Get naked for conservation

Hundreds of people took off their clothes to raise awareness of global warming. It was a chilly nude, since they posed on a shrinking Swiss glacier.

Few other than blogfish have the courage to bring you the frontal shot, Other, more demure types chose the rear view, and even then they only linked to the photo rather than showing it.

Artist Spencer Tunick got everyone to take off their tunics for one of his photos of nude gatherings in public places. It's an interesting and fun way to try to save the world. But it remains to be seen whether it works. Is it really the glaciers that everyone's thinking about?

Tweet

Cleaner shrimp farms thanks to Wal-mart

Pressure from Wal-mart is leading to cleaner shrimp farming in Thailand. To keep selling shrimp to Wal-mart, shrimp farmers are actually reducing the harm caused by their farms.

I like the approach. It's more valuable to fix bad farms than drop bad shirmp and switch to better sources. Wal-mart's commitment to sustainable seafood includes a pledge that they'll work with suppliers to reduce impacts and here's some evidence that it's working.

Not everyone is happy. Some shrimp farmers say that the process favors big operations with lots of capital, and environmentalists believe that the new cleaner farms still have environmental impacts. Some people support wild-caught shrimp, claiming that it's better than farming, but shrimp trawling is not exactly an ocean-friendly activity.

Yeah, I wish there was more progress too. But here's an important question..who is doing more than Wal-mart to clean up shrimp farms on such a large scale?

Tweet

Freshwater fun

Another short vacation turned out to be unvirtual. Lolling about a mountain cabin, gazing at the creek, and eating. With no internet connection, so no temptation to spend time at blogfish.

Now that my vacation season is over, it's nose to the grindstone, back to the salt mines, and all that.

But just for fun, I'll leave you with a vision of freshwater fun, the very grand granite falls. Who knows where this is?

Tweet

Ocean vacuum cleaner saves corals from algae

If there's something strange
in your neighborhood
Who ya gonna call?
ALGAEBUSTERS

If there's something weird
and it don't look good
Who ya gonna call?
ALGAEBUSTERS

And in this case the algaebusters come equipped with a giant algae vac that sucks smothering algae mats off of coral reefs.

It's one of those sounds good ideas that might come from an 8 year old, but it actually works. It's being used in Hawaii to remove a nasty invasive algae called "gorilla ogo" from coral reefs. Compare before the super sucker vacuum hits the algae (lower picture) and after vacuuming the reef (upper picture).

There is an overfishing connection, algae-eating fish used to keep corals clean but overfishing has ended this free algae-busting service.

Tweet

Open ocean surfing on BIG waves

Check out big wave surfing over a seamount 100 miles offshore, with the biggest wave measured at 66 feet.

The action takes place at Cortes Bank off Southern California, where the mythical 100 foot surfable wave might someday be found.

Tweet