Is boiling Lobster alive humane?
March 31, 2009
I am a carnivore, I like to eat meat, I like to eat fish and I like to eat crustaceans. I’m not a tree-hugging hippy, I’m not a vegetarian and I’m not squeamish about killing for food. However there are three dishes that I will not eat: Veal, Shark-fin soup and Lobster.
Respectively I consider them to be: cruel, unnecessary and just down-right barbaric. At the same time I don’t judge others for doing so, with the exception of shark-fin soup which is idiotic (it won’t cure cancer), wasteful (the rest of the shark is thrown alive back into the ocean) and irresponsible (shark populations have been decimated by over 90% as a direct result of long-line fishing and fining practices).
My decision not to eat Lobster was based on an instinct that no matter what chefs might tell you, lobsters are bound to feel pain as they are boiled alive. I’m less than delighted to learn that my instinct may just have been proven correct…
Two new studies by Robin Elwood indicate that crustaceans feel both pain and stress.
From Discovery News
“In the past, some scientists reasoned that since pain and stress are associated with the neocortex in humans, all creatures must have this brain structure in order to experience such feelings. More recent studies, however, suggest that crustacean brains and nervous systems are configured differently. For example, fish, lobsters and octopi all have vision, Elwood said, despite lacking a visual cortex, which allows humans to see.
It was also thought that since many invertebrates cast off damaged appendages, it was not harmful for humans to remove legs, tails and other body parts from live crustaceans. Another study led by Patterson, however, found that when humans twisted off legs from crabs, the stress response was so profound that some individuals later died or could not regenerate the lost appendages.
Chris Sherwin, a senior research fellow in the Clinical Veterinary Science division at the University of Bristol, has also studied pain in invertebrates.
Sherwin told Discovery News, “The question of whether invertebrates experience pain is fundamental to our legislation that protects animals and our behavior, attitude and use of these highly complex organisms.”
He said that while the recent studies suggest crustaceans experience “something akin to pain, rather than fixed, reflex responses,” additional research is needed.”
Food for thought I guess, but I for one will continue to operate under the assumption that anything that must be boiled alive in order for it to taste good, is not food.
Full Discovery article HERE
Maldives first carbon neutral country?
March 24, 2009
The pioneering new president of the Indian Ocean nation announces plans for his country – under grave threat from climate change – to go carbon-neutral in a decade
The president of the Maldives, Mohamed Nasheed, will today unveil a plan to make his country carbon-neutral within a decade. The announcement comes only days after scientists issued stark new warnings that rising seas caused by climate change could engulf the Maldives and other low-lying nations this century.
The president will formally announce the scheme – and make a plea for other countries to follow the Maldives’ lead – this evening, following the world premiere of The Age of Stupid, a major new climate change film in which a man living alone in the devastated world of 2055 looks at old footage from 2008 and asks why people didn’t stop climate change when they had the chance.
From The Guardian: Read full article here
BB-films stock video galleries
March 19, 2009
Collection of various stock video galleries using Flash including this underwater collection of SD video clips from around the world including the Maldives, Honduras, Egypt, Malta and Australia.
Shot in PAL with a Canon AG-DVX100 and Equinox Pro8 housing and colour corrected using FinalCut Pro and Color. These clips represent a snapshot of the last 3 years of vacation diving and the immense pleasure gained from filming some of nature’s greatest sights.
Click image above to view the gallery
Shots include dolphins, various tropical fish shoals, hard and soft corals, sealions, barracuda, lionfish, pufferfish, Napoleon wrasse, unicorn fish, oriental sweetlips, scribble fish, trigger fish, turtles and much, much more.
FOR SALE:
I will soon be upgrading my underwater filming equipment to the Sony PMW-EX1 with Gates housing so if you’re interested in buying my old equipment used to shoot the footage in this gallery, send an email to admin@bb-films.com and I’ll let you know when it goes up for sale on eBay.
| These clips & others can be downloaded in various high quality 25fps formats from my iStockvideo Lightbox “Underwater”: |  |
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Loggerhead turtles current-riding 20,000km round-trip
March 16, 2009
A marine biologist has helped fill in the so-called lost years of Australia’s loggerhead turtles by discovering they are using ocean currents to undertake a 20,000-kilometre, round trip across the Pacific Ocean.
Dr Michelle Boyle, of the School of Marine and Tropical Ecology at James Cook University, Queensland, and colleagues used genetic testing to track the migratory behaviour of the Australian-born loggerhead turtle (Caretta caretta), which hatches in rookeries on the Queensland coast.
Boyle says it appears the endangered turtles use the ocean currents that make up the South Pacific gyre to travel across the southern Pacific Ocean to the waters off Peru and Chile.
In scenes reminiscent of the animated movie Finding Nemo, they then pick up the East Australian Current (EAC), which they “ride” down the coast of eastern Australia.
From ABC Science, Full Article HERE
38cm baby Whale Shark rescued in Philippines
March 12, 2009
A 38cm-long whale shark, the size of a forearm, was rescued and released last week by activists in the waters off Pilar in eastern Philippines. The World Wide Fund for Nature called it “arguably the smallest living whale shark in recorded history.” The group said the tiny whale shark was tied to a small rope on a beach and said the discovery is the first indication that the Philippines coastline may be their birthing ground. In this photo, biologist Embet holds the baby whale shark.
Click HERE for ABC News Baby Animals photograph library.
