Tuesday, January 31, 2012

Jack mackerel frenzy in the south Pacific

A new report by the Internationa Center for Investigative Journalism tells a sad story of overfishing in the South Pacific. Here's the overview:
As other fisheries are pushed to their limits, giant trawlers have moved southward toward the edge of Antarctica to catch what is left. For this finale of Looting the Seas, reporters from the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists spent seven months on four continents to document how Asian, European and Latin American fleets have devastated fish stocks in the southern Pacific, once among the world’s richest waters. The stories were reported in collaboration with the investigative journalism centers IDL-Reporteros in Peru and CIPER in Chile. A documentary co-produced with London-based tve is planned to air on BBC World News TV in the spring.

Monday, January 30, 2012

Overfishing rap



Original here

Thursday, January 12, 2012

The magical soul of surfing

This is the most moving surfing film I've ever seen. It features truly beautiful footage of big, incredibly powerful, nearly-unridable waves and a "you are there" experience alongside the venturesome people surfing them. Watch it again and again, and feel slow-motion explosions as amazing rides eventually start to come apart in the teeth of monumental ocean force. Wow. And wow again. And maybe even one more final last wow.

Note: this video moved, here's a working version:


More Surfing Videos


Tuesday, January 10, 2012

Ocean hammered by CO2 rise off US west coast

Bad news for an Oregon ocean guy...new studies show that CO2 impacts are already bad and expected to continue hitting hard in the Pacific Ocean off the US west coast and Puget Sound (near Seattle).

First, oysters have been having trouble reproducing in the region due to CO2-driven ocean acidification. As a result, "the state of Washington classified the entire Puget Sound as “waters of concern” because of ocean acidification’s threat to local shellfish and fish resources. This means the data show that ocean acidification is threatening the region’s ability to support fish and shellfish" according to the Center for Biological Diversity.

Now comes news that this region is also at great risk for harm from CO2-driven ocean warming because of low natural temperature variation.