Hawaii bans shark fin soup – thank you Governor Linda Lingle

From time to time a glimmer of hope appears as some honorable, committed individuals stand up for what is right, demand a change to human behaviour that, although it may be ‘traditional’, is just downright barbaric and damaging to the environment we live in – thank you Governer Linda Lingle of Hawaii!

Governor of Hawaii, Linda Lingle, has signed into law a ban on shark-fin soup, according to Reuters. The soup is currently served in a number of Chinese restaurants in Hawaii, but the trade has decimated certain shark species due to overfishing.

Between 26 and 73 million sharks are killed annually for their fins to produce the high-end delicacy in Asia. Sharks are brought aboard ships where their fins are cut off then they are thrown back into the water—often still alive—where they succumb to their injuries.

The trade is seen as the primary driver behind drastic declines in many shark species. The scalloped hammered population has dropped by 98 percent in some regions, while the oceanic whitetip shark has declined by 90 percent in the central Pacific Ocean and 99 percent in the Gulf of Mexico. The IUCN Red List has found that 32 percent of open ocean sharks and rays are currently threatened with extinction, a much higher percentage than mammals or birds.

Earlier in the year eight shark species failed to gain international protection at the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES). Pressured by Japan, votes to protect sharks and other marine species failed time and again.

Read full article at Mongabay.com

If you’re interested you can contact Linda HERE to show your appreciation.

Corals flourish at Bikini Atoll

Huge colonies of Porites coral growing up to 26 feet (8 meters) high flourish in the Bravo Crater in the Marshall Islands’ Bikini Atoll.

A recent international survey of the 1.2-mile-wide (2-kilometer-wide) crater, created in 1954 by the impact of the most powerful atom bomb ever detonated by the U.S., shows that some coral species have bounced back.

“It was awesome to see coral cover as high as 80 percent and large treelike branching formations with trunks 30 centimeters (11 inches) thick,” Zoe Richards of the ARC Centre of Excellence for Coral Reef Studies said in a statement.

However, 42 species of corals never recovered from the devastating event, which vaporized nearby islands and raised water temperatures to 55,000 degrees Celsius (99,000 degrees Fahrenheit).

From National Geographic Read more

Turtle survives after dentist filling

A rare turtle that survived being bashed against rocks when he washed up on a Cornish beach has had his shell patched up using dental paste.

The half-metre-long loggerhead turtle was underweight, malnourished and dehydrated when he was found stranded at Widemouth Bay near Bude eight weeks ago by a woman walking her dog. Since then the turtle has been nursed back to health by staff at the Blue Reef Aquarium, Newquay, where he was nicknamed James Bond after being allocated the number 007 by the marine strandings network.

The staff were unsure of what to do about black lesions on the turtle’s shell, damage that was caused when he was tossed against the rocks. A local pharmacist and a dental surgery came to James Bond’s assistance by donating a protective paste called Orabase to provide an extra layer of protection while the injuries heal. Bond is now doing so well that he is on display at the aquarium and staff hope to release him back into the wild, possibly in the Canary Islands, in the next few months.

Form the Times Online

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