SOAR

WISDOM

2012-02-08T17:06:00.000-10:00

John Klavitter, USFWS, holding an albatroos, ready for banding.

I took this photo on Midway in 2009 when I first learned about Wisdom.

Since that time, I've worked on a book about her while teaching kids around

the world about albatross issues, especially dealing with plastic that kills so many of them.

I learned yesterday, that someone else has gotten a book out about Wisdom and so,

I have to rethink what I will do with all the information so many have provided and

that I've written about Wisdom, albatrosses, and ocean problems.

I'm posting this image of John to thank him for his many kindnesses as I've

worked on Project SOAR with kids.......He has helped in so many ways

and is the one person I am calling WISDOM'S KEEPER..........

One who cares so deeply and never asks for much in return, like

the kids who originally inspired what I do.........The kids of CSG and

other schools around the planet who are trying to find ways of

helping the ocean.

Maybe I will write a book called Wisdom Keepers. For John.

And, by all means, check out the new book,

Wisdom, The Midway Albatross.

I hope it is a good book and helps Wisdom in ways needed by all ocean creatures.

Malama i ke kai.

Palau Sea Turtle Story Shell

2012-02-01T16:53:00.000-10:00

honu ea photographed at Marrowstone Point. 2012.

My cousin Tom Rice introduced me to the science of the oceans when I was quite young. I collected sea shells for his Of Sea and Shore Museum. At the time of its opening, it was the largest collection in the United States and is still open in Port Gamble, Washington.

Tom recently moved to Thailand and scaled back the museum's displays. I inherited some treasures when he moved, including this Honu Ea or Hawksbill Turtle "shell"........The carapace of this beautiful sea turtle is etched with a story from Palau...........Tom brought it home from one of his many travels around the world and has since forgotten the legend or folk tale being told in the many etchings on each of the "Moons" or shields on the turtle back.

Each of these pieces of the back fit together like a puzzle and over the years, they have slipped apart a bit so that it is difficult to transport and share in my workshops about marine debris.

But as a piece falls out of the back, I can carefully hand it to a child so they can hold it to light and see the beauty of the transparent shell............No wonder people killed these creatures for the shell, turning them into sunglass frames, jewelry, and other fashion pieces..........

Ironically, the shell is a kind of pre-plastic and today, the turtles, like so many sea creatures, suffer from entanglement in nylon netting, fishing line, and other debris. Saved from harvest, they now must swim seas filling fast with plastics created to replace the more natural shell and other materials of earlier times.

I wonder if people of Palau would want this turtle returned.

If you know anything about picture stories etched into these shells, do let me know. I have also put out a question to list serves and so, will keep posting any information. In the meantime, I will bring this to all my presentations in coming years...........Kids are so inspired and enchanted on holding and touching and imagining this sea turtle's past. They seem more eager to help the turtles and the ocean on experiencing the gift from Palau!

Project AWARE --- Taking More Action to Clean the Seas Beneath the Surface

2012-01-29T13:53:00.000-10:00

For those of you who dive or know someone who does, please share the following:

Project AWARE is adding more enthusiastic ways people can get involved in cleaning the seas AND in educating others about marine debris, especially the tons of trash beneath the surface. They are moving away from those single day dives to do a cleanup. To learn more visit their site:

http://www.projectaware.org/

The Project AWARE website offers divers some tools and information kits for collecting data on marine debris and for educating people about sharks, as well as posting events in which divers can participate.

from that website:

"Project AWARE Foundation is a growing movement of scuba divers protecting the ocean planet – one dive at a time.

"Over the past two decades of underwater conservation we’ve learned that divers are true leaders in ocean protection. We’re ocean heroes numbering in the millions across the globe. We believe together our actions will make a huge impact and will help to rescue the ocean.

"With new programs and more online resources than ever before, Project AWARE supports an unprecedented global movement of divers acting in their own communities to protect oceans and implement lasting change.

"We’re focusing in on two major ocean issues –Sharks in Peril and Marine Debris, or trash in our ocean. Truly, there are many conservation issues converging on our ocean planet at once, but we’re concentrating on these serious problems where scuba divers are uniquely positioned to directly and positively affect real, long-term change in these two areas."

FRED FOR PRESIDENT and a LINK TO CURRENT ARTICLE ABOUT SOAR

2012-01-25T15:52:00.000-10:00

Apparently, Fred did the research and has all his background checks ready for inspection, but wanted all of you to know before news leaked to the media...........

Fred is running for President! His single campaign issue? Malama i ke Kai........Protect and Care for the Ocean!!!

And, get this, he's running as a Republican. He listens to John Prine A LOT and loves the line,,,,,,,,,,,,Grampa voted for Eisenhower because Lincoln won the war.............and, truth be told, Fred will run as a Republican to draw votes away from challengers, knowing his good buddy, Barack Obama will win if Fred tosses his lei into the ring!!!!

And, just in time for the candidates first appearance, there is a great new article about PROJECT SOAR in the December issue of CURRENT, The Journal of Marine Education. Here is a link to that article, provided by Columbus School for Girls. you will have to visit this site, then go over to the right hand side and click on the article..........

http://www.columbusschoolforgirls.org/news/detail.aspx?pageaction=ViewSinglePublic&LinkID=3395&ModuleID=141&StartDate=12/8/2011

Be in touch for more information about Fred's travels this spring. He is headed into new territories, ready to explore and study and help inspire others to take care of the ocean.

Clean Energy Solutions Lecture by Vicki Osis..........

2012-01-16T12:52:00.000-10:00

I am sharing this with all of you. Since I can't post a multiple page document it is all printed here.

Vicki OSIS .... and Thanks so much for your interest. You give me hope.

There is consensus among scientists that we can no longer halt climate change but can only work to slow its progress and lessen its impacts.

• Our current situation, C02 concentrations in the atmosphere are at their highest levels since 1961 when the announcement was first sent out by Charles David Keeling, who produced data showing that carbon dioxide levels were rising steadily in what became known as the "Keeling Curve".

• The US has not signed the last three IPCC protocols to reduce emissions and currently has no national policy to reduce emissions.

James Hanson, head of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies notes that if we replace all our coal fired electric power plants with emission free energy sources we can reduce C02 emissions enough to save us from the worst effects of climate change. (there are 600 coal plants in the US) We must act now as we have only 10 years left to try to slow C02 emissions to levels that will reduce the worst effects of climate change. (he made his statement in 2010) Hanson goes on to say “It is extremely irresponsible to make the assumption that efficiency and renewable energy sources are all that will be needed to save us from the worst of climate change and will provide the energy to run our nation.

Solution: 1. Our biggest need is a public who is aware of the risks that we are facing by not reducing out C02 emissions! We need a public that is willing to speak out and demand change. Only with a knowledgeable public can we bring pressure to bear on our governmental officials to make the transition away from coal and oil as our main energy sources.

Solution 2. We need to use every possible emission free source of energy we have and demand that funding be made available to do the research to develop the high intensity energy sources we need. Some experts say it will take an effort comparable to the effort to put a man on the moon or maybe a better comparison is the effort and dollars we put into winning the 2nd world war.

Solution 3. The public needs to know the risks and drawbacks with each energy choice and be able to make intelligent choices based on the best information that scientists can provide.

Solution 4. Switching to electric cars. Electric cars are now on the market. Since we do not shut down our electric generating plants at night, by recharging the cars at night, energy will be available to meet the recharging demand. We must develop a public who is willing to transition from a gas powered cars to electric.

The following provides information about the energy choices we currently have and the pluses and drawbacks of each.

Comparison of the generating capacity of green energy compared to nuclear energy.

Power generated by a power station is measured in multiples of watts, megawatts (10 to 6th watts or gigawatts (10 to 9th)

• Wind farms: A large wind farm with 44 turbines produces 101 megawatts

• Solar Power : One of the largest solar powered plants in the world in the Mojave Desert of California produces 354 megawatts.

• Gas Powered- Medway Power station in Kent , UK makes 700 megawatts. (gas plants release half the amount of C02 that coal plants emits)

• Hydroelectric - Aswan Dam in Egypt has a capacity of 2.1 gigawatts.

Wind Farm largest is in Oregon (to be completed 2012) 889 megawatts (has 300 wind towers.)

• Nuclear : Three Mile Island Nuclear Plant 802 megawatts

Wind and Solar do not have the energy intensity to meet our energy demands. Solar units for homes in cloudy northern states currently only produce about 1/3 of an average home’s energy needs. (source solar energy agent) Promises of more efficiency and cheaper units are still being developed but have yet to be brought to market.

We have 104 aging nuclear plants built in the 1950’s that need replacing and we have no energy policy to dictate what energy source to replace them. These conventional Nuclear plants only burn 1% of energy in the fuel rods; the remainder is left in the fuel rods leaving them with high levels of radioactive toxicity. These "spent" rods must safely be stored for 10,000 years until that toxicity has depleted. *The spent rods are currently stored on site in pools in the existing plants. On-site storage of spent fuel in dry casks has become increasingly popular among licensees needing additional capacity for storing spent fuel. Fuel that has been stored for at least five years in water has cooled sufficiently, and its radioactivity decreased enough, for it to be removed from the spent fuel pool and loaded into casks for dry storage. This frees up additional space in the pool for storing spent fuel newly removed from the reactor. (source US Nuclear Regulatory Agency)* the spent fuel rods stored in the Fukushima plants in Japan was one reason their melt down was so horrific.

What are our options for emission free energy sources.

Bloom Boxes Fuel Cells http://tinyurl.com/82bst5h

These are fuel cells that use natural gas as fuel, but do not burn the fuel therefore less emissions. (see problems with mining for natural gas) Bloom boxes are on the market and being used by companies such as Google.

Nuclear produces electricity with no C02 emissions.

Arguments in favor of nuclear power (from Hanson Book. Storms of my Grandchildren.).

•Fast Breeder Reactors (FBR) , the new improved ones, called "Third Generation" do not depend on mining more uranium.

• FBRs use spent fuel from old conventional nuclear reactors, and nuclear wastes from nuclear weapons production. That spent fuel is toxic for 10,000 years and no permanent storage site has yet been found.

• Conventional reactors only burn 1% of energy in the fuel rods; the remainder is left in the fuel rods which is the reason for their radioactive toxicity.

• FBRs burn 99% of the remaining fuel rod’s energy. They multiply the fuel as well as produce electricity. Hanson estimates we have 1000 years of energy using the FBR technology.

• The spent fuel rods from the Fast Breeder Reactors is toxic for only 2 centuries during which they decay and becomes non toxic. A great improvement over 10,000 years.

• The technology is available and they can be built now.

These are large powerplants that will take years to site and build.

Small scale nuclear reactors. All the nuclear accidents, Fukushima Daiichi complex, Three Mile Island and Chernobyl all occurred because of pump failure. Pumps are needed to provide a constant supply of cooling water for the nuclear reactors. If the cool water supply is halted the nuclear core over heats and melt down occurs.

Nuclear has the energy intensity to meet our needs, but the fear aroused by the Fukushima has resulted in Japan shutting their nuclear plants and now are bringing back on line their oil and coal fired plants. Germany has also started to shut down its nuclear plants and replace it with coal.

In the US small modular nuclear reactors are under development and soon may be available including NuScale. NuScale does not use pumps but rather convection currents for cooling the core reactor. NuScale offers small separate modules and many modules can be added to a site. They can be installed on coal plant power sites and hook into the existing grid. These are expected to be ready for installation soon. http://www.nuscalepower.com/ot-Scalable-Nuclear-Power-Technology.php

The other small-scale nuclear reactor currently under development is Terra power. (ready maybe by 2030). These units use waste uranium (spent rods) for electricity production and also do not use pumps for cooling. Bill Gates is investing in this research and development. See Gates Ted Talks Terrapower. They researching ways to burn more of the energy left in the radioactive wastes. Reduce the time the rod must be stored and supply us with emission free energy that we need. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JaF-fq2Zn7I and http://tinyurl.com/2b5nzd5

Examples of small nuclear reactors.

NuScale- http://www.nuscalepower.com/ot-Facts-NuScale-System-Technology.php

TerraPower http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/03/24/bill_gates_and_terrapower/

Toshiba Mini nuclear reactors

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Toshiba_4S

Hyperion mini nuclear plants.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hyperion_Power_Generation

All our energy choices come with issues. Wind and solar are emission free but are not energy intensive, Natural gas releases half the C02 of a Coal plant but mining for natural gas involves fracking. “fracking” (pumping water and chemicals under high pressure into shale to release gas from rock strata). This has contaminated ground water supplies in many states. In Arkansas, spring 2011, fracking, released uranium present in the rocks, contaminating ground water with radioactivity. Lousiana and in other states fracking liquids have contaminated ground water supplies ruining fresh water supplies for towns, cities and wells for household use.

(New York Times Feb 2011 from EPA study)

As for reducing our dependency on oil, electric cars are now on the market. Since we do not shut down our electric plants at night, by recharging the cars at night, the reduced demand in energy would meet the recharging demand.

More From Vicki Osis......Climate Change Links and Lecture Notes

2012-01-13T13:01:00.000-10:00

These two URLS will lead you to information provided by Vicki at Scuttlebutt today..........Vicki is passionate about the need for people in all walks to learn and then talk the talk of climate change to others. Her lectures at Oregon State University are also available, but please think about how valuable these are and send Vicki something, even though she asks for nothing in return.........I will check on her interests in, say, Chocolate? At least return mail envelope................THANK YOU VICKI, for the oceans and for future generations!

1. A compilation of teaching websites to teach climate change issues. It includes comprehensive websites
as well as teaching activities that address specific issues of climate change such as impacts on coral reef, forests etc.

I am sure there are other good sites out there but these are the results of days of searching the web.

www.Members.peak.org/~laimons/climate_Change/urls2011.pdf

2. The other URL will take you to a discussion of the recent numbers of extreme weather events and how these are tied to the drivers of global weather such as the Arctic Oscillation and El Nino and La Nina which have also reached record levels of strength.

www.Members.peak.org/~laimons/climate_Change/urls2011.pdf

NOTE both of the above are PDF files. On my computer it does not open but will download them into my downloads files.

And finally I have the online course I taught for Oregon State University on a disk. It contains 20 "lectures" on different aspects of climate change from impacts on coral reef, forests etc. Each lectures has links to teaching materials on each topic. The list above is a compilation of that. If you would like a copy of the disk please send me your mailing address. vjosis@yahoo.com and I will get them into the mail, but it will be early February before I can get to it. There is no charge for the disk, its not worth my time to try to bill you for postage.

Thanks for your patience with my posts. My concern about teaching climate change sometimes brims over.

Vicki Osis

Again, Thank you Vicki for your work and for sharing with others!

OCEAN ACIDIFICATION.......Some sources and People Who Care Deeply

2012-01-11T13:55:00.001-10:00

Here are some recent conversations and posts from Scuttlebutt, National Marine Educators Association list............follow links to good educational materials and awareness building stuff for any talk or classroom discussion. This issue is so very critical as we attempt to bring global climate change and ocean conditions back to a healthier state of being. Read and view:

Everyone,

Please go to, and download or read Elizabeth Kolbert's article from the November 2006 New Yorker Magazine. From that please show the YouTube video
"The Acid Test". 21 minutes. And PLEASE see and show this film to your

adults/everyone: "A Sea Change" a film by Barbara Ettingger

http://www.seachange.net/

Elizabeth Kolbert, Annals of Science, "The Darkening Sea," The New Yorker,

November 20, 2006, p. 66

Read more

http://www.newyorker.com/archive/2006/11/20/061120fa_fact_kolbert#ixzz1ihl1dGk5

We are inundated with references to Ocean Acidification. I believe it is
exceptionally well understood and still does not get anyone excited. As

Pogo said "We have met the enemy and he is us."

Find some way to act. There are now lots of labs that demonstrate the process. Some are simplechemistry and others more involved.

Steve Bartram
Oceanography and Biotechnology Teacher

It probably should be noted that the intertidal does see large swings in pH daily - This is a nice (perhaps I'm biased though) article on intertidal pH and the overall issue of ocean acidification along with some links at the bottom of the article. The science can be a little confusing - there are researchers who have found increased calcification with lower pH in some organisms. This is not to detract from the importance of the issue - just to point out that, like most science, the data is still being gathered and analyzed.

http://www.mbari.org/news/homepage/2011/Chavez-intertidal/pHsensor.html

Dr. George I. Matsumoto
Senior Education and Research Specialist
Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute
7700 Sandholdt Road
Moss Landing, California 95039

http://www.mbari.org/;
www.mbari.org/education
www.mbari.org/staff/mage

Here is ocean acidification as explained by Vicki (Osis), I am quoting her here:

Ocean acidification is a drop in pH on that scale. Scientists report there has been a decrease of pH in all ocean waters from 8.25 to 8.14 since the onset of the Industrial Revolution. That change represents an increase of 30% in the hydrogen ion concentration. This is the biggest change to ocean pH in the last 20 million years. Like the magnitude scale of earthquakes, one unit on the pH scale reflects a change of a factor of 10. The 0.1 pH change means there are now 30 percent more hydrogen ions in the water.

Scientists also warn that unless we quickly reduce our C02 emissions the acidification will continue and we will experience an increase of .3 - .4 points on the pH scale. That would mean a 90-120%, other sources predict an increase of up to 140% increase. Without action to reduce C02 scientists warn that we can create an acid spike more intense than the earth has seen in the past 8,000,000 years. The change we are currently experiencing is happening too quickly and too intensely for ocean animals to adapt.

Source: Real Climate
http://tinyurl.com/y44sg3

Although ocean pH has not dropped into the acidic side of the pH scale, the change has been enough to disrupt shell formation in sea creatures as the carbonic acid chemically changes calcium carbonate to the point that shelled organisms can no longer utilize it. This is a threat to tiny, fragile-shelled zooplankters, as well as the microscopic larvae of shelled creatures including clams, mussels, crabs and oysters. The second problem is the acid may become 6 eventually become strong enough it will dissolve the shells of adult animals and become a threat to corals, as well as a many other economically important animals.

On Tue, Jan 3, 2012 at 1:25 PM, Vicki Osis wrote:

Find a teaching activity for teaching ocean acidification here

http://members.peak.org/~laimons/teaching_acidification/TeachAcidification.p

Teaching Ocean Acidification.

Ocean acidification is defined as the drop in pH that occurs due to the absorption of carbon dioxide by ocean waters, C02 +H20 creates carbonic acid. The change in ocean pH we have already experienced is the biggest change to oceans in the past 20 million years and the change is happening so quickly marine organisms cannot adapt. The information from the teaching activity can be adapted for grades 5-12. Grades 5 -6 provides an introduction to plankton and its role in ocean food chains. Grades 8-12 can explore plankton and its role in food chains, plus learn about the problems ocean acidification is causing. Also included is a pH testing activity and a list of various student friendly energy conservation measures to reduce C02 emissions. The last piece is step-by-step outline of the chemistry of acidification that could be used with high school students.
If it does not open and I have that problem with my Mac computer....go to

the Å,downloadsË file and search for TeachAcidification.

It is a 7 page document.

Vicki Osis Retired Marine Education Specialist OSU Hatfield Center.

Rob Moir
Ocean River Institute http://www.oceanriver.org/
12 Eliot Street
Cambridge, MA 02138

http://www.oceanriver.org/
Twitter OceanRiverRob
7 min Video: Rob on Winter Island Salem Sound with Ducks Saving the Ocean
http://youtu.be/5QuribfZPw0
and calling for a vacation from lawn care during the rainy season when green slime algae s hungriest.

Moir's Environmental Dialogs, Ocean River Shields of Achilles Internet Talk Radio

http://www.voiceamerica.com/episode/55373/working-towards-a-greener-and-healthier-british-virgin-islands-and-the-benefits-of-sustainable

Episodes listing and descriptions (free on iTunes):

www.oceanriver.org/AchillesShieldsRadio.php

ORI all together now, sing along
http://www.oceanriver.org/05-SPOT-Moir-07-10-09.mp3

Invitation to Contribute to New Blog........Best Dogs

2012-01-08T15:55:00.000-10:00

A New Year always calls for fresh starts.

For me, the creative tugs often involve dogs since I love dogs so much and yet, have never really published much at all about them..............Here is your opportunity to collaborate while possibly finding some innovative ways of helping kids learn more about nature, their pets, and the future well being of our planet. Send me a dog story or have your students write about their BEST DOG EVER and send it along. I will post the best.........

We seem to love DOGS and our other pets far more than we love creatures of the wild. Not big on statistics, but it isn't difficult to believe we spend more money on our pets than on environmental issues. At least, we spend far more on our dogs than, say, on saving Polar Bears. Who would want a polar bear as a pet anyway..............And, life seems to have gone on successfully following the extinctions of several species in recent years. Did you know the O'o was gone, forever?

Trust that I love Polar Bears and spend a great deal of time helping them in several ways. And, I held out hope of seeing an O'o on Kaua'i before Hurricane Iniki dealt the final blow for this rainforest bird........But, I also hope you can have faith in young people who might leap into ways of helping wild creatures and wild places in new ways by learning more about animals through their love of dogs........

I include all this here under the SOAR banner because I fear a future in which so much plastic washes ashore that our pet dogs will begin to feel the impacts of its deadly ways. Tonight, I picked up several pieces of plastic. One, a prescription bottle, was sniffed out by Monsoon as she rooted around in the drift line, looking for dead crabs. Try as I might, she will munch the crabs before I can call her off and when I saw her go for the pill container, I hollered, not sure what it was she was going to chomp.

If you have ever broken a pill bottle, you know the kind of plastic it is made from and how easily it breaks into sharp splinters. If Monsoon bit into that bottle, it wouldn't have been a good thing...........Already, I have seen pieces of plastic in coyote and otter feces along the beach...........Why would I look?.......Well, I'm a biologist and once spent a couple of years studying the food habits of river otters in marine waters.........old habit --- I occasionally check out the droppings to see what they are eating. Plastic is part of their diet now, likely consumed indirectly when they swallow a fish or seabird that ate it in the first place.

And so, this all comes back to my original studies of plastics on the beach, in the sands, and on the ocean waves. Plastic dog toys that are brittle should never be used on the beach. Frisbees are sometimes made of this kind of dangerous stuff, so too the toys we bring for kids to play with in the sand. I find them all the time and their broken shards are sharp. Ingested by albatrosses, they are just one more item they deal with on a daily basis.......deadly. Ingested accidentally by ONE dog and they will probably make the nightly news.........I rest my case. We care far more for our pets and I hope you might find time to check out my (Mostly fun but maybe sometimes with messages) dog blog...................... at http://ronhirschibestdog.blogspot.com/

Happy New Year and take care of those pups!!!!!

WISDOM RETURNS............To Mother Once Again in these Troubled Seas, these Troubled Times

2011-12-23T17:33:00.000-10:00

I've just gotten word from John Klavitter of the US Fish and Wildlife Service that Wisdom is not only alive and well, but that she is back on Sand Island within Midway Atoll..........also within Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument............AND, she is attending to her new little one.

She is on an egg and will spend the next six months watching over the egg and chick, once it hatches. Together with her mate, of course. They will take turns flying more than 1,000 miles a week to fetch squid, flying fish eggs, and an occasonal fish to feed the little Laysan Albatross.

She will return to the nest and take a bit of a rest. Then, off again to fly and feed. Like all adult Albatrosses, Wisdom can upchuck solid pieces of squid beak or plastic trash. but her chick must wait for a once only regurgitation between now and July, hopefully ridding itself of any debris that clogs so many young seabirds these days...........

Currently, I am working on two different drafts of a story about Wisdom and the ocean world she has inhabitated just about as long as I have been alive...........As I work on the book, I think back on how much our world has changed since the early 1950s. Plastic has replaced glass and in just a simple way, I remember what that meant and means to me. As a kid, I was kind of poor and got a lot of change by picking up beer and pop bottles along the highway. I got a penny for each beer bottle. Three cents for a coke bottle...........I can't remember seeing my first plastic bottle along the road, but when it happened to become all too pervasive, the plastics just seemed to fill the ditches. When it rained, they washed into the sea and now, our ocean is home to more than we can deal with.

Wisdom. She somehow moves around all the debris and has found a way to feed herself and her offspring without swallowing too much plastic. If only we could find a way to speak with her, to communicate directly............She could help us save the world.

Year End Reminder.............or, Will Plastics Pass Away........

2011-12-11T15:47:00.000-10:00

All things must pass away...........Right?

Having just returned from the beach and a brief clean up........I wonder.

The scene never seems to change and as I pick up the straws, caps, and other

plastic trash, the song runs through my head as if George Harrison was here today.

All Things Must Pass Away.........I don't know.

Let's try to do better in 2012.

My simple beach clean ups are a measure of how we are doing.

I'll be back next year to see how well we do!

Happiest of Holidays and a Wonderful New Year!

Project SOAR Mapped and Soaring from Ohio

2011-11-30T16:32:00.000-10:00

Debbie Charna and her SOAR Team recently mapped

Fred's travels around the world. Her room now includes this map and so, if you visit, Columbus, Ohio

do stop in to see where Fred might appear next and where he has spread his wisdom about

marine debris, ocean issues, and Papahanaumokuakea and other marine protected areas.

Of course, we could add here, a digital map, but it would be more fun for you

to see the original...........originals.......so rare these days!!!

While our project may not be the largest or most highly funded, it has a lot of heart and as you

can tell from the smiles on these faces, it is also a lot of fun to learn, teach, and share

in ways that will save the earth, one bit of info at a time........

Project SOAR has reached England, Scotland, Ireland, Australia, Switzerland, South

Africa, the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Hawaii, New York, Ohio, Wyoming, Montana, Washington,

Oregon, Midway Atoll, and other locations around the planet.

Thanks in large part to pro bono efforts, SOAR

continues to move people to act in fun ways..........cleaning beaches, making art,

teaching about recycling and reusing, and sharing creatively so that

plastic pollution may someday be forgotten.

Please see the December issue of CURRENT,

the journal of Marine Education

for an article about SOAR!!!

And do be in touch to receive a SOAR teaching kit

so you can be more actively involved!

RESPONSE TO SENATOR CANTWELL: EDUCATION IS KEY TO OCEAN HEALTH

2011-11-07T16:35:00.000-10:00

I just sent the following letter to Senator Maria Cantwell in response to her call for funding to help cleanup the trash washed into the Pacific from Japan, following the earthquake and tsuname last spring.
I felt like it was a moment worth leaping on to help call attention to the ever present problem of ocean debris..............to remind her and others the problem is not something new and that the trash from Japan, sad as it is, will not simply land on our shore and be easily dealt with in a short period of time.

I go to the beach each day, picking up trash endlessly...............sorry to say, sometimes I am a bit down and don't bother since there is so much to deal with........Tonight was the worst since winter storms have already arrived. With the cold and early darkness, it is never easy to have a good walk, haul off some junk, play with the dog, and try to make a dent in the endless stream of junk.

Actually, I had ignored a huge chunk of rope for several days. Tonight, I just had to remove it and it was all I could do to haul it up and over the logs to remove it from the sea. Who knows where it originated! Multi-colored, it had to weigh more than 200 pounds. No matter, it will not wash back into the sea where it could actually re-circulate in the ocean and find its way in the currents to Japan!

Anyway, here is my letter to Maria Cantwell. I suppose I could have composed a better letter, but I wanted her to know about schools making a difference. Schools like Sharon Buda's Wyandont where kids learn about their connection to the ocean even though they are a couple of thousand miles from the sea. And, for sure, Debbie Charna's kids who helped create this Project SOAR! And, Lisa Keller's students at Bush School where she helps teachers guide projects that make a difference.

All I can hope for is that some funding finds its way to schools at which kids can ACT not just read about issues like this one. Education only matters if the world becomes a better, healthier place because of what kids learn. I'm not saying we should put kids in the seats of bulldozers and put them on the beaches.......I am saying we could have kids designing creative ways in which the plastics and other debris headed our way is dealt with in ways that first, do no harm to ocean life..............How about it kids? Any ideas?

Dear Senator Cantwell,

I just returned from the beach near our home on Marrowstone Island in Jefferson County. As often happens, I spent more time removing several hundred pounds of trash from the shore than tossing the stick for our Labrador. Tonight, it was mostly in the form of a 2-300 pound chunk of nylon hawser and some tires.

On my way home, I listened to an NPR report about a bill you are sponsoring to deal with the trash washing our way from the spring tsunami in Japan. The sadnesses visited upon Japan remain in all our hearts and that huge input of plastic, etc will be a serious problem to be sure. But I hope you are aware of how long it will persist and how it impacts the Pacific, wildlife, and people all across the ocean.

We know, based on studies, that the world's one ocean was already filled with about 50,000 pieces of plastic per square mile prior to the tsunami.

Here on Marrowstone, we receive trash from Hawaii and the distant west as well as tons from Seattle and Tacoma. I pick up several tons each year, including large quantities of bottle caps, and other items not recycled in Seattle.

According to NOAA, flip flops I find on our beach may well have washed away from beaches on Oahu or the Big Island. And so, it will not be a surprise to begin to find "new" pieces from Japan in the weeks and months, and years to come.

That is why I write. This trash heap will not simply fall on our shores in a single or even in ten or twenty events. It will not be an easy to manage clean up fundable by a quick vote and a rush of equipment aiming to scoop up and return or recycle items.

It is going to be a problem for generations to come. And so, I urge you to include in your funding, efforts to educate and involve young people who are already working hard to reduce plastic and other trash sources.

According to the USFWS, as many as one million seabirds already die each year due to plastics in the ocean. Whales are entangled in trash, sea turtles die, seals are threatened as well. All the while, kids in grades k and above are finding ways to solve the problem.

This moment, this pressing problem from Japan, this fundable issue can be a time when you and other lawmakers decide education is a key to the ultimate solution.

All that trash will be churning and washing and mixing with other debris for decades, if not centuries. Kids I now work with in grade school will be in college by the time good solutions are found to deal with the problems of clean up, recycling, and repurposing the trash.

Please consider ways in which you can fund educational efforts that put kids in place to help deal with the issues. No workers in machines can match the kids who think, consider, and act creatively. I know this based on experience as a biologist who works with them on the pressing problems of ocean pollution.

Kids have helped me find ways of dealing with ocean issues in the past. I know they can help you.

I suggest you help support projects at the Bush School in Seattle; Wyandot Elementary in Dublin, Ohio; North Kitsap Schools in our home state; Fishing Cove Elementary in Rhode Island; Columbus School for Girls in Ohio; and many schools in the Hawaiian Islands where the trash will first wash ashore.

I've worked with many wonderful teachers who can bring creative solutions to the forefront if you help them inspire their students to come up with ways to deal with this enormous problem.

I am sending a copy of this letter to teachers and others who can help you. Thank you for responding to the crisis, and thank you for thinking of it as a longterm problem with needs for educational efforts that involve kids directly in finding solutions.

Ron Hirschi

Project SOAR

http://soaronhirschi.blogspot.com

www.ronhirschi.com

GLOBAL INTEREST IN OCEAN PLASTICS........Some New Literature and Research

2011-11-03T12:25:00.000-10:00

Global interest in Marine debris, microplastics, and the overall problem of plastics in our oceans has increased greatly in the past few years.

For my part, I've been sharing the problem and potential solutions with young people. I'm also at work on a book about Wisdom, hoping her life story brings attention to the issue. She has lived through the worst problems related to longline fishing and drift nets. Wisdom also survived her early years on Midway when rats were a plague. A little known cause of death on Midway was also avoided by this remarkable albatross-- that of lead poisoning from paint flaking off old military buildings. As many as 10,000 albatrosses die on Midway each year from this ongoing source of pollution according to the USFWS.

Wisdom has survived 60 years of ocean and island life, reflect the positive and potential for other birds. But many scientists have little hope for solutions to the growing crisis in plastic pollution and its associated problems related to PCBs, PBDEs, and other organics that "attach" to plastics in the sea. The following is a link to one of the best sources for finding literature on research into the problems and potential solutions, from SEAWEB. Be sure to check out the report on biodegradable plastic grocery bags:

http://www.seaweb.org/science/MSRnewsletters/msr_CandP-MarineDebrisPlastics_11-2011.php#one

Follow their newsletter and you will be rewarded with a great deal of information on this and other ocean issues. I urge you to support them financially too!

Thank You !!!

Fred and His Albatross Friend About to Travel

2011-10-20T16:29:00.000-10:00

Always smiling, Fred is about to set off on a new adventure.

Debbie Charna and her students are preparing to send him and

his little Albatross buddy to a school......maybe in Florida? Or with new

Friends of Fred in Seattle, the Big Island of Hawaii, Kauai, or down in

La Jolla............all possible places where Fred will bring much news about

Papahanaumokuakea, Ocean Issues, and what kids of Columbus School for Girls

have been doing lately to help Project SOAR take flight!

Be watching CURRENT, the Journal of Marine Education

for a story about SOAR.

And, be watching SOAR to see where Fred Z126 and his little albatross visit next.

At the same time, be in touch to learn about the arrival of Albatrosses at

Kilauea National Wildlife Refuge on Kauai and, of course, out on Midway

and other locations within Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument.

Here on the mainland, it may be Fall, but out in the nesting islands of the Pacific,

it is a kind of springtime...........when our seabirds find a nesting place, safe

for their young ones. We will be hoping Wisdom returns to nest once again. To be sure.

Wisdom.

She is constantly on our minds and in our hearts.

Wisdom, the Oldest Known Wild Bird on Planet Earth.

Her story will soon be in book form, so watch for this as well!

WISDOM WITH HER CHICK 2011

2011-10-03T08:20:00.000-10:00

Wisdom and her 2011 Chick/Sand Island, Midway Atoll

Both Photos: Copyright Wayne Sentman

Note Wisdom's Red USFWS Band # Z333

TUGGING AT HEART STRINGS

2011-09-30T17:11:00.000-10:00

Not Wisdom's Chick, but a Laysan Albatross nearing fledging

Midway Atoll 2009.

Every time I sat down. Each time I tried to photograph or observe,

these young albatross would tug at my shirt or preen.........as if

I was also an albatross.

There are bonds between species..........any of you know how this goes

with a pet dog, cat, or bird...........They love us because we attend to their wishes

and try best as we can to understand their needs.

Even though it has been more than two years since this photo was taken, I feel

a need to protect these incredible birds.

As I write this in the early Fall, Laysan Albatross fledglings

are flying over the open Pacific in search of food on their own.

Some might find their way to our coast here in Washington, or down along

Oregon and California.

Imagine their ability to survive in an ocean world now so confused with

so much plastic. And, it seems the news cycle has passed that issue as

we try to find ways of working our way out of economic slumps..........

The baby albatross tugging at my shirt is approaching the age at which

it will return again to Midway this winter...........Hopefully, it has survived.

If so, it will begin a courtship ritual, mate, and raise a young bird to

perpetuate its species.

No one will celebrate its life.

No one will name this bird.

No one will ever see it again as an individual.

And yet, here you are.........I was touched by this bird.

I hope you might be too.

WISDOM'S CHICK

2011-09-28T16:29:00.000-10:00

Wisdom's 2011 Chick that successfully fledged this summer.

Photo courtesy John Klavitter, USFWS.

This is a beautiful image of a young albatross alllllllmost fully feathered, but

still sporting a bit of juvenile softness, especially up there on the head.

Laysan Albatross chicks hatch at a size roughly the same as your fist.

Two weeks later they are double or triple this as adults feed them

pretty much every day, or perhaps every two days.

The young ones learn to identify their parents as they fight their way out

of the egg, a process that can last half a day or longer. At the same time, adults

identify with their little ones by smell, but maybe there are other clues, such as

behaviors and appearance. Afterall, every Albatross chick does not hatch at the same time, and so,

feathering differences may be clues that help sort out young when adults return

from 1,000 mile or longer feeding flights.

I watched adults soar onto Midway, land, and strut to their chicks as if nothing

could steer them from the correct young one...........This ability to locate also

reinforced by a nest site fidelity. The adult birds nest in the same location for as many

as 6 decades, a fact we know because Wisdom has been raising a chick that long!

When the above photo was taken, Wisdom's chick was still a few weeks away from fledging, an event you may not fully appreciate without seeing in person..........

Adult albatross have these incredible runways around Midway. They walk then run, then lift off FROM LAND.............They take flight like a jumbo jet, quite elegantly.

Fledglings??????

I watched this take place and it is quite amazing because the young birds take a lot of time to

leave the island........At first, they make their way to the very edge of the sea. On Midway, this means

they pad across sand to a most beautiful turquoise lagoon.......they might hop in the water one morning, only to go back ashore for a time. Next day they might hop in again, but at long last, sometime in July for the most part...........they swim out into the vast lagoon surrounding Sand and Eastern Islands.

The young are occasionally, but not often, preyed upon by Tiger Sharks as they swim away from the

place of birth.

The fledglings swim nearly all the way or even beyond the atoll rim - the remains of the island perimeter..............and with wind assist, lift off after a long swim. I can only imagine they have evolved to do this because the next year or two will find them ONLY at sea. And so, they must have adapted over time to be able to lift off (with a seven foot wingspan) from the ocean surface, not from a runway like that used by adults.

We know Wisdom has been able to feed this young bird without adding a lethal dose

of plastic. We also know, according to John Klavitter, that Wisdom feeds in areas

with a great deal of plastic.

What we do not know is how she avoids the toxic trash.........She does so at a time when

approximatley one million seabirds die each year from this cause of mortality. Keys to

her survival will be unlocked as more and more birds are fitted with Satellite tags

and as more young people find ways of studying birds in the wild.

I can imagine studies of albatross feeding behavior using more

sophisticated devices than exist at present.........How about Apple and Google and

Amazon joining forces to equip Wisdom's little one with a cam so we can

follow this young bird through its own 60 years of life!!!

What will we report at SOAR in the year 2071?

I'll leave that up to you kids.

OLDEST KNOWN WILD BIRD ON PLANET IS SUCCESSFUL MOM ONCE AGAIN

2011-09-26T15:49:00.003-10:00

Legbands once worn by Midway Albatross.......Many died

of plastic ingestion........How has Wisdom avoided this fate?......

John Klavitter, USFWS biologist, has just confirmed the successful fledging of Wisdom's 2011 chick. Mother and offspring were in the news last spring when they survived tsunami waves that destroyed many other nesting birds on Midway Atoll within Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument. Successful fledging means Wisdom and her mate were able, once again, to find and return food to the nesting island where the chick was hatched early this year.

Wisdom, the oldest known wild bird on earth is a Laysan Albatross. She may well hold the key to success in an ocean filled with threats to survival of many kinds.I first learned about her amazing story when visiting Midway in 2009. Since then, FWS and NOAA staff have kept me in touch with Wisdom and other issues within the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands, especially those on Midway's nesting grounds.

Wisdom was first banded by Chandler Robbins on 10 December 1956. He estimated she was at least five years old at that time. Since then, Wisdom has been rebanded several times, the last when she was "rediscovered" by USFWS volunteers and staff on 6 December 2006. She now wears stainless steel band number 1517-62900 on her left leg and a red plastic band Z333 on her right leg. These are the same kind bands worn by Fred and Friends in our project to help kids learn more about the ocean and how to protect species like the Laysan Albatross.

Chandler Robbins helped biologists relocate Wisdom after he had returned to Midway in 2002 to band more albatrosses and observe them up close in a setting where more than 800,000 Laysans sit at nests during the January to July on island season. The rest of the year, albatrosses soar across the ocean in amazing journeys that find individuals covering more than a million miles in a lifetime. Birds living as long as Wisdom might clock well over ten million miles or more.........who knows for sure?

When Robbins came back, he was so busy banding, he wasn't aware of the rebanding of Wisdom. But he later noted her presence in his log of band data and when USFWS staff caught up with him in 2006, they learned where he had snapped an identifier on her leg. Resilient, Wisdom was now wearing yet another piece of metal. A great gift to science, she was found in 2006 and fitted with her current Z333.

Laysan Albatross return to the exact location time and time again. They can find their chick by scent in an amazing search starting with a wing set soar as they approach the island...........They only move a nesting site when trouble lurks such as the invasion of obnoxious weeds. This happens on Midway because of a true pest, Verbesina. I can attest to its tenacity, having pulled many stems while on island in 2009. Thanks to the USFWS and wonderful volunteers, the plants are being removed and replaced with natives that don't hinder nesting success. Verbesina towers over the birds, clogging access to adults coming and going with food for their offspring.

As for Wisdom and her chick.............She has apparently found a way to seek food in the ocean where few pieces of plastic bob and bounce on waves. Or, she is extremely good at distinguishing squid and the eggs of flying fish from bottle caps, strands of rope, and other marine debris. Regardless, she has survived and continues to give birth to chicks that survive to fledge. I am about the same age as Wisdom and marvel at how she can continue..........Our daughter. One child. She is a happy and successful person and I can not for the life of me relate to giving life support for new children every year for more than fifty..............

Think on this. She and her mate flew off the island at Midway from January to July, more or less once a week. Each flight was about a thousand miles round trip. They caught food for themselves and their one chick. They shuffled flights, sometimes stopping on island for a single day, then off again...........Thousands of miles of flying to fetch food in the Bering Sea. Perch on the waves for a time, snatch a squid, shuffle off to Midway..............Feed baby. Fly again...........

After 60 years of life, one would think a bird known as Wisdom would wise up and call it a time for retirement.............It must be in her genes to be one who makes the difference in survival. As any student of ecology knows, it is all about passing along those genes. That and learning in a world of change.

A NEW SPECIES OF SHEARWATER AND OTHER SEABIRD NEWS

2011-09-13T10:58:00.000-10:00

These articles recently appeared in journals, including the announcement of a proposed new species! Discovering a new bird on the planet may seem unlikely, but researchers are sure they have found a previously unknown Shearwater, one of the most amazing seabirds. Like Albatrosses, Shearwaters soar out over the ocean, clocking hundreds and even thousands of miles on feeding flights. The new species, Bryan's Shearwater needs attention.............Here is the citation along with two other articles:

Pyle, P., Welch, A.J., and R.C. Fleischer. 2011. A new species of shearwater recorded from Midway Atoll, Northwestern Hawaiian Islands. Condor 113 (3): 518-527.

The authors are proposing a new species based on a specimen collected on Midway in 1963. This small shearwater's breeding and nonbreeding ranges are not known and the authors call for more investigation. The ocean is vast and research opportunities like this might call a young scientist to seek information needed to possibly save this bird from disappearing before we know much about it.

Doughty, R.W. 2010. Saving the Albatross: Fashioning an environmental regime. Geographical Review. 100 (2): 216-228.

I have to say I've only been able to read an abstract of this article, but look forward to a trip to the UW library to read more of what Doughty has to say in this review of the history of exploitation as well as protective efforts meant to save albatrosses, one of the most threatened of all bird groups. Saving Albatrosses is all about saving the world oceans since these birds reflect so many of our impacts, both negative and postive.

Volter, S.C., Archibald, K., Morgan, G., and Morgan L. 2011. The use of plastic debris as nesting material by a colonial seabird and associated entanglement mortality. Marine Pollution Bulletin. 62 (1): 168-172.

Plastics appear in nests of many birds. Check out an Osprey nest in Wyoming or Montana, and you might see some orange baling twine dangling from the stick structure. Out at sea, many birds pick plastic as food, but, as these authors report, Northern Gannets gather great quantities for their nesting material. They studied a Gannet colony at which nests were found to contain an average of about 470g of plastic, mostly rope, for a colony total of more than 18 tons. Yearly entanglement in the colony ranged from 33-109 birds, mainly nestlings.

As more and more plastics enter the sea, it is not surprising to see birds "repurpose" the material. Most of us can remember photos of those six pack rings entangling sea creatures, including birds, turtles, and marine mammals. Rope tangles wash ashore on all ocean beaches and so,

THANK YOU TO ALL WHO WILL BE PARTICIPATING THIS WEEKEND IN THE INTERNATIONAL BEACH CLEANUP.

If you live away from the ocean, help out by cleaning a stream, lake shore, or other waterway. You might be saving an Albatross and removing rope that would otherwise become a hazard for young Gannets!

HELP YOUR STUDENTS SOAR!!!

2011-08-04T15:31:00.002-10:00

Teachers, Principals, and Parent Organizations:

If you are searching for an author to visit your school, or if you are interested in having Ron Hirschi return to your school, keep in mind that Project SOAR has given Ron a great deal of new energy and inspiration.

Writing, Art and Ecology, Nature Study, and other projects mentioned on Ron's website, http://www.ronhirschi.com/ , are all available as the new school year gets underway.

Project SOAR can help give your school a focus, especially related to how kids and schools connect to their own community and larger watershed. No matter how far your school might be from a river, lake, or the ocean, Ron has discovered fun, educational, and challenging ways to get kids excited about discovery learning that links math and science, writing and art, ecology and action.

For those of you involved in any form or recycling effort, school lunch garbage projects, and community involvement with a park or other natural area ----- take a look at the art projects with repurposed and fused plastic. Ron is currently helping a summer school project find ways to help two malls find ways of redirecting their plastic "waste stream", already having had impacts in the North Kitsap County region of Washington State.

Repurposing plastic that might otherwise end up in a dumpster is a clean way of obtaining free art supplies that are also finding a meaningful new life as ART!

One goal Ron has for the 2011-12 School year is to help kids find ways of turning this same plastic into building materials, hoping to focus attention on the engineering interests of many young people. Artists, Engineers, Builders, Architects.............all kids can find ways of leaping into these fields of study by brainstorming with Ron for a while, then diving into an activity.

In an Upper Arlington, Ohio news article, Principal Tom Bates of Tremont Elementary noted that, "Hirschi's visit was important for the students to learn about how their education tanslates to the real world"............and that he was particularly impressed with the way Hirschi interacted with the students, adding:

"What stood out to me was how Ron Hirschi was able to gear his activities and discussion and information so it was meaningful to the students whether they were in kindergarten or fifth grade." (Gail Martineau. Non-Fiction author helps to integrate curriculum. This Week Community Newspapers. Upper Arlington. October 7,2010.)

Contact Ron at whalemail@waypoint.com for more information and availability this school year!

Thinking of Polar Places on a Warm July Day..........

2011-07-02T11:05:00.001-10:00

VISIT: http://www.clamer.eu/ for some of the best in news and original science on Climate Change and Marine Ecosystem Research...............

For a brief on what is being talked about quite a bit, here's an AP article that has been quoted quite a bit........If you haven't heard these bits of news, it is something to ponder on a warm summer day:

Whales, plankton migrate across Northwest
Passage

By ARTHUR MAX, Associated Press – AMSTERDAM (AP) —
When a 43-foot (13-meter) gray whale was spotted off the Israeli town of Herzliya last year, scientists came to a startling conclusion: it must have wandered across the normally icebound route above Canada, where warm weather had briefly opened a clear channel three years earlier.

On a microscopic level, scientists also have found plankton in the North Atlantic where it had not existed for at least 800,000 years. The whale's odyssey and the surprising appearance of the plankton indicates a migration of species through the Northwest Passage, a worrying sign of how global warming is affecting animals and plants in the oceans as well as on land.

"The implications are enormous. It's a threshold that has been crossed," said Philip C. Reid, of the Alister Hardy Foundation for Ocean Science in Plymouth, England.

"It's an indication of the speed of change that is taking place in our world in the present day because of climate change," he said in a telephone interview Friday.

Reid said the last time the world witnessed such a major incursion from the Pacific was 2 million years ago, which had "a huge impact on the North Atlantic," driving some species to extinction as the newcomers dominated the competition for food.

Reid's study of plankton and the research on the whale, co-authored by Aviad Scheinin of the Israel Marine Mammal Research and Assistance Center, are among nearly 300 scientific papers written over the last 13 years that are being synthesized and published this year by Project Clamer, a collaboration of 17 institutes on climate change and the oceans.

Changes in the oceans' chemistry and temperature could have implications for fisheries, as species migrate northward to cooler waters, said Katja Philippart, of the Royal Netherlands Institute of Sea Research who is coordinating the project funded by the European Union.

"We try to put the information on the table for people who have to make decisions. We don't say whether it's bad or good. We say there is a high potential for change," she said.

The Northwest Passage, the route through the frigid archipelago from Alaska across northern Canada, has been ice-free from one end to the other only twice in recorded history, in 1998 and 2007. But the ice pack is retreating farther and more frequently during the summers.

Plankton that had previously been found only in Atlantic sea bed cores from 800,000 years ago appeared in the Labrador Sea in 1999 — and then in massive numbers in the Gulf of St. Lawrence two years later. Now it has established itself as far south as the New York coast, Reid said.

The highly endangered gray whale sighted off the Israeli coast in May 2010 belonged to a species that was hunted to extinction in the Atlantic by the mid-1700s. The same animal - identified by unique markings on its fluke, or tail fin — appeared off the Spanish coast 22 days later, and has not been reported seen since.

Though it was difficult to draw conclusions from one whale, the researchers said its presence in the Mediterranean "coincides with a shrinking of Arctic Sea ice due to climate change and suggests that climate change may allow gray whales to re-colonize the North Atlantic."

That may be good for the whales, but other aspects of the ice melt could be harmful to the oceans' biosystems, the scientists warn. Plankton is normally the bottom of the marine food chain, but some are more nutritious than others. Plankton changes have been blamed for the collapse of some fish stocks and threats to fish-eating birds in the North Sea, the studies show.

The migration of a solitary whale and two species of plankton is not of much concern so far, Reid said. "It's the potential for further ones to come through if the Arctic opens.

That's the key message."

Copyright © 2011 The Associated Press. All rights reserved.

ROCKING THE BOAT

2011-06-24T12:45:00.000-10:00

I couldn't resist sneaking into a picture with Kindergarteners when

Mary Fox sent over some photos of our final day of installing the

sea creatures and more.........

You can see an Orca on the far left, a cool butterfly, jellyfish, and more...

from our fused plastic and marine debris awareness project. A little bit of the

rope and other trash is in view to the left and, of course, the old canoe!

Thanks to Del and Mike Harris for the boat!

It served well as a model for many of Del's beatiful cedar canoes

and now that Del is paddling on that longer canoe ride, I hope he smiles down

on what we created here.

In fact, Del would be happy to hear that our project is inspiring

schools and at least one aquarium in California!

We'll call future projects "Rock the Boat"

in his honor!

If you would like to know more about how to create fused fish and marine

debris related projects, be in touch at

whalemail@waypoint.com

Rock the Boat in your community by

encouraging people to go plastic free, but when they can't,

to turn that old plastic into art that matters!

Have a Fun Summer!

FUSING PLASTICS AND WHERE DOES ALL THAT MARINE DEBRIS COME FROM?

2011-06-15T16:43:00.000-10:00

Many have asked about techniques and materials in our fused plastic art projects.............Here are some good links to lead you to more understanding of issues, where to find plastics, and how to fuse.

The best starting point by far is at http://www.marinedebris.noaa.gov/ to find out more about the entire ocean filling with our throw aways. NOAA is working to make sure we understand the problem and they continue to add informative maps, best available science, and more. Also, they host conferences you may wish to attend.

I started my journey into making art from plastics much like a street artist in South America........His name is Jhon Jairo Morales Bernal and he was photographed by Jan Socher as Jhon worked his magic, simply burning plastic cups from the trash bins to sculpt little figures. Burning fingers, melting our throw aways, he creates beautiful pieces that call to mind Picasso. Primitive art. Simple figures. Basic materials.

I got away from burning since the fumes and danger of fire are not my style, but do check out Jan's photos of this little known artist at http://www.jansochor.com/ by clicking on plastic art over to the right hand side of his main page.

I hope you can get onto this site to find many many sites with crafty and artsy uses of plastics. Friend, Michelle pointed me to this site and it was here where I got some of the basics that got me fusing:
http://nimcraft.wordpress.com/2009/01/07/plastic-bag-crafts-monster-sized-round-up/

a whole lotta letters and numbers to get wrong, so please forgive me if I lead you astray........

From my experience, here is a simple way to start fusing plastics you find at the beach, in recyle projects, and other ways............as in our case at Breidablik, collecting bottle caps for over a year............

Step One: Gather some plastic bags and shape into a shape you wish to make (fish, jellyfish, octopus, etc).
Make sure you have about four or five layers of sheet plastics/bags/shrink wrap.

Step Two: Place the shaped plastics between two layers of parchment paper.

Step Three: Iron with a hot, dry iron.

Step Four: Turn over.

Step Five: Repeat ironing, shaping the fused pieces to make the shape a bit more realistic, tucking edges over to allow all the plastics to fuse.

Step Six: Add more plastic to make fins, tentacles, etc, ironing between the layers of parchment paper until you have a finished creature.

Add bottle caps and other soft plastic pieces by applying pressure with iron, always remembering to keep parchment paper between the iron and the plastic piece.

Be in touch with any questions and have fun!

COLLABORATIVE FUSING OF BEACH PLASTICS WITH KIDS........TO SAVE THE SEAS

2011-06-14T17:18:00.002-10:00

WELCOME SKY FRED!!!

Life is Good Sky Fred

arrived at Breidablik during our art installation week,

a gift from Rhode Island!

Already, Sky Fred has captivated one and all. His good work

to help with fusing beach and recycled plastics is overwhelming.

Sky Fred learned much from kids and teachers, and his monkey relatives as well as

Friends of Fred around the planet.......Especially, the First and original,

Fred X310!

Fred X310 passed along much knowledge of coral reef troubles,

learned out on Coconut Island off Oahu, helping Sky Fred

build awareness for kids.........plastics harm so many reef creatures!

Incredibly valuable science, contributed by dedicated teacher, Jeff Manker

and USFWS biologist, John Klavitter, helped kids learn so much about

threats to Albatross........Here, Jeff and John band a young Laysan Albatross

right outside a building on Midway (Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument).

You might find it odd they are by a building, but consider the tiny tiny tiny size

of the islets inside the Midway Atoll........that were nearly swept away in recent

Tsunami waves..........The Albatrosses nest alongside buildings, along the air runway,

and even atop trash that washes ashore by the ton.......and more tons......and more....

Like these albatross chicks, born amidst the trash of the Pacific........

Netting, ropes, legos, bottle caps, toothbrushes..........our throw aways,

washing into the seas........hoping someone will notice. And help.

Hoping someone will notice the serious sand.........filled with our tossed trash.

This photo, I took......2009. Midway, where my Dad cruised past in WWII and where

our ocean tosses large and small bits of lighters, rope, computers, flip flops, buckets,

toothbrushes, more lighters, more toys than imaginable........onto the most

beautiful beach on earth.

Where I watched, helpless..........as helpless as this baby Albatross, its

stomach filled with plastic......testing wings that would never fly

across the seas of its ancestors, the mythical and majestic soaring

creatures affected by our thoughtlessness.......until kids came along who care!

Kids who learn that baby albatrosses, like seals, whales, and more.....accept

bottle caps and other plastics as food.........Here, a parent Albatross feeds its young

by regurgitating what it has taken from the sea after flying as many as 500 miles in one direction

to find squid or other food........on the sea surface, only to fly back to offer up the meal.

Sadly, more than one million seabirds die each year because they mistake plastic

for natural food..........

Lucky for the Albatrosses and Other Sea life, kids Care so much...

Here, a First Grader attaches bottle caps to an Orca Whale..Like a

Traditional Button Blanket created by Northwest Coast Peoples,

She carefully sews the bottle caps onto a plastic mesh oyster bag,

shaping and coloring her whale in an outdoor art collage.

Saving the Seas. One bottle cap at a time.

One Baby Albatross saved from the potential discards of our coastal world.

All the while, other kids created fused plastic fish, crabs, jellies, and more sea

life to embellish their playground fencing.........along with trash collectected from local shores.

Follow this blog to find sources of how to fuse and how to build community while

cleaning beaches and saving the seas as we did at Breidablik!!!

Thanks to Librarain, Mary Fox for spearheading

Jump Off Joe to the Sea Art Project

and to the parents, teachers, and students

of Breidablik Elementary.

Special thanks as well to the Cleavers, and to Dr. Gail Davis!

As always, Thanks to the USFWS, NOAA, and

State of Hawaii for hosting me on a journey begun at

Midway in 2009 with friends of Fred, Jeff Manker, Linda Schubert,

Annie Bell, and young Trevor, and the rest of the PAA team!

Visit all sites to do with Papahanaumokuakea for more about

the islands and life in the Northwestern reaches of what we call Hawaii.

Malama i ke Kai i ka Aina

Breidablik Ocean Saving Plastic Fantastic Art Installation........

2011-06-10T16:27:00.000-10:00

Just two years ago, I stepped foot on Midway Atoll,

and began what has become a journey with thousands of kids around the world -

a journey to find a way to a better planet, a healthier ocean, and a healthier future.

The photo above is an image permanently etched in my heart.

It is one of hundreds of young albatross I saw dead and dying

from accidental ingestion of ocean trash........Legos, Bic Lighters, markers,

toy soliders, and endless numbers of bottle caps..........

On coming home, I found an endless stream of plastic on local beaches

and began picking up as much of this trash as I could on daily walks with my dog.

I even found a seal on the beach, dead from choking on plastic mesh used in clam

and oyster harvests.........and miles of rope, hundreds of bottle caps, and a

constant supply of straws and plastic junk from cruise ships.

Then, KIDS FROM BREIDABLIK ELEMENTARY gave me

INSPIRATION!!!!!!!!!!

On hearing of what I'd learned at Midway, they started collecting

bottle caps and soon we started plans for some kind of art project

to share our concerns about the ocean and all that plastic entering the waters

of our one, precious ocean.

In the past year or so, they collected well over 5,000 bottle caps!

We also collected recyled plastic bags, shrink wrap from a wonderful local grocer,

and a whole lot of the trash I collect on the beach.

With caring teachers and parents helping out, we started making our ART -

our Collage ---- a Sculptural piece installed today on a section of

playground fence.....

Complete with a Canoe too!

and jellyfish made by the most creative kids you will ever meet!

NEW WORLD RECORD FUSED PLASTIC SHARK............created by BREIDABLIK KIDS WHO SAVE THE OCEAN!

2011-06-09T16:18:00.000-10:00

Breidablik Students Proudly display their Creative Energy

and Ocean Saving Project........

After four days of creating fused plastic fish, jellyfish, octopuses, squid,

whales, and more...........These young artists completed

A SIX FOOT LONG FUSED PLASTIC SHARK

Believed to be the world's largest, barely surpassing

another created the day before,

This Shark is made from

Central Market Recycled Shipping Wrap, Penn Cove Mussel

Aquaculture Disc, and beach found plastics.

The shark is one of several hundred sea and land creatures

created from plastic that may well have ended up in the ocean.

THANKS TO THE PARENTS, TEACHERS, AND STAFF

as well as former Breidablik Students for helping

kids reporpoise a library full of plastic.

Stay tuned to see the installation of their creations

on the Playground fence! The project now includes a reporpoised canoe,

fishing equipment, and two years of beach trash collected on local shores.

ONLY YOU CAN PREVENT OCEAN POLLUTION

2011-05-07T15:27:00.000-10:00

Fred Z126 During Meeting with Smokey The Bear

You are probably as surprised as Fred.....to see that Smokey is actually quite small.

Fred met with Smokey after a brief tour of National Forest Watersheds of Hood Canal

this past week. Fred met with Smokey to begin negotiations on a new Watershed Campaign,

letting people know that Smoking, Cigarettes, Lighters

(NOTE THE SAMPLING OF HUNDREDS OF LIGHTERS

THAT WASHED UP ON SALISH SEA SHORES

IN THE PAST FEW MONTHS)

and other fire related issues are probably more important issues

today than forest fires............at least for our oceans!!!!!!!!!

Smokey has done a good job. No doubt about it. And in doing some research,

we have learned that Bambi was originally enlisted to help the Forest Service

get the word out about fire danger.

Imagine if Smokey the Bear and Bambi shouted out to the world,

letting everyone know that cigarette butts are one of, if not the most

common forms of ocean pollution!

Apparently, scientists have discovered that cigarette butts kill fish.

We also know that lighters these days are tossed into the sea

at an alarming rate, washing onto beaches or being snatched by Albatrosses and Fish,

killing by choking..............

Fred hopes to enlist Bambi and Smokey since, like Fred,

there are many many Bambis and many many Smokeys!!!

All with the same name!!!

Imagine that!

Imagine too, a time when Fred and Friends, Smokey and Bambi

appear on TV, helping kids help forests be free of fires

while at the same time

helping the ocean being free of cigarette butts, lighters, and the

caustic debris that washes into rivers and seas from fires on land!

Remember!!!!

ONLY YOU CAN PREVENT OCEAN POLLUTION

WHALES HO!!!

2011-04-28T16:27:00.000-10:00

GRAY WHALE BLOW

marrowstone island april 27 2011

This may not be the most exciting whale photo you have seen.........but then,

it might be one of the most amazing in that I took this photo while standing on the beach

no more than 100 feet from this Gray Whale as it fed in the shallows

off East Beach County Park, Marrowstone Island........

This has been an incredible week for whale watching here, taking my mind

in new directions as I walk the beach and pick up trash that may be killing

these amazing creatures.........

First, there was a Humpback last Wednesday, cruising up the east shore in the early

morning.......then there was a Gray Whale and several Harbor Porpoises three days ago.

Then, this Gray Whale decided to root around in the sand flats where I often walk at

lower tides..........Can't wait to see what the whale created in the flat as it continually

rolled, and dug into the sand, tossing up shrimp and, no doubt, the many sandlance

that burrow here as if these fish thought they were clams?

I took several photos of its flippers and tail that was heavily scarred and had a chunk

torn away..........Cascadia Research is now checking those photos to try to identify

this individual.........Will keep you posted if any news on where this Gray Whale

might have traveled in recent months and years.

In the meantime, there are orcas in the vicinity, but I keep missing them!

Friends watched them kill a sea lion recently, down on Marrowstone Point and

I found a harbor seal washed ashore shortly after the whales had been

on the prowl..........The whales had apparently tossed it around too.......

See the Orca Network Website and Facebook images for

spectacular images of what was likely the Humpback we saw

last week here on Marrowstone.

The Humpbacks are returning from Hawaii

and returning in numbers as their population recovers from

whaling days not all that long ago........

It is so good to see these whales, to watch them spray their breath into

the same air we breathe........

REPORPOISING PLASTICS PUTS US ON A PLAYFUL PATH.....

2011-04-12T15:59:00.000-10:00

"REPORPOISED PLASTIC"

and

REAL FISH PARTS

Kids at Breidablik have taught me a great deal about staying with a project.

They've been collecting bottle caps now for two years,

waiting for just the right way to use them.

They are now collecting plastic bags

because we have settled on our Playful Project on their Playground Fence.

The "Queen Fish" on the right is made from fused plastic bags.

The Sawfish body part is from an actual Sawfish, Thanks to my Cousin Tom!

The stingray tail, far left is also from Tom's vast sealife collection.

The lumpy looking plastic is a fused RePorpoised art piece

in its early stages.....

See an earlier post for instructions and ingredients of some of our first

Reporpoised Fish made from beach plastics and other

recyclables.

Keep checking back to see our project as it continues to grow

as we discover new ways of RePorpoising.

Remember Reduce, Reuse, and Recycle..........?

I much prefer RePorpoise, Restore, and Remember the Ocean!

Thanks to all the Breidablik staff, parents, and students for

helping our area and the more distant ocean world

where Albatrosses Soar......

Every piece of plastic you RePorpoise

helps saves the seas!

NENE...........OR, WHY KAUAI MATTERS SO MUCH

2011-04-04T16:33:00.001-10:00

Nene with two chicks.

Kauai. November 2010.

Not all that long ago, Nene, the State Bird of Hawaii,

were thought to be in danger of extinction.

Thanks to captive breeding in England and on the mainland,

as well as to forward thinking biologists like Paul Banko,

The Nene is surviving, especially on Kauai.........

WHY KAUAI?

Little by Little, the main Hawaiian Islands

are becoming carbon copies of the mainland.

IZ sang about this and anyone with a sense of place in the islands

knows full well that freeways and stop lights

along with Walmarts, Costcos, and Timeshare Condos

spell doom for native plants and animals as well as

the island way of life........

Nene have survived on Kauai because of land use restrictions

and because of the lack of serious predation by mongoose and because

native vegetation still thrives in places where the geese need habitat for

raising their young.

Dogs, Cats, Mongoose.......all these are threats on other islands.

When these predators are kept away

AND

good quality NATIVE PLANT HABITAT is present, Nene thrive.

Ironically, Nene also inhabit golf courses and some urbanizing areas

where people actually feed them.........not to be widely publicized for sure,

but these little geese can live in our presence if we pay attention to basic needs.

But just like golf courses anywhere on earth, careful consideration needs to be

aimed at maintaining native plantings and healthy riparian vegetation (streamside,

pondside, and oceanside plants that include nene food sources such as

ohelo and pukiawe).

I photographed the Nene above at Kilauea Point National Wildlife Refuge.

But, I saw my first Nene down at what eventually became the

Poipu Bay Golf Course.........I see them now along the

bluffs and open dry lowlands

above Moloa'a Bay and Larsen's Beach

where Laysan Albatross also nest.........

If you visit Kauai, make sure you stop at the Kilauea Point NWR.

Take a look at the banding of the Nene.

Just like Monk Seals, these bands help researchers and

curious naturalists

learn more about these animals.

While on Kauai, chances are good you will see

Whales, Dolphins, Nene, Albatross (winter only), and

Monk Seals.........You might be surprised when and where

you encounter these birds and mammals, often at very crowded shores.

This is because habitat is present and, so far, human disturbances

have not reached levels beyond which that habitat value is lost to wild creatures.

No matter where you stand on earth, some creature is missing or much

reduced in numbers. Their presence or absence is what makes for the beauty

of all life.........Bringing back a single plant or animal, or protecting those

holding on in fragile ways........This is what we can do with and for our children.

Just last night, I watched a pair of Canada Geese working on their nesting area.

Not all that long ago, they were like the Nene, gone from much of our mainland.

Now, many of you will probably say Canada Geese are TOO abundant.

Wouldn't it be nice to say that about more animals!

MONK SEAL.........UPDATE WITH GOOD NEWS!!!

2011-04-04T07:55:00.001-10:00

This is Monk Seal T12, photographed last fall at the very northern end of

Aliomanu Bay, just as it bumps into a point of rocks.

I'd posted this photo and remember so well that morning.

The seal was bothered by a buoy, free floating along with much more trash.....

This morning, I got word of a sighting of T12 on Kauai down on

Waipouli Beach!!!!!

THIS IS GOOD NEWS

for many reasons.

Thanks to Brenda Becker and other scientists,

Monk Seals are tagged, identifying them so that we can all help with research.

Monk Seals are among the rarest mammals on the planet

and some believe they have no chance to survive...........

LET'S PROVE THIS TO BE WRONG!!!

While the overall population of monk seals is declining

(at 4% per year in the NW Hawaiian Islands),

many more people are out there, cleaning beaches,

helping the survival rate increase, especially in the main Hawaiian Islands.

Entanglement in nets, fishing gear, and other debris is a killer,

so any time you remove plastics from a beach, anywhere leading to the Pacific,

YOU ARE HELPING MONK SEALS SURVIVE!!!

In 2009 two pups were born on Kauai, 1 on Oahu, 4 on Molokai, and 1 on Maui.

I will give you an update soon and share other photos of T12 and other

Monk Seals you might also get to know and to help!

Thanks for any comments, especially if you see a Monk Seal

Begin or Continue a Pacific Ocean Beach Cleanup!

As for me.........I think I will make a seal from the plastic stash

collected over the weekend......Thanks to Ray Lowrie for bringing by

a bag full of plastic bags his newpaper comes in each morning.....and to

Central Market Staff for the great plastic film

they tear from pallets of frozen food.

There is a lot of quite beautiful plastic waiting to be repurposed and in so doing,

to save a seal.........or albatross.........or who knows, someone

sitting right next to you.........

REPURPOSING PLASTICS AND THE STRINGBALL

2011-03-30T07:53:00.000-10:00

FRED IS BACK..........Fred Z126 arrived on Marrowstone Island two days ago

wearing his GO GREEN shirt and reminding one and all that Albatrosses tagged

with legbands beginning with the letter Z include WISDOM, the oldest known

wild bird on Earth! Wisdom is Albatross Z333 in case you spot her flying out over

the Pacific Ocean between now and July as she searches for food for her chick. Once

the baby bird fledges, Wisdom might just show up along our coast. One never knows!

In the meantime, Fred is busy with new plastic projects and probably because he is a

Happy Eye Monkey from Hawaii with connections all around the planet,

Fred now champions

REPURPOSING PLASTIC AS ART!!!

The photos above were taken this morning on the East Beach side of the island

where we receive tons of Seattle and Tacoma trash.

The colorful mesh bags came in on the tide yesterday afternoon

along the north shore of Hood Canal near the mouth of Shine Creek.

Funny, I used to feel a sadness on finding plastic on the beach.

Now with acceptance of its presence (much like beach glass),

I see it as a resource worth removing from the ocean

for all the right reasons,

then making cool stuff with it along with kids who care.

North and Central Kitsap Kids do care a lot!

We will be fusing plastic, picking it up from watersheds,

drilling holes in bottle caps, and more.........to make

SALMON

WHALES

DRAGONFLIES

BEAVERS

SHRIMP

CRABS

and more.........Stay tuned.

p.s. My Stringball still grows, but it has now been repurposed completely

as a kind of storage unit for plastic art supplies.......

The fish you see in the bottom photo was made mostly with fused

shopping bags, oyster mesh bags, dog treat bags, top ramen wrapper, and

junk mail plastic wrappings. The eye is a bottle cap. The gill cover is

a food container lid and the white mesh is a crab bait holder, cut

then fused to some bread wrappers and other plastic bags.

FUSED PLASTIC PROJECT NUMBER ONE......Saving Albatrosses One Plastic Bag at a Time!

2011-03-23T14:19:00.000-10:00

FUSED PLASTIC BAGS

Created after Beach Cleanups with

Bags, Plastic Film, Bottle Caps, Recycled Phone Wire, Found Objects

I photographed these on one of the beaches where I pick up plastic.

If you look closely, you will notice that one of the closures

(Middle Bag I call "Move over Gucci")

is a Monopoly Hotel found on this beach.

The red plastic is a mix of bags and film from a local grocery store.

It is thin. It would otherwise be tossed in the trash

and was originally used to wrap pallets of frozen food in shipment.

Bag used in far right piece is combo of this and an empty Sunflower Seed Package.

THE COOLEST PART

If you are familiar with fused plastic........

sort out some bottle caps, selecting soft ones, not those

with a rigid feel to them........

You can fuse the bottle cap between layers of plastic bags!

(The Green Blotch on the middle bag is a former bottle cap

that melted nicely, fusing elegantly into the red plastic)

THE RECIPE

I just started doing this for a project with kids in a couple weeks,

so I am having a lot of fun learning on their behalf.

The basic steps I've followed:

1) Sandwich about four or five layers of plastic bag

between PARCHMENT PAPER that is placed on a hard, flat surface.

Make sure the plastic is inside the parchment 'sandwich", especially if using

your only iron. I've been reusing the same piece of parchment paper

that is about three feet long and folded in half.

2) Press down hard with a hot dry iron, using a bit of circular motion

to heat the plastic uniformly. Again, make sure the plastic is tucked in between the

layers of parchment paper.

3) As the plastic fuses it simply flattens out and you can easily flip the

parchment sandwich to fuse both sides.

4) Continue pressing as if ironing a shirt, tucking edges over as you see the

now fused sheet form into a more rigid piece. It stiffens quite a bit.

5) You can now cool the sheet and form as you wish or simply use to cut out fish, trees, flowers,

or other shapes.........All suitable for outdoor uses!

The above pieces were single sheets. I folded them over, then fused at edges to form pouches.

No additional work was required to fold the flap. The sheets from this batch

were pliable enough to simply fold. I then punched holes in the sheets where I wanted

to attach the bottle cap buttons and "sewed" them on with recycled phone wire.

I'm now experimenting with bottles, frisbees, toy soldiers, and other found

plastic trash I collect pretty much everyday at the beach........

Thanks to Michelle Kaskovich for the Inspiration!

NOTE:

The bag on the far left incorporates plastic mesh that fused

nicely with the red sheeting. Sharon Buda and I picked

the mesh from a beach the other day after she and I had

presented at the NAEA Convention in Seattle.

You will be seeing a lot more use from this type of mesh bag,

one of the most common beach finds in recent months. Like

Bottle Caps

It comes in many bright colors and is a type of plastic that easily fuses!

Have Fun and Malama i ke Kai

WISDOM RETURNS.........Mana'o Akamai...........

2011-03-22T12:11:00.000-10:00

WISDOM FEEDING HER CHICK

Photograph by USFWS Midway Wildlife Biologist, Pete Leary

In a March 21 News Release, the USFWS has officially announced that

WISDOM

has returned to her chick following earlier reports of her possible loss

in the aftermath of the Tsunami of March 10, 2011.

The Mana'o Akamai (Spirit of Wisdom) is strong.........

This 60 year old Female Laysan Albatross

has been successfully raising chicks

on Midway for several decades and is

THE OLDEST KNOWN BIRD LIVING IN THE WILD.

Mixed results following the tsunami were understandable for many reasons.

Adult Albatrosses share in the raising of their single offspring.

Both partners switch off during the nesting season,

flying hundreds of miles to feeding grounds,

returning to feed their young one a mix of sea life,

composed of a high percentage of flying fish eggs and squid.

Wisdom must have left Midway shortly after or even during

the time of the tsunami which swept away and/or directly killed

approximately 110,000 juvenile Laysan and Blackfooted Albatross chicks

and about 2,000 adult Albatrosses.

Many more seabirds were killed, including shearwaters and petrels.

Burrow nesters, these seabirds are more difficult to count than the

cup nesting and much larger Albatrosses.

Weighing about 8 pounds, Wisdom has survived life on Midway

through many years of the build up of ocean plastic that annually

kills about one million seabirds worldwide.

Tsunamis are not preventable and the low lying Pacific islands

where many seabirds nest are in harms way whenever severe quakes occur.

Rising Sea Levels also threaten their populations

and yet,

It is the death by plastics (legos, bottle caps, pens, markers, sheeting, lighters, toothbrushes,

fishing gear, broken crates, combs, brushes, and other items

we fail to successfully repurpose

enter rivers, streams, storm drains, and seas

then float out into the ocean.

Looking for a Squid, Albatrosses

mistake the glisten of a bottle cap for food, snatch it up,

then fly back to Midway where their waiting young dine on

so much plastic, they are unable to consume natural food.

See earlier posts at SOAR and links at this site

for educational information, teaching tools, and

art/ecology ideas........

In the meantime, Wisdom has found safe feeding areas

and her survival suggests hope for the future of our

ONE OCEAN, her only home.

See http://www.fws.gov/pacific for more information

about Pacific Ocean issues and further Wisdom updates.

Thanks to Pete, John, and all out on Midway!!!!!!!!!

ART, SCIENCE, AND INSPIRATION FOR KIDS

2011-03-20T11:14:00.001-10:00

Green Darter. Photo by Barb Mayer. Midway Atoll.

Project SOAR and Friends of Fred have added DRAGONFLY

to our growing list of species.

The above photo was taken by Barb just as the adult Dragonfly

began unfolding its wings at the edge of quiet waters.

Google Green Darter and you will find many articles about these insects.

Team up with Friends of Fred and you will soon learn much more and,

hopefully get involved in the science and art of Dragonflies.

I spent a couple days presenting and attending the

National Art Educators Association convention this week.

On returning home, I realized I should have presented a talk

called INSPIRATION........

Dragonflies inspire for sure.........They are beautiful creatures.

Their wings seem so delicate and yet they carry these predators

as if made of Boeing aluminum and fitted to the body with rivets.

Some kids, when I ask about this beauty tell me God made them.......

To each his and her own beliefs........

As an ecologist, I am adding Dragonflies to SOAR

because they represent a critical link

in watershed ecology

AND

Their beauty helps kids create dazzling art,

ART THAT MAKES THEM THINK!!!!!!!

Art and Science go together in the world of children

like chocolate and peanut butter.....and honey, and nuts, and more

chocolate!

Dragonflies link with their relatives, the even more delicate Damselflies.

Dragon and Damselflies are aquatic, totally so for most of their lives.

They are somewhat unusual in that the juvenile form, known as NYMPHS,

lives far longer than the adult form and there is no intermediate stage between

EGG

and

NYMPH.

The NYMPHS are so kid friendly.

I take hundreds of kids out onto and into ponds, netting up big wads of gooey muck.

We haul the net onto the shore and take a look..........

At first there may be no sign of life.......nothing at all. Then, suddenly, as if added by

Steven Spielberg,

DRAGONFLY NYMPHS crawl out of the goo, greeted by screams of delight!

A Dragonfly Nymph might measure a couple inches and, equiped as it is with

HUGE AND POWERFUL JAWS,

The Nymph can and does feast on fish!

As a juvenile, the Dragonfly is an awesome predator, inspiring kids

with its curious shape, strong legs, and water lifestyle.

Follow this blog thread and we will share seining trips to

Buck Lake in Washington State with kids from Breidablik Elementary

and, later in the spring, with kids from Ohio and beyond.

Watch for the Nymphs this spring as they crawl out of the muck

at a pond near you........Watch as they become motionless, then crack open to reveal

a dazzling

GREEN DARNER!!!

Much Smaller Damsels are also predatory as juveniles, live in the same

basic wet habitats, and go through a similar metamorphosis......

To tell a Damsel adult from a Dragon adult?

Like butterflies and moths, the two generally have different wing resting positions.

Dragonflies hold their wings out when at rest.

Damselflies hold their wings together.

If you live in Hawaii,

Watch for endangered Damselflies and read more about them in:

HAWAIIAN INSECTS AND THEIR KIN

F.G. Howarth and W.P. Mull

and

Hawaiian Damselflies: An Identification Guide

by Dan Polhemus and Adam Asquith

Happy Dragon and Damselfly Watching!

Fred The Happy-Eyed Monkey

2011-03-16T12:36:00.000-10:00

Here are the lyrics, all revised and ready for you to sing along with the kids from CSG on their debut performance at YouTube:

Fred the Happy-Eyed Monkey

Adapted from Peter, Paul, and Mary's Puff the Magic Dragon

by:

Ron Hirschi and the Form III classes at Columbus School for Girls, Columbus, Ohio

Fred the Happy-Eyed Mon-key,

Was born by the sea.

And surfed a-long Bla-ack Pot,

In a Bay called Hanalei.

All the lit-tle Kei-ki,

Smiled when - 'ere he came,

Navy Ships would hoist their flags,

When Fred called out their names.

Fred the Happy-Eyed Monkey,

Loved the birds and SEAS.

Helped the IWA, ALBATROSS, 'n RED-FOOTED BOO-oo-BIES.

Fred the Happy-Eyed Monkey,

Loved the birds and SEAS.

He knew that he could d-o more,

With help from you and me!

Then one day it happened,

Fred, created SOAR!

Now the lit-tle Kei-ki,

go down to their own shore!

They pick out all the plastic,

And put it in its place.

Now, Fred smiles his Monkey smile,

Having helped the Human Race!

Oh, Fred the Happy-Eyed Monkey,

Loves all the Seas.

He surfs and boogie boards to play,

At a place called HANALEI........

o-o-o-ooh yeahhh........Ha-na-lei

right down by the bay!!!!!!!!!!!

NEWS DIRECTLY FROM MIDWAY...Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument

2011-03-15T12:40:00.000-10:00

To see and hear first hand accounts of the impact of the Tsunami on Midway Fish, Wildlife, and Habitat:

http://peteatmidway.blogspot.com/

As one who saw hundreds of dead albatrosses during "normal" conditions, I can't imagine how tough it is to witness thousands dead and dying. As more reports come in, I will keep you posted on information from Midway sources. The deaths of reef fish and incredibly powerful Ulua is especially sad to hear about since these fish are threatened in ways we don't normally appreciate. I am guessing more reports will help to determine losses of corals as well as the fish Pete talks about in his recent posts.

I'm a fish person and dream of catching Ulua the size you will see at Pete's blog. They are beautiful fish and feed at night, so the Ulua would likely be washed ashore as it chased smaller fish, not sensing the tsunami as something to move away from. Just last spring, during high surf on the windward side of Oahu, I almost touched a huge Ulua as it chased a parrotfish at the front of a big wave. The Ulua chomped the parrotfish in half as the wave curled, dropping the head end onto the beach, right at my feet.......So, they ride waves to feast. Sadly, the tsunami waves also carry them far too high onto the shore.

Please also note the importance in this tsunami event of Naupaka, the shore plant that more or less filtered Albatross chicks from wave surges.........This natural vegetation is what the USFWS is working so hard to protect as workers struggle to pull up non-native plants that inhibit nesting and destroy natural habitat.

All things connected.......from naupaka to ulua to baby petrels and albatrosses................Thanks USFWS!

TSUNAMI AND ALBATROSS POPULATIONS...........

2011-03-14T16:39:00.000-10:00

Our hearts and helping hands go out to all the people of Japan and we urge everyone to find ways to help ease the pain and suffering following the earthquakes and tsunami.......But we must also consider our original mission and help all who wish to know more about impacts on Albatross and other wildlife.

At latest report, we know that tens of thousands of Laysan Albatrosses and large numbers of Black Footed Albatross were killed on Midway. A high percentage of the world population nests there and even though waves reached no more than about 5 feet above normal, over one half of low lying Eastern Island was swamped by the surge of tsunami waves.

A bright spot in all of this was the survival of the Short Tailed Albatross Chick who had already been washed from its cup nest once before!!!!!!! And, we have heard that Wisdom, the Sixty Year Old Albatross (Laysan) and her chick also survived. She nest on Sand Island where the approximately 65 humans reside and found themselves just fine after the waves washed over much of the runway and lower lying areas of the island............Not to say there is any "highland" to be found...........USFWS staff and volunteers were busy and continue to rescue and monitor. Our Friend and supporter of SOAR, John Klavitter is on island and as soon as it seems right to get in touch, I will post a comment from John.

I do know that he has made comments about the Black Footed Albatrosses on Midway. They nest closer to the ocean, generally, than Laysans. And so, they were hit harder.

I remember so well being on Midway when the chicks of both species were testing their wings. I thought at that time that the greatest threats they faced were from humans who toss plastics into the sea..........and now this natural event the birds have evolved with for centuries, adapting to the rise of seas. Wisdom chose her nesting place long ago. She survived this tsunami and so will many hundreds of others. We might mourn the losses as is our kind way of thinking about all species..............and yet, survival is what brings hope. If a Sixty Year Old Albatross can raise a Chick out in the middle of the Pacific, life goes on......and if a Short Tailed Albatross ----- ONE ONLY thousands of miles from any of us ----------can survive this historic tsunami......Then surely, life goes on.

Please give to a Japanese relief organization of your choosing and remember the Albatrosses and other seabirds, sea turtles, monk seals, and wildlife of the ocean who can not survive without human help.

To learn more about the fate of all Pacific Albatrosses and other seabirds, visit http://www.acap.aq/ and follow the Friends of Albatross Midway (FOAM) site of good friend, Barb Mayer....

CONGRATULATIONS TO PROJECT SOAR CO-FOUNDERS!!!!

2011-02-26T09:42:00.003-10:00

See the Award Winning CSG Students

Singing

FRED THE HAPPY EYE MONKEY

AND

TALKING STORY ABOUT PROJECT SOAR:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=_IE78y5od0c

The International Reading Association

has just announced:

Debbie Charna's Students at Columbus School for Girls

FIRST PLACE WINNERS

THE LITERACY AND SERVICE RECOGNITION AWARD

for

"Developing and expanding Project S.O.A.R.

SAVE OUR ALBATROSSES/RESEARCH.

In announcing the award to Debbie Charna and her students,

Denise H. Stuart, Ph.D.

Co-Chair and Literacy and Service Award at IRA

stated further:

"They purposefully put literacy skills into caring action, while developing

international friendships and chains of communication arond concern for

enviromental awareness and responsibility.

These young girls exemplify the kind of leadership

we want to recognize."

They have been invited to Orlando, Florida on May 10th to accept their award!!!

The five students have been a major part of what I have been attempting here at SOAR

and I have had the honor

to continue working with Debbie and her incredible kids at CSG.

In past weeks, we have collaborated with NOAA, schools in the Dominican Republic

and Israel.

We've also started to explore ways of connecting whales and freshwater systems

by focusing on Orcas and Dragonflies.

Friends of Fred teaching kits with Orca and Dragonfly information

and educational projects are off and away to Rhode Island and Norway

where we will launch our first connection with a Marine National Park

in the Scandinavian reaches of the ocean.

None of this would have been possible without the help and inspiration

of Debbie Charna, her students, and the many other

teachers, parents, and partners at NOAA, USFWS, and other agencies

and Not For Profits!!!

CONGRATULATIONS DEBBIE AND STUDENTS!!!

OCEAN VALENTINE FROM FRED X193

2011-02-14T17:33:00.000-10:00

ALOHA NUI LOA

From Fred X193

Just before heading out into the world to explore Dragonflies.

First stop, Kauai with Yumi, then on to Rhode Island and beyond.........

But first, a big Valentine Aloha to Linda Schubert and Ann Bell.

Thanks to both of them, Fred has a way about him not possible

without their help and sense of humor........

Fred's Cousin, X310 gotta lotta Aloha from Linda and Ann.

Fred X193 is aiming to catch up with all of them, sometime, someplace

on a planet not so full of all those bottle caps,

THANKS TO KIDS WHO KNOW WHO THEY ARE!!!!!

Thanks kids for cleaning up your world by removing bottle caps

from watersheds of planet earth.

Just you watch.........that heart can change the world. One heart.

WHERE HAVE ALL THE FLOWERS GONE........

2011-02-08T16:57:00.000-10:00

For those of us who came to know responsibility with the help of poetic music

of the sixties and early seventies,

These words ring. Where have all the flowers gone......Okay, Pete got alot of us

thinking as we entered our professional lives.

In his song, as in many of his works, we might think about injustices

related to war and the hope of peace on the planet.

Tonight, I walked the beach here on Marrowstone Island.

Susan and Howard Berta of the Orca Network had sent out a note

to let us know there were whales in the area........And so, I went on my

evening beach walk and cleanup a bit earlier than normal. It was easy.

We had SUN today and Monsoon was eager to swim.

I hoped to see the whales, but when I got to the beach, a lot of military

boat traffic apparently frightened the whales. They were actually within

a reach of water I could see in the distance --- down near Point No Point,

a very historic place.........But then, they suddenly turned south

as the shipping noise probably interfered with their movements.

Sonar perhaps.........not uncommon and needed to be sure during

our time of war.......

Monsoon and I walked the beach and found a lot of mesh netting. We stopped a lot,

scanning the water as the ships disappeared only to be replaced by the

endless stream of freighters leaving Seattle and Tacoma.

No whales in sight.

I kept putting the binocs on Craven Rock to my south.

Sea Lions perched atop the rock sat without making any sound.

No seals were in the water. No porpoises.

As it grew dark, I walked to the very northern tip of the island and

began a closer look at the drift line where high tide dropped

some of what you see in the above photo.........

Right there, Tangled together in seaweed ---

a plastic flower and one Green Soldier.

Now the soldier rests on my desk with a blue one....

but this green guy fascinates. He holds binoculars, not a rifle..........

and, curiously, mixed in the very same tangle was a tiny plastic bag.

If you look closely at the photo you will see dollar signs printed on the tiny plastic pouch.

Where have all the plastic flowers gone? All I know is that some wash up on our shore.

Some have gone to soldiers. Some float with plastic bags once holding funds of some sort.

If you notice too.........that tiny Earth squeeze ball above the flower.......

It was a gift from some young students......I pick it up daily and give it a few squeezes.

Printed on the Earth:

"Reduce Stress

on the Earth:

Support Family Planning"

As many kids say to me, this is what it is all about. What it comes down to.

There are simply too many plastic soldiers on the planet because, well, hey,

there are far too many of everyting. Apparently there are now so many

plastic flowers that we need another Pete Seeger to sing their song.

SUPER SIZED STRINGBALL ON SUPER BOWL SUNDAY

2011-02-07T10:11:00.000-10:00

It has been a while since I quantified Beach Plastics and so, yesterday being Super Bowl Sunday, I thought I'd hop aboard the competitive spirit train and offer you this. Here is a listing of all the plastic I picked up just before half time on Super Bowl Sunday at Marrowstone Point, along the eastern shore of the island from what we call The Goat Ponds to just about the tip of the point..........a distance of about half a mile. All plastic counted was washed ashore on the first high tide on 6 February 2011, so this is freshly dropped trash, mostly brought in on the tide after a moderate wind from the south (Once again, Thank you Seattle for all your trash - it is mostly added to the now netted Stringball, supersized on Super Bowl Sunday:

Plastic Lumber 1 five foot 2x2

Plastic Bags (clear) 15

Plastic Sheeting/film 19 pieces about enough to cover an average back yard

Food and Candy Wrappers (most very fresh and some with mints) 21

Other Wrappers 4

Bottles 1

Tire Buoys (styrofoam filled tires) 2

Lighters 5

Shotgun Shells 4

Shotgun Shell Shot Sleeves (the pieces that look like squid) 12

Rope 4

Planter 1

Fencing 1 section

Unidentified 10

Cargo Netting 1 piece (visible in photo above)

Toys 4 (frisbee piece, balls)

Fireworks 3

Bottle Caps 13

Flip Flop 1

Health and Beauty Aids 4

Ant Trap 1 (printed with CAUTION and listing of contents: Hydramethylnon, EPA reg. no. 1663-33)

Mesh Tubing/Bag 12

Balloons 3

Food Containers 2

Tool or Brush Handles 2

Tape 3 chunks

Glove 1

Buckets 1

Large Handles 1

Fishing Lures/Gear 2

Tags (includes shellfish identification tag from Skokomish Harvest) 2

Straws 10

Note that I only found one bottle. That is unusual for any time of year, but many of these are blown up and away from the high water mark, so tonight I might recover many more of these. The Cargo Netting was disturbing in that these larger pieces of debris are usually found in outer coastal areas and are major problems for marine mammals. When I was on Midway, Cargo Netting was a major part of the trash washed ashore just as it is on the windward sides of each of the main Hawaiian Islands.

Of interest too, I found a section of what I do believe is a rib bone from a whale.

You have to wonder about the ant trap and its contents. Rodent traps, mosquito repellent, and other liquid biocides wash into our waters, but how to quanitify these and to what extent do they enter marine foods we eat, not to mention the foods eaten by seabirds, fish, and marine mammals.

Note: My stringball receives only a fraction of the trash since much of it needs to be disposed of in other ways or simply reused or recycled.

ORCAS AND PLASTIC SNEAK PAST MARROWSTONE ISLAND

2011-02-03T16:46:00.000-10:00

Stringball. 3 February 2011.

On February 1st, two pods of Orcas snuck past Marrowstone Island

in the middle of the night......well, snuck might not be the right word, but for

those of us who enjoy seeing them, it works. They were heard on the local

hydrophone, then seen near Seattle yesterday. They were on the nightly

TV news late last night, thrilling ferry riders.

They are, as I type, somewhere just to the south of here. Some,

according to the Orca Network's Susan Berta, down around Tacoma.

Others are headed north from around Seattle so they might show up here

in the middle of the night again.

Sometime in that same time frame, tons of plastic drifted past Marrowstone.

This morning, I hauled 31 more Mussel discs off the beach, each wrapped along

a plastic mesh bag used by mussel farmers.

The discs are those round black plastic objects on the outer rim of the

ever enlarging stringball.........You can also see a bright orange crab bait box,

plastic bottles, rope, crab buoys (with names of owners), and a pink flip flop - one of more than

a dozen so far attached.

All this simply to show you what washes up. You can imagine what remains

out there in waters where orcas, seals, sea lions, fish, seabirds, humpbacks,

and other ocean animals are trying to survive in a world in which

their food sources are diminishing. It is no wonder so many end up

mistaking plastic for food.

See the Orca Network for today's announcement from NOAA

that allows killer whales a share in the harvest of chinook salmon - meaning

that salmon fishermen will have fewer salmon to harvest so that orcas

might have a larger share of this valuable food source.

No one, however, is talking about who should take how much of the

JUVENILE salmon population that will soon leave rivers and streams

and enter the ocean world where hungry humpbacks dine on them

along with herring, sandlance, candlefish, smelt, and other small fish.

Just a guess, but an educated guess.........Humpback Whale population increases

are taking a large share of the orca's chinook, probably a much larger

share than that taken when the chinooks grow to adult size and become

targets of commercial and recreational human fishermen. Not an easy issue

to study, so no one is able to work on this in a meaningful way. So far.

Meanwhile, plastics continue to enter the ocean in far greater quantities

than baby salmon.......And so, many whales will die from our inability

to manage our waste stream.

HARBOR PORPOISES AND PLASTIC FISHING LURES

2011-01-27T09:05:00.000-10:00

Last night the beaches of Marrowstone Island were littered with an unusually high number of fishing and hunting related "pieces" of plastic trash. Many were small, but the shotgun shells and shot sleeves are washing up in greater numbers than bottle caps. The shot sleeves are probably devastating since they look a lot like a squid with their cupped end and fanned out wings. You could affix these translucent plastic pieces to a hook and catch a salmon or even a harbor porpoise.

As I write, there are a couple dozen or more Harbor Porpoise swimming offshore. I got this report from a Washington State Department of Transportation biologist. She is monitoring marine mammals off Marrowstone Point while a colleague rides back and forth on the Port Townsent-Keystone Ferry. They watch for whales, then alert construction crews if whales are in a certain area. The ideas, apparently, is to shut down construction so that noise from the pile driving and other activities doesn't impact marine mammal movements through the Strait of Juan de Fuca and Admiralty Inlet.

The ferry boat monitoring reported several small pods of porpoises, not surprising since forage fish, squid, and swarms of bioluminescent lantern fish ---- all prey of harbor porpoises --- are out there in good numbers. So, I wonder...........how many pieces of shotgun shell are they consuming? How many of the other, pieces of hunting and fishing related plastic are they downing as they mistake shiny plastics for natural food? It is common, in the marine mammal literature to read a cautionary line about our not knowing much about whale deaths because they sink before we find most of the dead.

As I picked trash from the shore last night, I kept finding the usual containers I use to haul "micro" bits of plastic from the beach. Plastic bottles are perfect. I simply unscrew the cap if one is still on the coke, energy drink, or water bottle. These containers have become a new way for me to place trash in a receptacle that will be attached to my educational string ball (see earlier post). So far, I haven't had to walk far before a ballon and its ribbon shows up in a tangle of kelp. I stuff these into the filled bottles, screw the cap back on, and carry the lot back to the Subaru. Dozens of bottles now dangle from blue, red, and green ribbons once used by cruise ship passengers to celebrate as they leave Seattle for their Alaskan vacation.

Fishing trash of late includes some dazzling lures now used by saltwater anglers as much as those who fish mostly in freshwater for bass. Hundreds of designs may attract fishermen more than fish, but once broken free of the leader, these lures can float hundreds or thousands of miles before washing onto a beach or being swallowed by an albatross, frigate, seal, or harbor porpoise. Sea run cutthroat flies are another common piece of beach litter and none I have found lately are made of anything other than plastic.

I also find many tiny, bright orange lures and strike indicators. If you are not familiar with the latter, they are an invention now so popular that my most recent fly fishing magazines and fly fishing supply catalogs make these dangerous items seem like mandatory gear. Fishermen hook them onto their lines while fishing a sinking fly much like a worm fisherman attaches a bobber above the wiggling lure. As the indicator floats along, it is visible due to its neon brightness. If it bobs, chances are good a fish has grabbed the fly, indicating time to raise the rod tip and hook the prey. Problem is, they float downstream and into the ocean........by the millions now that they have become so popular.

Add to this ever present source of trash from a sport I love, the splashy, sparkly, plastic tinsel tied onto virtually every form of fishing fly from imitations of mayflies to the gaudy creations used to attract steelhead and their fishers.

I remember so well, a day maybe 25 years ago in West Yellowstone, Montana. I walked into Madison River Fishing Company after a good day on the Firehole River. Like any flyshop, they have a great selection of flies, spread out to catch your eye. I tie most of my own flies, but that day, a sparkling bit of shimmering green caught my eye and I picked up what the guy behind the desk told me was the new and very hot mayfly imitation. At the time, I was both skeptical and a bit turned off by the addition of this artificial stuff on a fly meant to be, for all of us old timers, made of feather and fur........

Long story short, I was soon converted to tying my own sparkle duns and other flies that incorporate plastics. My fly boxes are filled with trash, so to speak, and I even tie flies while inside Yellowstone with plastic I find along park rivers and streams ---- sometimes going so far as to bring only hooks and thread, then tying flies for the trip using only found objects for the materials. Plastic has become so much a part of our environment that I can pick it up anywhere, any time, and make use of it.......Trouble is, I do believe I am picking up such a small percentage, even here on Marrowstone Island, that it makes little or no difference in the lives of ocean life, especially those Harbor Porpoises now swimming off the island where I live.

If you would like to read more about this threat, see, for example:

Jacobsen, Massey, and Gulland. 2010. Fatal Ingestion of floating net debris by two sperm whales. marine pollution bulletin 60 (2010) 765-767

Baird and Hooker. (Not sure if published yet, but an in press copy available online) Ingestion of Plastic and unusual prey by a juvenile Harbour Porpoise. Marine Pollution Bulletin.

The SIMON report: Special Status Species: Harbor Porpoise (Phocoena phocoena). A report of the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary. Sanctuary Integrated Monitoring Network.

DEATH BY PLASTIC (as in near or....well, who knows)

2011-01-24T13:06:00.001-10:00

SEA LION. Found on beach, southwestern end of Indian Island, Jefferson County, Washington State.

Dropped by high tide this morning, 24 January 2011. Water depth stick alongside is two meters long. Total length, approximately 250cm, snout to tip of tail. Scars mostly skin deep. Skull still with fresh flesh, but jaws as if cleaned by beetles in a museum.........Some teeth missing in a jaw exposed. Strange to find a plastic fork there at its tongue........probably also dropped on the morning tide change. Who knows?

Not long ago, I found a freshly dead harbor seal a few miles from this site. It had a heavy black mesh plastic stuffed well into its throat and wrapped around its teeth so that the seal could not eat. To my way of thinking, it had died of plastic.

This sea lion will likely not be necropsied since no one seems to bother with small marine mammals. I have no way of knowing if the plastic fork came from the sea lion or just happened to drop with the falling tide.

If you read my post from this morning, you will know that a lot of trash arrived on Marrowstone Island over night. Marrowstone rests alongside Indian Island. In fact, they are artificially joined on their southern ends. Where I photographed but did not touch this sea lion, the US Army Corps of Engineers dug a channel, removing an ancient Indian Village and burials to do so. This excavation created a ship canal between Indian Island and the mainland, allowing safe passage for small boats that would otherwise have to round the stormy waters off the east shore of Marrowstone.

The Indian Village(s) had been occupied for centuries and remain places of importance within the Usual and Accustomed living, hunting, and fishing areas of the S'Klallam. I bring tribal youth here to share with them what I know of their ancestral homeland and waterways. Lucky for me, I learned by listening to tribal elders as a child and when I worked for the S'Klallam as their first fisheries biologist and cultural resource specialist. It seemed a bit interesting to find this sea lion today..........about ten feet from where I once found two stone tools........and then, as I looked up from the sea lion's body, a river otter ran down the beach and slipped into the ocean. The otter swam only five or six feet from shore and turned into the current and watched me for a long time. The pair of eagles, always present here, shouted out something. I suppose they hope to complete the job of reducing the sea lion to bones. But where this huge marine mammal rests for now makes me think it will simply wash out to the more distant seas to the west.

A MOST BEAUTIFUL BIRTH IN THE NEW YEAR..........

2011-01-22T17:15:00.001-10:00

I remember so well, a day in 2009. Out on Eastern Island in the middle of the Pacific Ocean. Matt Brown walked a small group of us to a most unlikely spot. Birds hovered around our heads, screaming as loud as they did when Alfred Hitchcock chose this very place to record the audio for THE BIRDS..........We had to watch our step as we made our way through thousands of nesting terns, noddies, Laysan Albatross. We passed a small wetland Matt created to encourage, successfully, the nesting of rare Laysan Ducks.......Then, in the distance, we could see oh so silent and still, magnificent birds taller than the rest with golden heads and gleaming white bodies...........but on closer approach, we could see they were decoys, meant to attract one of the rarest large birds of the ocean, Short Tailed Albatross.

Matt (USFWS Refuge Manager) told us that one pair had visited the decoys early in the year and he had high hopes they would return one day.............Well, you are in for a treat to witness their return. Return they did this winter! One pair found the island and have successfully hatched one chick.

Here's a photo I took on Eastern Island in 2009 of the decoys that helped attract the pair now raising a chick. This photo also includes young Laysan and Black Footed Albatross about to fledge..........

You can see a photo of the 2011 Short Tails by visiting Barb Mayer's great site, Friend of Albatross Midway (FOAM) at:

http://foam-friends-of-albatross-on-midway.blogspot.com/

Note that the photo was taken in January, so the surrounding area is filled with nesting Laysan Albatross tucked atop their eggs. Keep in mind that it will be more than six months before the young birds of any of the albatross parents are ready to fly on their own. Remember too, that hundreds of these young birds will not survive unless we rid the sea of lighters, bottle caps, plastic shovels.........

Keep watching the FOAM site and I will also try to get updates from Matt and others out on Midway within Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Sanctuary..........Watch also for a Short Tail Albatross Friend of Fred coming soon for someone with interest in learning more about these incredible birds. And, oh, did I mention this hatching is the FIRST known on Midway?????? Much like the birth of a Blue Whale or successful rearing of a Polar Bear Cub in American icescape within Alaska to be sure.......Cause for celebration in these times of change for all creatures of planet earth.

WHY KEEP CLEANING UP THE OCEAN?

2011-01-17T13:43:00.000-10:00

Why? Okay, I admit it.......it's kind of fun to see what I can add to

OCEAN TRASH STRINGBALL.......

It's getting too big for the Subaru....so where, oh where

can I put my ball of flip flops, buoys, toys, rope, stuff....???

I was thinking I might hoist it up Carl Johnson's flagpole?

Or maybe shape it a bit with a torch and pressure to create a

Whale? Fish? Giant Talking Rain Water Bottle?

Got ideas, let me know.......Want it, it's yours.......

THE ARC IS FULL........WHO CAN IDENTIFY ALL THE PASSENGERS?

2011-01-12T11:23:00.001-10:00

Well, okay, the Arc is always changing its passenger list, but imagine loading up planet earth with each species, two be two. Like a good teacher and principal, greeting students at the door on a Monday morning, the greetings for each plant or animal would need to take the shape of a proper hello ------- all words carefully chosen to let each arrival believe he or she is the most important at that moment.

"Hey Slime Mold! Welcome aboard!........Bacteria, please line up for a lunch count with Mr. Smith. Single Cell ------I mean all of you, no indoor recess today!"

If you look at any depiction of the Arc painted right up to last week, you might notice a lot of fur and feather. Where are the scales, smooth skin, slimy one celled pockets of life? Could it be the Arc only has room for those creatures fitting into our favorites in zoos, aquariums, farms, or fields? What species really matter?

That latter question hit home today when I was talking story with Michael Lombardi. His work is so great, I hope all teachers, students, and parents take a look at http://www.oceanopportunity.com/ to see what he is up to.

Here is the story he told me today:

".....the most pivotally inspirational moment of my life (true story) was on May 28th, 2002. The prior two weeks I was under contract with NOAA's Caribbean Marine Research Center to orchestrate what would be their first scientific diving program involving the use of mixed-gas (varying mixtures of oxygen, helium, and nitrogen) to venture beyond the routinely studied depths of benthic marine science and conduct investigations at depths of 300 feet (90msw). In just 8 brief minutes at depth, a time restricted by the technologies available at the time, more than a dozen new, never before described species were discovered. Later, labratory investigations unveiled that half of these species produced chemicals of interest in fighting cancer and other human conditions. Imagine the potential of 'the 9th minute'.

He went on to let all of us know that his quest for that 9th minute has fueled his fire ever since............Michael was kind enough to allow me to share this and it is my hope to place his story and images from his ocean work in FILLING THE ARC, a book that explores biodiversity in all its wonders.

Here is a challenge to kids out there: Visit http://www.oceanopportunity.com/ and create some images of new species you find there and at other ocean sites. I will include YOUR drawings of species new to science on this site and in my future publications and, of course, will send you and your class some cool stuff......maybe a penguin or porpoise for your classroom?

Ron Hirschi
Marrowstone Island
January 2011.....1/12/11

FILLING THE ARK...........A WAY TO RESTORE PLANET EARTH

2011-01-07T17:41:00.000-10:00

Like many others, you may have looked up at the night sky in wonder, imagining life beyond our planet. Space remains a vast mystery and yet, there remain many mysteries to be discovered here on earth. Many. Not just hundreds, but millions of plants and animals new to science await discovery. Many others, certainly need our care. Right now.

I began this journey many moons ago as a child collecting seashells for my cousin's museum. Later, I studied at the University of Washington, worked for agencies, Tribes, and nonprofits. I write and teach and try to work with gifted schools and communities who understand the need to take kids outside to learn and add to the understanding of biodiversity...........the mix of life we so often either take for granted or fumble upon in school, at work, or in the news. Life. No matter how you slice it, we are all connected and need to understand, completely, how that connection works.

To date, science has named and described about two million species. This seems like a large number. I only recently understood one million on arriving on Midway Atoll where a million seabirds danced, flew, and attempted to reproduce - all in small enough space to allow me to comprehend ONE MILLION........a million albatrosses, some of which are pecking at your shirt or landing as you walk or bike through their tiny island world..........Let me just say, it is mind boggling to realize we are just now getting to the point of understanding how many more species, or kinds, of plants and animals exist on earth.

Many researchers believe there are as many as 20 or even 30 million species on earth. Imagine if there were 20 million flavors of ice cream or 30 million latte combos..........Starbuck stocks might soar?

Every year, new species are added to the list and friends and relative Tom, add new species due to their little valued work in describing species. A new stingray was added recently. A fruit bat was just discovered in the Philippines. Australians added a new box jellyfish in 2007, naming it after a man killed by this jelly's lethal sting. The listing goes on.

Hawaii tops the list in the United States with the largest number of species. It likely has the largest number of species yet to be described. There are far more endangeredc species in the islands due to their isolation and incredible land and water alterations after initial human settlement.

We lose species daily. We add species too..........and in the years ahead, this project, with help from Fred the Monkey will spread news and share projects to help in understanding and protecting as well as doing initial research into learning more about ways of working with cutting edge science. Together, we will help restore planet earth, one species at a time.

ALL MY FRIENDS ARE FRIENDS OF FRED........FOR IWA, WHEREVER SHE MAY SOAR!!!

2010-12-10T08:05:00.001-10:00

FRED THE HAPPY EYE MONKEY

With Thanks to Peter Paul and Mary

for enchanting so many through the years

and introducing the magic of Hanalei Bay to the world.

In Memory of Andy Irons

Fred the Happy Eye Monkey was born by the sea

and surfed out of Black Pot

at a Bay called Hanalei

All the little Keiki smiled whenever he came.....

and Navy Ships would hoist their flags

When Fred called out their names

Fred the Happy Monkey

Loved all the SEAS

He helped out the Albatross,

Iwa

and

BOOBIES (redfooted especially but ya don't have to sing that part)

then one day it happened......

Fred created SOAR

Now all the Keiki go down to their own shore!

They pick out all the plastic

and put it in its place

Fred smiles his Monkey smile

Knowing he helped save the Human Race!

Oh, Fred the Happy Eye Monkey

Loves all the Seas

and surfs and boogie boards all day

at a place

CALLED

HANALEI................not lee, it be Lei!

Happy Holidays for all Keiki and their moms, dads, teachers, aunties, uncles, kupuna

and most especially........for you, little Eva!

FredX168

Note:

Whoever sends me a photo of a group of postable kids singing

Fred the Happy Eye

WINS

Aloha Hanalei FredX168

who now wears a genuine Albatross Leg Band,

courtesy of the US Fish and Wildlife Service/Midway/

Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument

Battle of Midway National Historic Site

FredX168 comes

with a journal, a sand sample collected at Hanalei

AND, get this,,,,,,,,,a small container of ocean water from Hanalei Bay!

A few other treasures, like shells and a Friend of Fred to be decided....

DO SHARKS MATTER?

2010-12-07T17:20:00.001-10:00

Terry Lilley just posted this photo along with a heartfelt talk story......

See: http://terrylilley.wordpress.com/ for full story about this Gray Reef Shark

they tried, unsuccessfully to revive after it was caught up in a net......

This story comes the week of the death by propellers of a Bryde's Whale

here in Washington State Waters. I imagine a hospital ship maybe trying

best they can to patch up a torn up back of a huge whale someday, or,

as my wife, Brenda suggested in all sincerity......That Raw Honey that patches

human scars and healed our Labrador Retriever recently.....you know the

Treatment?

She suggested dripping from a helicopter,

Huge drops of Honey on the Whale.

Right smack dab on its back where you can actually see

at Orca Network's website,

the brutality of ship props that slashed that whale, not once,

but several times........

I told Susan Berta at Orca Network that her followers would be

a bit overshelmed to truly know......to see........to comprehend,

the millions of seabirds and

Marine Mammals killed each year by human intervention in the sea.

Seals wash up dead on Marrowstone all the time. Eagles, seabirds, and whales

are dying due to ships running into the largest of our marine mammals

as tiny pieces of plastic fill the throats of our "smaller" mammals and birds.

Fish. Does anyone care about Sharks?

Do sharks matter.........read Terry's beautifully written story.

I know it is the season of hope and kindness, but hey, let's be kind to the sea.

malama i ke kai

protect the ocean as you would your grandchildren

Big Thanks to Terry for his incredible educational work!

Go out with him on Kauai........and do check his work with surfing for anybody

who thinks they might not be able....out at Black Pot. hanalei. magic water.

SERIOUS SAND UPDATED AND REVISED

2010-12-06T09:42:00.000-10:00

Barb Mayer took this photo the other day on a beach near her home on the windward side of Oahu. The scene could be along any accretion beach on any windward side of any island on earth.......Look closely along the drift line - the point at which high tide decided to go landward no more....

The blues and whites especially - Those are microplastics and Barb said it was as if a foam of plastic had washed ashore. But then, Barb sees this all the time. I do too, here on Marrowstone Island in Washington State, along the outer coast of Washington, and on the windward side of Kauai.

Barb is sending me samples of this sand and I am now working with high school teachers who will share the samples with interested students. I will keep you posted on results.

In the meantime, if any of you walk beaches or riverbanks or lakeshores, please take samples under a new protocol:

Walk along until you locate an accretion area. This is where sand and other materials settle along the shoreline. Typically, this is at a point, along a sand bar, or barrier type island - basically, where sand accumulates instead of eroding away all the time.

Grab a hand sized amount of sand along with the chunks of small plastic you see. This study is not meant to chronicle if, but where and why plastic enters the sea. We already know way too much about the "facts" of plastic in the ocean. We need to start doing serious sand study and more to alert people about possible solutions to this global crisis.

Micro Plastics are here to stay and can not be removed from the ocean effectively.

Micro Plastics can be prevented from entering the ocean and waste stream if

people follow practical reduce, reuse, restore, recycle, repurpose principals

discussed in many educational circles.

Please send samples to :

Project Serious Sand

PO Box 899

Hadlock, Washington USA 98339

Here are some links to sites with more information on plastic debris and ocean issues related to the ever increasing deaths by plastic, deaths of albatross, shearwaters, gulls, puffins, seals, whales, and pretty much all life forms..........

FOAM http://foam-friends-of-albatross-on-midway.blogspot.com/

Terry Lilley http://terrylilley.wordpress.com/

NOAA http://marinedebrisblog.wordpress.com/

Ron Hirschi

Marrow Stone Island

MONK SEALS........WHAT IT IS ALL ABOUT! Or Maybe.......It is All About Us?

2010-11-28T12:41:00.002-10:00

This is young T12, a Monk Seal Pup born at Larsen's Beach on Kauai April 2010. I photographed T12 up and down Aliomanu Bay in late October. On this morning, the young seal had been trying to come ashore after a night of solo feasting, no doubt on lobster and other invertebrates or maybe a fish or two.......... T12 was being bounced on the head and body by a large plastic fishing buoy. The size of a bowling ball, the buoy is one of hundreds of thousands that break away from mile after mile of discarded debris floating in the world's oceans.

I walked around T12 and grabbed the buoy just as it was about to slip into the current and round the point and wash away into distant and remote Papa'a Bay. As if a gift for doing so, when I turned back to photograph the seal for identification, I looked to my feet and there, inches from the snout of the seal was a beautiful Hebrew Cone........a treasure to share with kids, just like this true life story.

Monk Seals love nothing more than to come ashore and bask in the air, partly to simply sleep, but also to avoid tiger sharks. Avoiding predators has been something they have had to deal with for all the centuries of their existence. Harpoons almost wiped them out during whaling days. Now, they must deal with the PCB/PBDE and other chemical threats like orcas and other marine mammals..........And, the threat from plastics is not just a hindering hastle like the buoy bouncing T12 around that morning.

Plastics wash ashore on all beaches on earth. Out at Pihemanu, I observed hundreds of dead albatross, killed directly by plastic. I also listened to biologist, Brenda Becker, mourn the decline of Monk Seal populations. One problem is genetics and the monk seal population size, post human arrival in their midst........But a much larger problem is the no doubt unseen deaths due to plastics, fish nets, cargo nets, and the many pollutants we directly or indirectly pour into the ocean each second of the day. (Note: The above photo of an entangle pinniped, courtesy Dr. Hans Van Weenen of the Netherlands; photo source: C.W. Fowler of the National Marine Mammal Lab, Seattle, Washington USA).

Do Monk Seals matter? That is another way of asking my earlier question about their major breeding grounds within Papahanaumokuakea. Add to this list........Do sea turtles, spinner dolphins, or mahi mahi matter?

Help us find ways of redirecting plastics from the sea. And check out a recent video at :
http://tinyurl.com/2fbtruh submitted by Vicki Osis.......Thanks Vicki! And Scuttlebutt/NMEA.

Project SOAR and Friends of Fred are now sending Teaching Packets around the world. The packets include An Original Fred, A Friend of Fred such as an orca, seal, or other animal in need of your help, a traveling journal, gifts from NOAA and the USFWS, along with activities, suggested projects, and links to schools and other community minded places of education.

Contact whalemail@waypoint.com of find a Fred somewhere in England, Switzerland, Australia, Hawaii, the Mainland USA and join Fred and Friends in their many water related projects.

DOES PAPAHANAUMOKUAKEA MATTER?

2010-11-28T09:38:00.000-10:00

I recently posed this question to some who care deeply about the fate of Papahanaumokuakea Marine National Monument. This place where, according to legend, Papahanaumokua and Wakea did their magic and created living space for all who need a foothold on planet earth.

Ever since visiting the atoll (aka Midway), I have thought of this large question, especially last spring when I was a guest of the US Marines as an artist and writer in residence at Mokapu Elementary. While at Mokapu, I learned a great deal about Hawaiian history, culture, and the history of the US involvement in wars in the Pacific.

I think most people know that Pearl Harbor stands as one of the most important military battle places. And yet, when I ask adults and children if they know where the first bombs were dropped on December 7, 1941, it is a rare (1 in more than a thousand) person who knows that the Japanese target on that day was first zeroed in on Mokapu.

Take a look on a map to see where this beautiful piece of Oahu is located. Visit the area today, tucked as it is alongside Kaneohe Bay on the windward side of the island...........Why would the enemy want to take out Mokapu before rising over the Koolau to drop more on Pearl? Certainly, to target the US Marine Corps stationed there, then as now.........but you have to wonder. Did they also want to damage or attempt to destroy the sacred ground of Mokapu? For, it was here, again according to legend, that the birth of the first Kai Kane happened........humans created here, so far from Pihemanu up on the fringes of Papahanaumokuakea --- the third place bombed on that day that plunged the United States into World War II.

I have been to Midway and Mokapu.........with chances to do so, I have hesitated a visit to Pearl Harbor. It's a long story, but my Dad could have been on the Arizona alongside his buddy, Chewy Mathison who went down on that battleship on December 7th.......Dad retells the story and also let me know recently, that he sailed past Midway during the war, on his way to South Korea and other destinations aboard an LSM. Like so many Navy Vets, he is humble about his war time heroics but I'm proud of what he accomplished.

Most of us who have gotten to travel to Papahanaumokuakea in recent months do so in hopes of bringing greater awareness of the plight of our ocean's health. Plastic trash has been a big focus of mine. It is also important for each of us to remember its place in the larger story of our planet and how the mythology of Hawaiians allows a beautiful way of thinking how life started. As a child of the 60s, I guess I lean as well on idealistic hopes that learning about Papahanaumokuakea, Midway, Mokapu, Pearl Harbor, and war in general.......that learning and sharing story of these interconnected places can help bring about world peace.

There is a power in these places far beyond human capability of understanding. Not that Papahanaumokua was ever a walking talking "Earth Mother" or that Wakea was dancing in the sky as Father of All.......Nope. I just love the story, just like the story of Jesus is so compelling, especially this time of year......And as one who gets to work with a lot of great teachers and thousands of kids, it is nice to have stories like the ones associated with Papahanaumokuakea in my pocket. To share, best I can.

Yes, Papahanumokuakea matters. It matters so much that I want to share my experiences there for as long as I am able. Few humans will ever have the opportunity of visiting Midway....Pihemanu.......But a heck of a lot of albatross, boobies, frigates, spinner dolphins, ulua, honu, and concerned scientists will be there, hopefully forever. Well, not forever, because the life kick started by Earth Mom and Sky Dad insured one thing would happen.......change. Just as the Big Island of Hawaii has risen from the depths, Pihemanu sinks under the very weight of its volcanic stone. Midway is sinking fast, geologically speaking, and so, we need to insure, more than ever, that the albatross, boobies, frigates, shearwaters, honu, monk seals, and other life dependent on ISLANDS find safe havens.

As sea levels rise, scientists can only send messages to those of us living on mainlands and main islands.......THE ISLANDS ARE SINKING AND THE SEA IS RISING.

Papahanaumokuakea, then becomes a kind of messenger from the past as well as a predictor of future outcomes. It matters to pay attention to what is going on out there, just as it is important to pay attention to Palau and other Island Nations. Listen up. Rise Up. Let your voices join with the creatures who need us to share our planet.

Ron Hirschi
Marrow Stone Island, Another Disappearing Piece of our Planet
November 2010

FISHING FLOATS AND COSTCO TRASH

2010-11-22T07:06:00.000-10:00

I took this photo a couple of weeks ago along Papa'a Bay on the island of Kauai, Hawaii.

I also found a couple of glass fishing floats this same trip, a time of high surf along the entire windward coasts of the islands. It was nice to find the glass treasures, something I point out for kids in my book so beautifully illustrated by Yuko Green, WINTER IS FOR WHALES.

That book is for young people. This image is for those of us trying to figure out how to deal with the ever increasing disregard for our planet. Anyone who has read this blog or attempted to understand ocean issues knows that we are all to blame and we are all needed to find a fix for plastics entering watersheds and, eventually, marine food webs.

I remember being out on Midway Atoll not that long ago. Standing on the beach there, literally watching albatrosses and frigates dead or dying of plastic was truly a wake up call for me. I suppose if we all had to sit and watch a baby albatross die, we might feel a bit more of the resolve needed to come to grips with the issue? I don't know.

Regardless, you can see in this close view, just a small fraction of the beach plastic I removed from the ocean in just one morning. Fishing floats from Asia were much more prevalent on this day. I also noted more shampoo, conditioner, and other "health and beauty aids" washed ashore. You can see, quite clearly, that a Seattle box store contributes greatly to trash. Should we blame Costco for adding to the problem? Should we blame Taiwanese and Japanese float manufacturers?

All I can say is that I remember walking Kauai beaches just twenty years ago and finding far fewer "treasures" like this.

Happy Thanksgiving Week!
Marrowstone Island, Washington State

FREE THE SEAS.............REMEMBERING KEIKO

2010-11-15T16:31:00.000-10:00

Our daughter, like most ocean people, loved Keiko.

It seemed fitting today to help all who might gaze into Keiko's eyes

think back on the wider meanings behind capture, movie versions of oceans,

and what Keiko has meant.

Nichol loved visiting Keiko in Oregon.

You can guess what Keiko thought of her.

I know, as her father, that any living creature feels safe in her midst.

Thanks Cols for all you do to help others find the beauty.

And for any of you with powers of perception in all imagery dealings,

let me know if you can focus the image in the reflection.

This thought........it might, just maybe, show what Keiko saw in Nichol's eyes

that day.

From the shores of the Salish Sea. November 2010 as a half dozen orcas

swim nearby........

Golf Balls Floating the Seven or Eight or Nine Hole Seas.........

2010-11-14T17:42:00.000-10:00

Aloha Sunday and a big win for our Seattle Seahawks today. Great game and great to watch it with son-in-law, Scott...........Scott is a pretty competitive golfer and has a lot of fun with his friends out on the green grassy fields from here to Kauai........I played with him once over there at the beautiful course just above Kalaheo where, when you play, you can enjoy so much local culture and gaze out across the ocean to the far away west and northwest. The McBride Family created and dedicated the course to all, so that today, even a person like me can enjoy the game and on that special day, I even hit the ball onto the green in one shot. Once......

Which brings me to the point of this small story. A small story. But one with a big message for anyone who loves the game of golf.

I brought a golf ball with me today. After the Seahawks had secured the win, I got the ball and did a little experiment with it.......You see, this was not any ordinary ball. I found it on the beach on Kauai just two weeks ago. It washed up on Papa'a Bay's shore just inches from where a glass ball dropped onto the sand. It looked to have been in the ocean for a long, long, long, long, long time as Harrison Ford might have said had he found it when he was starring on the very spot in Six Days and Seven Nights.........

Scott confirmed this after examing the ball. It is an old golf ball, maybe 40 years at sea.

So, where do you suppose it came from?

My friend Carey Morishige assures me that a flip flop can drift from Hawaii to Marrowstone Island.

Could a golf ball drift from the Port Ludlow Golf Course by Scott's house to Papa'a Bay on the island of Kauai in Hawaii??????

My first test of this was to place the ball in a glass of freshwater.

I should say that I had the great pleasure just yesterday of finally meeting Curtis Ebesmeyer in person. We had talked before and I stood in for him at a lecture in Oregon, one that he was unable to attend. It was a fun night in Salem and he thanked me yesterday for taking his place. That said, Curtis laughed about golfers not believing that golf balls float...............

And so, I took my Papa'a Bay golf ball and dropped it into the glass full of freshwater. It bounced off the bottom of the glass as if trying to float and it more or less danced a bit before settling pretty much on the bottom.

Next test?

I added sea salt to the taste of Scott and I.........the taste we share of a gulf of sea water after maybe not getting the mask just right. Or, in my case, of drinking a bit of Hanalei Bay recently just for the refreshing thought of bringing ocean into my body.........

What do you think happend on our placing the golf ball into a sea water mini ocean???

Sure enough, just as Curtis would predict.

Golf Balls float in sea water even if they sink in fresh.

Next test I will not perform for ethical reasons. No. I will not toss the golf ball into the sea with marks on it to see if it is recovered somewhere on the planet.

THE OCEAN IS FAR TOO FULL OF TRASH TO ADD ANY FORM OF MARKED ANYTHING.

But, please be in touch to answer my question. Could the golf ball have drifted out of the Salish Sea, into the Pacific, and found its way to the central point at Papa'a Bay?

Mahalo nui for any thoughts. And, more importantly, please fetch your golf balls if they fall into any body of water, especially those leading to the sea.

Ron Hirschi
Marrow Stone Island, Washington USA

ps Great Game Today Seahawks!

SLIPPA SLIDE ALL DA WAY FROM ISLANDS TO ISLAND????

2010-11-10T17:05:00.000-10:00

Ahoy.

I posed the question earlier. Can a flip flop. Slippa. Can a slight little sandal drift at sea all the way from Hawaii to Marrowstone Island in Washington State.

Going straight to a NOAA source, I find this out and more for you to explore.

Carey Morishige, Outreach Coordinator of the NOAA Marine Debris Program in Honolulu, a person who has helped many of us in recent times of interest in ocean issues, says,

"Yes. It is possible given the current patterns, that a slipper could drift from the Hawaiian Islands to Marrowstone."

Here is a graphic that helps to explain this pattern of ocean water movement at the surface, at least. remember that I picked up a lot of flip flops out on Kauai where 30 foot surge waves were washing the north shore last week, bringing in a lot of the accumulated garbage in the swath of the sea we call a convergence zone. Here on Marrowstone, I picked up a lot more trash tonight in a different form of convergence in which nearshrore drift patterns converge at the north shore of our island, bringing us all kinds of interesting trash from near and far.

Tonight, I picked up or obeyed laws prohibiting touching the usual mix of lighters, binky, straws, shoes, PVC, dead birds, marine mammal parts, and assorted debris......AND found the coolest but single flip flop from Quiksilver! Cool embossed sole just right for ocean art stamping with kids!

Anyway, here is the NOAA map to show you how tons and tons of trash move to our coast from the east:

I also find a fair number of Asian items. Mostly plastic bottles. Out on Kauai and especially at Midway, I find tons of Asian fishing items. If you want some, let me know.

Please also go to the great site NOAA develops and maintains:

http://www.marinedebris.noaa.gov/

Fred and NOAA are much in the same line of work.......only NOAA really needs you to support them in a big way by letting your representatives know how vital they are to the ocean's future. Fred can get by since he does not need anything other than bananas for support!

FRIENDS OF FRED, OCEAN PROJECTS

2010-11-10T07:06:00.000-10:00

FRIENDS OF FRED is a global project aimed to help teachers and others make use of the many connections made by PROJECT SOAR.

The long term goal is to circulate several of each of 52 Species that represent major Watershed and Ocean habitats in need of our attention. This practical and important work makes it easier for students and the larger communities within those habitat areas to ACT in some responsible way while learning about the world.

As a Writer, Biologist, and Author, I have spent my entire career working to protect and restore habitats. My specialty as a scientist has been mainly with fish habitats of rivers, streams, and coastal areas. I have a lot of experience dealing with difficult land use decisions and count among my friends some of the most effective "players" in this profession. These people include guys like Jim Lichatowich who wrote the book, SALMON WITHOUT RIVERS........That book stirred up a heck of a lot of help for salmonid waters. I also get to work with gifted teachers like Dr. Sharon Buda and Ray Lowrie; Deb Charna; Claudia Fett, Tracy Poduska, Michelle Kaskovich, and Mary Fox. Together, we have led children out into waters to make sure they experience the water world FIRST HAND............

If we fail in our efforts to take children out into the real world, we will continue to lose more and more healthy habitats. True, there have been great strides with endangered species protection and increased restoration. But as one of my early mentors with Washington Department of Game told a group of us starry eyed grad students at the University of Washington, "There is always going to be a new batch of idiots elected who will undo your good works."

Say no more. These days we stand to lose our oceans simply because of our ignorance in relation to the connections between upper reaches of watersheds and the sea.

In the old days, many people around the planet had land divisions similar to those held under ethically bound rules of use of resources. Hawaiians, for example, divided up the islands so that decisions about logging, taro planting, fishing, and other land uses made sense from mountain top to river valleys and on as well as into the ocean. Fishing was banned when necessary and strict kapu helped those with authority to make sure overharvest did not take place. Sure, there were problems with the system such as wide scale alteration of native plants and birds. But the principal remains important: We need to think of land and waterscapes to manage effectively.

What does this have to do with a bunch of silly stuffed animals at the heart of "Friends of Fred"?

Friends of Fred begin life with me, here on Marrow Stone Island in Washington State. Like Fred the monkey, they start a journey of discovery, learning, and action. Sometimes, they end up helping kids talk story and create wonderful art and writing projects such as BIG BOOKS like those at Wilson School in Wyoming, Fishing Cove Elementary in Rhode Island, and Mokapu Elementary on Oahu.

Currently, a beautifully crafted Northwest Coast Style Frog named Ribit is in the hands of students working with the Columbus Zoo on projects to help endangered amphibians. A Monk Seal just traveled to Ohio to join the cause, helping kids to link the frog project with the distant ocean world of marnie mammals. A tiny but accurately crafted Laysan Albatross, gifted to me by the USFWS at Kilauea on Kauai is now in Edmonds, Washingto with a student from King's School. Cougars continue to circulate as part of a Cougar Fund project begun in the wilds of Oahu of all places to find a mountain lion........

All the Friends of Fred bring smiles first, then thought, then actions. My intent is to help teachers use these little buggers to use playful inquiry into the lives of young hearts and minds.

As my friend and colleague, Tom Mangelsen shows the world, the beauty of nature brings us in to the world of appreciation first........We can all appreciate the majestic sight of a Polar Bear in northern light and can enjoy the seemingly happy face of a Monk Seal just wiggling out of the surf and onto a sandy beach in Hawaii.

At the same time, we know there are extremely difficult decisions to be made if Polar Bears and Monk Seals are to survive. In fact, Monk Seal populations are declining at a rate that projects extinction for the species and hope for Polar Bears is not exactly as promising as the increase in eagle populations or frog numbers in the rapidly developing rural fringes of Columbus, Ohio.

We are connected to Polar Bears, Monk Seals, and Frogs in more ways than we currently understand and so, Friends of Fred joins other attempts to help young minds begin journeys of discovery in hopes kids of today grow more successfully into stewards of planet earth as they all too quickly become a part of the world of competion between species, habitats, and conflicts over oil, water, fish, trees, jobs, and the very future of planet earth.

Friends of Fred might show up in your community soon. Be watching for a kid carrying a stuffed animal, not just to collect some cute toy, but to engage you in decisions about our daily impact on habitats from mountain top to river valleys to the sea........Have fun if you wish to join in the networks created as Friends spread around the world. This is not a top down project.......it simply is what it becomes and it is up to you to grab a seal, turtle, bear, spider, crab, lobster, mountain goat, deer, trout, whale, or other Friend of Fred.

Contact me for a starter kit that includes any of 52 different species (YES there are more than one of each just as there are more than one Fred); a journal with your Friend's first steps into the wild world; any links to organizations, schools, teachers, and other information to help you start a project in a school or community, or simply in your own backyard or beach or stream..........Simple as that.

I will add a couple of photos to share recent activities of some Friends of Fred, but also check the histories of Fred here and at other sites such as Learn to Sea, a not for profit in England or AUSMEPA in Australia.

Ron Hirschi
PO Box 899
Hadlock, Washington 98339
whalemail@waypoint.com

QUESTION FOR NOAA AND ALL..........DID THESE FLIP FLOPS (AKA, SLIPPAS) REALLY COME FROM HAWAII?

2010-11-08T13:02:00.001-10:00

JUST A SAD REMINDER..........Jeff, Trevor, and I wandered one day to the "Graveyard" on Midway Atoll's Sand Island, aka Pihemanu.........I took this photo of a dead Laysan Albatross. You can see some of the hundred or more bits of plastic and larger pieces the bird ate when its parent fed the near fledgling bird. The adult Albatross had given the baby bird plastic as it regurgitated the "food" from a foraging trip into the young one's mouth and throat. The adult had flown out into the North Pacific to pluck "food" from the ocean surface, now littered with Trillions and Trillions of pieces of plastic, discarded from land based people of planet earth. As you can see, we all contribute to this Ocean Trash. It is not an island of garbage. It is not a patch we can sweep up. It is, well, it is a sea of waste and while many people argue about how much there is and how to clean it up, we have, my friends, passed a point of difficulty and need to clean up our act.

So, I pose the following bit of news and a question, hopefully directed to the proper authorities with NOAA, Municipal Garbage People, National Leaders, and anyone brave enough to take on the petrochemical businesses that float this junk into our arms, then into the sea..............

My Question:

Just back from Kauai where we picked from the beach three beautiful glass balls.......treasures along with great shells,including a nice gifted granulated cowry from local guy, Leo......Mahalo Leo, big time!.......

I also saw and even picked up a couple of tons of plastic trash and trashtic fantastic stuff like maybe one ton of fishing floats up to two feet in diameter. We wonder, will these plastic balls be the next generations glass treasures? I don't think so, based on seeing how they begin to harden, then scuff, then break apart into microplastics like most other forms of this insidious and increasingly alarming ocean debris.

All this to ASK: Especially maybe, friend Linda on Oahu if you are listening in.......As soon as I got home and slept a bit, I went down to the beach here on Marrow Stone Island in Washington state............My pup, Monsoon was up by 6. Dark. But we headed down to East Beach and by daylight, I started picking up trash along with the stick to throw for Monsoon........she was excited to be back on the beach.......gotta fetch.......gotta dig in da sand.......her best work!

So, anyway, I find a flip flop. I begin to wonder. After having picked up many many many flip flops in the islands the past couple weeks, over on Kauai's windward shore where we found the glass balls.............COULD IT BE POSSIBLE FOR FLIP FLOPS TO DRIFT ALL THE WAY TO MARROWSTONE ISLAND FROM HAWAII?

That's my question to anyone out there with knowledge of oceans. Wind from the east, so those trades might prevent this from happening, but what about currents?????? I know that the albatrosses we see out on Midway come to our shore, so maybe some tricky albatross picked up a slippa and dropped it off, just to confuse me?

The flip flop in question is a lady's maybe size seven in black with decoration of silver beading on strap dealie.......you know, the part going over your foot......it was on the beach right at the strand line where I also found plenty of caps, lighters, bottles, and stuff just right for my next big art movement. To try to find ways of making this plastic found object into sellable products. Functional art and functional building material like they do in that country over the other side of the ocean that sends back our recycled material on the huge ship passing, literally as I type........It says on its side, CHINA, in huge letters and is steaming into Seattle or Tacoma to unload Christmas toys of plastic, shoes of plastic, chairs, hair dryers, and all those things you buy for use of alimited time then toss into the recyled bin only to go to China to be resent over here in the big ship that...........and so on and on and on......

Thanks for any response and be looking for news from Brand newly discovered Cousin of Fred, FredE727 who wears an Aloha Shirt and wears, guess what? FLIP FLOPS. Oh so cool a little monkey he is and he is looking for a school out there wishing for avisit from Fred and his new Friend, A beautiful little Honu crafted by Douglas Toys, the same people who made the original FredX310......who, by the way is visiting Tremont Elementary in Ohio, working with kids on an Amphibian project with Ribit, a Frog from the Pacific northwest.

Cheers, Ron Hirschi and FredE727......The Aloha Fred!

UNITED STATES NAVY HELPS OCEAN AWARENESS

2010-10-19T14:38:00.001-10:00

I get to work with a lot of people and recent commentary on national marine education networks actually suggest that the military does great harm to the ocean world.........Hmmmmm. My experiences and knowledge of history tell me the Navy and Marines are responsible for protecting the ocean, our coasts, and the well being of our country as well as most of the rest of the planet. Of course, the Coast Guard is very devoted to protecting the shores too, but the Department of the Navy is where I spend time, volunteering as opportunities arise. I am proud of my time spent out on Midway learning about that battle area and of my time volunteering at Mokapu, Marine Corps Base Hawaii............That said, I also get to spend time closer to home, working with some great people in western Washington at local Navy bases.

NOVEMBER 13th, try to get over to the NAVAL UNDERSEA MUSEUM in Keyport Washington! That day, you can meet and greet military experts with incredible stories to tell about submariners rescuing downed bomber pilots toward the end of WWII; take a tour of a fascinating worldclass museum; and meet and greet 20 Pacific Northwest authors including the great chef, Greg Atkinson!

Okay, I'll be there with copies of the hard to find and out of print but not out of mind, SEYA'S SONG. This book is available normally from the Port Gamble S'Klallam Tribe or at used book sources. But, I will bring along copies and they will be available for sale with ALL proceeds going to restore salmon habitats on Marrowstone Island, Washington State.

You can order copies from me and I'll sign them on the 13th and ship for free. In the meantime, check out the museum website, or check them out on Facebook where you can discover more about this, one of my favorite local spots to hang out. Last time I was there, a docent showed me a torpedo that my Grandmother may well have helped construct during WWII when she was employed at Keyport. Gramma Daisy had two sons overseas in the Navy, one of whom was my Dad.........and so, she went to work as "Rosie the Riveter".......well, Daisy the Igniter Maker, and was very proud of her service to her country at a time of war.

I have a replica torpedo she made......or rather, our daughter now has the little silver undersea weapon that was one of the means used to end the war, including out at Midway Atoll, aka Pihemanu........a most incredible place now safe for nesting seabirds because of the US Navy.

See you on the 13th of November at Keyport. See http://www.navalunderseamuseum.org/ for more information about the event as well as much more about their fascinating history collections and ongoing lectures, family fun days, and more. Their gift shop is where I recently got my Dad a great Navy Vet hat and they also have cool ocean toys!

Ron Hirschi
whalemail@waypoint.com

MESSAGE TO ALL WHO ENJOY SEAFOOD FROM THE PACIFIC

2010-10-14T10:28:00.000-10:00

fresh sockeye.......

Scott Davis is planning his trip to sail from Marrowstone Island to collect plastic and other marine trash, headed up the Inside Passage. This effort continues the work initiated by the USFWS, NOAA, and State of Hawaii when they sent Ron and Fred to Pihemanu (aka Midway Atoll) in 2009.

As you know, plastic debris is a deadly ocean contaminant, bringing with it PCBs and other toxins. Many thousands of marine birds and other sea life are also killed directly by consuming plastic drifting on the waves and washing onto ocean shores.

Scott and Ron have already collected a large amount of plastic from Marrowstone beaches and could probably spend the rest of their lives doing just that............but why not expand the effort while educating and connecting with others who care about salmon, halibut, lingcod, herring, smelt, shrimp, Dungeness Crab, King Crab, spot prawns, butter clams, steamers, oysters, and those delicately delicious mussells........Why not help all who enjoy seafood eat healthier ocean dinners!

We ask anyone with an offer to help to be in touch. Help Scott launch his boat, pack a lunch, or meet him on the beach between Marrowstone and Whidbey, Whidbey and Orcas, Orcas and Vancouver, Vancouver and Ketchikan. Do what you can and be in touch for more news as Scott gets his beautiful wooden sailboat rigged for the launch.

In the meantime, check local and state and federal regulations regarding the safety of consuming shellfish, finfish, and other sea life. Mercury level warnings are alarming, but plastic derived contaminants are filling the sea and sea life. And, there are no warnings to you, the consumer or commercial harvester. Let's clean up the sea, together, before it is too late and their are no fresh fish fit to eat.

I KNOW WHY THE WILD FROGS SING.......

2010-10-13T06:32:00.000-10:00

Students at Tremont Elementary

in Upper Arlington, Ohio

were treated to Sipp Family Farm and Pond Days!

Taking kids outside leads to discoveries big and small.

Fred Joined students, teachers, parents, and friends of the school

to study water quality, investigate the forest, search for woodland art,

and much more.

Back at school, kids began a year of study, writing, art, and ecological awareness

led by caring teachers, including super Librarian, Claudia Fett!!!

Fred Cheers for kids catching fish, beetles, and TONS OF FROGS!!!

Thanks to the Sipp Family

and the Parent, Teacher, and Student Organization at Tremont

for helping kids learn in the out of doors.

No Child Should be Frogless,

and so, Friends of Fred have sent

RIBIT to Ohio........stay tuned for tales from Ribit, Fred X310, and

how the kids of Ohio are saving frogs with help from

The Columbus Zoo.

Scott Davis Cleans Up the Salish Sea

2010-10-13T04:49:00.000-10:00

This is to introduce Friend of Fred, Scott Davis. I met him as I often meet young people with passion for the sea, by way of his Mother............Molly is a neighbor and friend who grew up near the likes of Buster Keaton and other famed Hollywood stars. Here on Marrow Stone it is not unusual to meet these gifted people and Molly and I walk together many days of each week. Her Sparky and our Monsoon love one another..............dogs find good people friends?

Scott learned sailing and life long learning from Molly and when he was a kid, Mollly took him and brothers from the Bay area to the Sea of Cortez......I've read her journal and marveled at the photos she took on that year long adventure. Her writing and chronicling the adventure ought to be a movie.

Scott now works on his wooden boat and plans to leave soon to draw attention to the ocean of plastic on our shores.................

Here is a small sample of his admirable and as yet unfunded project:

Scott's solo journey up the inside passage will begin soon. Here is his skiff, loaded with trash and reusable crab buoys, mooring buoys, and lots of holiday cups, straws, pop containers, and other debris found along Ft. Flagler State Park beaches on a recent cleanup with Fred.... You can see Fred all tangled up in some wire and other junk left behind by careless boaters, campers, and day visitors to the park. Scott's plans include stops at Canoe Family and other Friendly Ports from Marrowstone to Alaska.

His sailing abilities are vast and his experiences include service in the US Navy as a submariner quartermaster. So, Scott knows how to navigate troubled waters and his plastic mission is as clear as Fred and Friends. Scott will simply pick up plastic and other trash from the ocean, bring it ashore, and educate as he recycles and repurposes as thousands of others have, thanks to the original mission set by staff and students of Columbus School for Girls and Wyandot Elementary.

Be in touch with Scott through this blog site until Scott chooses another means of communication with the digital world.

Mahalo to Scott and the Davis Family!!! And thanks once again to all who helped Fred and Friends set sail on their many adventures in learning and helping Malama i ke kai i ka aina.

Please also know that Scott's sailboat has been invaded by some monkey........it seems to be wearing a tag oh so familiar. Could it be that sneaky Monkey who recently visited Haiti and Namibia........I don't see him hanging around the office...........where oh where is Fred. And, has anyone seen Mokapu, Eddie, or that bright sided Mahi Mahi last seen on its way for Wyoming???????

Here's Scott Davis picking up day use leavings at Fort Flagler State Park. In the distance you can see the Olympic Mountains. The water you see is Port Townsend Bay. The large log is from old day timber times and the small branches are the remains of more recent logging debris. Google Human Modification of Hood Canal and the Eastern Strait of Juan de Fuca, a report to the Point No Point Treaty Council, to learn why it is not good to remove these logs from beaches. Check out earlier postings here and at other sites to learn more about the dangers of marine debris and how to find ways of recycling.

NOTE TOO: Jefferson County, thanks to Matt Hall and Skookum Recycling has been leading the way to find successful recycling mills. BUT, Skookum is constantly under attack due to mega waste management corporate efforts to take over small yet effective recyclers like Skookum. Find out more by calling Matt Hall at Skookum in Jefferson County, Washington and call Jefferson County officials to support Skookum and their tireless work to rid the beaches of plastic and other trash.

THANKS MATT!!!!

THANKS SKOOKUM EMPLOYEES!!!

FROG SAVERS IN OHIO.............

2010-10-08T12:16:00.000-10:00

A photo or two will help you understand how special this was...............but before they appear, here are a few words to consider. Frogs. Frogs. Frogs. Frogs. Frogs.

We caught five different species at Sipp Farm in the middle of a 70 acre forest tucked within the beautiful farm country of Central Ohio. We were out there with Original Fred X310, a bunch of 4th and 5th Graders and a lot of parents, teachers, and others. All came to have a fun day of science, art, story, water quality, picnic, and mushrooming as well as doing a bit of deer hunting preparation with the greatest of guys, Paul and Scott.

The trip was a revisit to Sipp Pond, a restored wetland filled with fish, water scorpions, diving beetles, dragonflies, tadpoles, and much more. What a healthy water world within the Mad River Watershed and pretty close to the Little Miami, a National Treasure that is a designated Wild and Scenic River and one that Fred visited last year with our friends from the Greater Cinncinatti area including Judy and a whole bunch of Mariemont Kids.

BUT back to the FROGS!!!! Kids at Tremont Elementary have partnered with the Coumbus Zoo to help learn more and educate others about FROGS..............So, it was a great day at Sipp Farm when we found FIVE different species in a world where others are saying frogs are disappearing! What's up? Stay tuned, but for now it appears that maybe, just maybe, all the protective legislation for cleaning up the air and water of our nation is working. The frogs certainly think so, according to one happy Happy Eyed Monkey named FRED..........But then, the frogs might just owe it all to a man named Paul........

Fred actually snuck away from me, Ron, as I left Tremont and Upper Arlington after enjoying ice cream at Graeters...............Fred looked at me over his shoulder and said, "I have a new mission here in Ohio. I'll work with these kids and their teachers and families to make sure Frog Friends of Fred like RIBIT (A Tsimshan from British Columbian Waters) are living a healthy lifestyle.

Apparently, Fred knows some Northwest Coast Indian Artist who sent RIBIT to Ohio to join him and the kids at Tremont. All I know is that RIBIT is a Frog of legend and carries with him or her? a lot of fun stuff about the Pacific Northeastern corner of the ocean world and Pacific Northwestern corner of North American watersheds.

I am guessing photos will be coming soon from Ribit, Fred X310, and other Friends of Fred.

In the meantime, here is a photo of Fred X310 during a summer hiatus on Long Island. Fred helped redecorate Martha Stewart's beach, dumping eighteen tons of recycled plastic chairs onto the upper edges, making sure none would wash to Marrowstone Island during a storm. According to Monkeys, Martha made some deals recently to insure high stock prices for all Chinese merchants dealing in recycled plastic products!! Fred's other inside trader scoops will appear along with all news of plastic frog toys, plastic microscopes, and the incredible number of so-called stainless steel tools being sold in America. Again, according to Monkeys, the Chinese industrial complex is teasing the American buyer into purchases of Iron Ore and Petroleum products made from natural resources from our country. Smart Chinese merchants. But wait. Does that mean we could also manufacture plastic lawn chairs in America? Could we turn Michigan ore into steel right here in the USA???????

Fred has been meeting with high level US officials all summer and into the fall, so stay tuned. He actually thinks he even has the ear of President Obama, but we will see! He certainly cherishes the time he spent with a certain FWS Belle! Bell? Something ringing true in Fred's ears..........

malama i ke kai, ron hirschi, fredless once again on marrowstone island........

.......fredless but not friendless since a Mountain Goat Freind of Fred is thinking Rhode Island or is that someone calling from Canada?
"Oh Canada!", I heard a man sing this summer from the shores of Hebegen Lake just outside of Yellowstone where I first ran into Yellowstoney the Mountain Goat in a campground downtown in Gardiner Montana when we were just hiking along..........Yellowstoney, like Mokapu and Eddie, are Friends of Fred and searches for her mate......

All 52 Friends of Fred appear destined to save the world, one creature at a time. Do be watching for Fred hitching a ride on a Great Lakes Ore Ship! He does have a lot of friends in the waters of Walleye, Pike, and Pikerel. Yummmmmm. And beaver, otter, mahi mahi, yellowstoney, buffalo, crabbie, and more will arrive, often unannounced to begin a visit with you and your family, students, or office partners. THEY ARE HERE TO STAY and MAY GET IN THE WAY OF BUSINESS AS USUAL if business as usual includes keeping kids indoors. No child should be frogless, without a fishing pole, or with no place to listen to the birds sing. Please do open the doors of your classrooms and learn with nature. Thanks from Marrowstone Island...........

It's Me, Fred X310.........I'm BACK!

2010-10-07T17:48:00.000-10:00

Okay, school is back in session and Fred X310. Yes, the Original Fred of Pihemanu, CSG, FWS, NOAA, Mokapu, Rhode Island, Haiti, Namibia, SouthAfrica, and much more fame and notoriety..........Fred the Happy Eyed Monkey is back.

Sort of.

Actually, Fred is down in Upper Arlington!!!! He is hanging out with kids who care about FROGS. After all, Frogs are one of the most important species on Planet Earth. They help us understand water. WAI. Wealth. Quality of LIFE............

And so, Fred will be talking story to all of us soon. Oh. By the way. Friends of Fred, including RIBIT, a Frog from the Tsimshans up north, MahiMahi from Hawaii, and of course, Yellowstoney the Mountian Goat are all traveling the planet in good ways.............you will be treated to story, photos and much more from one and all by way of Fred, that incredible monkey who was born in Hawaii (kinda like Obama guy?) but who went to school in Dublin, then hitched a ride to Washington with Papa Kupuna Ron............the rest is his and her story..................stay tuned and do check out all things happening with Mokapu, Rhode Island, Wilson School, Breidablik, Tremont, Fishing Cove, Cougar Fund, Pals of the Pacific, and the United States Navy and Marine Corps (YOU Rock)...........Thanks to Commander Robert Rice and General John Broadmeadow and to be sure, Michelle and Eva! You buggers!

SPECIAL THANKS TO CLAUDIA AND BASIL who are the best friends of Fred ever! Oh, and those Mexican Tomato Plants in Arlington............they can feed the world. With a little help from the Sipp Family and Johnsons and Lowries here on Mstone............

Cheers, Ron and Fred, reunited thanks to Annie Bell and Judy and Jody!!!

FRED RETURNS TO MARROW STONE.......FOR A QUICK BREATHER....AND A SWIM WITH MONSOON, BEAV, AND A VERY LONESOME LITTLE BEAR

2010-09-03T08:12:00.000-10:00

Fred Y958, some may remember, has been in such loving hands for several months. Very long story, much too short...........Fred met Judy Schmidt and Friends down along the Miami River in Bearcat country --- you know, that great school with incredibly wonderful elementary schools leading up to it.......in the town so difficult to spell - Cincinnnnnatttiiiii. How many n, t, i can you place after the C?????

Anyway, Judy kindly took Fred along on her many journeys to help earthquake victims in Haiti and to aid many in Namibia too. While in Africa, Fred was befriended by Cape Fur Seals who climbed onto a boat to greet Mister Friendly Fred! Wow, I think Judy is far more adventurous than any.......well, you have to remember Fred X310's adventures out on Pihemanu and Fred's British and Aussie cousins who have gone for free dives with Maying back to their college classes east of here.........they both were awarded full rides, partly because they are THE BEST SOFTBALL PLAYERS in Chimacum High School history and because their smiles light up the world just like their Mom's.........Fred is trying to catch them so they can sign an official college softball as a way of preserving memory of the Garing Heros!

gotta go find those heroic kiddos!

Ron and Fred, Marrow Stone Island, still summer, 2010.

p.s. The ocean has been very good to the redfish and Dungeness Crab of late, so we are just pulling sockeye from the smoker to take down to Grampa Hirschi, Nichol and Scott, and to Ron's hero, Ray Johnson, a field biologist like no other. Ray once was so blessed to witness the return of right around 1,000,000 humpies (one of our smaller salmon) to the Dose and Dungeness/Graywolf Rivers. In fact, when Ray called Olympia's Fishery office, they did not believe his report and actually forced a change in the real numbers, a change from "on high" that may well have devastated those incredible runs of wild fish.

Ron (me) and his dad fished the Hood Canal run that famous year (1963) and witnessed, first hand, schools of salmon so thick that it was not possible to get herring bait through the school to try to catch any silvers or kings that might also be tagging along with all the humpies (aka Pink Salmon for all who don't fish northeastern Pacific waters).

Matter of fact, Ron had to take his Dad back into Port Gamble one day so Glenn could get to work in the mill at 8 a.m., starting whistle time.........then Ron headed back out to catch more salmon. But first, he had to take the limit his Dad caught that morning up the hill to the freezer or fridge......was a long time ago, but father and son still laugh and enjoy remembering those days in Hood Canal that Ray Johnson chronicled for the historic scientific record and many locals chronicled in tasty and fun memory of a time not necessarily gone. As I said, the ocean seems healthier than ever at the moment........maybe the warm waters are producing more bait for the sockeye, coho, and chinook?????????? This not being a humpy year (in our waters the adults return to the river of birth in odd numbered years) we will see if next year brings back a million fish to spawn up the tributaries of S'Klallam rivers east of the Hoko and north of the Duwamish.

to the few who will ever read this

2010-08-04T20:27:00.000-10:00

I am a long time reader of Hemingway and others of that time, long ago when fiction was being created for a modern audience. Gertrude Stein is my hero.........

I just reread Big Two Hearted River and realized that Hemingway might have been born with a silver spoon, but he and I had quite similar life experiences.

So, I wrote the Ricky story to honor my childhood, my childhood friend, Ricky, and to purge my soul of thorns long prickling my side.

All you read happenend to me, just as the Nick Adam's stories happened in Hemingway's troubled youth. He and I lost our souls to trout, rivers, and troubled times. I plan to live out my life though. Having just ben in Ketchum, I feel a great sense of loss for his family, friends, and reading and writing public.

Maybe the best thing we can think is that it would have been nice if Hemingway had traded all his weapons for fly rods and spinning gear, he might not have gone out so violently?

If and when Tom Brokaw reads this, I hope Tom remembers when we met in Montana.........back when Tom had the golden opportunity to bring the world back to the best of times within the land and water scape of the last great place. That Kitteridge and Welch place where writers know heart and soul of white, brown, and red meet on an even playing field............lodge poles erected and salmonflies fluttering in the same even breeze of eternity.

Ron Hirschi Marrowstone Island, Washington. 2010. Just after a visit to Sacajawea's birthplace in the Salmon River Country of Idaho

Boys and Dogs,,,,,,,,,,,,,Fictionalized Version

2010-08-04T20:14:00.000-10:00

Ricky hiked up his jeans. He walked out of the house, looking over his shoulder, as usual, to see if Doris was watching. She was busy clipping ads from the Sun and thinking about the night. Bingo in Bremerton might bring her closer to her dream.

All Ricky wanted was a candybar or some bubblegum. He stuffed the gunnysack into the bike basket. He checked to see if the wood bin was filled, then opened the garage door to look into the freezer compartment. Even though he was only ten, his responsibility for family meals included shooting ducks and deer and catching enough fish for Friday meals. The freezer compartments were completely filled with black bass, venison, and pintails. A couple of out of season geese and mallards completed the list of meals he felt were needed to keep the family until next year.

He slipped the kick stand up and hopped up on the soft, cool seat and headed over the graveyard hill to the store. Ricky's mom could be heard in the soft evening air, sighing and saying, "Where is that stupid kid?"

Bessy was standing behind the counter at the Post Office when Ricky placed the dime, two Jefferson nickels, and a couple of pennies on the copper sheathed surface upon which many postal transactions had taken place since the early 1850s. Dan Evan's grandfather had been the first postal person to work here and Ricky knew all that history because his Grandma Daisy once was courted by Governor Evan's dad. She was a fetching young redhead when she started business college in the Smith Tower in Seattle in 1918. Dan's dad was a student then at the University of Washington. He had his eye on young Daisy, daughter of a Liverpool banker who braved the new world only to be disenfranchised by his father who, in disgust, left his wayward son a comb for his only inheritance.

Ivy House, back in England, had been a showcase and filtering stopover for all who did the Queen's bidding at the time. Young Phil had gone to Port Townsend early in the 1890s and sent his brother an urgent letter that read in part, " Dear Henry, Young and beautiful Irish girls await. Gold. Tall trees. Riches. And Indian girls lavish pots of cockles alive."

Henry was on the next boat.

Daisy was born in 1902 in the up and coming mill town of Port Gamble and the family was well established as a friend of the Indians and somewhat a friend of the Opium delusioned upper class who ran the mill, store, and assorted bars, gambling halls, and even a playhouse or two.

Henry, a proud actor and black face comedian, sang and danced with the best fof them on weekends. He tallied lumber on the mill docks with the Jones boys who loaded the cut timbers onto barges and barks. The Indian boys were strong as hell, he often proclaimed in his neat ledger books.........but at night, beneath towering Douglas firs and broad sweeping branched maples, he and the Toms, Fultons, and Pursers.........people of brown skin and wisdom beyond belief..........he and the elders, he and the youth........He, Henry Cotter and the Indian leaders, would scheme of a day when the Popes, Talbots, and Kellers would leave them all alone to dig clams, enjoy children, and live a peaceful life on the shores of Port Gamble Bay.

The Bay...........tranquil then. Tranquil now?

This was the sort of past Ricky knew and loved. The memory handed to him through story. And when Bessy handed him sheets of stamps, Ricky slipped his coins onto the copper sheathed counter to purchase tiny pieces of history.

One day, Ricky was walking from the Post Office to the store to buy the latest copy of Field and Stream. He was excited to buy the issue because it promised a story about the recent earthquake along the famed Madison River in Montana. Apparently, a mountain slipped down at night, burying people and river, trout and bears. Ricky wanted to know more.

Eventually, the fishing magazines would publish a story about how the Madison was "Better than Ever" and Ricky dreamed nightly of girls handing out fishing flies to hardy boys willing to fish troubled waters.

It would be many years and many miles before Richy made the trek to the earthquake epicenter. When he finally reached the destination, he would be transformed in ways only Nick Adams might appreciate........Lunker Browns greeted him as did nice Yellowstone Cutthroat. His labrador applauded each and every trout, then dove into the brush, only to retrieve a skull or antler from a long dead elk or whitetail so foolish as to overwinter along the banks of a flood and quake prone river.

On his first trip to the Madsion, Ricky unwrapped his sandwich. The fresh fragrance of sweet onion drifted up and away from the waxed paper and much, too much of the avadado clung to the damp edges of the wrap. Ricky bit big and hard into the tomato and cream cheese encrusted lunch, then took a long swig of root beer to quench a thirst born of too long a drive from Missoula.

His three weight sat waiting up against a twisted tangle of barb wire and fence post, willow and sweet grass. A Canada goose flew up on the other side of the river and a mountain bluebird scolded, gently from a nearby grave marker. Elk wandered high above the distant peaks within the Bob Marshall Wilderness and a Prairie Falcom shot past as if to mark its territory prior to the evening caddis hatch.

ricky brreathed in all the memory of family and so called friends, strung his silk line, and tied on a lighter than usual tippet, attached to a stiff chuck of riverfound mono that served as a transitional shooter between silk and clear leader.

ricky preferred the term "l;eader" to tippet and taper just because he grew up far to the west where his first fish were rock cod and salmon, bull cod and lings, so tasty and so tough that he needed braided cuccyhunk to haul them up onto the dock planks near where his Grandpa cut old growth into timbers and where he learned to carve cedar into a herring rake to fetch bait for big kings and bright silver coho and humpies, just right to fill the freezer for his screaming mother, hell bent on making him her provider. Or, as she could only put it, "her so called social security".

When the eighteen inch rainbow slammed his fly that first trip to the Madison, Ricky knew he had died and gone to fish nirvana. It was much like when he caught his first truly big chinook on Grandpa Walt's dock. The twenty pound king flopped around as Ricky kunked it on its head with a two by four. Then, he paraded it around to old Russell Fulton, Harry, and young Russ before displaying the golden sided salmon up in the carriage room where Pop worked ten hours each day, turning big trees into dimensional lumber.

Pop looked into the eye of that big salmon and smiled. Ricky took it home, fileted it, then placed each side into wax paper for his Gramma Daisy. He never shoed it to his mom. She was off to the bingo parlor in Bremerton. His Dad was building another speedboat in the garage.

By supper time, Ricky walked the heavy chunks of fish up past his Uncle Chuck's place and around the corner from Ida and Walt's bungalo. He snuck some peas from Enos's patch and left the fish in a white bucket on the porch just outside his Grandma's screen door.

Ricky then walked the mile back to his house, turned and tossed a tiny rock against Morris Fant's window. Morris opened the slider and slipped onto the roof. Hopping down onto the wet grass, Morris greeted his friend and the two boys went on down to the beach, lit a fire and toasted three marshmallows they snuck from the pantry earlier that day.

Long before their fathers and other millworkers awoke from much needed sleep, Morris and Ricky snuck back into their beds in the new england shacks. they slept until the mill whistle blew, then got up to do it all over again.

BOYS AND DOGS..............BEACHES AND LOGS

2010-08-02T16:58:00.000-10:00

Being Fredless on Marrowstone Island has its advantages. The little Monkey makes me work at tasks not so glamorous as simply going to the beach to fish, swim, walk with Monsoon, or look for agates and Marrow Stone Tools. The latter have been showing up regularly now that I don't focus on Plastic Trastic so much.......but more on that cultural resource in another note. But just to say, Ted George of the S'Klallam Tribe and Book group, gave me a good path to follow when he suggested I use the tools I find to teach S'Klallam presence on Marrowstone Island........

I find tools of stone, created by S'Klallam artists and craftsmen for the past 2,400 years.

I find tools of wood, fallen into the ocean, mainly during the past 150 years. Prior to that time, trees simply fell and when I was a boy with my childhood dog, Bart, there were still old growth trees falling into Hood Canal and the Eastern Strait of Juan de Fuca.

Almost ALL those big old trees, their trunks, limbs, and branches.......almost all of them are now gone from our shores.

Big Deal?

Yes.

Trees along beaches here in the inland waters are like Grandparents to our children. They hug the shore, creating safe habitat for baby salmon, crab, oysters, mussels, and more.......They also buffer the high, sandy bluffs of the east side of Marrowstone --- or, once did ----from winter storms.

I've mapped the entire shoreline of Washington State and meticulously gps'd every inch of the shore of Hood Canal and the eastern Straits to chronicle how humans have modified our shores. When our small team mapped the coast in 1976-80, we found no big trees still standing in our local area and almost no old growth along the entire non-park shoreline of the entire state. None.

People have cleared entire shoreline reaches for mile upon mile.

Here on Marrowstone, the east shore is so denuded, that the sandy bluffs simply fall into the ocean in chunks the size of city blocks. People still cut remaining tiny trees and shrubs so that garden flowers and weedy scotch broom are the only vegetation on the gentler slopes just above tide water.

So, playing as always, the role of boy with dog, I started to try to save the shoreline.

Monsoon likes to fetch sticks. No tennis balls for her. She chases the stick, digs into the sand around it, then asks me to toss again.

I obligingly throw the stick on down the beach, but stop to pull logs into the holes she creates. The result?

You can see her above, digging around some of the hundreds of small logs I pull from the wave tossed shore. Little by little, we've started a nice little area of non-erosive shoreline here. Down on Marrowstone Point, we even created a pretty good protective log "soft armoring" around the old Coast Guard Light.

An old boy with a dog, some beaches and logs...........one stick at a time, we try for reasons not quite understood by the locals, to save homes that are ready to fall into the sea. Mainly, though, I just want to create good habitat for salmon babies, sandlance, seabirds, otters, eagles, and kids of the future who might walk this beach and wonder how the sand formed such a nice wide path at the foot of those high bluffs.

I doubt I can save some of the homes that are ready to fall. They will fall. Might be able to keep some people from losing life and property while having some fun with Monsoon.

Stay tuned for more photos. You would not believe where people place their homes.

Marrow Stone Island, Washington State. Winter-Midsummer 2010

The odds say, "This House will fall onto the beach this winter. Local Realtors
are actually selling adjacent property to unwitting buyers.........integrity? Come On down, buy
some "waterfront" property and literally live on the beach next summer!

Just have to say, I have been trying to protect this and the other homes along this shoreline. I even went so far as to offer free time to the landowners losing their land, future, and more to this foolish use of planet earth and mother mother ocean.........As Jerry Jeff sings, "You can trust the might ocean. You can trust the moon to move her. You can trust the sun to shine upon the land."........but, I disagree with Jerry Jeff Walker in his lines about "Trusting, or leaving the rest to the quiet faith of man...............Man, here on Marrow Stone Island seems to have jetted off island to some mall in Missoula, or simply gave up and moved his or her fence and home back from the precipice.

Bottom Line?

This home will fall into the Admiralty Inlet waters soon. When? Simply soon.............I tried to save Mary's home. I tried to get East Marrowstone residents to put more big wood along the beach. When will they ever learn? When will anyone ever learn...........

INTRODUCING: GREATER YELLOWSTONE FRIENDS OF FRED

2010-07-29T14:57:00.000-10:00

Dear Fred,

It's me, Yellowstoney the Mountain Goat along with your old friend Beav and Wally. What a funny little moose he is for sure!

Down below there, hanging in that net, is a straggler. A baby black bear who doesn't even know her own name. We met up with her in a campground in downtown Salmon, Idaho. She was just bumming around. Backpack to backpack, we started in to talking.......next thing we know, she was camping with us friends.

We owe it to the tiny bear to find her a home. Maybe in Richmond, Virginia, Colorado, or up Alberta way?

She says she is a salmon eater but I don't know for sure. Us Mountain Goats stay far from the river, but enjoy its sounds. We like the view to all the stars, high above the rest. Up where we can hide from wolves.

Beav wanted to let you know how frightened he is of those pesty wolves. Last night we camped up there in those hills you can see behind us ---- inside Yellowstone National Park. That big arch is a kind of memorial to when a president signed paper that kicked out our Shoshone Friends and made it open to other Americans by horse, then train, plane and automobile. Whew.......we just about got run down by a car just this morning. An antelope hopped in front of buddy Ron's camera just as we were hopping into the back of his car.

Buddy Monsoon opened the door for us when Ron wasn't looking and we all got in, hiding our little black bear buddy from the Rangers and strangers. Next thing we knew, we were fly fishing for trout, back on the big, beautiful Salmon River. We miss Sacajawea's family, friends from way back when. She used to swim faster than otter, way faster than Beav's family to be sure. My Grampa Rocky used to tell me stories of how she (Sacajawea) was kidnapped and taken far far away to the Dakotas I guess. Then some guys hoping to find gold and fame came out west guided by young Sacajawea and her boy, Pomp. Good people. They met up with their family at Beav's favorite spot on any map. It's a big rock that looks just like Beav! They even named a river, a county and a bunch of other stuff after the rock, even though Beav says his family didn't make out too well in the deal. Kind of like all your monkey family biz, eh?

Anyway, old friend, the four of us have stowed away in Ron's backpack. Just like you, I hear....didn't you come all the way from Ohio originally? According to Monsoon you've been traveling the globe. Been to Pihemanu again. This time with that great Brit, Maya! What a cool story she tells! Going to help planet earth through her Learn To Sea. And Haiti? New York islands too with best friend Annie Bell of the Fish and Wildlife! Wow!

I guess we might be careful for Fish and Wildlife people. Seems crossing state lines is something to think about. But we're small for our kind, large in heart, and strong of mind.

Me, Stoney, and your other mountain friends aim to teach headwaters to kids all this next year with a little help from Sue Warburton, Michelle Kaskovich, Mary Fox, Alan in Africa, and the kids of Capetown too.

We aim to connect with Mokapu the Whale and Eddie and Mokapu the Cougar (well maybe not Eddie....he seems to look hungry when he glances my way. Beav's a little scared of cougars too).......

You need to keep Ron busy fishing so we can all do the more important business of protection of our homelands! There is still a crazy war or two going on, we hear, so the people are busy with that and the money economy. But our natural economy is in tough shape, though greener than usual with the change in climate up here in the high country.

Be thinking of all of us Mountain plants and animals. Without healthy watersheds in the Rockies, the Yellowstone River, Snake, Columbia, Missouri, Green, Colorado, Salmon, and all others would dry up to dust. Protect us and you protect the ocean where you like to go free dive with your buddy Maya....

Hope to see you soon.

Your Greater Yellowstone Buddies,

Yellowstoney the Mountain Goat

Wally Moose

Beav the Beav

Little Lost Bear

Gardiner, Montana. July 2010

Note to all who teach and learn:

Fred and Friends are available in many ways. Follow their next adventures to Rhode Island, South Africa, Wyoming, Montana, Washington, Oahu, Kauai, and beyond. Be in touch for a personal visit from one or all Fred's Friends.

Fred and Friends

P.O. Box 899

Hadlock, Washington 98339

whalemail@waypoint.com

LEARN TO SEA WITH MAYA PLASS ---- OR, ALL BEST TO THE 2010 PIHEMANU LEADERSHIP GROUP

2010-07-11T10:35:00.000-10:00

A year has now passed since I visited Pihemanu (aka Midway Atoll) as part of the NOAA, USFWS, and State of Hawaii project to launch environmental leaders into some form of action. As you can read and see from the blog posts at this and other sites, my little friend, Fred has traveled to all corners of the world. I got to tag along on occasion and feel pretty good about the projects we launched in Ohio, England, Switzerland, South Africa, Oahu, Washington, and other locations.

It has been a fun yet tiring year of learning how to best approach ways of teaching about ocean issues while "swimming the swim" of protecting and restoring ocean health. I've tried best as I can to act locally and globally.......cleaning up tons of plastic (now called Trastic, thanks to my buddies in Rhode Island, greatest small place on planet Earth!)..........The best things, I do believe, are far less tangible. Say, for example, meeting a young Uk player at Mokapu.......Kai Kane now plays at his school under the watchful eye and heart of his Kupuna and others, singing his heart and soulful renditions of IZ tunes while the other kids make art and speak ecological wisdom beyond their years. Kai Kane and friends created a Big Book that will teach about how to Malama i ke Kai i ka Aina........even teaching Rocky Mountain and Cascade Mountain kids how to protect Cougar and other large predator habitats.

Imagine. A year ago, I thought I was going to simply clean up some oceans, ridding them of plastic. Little did I know the path would lead to ukulele strummings connecting Mokapu (Sacred land of Oahu where, according to Hawaiian Legend, the very first Kai Kane, or human, was created) with Wyoming!

but then, my work has always been about kids finding their way along water routes. Headwaters to the Sea and back again, I get to travel and teach ocean with nets, cameras, fishing poles, microscopes, water testing gear, and tons of paint and pencil. Making art seems critical to all this and young Kai Kane's musical talent simply gives voice to the need for more and more art within our schools. Making art with kids is where it's at.

If you wish, come to Seattle this winter and listen to Dr. Sharon Buda and I weave our stories of art and ecology that begin in Indian Creek, Ohio and travel to Oahu and beyond. We will be at the National Art Educator Association annual gathering, spreading the word about taking kids outside to do science and art. We hope to include work by others who have followed the journey of Fred and Friends to Pihemanu, others like Maya Plass, Director of LEARN TO SEA (find links here or google Maya and her organization and/or the 2010 PAA journaling).

Maya and I talked many times during the past year and she was fortunate to visit Pihemanu this year. She and the other group of 12 PAA leaders now have a year to do their best to take Kuleana (Responsibility) for a project(s) set out there in the middle of the ocean where our Papahanaumoku and Wakea got together to create all life on earth........it is now up to them to find some new ways of making earth healthy again. Hey, one person can make a bit of a diff, so go for it Maya.

Aloha nui loa, Ron Hirschi (Fredless on Marrowstone Island, June 2010)

WE JOIN THE WORLD IN HONORING AND PRAYING FOR THE MANDELA FAMILY

2010-06-11T21:08:00.000-10:00

To The Mandela Family and All World Soccer Fans Too....

We have been a tiny speck in the ocean of life this past year.

Project SOAR began in a conversation with a six year old

in the Middle of America.

A Silly Litle Monkey named Fred

has now traveled the planet bringing smiles

laughter and even tears

in hope

to find peace on planet earth.

Just today, a note came from Sandra Cecelski

and her Honors Oceanography Class at a high school in North Carolina......

The kids had just sent 15 pounds of plastic bottle caps to

THE STUDENTS OF MUIZENBURG HIGH SCHOOL

IN SOUTH AFRICA...........

A Whale Tail inspired by students, once again, in Ohio,

is being made of the caps from children all around the earth.

As I recall, the inspiration came by way of a tiny not for profit called

Pals of the Pacific.

POP was created in honor of my Grandfather,

Walter Hirschi, a son of a Swiss immigrant.

A Peace Loving Swiss Man who instilled in me a sense of caring

about all life.

I never heard my Grandfather, Pop, raise his voice to any human.

Okay, once he got really mad at me for shooting a duck out of season.......

And so, I became a biologist and now get to be

Poppa Kapuna (Grandpa to kids around the world), simply because

I have no grandchildren of my own.........sort of.......

And then, I heard on The Mountain (103.7 FM, Seattle) the earth saddening news.

Nelson Mandela's GreatGrandDaughter, Zenani

was killed in an accident.........

We offer our silent and deepest thoughts to you Nelson.

May you always know that the world

remembers your suffering for all people, black, white and in between.

I can not help but believe that Mexico and Your Country

competed in full honor today as they

truthfully reconciled a 1-1 tie.......

I ask all children on earth to send Nelson their best

and please, as well, send the students of Muizenburg, S.A.

ONE SOCCER BALL

emblazzend with your school or team logo.

Address to:

THE GREAT WHALE TAIL PROJECT

MUIZENBURG JUNIOR SCHOOL

56 Main Road Muizenberg

CAPE TOWN, SOUTH AFRICA 7945

MAHALO

and

ALOHA NUI LOA

Ron Hirschi

Director, Pals of the Pacific

CEO, FRIENDS OF FRED

PO BOX 899

Port Hadlock, Washington 98339 USA

whalemail@waypoint.com

Where Oh Where is Fred?

2010-05-25T11:29:00.000-10:00

It's me, Fred....Saved like the Ocean

by my buddies at Skookum Recycling

and Jefferson County Solid Waste.

Even got saved from TIGERS, no doubt sent here

for photo opportunity by friend Tom and the Cougar Fund?

Oaky, maybe not, but you know,

These men and women at the recycling

(working for great friend, Matt Hall)

keep millions and millions

of deadly plastics out of the Chimacum Creek Watershed,

Strait of Juan de Fuca,

and the beautiful Pacific Ocean.

Gotta go have fresh halibut from neighbors, Brian and Connie.

I love halibut and all seafood.

I thank Skookum and all Garbage Collectors and

Landfill Workers for making the halibut tasty and healthy.

Stay tuned for sad news. Got that today too.......a huge spill

of micro plastics along East Side of Marrowstone Island!

Strange how everyone thinks there is only one spill at a time?

Fred. Back from Hawaii where the Marines are in control of

GREENING PLANET EARTH!

Searching for Mokapu......Where oh Where Can She be?

2010-05-24T08:52:00.000-10:00

Eddie gets tangled up in cargo net

after wiping out on his new surfboard, shaped for him

by Tom Wegener of Australian waterman fame.

But, kids of Mokapu are

MEAN, GREEN, FIGHTING MACHINES

and like all Marines, they rescued Eddie

just like his namesake, Eddie Aikau, rescued many surfers

up on the north shore.........

Eddie Surfs to Oahu.

As illustrated by students for:

COUGAR TALES (http://www.cougarfund.org/ )

Mokapu Elementary, Oahu

Marine Corps Base, HAWAII.

Image from the BIG BOOK,

Pals of the Pacific, and The Cougar Fund.

Contact Michelle Kaskovich for permissions.

MOKAPU, MOKAPU, WHERE ARE YOU...........

2010-05-23T14:00:00.000-10:00

In the Highest Traditions of the Marine Corps and the United States Naval Service, Mokapu Elementary is not only lean and green, it's a true fighting machine, out to rid the ocean and land (Kai i ka Aina) of all forms of human insult. I had the honor of working with the sons and daughters of our enlisted men and women who are stationed at and serve from Marine Corps Base, HAWAII at the special place called Mokapu, on the Island of Oahu.

For those of you interested in United States military history, this was the very first place bombed on December 7, 1941 just prior to the attack on Pearl Harbor. Brave Marines and Navy personnel gave their lives here and fought valiantly.........And long before this battle, Mokapu was a most sacred place in Hawaiian creation story.......It was here that the first man was created (See works of Mary Kawena Pukui to learn more of this history tied to the creation of Pihemanu and all the islands.)

Books could also be written to tell the incredible history of how Mokapu and Marine Corps Base Hawaii is becoming a world leader in turning an entire community Green. As a very small part of this much larger effort, The Cougar Fund and the Marine Corps Family allowed me to work with artist and gifted teacher, Michelle Kaskovich. Michelle and her fellow marines, parents, teachers, and super staff at Mokapu School teamed together to create a working environment like no other. As a hint of things to come, where else could you tell the story of a cougar while young artists paint a life size whale on the school grounds to the tunes strummed on a unkulele by a young Kai Kane (ocean guy)?

We brought the wonder of Mokapu and Eddie, two Cougars (aka Puma and Mountain Lion) into the lives of kids who have family in Afghanistan and Iraq. They had fun and learned while they helped continue a story begun in Rhode Island and Breidablik, Washington. It is a story you will soon read and enjoy through sight and sound and writings of kids sharing how they see their world from Mountain Top to flowing rivers, and beyond to the much broader and vast waters of our one ocean.

It seems that Mokapu has many meanings, many faces and our little Mokapu the Cougar fell snout over paws for a surfing Cougar by the name of Eddie. They must have met at Brown University in RI or over a bowl of chowder and some stuffies at Duffy's. No matter. They parted company briefly and Eddie hopped a tramp steamer or a schooner and headed south, then west and north to meet up with his buddy Fred and Fred's many other friends (FOF). Moli the Wandering Albatross was one of these FOF's and according to some kids, Moli spotted Eddie surfing after his boat ride ended after a confrontation with pirates.

Hard to follow? Stay tuned and the kids will take over and allow you to enter the magical world where no one dies, where no one cries - the land of make believe. Okay, our funding partners also asked that kids teach us some science and ecology too, so you will soon see how kids have been teaching "Art and Ecology" with Cougars as icons representing the entire Mainland and many FOF's representing ponds, lakes, streams, rivers, estuaries, and, of course, the OCEAN.

Funny how this all came together and if you are lucky to meet up with Fred and his buddies, you will soon find out that Cougars are vital for the survival of all life, just as sea turtles and salmon are critical for aquatic systems to function. More importantly, you ought to take the time to ask kids from Rhode Island, Ohio, Washington, Wyoming, Oahu, Australia, South Africa, Great Britain, and many other places --- "Mokapu, Mokapu, Where are You?".........the sometimes silly, but always sacred trust we put in our children shines in this gentle story that combines creativity of many people. And, the special thanks to the US Marine Corps, the Parents of Mokapu Students, The Cougar Fund, and a tiny non-profit known as POP - Pals of the Pacific. POP is now home of Friends of Fred and busy as it might be, takes the time to think and act locally and globally on behalf of all creatures and their home, planet earth.

Marrowstone Island, Springtime 2010