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Gulf Oil Has Made Its Way Into Lake Pontchartrain

By hudson in July 27th 2010 No Comment »
Filed Under biodiversity, conservation, disaster, fish, flora and fauna, habitat, lake, oceans, pollution, salinity, seawater, wetland, world water Tags: bayou, blue crab, bp, brackish, british petroleum, coastal wetlands, crisis, Deepwater Horizon, disaster, drinking water, environment, environmental impact, fin fish, fishing, fishing industry, Gulf coast, gulf of mexico, Lake Pontchartrain, livelihoods, louisiana, New Orleans, oil spill, Rigolets, salt bayou, shrimp, tar balls, Transocean, water resources, water scarcity, wetlands

Tip of a very nasty iceberg? Perhaps. With hurricane season underway there is no way of knowing the outcome when a category 3 or 4 storm slams oil as well as seawater onto the gulf coast. If you pray in any form, now would probably be a good time to marshal your troops – Hudson.

By KRIS HUDSON of the Wall Street Journal

NEW ORLEANS – Idled commercial fishermen Vincent Caronna and Shirley Roach stewed with colleagues on their docks in the Salt Bayou this week, lamenting that oil from the BP PLC spill had begun seeping into Lake Pontchartrain, a body of water Louisianans had hoped was safe. “It will be a long time before they clean [the lake] up,” Mr. Caronna said, worried that storms could push more oil over manmade barricades and into the 630-square-mile brackish lake. “It will have to be completely restocked,” Ms. Roach said.

Since last weekend, tar balls and oil sheen have been reported on the lake’s eastern edge and in the Rigolets, a waterway that connects the lake to the Gulf eight to nine nautical miles away. Some officials say oil escaped an extensive network of protective piping called boom and skimmer boats only with the aid of recent storms and wind that pushed it into and through the Rigolets. The state has closed 5% of the lake’s area to fishing because of the oil, and fishermen fret that the restrictions will be expanded.

Last year, the lake yielded more than 4.8 million pounds of blue crab, shrimp and fin fish valued at nearly $4.5 million for fishermen, according to the state Department of Wildlife and Fisheries. It often provides safe fishing when the Gulf is too rough.

The fishermen, their livelihoods devastated by the damage oil has wrought in the Gulf of Mexico, offer some of the most pessimistic views. The oil’s encroachment into Lake Pontchartrain has been relatively minor, with tar balls and sheen being found. So it is as much a psychological assault as a physical one.

But the shallow lake, its southern edge ringed by New Orleans and its suburbs, is a crucial part of the area’s environmental, economic and cultural fabric. Massive efforts in the 1980s and ’90s cleaned the lake of decades of contamination from shell dredging and dairy farms. Since then, it has served as a recreational hub, a fishing grounds and a haven for sea life.

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So wasted: The Pacific Garbage Patch

By paulstewart in July 20th 2010 No Comment »
Filed Under conservation, fish, food security, habitat, health, mapping, oceans, pollution, seawater, world water Tags: ecologically intelligent design, food chain, Great Pacific Garbage Patch, marine trash vortex, North Atlantic Garbage Patch, ocean gyres, plastic waste, sea-of-rubbish

by Tim Siegenbeek van Heukelom for The Lowy Interpreter

Since its discovery in the mid-1990s, the Great Pacific Garbage Patch has attracted attention from scientists, media and activists. More and more evidence is appearing to show that so-called ‘ocean gyres’ – large rotating ocean currents – essentially function as a marine trash vortex for the plastic waste that ends up in the sea.

The plastic debris in the Pacific Garbage Patch is hardly visible from above, so on the outside it doesn’t appear to be a sea-of-rubbish the size of the Northern Territory. Yet, the micro-particles floating around contain all kinds of dangerous toxins, which in some cases might not immediately kill the confused fish feeding on it but will, due to our increasing love and consumption of fish, end up in our own food chain.

Even worse, the Pacific Garbage Patch is not an isolated phenomenon. There are four more ocean gyres also accumulating plastic waste. Only a couple of months ago scientists discovered the North Atlantic Garbage Patch, containing pollution levels similar to the Pacific Patch.

The problem of this non-traditional security threat lies unmistakably in the nature of plastic marine pollution. It is hardly visible, far offshore and barely understood in terms of long-term impact on the environment and food safety.

While the Dutch may have come up with a creative way of dealing with the plastic marine rubbish, a real solution seems to be a long way out. Awareness-raising campaigns are already underway as a much needed first step. Take, for example, the Australian film-maker Richard Pain, who is in training for an attempt to swim through the Pacific Garbage Patch to put this environmental concern higher on the political agenda.

Still, as climate change has evidenced, awareness of a serious global threat does not automatically translate into sustainable solutions. If we can’t even come to an international agreement on fighting climate change, how do we plan to deal with other less well-known matters of pollution?

The critical problem in this case is our perception and use of plastic. We produce plastic to last forever, but design it for a throwaway society. Hence, we fundamentally need to challenge the way we design plastic products. As outlined in the Cradle-to-Cradle philosophy, we may need ‘the transformation of human industry through ecologically intelligent design’.

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Five US states sue over Asian carp invasion

By admin in July 20th 2010 No Comment »
Filed Under biodiversity, fish, habitat, invasive species, lake, rivers Tags: asian carp, Lake Michigan, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio, Pennsylvania, The Great Lakes, The Mississippi River, US Army Corps of Engineers, Wisconsin

From The BBC

Five US states have sued the federal government and Chicago’s water authority seeking action to stop Asian carp invading the Great Lakes.

Scientists are afraid the fish may overrun native species like salmon, which inhabit the freshwater lakes on the border of the US and Canada.

The large fish have no natural predators.

The five states are asking the US Army Corps of Engineers to use nets to stop the carp from entering Lake Michigan.

The lawsuit filed in the US District Court in northern Illinois also asks for a study to be conducted on whether the Great Lakes can be separated from the US’s Mississippi River and seeks to close Chicago shipping gates and locks – which may be providing an entrance to Lake Michigan for the fish.

Asian carp have proliferated in the Mississippi River and can grow to weigh as much as 100lb (45kg). Some boaters have reported collisions and even injuries from run-ins with the species.

The US Supreme Court has rejected three previous requests for court action from Michigan, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Pennsylvania and Ohio.

The most recent lawsuit was prompted by the discovery of a 20lb (9kg) Asian carp last month on the wrong side of electronic barriers designed to contain the fish.

“President Obama and the Army Corps of Engineers have failed to fight Asian carp aggressively,” said Michigan Attorney General Mike Cox, a Republican running for governor.

He added: “Asian carp will kill jobs and ruin our way of life.”

[Ed-Apols for full quote]

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The oyster is their world, but oil spill threatens it

By admin in July 18th 2010 No Comment »
Filed Under biodiversity, delta, disaster, fish, flora and fauna, food security, habitat, mangrove, pollution, seawater, world water Tags: Deep Water Horizon, gulf oil spill, jobs, louisiana coast, oyster beds, oystermen, Terrebonne

In Louisiana, acres of mollusk beds are off-limits, setting off a chain of devastating events — starting with the oysterman.

By P.J. Huffstutter, Nicole Santa Cruz and Ashley Powers for the Los Angeles Times

Reporting from Los Angeles and the Gulf Coast — Laurentino Cardenas leaned over the edge of his narrow boat, his hands clenched above the murky green surface of the Gulf of Mexico’s Bayou Terrebonne. The name means “good earth” in French, and it has indeed been good to Louisiana.

Oystermen like Cardenas have long scraped the gulf’s floor, clinging to metal rakes as the oysters cling to reefs, with a determination that has allowed them to survive nature’s wrath and man’s mistakes. Until now.

The BP oil spill is killing off a centuries-old way of life, and endangering one of the world’s largest wild oyster systems. Businesses nationwide have been hurt or destroyed because Cardenas and his peers can’t work. Along the way, the oyster has become a barometer of the crisis’ economic reach and a portent of long-term effects.

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Gulf oil spill: A hole in the world

By admin in June 20th 2010 No Comment »
Filed Under biodiversity, conservation, delta, disaster, fish, flora and fauna, forestry, habitat, mangrove, oceans, pollution, salinity, wetland, world water Tags: biodiversity, bp, british petroleum, Deepwater Horizon, environment monitoring, habitat loss, loss of biodiversity, mangrove forests, mangroves, oilspill, pollution

Naomi Klein for The Guardian

The Deepwater Horizon disaster is not just an industrial accident – it is a violent wound inflicted on the Earth itself. In this special report from the Gulf coast, a leading author and activist shows how it lays bare the hubris at the heart of capitalism

Everyone gathered for the town hall meeting had been repeatedly instructed to show civility to the gentlemen from BP and the federal government. These fine folks had made time in their busy schedules to come to a high school gymnasium on a Tuesday night in Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, one of many coastal communities where brown poison was slithering through the marshes, part of what has come to be described as the largest environmental disaster in US history.

“Speak to others the way you would want to be spoken to,” the chair of the meeting pleaded one last time before opening the floor for questions.

And for a while the crowd, mostly made up of fishing families, showed remarkable restraint. They listened patiently to Larry Thomas, a genial BP public relations flack, as he told them that he was committed to “doing better” to process their claims for lost revenue – then passed all the details off to a markedly less friendly subcontractor. They heard out the suit from the Environmental Protection Agency as he informed them that, contrary to what they have read about the lack of testing and the product being banned in Britain, the chemical dispersant being sprayed on the oil in massive quantities was really perfectly safe.

But patience started running out by the third time Ed Stanton, a coast guard captain, took to the podium to reassure them that “the coast guard intends to make sure that BP cleans it up”.

“Put it in writing!” someone shouted out. By now the air conditioning had shut itself off and the coolers of Budweiser were running low. A shrimper named Matt O’Brien approached the mic. “We don’t need to hear this anymore,” he declared, hands on hips. It didn’t matter what assurances they were offered because, he explained, “we just don’t trust you guys!” And with that, such a loud cheer rose up from the floor you’d have thought the Oilers (the unfortunately named school football team) had scored a touchdown.

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Mangroves to be declared a ‘Protected Area’

By admin in June 17th 2010 No Comment »
Filed Under biodiversity, climate change, conservation, deforestation, desertification, fish, flora and fauna, food security, forestry, habitat, health, irrigation, mangrove, rivers, salinity, seawater, wetland, world water Tags: delta region, drip irrigation, eco system, forest department, indus delta, karachi port trust, mangrove forests, mangroves, natural barrier, soil erosion, water crisis, water sprinklers systems, World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought

The Express Tribune

KARACHI: The Sindh forest department has decided to declare the entire stretch of mangrove forests within the Indus Delta region as “Protected Area”, Sindh minister for home and forests, Dr Zulfiqar Mirza, said on Wednesday while marking the World Day to Combat Desertification and Drought.

Mirza issued directives to the Provincial Secretary Forest Department to involve stakeholders and other relevant quarters and take “concrete measures to ensure a proper use of available funds and resources to mitigate drought, improving the productivity of land and rehabilitate and conserve land and water resources”.

He also asked the forest department secretary to encourage farmers in using the drip irrigation and water sprinklers systems to conserve water.

Mangroves are a principal component of the delta eco-system as they support the existence of fish and various wildlife species.

They also act as a natural barrier against storms and reduce the chances of soil erosion, which is why it is imperative to chalk out a strategy to ensure the conservation and rehabilitation of these forests, said Mirza.

Mangrove forests are located at four locations along the 1,046 kilometre-long coastline. The Sindh forest department has administrative control over 280,470 hectares while the Board of Revenue has 260,000 hectares, the Port Qasim Authority has 64,000 hectares and the Karachi Port Trust has 2,547 hectares, he added.

The share of Sindh, out of the total forestland in Pakistan, is 0.678 million hectares or about 16 per cent, said Mirza, adding that a shift from rural to urban areas and the country’s water crisis have accelerated the deforestation process across the province.

[Apols for full quote]

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Violence Escalates Around India’s Largest Inland Lake

By admin in June 17th 2010 No Comment »
Filed Under conflict, fish, flora and fauna, food security, habitat, social structures, wetland, world water Tags: bay of bengal, bomb attack, chilka lake, commercial fisheries, conflict, eastern india, fishing village, gun battle, inland lake, livelihood, Ramsar Convention, saltwater lagoon, sustainable use, violent clashes, wetland, wetlands

By Manipadma Jena for IPS

BHUBANESWAR, India, June 16, 2010 (IPS) – Basudev Dalai, 43, never thought that the fishing village where he has lived all his life and which has been home to generations of fishermen like him would be embroiled in violent clashes over the very source of their livelihood.

“The stakes are so high people are even prepared to kill those they have lived with for generations,” says Dalai, a native of Alupatna village near Chilka Lagoon along the Bay of Bengal in eastern India.

A pitched gun battle and crude bomb attack early this month involving two fishing villages, long in conflict over Chilka lake’s resources, has left two dead, 40 wounded and the local economy in tatters.

Chilka is Asia’s largest saltwater lagoon and a wetland of international importance under the Convention on Wetlands, otherwise known as the Ramsar Convention, an international agreement on the sustainable use of wetlands among the member states.

Sprawled over 100,000 hectares of land covering three districts on India’s east coast, Chilka provides livelihoods to 137 surrounding villages or some 200,000 fisherfolk.

A day after the fight erupted and before police searches began, the thousand or so inhabitants of the warring communities fled to nearby villages in fishing dinghies. The assailants remain at large.

Eran Dalai, a 25-year-old native of Alupatna, says the fight started when his village fishers found their shrimp stakes and net enclosures destroyed. “Our villages had earlier engaged in violent clashes at least five times, but this was the worst so far,” he adds.

Before this month’s bloody incident, police had recorded a total death toll of 60 from similar attacks that began in 1999.

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BP oil spill could make Gulf hurricane season 'devastating'

By admin in June 2nd 2010 No Comment »
Filed Under biodiversity, conservation, delta, disaster, fish, flora and fauna, habitat, jobs, oceans, pollution, seawater, watershed, wetland, world water Tags: atlantic hurricane season, bp oil spill, chemical dispersants, coastal ecosystems, Deep Water Horizon, delta region, hammond louisiana, hurricane in the gulf of mexico, marsh grasses, mississippi delta, seasonal hurricane, wetland soils

By Pete Spotts in Hammond, Louisiana for the Christian Science Monitor

Forecasters expect an active hurricane season, raising concern that a storm could push more of the BP oil spill ashore. The Gulf’s biggest hurricanes are generally later in the season, however.

The 2010 Atlantic hurricane season opens today, and with it concerns over the effect the BP oil spill could have on coastal ecosystems if a major storm moves into the northern Gulf of Mexico and reaches land.

On one hand, hurricane forecasters and federal emergency officials say the first concern in any hurricane that makes landfall will be people. Yet healthy wetlands along the Gulf Coast – mainly west of the Mississippi Delta – are widely seen as a first line of defense against the storm surges tropical cyclones push ahead of them.

Marshes in and around the Delta region are already under assault. Sea levels are rising, and the widespread use of levees along the Mississippi River has starved the wetlands of fresh sediment the Mississippi River once delivered.

If oil from the Deepwater Horizon blowout invades the wetland soils, it can kill off marsh grasses at the roots, increasing the rate of erosion, ecologists say. With chemical dispersants mixed in, the brew also would be toxic to small marine animals that form a vital part of a marsh’s food chain.

A range of seasonal hurricane forecasters have indicated that this season is likely to be significantly more active than normal. Both the federal government and BP, meanwhile, have suggested that the leak might not be stopped before a relief well is completed in August.

“A hurricane in the Gulf of Mexico this year would be devastating,” says Qin Chen, an associate professor of civil and environmental engineering at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge.

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'Top kill' fails, BP moves on 'to next option'

By admin in May 30th 2010 No Comment »
Filed Under biodiversity, conservation, disaster, fish, habitat, mapping, oceans, pollution, seawater, wetland Tags: bp, british petroleum, chief operation officer, Deep Horizon, dispersants, Doug Suttles, gulf of mexico, gulf of mexico oil, oil spill, top kill

By the CNN Wire Staff

Robert, Louisiana (CNN) — Three attempts to pump mud and 16 tries to stuff solid material into a breached Gulf of Mexico oil well failed to stop the flow, top BP executives said Saturday, and engineers and executives with the oil giant have decided to “move on to the next option.”

That option: Place a custom-built cap to fit over the “lower marine riser package,” BP chief operation officer Doug Suttles said. BP crews were already at work Saturday to ready the materials for that option, he said.

Suttles said three separate pumping efforts and 30,000 barrels of mud — along with what chief executive officer Tony Hayward described as “16 different bridging material shots” — just didn’t do the trick.

“We have not been able to stop the flow,” a somber Suttles told reporters. ” … Repeated pumping, we don’t believe, will achieve success, so we will move on to the next option.”

Suttles and other officials said that the “top kill” attempt to stop the flow did so — but only as long as they were pumping. When the pumping stopped, the oil resumed its escape. And Coast Guard Rear Adm. Mary Landry said that BP would resume using undersea dispersants for the new attempt to trap the oil.

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My life in Paris, cradled in the bosom of the Seine

By admin in May 24th 2010 No Comment »
Filed Under Water - My Travels, conservation, drinking water, fish, habitat, health, invasive species, opinion, pollution, rivers, sanitation, social structures Tags: apartment, atlantic salmon, backdrop, bosom, foreign correspondent, From Our Own Foreign Correspondent, jane kirby, paris, principle functions, radio four, scatology, The Seine River, toilet facilities, tourists

By Emma-Jane Kirby for Radio Four’s: From Our Own Foreign Correspondent

The river Seine formed a key part of the backdrop to the three years I spent as the BBC’s correspondent in Paris.

My apartment partly looked over the river and almost every time I opened my window I could hear Edith Piaf belting out La Vie en Rose as a bateau mouche, crammed full of tourists, floated past my window.

For a few beautiful seconds, my heart beat alongside hers… and then she was gone, her little sparrow’s voice drowned out by the man on the loudspeaker saying: “Next stop Town Hall and sorry, but there are no toilet facilities on board this boat.”

Despite its charm, the Seine has never been able to swim free of such splashes of scatology.

Until the late 19th Century one of the river’s principle functions was to serve as the city’s sewer, a job she carried out admirably, dutifully transporting dysentery and typhoid to any Parisian foolish enough to ingest her waters.

Today, as a result of concerted clean-up efforts by successive governments, it is alleged that Atlantic salmon have begun to return to her currents.

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fish´s archives ↓

Gulf Oil Has Made Its Way Into Lake Pontchartrain

So wasted: The Pacific Garbage Patch

Five US states sue over Asian carp invasion

The oyster is their world, but oil spill threatens it

Gulf oil spill: A hole in the world

Mangroves to be declared a ‘Protected Area’

BP oil spill could make Gulf hurricane season 'devastating'

'Top kill' fails, BP moves on 'to next option'

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