Our Whales Are Missing

Commercial fishing of Salmon off the west coast is not just problematic for indigenous peoples as well as fishers, it is problematic for Orca's as well. There are two species of Orca's one eats sea mammals the other eats salmon. Orca's are intelligent, matriarchical in social structure and from the experience's we had with the individualist Orca; Luna we have found they use language to communicate between each other and with other species. They are intelligent, and learn. Now three of them of are missing off the coast of Seattle.

Researchers: 3 killer whales missing for weeks, feared dead

By PEGGY ANDERSEN
ASSOCIATE PRESS WRITER

SEATTLE -- Three young adult killer whales - members of the family groups that spend their summers chasing salmon around Washington's San Juan Islands - have not been seen in weeks and are feared dead, researchers said Tuesday.

One of the orcas leaves a 4-month-old orphan, whose care apparently has been taken over by another female.

The three salmon-eating orca families that frequent the state's inland waters are J, K and L pods. J-pod spends virtually the entire year in the waters north of Puget Sound, while the other two groups head out to the open ocean in winter.

The pods, called the southern resident population, are unique in diet, language and DNA, and were declared an endangered species last year, with a recovery goal of 120 animals. If the three missing whales have died, the three pods will total 87 orcas, with just 23 reproductive females.

The missing mother, K-28, is from K-pod, said Kelley Balcomb-Bartok, a research assistant at the Center for Whale Research in Friday Harbor, which tracks the pods and maintains photo-identification records of each animal.

A photo of K-28 taken Sept. 1 shows a dip behind her blowhole, which indicates illness or malnutrition, he said. The 12-year-old female may also have had difficulties related to the birth.

K-28 has not been seen since, though researchers have had other encounters with the group and have seen her calf swimming close to other family members. Her baby, K-39, likely is being cared for by an older female, K-41, Balcomb-Bartok said.

Orcas are not fully weaned until about age 2, and researchers worry the calf, described as "healthy and precocious," may not survive the winter.

The two other missing orcas are from L-pod: L43, 34-year-old mother of three last seen Sept. 2; and L-71, a 20-year-old male last seen July 15 despite 25 encounters with L-pod.

"We've spent weeks searching for these individuals, we've spent weeks waiting," Balcomb-Bartok said.

Since the two pods leave the state's sheltered waters for much of the year, "Our concern is the coast - what's out there?" he said. "Are there salmon runs they used to rely on that are reduced dramatically? ... Maybe in some areas they either are no longer available or they're in such short supply they're not sustaining the population."

Many of the region's salmon runs also are listed as endangered or threatened, their numbers down to about 10 percent of historical highs.

While orca calf survival rates have been problematic for years, "losing adults is cause for concern," Balcomb-Bartok said. He noted an earlier death to illustrate the risks: "When J-18 washed up off Vancouver Island several years ago he was sterile and a high level of toxins had eaten their way through his system."

Whale experts worry about the effects of pollutants such as polychlorinated biphenyls, or PCBs - an industrial product banned since the 1970s but persistent in the environment - and fire-retardant polybrominated diphenyl ethers, which are still produced.

"All those big boys," Balcomb-Bartok said. "Things that are insidious in the environment as a whole."

Federal action in response to the orca's endangered listing is still being decided. The National Marine Fisheries Service has proposed declaring as critical habitat virtually all the state's inland waters, except shorelines where water is less than 20 feet deep and areas near military installations.

Developers and agricultural interests have already challenged the draft proposal in federal court, contending the whales are part of a larger healthy population and do not warrant special protections - a stance initially taken by NMFS but reversed by a federal judge whose ruling led to the current listing .

A Whale of an Imitation

Listen to or download the mp3 or Ogg files. (what's ogg?)

Luna - Courtesy, Rachael Griffin

Remember Luna? He was the young killer whale runaway who took up residence in Nootka Sound, off Vancouver Island. He gained fame for seeking out the company of boats, sea planes and local people, and all attempts to lure him back to sea and reunite him with his pod were in vain. Eventually he got into an accident with a tugboat propeller and died. But because Orcas are such social creatures and tend to stay with their family pods their whole lives, Luna’s behaviour when he was alone gave scientists an opportunity to learn more about the implications of social living. Andrew Foote, a biologist from the University of Durham, studied hours of recordings of Luna and compared them to the recordings of Luna’s family pod. Part of his goal was to figure out, not just what killer whales are saying, but how they learn to speak. He thinks Luna’s vocal legacy, which includes not only his family’s sounds, but also those of other family pods and even imitations of sea lion barks, is good evidence that killer whales aren’t born with a full repertoire of sounds, but actually learn them from their surroundings.

Related Links

Study in Biology Letters
Lab at the University of Durham, where Mr. Foote did his research
University of Aberdeen in Scotland, where Mr. Foote is doing his PhD on Atlantic killer whales
Luna tribute page




Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Killer, Whale, Luna, Orca, West, Coast, Killed, Tugboat, Canada, DFO, USA, Seattle, Vancouver

The New Atlantis

In Malta they aren't waiting to find the real Atalantis they are building one of their own.

A megalithic temple under the sea

Atlantis: A computer-generated image of how the concrete megalithic temple will look in the proposed marine park.

A highly innovative marine tourist attraction out at sea is being proposed by a group of investors who include an operator in the fish farming industry, a hotelier and members of the diving community. The attraction, which is to be called Marine Adventure Park, would enable divers to swim with fish in an "aquarium" nearly the size of a football pitch that would be situated a kilometre off Ras il-Griebeg, outside Mellieha Bay.

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Atlantis, Plato, Volcano, Tharea, Minonan, Crete, Egypt, olive-branch, iceage, melting, flood, glacier, Noahs, Ark, Atlantis Ignatius, Loyola, Donnelly, Malta

High Crimes On The High Sea's

Canada is complicit in these crimes on the high seas. We have not supported the ban on whaling, or on bottom trawlers.

And the two are tied together. Canada allows for hunting of the Mienke Whale which Japan and Iceland also hunt.

Iceland is resuming the whale hunt for Mienke Whales and for other Whales listed as endangered species. Canada's silence over this matter is excused by claiming our Whaling is a traditional practice of indigenous peoples in the Arctic. Their quotas for whales are more than even those caught by Iceland.

In the case of bottom trawlers the Harpocrites who usually mimic the Bush Regime are declaring their political sovereignty at the expense of the environment.White House Joins International Call for Ban on Deep Sea Trawling

But it is not only Harpers American allies that want this ban so do his conservative pals in the Howard Government in Australia. UN considers deep sea trawling ban

While European cod stocks are down; Scientists: EU Should Ban North Sea Cod Fishing Next Year , the EU is promoting the continued destruction of other deep sea species through the use of the former cod trawlers.

EU suggests quota cuts to save deep-sea fish
Brussels - Europe's fisheries chief flew in the face of scientific advice on Thursday and called for hefty quota cuts for exotic deep-sea species, some of which can live up to 150 years, instead of an outright ban on fishing. Bearing names like orange roughy, black scabbardfish, greater silver smelt and roundnose grenadier, Europe's deep-sea fish grow and reproduce far more slowly than fish in shallower waters and are far more vulnerable to overfishing.With the depletion of EU commercial stocks such as cod and hake in recent years, deep water fish have become an attractive catch as trawlers switch from traditional fishing grounds.

Quotas as an alternative to outright bans have been proven to be a joke as the recent expose of Japans overfishing it's quota of Tuna in the Pacific has shown. Quota's for fish are the equivalent of 'voluntary' emission standards in the auto industry.

LAST CHANCE FOR FISH

Illegal fishing takes toll in Pacific

'Let fishing nations pay $400M'
Even where foreign fishing fleets pay in return for access to a Pacific country's fishing grounds, the financial returns from these access fees and licenses are worth a pittance of the total value of fish caught, often a mere 5 per cent of the $2 billion that the fish is worth when it reaches the international market,” he said.

Goundar said Pacific island governments must not allow foreign industrial fishing nations like Japan to hoodwink them into plundering their oceans.

Greenpeace: New European fishing vessels should be banned from Pacific

Despite two key Pacific tuna stocks already being in serious trouble, the European Union (EU) has licensed 96 new boats to fish in the Western Pacific region.

The licensed vessels are flagged in France, the UK, Portugal and Spain, and include three of the largest and most modern tuna seiners in the world.

These Spanish giant vessels, known as super seiners, have the capacity to freeze 200 tonnes of tuna a day and can hold up to 2,200 tonnes at a time.

In a year, two of these vessels can take nearly double an entire year's haul for the whole of the Federated States of Micronesia's (FSM) tuna fishing fleet, according to Greenpeace.

See:

Fishing

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Pacific, Japan, cod, EU, deep-sea, Micronesia, Bush, bottom-trawlers, Greenpeace, Iceland, whaling,Fisheries, fishing, Maritimes, Hearn, Conservatives, Bottom-dragging, draggers, Canada, government, dept. of fishiries, environment, industrialization, Rideout,

Did Nuke Cause Earth Quake

A week after the North Korea nuclear blast this happens....Earthquake Slams Hawaii.

Coincidence? I think not.Earthquakes, Tsunamis And Nuclear Testing

Artificial means of inducing earthquakes

Earthquakes are sometimes caused by human activities. Such activities include the injection of fluids into deep wells, the detonation of large underground nuclear explosions, the excavation of mines, and the filling of large reservoirs. In the case of deep mining, the removal of rock produces changes in the strain around the tunnels. Slip on preexisting faults or outward shattering of rock into the cavities may occur. In all other situations, the induction mechanism is thought to involve elastic strain release, as in the case of tectonic earthquakes. Here, earthquakes are triggered by small changes in the local strain field that produce rock fracture or fault slip. Local changes in strain around large underground explosions have been known to produce slip on already strained faults in the vicinity.

Nuclear Bomb Tests and their relationship to Earthquakes planetwide

Nuclear bomb testing has doubled the earthquake rate.
Gary Whiteford, Professor of Geography, University of New Brunswick

Abnormal meteorological phenomena, earthquakes and fluctuations of the earth's axis are related in a direct cause-and-effect to testing of nuclear devices.
Shigeyoshi Matsumae, President Tokai University Yoshio Kato, Department of Aerospace Science

TECTONIC WEAPONS
Secretary of Defense William S. Cohen, quoted as saying at a conference in April 1997, "Others are engaging even in an eco type of terrorism, whereby they can alter the climate, set off earthquakes or volcanos remotely, through the use of electromagnetic waves."

Planet Earth the Latest Weapon of War

The Earth as a weapon in 21st century of wars

IMC India - US Nuclear Testing Possible Culprit for Indian Ocn Quake

Was the Christmas/Boxing Day 2004 Earthquake-Tsunami Event Seismic (Tectonic) Warfare or Environmental Warfare by Default?


Plate tectonics - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

A Lesson in Plate Tectonics

Plate Tectonics, the Cause of Earthquakes

From
Oilfield Review Summer 2000 - Seismicity in the Oil Field
PDF version

Earthquakes can be triggered by human action

Scientists have observed that earthquakes can be triggered by human action.

Induced seismicity, or seismic activity caused directly by human involvement, has been detected as a result of water filling large surface reservoirs, development of mineral, geothermal and hydrocarbon resources, waste injection, underground nuclear explosions and large-scale construction projects.

It is important to understand the conditions under which seismicity may be induced so that these operations can be performed safely.

The notion that human activity can provoke earthquakes is not new.

In the 1870s, proposals for impounding water in man-made lakes across regions of southern California, USA, were rejected because of concerns that this might trigger earthquakes.

The hundreds of small earth-quakes detected immediately after the 1936
drilling of the Hoover Dam in Nevada and Arizona, USA, provided the first definite evidence of such an effect. Since then, more than 100 other cases have been reported around the world."

"In all these cases, the result of human interference was to change the state of stress in the surrounding volume of earth. If the stress change is big enough, it can cause an earthquake, either by fracturing the rock mass—in the case of mining or underground explosions—or by causing rock to slip along existing zones of weakness.

...

In many areas where the rock is not under large tectonic stresses, the seismic energy released during induced events is low—typically of magnitude 0 to 3—and not even felt on the earth’s surface.

However, if the rock mass is already under large tectonic stresses, the energy added by man’s endeavors can have a destabilizing influence.

Even minor actions can trigger strong seismicity."

Correlating Seismic Activity with Hydrocarbon Exploitation

It is always difficult to know whether seismicity is the result of human modifications in the region or if it is natural seismic activity related to tectonic processes; timing could be the key to knowing the difference.

In general, the answer might be obtained if a regional seismic network had been installed in advance of the hydrocarbon development, dam construction or mining operation. The seismic network could record a background level of natural seismicity and quantify its characteristics. If, after the beginning of human action, a significant change in seismicity character is recorded, it could reasonably be interpreted as a seismic reaction of the rock formation to man’s intervention.

Installation of seismic recording networks andassessment of background seismic activity are already common practice in regions where the level of natural seismicity is high. However, instable areas without a history of natural seismicity and where no sizeable earthquakes are expected, an advance seismic background study usually is not performed."

"The correlation between seismic activity andhydrocarbon exploitation means the two are related, but it does not indicate which one is the cause, which one is the effect, and how long it takes the cause to create the effect."

Exploiting Seismicity

Few will deny that there is a relationship between hydrocarbon recovery and seismic activity, but exactly how strong a relationship exists has yet to be determined. Furthermore, what can or should be done about it sparks another debate.

In regions of high tectonic potential energy, hydrocarbon production can cause severe increases in seismic activity and trigger strong earthquakes..."

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Korea, Hawaii, Earthquake, North-Korea, nuclearbomb, nucleartest, nuke

Ignatieff Cancelled

Ouch. There goes the my best friends are Jews sound bite...Ignatieff trip to Middle East cancelled OTTAWA - Michael Ignatieff's trip to the Middle East has been called off by the Jewish group that invited him The Canada-Israel Committee confirmed today that it decided to uninvite Ignatief. Hey isn't Warren Kinsella a member of the CIC. Double Ouch.




Also See:

Israel

Lebanon

Zionism

Kinsella

Liberal Leadership Race

Ignatieff

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Conservatives, Liberals, Israel, Harper, Ignatieff, Middle-East, Government, politics, liberal-leadership, Rae, Dion, Kennedy,Liberal, Leadership, Race, Canada, politics, Findlay-Hall, Kennedy, Volpe, Dryden, Brison, Israel, Blogs, Cherniak, Kinsella, Liberals, Jews, Leadership-race, Brison, Hubert, campaigns, anti-semitism, Canada, Lebanon, Hezbollah, anti-zionism, Jews, Israel-lobby, blogging,

The Working Class Hates Their Jobs

Remember this next time a neo-con ideologue of the professional self identified middle class denounces class war Lucien Bouchard questions work ethic in Quebec......this is the real face of class war in Canada;

The workplace blues

“Relatively high proportions of men and women who worked in sales or service, or processing or manufacturing or utilities were unhappy on the job. The same was true for men in administrative, financial or clerical jobs,” the report says. “By contract, comparatively low percentages of men and women in professional positions were dissatisfied. And among men in management, as well as those in farming, forestry, fishing or mining occupations, job dissatisfaction was particularly uncommon.

And speaking of class war in the US its called the War On The Middle Class and has created such unlikely allies as jinogist anit-migrant Lou Dobbs at CNN and the left wing Counterpunch.

That's because it about losing jobs, not the real oppression of capitalism which is jobs we hate because they demean and alienate us from our real creavtivity. Something the boss, the self employed and the middle class professional does NOT experience.

See:

Class War

Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
class-war, work, jobs, Canada, USA, Canadian, class, working-class, middle-class, Lou, Dobbs, Counterpucnch, StatsCanada

Tory Lies

The reason the Tories eliminated the Court Challenge Program was because they know their new Three Strikes/ Napoleonic Code is unconstitutional according to legal experts.

In Question Period Justice Minister Vic Toews lies saying that it is constitutional.Bill on repeat offenders introduced in House

Public Security Minister Stockwell Day in Question Period denies there is systematic discrimination in Canadian Prisons. Federal prisons discriminate against aboriginals, says ombudsman

Again in Question Period both the Prime Minister and his Minister of International Affairs avoided answering the question about the halt in CIDA funding in Afghanistan...Harper defends slow pace of reconstruction work

Finally they promised to announce the new clean air act this week .....still waiting. It is probably being revised again due to leaks and the need to acutally consult with climate scientists.




Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Harper, Towes, Prisons, Aboriginals, prisoners, crime, Day, Ambrose, Afghanistan, Tories, Tory, Conservatives, Government, Canada

The Return of King Coal

There is no existing clean coal environmental technology so why are new coal fired power plants being built? $$$$$$$$

U.S. Coal Plant Boom Poses Big Environmental and Economic Questions
Should power companies be permitted to build new plants that pollute more but are reliable and less expensive?
A building boom that would add scores of new coal-fired power plants to the nation's power grid is creating a new dilemma for politicians, environmentalists and utility companies across the United States. Should power companies be permitted to build new plants that pollute more but are reliable and less expensive? Or should regulators push utilities toward cleaner burning coal plants, even if it means they will cost more and are based on newer, yet still unproven, technology?

Clean coal technology: How it works
A range of approaches of CCS have been developed and have proved to be technically feasible. They have yet to be made available on a large-scale commercial basis because of the costs involved.

Coal is the major energy source in China which accounts for its high rate of greenhouse gases and China suffers severe acid rain contamination


Trojan Horses and the Big Lie of Clean Coal
According to American.edu’s study of China and coal, “Coal accounts for about 70% of China’s total energy consumption. The development and production of the coal industry provides stability in China’s economic growth. The coal resources in China have been exploited since 476 BC, and it is estimated that even with all the years of coal exploration, China has total coal deposits of 4, 490 billion tons, which are as deep as 2,000 vertical metres. Eventually China will exploit its coal resources until they are eliminated.”

See: Coal



Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
Hydro, electricity, nuclear, gas, hydro, coal, pollution, power,power, powerplants

China Goes Republican

Its not called the Red State for nothing. The Chinese are building a New Great Wall between them and North Korea. It is already deploying considerable resources to rounding up and returning the many thousands of refugees flooding across their 1300km border, along part of which it is starting to build a Berlin Wall-type barrier.

Just like the Republican Congress and Senate approved of building on the US Mexico Border. And like Israeli's illegal wall in Palestine. Through the gate and over the wall


See:

Migration

Berlin Wall

China


Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
North, Korea, China, wall, border, Republicans, Mexico, USA, Israel, Palestine, migrants, immigrants, migration, refugees, nuclear,

Damn Cat

Another example of mutual aid......though its a damn shame the dog died. So did the cat.....

After a disabled woman's cat started a house fire, her specially trained dog came to the rescue, then died trying to help the cat still in the house.

While many folks believe cats are smarter than dogs, and I must confess our family includes both, in this case the dog was clearly smarter, and did something that has been more often been associated with humans. Self sacrifice .

"She got me outside and then she heard the cat upstairs and she went up there to get the cat and she wouldn't come back to me," Hanson, 49, said at a news conference Monday at Aurora Sheboygan Memorial Medical Center where she was being treated for her injuries.


Find blog posts, photos, events and more off-site about:
cat, dog, mutual-aid, Kropotkin, disabled, germany, fire, animals, pets,