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The Majestic Plastic Bag – Part IV

June 1, 2011 by 1 Comment
Thin plastic shopping bags

This just in! Another fine addition to The Majestic Plastic Bag conservation series. A reusable plastic bag company, ChicoBag Company, announced recently that they are being sued by three of the nation’s largest disposable plastic bag manufacturers. Those companies are claiming that a link on the ChicoBag Company website educating citizens about the long term implications of disposable plastic bags to the environment is causing “irreparably harmed” their business.

Some of the statements that the disposable plastic bag companies have issue with are:

  • “A reusable bag needs only to be used eleven times to have a lower environmental impact than using eleven disposable bags.” Source: EPA
  • “Only one percent of plastic bags are recycled.” Source: EPA
  • “Somewhere between 500 billion and a trillion plastic bags are consumed worldwide each year.” Source: National Geographic
  • “The world’s largest landfill can be found floating between Hawaii and San Francisco. Wind and sea currents carry marine debris from all over the world to what is now known as the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. This ‘landfill’ is estimated to be twice the size of Texas and thousands of pounds of our discarded trash, mostly plastics.” Source: National Geographic
  • “Each year hundreds of thousands of sea birds and marine life die from ingestible plastics mistaken for food.” Source: L.A. Times

We’ll keep you updated on how this plays out via our Twitter feed.

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The Majestic Plastic Bag – Part II

May 26, 2011 by 2 Comments

Yesterday we brought you the “mockumentary”, The Majestic Plastic Bag. As a follow-up today check out this amazing infographic from reusablebag.com. Ireland reduced plastic bag consumption by 90% (1 billion bags!) from 2001-2011 by imposing a tax of 37-cents.

Bag Bans Worldwide
Source: Reusable Grocery Bags

image (c) http://www.reusethisbag.com

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The Majestic Plastic Bag

May 25, 2011 by Leave a Comment

Narrated by Jeremy Irons, here is a clip from the “mockumentary”, The Majestic Plastic Bag.

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“Always read something that will make you look good if you die in the middle of it.” P.J. O’Rourke

May 20, 2011 by Leave a Comment

Today Ira Flatow discussed summer science reads on Science Friday, my favorite radio program. So, I got to thinking about two very special books that I always wander back to when I want to reconnect with the ocean. Henry Beston’s, The Outermost House, and Jennifer Ackerman’s, Notes from the Shore, are two books written in the spirit and tradition of Thoreau’s, Walden. Beston and Ackerman are alone with their thoughts in a remote marine environment (Beston is on Cape Cod while Ackerman is on Delaware’s Cape Henelope) for an extended period of time. They both contemplate how the ocean can be a metaphor for our existence.

After his return from World War I, Beston built a writer’s cabin on Cape Cod. He called the home Fo’castle and there he wrote The Outermost House published in 1928. This book was an inspiration to Rachel Carson as she wrote The Sea Around Us. Fo’castle was unfortunately destroyed by high tides in 1978.

Here is an excerpt from The Outermost House that I come back to often (especially when I am coveting the latest smartphone): “Touch the earth, love the earth, her plains, her valleys, her hills, and her seas; rest your spirit in her solitary places. For the gifts of life are the earth’s and they are given to all, and they are the songs of birds at daybreak, Orion and the Bear, and the dawn seen over the ocean from the beach. ”

Let’s face it. Beston is not for everyone. Jennifer Ackerman is a bit most contemporary in her text and prose. After all, Notes from the Shore was published in 1995. Her outlook on man altering nature is spot-on, “It’s in our nature to see order and when we don’t see it, to try to impose it. We have to put things through our minds to make sense of them, and our minds crave pattern and order. So maybe what we glimpse is only what we desire.” A statement that reminds me sometimes we should just allow nature to take its course and see what happens.

Another reason I gravitate to Notes from the Shore is that she spends a considerable amount of time writing about my favorite animal, Limulus polyphemus. She even reviews her experience counting horseshoe crabs during the late nights in May and June, an activity this Beach Chair Scientist did quite often during undergraduate internships. With that I will leave off with Ackerman’s description on the incredible nature of the horseshoe crab‘s ability to remain so steadfast and unchanged, “These creatures so durable that they antedate most other life-forms, so adaptable that their survival as a species may, for all we know, approach eternity.”

Image (c) goodreads.com

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May 22 is National Maritime Day

May 18, 2011 by 1 Comment

In observance of the anniversary of the first transatlantic voyage on May 22, 1933, Congress has set aside this day to recognize those in the maritime industry.

The North American Marine Environmental Protection Agency (NAMEPA) and the North American Maritime Ministry Association (NAMMA)  are teaming up for their fourth National Maritime Day celebration next week in D.C.

At the National Press Club on Monday, May 23rd there will be a seminar, “Safety at Sea”, focusing on environmental intelligence in shipping. Later that day will be a National Maritime Day dinner and awards presentation.

This year’s celebration is particularly special now that NAMEPA is over 100 members strong! Click here if you’d like to learn more or are interested in becoming a partner.

Not in D.C.?

For some festivities remotely you will want to check out these virtual exhibits celebrating life at sea from the Smithsonian National Museum of American History. You can get the narrative of an English sea captain from 1680 or hear ‘Away Rio’ a little diddy about an outward-bound chantey filled with sailors facing homesickness and other hardships.

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Cancer research starts glowing, albeit with a lowly tunicate

May 15, 2011 by Leave a Comment

The BBC News released a news alert today stating that there is a species of sea squirt, or tunicate, off the coast of Scotland that ” will be able to light-up microscopic cellular activity that would otherwise be invisible to the human eye”.

Here’s a little bit of background on a sea squirt species found a little closer to home off the Atlantic coast. Molgula manhattensis are no more than 2 inches in diameter and arrange themselves in clumps. This often leads to another common name, sea grapes. They’re sessile creatures that attach themselves to boats, pilings, rocks, or other hard substrates found under water. These greenish-brown blobs with two siphon nobs feed by drawing water in one siphon and eject waste out the excurrent siphon. These hermaphrodites will spew water out of their siphons as a defense mechanism when poked (awfully scary it is not). This discovery will help people suffering from cancer, specially those with HCA https://homecareassistance.com/calabasas/.

These extremely tolerable animals have a related species that are becoming quite the nuisance for oyster reefs  in the Indian River Lagoon of Florida. Doesn’t everyone have a pesky cousin somewhere?
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Deep sea neighborhood sees improvement when philanthropic vents release Fool’s Gold

May 12, 2011 by Leave a Comment

“As iron sharpens iron, so a friend sharpens a friend.” King Solomon

There is not a lot life down in the deep sea. Fortunately, it is convenient that the hydrothermal vents down there share a wealth of minerals to the otherwise desolate neighborhood. More notably what was just uncovered is that iron particles (known as pyrite or commonly called Fool’s Gold) are released by the vents and suspend in the nearby environment. This discovery was made by researchers at the University of Delaware.

While it is not surprising that these vents release iron, what is shocking is that it does not fall directly to the bottom of the ocean floor as previously thought. Since the size of the iron particles that are released by the hydrothermal vents are so tiny (a diameter 1,000 times smaller than that of a human hair) they are actually dispersed throughout the water column of the deep sea this is turn helps create a richer more vibrant deep sea neighborhood than deep sea areas without vents.

“As pyrite travels from the vents to the ocean interior and toward the surface ocean, it oxidizes gradually to release iron, which becomes available in areas where iron is depleted so that organisms can assimilate it, then grow,” said scientist George Luther of the University of Delaware.

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Syzygy and Supermoons

May 11, 2011 by 1 Comment

OK, just in case you are playing some pub trivia this summer I want to mention the phenomenons of syzygy and supermoons. In celestial terms, syzygy refers to when three heavenly bodies (for instance the sun, the moon, and the Earth) are aligned. This alignment typically enhances tides to an exceptional level. In marine science, it can also refer to the highest of the high tides during one tidal period.

Now, on to supermoons. They would be the syzygy when the moon is at its closest approach to the Earth (or, in its perigree).

The image above is from the supermoon this past March. The picture was taken is Egypt (If anyone would like to sponsor a trip for this Beach Chair Scientist to someday visit Egypt please let me know. It is a bucket list trip for my husband and I).

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How to win a game of Survivor if stranded on a beach

May 9, 2011 by 6 Comments

DewberriesWhile I am not here to tell you how to form alliances, I can mention some edible seaside plants found along the Atlantic coast. These include: Sea rocket, sea lettuce, prickly pear, bull thistle, dewberry and winged sumac. You can eat the blackberries of the dewberry with milk and honey. For a refreshingly cool drink soak winged sumac in cool water for 15 minutes. Devour the sweet pulp of the prickly pear after you peel away the skin. Add the leaves of sea rocket and sea lettuce to a fresh seaside salad. Lastly, gorge on the stems of the bull thistle (of course, only after you’ve removed the thorns!).

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May is National Wetlands Month

May 8, 2011 by Leave a Comment
US-EPA-Seal-EO11628

Image via Wikipedia

In 1991 the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) declared May to be National Wetlands Month. They set aside the day to celebrate the economic and ecological value of wetlands and educate America of the natural resource. Throughout the country events take place to encourage you to learn more about wetlands and take action to restore them. Whether your neighborhood wetland is a swamp, bog or tidal marsh these areas are vital filtration and storage areas, as well as, nursery grounds to continue biological productivity in our local watersheds and beyond. Unfortunately these areas are threatened and their biggest enemy is mankind. According to the EPA, “Urban and rural development is now the leading cause of wetland loss, accounting for nearly 60% of freshwater wetland loss nationally.” Good news though is that on April 27, 2011 Lisa Jackson (Administrator of the EPA) work with others to get the Obama administration recommitted to recognizing the importance of clean water and healthy watersheds.

Surf Your Watershed is a great place to find out if there is a local organization dedicated to protecting your local wetland.

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