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Environmental Conservation

Since Eco-Photo Explorers (EPE) was formed to help promote public interest in protecting the underwater environment through knowledge and awareness, this section will be used to provide information on special environmental conservation efforts that you should know about.

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In the News

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150 stranded whales die in Australia
HOBART, Australia (AP) -- A group of 150 whales that became stranded on a remote coastline in southern Australia were battered to death on rocks before rescuers could save them.

Officials from Tasmania state's Parks and Wildlife Service rushed Sunday in four-wheel-drive vehicles to the remote site at Sandy Cape after the long-finned pilot whales were spotted by air a day earlier.

A helicopter crew that arrived late Saturday found about a dozen of the whales injured but alive, said Warwick Brennan, a spokesman for the service.

Other officials and volunteers arrived by four-wheel-drive vehicle on Sunday and worked frantically to save those remaining, but they died, Brennan said.

The coastline is strewn with reefs and jagged rocks, making it much more dangerous for the stranded whales than if they had landed at a sandy beach, said Rosemary Gales, another wildlife service official.

"Because of the physical beating they take from stranding on rocks and surf, compared to sandy beach strandings, animals die more quickly," said Gales.

Officials in small boats steered about 30 whales that were part of the same pod as those stranded away from the bay where they went ashore. They were apparently responding to cries of distress from an injured whale and were in danger of becoming stuck too, Brennan said.

The operation comes one week after rescuers saved 11 pilot whales among more than 60 stranded on a beach in northwestern Tasmania, which is an island.

Strandings are not uncommon in Tasmania, where the whales pass by on their migration to and from Antarctic waters. It is not known why whales get stranded.

Source: CNN, Updated 2:48 a.m. EST, Sun November 30, 2008

Will moving endangered species save them?
WASHINGTON (AP) -- With climate change increasingly threatening the survival of plants and animals, scientists say it may become necessary to move some species to save them.

Dubbed assisted colonization or assisted migration, the idea is to decide how severe the threat is to various species, and if they need help to deal with it.

"When I first brought up this idea some 10 years ago in conservation meetings, most people were horrified," said Camille Parmesan, a biology professor at the University of Texas.

"But now, as the reality of global warming sinks in, and species are already becoming endangered and even going extinct because of climate change, I'm seeing a new willingness in the conservation community to at least talk about the possibility of helping out species by moving them around," she said.

Still, it's an idea that makes conservation biologists nervous.

There are plenty of risks in moving plants and animals to new locations. They may not survive, or they may become invasive, growing wildly without predators and crowding out natives of their new location.

And it's not possible to relocate every species that may need it, so how to decide who gets moved and who gets left behind to become extinct?

Stanford biologist Terry Root has been traveling the country urging her colleagues to come up with a plan for "triage" to decide which species should be saved from global warming and which can't. After other biologists complained about the word "triage," Root said she now calls it prioritizing which species should be saved.

"We've got to work on the ones we have a prayer of saving," Root said.

Some species biologists will have to write off, such as the threatened and endangered species of the Sky Islands in Arizona and New Mexico because "they don't have any place to move to."

"Those species are functionally extinct right now," Root said. "They're toast."

When deciding which species to save and which to watch die, Root said one key is how unique it is. That's why she said she'd save the odd-looking Tuatara of New Zealand, a lizard-like creature with almost no living relatives, over the common sparrow.

The risk of extinction has to be balanced by the potential hazard to the community where a species is relocated as well as the time and cost of making the move, Parmesan says.

"Ultimately, the decision about whether to actively assist the movement of a species into new territories will rest on ethical and aesthetic grounds as much as on hard science," she said in a statement.

"Passively assisting coral reef migration may be acceptable, but transplanting polar bears to Antarctica, where they would likely drive native penguins to extinction, would not be acceptable," she said.

"Conservation has never been an exact science, but preserving biodiversity in the face of climate change is likely to require a fundamental rethinking of what it means to preserve biodiversity," Parmesan said.

Source: CNN, Updated 4:30 p.m. EDT, Thu July 17, 2008

Related Information

Global Warming
Join the Global Warming March at stopglobalwarming.org
An Inconvenient Truth | Buy DVD - Film documentary on the Earth's climate crisis features Al Gore

Environment: Fabled bachelor Lonesome George may finally be a father
Lonesome George, the conservation icon of the Galapagos islands and last surviving tortoise of his kind, may finally become a father, after keepers recovered a clutch of eggs from his enclosure.

Rangers at Galapagos National Park noticed George was behaving differently in recent months, and two weeks ago spotted one of his two female companions digging around in the soil in his pen.

On closer inspection, they discovered a nest containing nine eggs, three of which they transferred to an incubator. It will be 120 days before they are able to confirm whether the eggs are harbouring George's offspring.

George was rescued in 1972 from Pinta, one of the islands off Ecuador's Pacific coast, but has shown little interest in reproducing, much to the dismay of weary ecologists who are keen to prevent his species from becoming extinct.

The tortoise, the world's rarest creature, became famous after fishermen and pirates slaughtered the rest of his species for food.

If the eggs hatch and are proven to be George's offspring, it will represent a landmark success for conservationists, who are keen to rescue the species from imminent demise and re-establish the tortoises on Pinta.

Giant tortoises were once the largest herbivores on the island, and in their absence plant life has continued to grow unchecked.

The two females George shares his pen with are from the nearby volcanic island of Isabela, so any offspring will have only half the genes of a Pinta tortoise. It would take a breeding programme several generations - and possibly more than 100 years - to recreate a "pure" Pinta, scientists said.

Henry Nicholls, author of the 2006 book Lonesome George: The Life and Loves of a Conservation Icon, said tortoises often lay unfertilised eggs, in much the same way as hens do, but the fact that rangers had moved several to an incubator was a promising sign.

"There have been rumours of him mounting females, but nobody has ever witnessed penetration by George," he said. "Right now, we don't even know if George is fertile."

Conservationists have tried a variety of methods to get the tortoise to mate, including artificial insemination, manual stimulation and having George watch younger males mate. George, who is believed to be between 60 and 90 years old, should still be in his sexual prime.

Nicholls said even if the eggs are not fertilised, George's keepers should dissect them to see if they could find any sperm, a sign at least that George may not be infertile.

Jeff Powell, a professor of ecology at Yale University who has worked on giant tortoises in the Galapagos, added: "This is great news. The females have been with George for a long time, so if the eggs are fertilised, they will surely be his offspring."

Source: Ian Sample, science correspondent The Guardian, Wednesday July 23, 2008

Greenpeace: Japanese ship's crew stole whale meat
TOKYO, Japan (CNN) -- Greenpeace filed a criminal complaint with Japanese prosecutors Thursday, accusing whaling-ship crew members of stealing whale meat from a hunting trip.

The environmental group said "large-scale embezzlement" was allowed as an "open secret" by the Institute of Cetacean Research in Japan. The body oversees Japanese whale hunts, which are done in the name of "scientific" research.

The institute has previously accused Greenpeace and other organizations of "harassment" for interfering with Japanese whaling voyages.

The environmental group said that 12 members of a one whaling ship sent out at least 47 boxes of whale meat after they returned to a Tokyo port.

At the press conference, Greenpeace showed one box that it said contained about 52 pounds (23.5 kilograms) of salted whale belly meat worth up to $3,000.

The Japanese Fisheries Agency said that there is a long-standing custom of giving small amounts of whale meat to crew members as a "souvenir." It said it will investigate to determine whether embezzlement is taking place.

Junichi Hoshikawa, the executive director of Greenpeace in Japan, said at a press conference that the embezzlement of whale meat "will hurt Japan's credibility and trust, which is already shaky under so-called 'scientific' research whaling."

In the early 1980s, the International Whaling Commission determined that there should be a moratorium on commercial whale hunting. Whaling is allowed under international law when done for scientific reasons, which Japan cites as the legal basis for its hunts.

The country's annual hunt kills up to 1,000 whales a year. Many in the international community say such hunts amount to needless slaughter. Critics say that Japan's research is actually a pretext for retrieving whale meat to be sold in markets and restaurants.

Greenpeace and other environmental groups have waged a long battle against Japan's whaling activities.

This year's 101-day hunt was dogged by Greenpeace and Sea Shepherd Conservation Society vessels. The Japanese whaling fleet caught 551 minke whales -- more than a third less than its goal of 850.

"This year's mission was disrupted intensively by Greenpeace and Sea Shepherd, who use violent means for disturbance," Hajime Ishikawa, the head of Japan's whaling mission, said last month.

"Putting aside our own safety, their action put their own lives in danger ... Therefore, we had to stop whaling a total of 31 days."

The Web site for Sea Shepherd, a hardline conservation group, called the operation a "huge success."

Greenpeace also claimed success interfering in the Japanese whale hunt.

"Greenpeace played a significant part in nearly halving the amount of whales killed this season," said Junichi Sato, Greenpeace Japan's whales campaigner. "However, 551 whales is still over a hundred more than Japan took three years ago ... This blatantly commercial whale hunt must end immediately."

In March, Japanese whalers and anti-whaling activists clashed in waters near Antarctica.

Sea Shepherd founder Capt. Paul Watson told CNN that two of his crew members were injured when crew members on the Japanese ship Nisshin Maru threw flash grenades aboard his ship, the Steve Irwin.

Watson also said he took a bullet to the chest while wearing a Kevlar vest. "We don't know where that bullet came from," he told CNN.

Japan's Institute of Cetacean Research, which runs the Japanese whaling ships, denied firing any shots.

"No one shot Paul Watson. His claim that we shot at him and he has the bullet that was stopped by his bullet-proof vest is more fiction for articles by the Australian media," said Minoru Morimoto, the director general of the institute, in a news release on its Web site.

The institute said it threw seven "sound balls," which it described as "harmless" explosive devices, after people aboard the Sea Shepherd threw bottles of butyric acid -- an acid found in rotten butter -- at the Nisshin Maru.

The Japanese Coast Guard had also given "clear and loud warnings to the Sea Shepherd vessel during two passes," the institute said. It did not describe the type of warnings.

The institute said it was "disappointed that more serious means were required today for defending its research vessels in the Antarctic."

The International Whaling Commission will meet in Chile next month to discuss reaching an agreement on whale conservation rules.

Japan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs and its Fisheries Agency have lobbied a dozen members of the whaling commission, making their case to officials from Angola, Eritrea, the Republic of the Congo, Guinea, Ghana, Malawi, Tanzania, Palau, Micronesia, Cambodia, Laos and Vanuatu.

Source: CNN, updated 9:20 a.m. EDT, Thu May 15, 2008

Dolphin slaughter brings charges from both sides
TAIJI, Japan (CNN) -- Mention a dolphin to someone in the United States and they'll think about a trip to Sea World or the 1960s-era TV program "Flipper."

Talk about a dolphin in rural Japan and some people think of dinner.

Fishermen hunt dolphins about every day in Taiji, a town of about 3,000 in southwestern Japan that juts into the Pacific Ocean.

Locals know they offend Western sensibilities by eating dolphins, but they say it's a tradition hundreds of years old. And they say outsiders have no more right to tell them to stop eating dolphins than they would have to demand that Westerners stop slaughtering, say, chickens or cows.

"I know there are many different ways of thinking in different societies, but for us who've been eating this for a long time ... it's an awkward thing to be criticized for," says Kayoko Tanaka, a retired middle school teacher. "I either fry dolphin meat or turn it into a stew."

That disgusts Ric O'Barry, a 68-year-old retired dolphin trainer from Miami who makes a second home in Taiji, where he goes to unusual lengths to fight against the tide of local tradition.

O'Barry sometimes dresses as a woman or wears a large surgical mask to disguise his Western identity on trips to spots overlooking the ocean. He prowls the cliffs with a video camera, hoping to catch fishermen in the act with footage that could stir emotions and raise awareness in the West.

"This here is ground zero for the largest slaughter of dolphins on planet Earth," says O'Barry, who trained five dolphins to play "Flipper" on the TV series of that name. "It's absolutely barbaric and it needs to stop."

He says the dolphins face a cruel fate.

"It takes a very long time to die. They bleed to death. And some of them are dragged in the boats with hooks while they're still alive," he says. "Many of them are gutted while they're still alive."

Looming beyond questions of whether the slaughter is humane, however, are larger and more complex questions of culture and perspective.

To some puzzled people in rural Japan, the question comes down to this: What's the difference between killing and eating a dolphin and killing and eating a fish? Or a chicken? Or a cow?

Most Japanese do not eat dolphins -- it's common in a few small fishing villages -- but the government respects the rights of people in towns like Taiji, says Joji Morishita, the international negotiator for Japan's Fisheries Agency.

Many Japanese consider the deer a sacred messenger from the gods, he says, but they would never suggest that people in other parts of the world stop venturing into the woods on a quest for venison, Morishita says.

"We don't like to play God to say this animal is just for food and this is not," he says. "Because we know nation to nation we have totally different ideas."

That's obvious in the growing clash between Australia and Japan over whale hunting.

Japanese ships crisscross the Antarctic Ocean each winter to capture and kill up to 1,000 whales. Whaling is allowed under international law when done for scientific reasons, which Japan cites as the legal basis for its hunts.

Legal justifications aside, however, the whale hunts offend many people in Australia, where new Prime Minister Kevin Rudd has turned up the political pressure on Japan.

His government has dispatched a customs ship to monitor and videotape the whalers. And Rudd says Australia could even file charges against Japan in an international court to try to stop the whaling.

Back in Taiji, the fishermen are well aware of the Western sentiment that motivates whaling opponents. They realize the danger to their way of life that can come with prying cameras from other countries.

When CNN trained its cameras on fishermen gutting some freshly killed dolphins, the fishermen erected some tarps to obstruct the view.

Representatives of the Taiji Fishermen's Union declined CNN requests for an on-camera interview. So did the town's mayor and several others. And O'Barry says he's gotten into a few shouting matches with fishermen, who resent him and his camera.

So what does O'Barry say to their claim that he has no right to tell them to abandon a tradition that has flourished in their small corner of the world for more than 400 years?

"If someone came to my hometown and told me what to do, what to eat, I'd be outraged," he says. "But that's not going to stop me from doing it. I mean, tradition? It used to be traditional for women not to vote. So do we keep that going because it's traditional and cultural? Of course not."

Complicating the debate are findings suggesting that eating dolphins may not be good for one's health. The Japanese government said in 2005 that bottlenose dolphin meat contains 12 times more mercury than blue fin tuna -- high levels of mercury in fish can cause health problems in pregnant women and young children.

A city councilman in Taiji, Junichiro Yamashita, grew so concerned about mercury levels that he persuaded locals schools to stop serving dolphin meat at lunch. He even plucked some of his hair, sent it off for testing and discovered that it contained seven times as much mercury as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency considers safe.

The mercury findings have not swayed Masaru Matsushita, a Taiji fish dealer. He says that dolphin activists like O'Barry only see their needs without understanding the culture in his town.

"I understand that they think the dolphin in a cute animal, and I agree they're cute doing performances," he says, "but it is our culture to eat dolphins."

Source: CNN, Posted 8:22 p.m. EST, Mon February 11, 2008

Related Information

Save the Dolphin

Call To Action

HELP PROTECT SHARKS
Sharks need your help and the clock is ticking!!

Sign Petitions!

Sharks are under attack. Even international protection is not enough to prevent illegal slaughter. These magnificent predators are sentenced to a slow and cruel death by a barbaric fishery called finning. Sharks (and countless other non-target species) are first hooked on long lines and then dragged on board. Then all their fins are hacked off, the still living and helpless animal bodies are dumped overboard into the sea to die a slow and painful death. The killing is unsustainable and unacceptable. The following are just a few organizations that are seeking to safeguard sharks and other wildlife by educating and empowering people throughout the world using the power of media.

Environment & Wildlife Petitions

Sign Petitions!

Take action with hundreds of online petitions about the environment, wildlife, endangered species, environmental health, global warming, climate change, national parks and forests, the Arctic, oceans, oil drilling, air pollution, water pollution, the rainforest and more.

Imaging Foundation Uses Video to Combat Cocos Island Shark Poaching!

An Imaging Foundation (IF) expedition uncovered and documented poaching activity at Cocos Island. The core team and Imaging Foundation volunteers pursued poaching vessels and then found grizzly proof of the poaching underwater, just several hundred feet from the island. Team members removed portions of long line and documented the entire trip.

Imaging Foundation materials were produced in Spanish as well as English and were presented to Costa Rican journalists at a press conference. Materials also found their way to the desk of the President of Costa Rica, Oscar Arias. Imaging Foundation returned to Cocos in December on an unexpected trip to see if the poaching had been curbed. The results were encouraging. The number of vessels had decreased, and the poaching was only found at night. Imaging Foundation teams are eager to return and continue their investigation.

View the Imaging Foundation Video that Brought Attention to Cocos Island Illegal Poaching!

Imaging Foundation is looking for a few committed individuals to return to Cocos and Malpelo for one of two trips they will be spearheading in April and May. Join them and help make a difference!

Protecting Cocos Island is the mission behind the Imaging Foundation's latest project. Unless Costa Rican citizens are aware of the value that the island holds, it is unlikely that more "shark safe" legislation will be passed, much less enforced in a consistent way. To help convince the citizens of San Jose, Costa Rica that this island is worth the fight, Imaging Foundation plans to bring the island to them by creating a permanent, high quality exhibit.

Imaging Foundation is making Giant Strides!
Please call or email them with any comments or suggestions.

The Imaging Foundation
23852 PCH, Unit 110
Malibu, CA 90265

Phone: 310.458.0210
Fax: 508.464.6514
Email: info@imagingfoundation.org

Petition to Help Protect Snapper Ledge
Please take a moment to log on and sign Stephen Frink's Petition to protect Snapper Ledge, a beautiful reef loaded with marine life here in the Florida Keys. As far as the quantity of marine life that is found among Florida reefs, Snapper Ledge is one of the most magnificent reefs in the Key's. Recently, Nurse sharks have been speared along the reef and left to die on the bottom. Your signature will help achieve (SPA) Sanctuary Protected Area status for Snapper Ledge. Click here to sign the petition

Fight Global Warming
We are all contributors to global warming and we all need to be part of the solution. Most emissions from homes are from the fossil fuels burned to generate electricity and heat. By using energy more efficiently at home, you can reduce your emissions and lower your energy bills by more than 30%.

How to Help Stop Global Warming | Take Action
Join the Global Warming March at stopglobalwarming.org
An Inconvenient Truth | How to Help

International Coastal Cleanup

International Coastal Cleanup needs volunteers to help our oceans...

Clean oceans and waterways are vital to our health and safety. The International Coastal Cleanup is the world's largest one-day volunteer effort on behalf of the marine environment. Help us restore health to our oceans and waterways by volunteering in this year's International Coastal Cleanup. Events take place in more than 90 countries and in all 55 U.S. states and territories.

What: The International Coastal Cleanup; The world's largest one-day volunteer effort to remove marine debris.

When: view website at www.coastalcleanup.org for current dates...

Where: At a local beach or waterway near you.

Background: The International Coastal Cleanup is the world's largest one-day volunteer effort on behalf of the marine environment. In 2003 more then 450,000 people from all 55 U.S. states and territories and over 90 countries around the world participated in the cleanup collecting over 7.55 million pounds of marine debris. Volunteers also found 237 entangled animals last year, emphasizing the dangers that marine debris plays in the coastal environment.

From community groups to families and concerned citizens, many of your readers are participating in a local cleanup. Help tell their story and the story of how marine debris is not only an eyesore, but also poses a serious risk to health and human safety and harms wildlife.

To find a Cleanup site near you call
1-800-262-BEACH or log onto www.coastalcleanup.org.

Save the Dolphin Campaign

CNN Exposes Dolphin Slaughter Cruelty
Follow along as CNN goes with Ric O'Barry, of Save Japan Dolphins, to the annual dolphin slaughter in Taiji Japan. This video contains brutal fooatge of the suffering dolphins, brutally slaughtered for an outdated custom that must stop.

Save Japan Dolphins
This campaign to end the Japanese drive fishery slaughter of dolphins in Taiji is being jointly conducted by these international organizations with long and successful histories of dolphin conservation.
The Ocean Project | ACT for Dolphins
End Dolphin Slaughter in Japan- Please sign this petition and help us put an end to the slaughter of dolphins and small whales in drive hunts.
Earth Island Institute | International Marine Mammal Project
Elsa Nature Conservancy (petition)
Say 'NO' to Dolphin Captivity | Dolphin Facts
Dolphin Protection Campaign Toolkit (pdf)

Sea Turtle Conservation Program

Sea Turtles are seriously threatened, many are nearing extinction. Below are a few links to organizations that are making an effort to help save these amazing creatures. Find out how you can become a volunteer by contacting your location environmental group in your area. more...

Save the Albatross Campaign

The problem - Most albatrosses and several other seabird species are heading for extinction. They are being unintentionally drowned in large numbers by "longline" fishing boats. Longlines are the single greatest threat to the world's seabirds. Much of it is carried out by "pirate" fishing boats.

Save the Albatross | Albatross Conservation

World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSAP)

World Society for the Protection of Animals (WSAP) WSPA works to raise the standards of animal welfare throughout the globe and their vision is a world in which the welfare of animals is understood and respected by everyone, and protected by effective legislation.

Through their collaborative projects, WSPA is Campaigning Against Cruelty by exposing animal abuse and enforcing stronger laws; their Animal Rescue teams are working to save abandoned or neglected animals or those stricken by disasters; and by Changing Hearts and Minds amongst people living and working with animals, WSPA is forging a safer future for all animals.

Choose Seafood Wisely

If you’re having trouble keeping track of which species of seafood and shellfish are safe to buy from an ecological perspective, then check out the latest Seafood MiniGuides from the websites listed below. Your seafood choices can really help protect the health of our oceans for future generations. Since many of your favorite kinds of seafood are disappearing from the world's oceans because of over-fishing, habitat destruction and the unintentional catch of other species, being educated about the right seafood to buy at the store or order in restaurants, will make sure our favorite seafood and shellfish will be around for years to come.

In addition to making a difference with your seafood choices, you can take part in local conservation projects as well like beach and river cleanups.

National Audubon Society's Living Oceans Program
Environmental Defense "Which Fish is Best?" - Best & Worst Picks
Monterey Bay Aquarium Seafood Watch Program - National Chart
Marine Stewardship Council
National Audubon Society Right Bite card in PDF format:
Black and White | Color

Links

Atlantis Marine World
Blue Ocean Institute - Seafood Miniguide (pdf)
Endangered Species Act of 1973, US Fish & Wildlife Service (pdf version)
Endangered Species Program, US Fish & Wildlife Service
List of Endangered & Threatened Wildlife Species of New York State
Monterey Bay Aquarium
Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute
National Marine Sanctuary Program
Oceana - campaigns to protect and restore the world’s oceans
OceanNEnvironment
PaleMale: Red-tailed hawk who manages to thrive in New York City ( Links: 1 2 3 )
Peregrine Falcons: Webcam at 55 water street in New York City
SaveTheEnvironment.com
Sea Turtle Conservation Program
The Ocean Conservancy
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution
World Wildlife Fund
Zoos and Aquariums of AZA

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