone a chimpanzee guardian as a Christmas present by clicking here.

Watch the video below and you'll be immediately sold on the idea.

According to The Jane Goodall Institute:

The Tchimpounga Chimpanzee Rehabilitation Center in the Republic of Congo—Africa’s largest chimpanzee sanctuary—provides orphaned chimpanzees with a loving, safe home. 

Poaching for the illegal, commercial bushmeat trade not only kills adult chimpanzees, it also harms baby chimps who are captured and sold into the illegal pet trade.

The lucky ones are confiscated from poachers and sellers by authorities.

That’s where the Jane Goodall Institute comes in.

At Tchimpounga Sanctuary, the Jane Goodall Institute gives traumatized orphan chimpanzees, who are often sick, malnourished and close to death, a second chance at life.

The chimpanzees at the Jane Goodall Institute’s Tchimpounga Chimpanzee Rehabilitation Center sleep in dormitories and have large areas of secured forest and grassland enclosures to roam by day. By exploring the natural habitat together, they develop the social skills necessary for their well-being.

Make someone a chimpanzee guardian as a Christmas present by clicking here.

Either way, watch this adorable video:

A Day in the Life: Chimpanzees at Tchimpounga Sanctuary from The Jane Goodall Institute on Vimeo.

Whales versus submarines--which do you prefer?

Photo of melon-headed whales stranded off Kauai

Does this tear the hear out of anybody's chest but mine?

[Environmental] groups say that sonar can be as loud as 2,000 jet engines, causing marine mammals to suffer lasting physical trauma, strandings and changes in breeding and migration patterns. They contend that courts are perfectly capable of weighing the competing security and environmental concerns.

Chief Justice Roberts took a different view. Courts, he said, quoting a 1986 decision of the justices, must “give great deference to the professional judgment of military authorities” in making decisions about personnel, training and priorities...

... Whatever the correct answer to how many animals could be harmed, Chief Justice Roberts wrote, those injuries are “outweighed by the public interest and the Navy’s interest in effective, realistic training of its sailors.”

In other words, the Supreme Court of the United States has decided that the US Navy can fire off its sonar with impunity, regardless of the effect it has on the world's dwindling whale population.

Read more here.

If you eat fish, you eat plastic

The Tom Sawyer approach to saving the world

To change people's values, so the shrinks say, you change their behavior. You don't barrage them with ideas and cause information overload. You don't tell them their existing values are wrong and get their backs up.

What you do is you get them to change their behavior and, once you've done that, you let their ideas and values change all by themselves. "What a great idea we've come up with," they'll say.

So don't convince people to save the world. Just get them started saving it. Once they realize what their doing, they'll already be convinced.

But how do you get them started?

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This week I visited the Cornell Extension Program's Southold Project in Aquaculture Training (SPAT, which by the way, also happens to be the name of shellfish larvae when they first settle down and start growing their shells). The SPAT program concentrates on shellfish restoration.

Shellfish restoration matters, for example, because, one hundred years ago, every drop of water in the Chesapeake Bay would pass through the gut of an oyster every seven days. Today, there are so few oysters in the Bay that it takes 380 days.

That's a problem for two reasons. One is that oysters remove heavy metals and PCBs from the water. They literally soak up the pollution. The other is that oysters sequester carbon dioxide in their shells (they eat algae which absorbs CO2 during photosynthesis) and help mitigate climate change.

But the relatively small amount of oyster restoration at SPAT, in many ways, is not the most important part of the program. According to the SPAT web page, the program "was created to encourage community members to become stewards of their environment and to restore shellfish to the bays"

In other words, as it was explained to me by the head of the SPAT program, Kim Tetrault (pictured above), the volunteers are not there to restore the shellfish so much as the the shellfish restoration program is there to convince volunteers to become stewards of the environment.

Kim Tetrault is particularly talented at attracting and inspiring volunteers. He holds classes for them. Throws them dinners and parties. Encourages them to write and sell fundraising cookbooks. Teaches them to build boats. Lets them take long coffee breaks to socialize. Takes them snorkeling and canoeing around the saltwater creeks where the shellfish are seeded. Lets them tend to their own oyster nets and gardens.

He uses, in other words, the Tom Sawyer approach.

You know the story, right? Tom Sawyer had to paint a fence. So he sat on the ground and concentrated with all his might and made painting look like the most interesting thing he'd ever done. Soon enough, Huck Finn came along, saw how interested Tom Sawyer looked, and asked if he could paint, too. That's the Tom Sawyer approach to getting help painting a fence.

Kim's like Tom Sawyer except that he applies the tactic to saving the world.

Retired people volunteer to fill empty time with meaningful hours. High school students volunteer for credits. Lonely people join for company. Ocean lovers join to be near the sea. Volunteers donated over 13,000 hours at SPAT last year.

The point here is that people become involved for any number of diverse motivations. But whatever their reasons for volunteering, once Kim gets them restoring the shellfish, their values start to change. He doesn't ask them if they want to save the world. He just gets them to save the world.

And before you know it, that's what they want.

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Is this not a way forward to change minds about climate change? Might engaging citizens--actually getting them involved in volunteerism for any one of their diverse motivations--be a way to change people's minds and values?

Photos courtesy of Cathrine Kramer. To see more of her excellent pics of SPAT, visit Cat's Flickr page.

LV GRN: How to eat seafood sustainably

I've been writing the section of my book on the sustainable eating part of No Impact Man, and I came across this post on the blog. I thought it would interest those of you who call for more posts on individual lifestyle choices.

A fish is an animal that livED in the sea… at least that’s how the song is going to go about 50 years from now if nothing changes. The oceans are going to turn into liquid deserts. Goodbye sushi for the up market and fish and chips for the down. If you follow eco-topics at all, and you read the New York Times or The Independent or the BBC’s website, you probably already know all about this. But what no one offered was what we individual fish-stick eaters can do to help. That’s going to be the main point of this post. But first a little background for those who missed the November stories.

That we have only five decades left before our fish menu shrinks to zero is the scientific conclusion of a team of ecologists and economists from a dozen research centers who have studied detailed records on fish catches going back to 1950. Their study, published in the November issue of the journal Science, found that the number of commercial fisheries that have collapsed is accelerating and that the total eradication of all fish stocks in the world is due to be completed by 2048. This comes when just about everybody nutritionally inclined is saying that fish is the best food going.

Already, 29 per cent of the world's fisheries have collapsed. In some habitats, over fishing has led to the extinction of a number of species. "This isn't predicted to happen, this is happening now. If biodiversity continues to decline, the marine environment will not be able to sustain our way of life, indeed it may not be able to sustain our lives at all," said Nicola Beaumont, an ecological economist who took part in the study from Plymouth Marine Laboratory, according to The Independent.

The good news is that the trend is reversible if the fisheries are managed responsibly, which means, largely, taking fewer fish out of those parts of the ocean where stocks are depleted. The study participants called for the establishment of an international approach to protecting the oceans along the lines of the coastal waters of north-west America and Canada which are one of the best-preserved fisheries in the world. But until that happens, individual action—you know, by us—is particularly important.

As for my little family, for the purposes of the No Impact experiment, we have given up eating anything that, in my wife Michelle’s words, “wiggles or has a face.” That’s one way to ensure the oceans aren’t over fished. But if you are worried about your Omega-3s, it is also possible to obtain seafood sustainably.

The Worldwatch Institute advocates:

• Eating less of the big fish such as salmon, tuna, swordfish and sharks, which are the most vulnerable populations.
• Eating lower on the marine food chain, including smaller species that are less endangered such as clams, oysters, mollusks, anchovies, and sardines.
• Choosing fish caught by line, pot, or net (or other artisanal methods) and avoiding fish caught in massive trawl nets which pull everything out of the ocean whether it is the intended catch or not (see the poor turtle courtesy of World Wildlife Fund at the top of the post?).

On top of those tips, the World Wildlife Fund recommends that you only buy sustainably-harvested fish that has been certified by the Marine Stewardship Council and bears its logo (shown here) on the packaging. You can find MSC certified fish suppliers here. If the restaurant or grocery store you frequent doesn’t carry MSC certified fish, you can download a letter to send to the manager here.

[Since I posted, early commenters have added some excellent further resources which I thought I should move into the main post:

• Monterey Bay Aquarium's guide to sustainable seafood choices (Thanks Jason)
• Ocean Alive's best and worst seafood choices (Thanks Susan)
• An issue of Mother Jones devoted entirely to over fishing (Thanks Sara)
• Dr David Suzuki's page on ocean ecology (Thanks Tony)]

Finally, let me leave you with a Worldwatch Institute video on the subject. Click the arrow.

Strangling right whales and strangling the plan to save them

This, from a CNN article, makes me desperately sad:

• "[Right] whales are among the most endangered species on the planet, with only about 300 of them still alive. But a measure aimed at protecting them is snarled and stalled in bureaucracy."
• "That measure is a proposal from U.S. government scientists to require commercial ships to slow to 10 knots inside a 30-mile "bubble" near ports where and when these whales are migrating."
• "Right now, experts say, commercial ships kill about two North Atlantic right whales every year. 'We think that more animals are being killed than are being born, and there are a couple of main sources of human-caused mortality that we are trying to reduce,' said Jim Lecky, director of the Office of Protected Resources at the National Marine Fisheries Service. 'Collisions with ships are the number one cause of mortality, and entanglement in fishing gear is the number two cause,' Lecky said.
• "Many in the shipping industry oppose the speed limit, saying it would be too costly. A federal study concluded that slowing the ships near the whales will cost shipping companies about $112 million, or less than 1 percent of the $340 billion East Coast shipping industry income."
• "Rep. Henry Waxman said the long, drawn-out process within the office and Vice President Dick Cheney's office is demoralizing career government scientists... Waxman said the Bush administration thinks the 'science shouldn't bind them. They're going to do what industry wants.'"
• "CNN made several requests to speak with officials at the Office of Management and Budget about the delay in action on the proposed rule. The agency's Jane Lee issued this statement: 'We cannot comment at this time on an ongoing rulemaking process... ' Members of Cheney's office said they do not comment on internal deliberations.

Photo shows a U.S. Coast Guard ship assisting in a 2005 attempt to disentangle a right whale from fishing gear.

So much for the polar bear

Tomorrow, Friday, May 16, is Endangered Species Day. To celebrate, the Bush Administration has made the historic decision to list the polar bear as endangered while promising to do absolutely nothing substantive about it.

Here is what Leda Huta, executive director of the Endangered Species Coalition, had to say about it on their Stop Extinction Blog:

Today, the Bush Administration listed the polar bear as threatened under the Endangered Species Act, but refused to address the main threats to the species – habitat loss, drilling and global warming. At the Endangered Species Coalition, we welcome the listing of the polar bear under the Endangered Species Act, but we urge the Bush Administration to halt drilling in the bear’s habitat.

I guess it is hard for Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne to ignore drowning polar bears and the science that shows that they are endangered. However, we are alarmed that they are ignoring the impacts of drilling and global warming on the polar bears’ sea ice habitat.

I would ask Secretary Kempthorne: if we are not going to stop the factors that are contributing to the loss of polar bear habitat and the melting of the sea ice, how are we going to protect the polar bear?

The administration is creating exemptions under a 4d rule that appear to limit protections for polar bears from oil and gas drilling in their habitat. We know that species listed under the Endangered Species Act are much more likely to survive and recover than those that are left off the list. By listing the polar bear under the Endangered Species Act, it increases bear's chances of surviving. However, we are concerned that the Bush Administration is ignoring the impact of global warming and drilling on the polar bears’ sea ice habitat. We urge them not to allow drilling in the Chukchi Sea and other polar bear habitat by drilling loopholes in the Endangered Species Act.

Secretary of the Interior Dirk Kempthorne also announced that the department will propose “modifications to the existing ESA regulatory language.” In the past, the Bush Administration has proposed changes to the Endangered Species Act that would dramatically weaken protections for endangered species and their habitat and used Solicitors Opinions to circumvent the law.

We are troubled about how this administration has reinterpreted the intent of the Endangered Species Act in the past and how they may attempt to weaken protections for endangered species in the future. We urge them to protect the polar bear and its habitat instead of using loopholes to weaken the law and science to protect species.

According to the U.S. Geological Survey, “Projected changes in future sea ice conditions, if realized, will result in loss of approximately 2/3 of the world’s current polar bear population by the mid 21st century. Because the observed trajectory of Arctic sea ice decline appears to be underestimated by currently available models, this assessment of future polar bear status may be conservative.”

The law - and the American people – demand that the best science, and only science, be used to determine which plants and animals receive protection under the Endangered Species Act. Clearly, the science says that polar bears need our help and need the strong protections of the Endangered Species Act. The administration shouldn’t ignore the science to protect its habitat. The polar bear is only as protected as its habitat.

The listing of the polar bear is a drastic change from the Bush Administration’s track record on endangered species protections. The Bush Administration has systematically undermined scientific decisions to protect endangered species. Currently, the Government Accountability Office (GAO) and Department of Interior's Inspector General's office are investigating allegations of interference in a number of different Endangered Species Act-related decisions. Last year, Deputy Assistant Secretary Julie MacDonald resigned after being investigated for her role in undermining the scientific integrity of numerous decisions. The U.S. House Natural Resources Committee will hold a hearing on political interference in endangered species protections on May 21st.

Leda Huta

Endangered Species Coalition

www.stopextinction.org

Photo of polar bears stranded on melting ice courtesy of ScienceBlogs.

More species extinction means more global warming

A week or two ago, I wrote about how if environmental damage is hurting other species, it's hurting us. I wrote about how the massive number of extinctions that are occurring--some 20 to 50% of our species are expected to be gone within 100 years--cannot occur without fundamentally weakening the planetary systems we depend upon for our health, happiness and security.

Other bloggers left some excellent comments behind, explaining why human well-being is dependent on the well-being of other species.

Sharon Astyk wrote:

"Most species enable or carry over 100 other species - that is, there are at least 100 other species on which the survival of one depends. But we've never considered which species we truly depend on. Is it honey bees? Frogs? Bacteria? Are we killing them? We simply don't know our world well enough to know what we're costing ourselves."

Greenpa wrote:

"Each critter in the web is connected to others.  They eat each other, basically, or change the environment for each other. Reality is a lot more than the 4 connections that are usual in a spider web; but the concept still works, and it's a lot easier to visualize the spider web than the reality of critical ties to 40 other organisms...

So, get out your scissors, and snip out- not a connection, but a node. You now have 4 loose threads. (or 40, in the real world) The web is not greatly disturbed. Yet. Keep snipping.  The web gets weaker, and weaker, and eventually, just a slight breeze may rip the whole thing down."

But also, Jeremy Hance emailed me his  Mongabay story about a new study out of Brown University that showed a direct link between increasing extinctions and global warming. The study shows that protecting biodiversity in our eco-systems may prove to be another key in fighting climate change.

As Jeremy writes:

"The Brown scientists conducted their study for six years in Patagonia. They divided an area into ninety plots then began to systematically remove native species from each plot and chart the changes in the plot's productivity. Productivity dropped as species were removed."

"Productivity," as the researchers call it, refers to the amount of biomass growing in the plot. So fewer species means less biomass which means less carbon dioxide sequestered in the plant matter and soil and therefore more global warming.

"It's a double whammy," explained Osvaldo Sala who led the study. "We not only are disturbing our planet by putting more carbon into the atmosphere, but we're reducing the ability of ecosystems to capture and store it."

Photo of the Patgonian steppe, courtesy of Osvaldo Sala, Brown University.

If it's hurting other species, it's hurting us

One of the things I regret not posting more about is biodiversity and the crisis in the huge number of extinctions occurring on the planet. I think that is because one of the things I have been trying to do is get away from the environmentalists-care-more-about-animals that people stereotype.

Personally, I care a lot about the extinctions, not because of the utility of other species to humans but because I think they have their own value. But I consider my job not to be to write about just what I care about but to write about what other people care about. And one thing I think we can safely say is that we all care about human health and happiness, which is why I write a lot about the connections between our health, happiness and security and the health of our planetary habitat.

Anyway, what I wanted to mention is something that makes total sense to me--the fact that extinctions are occurring at an unprecedented rate is a direct harm to human health. The systems are complex, and I can't say that I understand how this manifests, but the blog Mongabay reports, as one example, that new cures for human ailments are under threat because of the global extinction crisis:

A new book Sustaining Life: How Human Life Depends on Biodiversity... is the largest text yet regarding the possible cures that have already been lost—and those that we are losing due to the globe's increasing loss of biodiversity...

... The gastric brooding frog of the Australian rainforest is just one example. Its unique style of parenting may have provided new cures for treating peptic ulcers in humans. The frog raised its young in its stomach; to survive the baby frogs produced a substance that halted acid and enzyme secretions, and stopped their mother from digesting the babies into her intestines. Unfortunately the two species of gastric brooding frog went extinct in the 1980s, and with them a possible cure.

I admittedly don't know much about this subject, so please, if you know more about how the extinction crisis harms human health and happiness, please leave behind a comment.

Photo by Rhett A. Butler courtesy of Mongabay.