Tag: wildlife

It is hurricane season in the Northern Atlantic Ocean.

When the storm winds hit a mere 40 mph, the “floating city” of BP’s oil collection and flare off ships in the Gulf of Mexico has to shut down.  They need 4 days in advance to do this, and find safe harbor.  This is according to Admiral Thad Allen.  They will need 4 days to set back up.  The total number of days that the oil from the wreck of the Deepwater Horizon can spill freely into the Gulf during a short, 2 day tropical storm, is therefore 10 days.

http://www.theoildrum.com/node…

Guess what.

This is Alex.

Alex is a tropical storm.  

By Tuesday, Alex could be a hurricane.

Alex is heading west right now.

Alex could then swing north.  

Photographer Rich Matthews takes a closer look at oil

Journalist dives into Gulf, can only see oil

It takes 30 minutes to clean off after diving into ocean 40 miles from shore

By RICH MATTHEWS, Associated Press Writer June 9, 2010

Eeewwwh!!   WHAT was he thinking!

Hope you have a De-tox tank, handy, Rich Matthews — you’re going to need it!

Photo Credit: June 7, 2010 photo, APTN photographer Rich Matthews takes a closer look at oil from the Deepwater Horizon spill, in the Gulf of Mexico south of Venice, La.. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

View related Photos

APTN photographer Rich Matthews takes a closer look at oil from the Deepwater Horizon spill, in the Gulf of Mexico south of Venice, La.. (AP Photo/Eric Gay)

MSNBC – Updated: 5:54 a.m. ET June 9, 2010

but wait this intrepid Reporter goes deeper …

See this link:

birds are not supposed to look like this

this was May 24th.  An oiled Pelican is left behind as her friends fly off in the Louisiana marshes nesting grounds.  

Cross-posted at DailyKos.

What a difference a year makes. About a year ago in my extremely popular  The Animals are Getting the Pink Slip (A Bronx Zoo photo and action diary) this is what big sister Moxie looked like;

Yesterday I took my camera to see the three new lion cubs at the Bronx Zoo. The diary is called Friday Evening Photo Blogging: Lion Cubs Today! I can hardly tell Moxie and her mama Sukari apart but I got some great photos of Moxie playing loving sister to three 25 pound cubs. Now the stars of the zoo are  Nala, Adamma and Shani;

What hasn’t changed is that both Bloomberg and Paterson are still screwing the zoo and many cultural institutions. This year much harder than last.

See below for what actions we the people have left.  

Crossposted at Daily Kos

THE WEEK IN EDITORIAL CARTOONS

This weekly diary takes a look at the past week’s important news stories from the perspective of our leading editorial cartoonists (including a few foreign ones) with analysis and commentary added in by me.

When evaluating a cartoon, ask yourself these questions:

1. Does a cartoon add to my existing knowledge base and help crystallize my thinking about the issue depicted?

2. Does the cartoonist have any obvious biases that distort reality?

3. Is the cartoonist reflecting prevailing public opinion or trying to shape it?

The answers will help determine the effectiveness of the cartoonist’s message.

:: ::

John Sherffius, Comics.com (Boulder Daily Camera)

Last night I watched the documentary on msnbc: “100 Heartbeats,” part of MSNBC’s Future Earth series on the race to save our planet.

In “100 Heartbeats,” the second premiere in MSNBC’s landmark Future Earth series, famed naturalist Jeff Corwin tells the story of the “Sixth Extinction” – caused by people and which can only be stopped by people. Keep checking futureearth.msnbc.com for information about the next premiere, “Future Earth: 2025,” which will air on Dec. 20. You can catch “100 Heartbeats” on MSNBC again on Thanksgiving at 11 a.m. ET.

I was glad to see this show in a Sunday evening slot on msnbc and I really wish to god they’d do more like this … just blanket their whole weekend programming with this instead of the prison porn they usually do. Why not? Perhaps we should think about a write-in campaign to convince them of that!

I’m suffering a ripple-over, a hangover, of thoughts and I’m attempting to share some of these thoughts here.

There is a lot of bloggage currently over the increasing volume on the xtian’s idiocy, see  this essay from gottlieb. I was struck this morning by the juxtaposition.  I am just… so … aghast at the hypocrisy and the indignity of their whining … when this is going on.

This is desecration. This is an unholy war. This is …

Every year tens of millions of sharks die a slow death because of finning. Finning is the inhumane practice of hacking off the shark’s fins and throwing its still living body back into the sea. The sharks either starve to death, are eaten alive by other fish, or drown (if they are not in constant movement their gills cannot extract oxygen from the water). Shark fins are being “harvested” in ever greater numbers to feed the growing demand for shark fin soup, an Asian “delicacy”.

Not only is the finning of sharks barbaric, but their indiscriminate slaughter at an unsustainable rate is pushing many species to the brink of extinction. Since the 1970s the populations of several species have been decimated by over 95%. source

Just wanted to pass along this email I got from the NRDC, so anyone who didn’t know about Obama’s Interior Secretary Salazar’s plan to allow wolf hunting to commence in May can take action.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In just a few weeks, the mass killing of wolves could begin in

Idaho and Montana — and not even newborn wolf pups and their

nursing mothers will be spared.

Please don’t miss this opportunity to speak out before this slaughter unfolds. On May 4, the wolf’s federal protection will be lifted, and hunters and government agents will be free to open fire. After that, the states will launch

public hunts, targeting wolves.

Time is critical, so please take a moment to act now to call off what may become a disaster to the survival prospects of wolves living in and around Yellowstone National Park and the Norther Rockies.

How comfortable would you feel knowing that “planned subsidence” mining was being conducted 600-1,000 feet underneath your home? It all starts with a letter notifying you that the mining will commence anytime in the next 5 years. Next come the contractors with bulldozers to knock down your trees and clear your fields. Then you hear the underground mining noises that are not as freightening as the continual earthquake rumblings and the above-ground noises of your house falling apart while the streams explode before they vanish. After a year-long investigation, The Center for Public Integrity (CPI) revealed how homeowners feel violated, anxious and stressed out as their dream home and real property are legally destroyed.

First, I support A Siegel for his many articles on energy issues — Get Energy Smart! NOW!!! and his article Whitehouse Drills Drilling has prompted this from me.  (Well, to be honest, it’s been on my mind a lot as it is, anyway!)

~~~~~

THE very most important issue facing us right NOW is global warming — it concerns the survival of the universe, itself!

We need more (Sen. Sheldon) Whitehouses who would state emphatically

. . . do any of you seriously contend that drilling for more oil is the number one issue facing the American people today?

As we know, WE have the technology right now to turn our energy consumption into other alternatives, windmills, solar panels, alcohol (derived from numerous non-edible sources, such as sugar beets, hemp, cattails*, etc.) for use as fuel for our motor driven vehicles.  It’s clean and efficient.  *Cattails also can serve as a “filter” to prevent “dead zones” in our waters.