Category Archives: Species At Risk

Endangered Whales and Dolphins Affected by Tankers

July 16, 2012Energy and Resources, Oil&Gas, Pipelines and Supertankers, Species At RiskBC Oil Pipelines and Supertankers, Enbridge, KinderMorgan, Oil and gas, species at riskCommon Sense Canadian

Douglas Coupland-narrated video shows ship noise impacts on whales — Animation of acoustic impacts on whales (Oceans Initiative)

by Julie Andreyev

Scientist Rob Williams is concerned about the Enbridge, Kinder Morgan and Vancouver Airport proposals that will increase tanker traffic along BC’s coast.

It’s a gray day in Knight Inlet, B.C. The calm silver surface of the water occasionally breaks with the fin of a dolphin. Dr. Rob Williams, marine conservation biologist, alumnus of UBC and head of Oceans Initiative, is helping PhD student Erin Ashe to count Pacific white-sided dolphins as they swim by. With the boat engine turned off, they are listening for orcas. They hear a sound — in the air — not over the hydrophone. It sounds like a storm coming.

Williams pulls in the hydrophone and gets ready to head home before the rainstorm hits. He looks around. The boat is surrounded by a solid school, hundreds of dolphins, storming by at top speed like horses galloping. Out of the corner of his eye he spots the dorsal fins of orcas. Over the course of a half an hour the orcas herd the dolphins into the bay, closer and closer to the shore. In a panic the dolphins leap to get out of the way of the whales. The largest male orca breaches the water aiming for a dolphin, striking it. Stunned, the smaller animal floats motionless in the water while the whale comes back around.

Williams has researched the local dolphin, orca and other at-risk marine mammals since 1995. “You forget what extraordinary wild animals the orcas are, what extraordinary animals the dolphins are, and how they live their lives. And, of course, their lives depend on being able to hear signals — like an orca is coming. That reminds us how important it is to keep the ocean as quiet as possible so that they can hear what they need to hear.”

Currently a Marie Curie Research Fellow at University of St Andrews in Scotland, Williams spends half the year doing field studies and conducting research off B.C.’s coast, and the other half in a university setting. He is concerned about the recent proposals for increased oil and fuel shipping in and out of B.C. “The orca populations off Vancouver Island are listed in the Species at Risk Act. The populations off the south coast of Vancouver Island are in worse shape,” says Williams. More ship traffic could have a disastrous effect on these and other threatened whale populations.

The increased tanker traffic from the proposed Enbridge Northern Gateway Pipeline to Kitimat, Kinder Morgan’s planned expansion of the Trans Mountain line to Burnaby, and a proposal to ship jet fuel up the Fraser River, would bring with it intensified ship noise, increased risks of spills and more ship strikes. The Enbridge Project alone would add 200 ships per year to the coast. The Vancouver Airport’s proposed port for supertankers at the south arm of the Fraser River, and Kinder Morgan’s proposal would increase the size and frequency of ships in the southern coast region.

In 2008, Williams and Ashe partnered with Dr. Chris Clark at Cornell University to conduct an ambitious study of ocean noise from ships operating in B.C. coastal waters. Ship noise affects dolphins and whales that rely on sound to communicate, detect prey and avoid the ships themselves. Threatened humpback, blue, killer and fin whales are at risk of death by ship strike, and all marine mammals are threatened if there is a catastrophic oil spill.

Sound is the key sense for dolphins and whales to find their way around, detect predators, find food and communicate. The sound frequency range within which whales communicate and echolocate corresponds to the frequency range of ship noise. Ships hundreds and even thousands of miles away interfere with the acoustic space of these animals. With more ship traffic, the ability for whales and dolphins to communicate, search for prey, and avoid predators will be compromised.

“Mind-bending” is how Dr. Peter Tyack, formerly Senior Scientist at Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute and now a professor at the University of St. Andrews, describes the distance that sound travels through the oceans. He cites a study where sound released underwater in the southern Indian Ocean could be heard in Bermuda and Monterey, California, thousands of miles away. Whales use sound for communication, sometimes over a thousand kilometers. “Marine mammals have evolved over the last tens of millions of years ways to depend on sound to both explore their world and stay in touch with one another… In this frequency range where whales communicate, the main source globally in the planet for noise comes from human ships. The effective range of communication [between whales] goes from a thousand kilometers to ten kilometers,” says Tyack. “If this signal is used by males and females to find each other for mating, imagine the impact this could have on the recovery rate of endangered populations.”

In the presence of ships and ship noise, whales have to expend more energy to find food, and they have to change their calls to use higher frequency sound and increased volume. If a whale can’t find food because of ship noise, his survival may be threatened; if a mother can’t hear and locate her calf, they risk being separated and the calf killed by predators; if whales can’t hear each other to locate mates, their population recovery is in jeopardy; if dolphins can’t hear approaching orcas, they can become prey.

On July 25, 2009, The Sapphire Princess, a massive cruise ship owned by Princess Cruise Lines, headed into the Port of Vancouver. The crew and holidaying passengers were unaware that the body of a 70 ft. long female fin whale was wrapped around the ship’s bow. It had been there probably since the ship toured the area between Alaska and Vancouver Island.

The fin whale, after the blue whale, is the earth’s largest living animal and is listed as “protected” by the International Whaling Commission and “endangered” by the World Conservation Union. Hits can result in external and internal injuries, suffering and drawn-out deaths. Williams has conducted studies of ship strikes that have injured or mortally wounded whales. The areas with highest risk for ship strikes with humpback and fin whales (Dixon Entrance, north North Haida Gwaii Islands, Hecate Strait) correspond to areas where the proposed Enbridge ship traffic would occur.

Propeller wounds on orcas are relatively common and the highest risk area for them is Johnstone Strait. “Port expansion and a proposed pipeline for carrying oil from Alberta to BC’s north coast (with associated oil tanker traffic) would increase ship strike risk for all three species,” says Williams. South from Kitimat through Hecate Strait, Johnstone Strait and around the southern tip of Vancouver Island have areas where whales and ships overlap. The sound of ships in the same area where whales are feeding is believed to cause the whales to be disoriented, which could increase the risk of potential strikes. Williams believes that “the few known cases of collisions involving fin whales suggest that mortality due to ship strike for this species may already be approaching or even exceeding sustainable mortality limits.”

At noon on August 20, 2007, a Ted Leroy Trucking Ltd. barge moving fuel and heavy equipment listed and drifted into Johnstone Strait’s Robson Bight Ecological Reserve. The barge tipped over, losing to the sea its cargo of eleven vehicles and a fuel truck loaded with 10,000 L of diesel fuel. The resulting spill affected 62 square kilometers of marine environment. The slick on the surface of the water persisted for days until it dispersed into the larger body of water. “All the oceanographic factors that help concentrate salmon into a bottleneck area, such as narrow areas in Johnson Strait, will attract orcas,” says Williams. In fact, during the days of the barge spill, scientists estimated that 25% of the threatened northern resident orca (NRKW) population was seen within its vicinity. “Oil spills have been identified as posing a threat to the recovery of transient and resident orcas, and this proposed [Enbridge] pipeline and associated tanker traffic are expected to increase oil spill risk substantially.”

During Williams’ field studies he found that “67% of the NRKW population was found to have visited the area of Robson Bight – Michael Bigg Ecological Reserve on one ‘superpod’ day, which makes this population highly vulnerable to extinction due to stochastic, catastrophic events.” The southern resident population off southern Vancouver Island is composed of only three family groups, and it is common to have 100% of the small population travelling together in Haro Strait. An oil spill could easily affect the entire population.

The Exxon Valdez spill in 1989 caused losses of up to 41% to two groups of orcas that have yet to recover to pre-spill numbers. As large as the Exxon Valdez, Panamax-class vessels are the type that would service Richmond. The Burnaby expansion would use the larger Suezmax tankers that carry nearly 1 million barrels of oil. Even larger VLCC (Very Large Crude Carrier) tankers – bearing up to 2 million barrels of diluted bitumen – would set sail from Enbridge’s port at Kitimat. If a significant number of whales in a threatened whale population were directly affected by another spill, losses to the population could be potentially beyond recovery.

Says Williams, “Any time you have an increase in ship traffic there is risk to dolphins and whales. In the worst-case scenario you could have a spill. Even in the best of circumstances ships make a lot of noise and whales rely on sound. Whales are at risk of ship strikes. In whale populations that are recovering their numbers from whaling, we have to be concerned about these factors. Underwater noise should definitely be one of the factors we consider when assessing the environmental impacts of industrial development applications.”

Julie Andreyev is a new media artist (video/audio/interactive) who teaches at Emily Carr University.

Law Takes Precedence Over Justice in Germany – An Update From Captain Paul Watson

July 6, 2012Oceans, Species At RiskCommon Sense Canadian

This article appeared originally on the blog of Captain Paul Watson’s Sea Shepherd Conservation Society.

I remain a prisoner in Germany in a case that has become highly unusual, controversial and international.

On May 13th, 2012, I was arrested at Frankfurt airport in Germany because in October 2011, Costa Rica issued an order for my arrest and extradition for an incident that had taken place in 2002.

That incident involved a confrontation between the Sea Shepherd crew and a poaching vessel that we caught finning sharks in Guatemalan waters. We were given permission to intervene to stop the killing of the sharks by the Guatemalan government. No one was injured and there was no property damage but the Costa Rican poachers accused us of endangering their lives.

And 10 years later I found myself arrested in Germany because of this complaint.

Even more strange is that I had traveled extensively between October 2011 and the present, including trips to Europe and had not been arrested. That was because Interpol had dismissed the extradition warrant as being politically motivated. But for reasons unexplained Germany had not dismissed the warrant despite Interpol `s dismissal.

Germany does not have an extradition treaty with Costa Rica but insists they can extradite to Costa Rica if they decide to so.

Is it a coincidence that Japan launched a civil lawsuit against Sea Shepherd in October 2011 when they were granted $30 million U.S. dollars from the Tsunami Earthquake Relief Fund to be used to protect the Japanese whaling fleet from the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society?

Is it a coincidence that Costa Rican President Chinchilla paid a visit to the Prime Minister of Japan in December 2011?

It is a coincidence that President Chinchilla visited Germany ten days after my arrest because she had no way of knowing I would be arrested and my arrest actually caused her problems and distractions she would have rather not had during her visit to Germany.

It was unusual that I was granted bail in a country that does not provide for the possibility of a bond for prisoners held for extradition.

It was unusual that the Costa Rican Foreign Minister requested a meeting with me during his visit to Germany with the President of Costa Rica.

It was unusual that the President of Costa Rica publicly made a statement that I would get a fair trial in Costa Rica. This statement alone implies that there were reasons to suspect that I would not get a fair trial in Costa Rica.

I believe that if given the opportunity to present our documentation, evidence and witnesses in a Costa Rican court that I would be found not guilty.

I told the Costa Rican Foreign Minster that I would return to Costa Rica voluntarily with my defense team if a trial date was set but I felt it was unfair to imprison me in Costa Rica until a trial date is set because that could take months or even years.

I also told the Costa Rican Foreign Minister that Sea Shepherd wants to work with Costa Rica to protect sharks and to protect the Cocos Island National Park Marine Reserve.

I don’t think that Germany or Costa Rica anticipated the international response of support for my position. Dozens of demonstrations around the world before German Embassies, 400 demonstrators in Berlin to greet the Costa Rican President, a statement from the President of the Brazilian Senate calling for my release, statements from celebrities worldwide, support from the European Parliament, threats to boycott tourism to Costa Rica.

Our legal team has filed a motion to dismiss the charges based on errors in the warrant.

If the motion is not granted, Costa Rica has 90 days to provide the file to the German authorities requesting extradition.

So I could be free to leave Germany in a few days, a few weeks or three months or if we lose the case then I would be forcefully extradited to Costa Rica OR if I lose the case, the German government can intervene politically to prevent the extradition.

All and all it seems like a great deal of effort to go to because a couple of shark finning fishermen who were not hurt nor had their property damaged had made a complaint.

Meanwhile nothing ever happened to the Captain of the Shonan Maru 2 for destroying the 1.5 million dollar Ady Gil and almost killing 8 people and injuring one of them. There is no extradition order for him, no arrest warrant – nothing!

Why?

Because the law is there to protect those who profit from exploiting the oceans and not for those who work to protect the oceans.

Whatever happens, there is one undeniably positive outcome of this entire incident and that is that worldwide attention is being focused on shark finning and the horrific massacre of tens of millions of sharks every year and for what?

For a bowl of soup!

Captain Paul Watson is the founder of Sea Shepherd Conservations Society.

Japan Torpedoes South Atlantic Whale Sancruary on Day 1 of IWC Meeting in Panama

July 3, 2012International, Politics, Species At RiskCommon Sense Canadian

Renowned BC-based whale expert Dr. Paul Spong reports on Day 1 of the 64th annual International Whaling Commission (IWC) meeting, taking place this week in Panama.

One of the great things about Panama is the predictability of the weather. When we got here, about the first thing we learned was that it rained at 4pm each day, with the rain accompanied by thunder and lightning, and that the downpour would stop as suddenly as it began. The thunder and lightning bit turned out to be true, as we sat chatting near the venue pool with a couple of Green Vegans yesterday, but “rain” was clearly an understatement. On cue at 4pm, after a great crack and drum roll, the Heavens opened. I tried to take a photo of the waterfall bouncing off the pavement, but the image turned out to be so blurred I regretted not turning on video. Half an hour later it was over, and after that much time again the pavements were dry. Awesome.

Potentially awesome, too, is what is happening in the room here. IWC 64 is looking like the last round in this fight for a couple of years, as the Commission will almost certainly move to biennial meetings, and it’s shaping up to be a brouhaha. I have a feeling the word “enough!” is in the air, and that the folk who are lovers of whales aren’t going to take it any more. They occupy a clear majority of the seats, yet they cannot exert their will, thanks to the corruption spread by Japan with the active cooperation of Norway and Iceland, with Denmark close beside.

This morning, the ambition of Latin American countries to establish a South Atlantic Whale Sanctuary was defeated once again, this time by a narrower margin than in previous attempts that began in 1998, but still a defeat. The outcome was unsurprising, including to the proponents, but the point was made. A 64% majority supported their proposal, short of the ¾ majority demanded by Commission rules, but enough to be called a landslide victory in other arenas. The fact that a vote was held at all amounted to a watershed moment in that it was the first IWC vote of any kind taken in 4 years. Last year the mere thought of a vote was enough to tear the meeting asunder because of Japan’s fear of things slipping beyond its control. This time, perhaps because of a change of leadership in its delegation, Japan was less strident, though the outcome was the same. No Sanctuary for whales in the South Atlantic. The decision leaves open the door to future commercial exploitation, a future that is clearly on Japan’s mind despite the real world, which includes declining interest in domestic consumption of whales at home, and increasing opposition abroad.

Very sadly, the USA is party to the unholy brew that is pushing whales onto the old track where they are seen solely as resources to be exploited by whoever comes along with a wish list. In this meeting, the wish list includes an “aboriginal” request by St. Vincent and the Grenadines that dates “all the way” back to 1875 (hardly ancient history) when a family whale killing business started up on the tiny Caribbean island of Bequia. At one point in the past there was some sympathy for the old whaler, which was accompanied by a tacit understanding that the hunt would end when he died. Not so. The old whaler has gone but his legacy has been seized by Japan in a cynical move towards the goal of having its coastal whaling operations declared “traditional”, if not strictly aboriginal, and therefore allowed under IWC rules.

Over the past year, the U.S.A. has led an ad hoc group discussion aimed at settling the aboriginal whaling issue at this meeting. Somehow, it came up with the crazy idea that bundling all the Aboriginal Subsistence Whaling requests together would be the easiest way for it to secure a 4 or 6 year Bowhead quota for its native Alaskan communities. It’s unsure what tea was served at the ad hoc get-togethers, but the insult of this morning’s vote, combined with the prospect of having to agree to the brutal slaughter of mother and baby humpbacks, was sticking in the craw of many Latin American delegates by the end of this day. Accompanying that thought was the marvelous video imagery of living humpbacks presented by Panama in the opening session – just about everyone applauded enthusiastically, though not Japan. The upshot is a real possibility that a vote will be demanded on the request by St. Vincent and the Grenadines. If this happens, the veneer of politeness that frames this meeting may fray.

Tomorrow, we will find out whether tonight’s party, hosted by Panama, was sufficient to achieve the reconciliation of views hoped for by the new Swiss Chair at the end of this afternoon’s session, or whether the distant sounds of thunder we’re hearing are the drums of war.

Dr. Paul Spong is a neuroscientist and cetologist from New Zealand. He has spent more than 30 years researching orcas in BC and is credited with increasing public awareness of whaling, through his involvement with Greenpeace and the International Whaling Commission.

Silent Summer: Leading Fisheries Researcher on Harper Govt. Killing Ocean Pollution Monitoring

May 28, 2012Canada, Fisheries, Ocean Health, Oceans, Politics, Species At RiskHealth and Environment, Politics, pollution, Salmon, species at riskCommon Sense Canadian

by Dr. Peter Ross

Since being hired 13 years ago as a Research Scientist at Fisheries and Oceans Canada (DFO), I have been fortunate to conduct research on such magnificent creatures as killer whales, beluga whales, harbour seals and sea otters. I have visited some of the wildest parts of coastal British Columbia, Arctic Canada and further afield. I have been humbled by the power of Mother Nature as we deployed teams to explore and better understand the lives of creatures beneath the surface of the ocean. I have marveled at the evolutionary adaptations of marine mammals to an existence at the interface of land, sea and atmosphere. And as a scientist, I have come to learn that I possess but rudimentary powers of observation when it comes to the mystery and beauty of a vast ocean. For all of this, I remain eternally grateful.

A blend of challenging field work and cutting-edge laboratories has helped me to look into the lives of fish and marine mammals, and the ways in which some of the 25,000 contaminants on the domestic market affect their health. Our research has drawn on the combined expertise of dedicated technicians, biologists, vessel operators and aboriginal colleagues, ultimately leading to scientific publications now available around the world. This is knowledge that informs policies, regulations, and practices that enable us to protect the ocean and its resources, both for today’s users, and for future generations.

I am thankful for the rich array of opportunities aboard Canadian Coast Guard ships and small craft, alongside Fisheries Officers, chemists, habitat biologists and managers, together with colleagues, technicians, students and members of aboriginal communities. I have enjoyed weaving stories of wonder on such issues as the health of killer whales, effects of flame retardants on beluga whales, hydrocarbons in sea otter habitat, trends in priority pollutants in harbour seals, impacts of current use of pesticides on the health of salmon, the identification of emerging contaminants in endangered species and risk-benefit evaluation of traditional sea foods of First Nations and Inuit peoples.

Past scientific discoveries such as high levels of PCBs in Inuit foods, dioxins in pulp and paper mill effluent, and DDT-associated eggshell thinning in seabirds formed the basis for national regulations and an international treaty (the Stockholm Convention) that have led to cleaner oceans and safer aquatic foods for fish, wildlife and humans. Canada was a world leader in spearheading this profoundly important treaty, drawing on ground-breaking scientific research in tandem with the knowledge of aboriginal communities.

I am thankful to my friends, family, supporters and colleagues, who have always been there to converse, share, learn and teach – in the laboratory, in the field, in the cafeteria, in the hallway. These people have made it all worthwhile.

It is with deep regret that I relay news of my termination of employment at Fisheries and Oceans Canada and the loss of my dream job. It is with even greater sadness that I learn of the demise of DFO’s entire contaminants research program – regionally and nationally. It is with apprehension that I ponder a Canada without any research or monitoring capacity for pollution in our three oceans, or any ability to manage its impacts on commercial fish stocks, traditional foods for over 300,000 aboriginal people and marine wildlife.

Canada’s silence on these issues will be deafening this summer and beyond.

For more information about Ross’ work:

Silent Snow: The Slow Poisoning of the Arctic, by Marla Cone, published by Grove/Atlantic http://www.groveatlantic.com/?title=Silent+Snow

http://articles.latimes.com/2001/feb/16/news/mn-26134

http://articles.latimes.com/1996-05-12/news/mn-3403_1_immune-system

http://articles.latimes.com/2003/jun/19/local/me-polarbears19

http://www.environmentalhealthnews.org/ehs/news/contaminated-killer-whales

http://www.environmentalhealthnews.org/ehs/news/2012/perus-dolphin-die-off

http://www.environmentalhealthnews.org/archives.jsp?sm=&tn=2title%2Clede%2Cdescription&tv=Peter+Ross&ss=1

For Whom the Bell Tolls: Disappearing Coral Reefs, Ocean Species

April 28, 2012Climate Change, Species At Riskclimate change, Ray Grigg, Shades of Green, species at riskRay Grigg

In one of the most beautiful essays ever written in the English language, the 17th century courtier, poet, adventurer, priest and lecturer, John Donne, reflected on the meaning of a tolling funeral bell. His Meditation 17, when rendered in a modern idiom, reads like this:

“No man is an island unto himself. Each is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. When one man dies, it diminishes me for I am a part of all mankind. Therefore, send not to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.”

Ernest Hemingway used a few of these words for the title of one of his famous books. But “for whom the bell tolls” has another relevance today that is more poignant, one encapsulated by a visitor to Hawaii who casually noted that the islands’ coral reefs are dying.

Indeed, they are. And they are dying elsewhere, too: throughout the South Pacific, the Caribbean, the Gulf of Mexico, the Mediterranean, the Red, the Indian — everywhere there are coral reefs. Perhaps the most spectacular casualty is Australia’s Great Barrier Reef. Scientists give it another 10 years before its corals will no longer be able to adapt to warming oceans. Unfortunately, like most of the world’s corals, the Great Barrier’s corals use a heat-sensitive single species of symbiotic algae for energy. And the reefs are not mobile enough to migrate poleward 15 km per year to cooler water (New Scientist, Apr. 9/11). As these reefs die, so too will the myriad species of spectacular fish that make these ecologies so rich and beautiful.

Reefs, as marine biologists attest, are the oceans’ nurseries. With about a quarter of all marine species living there, they are key to maintaining healthy fish stocks and biodiversity. If these multi-hued corals turn into bleak and grey gravestones of death, then the impacts will be dramatic and global.

Ocean acidification, an even more serious consequence of the carbon dioxide emissions from the burning fossil fuels we burn, threatens the entire marine ecosystem. The 500 billion tonnes of CO2 that has dissolved into the oceans since the Industrial Revolution is now threatening the foundation of the marine food chain with rapidly dropping pH levels. If phytoplankton, krill and the micro-crustacea are no longer able to form their carbonate shells, then the entire system collapses, from the smallest of creatures to salmon and great whales.

But the funereal bell is tolling almost everywhere these days. About one third of all mammals, plants, fish and birds are expected to be extinct within a human lifetime, victims of a fatal combination of climate change, habitat loss, exotic species, disease, pollution, commercialization, greed or any of the litany of ills sponsored by human indiscretion and ignorance. Amphibians are suffering some of the worst declines. People now travel the globe to get a rare glimpse of the few remaining tigers, white rhinos, frogs and rare birds. Over-fishing has brought most large fish to the edge of extinction.

We still live mostly in isolation from the consequences of our actions. The industrial machinery that makes our consumer products, the fossil fuels that generate our electricity, the cars that drive us to work, the airplanes that skitter us around the planet add 70 million tonnes of CO2 to the atmosphere each day. In the myopia of our daily lives, we don’t notice that about 30 percent of that CO2 is absorbed into the world’s oceans to form carbonic acid. Our oceans are now 29 percent more acidic than they were 250 years ago, and by 2050 they will be 70 percent more acidic. The consequences are already being felt. Along Washington’s coast, for example, the water is now so corrosive that oyster larvae cannot form shells — Pacific oysters there have been unable to reproduce in the wild since 2004 (Strait Talk, Spring 2012). This increasing acidity will eventually threaten squid, starfish, shrimp, sea urchins, mussels and abalone. Even fish at the larval stage may be unable to survive. Hardy jellyfish will be the last survivors in an excessively acidic ocean (Ibid).

Somehow, by a perverse and dexterous trick of self-deception, we have failed to duly personalize the wholesale environmental crisis that surrounds us. The outer limit of ourselves too often ends at our skin, as if an imaginative handicap prevents us from realizing that everything else on our planet is a part of us, too. All the things we know and experience derive from the diverse wealth of nature that contains us. It is the frame of reference for all our understanding and meaning. Time, rhythm, perspective, size, shape, colour, sound, taste, smell, distance, relationship — our very sentience — are all anchored in nature. Earth itself is only unique because of the living species that enliven it. As our treasured surroundings are threatened, degraded or lost, a justified response should be outcries of trespass, theft, anger and outrage, not indifference or vague expressions of concern. Environmental destruction is an assault against our person. At the very least, the measure of our present situation and the weighing of our future prospects should warrant silent mourning and inward weeping.

Donne’s Meditation 17 is an apt reminder that each death on our planet diminishes us because we are part of the whole. Each species that is endangered or goes extinct narrows the breadth, depth and richness of our experience as human beings. Each loss shrinks and withers the quality of our lives. How ironic and tragic that, just as we are discovering the incredible intricacy, complexity and intelligence of nature, we are destroying this astounding miracle with unprecedented efficiency, as if the same bell that is celebrating life is also tolling its death.

The Bee’s Needs

March 30, 2012Food, Organic & Local, Species At RiskHealth and Environment, PesticideMiranda Holmes

When the final tally is done on humanity’s many post-Industrial Revolution screw ups, it is likely that the top of the list will be: They let the bees die.

Consider this: According to a 2010 UN Environmental Programme report, some 100 crop species provide 90% of food worldwide. Nearly three quarters of these crops depend for their existence on pollination by bees.

This process, which has succeeded for millennia, is now under serious threat.

Every winter since 2006 when the term colony collapse disorder (CCD) was coined, commercial bee keepers in Canada have been losing an average of 30% of their bees. (Last winter, south and central Vancouver Island bee keepers lost 80% of their colonies.) To stay in business they are now importing bees from New Zealand.

There is as yet no definitive scientific explanation for why the bees are dying – or simply disappearing – but there is a great body of evidence to suggest the culprit is a family of insecticides called neonicotinoids, which are now widely used in agriculture worldwide.

It’s been known since these chemicals came onto the market in 1995 that they were extremely toxic to bees. Tragically, as with so many of the highly toxic chemicals regulators have allowed to be chucked into our environment since the 1950s, it was only after the fact that independent scientific research began indicating quite how bad the problem is.

Long story short: It now seems likely that exposing bees to this family of insecticides compromises their immune systems and is roughly the equivalent of deliberately giving them AIDS.

How did Canada’s Pest Management Regulatory Agency (PMRA) and other regulatory agencies around the world allow this to happen?

Simple: The primary information considered by the PMRA is provided by the manufacturers who make millions of dollars from their patented chemical compounds. As if this process wasn’t suspect enough, even when the studies provided are deemed insufficient, PMRA may provide temporary or conditional registrations.

Research by Anne Sherrod of the Valhalla Wilderness Society reveals that increasing commercial use of products based on imidacloprid (a particularly worrying neonicotinoid) has been based, since 2001, on registrations deemed “temporary pending further studies”.

According to the PMRA, imidacloprid has been actively under re-evaluation since 2009. However, Access to Information Act requests to the agency have produced no evidence to support this claim. Meanwhile, imidacloprid and other neonicotinoid products continue to be widely used on vegetables, fruit, nuts and grain.

The PMRA points out that these lethal products must come with labels warning farmers not to apply the insecticide when plants are in flower or bees are nearby. This vacuous mitigation ignores the fact that these systemic insecticides are absorbed into every part of the plant, including the pollen and nectar. Despite their well-documented threat to bees, the PMRA justifies approving these products because of their “value” to human food production.

In the U.S. more than a million people have signed a petition demanding a neonicotinoid insecticide ban. Similar action is being demanded in New Zealand.

Canada needs to catch up. Yes, we can all email our MPs, demanding immediate action to protect bees. We can also voice our concerns about the threats to bees posed by the PMRA to Health Minister Leona Aglukkaq.

And while we’re waiting for the politicians, we can each do our bit by thinking about bees when we are planting our gardens. Even apartment window boxes can help. (Helpful hint for those of us who need to be bee-friendly and deer-proof when we plant: Catmint, coneflower, foxglove, sunflower, lavender, sage, thyme and yarrow all fit the bill.)

These little yellow and black creatures are perhaps nature’s greatest gift to humanity and yet we’re allowing corporate greed and what amounts to regulatory malfeasance to threaten them with extinction. Seriously, are we out of our minds?

Miranda Holmes is an associate editor of Watershed Sentinel magazine. For more information on this topic, go to www.watershedsentinel.ca/content/disappearance-bees-and-pesticide-link.

Salmon Farms Killing Sea Lions

October 2, 2011Oceans, Salmon Farming and Aquaculture, Species At RiskAquaculture, Salmon, species at riskRay Grigg

If spreading sea lice, diseases and pollution weren’t justification enough for removing open net-pen salmon farms from BC’s wild West Coast waters, the latest outrage is the slaughter of California sea lions and their marine cousins.

The Department of Fisheries and Oceans, in an unusual gesture of candidness, reported that between January and March, 2011, salmon farms were responsible for the killing of 141 California sea lions, 37 harbour seals and two Stellar sea lions – which are listed as a species of “special concern” under Canada’s Species At Risk Act. All these magnificent marine mammals were shot – another four animals got entangled in netting and suffered the horror of drowning – because they trespassed on salmon farms (Vancouver Sun, Sept 15/11).

Ian Roberts, a spokesperson for Marine West, a West Coast salmon farming corporation, said that, “Zero lethal interaction is our goal.” Well, a “goal” is neither consolation to a dead sea lion nor deterrent for a hungry one accustomed to freely roaming the open ocean. And “lethal interaction” is a euphemism for “kill”, slippery public relations jargon intent on massaging the gruesome into something that seems less brutal. Considering that these corporate salmon farms are camped in the middle of a marine thoroughfare for migrating mammals – and wild fish, too – the obvious way to ensure “zero lethal interaction” would be to get their net-pens out of the ocean.

But shareholders don’t like expensive solutions. The more profitable alternative is to tame the West Coast wilderness with enough “lethal interactions” that troublesome marine mammals are eradicated, a tragedy considering that these waters have been their natural swimming, feeding and breeding territory for millennia.

But “lethal interaction” is the chosen course of action, evident from the information released by DFO in early 2011. The Director of Aquaculture for its western office, Andrew Thomson, who has been “monitoring” the kills during the last six years, offers the comforting assurance that the number of “culls” are down.

“Cull” is an revealing word. Since salmon farms are not mandated to manage the populations of marine mammals, authorization of a “cull” is yet another example of DFO managing the environment to suit corporate interests. Of course, DFO doesn’t kill the trespassing sea lions and seals. Neither do the farm employees dirty their hands with guilt. In a gesture that is supposed to introduce an element of compassion to the slaughter and distance corporations from the blood of outright killing, the actual shooting is done by “licensed contractors”. This attempted evasion of responsibility is analogous to the CIA avoiding charges of torture by “rendering” suspects to dictatorships so confessions can be forcibly extracted by less civilized regimes. Guilt cannot be contracted to others.

Not that salmon farmers are without a twinge of guilt. Mary Ellen Walling, Executive Director of the BC Salmon Farmers Association, confessed that, “We don’t take this lightly.” Indeed. But her explanation that sea lions are “extremely intelligent” merely makes the act less defensible – killing highly sentient creatures carries more moral burden than killing dull ones. And her description of sea lions as “aggressive” doesn’t elicit an image of a hapless and beleaguered industry suffering the terrible adversity of being surrounded and viciously attacked by marauding aliens.

So, what are the poor, victimized salmon farms to do? The burden of guilt must be extremely heavy – but not heavy enough to entice them to the safety of closed containment or land-based farms. Removing their net-pens from the natural habitat of unmanageable mammals while suffering the deprivation of less profitability must be a much more painful prospect than enduring the anguish of distributing sea lice, spreading diseases, polluting, and killing seals and sea lions.

And how many seals and sea lions? DFO’s numbers are sobering. Of the 13 years reported, 1997 was the worst year for seals when 550 were killed – 500 were common at this time. The worst year for sea lions was 2000 when 250 were shot because they weren’t “intelligent” enough to know that salmon farms are lethal. For anyone concerned with this bloodshed, the consolation is that those were only the most bloody years. The killing of 180 animals in 2011 – plus the four that drowned – is excused by the rise in their population, a defence that uses plentitude to justify slaughter. Although more marine mammals mean more predation and more “lethal interactions”, more salmon farms don’t count. What is a caring corporation to do with a conflict between its financial interests and the perils imposed by a marine wilderness?

Well, they could be honest enough to show visitors some of the gruesome events that actually occur on their farms. The sharp crack of a rifle will rivet attention while the dull impact of a bullet exploding through bone and brains will be vivid and memorable. The slumping body of a dying sea lion staining the cold ocean with a last ooze of blood should be informative for those who want to experience one of the unadvertised workings of salmon farms.

This unmitigated cruelty, this obscene and atrocious act of shooting magnificent marine mammals simply underscores the profound incongruity and the environmental folly of placing open net-pen salmon farms in the wild, natural ecology of the West Coast. The two have never belonged together, and the extent and severity of this conflict is getting worse. Orcas are scared away. Any native fish-eating creature – herons, otters, mink, eagles – all become the enemy of salmon farms. The diverse, vibrant and stunning character of BC’s West Coast is being systematically neutered by foreign-owned corporations so they can use small-fish protein – a food needed by the world’s poor – to grow an expensive product that most people cannot afford to buy.

Subduing the wild West Coast to suit salmon farming is ecological madness. The most sane option – especially for the sea lions, seals and wild salmon – is to get the salmon farms and their open net-pens out of the oceans. They are the trespassers.

Campbell/Clark Government Goes After Wolves

August 7, 2011Species At Riskspecies at riskRafe Mair

Campbell-Clark Government Goes After Wolves — photo: Ian McAllister/Pacific Wild

The Campbell/Clark government has done it again. Now wolves will be wiped out in BC because, it’s alleged (by ranchers), that their cattle are being slaughtered by wolves. Ranchers are friends of the government while wolves are not. The constituencies where cattle are ranched are constituencies the Liberals must win if they’re to win the next election.

Wolves are endangered such that Americans are bringing them back to National Parks in order to keep the species alive. Noble as that is, it’s rather a surrender to the same troglodytes who slaughtered the buffalo (bison) with the last vestiges now in parks, not on the plains, reduced to being objects of tourist’s cameras.

The wolf has had a terrible press over the years from writers of fairy tales to ranchers. In fact they are a magnificent example of highly developed animals that, in contradistinction to us humans, mate for life and are part of a pack led by an alpha male. Humans should have their sense of community.

There is a very strong moral argument, an argument ranchers deride as condominium conservationist stuff from the big city.

I have news for them. I live in Lions Bay where black bears abound and if they attack anything living aside from spawning salmon, it’s human beings. We get a “bear warning” in Spring which lasts until late Fall. Despite the danger, I know of no fellow citizen who would want bears murdered. I have seen several bears on our streets over the 11 years I’ve been here plus several coyotes and one cougar. Our view is that we’re in their habitat, not the other way around.

It is important to understand nature’s way of dealing with wolves. They will kill and devour ungulates (deer, caribou etc), invariably the weak ones, until their numbers deplete to the point that wolves starve and the ungulates replenish their numbers and on it goes as it has for thousands of years.

Into this mix arrived ranchers and cattle. This meant that when the ungulates were down, the cow became prey. As we will see, the number of cattle they kill is minuscule and wolves were a known part of life when ranchers moved in.

It’s rare that wolves attack anything other than small animals until winter when small animals are not around, which brings me back to the second question (above) “What the hell are cattle doing out on the range in the winter?”

For me, it’s as Yogi Berra is alleged to have said, “Déjà vu all over again”.

Over 30 years ago I became Minister of Environment and I immediately stopped the slaughter of wolves in British Columbia. When I left the ministry for Health, Tony Brummett, from the heart of rancher land in the Peace River region, and the great hope of the ranchers, maintained the moratorium as has every Environment Minister since until we reach the Campbell/Clark government which now encourages hunting and killing of wolves a 24 hour a day, 365 day of the year season.

A story about life as a member of Bill Bennett’s cabinet.

When the Tsawwassen overhead wire issue was being fought I spoke to several rallies and continuously asked where the Liberal MLA, Val Roddick, was, observing that usually you couldn’t shut her up.

A lady, an obvious government supporter, came up to me after one such rally and said “I’ll bet you didn’t go to these sorts of rallies when you were in government.”

My reply: when I banned the killing of wolves, a Socred backbencher, Cyril Shelford and his seemingly unending list of brothers arranged a rally in Smithers and I was dared to attend.

I did, and it was scary to see 500 or more angry ranchers wanting my scalp – literally.

I then said to the lady, “you probably think I was very brave?”

She allowed that she did to which I replied, “it had bugger-all to do with courage; if I hadn’t gone, Premier Bennett would have turfed my ass out of cabinet.”

I tell that story to demonstrate the size of the storm created by my decision.

In order to satisfy myself that the ranchers had blown the issue out of all proportion I sent a Kamloops man, once a Fish and Game officer, the late George “Sandy” Sandiford, to go on a swing throughout the appropriate parts of the province then give me his impressions as to whether wolves were destroying huge amounts of cattle.

After about four weeks he reported to me, in his characteristic way, “it’s mostly bullshit – what the ranchers really want is compensation for any losses, it being assumed that they were all killed by wolves”.

He recounted an especially forceful argument of ranchers, which was told as three separate incidents where wolves drove a herd of cattle onto a frozen lake and the ice fractured leaving the cattle at the mercies of the rapacious wolves. Three times this happened in different lakes!

You will, no doubt, be asking yourself “how did the wolves avoid drowning too?” and, “what the hell were a herd of cattle doing on the range in the dead of winter?”

In Anecdotal evidence not good enough to justify wolf kill in the Vancouver Sun, on Friday the 5^th, the estimable Stephen Hume makes the obvious point that there’s a paucity of evidence that wolves are a serious threat to cattle. He points out a survey in 2003 (that it’s far back because the Campbell/Clark government has made the Environment Ministry into a phantom post in which to deposit MLAs who are so grateful to be in cabinet, thus they go along and make no discernible waves).

In that report it was estimated that 93-95% of cattle lost were due to a great many other hazards such as “disease, toxic flora, calving problems, bad weather, getting hung up in the ubiquity of barbed wire fences, hit by vehicles, or killed and butchered by rustlers. There is no evidence of any basic change in the circumstances since my time as minister.

As I said, what ranchers seek is compensation for every cow lost, it being assumed that a wolf did it.

The wolf is a marvelous animal with a great sense of community. The same cultural immorality that has wolves endangered would eliminate grizzly bears, black bears, coyotes, cougars. Tragically, it’s the same ilk that destroy sharks so that oriental gentlemen can get erections and have their restaurants carry shark fin soup. Their counterparts poach wildlife in Africa such as wildebeests. Elephants and Rhinos and nail tigers and elephants in Asia.

What this wolf kill demonstrates is not only the complete lack of understanding of wolves by the Campbell/Clark government but their willingness to pander to their supporters without any science to support them at the expense of an environment which, to them, is a nuisance and a hindrance to development by their corporate donors.

It’s not just wolves but the desecration of wild salmon by fish farms; the ruination of rivers and their fauna and flora so that their private sector pals can produce power we don’t need; it’s the destruction of Agriculture and Wildlife Preserves that fortify (as if fortifying was needed) the evidence that this government does not give a damn about the outdoors, the treasured legacy we received but, thanks to the Campbell/Clark government, will not be intact for the next generation.

(I refer to it as the Campbell/Clark government not to be a smarty pants but because it’s a fair description of 12 years of government in which Gordon Campbell was head for 11 and was supported by Christy Clark when she was a senior cabinet minister and supported by her by not uttering a murmur of dissent when she was an open line broadcaster and has done nothing to alter since she has been premier).

It must be remembered that this is a government that cares little for anything but rightwing philosophy, regarding the Fraser Institute as their guiding guru. Kevin Falcon, now the 2^nd most powerful minister, said when Transportation Minister and said seriously “(the Chinese) don’t have the labour or environmental restrictions we do. It’s not like they have to do community consultations. They just say ‘we’re building a bridge’ and they move everyone out of there and get going within two weeks. Could you imagine if we could build like that?”

We pride ourselves on being “Supernatural British Columbia” as our government does all it can to destroy that heritage and do so as fast as it can so that like the omelet, it can never go back to its original form.

My opposition to this mob of disgraceful destroyers of our beautiful province is not just bewilderment, not just sadness, not just anger and disgust, but also of profound embarrassment that we the people have elected these bastards three times and might do so again.

Oceans in Peril: Radical Action Needed to Avert 90% Species Extinction

July 23, 2011Climate Change, Ocean Health, Oceans, Species At RiskAnthony Marr

The oceans of Planet Earth currently contain about a quarter million species of marine organisms, which together constitute the Marine Food Pyramid and the Marine Food Web. If we do not change our ways, radically and fundamentally, immediately or sooner, we stand to drive over 90% of them, or more than 225,000 species, to extinction, and that is from the oceans alone.

Of this 250,000-species global treasure the Marine Food Pyramid/Web, all the fishes on all levels and pathways combined number only 15,000 species, and all the marine mammals (whales, dolphins, seals) total only about 120 species. And all of these advanced species will likely be among those that would go extinct, as will likely be most corals and arthropods (krill, crabs, lobsters).

This is not all speculation and computer modeling. It has happened before, and can happen again. We are talking about Earth’s Mass Extinction bouts, the sixth of which we are as we speak deeply entrenched. 50 years ago, the planet was losing about 20 known species a day; today, we are losing over 100 known species a day, meaning possibly ten times that many unknown species. And when it is all said and done, we will have lost over 1.5 million known species, and many times that many unknown species – land, air and sea.

When we talk about mass extinctions, the End-Cretaceous Extinction 64 million years ago, the one that wiped out all the dinosaurs – Mass Extinction #5 – comes to mind. But first, at about a 50% extinction rate, it was not the most severe among the Big 5, eliminating “only” about 50% of Earth’s species including all the dinosaurs; and second, it was not caused by global warming, but by an asteroid.

The worst of them all was #3, the End-Permian Mass Extinction 251 million years ago, which drove some 75% of all land species and 95% of all marine species – including all the corals – to extinction. And it was caused by global warming resulting from geological activities associated with the break-up of the super-continent Pangaea.

The conditions are right for Mass Extinction #6 being a repeat of Mass Extinction #3, or even to out-do it.

This won’t be immediate, at least not in the human time frame – perhaps a century or two, or three – but it will happen if we follow our current trajectory. The only difference is: Which of our future generations shall we devastate the most?

Meanwhile, as we do the Amazon rainforest on land, so we rape the oceans and the seas, directly, with highly effective machinery from chain saws to trawlers, to drain pipes of pulp mills, to floating islands of plastic, as if there is no tomorrow. Many previously major species have been fished out of commercial existence, and poaching, such as shark-finning, kills off up to 90 million sharks a year, of which over 200 species are endangered. At the rate we’re going, perhaps there will be no tomorrow after all.

Imagine an ocean without whales, dolphins, seals, sharks, cod, octopus, lobsters, crabs, nor a single coral reef. It will still look breath-taking from a beach at sunset, but our soul will be filled with that ocean’s desolate emptiness.

Rafe on Shark Fins and the NDP

July 11, 2011Canada, Politics, Species At Risk, Western CanadaPolitics, species at riskRafe Mair

I urge everyone to get a copy of the Vancouver Province for July 10 and read, in the A section, pp 8 and 9, a story about shark fins. It’s a tragic story and proves once again that corporations – who have no environmental concerns whatever – will log the last tree, dam the last river, and kill the last fish.

Mentioned prominently is my good friend Anthony Marr. Let me tell you a bit about this unrelenting fighter for animal rights.

Anthony Marr holds a science degree from the UBC and has worked as a field geophysicist and an environmental technologist. In 1995, he became a full time wildlife preservationist, which has brought him to India three times, earning him the title of the “Champion of the Bengal Tiger” in the Champions of the Wild TV series aired in 20 countries. As an anti-hunting activist, he has conducted high profile campaigns in Canada for the bears and seals, and been to Japan twice for the whales and dolphins. He is the founder of Heal Our Planet Earth (HOPE) and is currently on his fourth Compassion for Animals Road Expedition (CARE-4), covering 40 states. He is also the author of Omni-Science.

Before going on, 8 years ago Wendy and I were in Tahiti. We took a trip with half a dozen other tourists, by boat, to a lagoon, to see the “Spinner” dolphins. Our guide was a fish biologist.

When we got to the lagoon we were fortunate enough to see these remarkable creatures come out of the water and, as advertised, do a couple of full twists before hitting the water. It was probably the highlight of a wonderful trip.

Our guide asked us what we thought and we were fulsome in our delight. The guide then said, “Two years ago this pod was at about 100 and it’s now over 135 – good news, huh?”

Even though I smelt a rat, I nodded, with the others, in enthusiastic affirmation.

“Not so,” said our mentor. “The increase comes as a result of the killing of sharks.”

“The dolphins, at night, leave the lagoon, cross the reef to find food. Their only enemy is the shark. The sharks are all but gone because of fishermen catching the sharks, cutting off their fins and throwing them, still alive, back into the water. Because the sharks are gone, the dolphins have expanded in numbers at the expense of the entire ecosystem in this area.” (Quite apart from all else, what sort of person would de-fin a fish then send it back into the ocean? And what sort of person would buy the product?)

As you will see in the story, it is mostly Chinese people who buy them as a status symbol, demonstrating their success in life or, in the case of men, for assistance in achieving an erection. (Yes, I know all meat eaters eat the product of cruelty but here added to that cruelty is extinction of a hugely valuable species in oceans all over the world. In fact there are 49 species of sharks in BC waters and 1000 species world wide.)

Why should we care?

Because our part of the oceans is home to many species which are of critical importance to us, including 6 species of salmon, halibut, black cod, several species of rock fish and crustaceans such as shrimp and crab. These are all part of the ecology of the world’s oceans – as John Donne said, “No man is an island unto itself.”

What to do?

Clearly there must be a ban on fishing for sharks and while we can’t make rules for the world we can impose our own ban and we can support Anthony in his battles.

It is possible to impose and police bans if we have the will to do it. An example:

Many years ago I was putting together a show from New Zealand and as part of it I visited Rainbow Springs, not far from Rotorua. This wonderful attraction had a Kiwi bird which is fully protected by the New Zealand government – the one they had was found wounded, and treated.

I went into the darkened room (Kiwi birds are nocturnal) and was permitted to hold it (whereupon it peed all over me!).

I saw some feathers around and I asked my guide if I could take a few and tie some fishing flies with it just for the fun of it.

My guide quickly informed me that if I was caught with them, whether or not I used them for a fly, I would be subject to a huge fine and perhaps jail. I got the message.

There is so much to do on environmental issues and just the thought can exhaust one. But they must be done and all of us must do our part.

Yes, it’s political and our senior governments have both failed us badly. There’s not much we can do for the next 4-5 years on the national scene but the provincial government has less than two years to run and election issues are starting to appear.

In BC we have a tradition of basing our votes on economic matters. Has it made any difference?

If you look back to 1991 can it really be said that the NDP, in fiscal matters, were worse than the present bunch?

I know it goes against the common mantras from the right but the stats show that the NDP was actually a bit better than the subsequent Liberal government and both faced very similar crises beyond their control – the “Asian ‘flu” for the NDP, the Recession for the Liberals.

My point is not to compare but simply to point out that there is really not that much to choose between them.

We have, however, some very real environmental issues including fish farms and their slaughter of migrating wild salmon, an energy policy that destroys rivers and their ecologies, bankrupting BC Hydro in the bargain, a highways policy that eats up farmland and bird sanctuaries and the serious threat to other species off our shores, including our shellfish.

And there is the huge problem of oil pipelines and tankers in our most dangerous waters.

These sorts of things are happening all over the world such that many species face extinction.

We must act and act promptly. We cannot allow ourselves to weary of the fight because it’s on many fronts. We must demand of political parties not just nice fuzzy words about the environment but specific policies in the areas I’ve mentioned.

Time is short – very short.

The Common Sense Canadian

Critical discussion of key issues shaping our economy and environment.