Surfonomics

Fri, 30 Jul 2010 20:49:22 -0400

What is your break worth?

The School for Field Studies in Baja California Sur has developed an online survey to determine the value of surfing and surfing related activities to convince law-makers to preserve coastal areas.

They are also trying to identify surfer preferences for the creation of a Mexican National or Regional “Surf Preserve” established in B.C.S. They hope to work with CONANP (the Mexican national Park Service) to create the reserve based on environmental preservation and surfing as an amenity.

If you have surfed in BCS in the last year, we could use your input!

TAKE THE SURVEY! Click link below for language version
English Version
Spanish Version

For more information contact Dr. A.J. Schneller at aschneller@fieldstudies.org

Surfing is a major tourist industry in many areas, and projects like marinas, hotels, and golf courses can impact or plain ruin your favorite break, at home or abroad. Furthermore, local livelihoods are often compromised as the result of habitat destruction and real estate speculation.

DON’T LET THIS HAPPEN! If legislators realize how much surfing and the breaks that draw the surfers are worth, they will re-consider building that jetty or allowing that developer to pump sewage into the ocean.

The Save The Waves Coalition has successfully completed several Surfonomic Studies, including Mavericks in California and Mundaka, Spain. Both studies pointed to the enormous environmental, social, and economic value of surf breaks based on the quantity of tourist visits per year. This information is crucial for decision makers to realize that surfing is not a fringe activity, and that the preservation of waves and coastal habitats actually has value, perhaps more than a marina...

Surfers Without Borders is a Fiscally Sponsored Project of The Ocean Foundation

The Top 5 Superbad! Awesome! Plans for Cleaning up Plastic in the Ocean!

Sat, 24 Jul 2010 16:08:19 -0400

The Top 5 Superbad! Awesome! Plans for Cleaning up Plastic in the Ocean!

by Wallace J. Nichols, Sarah Kornfeld and Andy Myers

Finally, after days, weeks, and months--OK, hours--in the making, we've selected the "Top 5 Superbad! Awesome! Plans for Cleaning Up all that Plastic" that Americans love and need so much from the place where much of it ends up--the ocean!

And, just so you can be assured that these Top 5 are really the very BEST Top 5 we can find, we want you to know that our distinguished panel of experts included voices from Dow, BP, almost every government on the planet, a global supermarket chain, lots of toy makers, a big PR firm, a really big bottled water pusher, and a really, really big soda megamultinational.

So here they are, our Top 5 Superbad! Awesome! Plans for Cleaning up Plastic in the Ocean!

5. SUCK IT: Yes, in development right now are Electrolux vacuum cleaners that WILL suck up the junk. Governments and people alike will be able to use these amazing products to just suck it up. Yup, just suck the plastic and away it goes! Actually, that's not quite right, these vacuums won't actually suck up the plastic from the ocean, they'll just be made (at least some percentage, anyway) of plastic from the ocean. Sounds great in theory, right? Only problem is: this will make a ball-peen-hammer-sized dent on the problem, but it will raise awareness of the issue among the hard-to-reach, über-influential vacuum cleaner market. And reinforce the circular logic that, if we just buy more designed-for-obsolescence plastic stuff, we'll feel OK because we'll be doing our small part. Brilliant!

4. LIVE ON IT: With population growth, massive layoffs, and homelessness on the rise, some have suggested gathering plastic from the sea to build a really big island of plastic for people to live on! No need to ever buy a plastic product again, now you can live on it, in it, and with it! Free seasickness patches included with each condo. Superbad!

3. EAT IT: Then there's the coalition of leading petrochemical conglomerates who created an amazing new product--a global army of plastic-eating bacteria! This will work, right? Just look at how well our massive destroy-the-village-to-save-it solutions, like 2 million gallons of toxic Corexit dispersants on oil in the Gulf of Mexico, have worked. Genetically modified bacteria are a step in the right direction: let's sic them on plastic all over the planet! One small caution: This technology has been thoroughly tested by exactly one high school science fair award winner, but, then again, it has been hyped by the media, so it must be ready for primetime, right? Awesome!

2. STRAIN IT: Promising to do for plastic what colanders did for pasta, introducing ... The Mongo! Though scientists estimate that there are a mere thirteen-gazillion bits of micro-plastic in the ocean, a consolidated team of petroleum companies will launch a flotilla of 1,000 ships--or, if you're game, just ten whale-sized vessels--all powered by petroleum, of course, and using fabulous new 500-foot-by-500-foot "Mongo" filters to STRAIN it from the water! Once scooped, all those tiny little bits of plastic--and the ocean life that comes with them--can be converted into oil, condos (see #4) and vacuum cleaners (see #5). See, we told you: This list rocks!

And now ... drum roll please ... the number-one "Plan to Remove Plastic from the Ocean" (an oldie but a goodie):

1. F**K IT: Let's do nothing! After careful review, our panel of esteemed experts threw up its hands and concluded that our present, do-nothing strategy is working quite well, thank you very much. So they will stick to denigrating "whacko environmentalists," attacking the validity of overwhelming peer-reviewed science (accumulating rapidly since 1974), and continuing to produce a crapload of plastic. Then, we get fat. Then, we die. That's SO pluckfastic!

And there you have it, folks. Five sure-fire plans, brought to you by the same guys who created the problem, to ensure we can all enjoy another Century of Plastic in comfort, cleanliness, and guilt-free style.

my reverse tweetstream from b4 spill to present

Mon, 19 Jul 2010 22:33:01 -0400

July 18th, back at home

• wild Inception-oilspill-Mad Max-like dreams last night
• In '09, 5 of 6 most profitable corps in world were oil+gas >>let's change that 2 green/clean energy/transpo/products/services
• www.gturtle.net helps ppl interested in seaturtles in Gulf of Mexico stay connected, share info +communicatehttp://bit.ly/bJE8Ao
• [BIG BANGING SOUND] Me: "what's happening?" Julia: "Nothing. I have to do it though."
• Oil in the Sands: Testing The Water - Mobile Alabamahttp://bit.ly/99Zdna
• I highly recommend BRC relocate 2 coast of Gulf of Mexico this year: Burning Man Project 8/30-9/6 http://bit.ly/crFqft
• The Gulf Oil Disaster, As Seen Through the Eyes of a Marine Biologist | Slideshows http://bit.ly/cFSUII
• oil & plastic have had total freedom on Earth for 100 years & they haven't behaved well at all...time 4 a time out!
• Turtle Rescue Efforts Are Guided By Hope And Guesswork, Not Data (VIDEO) http://huff.to/9Y9fTs
• Oil Spill Lawsuits: BP Spending Big To Acquire An Army Of Ocean Scientists http://huff.to/cY80d3
• excellent panel discussion: Unified Command Deepwater BP#OilSpill | #TurtleTalk Virtual TownHall Meeting 2pm CDT today
• Unified Command Deepwater BP #OilSpill | #TurtleTalk - Virtual Town Hall Meeting 2pm CDT today!http://bit.ly/9EOCuY
• Hope we can see all things R connected, us+nature+unfortunately oil, +there R much better ways 2B connected http://huff.to/ddvbsb
• NPR on solar, all of the callers are from Santa Cruz...love you guys
• No new oil drilling, end subsidies, start to shut old rigs down...you'll see a speedy transition to clean energy!
• Riki Ott: we are humans first, not Dem or Rep, and we need a healthy planet
• Fisherwomen and ecowarriors Diane Wilson and Riki Ott: oil industry treats Gulf like chemical dumping zone
• The J is short for Joseph, but not Joe or Joey....prefer that you just use J though, instead of Wallace...thanks!
• Bp says capped well may still be leaking...so what about the thousands of other capped wells?
• Meeting up with Diane Wilson + Riki Ott in Berkeley 2 talk#oilspill http://bit.ly/aE38tB
• Lisa Jackson Calls 4 More EPA Authority Over Oil Dispersants (after they've been dispersed) http://huff.to/bqpVuR
• Gulf sea turtle nesting distributions and oceanographic constraintson hatchling migration http://bit.ly/au5zsf
• SHRIMPSUCK.org: NYTimes on why shrimp + oil = dead sea turtles http://bit.ly/bo6ATp
• Please, may it be true! BP Says That Oil Flow Has Stopped as Cap Is Tested - NYTimes.com http://nyti.ms/97oogr
• Shell OIl says don't use petroleum? Support "sustainable mobility" http://bit.ly/arOOQX
• Gulf turtle evacuees could get lost at sea - environment - 15 July 2010 - New Scientist http://bit.ly/9y8McH
• Even more relevant now: HuffPo: Fly Yr Sea Turtle Flag High: A Slippery Stew of Shrimp, Oil + Sea Turtleshttp://huff.to/cCEQZi
• NYT vid is reminder ShrimpSuck.org & oil isn't only thing killing Gulf seaturtles, check the bycatch!http://nyti.ms/ckBuin
• please tell us exactly how oil in the ocean feels to you at OceanVoices.org (we want your voice)
• NYT: Q: What's Killing Gulf Sea Turtles? A: Oil+Shrimp trawls (as usual, no mystery) VIDEO http://nyti.ms/aBboFs
• Dear bp employees and oil spill contractors, the site is for you: http://wikileaks.org/
• thank you people of NOLA for sharing your big hearts, our thoughts are with you
• intense interview with Fast Company about scientist-journalists, the oil spill, and teaching our kids so they "get it"
•Julia: "did you fix it, Dad?" Me: "No." Julia: "did you fix anything?" Me: "not really" #oilspill
• HuffPo Blog: It's All Connected, Redux http://huff.to/bh0K17
• Interviews today for NPR at the KQED station
• LIVBLUE Blog: It’s All Connected, Redux http://bit.ly/d1M8WN
• numberless description Gulf #oilspill scale: as far as I could see in every direction from Cessna flying high above it all
• some of best reporting on #oilspill has come from scientist-journalists: photos videos blogs, unfiltered from the field--keep it up!•
• If you squint your eyes, at night, and think real hard, a summer Indiana cornfield can look and sound like an ocean
• A leatherback sea turtle from Panama named Dawn is swimming towards the Gulf oil spill MAP: http://bit.ly/aZVvYI
• Mr. Landry speaks 4 fishermen+volunteers +sings a GREAT song @ Presidential Oil Spill Commission in NOLAhttp://bit.ly/aFHgz3
• Lots of oil continues to flow into the dark waters of the Gulf: CNN Live http://bit.ly/aw32X3•
• Here's a map of where all dead + live sea turtles found during the Gulf oil spill have occurred http://bit.ly/a0kQBg
• Ive learned R new footage from low flight ovr DeepWaterHorizon site + underwater shots R broadcast on CNN http://bit.ly/bj0Hp4
• Pro Surfer Kyle Thiermann Receives Blue Frontier's Peter Benchley Ocean Youth Award: AWESOME VIDEO!http://bit.ly/c9PxAO
• Dr. Theo Colborn Joins PPC Science Advisors | Plastic Pollution Coalition http://bit.ly/9TIyPI
• MarineLife + GulfofMexico OilSpill Data/Photos: bottlenose dolphins + kemp's ridley seaturtles hit hardesthttp://bit.ly/cq8wZk
• Far 2 many endangered sea turtles R still suffering out thr in Gulf oil spill given extremely limited scope of on water rescue efforts
• Meeting with Capt Al to discuss sea turtle rescue strike teams then offshore drilling commission mtg in New Orleans
• had wine w/ Cousteau team in NOLA+ bartender was stressed w/ 2many orders so Jean-Michel hugged her +she cried#ocean #oilspill
• Dinner in New orleans with the Cousteau team...a moment to relax...offshore oil drilling commission hearings tomorrow am
•@FCousteau @wallacejnichols @hlohuis & myself spend afternoon at Audubon w/turtles affected by#oilspill. http://yfrog.com/2oetsmj
• Amazing day with @FCousteau @JMCousteau + the Audubon Sea Turtle Rescue Center team, thanks to them 4 saving sea turtles
• @oceanrevolution Indeed! "We need a big movement, & big movements come from beauty & meaning, not columns of statistics." -Bill McKibben
• after the oil gusher is stopped, we'll need a shredded, twisted, buried, torn, oiled boom cleanup effort
• CNN Gulf journals: Marine biologist's worst day »http://bit.ly/bj0Hp4
• U.S. to Issue New Drilling Moratorium - WSJ.comhttp://bit.ly/cnQuxO
• A Report on the oil's impact on marsh and mangrove for Grayce and Julia - CNN iReport http://bit.ly/dsMBmm
• Oil spill: Sea turtle rescue mission begins http://bit.ly/cz80Ml
• people R sharing bluemarbles.org all along the Gulf coast, 2 spill love + commit random acts of ocean kindness
• CNN's Amber Lyon tells Don Lemon about her underwater dive with Philippe Cousteau...http://fb.me/C6BF39Yq
• If It Was My Home - Visualizing the BP Oil Spill in your own backyard: http://bit.ly/cdE1M3
• RT @toddsteiner: dont release baby Kemp's turtles in2 Gulf until it's safe! http://bit.ly/9OyKDF
• Corexit + crude oil applied 2 duck eggs significantly reduced hatchling success (no surprise) http://bit.ly/9MSlZg
• 4 sound artist Halsey Burgund, talk is priceless - OceanVoices @ Museum of Science: The Boston Globe http://bit.ly/9s4mjR
• Sharing a Blue Marble with Jean Michel Cousteau in the Gulf of Mexico - CNN iReport http://bit.ly/bg57ng
• I uploaded a YouTube video -- Sharing a Blue Marble with Jean-Michel Cousteau in Louisianahttp://youtu.be/lqZ0mu8GhA8?a
• Keep an eye on algae, EuroCopter +others R researching it 2: Algae 2 solve jet fuel problem? The Observerhttp://bit.ly/bUbSRg
• Chris & I R folding R clean laundry in NewOrleans bar/laundromat & figuring out R nxt move wrt BP oilspill, kind of odd, no?
• Official: Oil Spill To Affect Generations To Come - WDSU New Orleans http://bit.ly/dwq7JG
• Spending the day tomorrow with @FCousteau and @JMCousteau to continue work on @oceanfutures and @PlantAFish projects in the Gulf
• Sunday evening at Igor's laundrymat/poolhall in New Orleanshttp://tweetphoto.com/32187885
• ESPANA!
• Yes, warm and rain! RT @WhoDat35: Heat index 115 tweeple in #NOLA. Stay cool.
• Working with redbridgeproductions.org on their film about the Gulf oil catastrophe http://tweetphoto.com/32154865
• The Gulf coast is smeared with oil based irony, oil stained plastc warning signs, bp sponsored sea turtle exhibit,etc
• Watching the Gulf Oil Spill into the Ocean: Cap Removed From Gushing Well, Oil Flows Freely http://huff.to/csVTqH
• how long does it take for an oil molecule to get from the BP Gulf well site to the ocean surface?
• Music with Jerry at DBA in NOLA after tacos at Cafe Negril
• Worked with @jmcousteau today to bring the sea turtle story to his film about the oil spill
• Under the Boom: Underwater footage at BP oil spill cleanup site - CNN iReport http://bit.ly/bGHz8w
• I uploaded a YouTube video -- VID06170 http://youtu.be/ybAG7GNYXJo?a
• wht happens when Corexit oil dispersants get in2 sand on EVERY Gulf sea turtle nesting beach, onto turtle eggs + us?
• I collected an oil covered latex balloon from the oil spill yesterday...two killers of sea turtles
• Under the Boom: Underwater footage at BP oil spill cleanup site 9 [HQ] http://bit.ly/9q3KF1
• Spent the day on the water with some of Stuart Smith's team, collecting useful information, samples, images http://bit.ly/bAXxsM
• as we meet ppl who live on the Gulf coast + C more ecological impacts of oilspill, I'm less able 2 find adequate words + emotions
• 2day in/on the Gulf was beautiful, interesting, humid, oily, exhausting, inspiring & mostly sad. 2morrow will B more of the same
• as always, gd conversations w/ @pcousteau abt R experiences in Gulf + the ocean revolution we need (over beers @ Circle Bar in NOLA)
• Thank you Martin RT @TheGlobalWe: a #love song to the#ocean by @MartinAelred ♫ http://bit.ly/auiQhB ♫ Please RT ♥
• Had a pod of bottlenose dolphins hanging out with us today, surrounded by oil booms
• Minor mechanical boat issue...solved with logic...back in action
• We are the only boat on the bay as far as I can see
• dolphins, booms, oily pelicans and terns on Barataria Bay
• Philippe and CNN crew are off with captain Al for hazmat dive, live!
• 4am boat haul to the launch ramp for some water time
• Federal appeals panel denies government bid to reinstate drilling ban - CNN.com http://bit.ly/cLGbfB
• got 2 eat, get gear ready 4 2morrow & zzz...4am wakeup, then trailering the boat behind the truck 2 the ramp 2 launch
• @pcousteau Tune 2 CNN Newsroom 2morrow, making history again 2 shed light on disaster. Diving in Oil Spill again live from underwater
• I gave a blue marble 2 security guard @ federal courthouse whr offshore drilling hearing was held 2day: he liked it + "got it"
• I gave Gov Jindal a blue marble with the message that "it's one in a million, protect it" BlueMarbles.org
• I'm @ offshore drilling moratorium hearing @ courthouse in NewOrleans: only person in courtroom wearing shorts and flipflops
• I'm @ offshore drilling moratorium hearing @ courthouse in NewOrleans: only person in courtroom wearing sea turtle action team tshirt
• I'm at offshore oil moratorium hearing at the courthouse in New Orleans: jobs vs environment, a familiar debate
• At the courthouse for the offshore drilling hearing in new Orleans...on behalf of dead turtles and the ocean
• I liked a YouTube video -- Young Sea Turtle Struggles in BP Oil Slick http://youtu.be/Bdzb2gFk-3g?a
• I uploaded a YouTube video -- SEA TURTLES LOHAN KITTENS TWILIGHT OIL SPILL http://youtu.be/rIPgi1xGw14?a
• NOLA motel put a card on pillow: "we are saving the planet by reusing towels"...b4 experiencing #Gulf #oilspill that seemed cool
• Gulf Report | Santa Cruz Good Times http://bit.ly/aNPgkY
• I keep reading that somehow microbes will solve all R plastic & oil pollution problems. My gut feeling is that's just not tru
• a la prensa latina: estoy disponible para cualquier información sobre el petroleo y las tortugas marinas en el Golfo de Mexico
• my friend Gabriel Hoeffer, a young leader of the Seri tribe + sea turtle protector says "vamos con todo hermano", yes indeed
• We'll B filming HD underwater vid @ many locations of #BP oil disaster zone on friday 2 learn more abt all that U nevr C
• everyone I meet agrees that survival of seaturtles, everything else in ocean + us depends on big change, an ocean revolution
• great meetings today with pro divers, local boat captains and CNN about Gulf Sea Turtle Task Force...good progress
• Dr Chris Pincetich and I r jammin to Skynyrd's Sweet Home Alabama, again, our cliche oil disaster stress relief valve
• biodiesel turtlecopters 4 indep media-scientists-activists wld B ideal 2 bypass bp security thugs http://yfrog.com/6xzy7gj
• a fisherman told me: 'bp gave fishermen a "job" to sit on the dock, but we want to help save the animals'
• HandsOn New Orleans: info for oil spill volunteershttp://bit.ly/aoqXax
• Staring Down the Dragon on Dependence Day, Seri elder, Alfonso Burgos, does sea turtle chant - CNN iReporthttp://bit.ly/ahN9rL
• OIled Kemp's Ridley Sea Turtle on Flickr - NOAA Photoshttp://bit.ly/aW5ycN
• Staring Down the Dragon on Dependence Day - CNN iReport#bp #oil new VIDEO http://bit.ly/ahN9rL
• inspired by all orgs & ppl wrkn long & hard 2 help ppl & wildlife soaked in oil here + how much MORE remains 2B done-please support them
• Please support all the people coming together to save Gulf Coast's oil-covered wildlife http://bit.ly/cNRROW
• LIVBLUE, Baby, BLUE!
• CNN: current count from USFWS: vast majority of birds, mammals and sea turtles collected dead
• CNN: did USFWS drop the ball on regulating offshore drilling impacts 2 sea turtles, whales, birds? Did they play "yes men" 2 bp?
• stunning photo we took 5July2010 of "ground zero" BP Deepwater Horizon oil gusher site http://yfrog.com/6co9cj
• Can't believe how close we got yesterday 2 bp oil rig, ground zero, in retrospect...like looking down throat of a fire dragon
• Visiting the oil spill rehab sea turtles at the Audubon Aquarium of the Americas
• Saving SeaTurtles, Creating Jobs, Changing Lives "Connecting w/ wild animal on its terms can b transformative" http://huff.to/dr9yeC
• U cn learn a LOT abt R planet + humans just by looking out window of a plane flying ovr an obscenely large, burning oilspill
• hre's R flight rt from 2day, along the LA and MS coast +out 2 GroundZero BP DeepwaterHorizon oil disasterhttp://bit.ly/cgKUil
• everyone we talk 2 along the Gulf coast talks abt the stories that arnt being told, the oilspill info that's not on CNN
• so many inspiring, dedicated ppl doing so many selfless good deeds arnd ths oil disaster, if thr's a silver lining, that's it
• I'll b on NAMAPAHH First People's Radio w/ Robin, Bonny +Chris @9 pm PST tonite to talk @ turtles + oilhttp://bit.ly/cWJIgd
• even from 1000 ft above the Deepwater Horizon oilspill site, our cockpit smelled strongly like gasoline
• bp oilspill site's more horrific than U cn even imagine from images on tv/print/web, chris + i'll post vids/photos 2nite
• Saw group of ~40 cownose rays v near DeepWaterHorizon#oilspill site today, similar 2this image: http://bit.ly/aU6fvK
• In a Cessna above "ground zero" of Deepwater Horizon...oil as far as the eye can see, mixing with ocean due 2 storms
• We will post photos and videos tonight from our flight over Deepwater Horizon and surrounding water and islands
• Refueling plane in Missippi after visiting DeepwaterHorizon rig +surveying islands: a nightmare, order of magnitude worse than I expected
• Taking off 2 survey bp oil spillhttp://tweetphoto.com/30967395
• Meeting pilot Schumaker to fly survey with toxicologist and USGS oil expert this am
• Update BP Oil Disaster: Drs Bonny Schumaker + @WallaceJNichols: Creatures in Distress 7/5/2010 NAMAPAHH Internet Radio http://bit.ly/9pcxyg
• Late night arrival to New Orleans, aerial surveys of oil in the am
• How'd U spend yr (Inter)dependence Day? Fighting 4 SeaTurtles, CleanEnergy + the OceanRevolution w/ the Team•
• I'll B cmpletly clear: SeaTurtle is symbol of R OceanRevolution +CleanEnergy: Fly yr SeaTurtle Flag Hi http://huff.to/cCEQZi
• En route to Louisiana to meet up with toxicologist Dr Chris Pincetich, happy 4th of July...
• oil among America's most heavily subsidized businesses, tax breaks @ ea stage of explore/extract processhttp://nyti.ms/b4CBr0

July 4th: Travel to Louisiana

• 2days mtg w/ UnifiedCommand STRP NOAA +DeptofJustice:#seaturtle observers on all #bp oil burn boats @carlsafina@pcousteau
• RT @oceanrevolution: Thank U LeaHaratani 4 contributing 2 TheOceanRevolutionFund & seaturtle rescue efforts in Gulfhttp://bit.ly/TORF2010
• oceanrevolution Gracias a AJ Schneller for his contribution to The Ocean Revolution Fund http://bit.ly/TORF2010
• STRP #bp lawsuit has had the desired impact: trained sea turtle observers requ'd on shrimp boats hired to burn oil at sea
• Pilot BonnySchumaker of OnWingsofCare is 1 of many wrkn hard in response 2 Gulf oil disaster, pls support her!http://bit.ly/abI9d7
• it's taken 2+ months, a lawsuit, whistleblower + 288 burns 2 put seaturtle observers on shrimpboats working oil burn box#bp
• Prelim Eval of Helicopter Survey as Method 2 Assess Sea Turtles in FL: Hovering allows 4 more accuracyhttp://bit.ly/9kKcIi
• productive call w/ STRP & UnifiedCommand on plan 2 put trained sea turtle observers on oil "burn box" vessels, better late than nevr
• conference call 2day on protocol 4 observers on board #bp"burn box" vessels 2 ensure no more sea turtles R burned =progress
• R research on Green Turtles in Baja, Mexico is among Pacific Science most-read ths month, cngrts Jesse!http://bit.ly/7Myskz
• The Ultimate Green Car: A Solar-Powered Plug-In Electric Biodiesel Hybrid : TreeHugger (4 years ago!)http://bit.ly/aHdKG7
• UPDATE 1-Deal struck to save turtles from Gulf oil burns | Reuters http://bit.ly/d80Ek8
• gracias a nuestros colegos alrededor del mundo trabajando toda la noche para la conservacion de las 7 especies de tortuga marina
• thx 2 R sea turtle conservation colleagues around the world who work all nite this time of year 2restore those 7 species
• Grayce and Boo surfed with Jonathan today...now Boo wants a gold wetsuit
• Happy July 4th Dependence Day Weekend: Petroholics Anonymous http://bit.ly/beJazr
• Gulf Oil Spill: The Plight of the Sea Turtleshttp://huff.to/cBjIN3 •
• @oceanrevolution Big thx 2 Nora Jamieson 4 supporting The Ocean Revolution Fund! http://bit.ly/TORF2010
• @oceanrevolution Merci, Frederic Marangone, yr donation 2 The Ocean Revolution Fund is MUCH appreciatedhttp://bit.ly/TORF2010
• RT @issueswithjvm: Is BP trying 2 cover up the oil that's blackening R beaches? @PCousteau (Philippe Cousteau) will join us
• U know the " "you break it, U bought it" rule? #bp broke the Gulf, now it seems like they "own" it
• RT @therightblue @oceansforme: Oil Spill's Toll on Wildlife Could Soar - CBS News http://bit.ly/cuOKaR #oilspill #ocean
• i'm getting my own mini solar-copter w/ a turtle scoop on the bottom so I cn fly arnd Gulf & move seaturtles 2 clean ocean
• Endangered Sea Turtle Nests 2 Receive Special Transportation -in electric or biodiesel trucks? http://bit.ly/dD7htw
• Live like you love the ocean LIVBLUE.org
• If speeds were a little lower, cars were a little lighter + mpgs were bit higher we could use a LOT less oil...too simple?
• RT @toddsteiner: We may have deal by morning w/ BP 2 stp burning sea turtles Stay tuned http://bit.ly/9mGvlG
• When we stood on R beaches linking R Hands Across the Sand wr we protesters, activists or simply human beings protecting wht we luv?
• RT @oceanrevolution: Thank U Sheila Youngblood 4 yr contribution 2 The Ocean Revolution Fund!!http://bit.ly/TORF2010
• RT @oceanrevolution: Thank U Janet Kubalak 4 yr contribution 2 The Ocean Revolution Fundhttp://bit.ly/TORF2010
• oceanrevolution Thank U Joan Stevens 4 yr contribution 2 The Ocean Revolution Fund http://bit.ly/TORF2010
• oceanrevolution Thank U John Hunter Nichols 4 yr contribution 2 The Ocean Revolution Fundhttp://bit.ly/TORF2010
• oceanrevolution Thank U Sarah Jane Freymann 4 yr contribution 2 The Ocean Revolution Fundhttp://bit.ly/TORF2010
• STRP: Sea Turtles Nesting Amid Toxic Turmoil + Gulf Sea Turtle Rescues Delayed by Weather http://bit.ly/cJprss
• Julia sold a SLOWCOAST necklace she made 4 $10, then went ovr & bought chocolate cover strawberries w/ the cash
• Deep ocean beauty + biodiversity in the Gulf of Mexico PHOTO http://bit.ly/bRJmXM
• sturdy digital camera finally quit after many yrs of gr8 photos, anyone have a rec 4 replacement, or one 2donate 4 Gulf trip?
• in memory of all that is lost courtesy of BP + our fed govt: our soul PHOTO http://bit.ly/cEARuu
• ppl ask wht they cn do re BP oil disaster: don't vote 4 candidates who take $ from big oil/coal/gas/plastic/petrochem
• Cabo Pulmo Vivo | Por favor, firma la cartahttp://bit.ly/aTdLKR
• Met w/ execs from major global aircraft manufacturer who said biofuel tech 4 aviation's here, just slowed by regs & lobbyists
• Watch CreekKeeper JohnWathan's video on scope of BP Oil Disaster: Fire, Dolphins + Whales http://bit.ly/akc64C
• OCEANREVOLUTION Sea Turtle RESCUE-RESCATE Flaghttp://bit.ly/bJklN2
• Dispersants | EPA Response to BP Spill in the Gulf of Mexico | US EPA http://bit.ly/di8jsY
• Fly Your Sea Turtle Flag High: A Slippery Stew of Shrimp, Oil, and Sea Turtles http://huff.to/cCEQZi
• Gulf Oil Spill: 70,000 Turtle Eggs 2b Moved From Oily Beaches In Massive Relocation Effort http://huff.to/daRX9Y
• From Land to Sea: Blue Marble Planet lover Lea Haratani dives deep http://bit.ly/biJEZ0
• Wow I hate traffic...for this we destroyed the Gulf?
• On a panel tonight at Hub-SoMa 2 discuss innovation, collaboration and maverickiness 4 sustainability
• 15 Far Out Turtle Cities: I like #10 (thanks @oceanshaman)http://bit.ly/aXtDSw
• Lunch w/ pro-surfer @kylethiermann 2day, the 2010 Peter Benchley Youth Ocean Activist Award winner kylethiermann.com
• Pacific Environment: Dear Mr Jobs, I want a Greener Apple:http://bit.ly/9bUCUc
• Can Earth Day 2011 be like 100x bigger than ever before, please? And can it last forever? Mark your calendar now.
• Dear OrganicFood makers, Thr's a fast-growing # of ppl who dont wnt 2 buy yr stuff packed in plastic. Plz advise. Thx, J
• RT @oceanrevolution Many thx 2 LeslieStabile 4 generously supporting TheOceanRevolutionFund thru her seaglass jewelry http://bit.ly/TORF2010
• Oceanophilia: Mind+Ocean: it is time for a new kind of ocean science http://bit.ly/b9G8du•
• listening to Greg Brown in the SLOWCOAST Airstream at Swanton Berry Farm, working and chatting with people
• we have 2 get WAY past "carefully monitoring" rise of plastic & oil in ocean + decline of species 'round R bluefin planet
• great meeting today with Mark Armen at the SLOWCOAST Airstream about a world-changing idea (seriously)
• Lately I’ve bn trying 2 put words, ideas & science 2 that feeling & call it: Oceanophilia = love of oceanhttp://bit.ly/b9G8du
• Hands across the sand on the SLOWCOAST at Waddell Creek
• It's the Gulf Oil Disaster not a "spill" + it's the Ocean Plastic Disaster not a "garbage patch" or "marine debris" problem
• C U at the Peter Benchley Awards 2nite @calacademy honoring so many ocean heroes
• What's Behind the Food We Eat / Cheap oil drives industrial long-line fishing http://bit.ly/cuDF6z
• Biosfir Indonesia - Blue Marbles Shared along the sailing route from Malta to Indonesia! http://bit.ly/aE7Lvl
• On a day full of bad seaturtle news frm Gulf I rlly enjoyed DierksBentley +PunchBros taking on U2's Pridehttp://n.pr/a3FoJz
• It takes a global network of villages 2 protect & restore the ocean! rt on @whalegeek !
• sick of sea turtles covered in oil? make yr nxt car a bike or a vehicle that runs on clean energy
• Shocking & sad PHOTO of young sea turtle covered w/ oil in Gulf: join the Ocean Revolution: http://bit.ly/cWx5a5
• Thank U 4 yr support 4 my upcoming trip 2 Gulf 2 assist w/ sea turtle rescue efforts, it means a lothttp://bit.ly/TORF2010
• Gulf oil leak threatens baby turtles' food: FLORIDA TODAY photo: http://bit.ly/b0zdWD
• HuffingtonPost: Petrolholics Anonymous: "Hello, my name is [your name here], I'm a petroleum addict"http://huff.to/9SWleX
• Follow DePauw Senior, Josh Baugh's Sea Turtles of El Salvador Travel Blog http://bit.ly/9D6IKU
• Yes! RT @oceanshaman: #CNNHelpGulf: #RobertRedford not speaking in code,nor @pcousteau ~@wallacejnichols #oil#spill #gulf
• I uploaded a YouTube video -- Hawksbill turtle release.movhttp://youtu.be/nSfo2aIyk5U?a
• Weird: A pile of hair booms sits unused in a warehouse in Fort Walton Beach: TheDestinLog.com http://bit.ly/bl4Gj1
• USA Advances In World Cup With Epic Goal In Final Minuteshttp://huff.to/9eW3c2
• Date night with Grayce, good bread. Goat cheese. Classic wooden rollercoaster at SC Boardwalk
• Did an hour long interview on EcoReview with host Tom+ Lauren from Save Our Shores on oil spill topic
• Oil Spill: Turtles Rescued By Wildlife Agents, Only 1 in 5 Survive (VIDEO) http://huff.to/dte20j
• RT @oceanrevolution: RT @pluckfastic wow. lotsa plastic waterbottles on Larry King CNN BP oilspill set...some1 needs 2 connect the dots!
• Noticias.cabovision.TV - Observación de la tortuga negra en Pto. San Carlos http://bit.ly/asChOg
• June 25 My brother JohnnyHoy +theBluefish will B playing @ Atlantic in Edgartown on Martha's Vineyard a crazy gd timehttp://bit.ly/b0c3Kk•
• had vivid dreams/nightmares last nite abt rescuing small green +medium loggerhead sea turtles from oil laden sargassum in Gulf
• HuffPost: Prayer4Ocean? If Prez wld lk us 2 pray shldn't we begin w/ public prayers of confession by officials +CEOs?http://huff.to/97ay9K
• i'm MUCH more impressed by ppl who cn put things back tgthr (like the ocean) than ppl who cn blow things up (like the ocean)
• Prayer for the Ocean? This is a time for corporate acts of confession. http://bit.ly/9EdTnI
• My Father's Day "Caddyshack" moment: Grayce barfed lrg amt of strawberryyogurt +mangos in pool causing screaming evacuation +closure
• Violate the "employee handbook" in creative,direct, kind and healthy ways
• Controlled Oil Spill Burn: Massive Fire Blazing in Gulf (VIDEO) reports of immediate peril 2 seaturtles http://huff.to/bjryNQ
• Whole Brain (NeuroConservation) Catalog | Adbusters: Got this as a FathersDay gift from my kids! http://bit.ly/9T4RII
• pick up AdBusters' new issue on NeuroConservation: The Whole Brain Catalog adbusters.org
• Grayce, I'll give you a quarter of you can find a guitar pick for me...
• thank U 2 all volunteers, professionals +workers cleaning oil frm ocean, shores +wildlife--we support U every way we cn
• ~2000 birds, mammals +seaturtles rescued in Gulf so far, abt 1/2 visibly oiled, many pending, <50 releasedhttp://bit.ly/aOioa9
• I'm an optimist by nature & a lover of the ocean, but burning seaturtles in the Gulf oilspill calls 4 an @oceanrevolution
• in HuffPo: Fly yr Sea Turtle Flag High: A Slippery Stew of Shrimp, Oil & (Burning) SeaTurtles http://huff.to/cCEQZi
• Fixed the link: HappyFather'sDay, all U Dads: hre's a song I wrote/played/recorded 4Fathers (it's a little rough):http://bit.ly/cv2LJe
• Happy Father's Day, all you Dads...here's a song I wrote/played/recorded for Fathers (it's a little rough):http://bit.ly/cjxWVk
• RT @EcoDaredevil: if U've evr thought of yrself as an environmentalist, lover of nature or sentient being now's the time 4 yr A-game
• Sea Turtles Covered with Oil, Death by Fire in the Gulf #oilspill#BP http://bit.ly/dcE4iX
• Cousteau calls oilspill "kick in the butt" but I'd call it more of a "knife in the heart": CNBC http://bit.ly/cOpntt
• @oceanrevolution hope + change R mildly quaint ideas compared 2 wht we need arnd hre 2 protect + restore the#ocean
• Le Pétrole est mort. Vive le Soleil!
• WaterKeepers From Around the World Unite in La Pazhttp://bit.ly/a06Pwy
• @MarineLifeCtr Love it. RT @carlsafina: My interview from last night with Stephen Colbert - http://bit.ly/dg0RoV
• when it comes 2 having a serious, long term strategy regarding energy, war/peace + health the US seems 2 B just winging it + following the $
• @oceanrevolution HuffingtonPost: Baby seaturtles attracted 2 oilspill, hatching season begins 4 endangered specieshttp://huff.to/cCEQZi
• RT @0ceanophilia: RT @1bluemarble: really wish CarlSafina had given Stephen a blue marble on the Colbert Report last night! BlueMarbles.org
• A video on #PlasticPollution by @KelpClaw while sailing w/ SeaLifeConservation on our MontereyBay http://bit.ly/avnbgp
• How do oceanic oil spills make you feel? Share your voice on OceanVoices.org
• CCC is now Sea Turtle Conservancy! Saving Sea Turtles since 1959...my 1st sea turtle job was with them:http://bit.ly/aT2t4c
• A 64 ft plastic Jesus burned down last night in Ohio...wow
• Dear Pres Obama: with all due respect, it's not about prayers, it's about fixing what's broken with our woefully outdated economic model.
• Worth reading + sharing: Waking America from the BP nightmare | Grist http://bit.ly/9gL3C8
• on the am hike my main role was apparently seed disperser...post-fire the plants have overgrown the trails + R going 4 it!
• RT @1bluemarble: r u a PR professional/writer/blogger who loves ocean +wants 2 help? help spread BlueMarbles.org no budget/staff, just heart
• @1bluemarble if thr's 1 thing that's certain abt blue marbles it's that they R vry patient BlueMarbles.org #ocean
• July 30th: Whales | Tohorā + Ocean Voices east coast debut at Boston’s Museum of Science: http://bit.ly/9fdFzl #ocean
• LIVBLUE.org: Congrats 2 the 2010 Ocean Heroes:http://bit.ly/b9Y223
• @theslowcoast a SLOWCOAST is a clean, healthy coast without oil rigs SLOWCOAST.org
• Until birth +rise of modern petro-economy over past century strategy of “cleansing by the sea” was mostly successfulhttp://bit.ly/cWKkVc
• #5. Finally, he will "talk about what we must do 2 decrease our dependence on oil + other fossil fuels"http://huff.to/8WYYzH
• Get yr tix for 3rd Annual Blue Frontier Peter Benchley Awards @calacademy while they last, see u there: http://bit.ly/aSPHNt
• MoGO is a free iPhone™ app that turns you and your iPhone™ into a ‘citizen scientist’ savegulfwildlife.org
• Sea change in the Monterey Bay: Rare sea lion births being witnessed http://bit.ly/dlLefB
• I liked a YouTube video -- Wallace J. Nichols Behind the Scenes Photo Shoot http://youtu.be/MS_ELA_dS5s?a
• Talk +walk @ same time, vote +hope @ same time, think +act @same time, sing +march @ same time, swim +smile @ same time http://bit.ly/a1MRJ6
• I favorited a YouTube video -- Wallace J. Nichols Behind the Scenes Photo Shoot http://youtu.be/MS_ELA_dS5s?a
• RT @0ceanvoices: new OV question: "How do oceanic oil spills make you feel? Why?" Share yr voice viahttp://bit.ly/9bu4AG or OV iphone app
• congrats 2 JesseSenko on acceptance of r paper on FINE SCALE DAILY MOVEMENTS +HABITAT USE OF GREENTURTLES in JrnlofExp MarineBio+Ecol
• Endangered sea turtle is poster species 4 Gulf oil spill: swims through oil 2 nest on Alabama beach http://bit.ly/9fEyOg
• illegal 2 pour fake oil over one's self, but no1 arrested 4 pouring mlns of gal of real oil on US? http://bit.ly/bryJpC
• ME: Julia, would u like dark chocolate or milk chocolate on your s'more? JULIA: Both. ME: That's my girl! (EndanderedSpeciesChocolate, btw)
• wow...USA Ties England In World Cup Nail-Biterhttp://huff.to/a75eXy
• great meeting w/ PlasticCentury.org crew this am over scones and coffee...good plans 4 the next steps/actions...now 4 the start of summer
• Episode 1: It's All About Carbon : NPR http://n.pr/aVgo4f
• PlasticCentury.org team coming over this am 4 planning session on next efforts, then we host "Camp Nichols": 25 2nd graders 4 s'mores +tents
• my guitar, a beer + the latest copy of Endangered Species Research...ah, Friday night
• I'd swear JacquesCousteau himself sent me the Calypso sticker adorning the crosstube on the cool banana-seat 70s bike of my youth
• tents r pitched, campfire'ss stocked w/ firewood + s'mores, chickens r in coop +meadow's ready for 25 2nd graders frm GatewaySchool 2morrow
• Celebrate Cousteau's 100th bday + listen 2 beautiful live recording of OceanVoices @calacademy http://bit.ly/4UawWT
• CarlSafina will be on Colbert this Tues night to discuss the oilspill and the impact on our small blue marble
• lots of people asking how 2 help re #oilspill: make next car gas-free, set up bike 4 commutes, ride train, tele-commute
• RT @ecostarchef @wallacejnichols Santa Clara, Panama had most pristine white sand beach weve encountered w/1000s of shells + 0 plastcbottles
• congrats to Max Younger, 2010 graduate of Barrington High School, a scholar + an athlete!
• Happy Birthday Captain Cousteau! HuffingtonPost:: What Would Jacques Do? 100 Years of Oil http://huff.to/bq81qK
• Google Crisis Response - Gulf of Mexico Oil Spillhttp://bit.ly/cqZRth
• The Spill, The Scandal and the President | Rolling Stone Politics http://bit.ly/dD0plv
• Scientists estimate that as much as 40,000 barrels of oil have been gushing daily from BP site
• Celebrating Oceans Week @calacademy with #PlasticCentury+ sustainable seafood panel tonight...wd love to hear some good news!
• Sea turtles die in oil without intervention, according to Dr. Stacy rescue vet, theyre attracted 2 where oil aggregates
• Biodiversity, Function +Interconnectedness: Revolution in Our Understanding of MarineEcosystems +OceanConservationhttp://bit.ly/cWKkVc
• Take the time 2 read this: Nigeria's agony dwarfs Gulf oil spill. The US + Europe ignore it | The Observerhttp://bit.ly/aYty7m
• overheard: wow, all those "radical" peace + environmental activists are looking pretty much right about that war+oil stuff huh?
• Take a moment 4 some happiness: Blackhawks R Stanley Cup Champions! Chicago Tops Flyers In OT http://huff.to/ch3ATd
• Our friend, Shrimper Diane Wilson, emailed + said she was arrested: Doused Herself With Oil in Spill Protest - CBS Newshttp://bit.ly/9kyoBp
• @fcousteau Dares 2 Drink, Will You?Plastic Century @CalAcademy Thursday night http://bit.ly/baNgcQ
• If we were logical future wd be bleak indeed-But were more than logical-We're human beings-We have faith-We have hope-We can work-JYCousteau
• in search of a 5-mile stretch of beach, anywhere in the world, that is 100% plastic-free: submit your nominations 2 me
• A Song to My Spider: http://bit.ly/9fAAWz
• Listen 2 the LIVE recording of the debut performance of OceanVoices @CalAcademy HERE: http://bit.ly/4UawWT
• just like the oil spill, plastic pollution requires the same Rx: stop the flow = evolve away from single-use disposable plastics + oil
• Int'l WaterkeeperAlliance Conf, LaPaz, Baja June 9-12: heroes of r water/ocean planet network, share then return 2 the fight
• Newsweek: What the Spill Will Kill (hint: birds, seaturtles fish wetlands + everything else in its path) http://bit.ly/aPlAlL
• On WorldOceansDay Capt Linda Greenlaw on NPR talking @ longlining 4 swordfish, but somehow no mention of overfishing or seaturtle bycatch
• It's WorldOceansDay: What Would Jacques Do? One Hundred Years of Oil #cousteau #ocean #oilspill http://huff.to/bq81qK
• PlasticCentury: a taste of the polluted oceans - Boing Boinghttp://bit.ly/a9SImh
• Oil Spill got you down? This will def help for 1 minute:http://bit.ly/brm951
• WorldOceansDay: Marine Advocates Speak on Major Threats: Oil, ClimateChange, Africa, Whaling, Awarenesshttp://bit.ly/9nkYPy
• Do Oil spills in Africa not matter? « myweku.comhttp://bit.ly/clHSRo
• When Grayce was 3, her first Spanish word was "dimeloqueerestu" (tell me what you are) said as if it was 1 word
• Were working w/ @fcousteau 2 plant oysters+turtles+mangroves: Students Dive @ Chance 2Restore Oyster Population VIDEO http://bit.ly/aRpVpU
• @fcousteau @pcousteau @celinecousteau @Blue_LegacyFabien-Celine-Alexandra+Philippe yr grandfather wd b proud of yr class passion+tenacity!
• DePauw University 2010 Ocean Commencement Address, 3 pts, posted on YouTube, if u want 2 relive that HOT Indiana day! http://bit.ly/a1MRJ6
• Celebrate Earth's Marble-ous Oceans this Week! - Animal News: BlueMarbles.org on Animal Planet ! http://bit.ly/af24x2
• @1bluemarble tomorrow is World Oceans Day, be sure 2 take care of your blue marble, send stories + photos to BlueMarbles.org
• Speech called 2010 #oilspill commencement addresshttp://bit.ly/a1MRJ6 as seaturtles+birds cont 2 die in Gulfhttp://huff.to/d8XzCb
• Would U Drink Water From 2030?Plastic Pollution in the Water? Drink Up! | Fast Company http://bit.ly/cLb03u
• @1bluemarble 4,500 #bluemarbles shared with DePauw grads + families VIDEO http://bit.ly/c0phii
• collect more images, memories, and friends, fewer things @chasejarvis
• "Waves r washing over plastic bags filled w/ tar + oil. It's crazy," said Mike Reynolds, director of Share The Beachhttp://bit.ly/cng3tr
• I used the word BLUE 17 times in the DePauw Univ commencement address, 5x referring 2 my dog Bluehttp://bit.ly/daDI4Z
• Risking catastrophe we drill a mi underwater 2 get 2 oil ultimately used 2 make mountains of garbagehttp://nyti.ms/98PtSy
• Biosphere Fndn ship, Mir heads 2 sea tomorrow early am from Manoe lIsland, Malta on 2 SuezCanal, Red Sea, Egypt, ETA in Singapore early Oct
• Hwy 1, windows down, shirt off, Aerosmith loud, ah California coast...
• 1st hand report from NOAA scientist who visited "ground zero" BP oil spill 2x: worse than reported by media, ocean fire + brimstone
• 2 restore seaturtles, release 1b more babies + protect turtles fr death in trawls/longlines plastic oilspills + huntinghttp://bit.ly/bZMvS4
• OceanVoices was on NPR's West Coast Live! yesterday, not sure where you can stream or d/l it now:http://bit.ly/bhDQO8
• Got a sweet note frm poet Billy Collins @ my commencement speech, You Are Lovers + Fighters, which mentions his workhttp://bit.ly/cX1dQj
• next time-shrimp #1 seafood +most destructive! RT @SeafoodWatch Were on NPRs Splendid able. Sorry couldn't cover everything @wallacejnichols
• ShrimpSuck.org NPR's Splendid Table interviewed @seafoodwatch ! but didn't talk@ r #1 seafood shrimp, or seaturtle bycatch in tuna longlines
• THE END (of the plastic bag) IS COMING SOON!
• Can we endure another plastic century? http://bit.ly/b4HVWZ
• The rise and rise of the Plastic Century, 1910 to 2010 + beyond... http://bit.ly/b4HVWZ
• we need 2 teach all children neuroscience, how their mind/brain works, how 2 calm it, how 2 feed it + that emotions r good...
• Great to see all the DePauw alumni out @0ceanVoices@calacademy last night! Thanks for the support!http://bit.ly/arZ4NJ
• family sailing 2morrow w/ David +Shawna of SeaLifeConservation, Manuel, Halsey +hopefully Lea, r u coming? http://bit.ly/cDoZ1E
• @fcousteau: Now, New York Is His Oyster - Green Blog - NYTimes.com http://bit.ly/bH8w9P
• Live Like You Love The Ocean « Envirovents Green Eventshttp://bit.ly/arZ4NJ
• working with Kiki Jenkins on her Conservation Technology Transfer for Fisheries project today...she rocks!
• When honoring one's childhood hero, there's only 1 way 2 do it: all out. Thank you JY Cousteau for 100 years of inspiration.
• When honoring one's childhood hero, there's only 1 way 2 do it: all out. Thank you JY Cousteau for 100 years of inspiration.
• Full and busy week for ocean voices and Cousteau tribute...today the chickens need some attention
• Full and busy week for ocean voices and Cousteau tribute...today the chickens need some attention
• Ocean Plastics Experts On Sunset Sail Saturday June 5 « Sealife Conservation http://bit.ly/aTehlF
• LIVBLUE: want 2 join us on Saturday night 4 a sail on the Monterrey Bay? Get in touch 4 details: sealifeconservation@gmail.com
• LIVBLUE: want 2 join us on Saturday night 4 a sail on the Monterrey Bay? Get in touch 4 details: sealifeconservation@gmail.com
• Thank you to our sponsor of the OceanVoices.org iPhone app MonkeyBusiness...it rocks, get it!
• Thank you to our amazing sponsors of OceanVoices @calacademy tonight, SchoolMessenger, OCEANA +Marisla OceanVoices.org
• #PlasticCentury installation is going in @CalAcademytoday...NightLife + OceanVoices tonight 2 celebrate Cousteau's 100th bday
• June 3rd: Sound artist captures voices of ocean in unique performance @CalAcademy of Sciences | abc7newshttp://bit.ly/bu5aFE
• Aloha, Hawaii: Hawaii Bans Shark Fins: First State In Nation To Do So http://huff.to/cVW7oc
• How'd we get here? Big Oil Rules DC: NOAA Director Toes BP Line; Won't Confirm Sub-Surface Oil Despite Evidence??http://huff.to/9wZM4n
• OceanVoices debut @CalAcademy of Sci will b jammin 2morrow in planetarium +pumped into aquarium 2http://bit.ly/4UawWT
• LIVBLUE: Find Your BLUE at The Ocean Portalhttp://bit.ly/98yFKn
• Dolphin, sea turtle deaths only the tip of the BP oil spill iceberg - National Wildlife Federation http://bit.ly/dhodvj
• Im honored 2b part of Plant A Fish, Fabien Cousteau's newly launched effort 2 restore ocean + educatehttp://bit.ly/dp4EQY•
• RT @Haleerichard: RT @Wise_Strides: Ocean Explorer @fCousteau Announces @PlantAFish: New Nonprofit 2 Restore +Protect http://bit.ly/9AOP4v
• Debut of OceanVoices @CalAcademy celebrating WorldOceansDay + Jacques Cousteau's 100th bday is 1 day away! http://bit.ly/c5n4ee
• Grayce + Julia + Fabien practiced fish faces @ dinner last night, very appropriate! @susanmcp1 @fcousteau@PlantAFish
• NewResearch: Global research priorities 4 sea turtles: informing management + conservation in 21st centuryhttp://bit.ly/cq2zZF
• that was YUMMY! RT @susanmcp1: C u soon! RT @wallacejnichols dinner 2nite in SF w/ @susanmcp1 + @fcousteau +family @ Millennium (vegetarian)
• tired of all the short +sweet ocean tweets? longer stuff, research, writing +media r archived on my blog: wallacejnichols.org
• working dinner tonight @ Millennium in SF (amazing vegetarian food) w/ @susanmcp1 + @fcousteau + family 2 talk @PlantAFish
• On June3 OceanVoices @CalAcademy kicks off month of WorldOceansDay + Cousteau's 100th bday celebrationshttp://bit.ly/4UawWT
• RT @ShrimpSuck: We admit it, for the Gulf, oil sucks more than shrimp! ShrimpSucks.org #oilspill #ocean #BP
• Globally we use 260+ million tons of plastic per year, accounting 4 approx 8% of world oil productionhttp://bit.ly/cTalxh
• BP CEO Tony Hayward (VIDEO): 'I'd Like My Life Back'http://huff.to/auCz0d There r millions of people+animals who'd agree!
• you have $10 + your goal is 2 help the ocean. what's your 1st move?
• RT @theslowcoast: in fall of '08 we took long, slow 4-day walk up the CA coast 2 SlowFoodNation 2 meet Alice Waters + SLOWCOAST.org was born
• pluckfastic CelineCousteau: 'So put down that plastic bottle and go do something positive for the seas!'http://bit.ly/baFdQt
• Experience Life Magazine: A Friend of the Seahttp://bit.ly/d7WNE1
• Celine Cousteau CNN Opinion: We can help to save our seas but we must act now - CNN.com http://bit.ly/baFdQt
• Gulf Oil Spill: Massive Underwater Plumes Spell Disaster, Scientists Say http://huff.to/cSzIrq
• Celebrate Jacques Yves Cousteau's 100th bday w/ us + 4000 ocean lovers + hear debut of OceanVoices @calacademy June 3rd http://bit.ly/4UawWT
• Is this the beginning of the end of the Plastic Century? Dare2drink 6.3.10 @calacademy Plastic never leaves.http://bit.ly/4UawWT
• The Weary Kind on my guitar with Grayce's help...http://bit.ly/c44PDc
• 0ceanvoices radio interview about OV aired this morning here in San Fran on KCBS news radio - http://bit.ly/bfcAJn
• Must say, the new chicken coop is looking quite stunning, for a simple redwood chicken coop : )
• Big push on banning plastic bags in California - we have until June 4th to get this done! http://bit.ly/cgAUCm
• If Gulf oil spill is "criminal activity" then what's global plastic pollution in oceans, known 2 Science since '74?http://huff.to/abCzml
• 2010 Ocean Commencement Address: move decidedly + strongly towards sustainability + away from fossil fuelshttp://bit.ly/cX1dQj
• Halsey is in SF 4 rehearsals w/ musicians, counting down 2 June 3rd, Ocean Voices @calacademy http://bit.ly/4UawWT
• There's local and there's organic, and there's SLOWCOAST
• Our neighbor Butch Huff just dropped off some SLOWCOAST goat cheese and cajeta for Jamie to create with
• Celebrity Chef Jamie Smith has arrived to prepare a SLOWCOAST dinner using slow heat (our fallen alders) for our Gateway School guests
• the rest is silence
• LIVBLUE: we agree, it is full court press time re plastic and oil pollution in the ocean, keep up the pressure on every front
• LIVBLUE: California is poised to ban plastic shopping bags!http://bit.ly/bjmoQj
• I love my big beautiful family xo
• LIVBLUE: Phillippe Cousteau To Bill Maher: Even Before Oil Spill, The Oceans Couldn't Take Any Morehttp://huff.to/9xzxq2
• Dare to Drink? Find our Plastic Century at CAS, June 3rd and June 10th : What Sarah Sees http://bit.ly/aiTn6b
• "History doesn't repeat itself, but it does rhyme." Mark Twain
• Is eating wild Alaskan salmon in Florida or Maine lobster in Malibu sustainable?
• the oil spill underlines the need to think about both food miles + plastic when making sustainable, organic food choices
• Visionary Activist - Live Like We Love the Ocean! Poignancy is kinship KPFA 94.1 FM Berkeley: FreeSpeechRadiohttp://bit.ly/bQk0bS
• Grayce and I are cruising down PCH to Laguna Beach in our white VW bug, Herbie...to see the Hoy Clan 4 Jody's memorial
• Congrats to Dr. Stuart Candy, futurist extraordinaire !
• CNN live oil leak cam doesn't look so good
• spent a wonderful hour w/ Caroline Casey on her radio program Visionary Activist on kpfa.org discussing ocean + oil + plastic + turtles
• it is Rachel Carson's birthday, and it was a full moon when she was born
• HuffingtonPost: 12 Connections Between Oil Spills and Plastic Pollution http://huff.to/9NznCt
• I'll be on Visionary Activist Show @2 pm PDT TODAY 94.1www.kpfa.org talking about ocean, Cousteau, Rachel Carson, oil spill + fullmoon
• Mother Mother Ocean, We have heard your call... LIVBLUE.org
• The moon governs Ocean tides, movement, reproduction...think on our burning Ocean during tonight's full moon
• Grayce and I are at @calacademy for interview with ABC-KGO TV News about Ocean Voices
• Gulf spill is "officially worse" than Exxon Valdez spill in Alaska
• Looking for a quiet landline near SJC airport to use for a radio interview about ocean/oil spill at 2pm PST...any ideas?
• I need a quiet land line 4 a national radio interview @ ocean + oil spill at 2pm PST near the San Jose, CA Airport email me wjn3@me.com tx!
• Feeling Edgy? WANTED: Citizens of a Post-Plastic Society. Must Love Edges. http://bit.ly/d1NwOn
• RT @ShrimpSuck "if u kill the shrimp u kill fish that feed off shrimp, that wd b a disaster" Capt Dix: then y do u bottom trawl like madmen
• Wonders who has the best 2010 DePauw Commencement/Sauna/Sweatfest Tanlines...I saw a few across the forehead that were solid
• Happiness is finding part of a warm pupusa that the kids left in the back seat
• NPR: Ray LaHood, Sec of Transp says US will b cnxtd by hi speed interurban rail in the next decade or 2...about time!
• LIVBLUE: Wanted: Citizens of a Post-Plastic Society. Must Love Edges. http://bit.ly/97872Y
• nice morning: vSkype w/ Celeste's Science class in KY, meeting w/ ThayerWalker from SummitSeries + phone interview w/ Ariel from FastCompany
• Pensif (=thoughtful) Salaam (=peace) Abrazos (=hugs)
• Had an am video Skype session w/ Celeste Lawson's 8th Grade Science Class TK Stone Middle Sch E-town, Kentucky talking seaturtles +oilspill
• Teacher Angie Rizzo rewarded 4 teaching students 2 respect ocean, travels frm Indiana 2 SF 4 Cousteau's birthday partyhttp://bit.ly/9YTKr6
• An Ocean Commencement Address: seaturtles, oil spill, plastic pollution, lovers + fighters 4 r 1bluemarblehttp://bit.ly/de2POW
• Please make Sylvia Earle interim emergency president of US + Carl Safina her VP til we get our ocean protected, then Obama can have it back
• wow, lotta rain falling on us today
• OceanVoices: The Power Of Stories, NH Public Radio: Word of Mouth: oil, plastic, music, Cousteau http://bit.ly/94vYG7
• Full mp3 audio of the commencement address at DePauw, Lovers+Fighters, BlueMarbles, ocean planet...http://bit.ly/cZr5WI
• Living Blue is Better LIVBLUE.org
• Escaped goats on hwy 17
• Clips from Sunday's address: J. Nichols '89 Urges DePauw's Class of 2010 to "Love and Fight" http://bit.ly/azQvZ9
• One of the kids @ HanoverElementary asked if I was CITY or COUNTRY, I said 'what do u think?' He said COUNTRY +kicked my cowboy boots w/ his
• On my way to Hanover, Indiana to meet with the Ocean Voices winners
• RT @1bluemarble: @wallacejnichols '89 Urges DePauw's Class of 2010 to "Love + Fight", Make Our Stand 4 Our Blue Marblehttp://bit.ly/cIXkVj
• Hanging out with the amazing 402 at the Duck!!!!
• You can watch DePauw's Commencement Sunday 1pm EST on Live Webcast, my speech is titled "You Are Lovers + Fighters"http://bit.ly/cAAQeJ
• saw our friend Carl Safina on CNN, fighting for the ocean we love at congressional hearings on Gulf oil spill:http://bit.ly/cr2CHm
• You Are Lovers + Fighters: DePauw's 171st Annual Commencement is Sunday | The Indianapolis Starhttp://bit.ly/dBGiut
• DePauw Class of '89: it feels a lot like the day before our commencement, except you're not here : ( similar heat/humidity/economic forecast
• ecotravel @seeturtles Saving Sea Turtles, Creating Jobs, Changing Lives: http://huff.to/98bNMh (via @huffingtonpost@wallacejnichols)
• meeting w/ our friends @ EndangeredSpeciesChocolate (mmm) then over 2 Greencastle to hang out w/ DePauw biology major graduates!
• Enough, Mr. President | El Phoenix Sun http://bit.ly/ceIoTE
• SchoolMessenger Awards OceanVoices ClassroomContest GrandPrize 2 Angela Rizzo frm Southwestern Elem School, Hanover, IN http://bit.ly/a7qZ3A
• Train arriving in Indianapolis Union Station, where I'll walk a few steps, shower + go 2 sleep in my converted Pullman train car hotel room
• Train stop in Crawfordsville, home of DePauw's arch rivals, Wabash College...I could walk the rest of the way to Greencastle.
• Indianapolis tonight, then Greencastle for DePauw commencement, Hanover on Monday then home...
• Indiana has fed me in many ways
• The feel +sound +camaraderie of travel by train is more like ship travel than auto or plane. I know that may seem obvious, but there it is.
• Traveling by train thru rural Indiana past long straight flat country roads makes me nostalgic 2 ride my bicycle in a big gear all day long
• Train Journey continues: Chicago Union Stn to Indianapolis Union Stn, should arrive round midnight. What day is it?
• Almost to Chicago, then change trains to Indianapolis for the home stretch
• Rolling into Naperville, IL familiar territory...
• After 50 hours on the train, kindness prevailed and the guy put the coffee in my ceramic mug. LIVBLUE!
• Just passed a train pulling 50 full coal cars through Illinois corn fields...this train trip has been an energy transect across the US
• Crossing the mighty Mississippi River from Iowa into Illinois
• My hotel room tonight is a refurbed Pullman train car in Union Station in Indianapolis, better than the seat in this train car past 2 nights
• Glad I brought plenty of Endangered Species Chocolate and coconut water on this trip
• Rolling through rainy green Iowa http://twitpic.com/1pff7l
• Up with the late night train crew and a banjo player on into Lincoln, Nebraska
• 2 days on this train, 1 more to go til I reach my destination, Union Station in Indianapolis where my hotel room's a coverted train car
• I think Amtrak could do one car as a 25m lap pool, that and letting me sit on the roof and use my own coffee mug = happy train guy
• Wonder if there's any way I can climb on top of this train car in Denver w/ my hat, mangoes +coconutwater +ride the rest of the way 2 Indiana•
• Short unplanned stopover in Denver for dinner, any recommendations near Union Station?
• Herd of bison, a couple of antelope, some windmills, fenceposts, grass and hills for the day
• HELP...ME...I...CAN'T...STOP...EATING...THESE...DRIED...MANGOES
• The SEEturtles.org Project has reached a great milestone, $100k of support for our partners http://bit.ly/aICDsi
• Tried to get coffee in my own cup on Amtrak and the guy said he had to put it in a cup w/ plastic lid that I could throw away, no thanks!
• Did you ever notice that the position markers in Google Earth are blue marbles? BlueMarbles.org
• Some r afraid 2 fly, r avoiding security, like train food + views, 4 some it's nostalgia, time 2 spare + others don't fit in airplane seats
• Breakfast in Wyoming
• (from a train somewhere east of Reno, NV)http://twitpic.com/1p089b
• Short stop in Reno...air is cleaner on the train due to smokers taking a break on the platform
• A bulldozer hit a bridge so they're saying r train will reroute through Wyoming...guess that's better than a volcanic dust cloud
• About to enter a two mile long tunnel to the other side of the range http://twitpic.com/1oz2so
• Into the snowy mountains, coming up on Truckee, CA
• Chinese railroad men worked harder and ate healthier said the man narrating my train journey to Chicago
• Wish my girls were on the train with me!
• Auburn, CA: gold rush central
• Through our first train tunnels, fun
• When we reach the continental divide, I'll give me fellow Amtrak passengers blue marbles ; )http://twitpic.com/1oxt4a
• A 56 hour train ride cross country is like a marathon game of chat roulette
• California Zephyr train is pulling in to Davis, CA stationhttp://twitpic.com/1oxe8p
• Mood ring = bright iridescent blue
• Steel and concrete quickly give way to buckeye trees then wetlands and low brown hills with windmills
• Just departed on California Zephyr train from the Emeryville, CA station for Greencastle, IN via Chicago
• my mood ring, a gift from Julia, is blue-ish purple right now
• sleeping next to the train station tonight to the sound of whistles...train leaves in the am for Indianapolis
• Its a positive move but lets keep in context" said Kent Wells BP VP "Were @ shutting down flow of oil from this well"http://huff.to/bPSipW
• OCSC SAILING Salon - Oceans, Blue Marbles and Hope Spots | OCSC Sailing Blog http://bit.ly/dryytc
• I almost made it to the end with dry eyes, but not quite, thanks to Lisa for sharing http://bit.ly/bdx3t5
• @1bluemarble What does the Earth look like to the human eye from 1 million miles away? From i billion miles it's a tiny blue dot.
• If you have ever been a baby, go see BABIES the movie, you'll enjoy it!
• Fun talk on the ocean, hope spots, oceanophilia tonight at OCSC...blue marbles for everyone!
• @futuryst excited to confirm May-June @gaffta residency for art-futures-science collaboration w/ @dunagan23@sarahhere and @wallacejnichols
• Does anyone in congress have more than their ears pierced? A tattoo?
• A floating plastic bag looks very much like a jelly fish, which is also a sea turtle’s favorite food http://bit.ly/9zeFt0
• HuffingtonPost: Gut Feeling: We're All Ocean Activists Nowhttp://huff.to/aWA7rE
• LIVBLUE Event at OCSC on Tuesday, June 30th | OCSC Sailing Blog http://bit.ly/cH0KsA
• Working with the Gray Area Foundation on some interesting projects, more soon... http://bit.ly/a6qE11
• my dream house (I like to chop wood) PHOTOhttp://bit.ly/cvpbL1
• US spends $2 billion a day on military... Por que?
• Speaking 2nite @ Bubbles&Bivalves: Fundraiser 2 benefit Watershed Project's innovative oyster restoration + educationhttp://bit.ly/cpjvMw
• I ordered 4,500 azure blue recycled glass marbles for DePauw commencement speech, are you ready? BlueMarbles.org
• Seriously, there must b a dozen expeditions sailing round the world raising awareness @ PlasticPollution right now. So COOL.
• OceanGybe: A Global Research & Outreach Expedition 2 Protect the World's Oceans http://bit.ly/aTZwg0
• RT @0ceanvoices: sneak peek of upcoming OV performance @calacademy - http://bit.ly/cTnqlk - 22 days!
• really looking fwd 2 taking a SLOW train frm CA to Indiana next week 4 commencement @ DePauw...but gimme a bullet train any day!
• @Oceana #oceanhero bio of the day - meet Junior finalists, the @GreenChimneys finatics! http://bit.ly/cRcDxo
• RT @pluckfastic: new research shows 1/3 of necropsied endangered leatherback sea turtles have plastic inside? plastic bags r most common
• Support our friends at HumanLab - Download The Love EP on iTunes, Live Well, Love Much http://bit.ly/9g3blh
• hear the ocean in a way you've never imagined: OceanVoices.org debuts June 3rd @calacademy
• advised Robert Talbot + Ang Lee on some ocean aspects of upcoming film adaptation of Life of Pi...can't wait, great book brilliant director
• Davenport man celebrates his inspiration, Jacques Cousteau, at Academy of Sciences performance - Santa Cruz Sentinelhttp://bit.ly/arGNz1
• Boo says if you keep wiggling you get wigglier
• just watched final cut of BeautifulWave.com Film about sea turtles+ surf + family w/ Dave + Lynn, Boo fell asleep on floor, I get the couch
• Boo, after reading the airline Safety Instructions said "I don't really want to do that water evacuation...What happens to the plane?"
• Elena Kagan, seems like a solid choice for SCOTUS
• If you have a tv watch Into the Deep on PBS tonight
• Listening to Nirvana with Boo at SFO airport en route to LAX for work on documentary film
• biggest oil spill on planet in form of plastic pollution, spread thru every ocean basin + washing up on every beachhttp://huff.to/9NznCt
• Underwater Paradox CBS News: saying oil rigs r oasis in ocean is akin 2 saying dodging bullets is good exercisehttp://bit.ly/92uITK
• RT Mother's Day's best holiday cuz we celebrate my adoptive Mother, biological Mother, my daughters' Mother + Mother Ocean all on 1 day
• Psssst, Mr. Obama: tap the defense budget. We can be out of this recession in the morning. truthout: http://bit.ly/95ujNp
• Wild Well Control, Inc. built the big BP ocean floor "box" to "control" the oil http://bit.ly/9Kb5PW
• Sara Rocks! RT @Oceana: Meet today’s fabulous #oceanherofinalist, Sara Bayles of @thedailyocean http://bit.ly/ds3CWd
• 4 years we've been spilling oil in the form of plastic + crude into the global ocean + it's killing r blue planethttp://huff.to/9NznCt
• Mother's Day's best holiday cuz we celebrate my adoptive Mother, biological Mother, my daughters' Mother + Mother Ocean all on 1 day
• How BP Works Washington - Newsweek.comhttp://bit.ly/cJJ9BK
• bought my train ticket on California Zephyr Line 2 get me 2 DePauw 2010 commencement, 56h of chillax frm here 2 Indyhttp://bit.ly/8XF2lR
• The Daily Ocean: Help send Sara to Sacramento to lobby against plastic pollution! http://bit.ly/a1ZvQT
• HuffingtonPost: Gulf Coast Shrimpers Or BP Oil Spill 2 Blame 4 Sea Turtle Deaths? Answer: BOTH + Plastichttp://huff.to/cCEQZi
• Going to swim while listening to Jonah Leher's How We Decide (again)
• Today was all about fears of spreading Greece and oil
• Listening 2 NeilDiamond sing Forever in Bluejeans in LAX on iphone, makes 4 a funny soundtrack that no one knows they're strutin to
• RT @DianeN56: USAID Encourages Private Sector in SeaTurtle Conservation: http://bit.ly/d4m3eK We just launched Billion Baby Turtle Project!
• Are you ready for an ocean revolution?
• full fantatsic day with @fcousteau, the sea turtle team and children in El Salvador full of inspiration and hope for the ocean
• Talking about blue marbles + ocean revolutions at Turning The Tide 2010 ~19:00 in VIDEO: http://bit.ly/cT11jS
• great day in El Salvador w/ FUNZEL team + @fcousteau, Billion Baby Turtle Project...watching CNN, is Giuliani 4 real? Never watched him b4
• Effects of petroleum on the development and survival of marine turtle embryos. Fritts, TH | McGehee, MAhttp://bit.ly/cIbnlu
• @11count Smooth…so smooth....just like the ocean under the moon.
• Go Indiana! RT @0ceanvoices: Indiana is the front-runner 4 the School Messenger Ocean Voices contest -http://bit.ly/b1TC6L
• DISCOVER Magazine: Beyond Politics: Oil, Water, Shrimp + Sea Turtles: http://bit.ly/axXgow
• The Ocean Voices iPhone app is available 4 free from the AppStore, grab it + share your ocean ideas + dreams w/ us + the world
• En route to ElSalvador to meet up with@fcousteau, the FUNZEL team and the country's business and political leaders to help sea turtles
• 500 voices+ a planetarium+ an iPhone app+ a violin guitar cello+ a technomusical genius+ a marine biologist= OceanVoices.org
• woman's baby just threw up a gallon of stuff in her face on r plane...been there...lent them a hand or 2, memorable moments of parenthood
• Thank you SaveOurShores.org for successfully fighting oil drilling along our home coast way back in 1978!
• From a marketing point of view I am thoroughly impressed by the oozing stickiness of the chant "Drill, Baby, Drill"
• BP Oil Disaster Threatens Survival of Gulf’s Sea Turtleshttp://bit.ly/914p4A
• getting organized for redeye trip to El Salvador with @fcousteau to meet with our sea turtle + ocean-protecting friends there
• we're all Ocean Activists now
• LIVBLUE: no one likes to surf in an oil slick
• Hanging out with a beautiful big Great Blue Heron at Pigeon Point Bluffs
• LIVBLUE: what if we put wind and wave turbines on all of the oil rigs?
• Working late tonight on Ocean Voices in the planetarium with Hals at California Academy of Sciences, looks and sounds amazing
• meeting Halsey Burgund @calacademy tonight 2 run through @0ceanvoices project in planetarium after hourshttp://bit.ly/4UawWT
• Helping out with the Children's Hospice fundraiser this morning
• A Crash Course in Oceanography for the US: Gulf Stream May Send Oil Spill Up East Coast http://huff.to/cc6tDu
• How can we dance when our Earth is turning, How do we sleep while our Ocean's burning? http://huff.to/av5nqa
• Seriously, Arizona...
• J was the last of the 26 letters to be added to the modern Latin alphabet, phew!: http://bit.ly/9A3RGN
• Santa Cruz County Plastic Bag Ban Gains Approval | Save Our Shores http://bit.ly/cnTcLI
• HuffingtonPost: 12 Connections Between Oil Spills + Plastic Pollution http://huff.to/9NznCt
• great chat + planning call w/ @fcousteau about our upcoming trip to El Salvador + the Billion Baby Turtle Project
• HuffingtonPost: @WallaceJNichols: The Ocean is Burninghttp://huff.to/av5nqa
• Pls share this link w/ any educators u know 4a chance 2 join us 4 WorldOceansDayhttp://www.schoolmessenger.com/oceanvoices
• LIVBLUE: I didn't say "don't eat", I said "don't eat stuff that destroys our ocean" >> support the CLEANEST businesses + fishermen
• @ShrimpSuck September 2-6, 2010 is the 75th Annual Louisiana Shrimp & Petroleum Festival: http://www.shrimp-petrofest.org No joke.
• it's time to get much more wiley. know what I mean?
• HuffingtonPost: The Ocean is Burning http://huff.to/av5nqa

April 29th

• Beautiful Wave's Official website is live, this is a feature film I worked on @ sea turtles, family + surfing http://bit.ly/ddYjbc
• RT @KevinTConnor: Here's the new @Oceana PSAhttp://bit.ly/c38K4h Check it out + make the pledge! Retweet the heck out of this! #oceanhero
• Friend+colleague AlexGaos rocks our research in Goa, India: Satellite telemetry shows where ETP hawksbills gohttp://qik.com/video/6353783
• Sound of rain, helicopters, chainsaws, mountains, big trees crashing...salvage logging, post fire in the Santa Cruz Mountains
• RT @DianeN56: RT @pluckfastic Into the Blue: Submit your 60 second video about plastic bags & win a New FlipCamera!http://bit.ly/aNB0p7
• 7 Animals Being Eaten To Extinction: Turtleshttp://huff.to/cudf3r
• Bubbles & Bivalves: A fundraiser 2 benefit The Watershed Project's innovative oyster restoration + education programhttp://bit.ly/a22XQB
• Thank you for your great work Sealife Conservation: Marine Conservation + Science Under Sail http://bit.ly/d6WKpf
• Honored to be included w/ this great group of OceanHeroes: Vote 4 Heroes: Thanks Oceana! http://bit.ly/dj0wlj
• Honored to be included w/ this great group of OceanHeroes: Vote for Heroes: Oceana North America http://bit.ly/dj0wlj
• 2 Sacramento 2 support AB2138, the PlasticOceanPollution Reduction, Recycling + Composting Act + AB1998, the PlasticBag ban
• an experiment, Q: What do u do when yr upcoming commencement speaker "friends" u on fb? A: cool-accept B: wtf-reject! C: it depends
• Meeting up w/ ocean revolutionary Kyle Thiermann: surfer, ocean activist + recipient of 2010 Peter Benchley BlueVision YouthAward
• Huffington Post: Wallace J Nichols: The Planet Will Be Fine? http://huff.to/9zucMb
• Forbidden sea turtles: Traditional laws pertaining to sea turtle consumption in Polynesia by RW Rudrud in Conservat Sochttp://bit.ly/cCvuba
• meeting up with surfer Chris Malloy near Jalama in 2003 while we walked the coast from Oregon 2 Mexico:http://bit.ly/cvXRK1
• ProCaguama: por una pesca responsable, a model 4 sea turtle conservation from Baja California's Grupo Tortuguerohttp://bit.ly/cLrNtZ
• I uploaded a YouTube video -- Hawaiian Chant Practice by Grayce http://youtu.be/epqKeaPgjVI?a
• +seaturtles! RT @almeyda64 @OurOcean So amazing! @wallacejnichols LIVBLUE Restord 100-yr-old boat 2 monitor coralreefs http://bit.ly/a9mDv1
• LIVBLUE: Restored 100-year-old boat to monitor coral reefs for Biosphere Foundation http://bit.ly/bwjTgk
• breakfast with Jered and Nancy from Pie Ranch, and the kids, perfect day on the SlowCoast.org
• @theslowcoast Greg Brown: Your Town Now: Ah, the small and local must survive somehow http://bit.ly/csXt45
• Colombia proposal sparks concerns: migratory stop 4 humpback whales, new plan 4 deep-water port http://bit.ly/bnRrCb
• one more: "Spring has returned. The Earth is like a child that knows poems." -Rainer Maria Rilke
• "It's a tremendous act of violence to begin anything. I'm not able to begin. I simply skip what should be the beginning" -RainerMariaRilke
• "I hold this to be the highest task for a bond between two people: that each protects the solitude of the other." -Rainer Maria Rilke
• "All the soarings of my mind begin in my blood." -Rainer Maria Rilke
• @pluckfastic How to make a difference - Beyond plastic bags: stopping plastic pollution at source - The Ecologisthttp://bit.ly/97y8qy
• @0ceanophilia "If you go back far enough, everything lived in the sea: watery alma mater of all life" -Richard Dawkins
• HuffPo: Plastic Logic: once we begin moving towards solution 2 #plasticpollution there'll b no stopping ushttp://huff.to/c9n5vk
• I think it's time to re-re-re-read Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet, a book that's in been in my blood since high schoolhttp://bit.ly/9e5NEQ
• 2 word response 2 exploding burning sinking oil rig in Gulf: 'Nissan Leaf'...thoughts 4 missing workers + their families
• HuffingtonPost: I've Got an #EarthDay Hangoverhttp://huff.to/czqBtJ
• call MarbleKing.com for many, email me yr address for one, help us get to 1 million RT @VillaNavarrete: @wallacejnichols I need a marble
• Send us photo of yrself @ DisneyNature’s film OCEANS + receive special WorldOceansDay blue marble, more info BlueMarbles.org
• RT @theslowcoast: SlowCoaster Jim Cochran of Swanton Berry Farm is one 40 people who are redefining green | Gristhttp://bit.ly/9ar9Tb
• No, we do NOT want this on the California coast! Burning oil rig sinks in Gulf of Mexico - CNN.com http://bit.ly/a0Z5l7

April 22nd

• Nor is shrimp, the #1 seafood in the US RT @kevfly: Alexandra Cousteau: Tuna is not a sustainable alternative...http://bit.ly/bYWnwI
• happy 2 get 7 of the 14 chickens out of my office + into their new coop, was getting kind of loud, hard 2 have a serious phone convo
• Spooky: what's EarthDay spelled backwards? Google it and check the first link
• LIVBLUE: Earth Day 2010: 9 Reasons Why Blue Is The New Green (PHOTOS) http://huff.to/9K2azq
• explained to 5 year old Julia that it sperm fertilizes an egg to make an embryo, which grows into a baby. She said: "I just don't get it."
• RT @0ceanophilia : ( RT @pluckfastic New research: plastic garbage patch/vortex/gyre in all oceans, on land, sea + in us not patch after all
• RT @pluckfastic: seriously, wouldn't it b great if @ end of DisneyNature's new film, OCEANS it said "Now, take action: pluckfastic.org"
• RT @pluckfastic: here's link/url that shld B on screen at end of Disney's OCEANS film, but they forgot it:http://pluckfastic.org
• let's make the other 364 days of the year 'Earth Days' and April 22nd can be the one day we're allowed to act like idiots ; )
• my recent contribution 2 HuffPo: Our Plastic Ocean Turns Forty, #plasticpollution OLD problem looking 4 NEW solutionshttp://huff.to/cIZOpU
• @0ceanvoices another new Ocean Voice -http://bit.ly/95PZVU - 43 days until the premiere performance! oceanvoices.org
• @0ceanophilia Bringing Conservation into the Classroom with Disneynature's "Oceans" http://bit.ly/dCfWXf

April 20th, Deepwater Horizon explodes

• + Deep Blue, the theatrical release/reedit RT @surfartist: @wallacejnichols u shd check Blue Planet series if u want 2 c an important film
• Great conversation with the team from SealifeConservation.org about the path to post-plastic society
• Offshore Drilling Not the Answer: Tuesday, APRIL 20, 7-8 p.m. First Congregational Church, 900 High Street, Santa Cruzhttp://bit.ly/9B7NiO
• GoldmanPrize: congrats Randall, Lynn, Humberto, Malgorzata, Sereivathana + Thuli SF OperaHouse has never more beautifulhttp://bit.ly/cvQUUW
• Fact: Disney's OCEANS is a film @ r planet's ocean. Opinion: it's the most important film of r time b/c we live on an ocean planet
• Win a Free Trip to SEE Turtles in Costa Rica or Baja!http://bit.ly/9Ss0LH
• Peter Etnoyer + his blue marble: The Largest Habitats on Earth | Deep Sea News http://bit.ly/cVGg6x
• Get tix early 4 our June 3rd WorldOceansDay/OceanVoices NightLife event @calacademy http://bit.ly/9fK6X8
• Night pie on the Slow Coast
• @oceanshaman @wallacejnichols.#Beach Concession Stands in #PalmBeach County #Florida give no straws w/ any of their drinks:to protect wildlife. #green
• Calling all teachers! Win a trip to attend debut of Ocean Voices: http://bit.ly/aTyo5w
• Goldman Prize honors our friend Randall Arauz for his work to save sharks and sea turtles USATODAY.comhttp://bit.ly/bAdFDC
• RT @theslowcoast: No chain stores, no fast food outlets + no golf courses on the SlowCoast. Not one. We like it that way: SlowCoast.org
• RT @pluckfastic: Global study: three-fourths of ocean trash is plastic: pluckfastic.org: http://bit.ly/aKEzTl
• EO Wilson: successful scientist thinks like a poet and works like a bookkeeper
• GoldmanPrize2010 winners include our pal Randall Arauz!http://bit.ly/aXv3IU
• There's a man in a black suit and a black tie wearing white shoes sitting in the sun
• To Tiburon for a reception for one of the 2010 Goldman Award winners...a true ocean warrior and friend
• Julia keeps her favorite flies in her jewelry box
• HuffingtonPost: Disney's Oceans is the most important film of our time http://huff.to/coEcsL
• LIVBLUE: Disney’s OCEANS is the most important film of our time. Live like you love the ocean. http://bit.ly/9gIFlV
• Nice planet, let's keep it
• NPR: the ROI on drugs/treatments that cure disease is too low for big pharm, who prefer drugs u will take every day 4 rest of yr life
• headed to a pre-release screening of Disney's OCEANS with a gang of ocean-loving friends
• Congrats to our friend Josh Donlan on his brand new Guggenheim Fellowship!! http://bit.ly/cGqCne
• Scientific concerns @ PlasticPollution + Ocean Garbage Patch in Atlantic date back 40 years = we're slowhttp://bit.ly/d06pkX
• Can we elect a "hive mind", radically transparent governor? I think it would be AMAZING : Planet Green http://bit.ly/9KJYi5
• The US should have a K through 12 neuroscience curriculum...to jumpstart a democratic neurorevolution
• Just as important as environmental education is teaching kids @ how their mind/brain works, so that they're less likely 2 b tricked by ads
• We need to shift the focus from the plastic in the "gyres" to our lives, fast
• #ttt2010 we'll know we are making progress when we hear kids ask "Dad, what's a Coke?"
• Andrew Weil says that real change won't come to health care under mainstream political influence
• #ttt2010. Dr Andrew Weil is opening keynote...my former neighbor in Tucson, AZ
• planet doesnt need more successful people...desperately needs more peacemakers healers restorers storytellers + lovers of every kind -D. Orr
• Radio man says that in various places around the bay a deer, a branch and a blanket are blocking traffic
• @0ceanvoices: an Ocean Voice from northern India!http://bit.ly/ds4wgw - 50 days until the premiere! - oceanvoices.org
• Pumping Green Iron: California in the Post-Arnold Schwarzenegger Era : Planet Green http://bit.ly/9KJYi5
• Eating 4 the Environment | Santa Cruz Good Times: Reducing meat consumption to solve environmental problemshttp://bit.ly/9MWkNR
• RT @pluckfastic: The Patron Saint of Plastic Bags - TIMEhttp://bit.ly/acWO2Y
• 8 year old daughter Grayce left me a cryptic message written on back of envelope: "if it's we"http://tweetphoto.com/18442165
• HealtheBay: bill would phaseout use of single-use plastic, bioplastic + paper bags by 2012 http://bit.ly/ao7sHH
• Trampled by Turtles: "We're loud, we're a lot louder than a traditional bluegrass band on stage." http://bit.ly/d1vxKb
• Onward in Audacity: Ocean hope at Mission Blue: A collaboration experiment comes good http://bit.ly/8ZjiXT

April 14th

It’s All Connected, Redux

Wed, 14 Jul 2010 12:29:45 -0400

A common question asked of scientists is how the oil spill will affect life in the Gulf.

My sense is that it will effect directly or indirectly, severely or slightly every single form of life in the Gulf, for many years to come. The air, the water, the sand, the mud, the microbes, the plankton, the marshgrass, the mangroves, the jellyfish, the oysters, the shrimp, the shorebirds, the turtles, the sharks, the redfish, the children, the fishermen, the chefs, the taxi drivers, the artists, the oil industry workers, the politicians. Every single bit and blob of life will be impacted. Save a few oil-eating microbes, no life will change for the better.

Some life will be killed immediately, others will suffer slowly. Some will move away, in search of food, in search of jobs. Some aren't able to move.

From a single hole, drilled into the bottom of the ocean 5000 feet underwater, gushes catastrophe.

The signature chemistry of the oil coming from the ill-fated Deepwater Horizon well, mixed liberally with the dispersant Corexit that has streamed into the ocean with it, can now be found on the shores of every Gulf state. It's in the bodies of thousands of species of sea life. It's in the mouths of hundreds of sea turtles. It's on the hands and feet and in the lungs of Texans, Louisianans, Mississippians, Floridians, Mexicans as well as all workers and visitors to the Gulf coast. The fact is we don't know exactly what that means for the health of those in harms way, or for the next generation. Testing on previous versions of Corexit mixed with oil indicate an additive effect. Together they're more toxic than alone. Previous studies suggest a whole range of ecocidal properties of this chemical soup, from the death of duck embryos to internal bleeding in humans.

A single error amplified and shared equally among individuals, bad apples, misinformed response teams, corrupt regulators, greedy executives, hypnotized politicians, misguided energy policies, and an oil-addicted society, has resulted in our nation's worst environmental disaster.

It's all connected. You've heard it before from ecologists, astronomers, physicists and metaphysicians alike. And the main reason so many thinkers from such diverse backgrounds find agreement on that point is this: everything is.

Each of us has used oil from the Gulf in a variety of joyful and productive ways. To visit grandma's house, to commute to work, to hold water, to make music or to save lives.

What we absolutely didn't have in mind at the time was disaster. My first hope is that one impact of the Gulf oil spill is that the very real line leading from our hands to the gas tank to the pump to the tanker to the rig in the middle of the ocean is somewhat brighter than before. And that that line now stretching from the rig, to the spill, to an asphalted salt marsh, to a dead industry, to a torn family is likewise clearer.

My other hope is that we can now see that all things are connected: us and nature and, unfortunately, oil. And there are much, much better ways to be connected.

Staring Down the Dragon on Dependence Day

Tue, 6 Jul 2010 00:42:07 -0400

On the night of the Fourth of July, I flew into New Orleans. I watched from above as fireworks sailed from below into the sky to celebrate Independence Day.

The young man from a small Louisiana coastal town sitting next to me said "I've never seen fireworks from above."

"Me neither."

"I've never been on a plane before this either," he added.

A few hours later I was back in the sky, this time flying above a different kind of fireworks. The kind that mourn our dependence.

Our small Cessna traced the coast of Louisiana and Mississippi, documenting the flow of oil and tar balls onto islands, wetlands, mangroves, beaches and the inadequacy of the bright yellow and orange booms floating here and there and more often than not, beachcast and twisted by the wind and waves.

One member of our team a government geologist studying the weathering of oil on seawater. One member of our team an environmental toxicologist. Our pilot, a NASA scientist herself. And myself, a marine biologist in search of sea turtles.

Bonny skillfully skirted the edges of thunderclouds and positioned our plane wherever we wanted it.

Down the oily coast we flew. Timbalier and Cat Islands, Grand Isle, the Mississippi River Delta, Chandeleur Islands. None of these places, and so many others, will be themselves for a long time.

Then we turned offshore, for deep water. Beneath us muddy water, oily water, oily muddy water. Then the edge, a giant convergence, between deep blue and shallower oily water for as far as we could see. There we found a school of forty cownose mantas, searching for food, traveling together. Without a doubt they have all eaten oil.

We flew further offshore. Closer to "ground zero," the site of the oil gusher and location of the ill-fated Deepwater Horizon.

I've spent my adult life working for the ocean, the endangered animals living in it, and the people who depend on it. I've seen the wholesale destruction of species by commercial fishing, illegal hunting of marine mammals and sea turtles, and the despoilment caused by plastic pollution. But none of that prepared me for this.

Our plane surveyed a path across the thousands of square miles of destroyed ocean habitat.

Then we descended a bit and flew over "ground zero", the site of the ill-fated Deepwater Horizon. A new platform has taken its place. A large flame of burning methane jetted from the side. Ships worked the waters all around. Bands of oil extended off into the distance, set off by the deep blue of the Gulf.

We were close. So close I could smell it. The cockpit filled with fumes. I breathed in the foul breath of the fire dragon. We buzzed the beast, like a pesky fly. Our small craft banked, circled back around for a closer look. This time I held my breath.

I thought of the tragic loss of human lives that occurred just below me eleven weeks prior. I thought of the massive loss of animal life that's already happened and will unfold throughout this ocean for years to come. I thought of the distraught fisherman who took his own life. I thought of the people below, working to stop the flow of oil, working to burn the oil on the surface. I thought about my daughters. I thought ten million other things at the same time. I felt like I was going to cry. Somehow I didn't, but I raged inside silently.

Eventually, I could hold my breath no longer and I sucked in the breath of the fire dragon again.

I will think of the Deepwater Horizon every time I smell that smell. Every time I pump gas into my tank, or ride my bike behind a truck on a busy street. At airports and bus stops. At BP, Exxon, or Chevron stations. It will keep me going in this ocean revolution, our collective effort to slay the dragon.

Petroholics Anonymous

Wed, 30 Jun 2010 12:58:26 -0400

by Wallace J. Nichols, Sarah Kornfeld and Andy Myers
Huffington Post  It might begin like this: "Hello, my name is [your name here]. I am a petroleum addict. I've tried Valvoline, Vaseline, kerosene, gasoline, jet fuel, diesel, and natural gas. I've even tried plastics."
The first step to recovery, after all, is admitting you have a problem. It's hard, but that's the way it goes.
Before any real recovery, of course, one must hit bottom -- the real kind of bottom, too, not the "worst hangover of my life, I'm never doing that again" bottom that always precedes a relapse.
In this case, true bottom is readily apparent in a Gulf of Mexico infused with toxic petroleum, in endangered sea turtles seared alive by controlled-burn cleanups, in the collapse of sea-based industries like oystering and tourism, in baby albatross bellies laden with indigestible, toxic plastic, and, of course, the telltale sign: our chief-addicts-in-charge babbling on CNN in complete denial, saying,"We're fine. We can handle it. It's really not as bad as it looks. We can stop anytime."
Except, we can't.
But, what if our government took the first step and heeded the intervention playing out before our eyes in the Gulf of Mexico and elsewhere? Several Presidents have admitted our addiction to oil, but none so far has had the 4:00am-man-in-the-mirror moment and said, "Enough."
Before we go on, let's define "addiction" so that we can understand our own complicity in setting the ocean ablaze and in robbing our children of their future.
ad·DIC·tion, noun: compulsive physiological need for and use of a habit-forming substance (as heroin, nicotine, or alcohol) characterized by tolerance and by well-defined physiological symptoms upon withdrawal; broadly: persistent compulsive use of a substance known by the user to be physically, psychologically, or socially harmful.
Sound like anyone you know? We're compulsive users for sure. And, yes, the substance is physically and socially harmful. If you look carefully, you will see the symptoms of tolerance and withdrawal, too: the ability to consume massive quantities, and the irrational, often-imagined pain reaction to quitting. When you are addicted, your body requires the chemical.
The dealers might be right, you know: the problem is us. We are addicts. This mega-industry is merely answering a societal need, just responding to an insatiable, albeit self-destructive demand. "If we don't do it, someone else will" they argue.
But, what if, for the sake of argument, we are not "addicts" at all, but rather hopelessly co-dependent on a gargantuan industrial complex and the mass production of petrochemicals? In that case, getting off the stuff wouldn't be as hard as we fear. What if beating the addiction was simply a matter of making different choices; choices that have been available to us all along, but actively and intentionally obscured by the dealers who don't want us to see them?
Clinically addicted or not, let's give it a shot. Let's kick the petroleum habit.
Here's our Twelve-Step Program fresh from International Petrolholics Anonymous:
Step 1. We admitted WE chose to feel powerless over oil and plastics--that our lives had become toxic and dependent.
Step 2. Came to believe that a Power greater than ourselves--lucidity and responsibility--and some voice deep inside whispering "oil is wrong" could restore us to sanity.
Step 3. Made a decision to turn our will and our lives over to the care of our individual communities, as we understood them.
Step 4. Made a searching and fearless moral inventory of our homes and lifestyles where oil and its products, such as plastics, were present.
Step 5. Admitted to ourselves, and to other human beings, the exact nature of our engagement with petroleum.
Step 6. Exorcised the need for a perceived "easier life" in favor of conscious living.
Step 7. Humbly admitted our shortcomings, our internal combustion engines and our bottled water.
Step 8. Made a list of all persons, animals, oceans, ozone, children, ourselves, plants we have harmed, and became willing to make amends to them all.
Step 9. Made direct amends to the entire living planet wherever possible.
Step 10. Continued to take personal inventory and, when we were wrong, promptly changed it.
Step 11. Sought--through the sale of our stocks in companies engaged in petroleum mining and production, reduction in the size and/or change in means of propulsion of our cars, refusal of single-use plastics, not feeling goofy for saying "no" to a straw, feeling good about using our own bags, not drinking water from plastic bottles--to improve our conscious contact with our one-and-only planet as we understood Her.
Step 12. Having had a spiritual/practical/pragmatic/reasonable awakening as the result of these steps, we tried to carry this message to people, and to practice these principles in all our affairs.
We can engage the patterns of addiction and do what millions of addicts have done: come to grips, band together, use a proven structure to free ourselves, hold ourselves and others responsible for toxic behaviors, and be relentless in our desire to change.
So, let's do it. Let's start Petrolholics Anonymous. Meetings can begin just about anywhere: in a cafe, a basement, or a patio starting tomorrow. It will work. Will you be there? If so, can you bring some guacamole and chips?

Plastiki Blog: OCEANOPHILIA = LOVE OF OCEAN

Sun, 27 Jun 2010 02:42:42 -0400

OCEANOPHILIA = LOVE OF OCEAN
June 26th, 2010, posted by Shore Crew
Tags: Oceans

I recently connected with Jo Royle of Plastiki, and as one might expect we found lots to discuss, a blue planet of common interest. In particular, we shared thoughts about that thing we feel when in-on-under the ocean. That wordless sense of place. That thing you don’t even need to explain to another ocean lover. Lately, however, I’ve been trying to put words, ideas and science to that feeling, and called it: Oceanophilia = love of ocean. In the interest of the 3R’s, I’m reusing (or is it recycling?) a blog entry from HuffPo on Oceanophilia for the Plastiki community. I look forward to your thoughts, or perhaps simply your knowing nods.

Read more HERE

Prayer for the Ocean?

Sun, 20 Jun 2010 13:37:35 -0400

Prayer for the Ocean? This is a time for corporate acts of confession

Wallace J. Nichols and Sarah Kornfeld

Last week the President addressed the nation from the Oval Office, outlining the cleanup in the Gulf, the realities of its negative impact on the environment, and the urgent need for reform. He ended his carefully crafted speech with a crystal clear call to action: prayer.

"The oil spill is not the last crisis America will face. This nation has known hard times before, and we will surely know them again. What sees us through -- what has always seen us through -- is our strength, our resilience, and our unyielding faith that something better awaits us if we summon the courage to reach for it. Tonight, we pray for that courage, we pray for the people of the Gulf, and we pray that a hand may guide us through the storm towards a brighter day," the President said.

He also referred to the tradition of the "blessing of the fleet" and the hopes of fisherpeople to weather great storms. This reference to prayers for the sea was meant to show respect to those in the Gulf. Yet this tradition of asking for prayer in the face of corporate illegality has become all too familiar and now very alarming.

Human beings have always sought and will continue to seek hope, spiritual intention, faith, humanism and facts in response to crises. But, the President missed a opportunity for greatness: the chance to use the world's largest megaphone to proclaim, "Oil is Dead." He failed to declare that the Century of Oil must come to an end. And, he did not take the rationalists' perspective that prayers and courage alone won't change our interdependency and addiction to petroleum, plastics, and all forms of oil-based products.

If the President would like us to pray, shouldn't we ask that all complicit government officials and corporate CEO's begin with public prayers of confession. The tradition of confession in prayer is well known and central to creating change and clarity in people and communities. It's not enough that "confession" has turned into senate hearings. No, what if it were more: what if the President laid the responsibilities of public prayer not on the American people, but on the corporate and government leaders who need it most?

We'd like to suggest a few prayers of confession that these people should make publicly in the wake of their violent, ecologically devastating act:

"Our mighty Mother Ocean," the prayer would begin...and might conclude with mea culpas along the lines of:

- "We confess to not heeding the wisdom of the prophets--the scientists--who told us this would happen."

- "We confess to greed and acts of war against this planet to maintain the flow of oil."

- "We confess to bearing false witness against our neighbors, and their children, through deceptive public relations strategies that hawk harmful oil-based plastic to them."

- "We confess to a failure of strategic planning, collaboration and commitment on climate change and to casting doubt upon the role of fossil fuels in that crisis."

- "We confess to burning sea turtles and to complicity in the extinction of sea life and cultures of the sea."

While such unlikely confessions would certainly make these leaders feel better, but it is not enough just to say, "I'm sorry". For confession to be whole, contrition must follow and the president must demand it.

Though the President has started to take a hard stand on BP, he should willingly accept the claims of heresy by the oil industry and declare: "the Reign of Oil is Dead." For, if the reign of oil is dead, then our ACTIONS as a nation, not just our prayers, may make some difference in freeing us from our corporate enslavement. If we believe that the reign of oil is dead perhaps then we may lead ourselves into the promised land: an oasis of hope where people of action will unite to protect and restore our Ocean Planet.

Related News:

President Obama's Oval Office Address on BP Oil Spill & Energy
CNN.com: Louisiana lawmakers propose prayer to stop oil disaster
Houston Chronicle: Texas Gov Perry stands by ‘act of God' remark about spill

What Would Jacques Do? 100 Years of Oil + Plastic

Tue, 8 Jun 2010 15:40:50 -0400

By Wallace J. Nichols, Sarah Kornfeld, Jake Dunagan and Stuart Candy

Jacques Yves Cousteau spent halcyon days gliding above and beneath the ocean. He lived among the largest mammals and sea drift. He was the master educator and voice for the sea. And so, on this, the 100th anniversary of his birth, it is a sorry state of affairs that we cannot celebrate the legacy of his ocean life, but instead it is the centennial of our own legacy with oil, plastic and associated toxins we must confront. One hundred years ago, 1910, the fossil-fuel-based plastics industry was born, as was Cousteau, and thus began the first plastic century.

Plastic is made from oil and gas, plain and simple, yet we do not think of oil or plastic pollution when we think of Cousteau. We think mostly of how he inspired wonder in us. We wondered at life aboard the Calypso with its salty crew. And, this wonder for the sea has engendered generations of people to become oceanographers, biologists, divers and simple lovers of the sea. But, if we do not make the serious connection -- now -- between the legacy of Cousteau and our legacy with petroleum we will sully the memory of the man.

Yet, the memory of the ocean was hardly what Cousteau was all about: he was really about the future of the ocean. He was always looking ahead -- not behind. He wanted people to have knowledge so that they could have foresight. His great genius was not that he made you want to go swimming today; it was that he inspired you to want to know deeply and explore constantly the ocean in the immediate future, and always.

"If we were logical, the future would be bleak, indeed. But we are more than logical. We are human beings, and we have faith, and we have hope, and we can work," he said.

Right now, however, we have our thinking backwards; we are watching a reckless and inane "clean up" of the Gulf of Mexico play out in slow motion. What can we imagine he would say right now? Would we listen? Would we nod our heads with a sense of security that the great man was leading us, teaching us, telling us how to get out of this mess? What would he do? Would we join him?

Who knows, but a good guess is that that great lover of the sea, and great pragmatist for the environment might be furious. Enraged. Heartbroken. One can imagine at the same time, the man rallying us to demand substantial legislative changes, responsible action from the oil industry, and a global systemic shift away from oil/plastic/toxins because our very lives depend on it. His line in the sand would be deep and long.

But, he's not here, is he? Yet, his 100th birthday is right before us. His legacy of an ocean is literally mired in the slick dependence we have on oil. So, let's make the list that a pragmatic leader like Cousteau might offer.

Let's do this:

• Tell someone each day what our Ocean Planet, our one and only blue marble, means to you. Describe how you love it, why you want to see it and hear it. Love is stronger than apathy, and your vision for the future of what you love can impact people. Use all of the media at your disposal to share your oceanophilia, get in on rallies, letter writing and vote for the ocean.

• Stop pouring toxins, any toxins, into the drains around you, onto your food, into your tank or into your body: you can show BP what responsibility looks like -- what you don't pour down the drain won't get to the ocean. "Think tank," you might say. Think about what goes in it and what comes out.

• Remember that great people leave Earth, but plastic never does. Reject straws, coffee lids, forks, or anything plastic you use once then throw away. First off, they are made of oil and gas and can make you sick. Second, when they end up in the ocean they make the ocean sick. Try as best you can to free your home, school and business of single-use disposable plastics.

The time is now for us, the lovers of the sea. We cannot wait for a great tide to take the oil, and our need for it, away to a magical place. And, we can't wait for the memory of great people to inspire us to change. We must honor their memory by doing something great ourselves.

Each of us must be Cousteau -- we must embody his legacy with a vision for the future: one that includes a world with a healthy, thriving sea. We must embody his memory -- a person who wanted a healthy, thriving future for the planet.

Ask yourself, "What would Jacques do?" Act as he would. Because we are all ocean activists now.

Wallace J. Nichols, Sarah Kornfeld, Jake Dunagan, and Stuart Candy, are a hybrid art- science-futures collaboration. Their installation Plastic Century is an interactive installation created for the California Academy of Sciences that explores the relationship between plastic, people, and the environment over the 100 years since the birth of Jacques Cousteau. The installation will be at the California Academy of Sciences June 3rd and June 10th. The Plastic Century Team is currently in residency at the Gray Area Foundation for the Arts (GAFFTA), in San Francisco.

WANTED: Citizens of a Post-Plastic Society

Wed, 26 May 2010 02:22:17 -0400

Wanted: Citizens of a Post-Plastic Society. Must Love Edges.

By Wallace J. Nichols, Sarah Kornfeld, Jake Dunagan and Stuart Candy

Who were the suave guys who first made the first marketing plan for the plastic age to come? It's easy to imagine an industrial-era confection sold to us by Mad Men -- slick, cynical, ambitious, and poised for ruin.

But let's look closer.

The following comes from a pioneering book, first published in 1941, envisioning the Future of Plastic.

"Plastic Man" [sic] will come into a world of colour and bright shining surfaces where childish hands find nothing to break, no sharp edges, or corners to cut or graze, no crevices to harbour dirt or germs ... The walls of his nursery, his bath ... all his toys, his cot, the moulded light perambulator in which he takes the air, the teething ring he bites, the unbreakable bottle he feeds from ... all will be plastic. (Plastics, Yarsley & Couzens 1941, p. 154)

Seventy years on, and the child dreamt up by Yarsley and Couzens in 1941 has come true. Our babies have all of their needs met by plastic. This much is certain. But whether our lives are that much safer, cleaner and better is far less clear. Our sterile, perfectly rounded, and edgeless plastic lives are not safer. In fact the opposite is true:

- People are polluted with chemicals showing up in human sperm abnormality, premature puberty, increased risk of breast cancer due to endocrine-disrupting compounds (phthalates and parabens) in skin care and shampoo products.

- Children face increased risks of cancer, reproductive disorders and concerns about brain development using baby bottles and pacifiers due to BPA.

- Plastic pollution can be found in varying amounts in every ocean basin, every beach in the world, and inside one third of endangered leatherback sea turtles.

- Plastic production has been increasing on an exponential curve for over a century, and is now around 250 Million tonnes per year, and still rising. A negligible percentage has been recycled and all of it still exists on Earth.

Was this really the future we wanted for ourselves? Were we mad? Or perhaps we were simply caught up in the momentum of an industry so exciting and full of potential that it seemed like it single-handedly reinvent society -- which, indeed, it has. Yet Victor Emmanuel Yarsley and Edward Gordon Couzens were not Madison Avenue advertisers, but applied chemists from Britain; scientists who really believed in the beauty of the world they were helping to create through plastic: "a world in which nations are more and more independent of localized natural resources, a world in which man, like a magician, makes what he wants for almost every need, out of what is beneath him and around him: coal, water, and air." (Plastics, Yarsley & Couzens, p. 158)

We now inhabit the world we supposedly wanted then. We donʼt have to wash the dishes. (Itʼs better we throw them away?) We have plastic straws. (Those paper ones leak?) We have plastic forks and knives. (Weʼll never cut ourselves again?) Everything we wanted turns out to have a hidden cost: our dreams are biting back. This plastic age is one of ironies at every turn, now revealed as a dangerous and unsustainable vision, a failed utopia. And, over the decades, the idea of making life safer, softer, and rounded with plastics has become a total Faustian nightmare.

In order to extract ourselves from the vortex of a plastic century, we must envision a post-plastic society. But this society will have "edges". Edges represent responsibility, reality, opportunities and the mature understanding that we cannot live in a plastic bubble. Our addiction to plastic is directly related to our fear of being hurt through exposure to the "harsh realities of life".

Fear of edges led to a plastic addiction that is choking the biosphere. Itʼs time to bring back edges.

Hereʼs a simple place to start:

1. Use and reuse glass, ceramic and metal containers. Refuse plastic bottles.

2. Teach your kids to use real forks and knives - theyʼll be fine! Add a full set of real flatware to your glove box, backpack or laptop case.

3. Are you really happier with a straw? Your new mantra: "Iʼll have a glass of tap water please. No ice, no straw, thank you." Loving edges doesnʼt need to mean being edgy.

4. Donʼt order collagen or silicone implants. Your evolving natural edges are most beautiful.

For the future of our planet, for the chance to live in a post-plastic society, let's reclaim our world and its edges from the Mad Men, scientists or not. Letʼs all meet in that world where we are not "Plastic People", but human beings, alive, and unafraid.

Wallace J. Nichols, Sarah Kornfeld, Jake Dunagan, and Stuart Candy, are a hybrid art- science-futures collaboration. Their installation Plastic Century is an interactive installation created for the California Academy of Sciences that explores the relationship between plastic, people, and the environment over the 100 years since the birth of Jacques Cousteau. The installation will be at the California Academy of Sciences June 3rd and June 10th. The Plastic Century Team is currently in residency at the Gray Area Foundation for the Arts (GAFFTA), in San Francisco.

You are Lovers and Fighters: Commencement Address

Sun, 23 May 2010 21:21:15 -0400

You Are Lovers And Fighters
DePauw University Commencement, 23 May 2010
Wallace J. Nichols
(AUDIO + VIDEO HERE)

Buenas dias.

Aloha.

Ni hao.

Good afternoon, y’all.

President Casey, Board of Trustees, faculty and staff, class of 2010, friends and family and, of course, Marvin.

Are we in Greencastle or Costa Rica? What a beautiful day. It’s good to be back.

I was surprised and deeply honored to be chosen to speak to you today.

I thought one had to be a famous alum to be asked to speak at commencement.

Or, apparently, you can be a sea turtle guy.

I hear turtle guys are all the rage at commencement speeches across the US this year.

I thought, why would someone who studies the ocean be asked to address the graduates at a university in the heartland?

The first and most obvious reason is that I attended DePauw.

And it turns out this place is kind of a hotbed for producing sea turtle scientists and NCAA basketball coaches.
The second reason is that we live on the same planet, an ocean planet whose surface is mostly seawater.
Our actions, wherever we are, matter to the future of the ocean, and the future of the ocean matters to all of us.
Even so, I think it's safe to say that I'm the first "Turtle Guy" to give a commencement speech at DePauw.
But I'll bet I'm not the last.
When I was asked to give this speech, I had to check in on what commencement speeches sound like these days.
Giving a commencement speech at one’s alma mater is a very special thing.
I looked back on the dozens of brilliant people who have stood here.
People who made you laugh.
People who made you cry.
People who told you what they think you'll need to know to make the world better and your lives more meaningful.

And people who talked about how they really didn't fit in and weren't sure what they were doing, back when they went to school here.

What I learned from them is that life is sometimes funny, and sad and no one really knows exactly what the future will bring.

That many people who achieve success and live their dreams often feel like they don't fit in and aren't always sure what they're doing.

But thats why we’re all here on this beautiful blue planet, figuring it out and fighting it out...together.

My next question was "Who are you?"

Lesson number one in public speaking is "know your audience".

Lesson number two is be sure your speech has a beginning, a middle and an end.

So, for the beginning I’ll talk a little about me, my time here and what it led to.

In the middle, I’ll talk about you.

And at the end I’ll talk about us and explain why you’re holding a small blue marble in your hand.

THE BEGINNING OF THE SPEECH: Me

For four years during the late 80s, I explored the 50 square blocks of this campus and its surroundings, joined by my dog, a labrador retriever, named "Blue".

I am certain I checked this place out more thoroughly than most students.

Wearing a mask and snorkel I dove to the bottom and explored the diversity of underwater life in Bowman Pond. My first discovery about Bowman Pond is that it was only 5 feet deep. Then I went on to discover it was also home to a shopping cart, a bike, some bottles and cans and a few pledge pins.

We explored the cemeteries and stadiums and found our way through the tunnels, back doors and onto the rooftops of most of the buildings on campus.

We played our guitars into the wee hours in an empty Meharry Hall. That space has great acoustics.

Playing guitar at the penitentiary and giving lessons to a young woman in a nursing home who’d lost her memory in a car accident, I learned how music can help heal the brain.

We learned to scuba dive in the cold, silty rock quarries just down the road and spent many nights out on their rims.

We kayaked or canoed nearly every navigable river in the state and camped in almost all of Indiana's state parks.

I learned about the plants and animals living on campus, and off.

I could tell you the genus and species of the weeds that grew in the cracks outside Harrison Hall.

Common chick weed is Stellaria media, in case anyone’s wondering.

During winter terms, groups of us trained as Emergency Medical technicians, made two service trips to Peru and one to Guatemala with the legendary Fred Lamar.

I volunteered for Putnam County Rescue for 3 years.

There's no better way to get to know people and a place than being a first responder.

I wrote about my adventures in a weekly column in the campus paper appropriately called “Wild Life”...two words.

Looking back, I may have been a little strange for this place.

But from the look of things now and the amazing students I’ve met, I know I'd fit right in.

When you get to know a place. I mean, really get to know it. The beautiful flowers, as well as the weeds. You fall hopelessly in love.

Even so, when it was time for Blue and me to go, we were ready.

Boy were we ready.

In fact, I think Blue was sitting right there in the driver's seat of my Jeep, packed and idling at the end of the graduation stage, ready for me to jump in and take off to Mexico right after Dr. Bottoms handed me that diploma and I moved that gold tassel across my mortarboard.

Blue was a good dog, though not such a good driver.

But during that senior year...I had read “the book”.

The year I graduated, 1989, was the year Bill McKibben published his first book, “The End of Nature.”

I read it. I re-read it. And I probably read it again.

McKibben described the destructive path that we were on and the consequences for life on Earth if we didn't move decidedly towards sustainability and away from our addiction to fossil fuels.

Two decades later, what Bill wrote has come to pass, faster than he predicted.

When I read that book I got this feeling of falling through some kind of endless Indiana Jones tunnel, snakes and all...

Except different.

Indiana Jones sorta knows he’s going to end up in the tunnel.

It’s in the script, you know? He always ends up in spooky tunnels or tombs or exploding mountains … usually with snakes.

But here I was, just sitting on a comfortable chair in Roy O. West library, one moment...

About to get my bachelors degree at a premier liberal arts institution…

And the next moment I'm in free-fall though a snake tunnel.

As I read, I thought to myself, “Holy...cow”, except I didn't say cow.

“We are totally...in trouble”, except I didn’t say “in trouble”.

“Why the...heck...isn’t everyone talking about this?” except … well, you get the idea.

I left knowing that I had squeezed every experience and every opportunity from DePauw.

I had sucked the marrow out of it, as Thoreau might say.

And at that moment, I had discovered my passion.

I wanted to fix what was being destroyed.

I'll tell you, there's no greater gift than to find your passion.

To be handed the keys and a license to drive.

Just ask “Blue”.

Little did I know that snorkeling in Bowman Pond,

scuba diving in the quarry,

writing for The DePauw

and ravaging Marvin's burritos

were preparing me to be a marine biologist studying sea turtles in Baja, Mexico.

Flip to the next chapter:

I'm about your age, maybe a bit older.

I’m standing with my father in his living room.

I'm about to begin a PhD program.

He looks at me, and in his Harvard MBA-voice, summoning all the gravitas of every father-son relationship ever formed on Earth … combined! … he asks:

“Sea turtles, son? WHAT are you going to DO with SEA turtles?”

And then the floor beneath me gave way and again I began to fall.

Through that dark, deep snake-lined Indiana Jones tunnel.

So, I'm falling...head first...upside down...in the dark when...I remember...

The bullwhip! Attached to my belt.

That bullwhip could get Indy out of any situation, right?

And then I’m back, staring into my father’s eyes.

Summoning all the prodigal-son, make-my-own-way-in-the-world bravado a twenty-three-year-old could muster, I said …

“Everything.”

And...it felt good.

So I said it again. A little louder, a little bolder.

With a nod of my head as much to convince myself as him.

“I’m going to do...everything.”

“I don't know what that means”, he said

Neither do I, I thought.

But I was free of the snake tunnel and swept up in a fast river I'd never been in before.

And...I liked it.

Next chapter:

After some years of grad school, advanced degrees in economics, evolutionary biology and wildlife ecology and travels spanning cultures and continents, my work is to study and protect the ocean, the single greatest living feature of our planet.

Our team has tracked sea turtles swimming the ocean's widest expanse, 6,000 miles from Mexico to Japan.

And we scuba dive in places with animals a bit more exotic than the carp in Indiana's quarries, and better visibility than Bowman Pond.

We've been challenged to think about how to clean up a continent-size part of the ocean polluted by bits of plastic accumulated over a hundred years.

We’re also exploring the neuroscience behind how the feel, sight and the sound of the ocean can calm, renew and heal our bodies and minds.

And as we gather here, the world’s worst environmental disaster is unfolding in slow motion in the Gulf of Mexico.

Sea turtles are the poster species for this oil spill as well as the revolutionary response required of us going forward.

Over the past 20 years, my campus has grown, from a ¼-square-mile plot here in Greencastle to the 65 million square miles of wide-open Pacific Ocean.

In that 20 years, DePauw has changed, too.

Back then, the word “sustainability” and the prefix "eco" were NEVER used. Never.

If you said "green", you meant money, you were envious or perhaps you were taking Bruce Serlin's botany class.

"Organic" was shorthand for the two most brutal semesters of my life: Organic Chem I and Organic Chem II.

Al Gore was just a moderate senator from Tennessee.

Leo DiCaprio was a punk thirteen year old reading comic books in Echo Park.

And the Exxon Valdez for the first time caused many of us to seriously consider the down-side of America’s addiction to oil.

Back then life was tough.

People actually drank their water from the tap!

Today, our university is a national leader in the subjects of sustainability, environmental ethics and socio-ecological problem solving.

Plastic bottles are on their way out.

Green is a lifestyle. Green is a TV channel. Green is sexy.

Times have changed.

THE MIDDLE OF THE SPEECH: You

So, here you are.

The class of 2010.

And you are making the changes that inspired me happen.

I’ve studied you.

As you may know, I friended the entire senior class on Facebook.

Except for Alexandra, who repeatedly denied my requests.

You’re a smart young woman Alexandra.

As for the rest of you…

I friended you all for a good reason.

I’m a scientist.

It's important that I understand my subject matter.

How can I give an adequate commencement speech without knowing you.

So...I’m a scientist. I studied the class of 2010.

Here’s what I learned just by observing.

College students have much less time for computer games like MafiaWars and FarmVille than people with "real jobs" being paid to sit in front of their computers.

Exactly NONE of you have poked me or gifted me a virtual strawberry patch.

That's a good sign. You're a serious, studious, hardworking bunch.

And while you weren’t sure if you were going to survive that Astronomy final, you did.

DePauw students come from 42 states and 41 countries.

58% of you are women.

3% were born under the sign of Leo.

When most of you were born, Ronald Reagan was president, people wrote on typewriters, and telephones were attached to things.

You've just spent most of your life in school, increasing your understanding of this evolving world of ours.

A very wise person once taught me that the foundation of love is understanding.

And there’s so much more to you than those statistics and what you know.

After studying you a bit more, a quote by Ray Davies of The Kinks came to mind:

“I'm a lover, not a fighter.”

But here’s the thing, you are both.

You’re lovers AND fighters.

You love each other.

You love your university.

You love your families.

You really, really love your families!

You love this planet and you love all the life living on it.

In fact, you love it so much you might even consider getting a small sea turtle tattoo in some discrete, easy to cover in a job interview, location.

But, you are also fighters.

You’ve fought hard to reach this day, to graduate from college after almost two decades of schooling.

You’ve fought to make your campus cleaner and greener and your world more just.

On campus, in the classroom, on the tracks, the courts and playing fields, as you travel the world, you fight for what you believe.

For what you want.

You fight for the things you love.

That's why you are lovers AND fighters.

Don’t worry, you can be both.

You’re college graduates now, you can do lots of stuff simultaneously.

Talk and walk, vote and hope, think and act, sing and march, swim and smile … all at the same time.

You are lovers AND fighters.

And I admire that.

So, what are you going to do with all that love and fight?

The shortest and best bullwhip of an answer I can think of is "everything.”

But we are in the age of crowd-sourcing, hive-minds, flash-mobs, swarm-mentality, and hyper-networking.

We have to answer these questions together, as a group.

So, I asked the most interesting thinkers I know—scholars, poets, artists and futurists

I asked them: what's your burning question for the 2010 class of Lovers and Fighters?

They came back with some great questions like:

Why does the Supreme Court think corporations should enjoy the same rights as individuals?

Can government meet the challenges of climate change, the end of cheap energy and our economic house of cards?

Is there a real relationship between how hard I studied and how well I will do in the world?

That one was from Billy Collins, former poet Laureate of the US. You should read all of his poems.

Can democracy survive complexity?

Where does all that plastic go?

How do my decisions affect those who will live 100 years from now?

How do we love all children of all species equally and for all time?

And then, the most perplexing one of all: If it’s we.

That’s from my eight-year-old daughter, Grayce.

She wrote it on the back of an envelope and handed it to me while I was writing this.

It’s sort of a question and an answer at the same time.

If it's we who ... will renew our democracy;

If it's we who ... will discover a new way to live on the earth;

If it’s we who … will be the change.

Then we must get beyond “us versus them.”

And focus on the idea that we love all children, our parents, our friends and our special places much more than our things and our ideas.

What does being a lover AND a fighter make you?

It makes you an Activist.

Because activists … ACT … they fight for what they love.

You know in your gut that there isn't time to mess around.

You join organizations and groups.

You start campaigns.

You discuss and argue and analyze … and then you ACT.

Like it or not, we are all activists now, because the ocean is burning.

THE END OF THE SPEECH: Us

So, here you are, graduating.

You are well on your way to finding your passion.

It's my sincere hope that it has something to do with healing what is broken on our planet today, whether your focus is on the environment or fellow human beings.

To do that, you must feel things … deeply.

Don't rely so much on reason and logic.

It may seem funny that a scientist would tell you that.

But it is the neuroscientists who taught me that we can’t have reason without emotion.

That all of our decisions are based in emotion, whether we like it or not.

Understanding this—how your own brain works—in the context of human evolution and the history of the universe deepens our love and empathy for each other and all of life.

This is the nugget of truth in our fight for the blue planet.

So, let’s do a little exercise in perception.

I got here from the West Coast by train.

It took 62 hours — two-and-a-half days.

If I’d taken the space shuttle flying at maximum speed,

straight away from the earth,

in the same time,

I would be about 1 million miles away right now.

Imagine yourselves out there, looking back.

Now, take out that blue marble.

Hold it at arm’s length. Peer through it’s glass.

From a million miles, Earth—our home—would look about the size of that small blue marble.

Pretend you’re a million miles away, looking back at Earth.

That blue marble you see?

It is your only home and it is blue because of the ocean.

My fellow biologist, Richard Dawkins, called the ocean “the watery alma mater of all life.”

And Carl Sagan, another a very smart man, once pointed-out that that blue marble is where "all of human history has happened.”

On this blue marble we call Earth, every being who ever lived was born and finished their lives.

Every mother and father.

Every hopeful child and college graduate.

Every oil executive and environmental activist.

Every dinoflagellate, every dinosaur, every sea turtle, every mountain lion.

Every single burst of passion and firing neuron that fights for what it loves has lived on just one planet.

On this lone, beautiful blue marble spinning in the vast emptiness of space.

This Earth—our one and only blue marble—is where we must make our stand.

So while were here together on this Earth, we may as well fight for what we love because, as far as any of us knows, it's our only home.

My hope is that you find and hold on to the passion that keeps you awake.

The kind that sits you bolt upright in bed in the middle of the night with the excitement of your own ideas.

My hope is that you continue to fight for what you love.

I've given you this simple gift of glass, a blue marble, to remind you of what you already know.

That the best things life has to offer are worth all the love and all the fight you can muster.

Don't be afraid.

Just love … and fight.

Keep your cool, maintain your center.

But love and fight, fight and love.

And do it with everything you have.

Because that’s what you are.

You are lovers and you are fighters.

Congratulations and good luck.

Saving Sea Turtles, Creating Jobs, Changing Lives

Mon, 17 May 2010 14:29:32 -0400

Two years ago we founded a project called SEE Turtles with the straightforward goal of saving sea turtles by helping people to experience the joy of these animals in the wild while generating income and work for people living with endangered sea turtle populations.

The concept came out of more than a decade of working with sea turtle hunters in Baja and turtle egg collectors in Central America who mentioned they'd rather take people to see the turtles. Rather than wait around any longer for existing ecotourism outfitters to do it, I decided we should get started ourselves.

I teamed up with Brad Nahill, Chris Pesenti and Luis Garduno whose backgrounds in community organizing, environmental economics and ecotourism complemented my own as a marine biologist and we picked three important locations to begin the work. We knew that many grassroots organizations sought visitors and volunteers to help combat poaching and to provide alternative incomes, but lacked the resources to make that happen. We could provide that marketing reach by combining their efforts within a single portal, designed to find would be turtle lovers looking for different and meaningful travel. We partnered with strong organizations in Baja California, Mexico, Costa Rica and Trinidad and Tobago and set about connecting people with the trip of their life.

Now we have reached a milestone of sorts, having generated more than $100,000 in new income in the communities where we work--funds used to expand protection efforts and connect fiscal well being with restoring these endangered animals. To date, more than 200 travelers have visited nesting beaches and turtle nursery areas and volunteers have covered more than 500 work shifts, saving the projects thousands of dollars. We are now poised to build from this strong base of healthy relationships.

To be sure, tourism has its downside. There's the carbon footprint, plastic footprint, cultural footprint and the potential negative impacts hoards of visitors can have on the wildlife itself. SEE Turtles, like many others, works to redirect would be travelers to places where their footprint is minimized and the positive effects are amplified.

Every bit helps as the odds are stacked against sea turtles, whether the threat is in the form of fishing nets, plastic pollution, beach development of consumption of their eggs and flesh.

But as Brad points out, “when every dollar spent visiting a turtle conservation project helps to improve conditions for sea turtles and people that goes a long way towards showing that these amazing creatures are a valuable and to protect.”

To celebrate these successes, SEE Turtles is offering a free trip to visit a turtle conservation project in Costa Rica or Baja California Sur, Mexico. One winner will receive a free spot on an upcoming tour run by ecotourism companies EcoTeach or Baja Expeditions. To enter, visit SEEturtles.org and sign up for the monthly e-newsletter. The contest runs through August 31st, 2010 and the winner will be chosen at random in early September.

An added benefit is that when people come back from these kinds of trips they are even more dedicated to local conservation work. Connecting with a wild animal as ancient as a sea turtle on its terms can be transformative, for the visitor, for the residents and for the sea turtles.

No matter why you travel, to see turtles or to make friends, make it count.

Beyond Politics: Oil, Water, Shrimp and Sea Turtles

Wed, 5 May 2010 00:02:59 -0400

Beyond Politics: Oil, Water, Shrimp and Sea Turtles

Discover Magazine

My brave friend Leilani Münter called from the field to report that the National Wildlife Federation and CNN had documented the first sea turtle caught in a slick at sea, gasping for air through an iridescent sheen. Tragically, just as nesting season for a number of the Gulf of Mexico’s sea turtle species is set to begin, these highly endangered animals become the flag species of the BP Gulf of Mexico oil spill.

Soon, if not already, adult male and female turtles will gather in shallow coastal waters, mate and prepare to nest, precisely where oil is accumulating. The pregnant females will scuttle across beaches at night to lay eggs, just as they've done for millions of years, but these beaches will be different—they will be blacked with oil.  In a few short weeks, a new generation of hatchlings will emerge from the sand and make their way across oily beaches to an oily sea where tar balls and slicks will make their already-long odds of survival even longer. As they mature, they will have to rise through oil slicks to breathe and survive by eating oil-coated animals, algae and seagrass. While sea turtle will be among the most recognizable victims, they won’t be alone. Many species of birds, fish, invertebrates and plants will fare just as badly.

Even before the spill, sea turtles had it tough. US and Mexican trawlers drag nets across the sea floor in search of shrimp, but catch thousands of turtles by “accident.”  Bright beach lighting deters pregnant female turtles as they come ashore to nest, or distracts hatchlings as they poke their heads from the sand looking for the sheltering sea.  If they survive this gauntlet, plastic pollution might choke them or fills their guts with worthless, indigestible junk.  Long-line hooks snag them by the thousands each year.

With the BP spill, many of the sea turtles’ remaining few ocean and coastal habitats will now be slathered in sticky, slippery, untamable oil. Ironically, these are the very same habitats where industries traditionally at odds with the sea turtles—tourism, oystermen, and shrimpers—make their livelihoods. Such an uncomfortably close tie between oil, seafood and wildlife is an everyday irony of the Gulf of Mexico. In fact, in early September, the people of Morgan City, Louisiana, will celebrate the 75th Annual Louisiana Shrimp & Petroleum Festival.  (I am not making this up.) In the organizers' own words, the event "will prove that oil and water really do mix.” But oil, water, shrimp and sea turtles don’t mix; they make a sticky, deadly stew.

What will happen next with the BP spill? No one knows for sure, but even the most optimistic scenarios provide little hope. Oceanographers who know the currents of the Gulf fear that the slick will wend around the tip of Florida. Meeting the Gulf Stream there, the oil make its way up the Atlantic seaboard, wrecking havoc along hundreds, perhaps thousands of additional miles of coast. All of the volunteers and sponges in the world won’t be enough to sop up this mess.

Like us, these endangered, ancient sea turtles are caught up in a disaster of someone else’s making.  The timing is brutal for all.  Things will likely get much worse, but there is some hope. The "turtle huggers,” like me, are legion … and dedicated.  We care about our neighbors, passionately. It could take a while, but the work must get done. If you can’t be on the front line, please support those who are.

For our part, Fabien Cousteau and I are in El Salvador launching the Billion Baby Turtles Project in close partnership with our colleagues at FUNZEL, the premier wildlife conservation group protecting sea turtles in El Salvador.  Over the next decade, we will release a billion baby turtles around the world, to help rebuild populations decimated by unchecked human activities, like egg collecting, bottom-trawling, and, of course, oil spills.

In the coming years, we'll learn a lot about the impact of massive oil spills on sensitive species and ecosystems, as we do every time a spill like this happens. Study upon scientific study will be forthcoming.  Hopefully, they and this crisis will lead us to the clean energy future. Meanwhile, wherever you are, I urge you to get beyond politics and fight for a clean, healthy, oil-free ocean for turtles, for fishermen, and for yourself.

And, of course, to fly your sea turtle flag high.

The Ocean is Burning

Thu, 29 Apr 2010 18:55:39 -0400

Why do we wait until the ocean is burning?

Why do we wait until the mountain tops are removed?

Why do we wait until the big fish are gone?

Why do we wait until the big cats are hanging on?

Why do we wait until all the old growth is new?

Why do we wait until the waters are poisoned?

Why do we wait until the seas are plastic?

Why do we wait until the ocean is burning?

Earth Day Hangover

Thu, 22 Apr 2010 11:59:34 -0400

hang·over \ˈhaŋ-ˌō-vər\ noun 1894 : Something (as a surviving custom) that remains from what is past : a letdown following great excitement or excess.

For some, New Years Day is defined by a thick party hangover. For others, November 1st inevitably involves a sugar hangover haze.

But for me, it's the day after Earth Day that always leaves me feeling slightly carved out.

After forty years of Earth Days, I still get stoked and pumped up that on THIS Earth Day the world will really change, presidents and prime ministers and queens and kings will jettison politics and tradition and declare that every day will be lived like Earth Day.

We clean up beaches, make new pledges, paint our kids' faces and fly the Earth flag. Inevitably I find myself stationed behind a non-profit info table dispersing knowledge and answering questions or just giving away cool biodegradable stickers.

This year was the fortieth anniversary of Earth Day, which is both impressive and daunting. On the first Earth Day in 1970 twenty million people, a solid ten percent of the population, joined the party in thousands of parks and schools across the nation.

Now, Earth Day is internationally recognized and has gained some momentum since its slump years in the 80's and 90's.

The leading issues threatening our planet remain largely the same: climate change, deforestation, population, pollution in its many forms, overfishing, all underlined by the urgent need to address peace, poverty, equity and women's rights.

Paul Hawken says there are as many as two million organizations around the world working for justice and the environment. People organizing themselves to address the problems government and business have ignored.

On Earth Day, this network of organizations party together.

We raise our collective voices high and check in on where we've been and how far we have to go.

We deepen our commitments and further collaborations.

We make speeches, sing, dance, love, play and share.

Because that's what's at the core of the global environmental justice movement.

No wonder the day after Earth Day I feel hung over. But the great thing about a hangover is that after a big glass of clear water and a nap, it's long gone.

And I'm ready party like it's Earth Day 2011.