Here is a beautiful video with Jeremy Irons .
Sea Lions – update
I am sharing some of the words from a blog I wrote last year because I just heard some news about the sea lions off the coast of California.
A couple of years ago I had the chance to sit at the Fisherman’s Wharf in San Francisco and watch the sea lions. They made me laugh with their antics. They bark very loud if one invades the other’s space yet don’t seem to mind sitting all squished in alongside one another. And they appear to delight in the attention of the humans watching them. Did you know? Approximately 300,000 sea lions live between the Mexican border and the state of Washington.
Young starving and dying sea lions are again turning up on the shores of California and it looks like the numbers will be similar to last year’s total which was quite bleak.
Normally, sea lions eat squid and sardines. Yet the warmer ocean is pushing those prey deeper beneath the ocean’s surface. In fact, the ocean is up to five degrees hotter. This means sea lion mothers must go further for food. And it means their pups are left alone for longer periods of time than usual. Weakened and devoid of sustenance, the pups wash ashore.
Animal rescue shelter employees and volunteers are rushing to save the sea lions. Unfortunately, they cannot save all of them. Often, they must leave some sea lions on the beach because they do not have space to take them. It is like leaving injured patients at an accident scene because there is not enough room at the hospital.
This is the fourth year in a row for a high number of sea lion pups to die or be stranded. The death number was so high in 2013 that experts declared it an “unusual mortality event” for the species. 2015 was also high. Perhaps you would like to donate money to a marine mammal rescue center or volunteer to help the sea lions. You can also help by reducing your carbon footprint. Make a difference, time is running out.
Nature’s Value
An Ocean Full of Plastic?
Plastics, they are everywhere –we type on keyboards made from them , we drink and eat out of bottles and plates made from them and we use them for cars and all sorts of things. Gone are the days where people like my grandparents used glass bottles and plates, and where cars were composed mostly of metal.
The use of plastic has increased by twenty times in the last 50 years and is expected to double again in the next 20 years. That is staggering. What saddens me the most is that our oceans, by 2050, will contain more plastic in terms of weight, than fish. Whales, dolphins, seals, and sea-birds end up eating the plastic and then die from intestinal blockages, choking or starvation. I once met a beautiful seal at an animal hospital. Her stomach was so full of plastic things that 22 days went by before all of it was out. Fortunately, she was one of the lucky seals, she was saved before it was too late.
Is there any good news? We can work together to produce less waste and slow climate change. Plus, we can make sure we recycle our plastics. Almost one-third of all plastic never gets collected and ends up in our oceans. We can also change how we manufacture things. Instead of plastic we can use hemp. It can be used to make containers and in car production. As I wrote in an earlier blog, hemp is also biodegradable.
Let’s get together and stop using plastics. Our oceans will thank you and so will the animals in them.
A Great Way to Mitigate Climate Change
You often hear that we need to reduce our carbon emissions from fossil fuels to fight climate change. While that is true, we have another way to reach our goals. It is easier and less expensive to save and regrow tropical trees. According to Nature Climate Change, tropical forest conservation and restoration could make up half of the global warming solution.
Cutting carbon emissions and pulling carbon out of the atmosphere (courtesy of rainforests) would significantly reduce carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. According to Dr. Paul Salaman, “the potential of rainforest conservation to address global warming should be enough to galvanize massive worldwide rainforest conservation efforts.”
Dr. Salaman also said “rainforest conservation is also incredibly economical. One acre of Amazon rainforest in Peru, which stores up to 180 metric tonnes of CO2, can be protected for just a few dollars; the same is true elsewhere in Latin America and Africa…for the cost of …a coffee – each of us could save an area of forest about the size of four football pitches and safely store about 725 metric tonnes of CO2. To put this in perspective, the annual emissions of a typical passenger vehicle in the United States is less than 4.5 metric tonnes of CO2.”
Another reason to conserve the rainforests is for the animals. They provide homes for orangutans, elephants, tigers, and many other species. It is time to start saving and protecting our rainforests. They are the key to our future.
Check if Your Favorite Celebrity is on This List
There are nine celebrities who are advocating for climate action.
They are listed below, in no particular order.
Robert Redford
Pharrell Williams
Emma Thompson
Mark Ruffalo
Jessica Alba
Don Cheadle
Ian Sommerhalder
Leonard DiCaprio
Arnold Schwartzenegger
http://www.climaterealityproject.org/blog/nine-celebrities-changing-conversation-climate-action
A Poem….
“I am Earth” by Sheryl Lee
I am Earth
and from my body
grow the trees
you chop down
with you careless acts
I am ocean
for from my womb
all beings are birthed
I am desert
my long, voluptuous dunes
now burnt to drought
by August sun
my blood
the dyeing rivers
you pollute
with discarded greed
and selfish denial
my breasts
are sacred mountains
climbed for your egos sake of reaching the top
your summit
my nipple
without soft, tenderness of touch
that is required for such a holy journey
you, who call me home
I am not something to be bought or sold
I am alive
and in the eyes of every living creature
you will find me
their mother
mirrored back to you
do you dare look?
can you hold my gaze?
while you run your fingers through my sunlit hair of wheat at harvest?
that same nourishing grain you paint with poison for your benefit?
and do you care?
when you stain the path of this delicate wrist as you wind your way along my enchanted forest of pine?
you, my child,
who call yourself king
have scratched my skin raw
etching your name across virgin land
dark bruises mark my thighs
as you drill into the deepest marrow of these bones
searching for more gold
more silver
more of my life giving waters
you continue to ask for more
more of my precious milk
more of my cherished stone
you always want more
and I give it
again and again and again
I give
but now, my pets
I have run dry
I crack, I moan and I quake
I break open in pain
I am rain
I burn, I flame, I heat
I erupt with the force of my grief
and then
I cry
for days and days and days
I cry
and you, my dears
still look to my husband’s heavens
asking why
Holiday Wishes
I wish you and your loved ones a very happy and healthy holiday season. Let us be grateful for our blessings and may there be peace on Earth.
Were the Paris Climate Talks a Success?
Were the Paris climate talks and the climate agreement a success? It depends who you ask. Below are two comments from leaders who would say yes and two comments from leaders who would say no. Personally, I feel the agreement is a good start but we have much more work to do.
In case you missed it, almost 200 countries signed a historic climate agreement on December 12th to hold global temperatures to a maximum increase of 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.
Former Vice President Al Gore said, “This universal and ambitious agreement sends a clear signal to governments, businesses, and investors everywhere: the transformation of our global economy from one fueled by dirty energy to one fueled by sustainable economic growth is now firmly and inevitably underway.”
French President François Hollande said, “This is a major leap for mankind. The agreement will not be perfect for everyone, if everyone reads it with only their own interests in mind. We will not be judged on a clause in a sentence, but on the text as a whole. We will not be judged on a word, but on an act.”
Bill McKibben, founder of environment movement 350.org said, “The power of the fossil fuel industry is reflected in the text of the agreement, which drags out the transition [to clean energy] so far that endless climate damage will be done.”
Kumi Naidoo, Greenpeace international director said, “The deal puts the fossil fuel industry on the wrong side of history. But emission targets are not big enough. The nations that cause this problem have promised too little help to those people who are already losing their lives and livelihoods.”