Our Oceans are Under Attack

Confessions of a Former Climate Change Denialist | Canadian Science Writers Association

 

The Worst Koch-Funded Lies About Climate Change in 90 Seconds | desmogblog.com

 

A third of US shrimp is 'misrepresented' | The Guardian

 

Climate Change: The Effects Of Global Warming Broken Down By Continent | International Business Times

 

Sharks that are caught and their fins cut off are not always dead when their bodies are thrown back into the sea. Without its fins the shark simply sinks to the bottom of the ocean where it dies. Such a horrible death for such a magnificent creature and diet, the whole entire practice is unethical, environmentally damaging and will cause havoc in the biodiversity predatory hunting circle if we lose our species of sharks.

Shark fins, once they are harvested, are then dried to be sold in markets to individuals and restaurants to be made into shark fin soup and sold to the public (especially tourists) for as much as $350 per bowl! The shark fins don’t even add any flavor to the soup. Chicken or pork are used to flavor, the fins are for texture only.

The shark fin soup industry uses a wide variety of relatively large sharks. The majority of these sharks are now under threat. They are slow to mature and breed sharks give birth to a few live young or lay a small number of large eggs depending on species, rather than produce thousands of eggs at a time in the manner of many bony fish. Large sharks also do not mature until they are several years old. These characteristics mean that shark populations cannot support high levels of exploitation = nearing extinction to species vaporisation for a bowl of lousy fowl tasting soup.

Mackerel Sharks

The order Lamniformes includes some of the best-known and biggest sharks. Among them are the great white shark, the basking shark and the thresher sharks. All these species are targeted for their fins, and all are either endangered or vulnerable. The great white shark, for example, might be the most feared species of shark, especially after starring in the ’70s thriller “Jaws.” However, they are more threatened by humans than humans are by them.

Ground Sharks

Carcharhiniformes is another order boasting well-known sharks, such as the bizarre looking hammerheads, whose fins command high prices. The order also includes the family of requiem sharks. These are sharks are your typical sharks, with streamlined bodies and sharp teeth. Tiger sharks, bull sharks and the spinner sharks, which jump out of the water, are all requiem sharks, and they are all taken for their fins.

Dogfish

The order Squaliformes includes all the sharks known as dogfish, the bramble sharks and the rough sharks. They are generally small, benthic, seabed-dwelling sharks that lay eggs and reproduce relatively quickly. Their fins are not of much value, although these animals are often targeted for their meat. The tails of some species of dogfish are used for cheap versions of shark fin soup.

Of the five remaining orders of sharks, carpet sharks, bullhead sharks, angel sharks, frilled sharks and saw sharks, few species are used for shark fin soup. They are mostly small sharks, with small or undesirable fins, and they are not valuable in the shark fin market. Some species, notably the critically endangered angel sharks and the whale shark — a species of carpet shark and the largest fish in the world — are targeted for their meat or oil, but not the fins.

If we don’t take urgent notice now and demand that CITES Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora take more action and demand that law enforcement cease this repulsive and degrading trade then we will see an ocean without any sharks that will unfortunately create a massive aquatic biodiversity nightmare in the aquatic hunting food chain.

Sharks eat many prey, these prey need to be naturally controlled to preserve OTHER species of smaller aquatic marine fish, and should the shark numbers carry on dwindling at massive proportions then we are heading for a global catastrophe.

 

When Lisette Kreischer created the Dutch Weed Burger, a plant-based burger, she and her co-founder Mark Kulsdom didn’t just want it to be a vegan alternative to meat; they wanted to encourage people to rethink their consumption habits through the promotion of a food source that’s at the bottom of the food chain – seaweed.

“We are now seeing that this method [of meat as a source of protein] is no longer sustainable towards the ecological system. The population is growing and so is the demand for proteins, but the Earth remains the same size; so we need to look at other sources,” says Kreischer, who believes that investing in synthetic, lab-grown burgers will only encourage people to keep wanting to eat meat. “Beans and other plant-based products are good sources of protein, but you still need agricultural land and fresh water to grow them ... Seaweed can be harvested in the sea.”

The Dutch Weed Burger has homegrown seaweed in its meat substitute and sauce, along with algae powder in the bun, and is available at several restaurants across the Netherlands. Kreischer and her team have also been working closely with experts from Wageningen University to ensure their cultivation practices are sustainable.

 

We aren't seeing any such thing. YOU see all sorts of man made ills.
You don't like people I think, but you ARE one.
The USA isn't over breeding and is NOT growing in birth rate, and as soon as we stop immigration, will have a stable or diminishing population.
Our birthrate hasn't kept up with maintaining population level since 1972 as I posted before.
Only immigration swells OUR numbers.
Nobody has a RIGHT to immigrate here!
We do NOT have to absorb the excesses of other nations.
Over population is THEIR problem, and THEIR consequences.
Nature will solve the problem for those too populous nations, with disease, starvation, and predation (wars).
They have known a long time they are producing too many children. Who's fault is it if they continue?
Who will suffer most?
We have as much right to look after our own interests as does any other nation.

 

If you want to eat vegan, Myark, go ahead.
I insist I have the equal right to eat meat, because I choose to.
You are not going to rule the world.
Give it a rest!
Be careful you don't over stress yourself with frustration.
You accomplish nothing with your vegan ideology preaching.
You aren't convincing.

 

Nobody has a RIGHT to immigrate here!

That is what the Indians said about you yob, and all the other countries invaded by westerners who brought diseases and religion, then conquered "killed"

 

I AM part Amerind, SIOUX.
Put THAT in your pipe and smoke it!
ROFLMAO!

 

yea but mostly invader

 

The amerinds also immigrated here. And my European ancestors arrived here about 1700. We and other early settlers created this country.
We had room for imigrants for centuries. Now we don't. Full up, we are!
Immigration must be stopped, and soon.

 

WE WE WE WE WE Me Me ME My My My I I I I I
Who cares

 

Who cares about your radical opinions? About being vegan? Very few Americans.
But apparently you think the USA is responsible for the worlds problems and curing them.
I suggest isolation. Once again.
When the subordinates congratulated the Admiral running the Japanese attack fleet that bombed Pearl Harbor, he supposedly said he feared he had only awoken a sleeping giant.
Time for the giant to dose again and stop being the worlds sugar daddy.
Stop foreign aid of every kind. Reduce funding the UN to the minimum.
Let the world find it's own way without our beneficence.
Other nations think they are entitled to America's generosity! Nope!

 

Environmental vegans are quick to point out the unsustainable, energy- and pollution-intensive nature of meat production. The numbers seem to agree, as several studies and reports detail the detriments of livestock farming to air, water, land, climate and biodiversity. The livestock industry sucks at least 8% percent of the global water supply and pays it back with pollution, dumping antibiotics and hormones, chemical waste from tanneries, pesticides and feed-crop fertilizers into local waterways. According to the World Resources Institute, 20-30% of the planet’s forests have been converted to grazing land and feed-crop land for livestock. Deforestation leads to habitat destruction and a loss of biodiversity, not to mention fewer trees to absorb carbon dioxide, thus contributing to greenhouse gas emissions.-
And how about this: one dairy cow excretes about one hundred and twenty pounds of manure a day. That’s twenty to forty times more than what a human produces. All this manure assaults the environment in two ways. It pollutes waterways, but more importantly, it’s a huge contributor to greenhouse gas emissions. The Environmental Protection Agency estimates that livestock is the largest source of human-induced methane emissions. A 2005 University of Chicago study suggests that a vegetarian diet produces fewer greenhouse gas emissions than a meat-based diet, with the difference equivalent to about 1.5 metric tons of carbon dioxide per year. All told, livestock produces an estimated eighteen percent of man-made greenhouse gas emissions—although British farmer and writer Simon Fairlie disputes this figure in his new book, Meat: A Benign Extravagance, saying it focuses on deforestation from livestock ranching while neglecting logging or development as deforestation sources. The US, with its veneer of affluence, is especially loose with its resources. Against a backdrop of American meat consumption that rose by approximately forty percent between 1962 and 2002, as much as seventy percent of US-grown grain goes toward feeding livestock (3), and fifty percent of the country’s water supply goes toward livestock production (4). A 2009 Loma Linda University study found meat-based diets use almost three times more water, two-and-a-half times more raw energy and thirteen times more fertilizer than do vegan diets. So yes, it seems that if everyone on the planet converted to a vegan diet, we’d all be much, much better off in terms of living in a far purer environment, and what’s more, there’d be a lot more water, land and food to go around.