I Don’t Think You’re Ready, For This Jelly

In Sweden, jellyfish populations overwhelmed and clogged a nuclear power plant’s pipes. These pipes turned out to be extremely important as they cool the plant’s turbines, and the nuclear power plant had to shut down. A year before, the same thing happened in California. In less extreme cases, yet still costly, large amounts of jellyfish have clogged fishing nets and damaged fishing gear. All of these jellyfish problems have raised eyebrows, and when scientists looked into jellyfish populations, they found that jellyfish are blooming more often, earlier, more intensely, and staying longer.

Around the world, jellyfish populations are booming. While this may not seem like such a big deal, it is yet another sign of climate change and environmental degradation, one that is costing various industries millions of dollars. In addition, the jellyfish feed on plankton, crustaceans, small fish, and fish eggs, which are all food resources of which larger mammals such as whales rely on. Jellyfish are thriving in places the don’t usually thrive, and this is seen as a sign that oceans around the world are stressed or unhealthy.

***Jellyfish population trends. Red indicates an increase with a high degree of certainty, while orange indicates an increase with a low degree of certainty. Blue indicates a decrease. Green represents a stable or variable population. Grey indicates no data.***

In areas where jellyfish populations have boomed causing nuclear power plants to shutdown, scientists have found that the species is causing the damage is the common moon jellyfish. This species of jellyfish thrives in areas of the ocean that have been “overfished or have bad conditions.” Bad conditions refers to anything from toxic chemicals, fertilizers, and too much trash in the oceans. Overfishing leaves lots of open space for the jellyfish to thrive, and when the fish are gone, jellyfish have the chance to dominate the ecosystem. It seems as though we have another case where humans have exploited the environment and caused detrimental effects.

What You Can Do To Help

One of the biggest problems with the booming jellyfish populations is that no monitoring exists to track the jellyfish populations. Data gained from the monitoring is needed for scientists to figure out how to address the issue. Luckily, a website and apps for iPhones and Androids have been created where the public is able to report where jellyfish are blooming. The scientists will use this data to figure out where jellyfish are, how often the blooms are occurring, and for how long. Without the help of the public, this research would be too expensive. With more research occurring, scientists will be able to find and implement ways to curb the jellyfish explosion. If you see jellyfish, report it!

Photo Cred: cbc.ca

As always: comments, questions, concerns or even random thoughts? I would love if you shared them with me so please comment below!

Safari Hunting as a Conservation Measure

Where's Mary?

It seems like on a fairly regular basis there is a large outcry from the public about big game hunting in Africa. Disproportionally, it seems that these attacks are focused on attractive women (ex. 1, ex. 2) – but is certainly not limited to just women (ex. 1).  This is an ongoing debate that will never be settled until there are no more animals left.

First, let me present my credentials: while I am not personally a hunter, I come from a family of hunters and grew up around hunting. My dad is an avid hunter, hunting deer and pheasants in Iowa, and taking many trips to hunt big game in the United States and abroad. I have joined him on two such trips, Zambia in 2010 and Zimbabwe in 2013. Both of the safaris were hard work – lots of walking, tracking and waiting…

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You Know Exactly What This Is About

They Call Me Crazy Legs

You know what’s coming. This is all about that one girl who hunts stuff: Kendall Jones.

I’m not one who likes to jump into the middle of a social media debate like this one, but I haven’t paid a visit to the ole blogosphere in a while and needed to do a little somethin somethin.

Let’s start off with some honesty

I have done little to no research on this topic. I wasn’t even sure what Kendall’s name was until I actually had to type it out moments ago. Actually, the initial plan for this post was to make up a new name for her every time I would have referred to her. But that seemed a little insensitive because she’s an actual person with actual feelings and stuff, imagine that.

Most of my commentary will stem from the quick little snipits of information that I have received from the…

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Global Gala

Hey guys, don’t forget to get your tickets to the INDEVOURS annual Global Gala! There will be a silent and live auction along with entertainment and guest speakers. Click on the poster to purchase your tickets!

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Some Not So Humble News!

The Humble Bumble was a blog post I wrote which described why bees are so important to humans, and how these bees are threatened from the use of pesticides. At the end of this post I has stated that Health Canada would reevaluate the measures it had taken to combat pesticides harming bees if these measures proved insufficient. In addition, I stated that the measures were indeed not enough and that further action was needed.

It is with great pleasure that I can now inform you that Ontario is looking to restrict the use of bee-killing pesticides!

Ontario’s Agriculture Minister Jeff Leal has said that Ontario wants to ““move away from the widespread, indiscriminate use of neonicotinoid-based pesticides.” These are the pesticides which have been deemed unsafe by many scientists and ecologists world-wide. Leal is considering implementing a licence system to control the use of the pesticide. This is not quite the ban which Europe has itself done. The licence system is one where the province hopes to reduce the use of the pesticide to only areas where there is ‘demonstrated need’.

The article that was released shows that there is growing evidence against neonicotinoid-based pesticides which links the pesticides to killing bees. The increased media attention has grown since the provincial election in June where the topic has been much discussed, and more big names have been reviewing their stances on the use of these pesticides. Rona, Canadian Tire, and Home Depot are now reassessing their need to use the pesticides and Health Canada is monitoring the situation.

This is a great step forward in protecting our bees and gaining more awareness on the issue. Hopefully this will lead to more adaptation, monitoring, and elimination of the harmful pesticides we use in Canada!

PhotoCred: http://www.salon.com/2013/12/14/can_bees_be_trained_to_sniff_out_cancer_this_designer_says_yes_partner/

As always: comments, questions, concerns or even random thoughts? I would love if you shared them with me so please comment below!

A Familiar Face: A follow up to Game Over

She’s back.

Thanks to a reply from Simon and Tomm, and a mention by Josh, I have decided to do a follow up blog post on Kendall Jones, trophy hunting, and this article.

As mentioned by Simon, the article describes how trophy hunting can help conservation efforts in Africa. The study states that trophy hunting has received a bad name in from many different people and countries, due in part to reckless hunting resulting in species extinction. However, the study then goes on to state that hunting has facilitated the recovery of struggling species by giving ranchers incentives to reintroduce animals into environments in order to have more opportunities to hunt them. Specifically, it gives the example of the white rhinoceros who grew from a population of 50  one century ago, to 11,000 population members today.

While this example of how hunting (even trophy hunting) can aid in the conservation of species exist, much controversy remains. Tomm mentioned this controversy in a reply to my original Game Over blog post.

“…people think that paying $40,000 for a tag to go kill a rhino is going to help ‘conserve’ the population. While it does raise awareness, it’s also a bit of an irony that endangered or the ‘big five’ have to die to make a point about wildlife conservation. Wildlife conversation has never taken on that trademark of a dark side until recently.

It is also somewhat of an unfortunate instance that African countries have to rely on this type of tourism to add to their economy, and might speak to the perils of the order of the state in some of these cases that this is looked upon as a last resort rather than promoting other forms of smaller (terms of $$) tourism.”

I agree with Tomm. How is it that killing is the best way to conserve?

Per Josh, sport hunting brings in an astounding $200 million a year from tourists in Africa. This figure is a large one for many African nations, and as such, they are unwilling to stop an activity that brings in a large amount of money. In fact, the bans which I described in my earlier post (where Australia banned certain animal part importations) are being fought by Zimbabwe in an attempt to keep the money flowing.

The situation we find ourselves in is one of weighing ecological values against economical values. Which are more important? The answer most likely depends on who you ask and what situation you find them in. I for one value conservation, and at this point, it seems as though one of the only ways to find funding for conservation is through hunting and permits. This is a balance between inhumane activities and species conservation.

If this is truly the case, a search for a more humane way of funding conservation is needed. In addition, hunting permits need to be regulated. Kendall Jones attempted to defend trophy hunting as conservation by stating that “permit money goes back to local communities who use it to fund schools and water wells.” Now i’m not an expert, but that does not sound like ecological conservation to me.

Photo Cred: cbc.ca

As always: comments, questions, concerns or even random thoughts? I would love if you shared them with me so please comment below!

Game Over

 

Does this picture look familiar? Well this picture was taken by ‘big game hunter’ and ‘conservationist’ Kendall Jones. The picture is part of a news and social media story that has recently gone viral. Jones hunts big game animals and posts the pictures of her kills on her social media pages. She is looking to start a TV show in 2015 which follows her exploits, and has recently become the subject of much (justified) outrage. The viral news story can be found here. 

“In 2008, (age 13) I took my second trip to Africa to start my Big 5 experience”.

**The ‘big 5’ is referencing to the 5 most coveted big game animals to hunt, the lion, elephant, leopard, buffalo, and rhinoceros.**

“The first animal I ever shot was a White Rhino with a .416 Remington!”

“On this trip I also took some plains game, such as impala, kudu and mountain reedbuck home.”

Do Kendall’s actions appall you?

Well you are not alone. Thousands of people have joined her social media sites to criticize her actions.People from South Africa demand that she ‘leave their animals alone’ because what right does she have to ‘kill off another countries’ animals’. Others shame and threaten her, and have set up petitions to shut down her social media sites and stop her hunting exploits.

However, Kendall and her supporters continue to pursue the big 5 claiming that big game hunting is necessary to control populations, and to protect livestock, noting that permits sold for hunting animals gives all of the money raised back to fund schools and water wells. As a result, right now Kendall is hunting “leopards, elephants, hippos, crocodiles, zebras and impalas with bows and guns” in Zimbabwe and South Africa.

Personally, I am against trophy hunting. In Kendall’s news story, she describes a type of trophy hunting called canned hunting. This is a legal practice where animals such as the big 5 are bred and farmed in order to later be hunted in captivity.This practice is inhumane. The animals are contained within a compound and are not given a fair chance to run and hide. Sometimes they are even baited within the compound to make the hunting even easier. In Australia, Jason Wood organized a campaign to ban trophy hunting. He has illustrated how inhumane canned hunting is:

“I don’t even call it hunting, most of the time they have bait there. There’s this very graphic video I’ve seen where you have a lion just lying under its food and it just gets shot. And the very distressing thing is the lion is perplexed as to what is going on – why, because it is used to interaction with humans.”

The Good News

As a result of Wood’s campaigning, Australia has banned trophy hunters from bringing home all rhino body parts they collect from overseas. While this may seem like a small step, it is a significant one. If a hunter cannot bring home their ‘trophy’ for their mantle and prove that they were ‘skilled’ enough to kill a rhino, there is a lot less incentive to pay $40000 to go and kill it. In addition, hopefully this will be an example that will persuade other nations into doing the same. 

While Kendall is still able to go trophy hunting in foreign countries, it is essential for nations around the world to not only ban trophy hunting, but also to follow in Australia’s footsteps and ban the importation of the body parts they gain abroad. 

Sign petitions and find additional information here:

https://www.change.org/

https://www.change.org/search?q=trophy+hunting

http://www.change.org/petitions/republic-of-south-africa-government-ban-trophy-hunting

https://secure.avaaz.org/en/petition/Facebook_CEOMark_Zuckerberg_Remove_the_page_of_Kendal_Jones_that_promotes_animal_cruelty/?wNPCMhb

Kendall’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/_kendalljones_

Kendall’s Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kendalltakeswild/info

Photo Cred: cbc.ca

As always: comments, questions, concerns or even random thoughts? I would love if you shared them with me so please comment below!

The Humble Bumble

Bumble bees are incredibly important to our food systems. It has been estimated that a third of the food which humans consume each and every day relies on the pollination which bees provide. Examples of foods which require the pollination of bees includes avocados, soybeans, apples, strawberries, blueberries, asparagus, broccoli, celery, squash, sunflowers, cucumbers, citrus fruit, peaches, kiwis, cherries, cranberries, melons and many more. In addition, bees pollinate clover and alfalfa, which is used to feed cattle, and cotton and flax, which is used to make clothes. This means there are many implications for meat, dairy, and clothing industries as well. Essentially, honeybees are a main reason why mankind is able to enjoy a diet that consists of more than just water.

Bees help humans by pollinating plants and making these plants able to reproduce and grow. Unfortunately, pesticides used for agriculture often unintentionally kill bees which are necessary for crops to reproduce. This has resulted in reductions in the number of wild bee colonies world wide. As a result, scientists have petitioned for two commonly used pesticides to be banned around the world to minimize the amount of mass killings of bees which harms the planet’s ecosystem.

These scientists hold that “life would be awful” without bees for the reasons outlined above. With these pesticides, bees are being killed which will result in a lot less fruit and vegetables humans like to eat, any plant or animal that relies of these plants or seeds would be at risk, and soil and water environments are polluted. In fact, “more than 90 per cent of the pesticide goes into the environment rather than the crop”, and these pesticides build up until groundwater and streams become contaminated. This contamination in turn has negative effects on other environments, plants, and animals, such as terrestrial animals like worms who live within the contaminated soil.

Health Canada found pesticides on 70% of dead bees last spring, but believes this to be due to the bees being “exposed to the dust that’s kicked up during the planting process”.  The Canadian Government has been monitoring these effects and has created measures for minimizing bee exposure to pesticides. These measures include reducing dust from coated seeds, safer seed planting practices, and labels with enhanced warnings. In addition, Health Canada has stated that if these measures turn out to be insufficient, they will reevaluate the situation and take new measures to minimize bee risks.

However, these measures are not enough. Europe has linked these pesticides to the death of honeybees and as a result has decided to ban the use of the pesticides. In addition, it has been found that reducing dust coated seeds has not reduced the risk to bees. While not everyone agrees with the EU’s decision, until the risks of these pesticides are understood, they should not be used in order to ensure that the bees are not placed in irreparable risk.

Photo Cred: whyfiles.org

As always: comments, questions, concerns or even random thoughts? I would love if you shared them with me so please comment below!

An Oppor-TUNA-ty To Get Involved

Tuna fish are amazing. They are huge (up to 1500 pounds huge!), extremely fast swimmers (up to 70 mph fast!), they have an impressive amount of stamina (annual travelling of 4000+ miles!), and they are worth A LOT of money (one bluefin Tuna sold for $1.76 million dollars in 2013). Unfortunately, like many fish in the sea, Tuna have been overexploited using environmentally degrading practices.

Besides unsustainable practices such as sport fishing, Tuna are fished by ranching, and corraling. Now both of these practices are bad in their own ways.

1. Ranching is when entire schools of Tuna are caught in nets, and then towed to nearby the shore. Here, the Tuna are raised for a few months and then harvest and exported. Ranching itself does not count towards legal catch quotas, and as a result, does not fall under aquatic regulations and remains unregulated. In addition to a lack of regulations, this form of Tuna fishing negatively affects the age structures of wild populations. Juvenile Tuna are removed from the wild; juvenile Tuna being the type of Tuna in charge of replenishing wild populations.

2. Tuna are found swimming below dolphins in the ocean. As a result, corraling the dolphons is the method used to catch Tuna, The dolphins are corraled into a small area, and then a net is dropped around the dolphins, simultaneously catching the Tuna below. All species caught in this area (mainly dolphins) are then hauled on board the ship.  Consequently, all dolphins caught while trying to catch Tuna are dead before they can be freed.

The problem with Tuna is that they are valuable, yet undeniably finite. There is a large demand for Tuna, and a large profit to be reaped from selling Tuna. The question is whether or not the world is able to reach an agreement that preserves wild tuna stocks.

This post is not about finding a better way to catch Tuna. I am be no means an expert fisherman with the ingenuity to create a revolutionary technique or net that only catches exactly what you are looking for. That in itself is its own problem. I am, however, calling for you to get educated on the issue, and to get involved in pushing for more regulations. There still only exists a few regulations for fishing Tuna, and many areas around the ocean have no catch limits. Tuna populations would also benefit from restrictions on catching juvenile Tuna, but this would require countries to take a hit economically speaking in the short term.

Photo Cred: http://learn.uvm.edu/foodsystemsblog/2013/09/19/species-on-the-edge-of-a-knife-can-bluefin-tuna-survive-the-sushi-craze/

As always: comments, questions, concerns or even random thoughts? I would love if you shared them with me so please comment below!

The ‘Scientific’ Whaling Charade

Japan claims that it needs to catch (kill) 850 minke, 50 fin and 50 humpback whales every year for ‘scientific’ purposes. THANKFULLY the International Court of Justice has ordered Japan to stop its whaling program because it has found that the program is not actually for scientific purposes that the Japanese government had claimed.

This Japanese whaling program has been criticized for years due to its unsustainable and unethical nature. Analysis has shown that if this program of hunting whales, dolphins and porpoises continues, many species may be driven to extinction, but Japanese governments have defended its program by declaring it a tradition practice. For hundreds of years Japanese cultures have hunted whales and they are offended by the suggestion that this part of their culture needs to stop because this is threatening their culture. But it is much more than that.

ETHICS: Whales are highly evolved and highly intelligent mammals that can feel pain and who have the right to live no matter what their economic value.

SUSTAINABILITY: Many whales are either extinct or endangered and with programs existing to hunt these animals their precarious situations will only worsen, making it folly to continue to kill them.

WHALE WATCHING INDUSTRY: A US$ 1 billion per year industry, whaling initiatives can only harm these businesses’ causing economic hardship and a loss of entertainment.

CONTROVERSY: The Japanese whaling industry has faced numerous counts of scandal, debt and corruption accusations regarding their operations.

GLOBAL EFFECTS: Whales contribute in many ways to create and maintain life in the oceans around the world. The ocean plays major environmental, economic and social roles around the world, and if whales were to become extinct, humans everywhere would be negatively affected.

It is great to see this major step against whaling take place. Hopefully in the future all other nations such as Norway and Iceland will see similar changes that protect these great species. Finally, if you ever have the opportunity to go whale watching, I suggest you capitalize on the opportunity because it is an awesome experience as the picture above shows!

For more information on this topic check out these links (especially #5! So cool.):

1. http://www.cnn.com/2014/03/31/world/asia/japan-whale-hunt/
2. http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/01/world/europe/united-nations-court-rules-against-japan-in-whaling-dispute.html
3. http://www.greenpeace.org/international/en/campaigns/oceans/whaling/ending-japanese-whaling/
4. http://www.animalplanet.com/tv-shows/whale-wars/about-whaling/why-japanese-hunt-whales.htm
5. http://animals.nationalgeographic.com/animals/photos/whales/

As always: comments, questions, concerns or even random thoughts? I would love if you shared them with me so please comment below!