WiLD Blog

The historic San Onofre State Park is in dire need of southern California's help as she is threatened by the continuing tug a war battle of land developers and conservationists.  However, this time, if swift action is not taken the outcome may hit closer to home than you think.  The Transportation Corridor Agency is seeking their coastal development permit to construct their toll road, which will pierce straight through the heart of San Onofre State Park, meaning complete alteration for no one's benefit.  In their defense the TCA boasts that it will "provide improvements to the transportations infrastructure system that would help alleviate future traffic congestion and accommodate the need for mobility, access, goods movement, and future traffic demands" completely disregarding the facts of what will befall upon the state park, simply put as TCA's "Preferred Alternative."

Established in 1971 by Gov. Ronald Reagan, it has matured as one of the five most visited state parks in California, a gorgeous playground to hikers,campers, bikers', and well known for its prime surf break.  The park includes thriving wildlife both on and offshore, freely roaming one of the last well-preserved ecosystems of southern California.  Gov. Reagan stated, "The greatest legacies we leave to future generations is the heritage of our land.  But unless we can preserve and protect unspoiled areas which god has given us, we will have nothing to leave them."  Such protection calls for the whole community to unite under the flag of the earth, retaining San Onofre' unscarred face from land development.  How will this roadwork affect Trestles?

The Transportation Corridor Agency has fought conservationists and fed misguiding information to the public in order to acquire their permit for construction. Such information fabricated San Onofre State Park being an unpopular site that will not be missed and is in call for closure, which is entirely false.  Also making petty offers of $100 million dollars to theDept. of Parks and Recreation for the beautification of other less visited parks as an elusive tactic to altar the coastal commissions decisions in their favor.  If the TCA were to win it would level sixty percent of the park’s acreage, eliminating most of the hiking and biking trails, and closing San Mateo campground and it’s one hundred and sixty one campsites.  After the toll road would be built, increased pollution will run off into the watershed of the remaining park, then in turn endangering the world-class surf at Trestles.  All this destruction to save a few minutes of drivers commutes?

Certainly such an environmental threat has to be dealt with.  Awareness needs to be spread and action is to be set in immediate motion.  As Californian’s we must work together, side by side, to preserve our land from the defilement of the TCA incursion. Involvement is relevant.  If enough of the community makes their opposition known to the Coastal Commission Office, we can put a stop to this thing.  Simply writing letters of your protest will have the greatest impact on San Onofre State Park.  Do not let developers pave over your beaches.  Nature may not have a voice to stop this, but it has mine. Why not yours?

Nathan M. Clower

In a surprising (or maybe not so much) decision by President Bush to put military maneuvers above the good of the environment has threatened the wellness of the marine mammals that live and migrate off the coast of Southern California.  A news article dated 17January from msnbc.com cited “President Bush’s decision to let the Navy continue using high-power sonar in its training off Southern California, a practice they say harms whales and other marine mammals” despite the fact that the use of this type of sonar is outlawed in the Coastal Zone Management Act which was passed unanimously by Congress, the federal court, and the California Coastal Commission.  Conservationists continue to protest this decision yet Bush seems to hold fast that the use of sonar off California’s coast is pivotal in Navy training exercises.  The Navy claims that they are on the watch for marine mammals during exercises, and if one is spotted within 2,200 yards, the sonar is cut off, but is this enough? High frequency sonar is proven to cause debilitating harm to marine mammals’ brains and ears.  Also, many marine mammals use their own version of sonar to locate food, and with conflicting sonar patterns being produced by the Navy, it will inhibit the ability of the mammals to locate their own food source. 

This picture shows a dead dolphin with blood coming from its ears.

Julia Novak

Like the millions of Californians who love San Onofre State Beach Park, we were dismayed by the Guvernator's support for the TCA toll road that will destroy a large portion of San Onofre Beach State Park. But the Los Angeles Times said it best in a recent editorial,

Maybe Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger was trying to make up for planned cuts to state parks. Otherwise, it's hard to imagine what could have led to his recent support for the Foothill South toll road.

In announcing his change from neutral on the highway that's proposed to take traffic pressure off Interstate 5 in San Clemente, the governor said the project was "essential to protect our environment" and could be built in a manner "that will enhance and foster use of the coast." This is environmental doublespeak. As planned, the toll road would cut through a wilderness preserve in eastern Orange County and then traverse the length of a narrow, pristine canyon that makes up most of San Onofre State Beach, one of the most popular California state parks. The governmentSchwarzenegger heads is suing to stop the project.

Perhaps the $100 million offered by the Transportation Corridor Agencies as environmental mitigation -- to be used for improvements in other state parks -- enticed the governor at this vulnerable moment when he's proposing to close 48 parks temporarily as a budget fix. But the mitigation money could not begin to make up for the damage the road would cause. It wouldn't buy more parkland. What makes all this especially paradoxical is that the wilderness preserve and the campgrounds at San Onofre were themselves created as mitigation measures for other developments.

Both metaphorically and geographically, the Foothill South tollway would lead the state down a bad route. As proposed, it would go where few are interested in heading -- eastern Orange County. Commuters on the I-5 are generally headed toward the central county; the toll road agency is betting that to beat the traffic, motorists will pay a substantial toll to drive out of their way, a strategy that has failed before.

The best that can be said is that the toll road agency worked hard to find the most environmentally acceptable route among an environmentally unacceptable set of options. It doesn't have to end there, though. Agency officials have been loath to consider widening the I-5 with toll lanes through the congested area. This would be considerably more expensive and involves eminent domain proceedings. But toll lanes along existing freeways have proved popular. And eminent domain was used successfully to widen the I-5 through central and northern Orange County. When the California Coastal Commission meets Feb. 6 to consider the Foothill South proposal, it should disregard the governor's attempt to make environmental degradation sound good and insist on a better path.

So join us on February 6th at the Del Mar Fairgrounds for a meeting of the California Coastal Commission that will decide the fate of one of Southern California's last coastal open space preserves.
Serge

The Washington Post continues its excellent series on the ecological impact of global climate change, with a stunning report on the how fast the ice sheets of western Antarctica are melting. This will have far reaching consequences for sea level rise and the destruction of existing coastlines.

Climatic changes appear to be destabilizing vast ice sheets of western Antarctica that had previously seemed relatively protected from global warming, researchers reported yesterday, raising the prospect of faster sea-level rise than current estimates.

While the overall loss is a tiny fraction of the miles-deep ice that covers much of Antarctica, scientists said the new finding is important because the continent holds about 90 percent of Earth's ice, and until now, large-scale ice loss there had been limited to the peninsula that juts out toward the tip of South America. In addition, researchers found that the rate of ice loss in the affected areas has accelerated over the past 10 years -- as it has on most glaciers and ice sheets around the world.

"Without doubt, Antarctica as a whole is now losing ice yearly, and each year it's losing more," said Eric Rignot, lead author of a paper published online in the journal Nature Geoscience.

The Antarctic ice sheet is shrinking despite land temperatures for the continent remaining essentially unchanged, except for the fast-warming peninsula.

The cause, Rignot said, may be changes in the flow of the warmer water of the Antarctic Circumpolar Current that circles much of the continent. Because of changed wind patterns and less-well-understood dynamics of the submerged current, its water is coming closer to land in some sectors and melting the edges of glaciers deep underwater.

"Something must be changing the ocean to trigger such changes," said Rignot, a senior scientist with NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory. "We believe it is related to global climate forcing."

Of course for coastal cities in the U.S., the "cure" for this coming catastrophe is to dump billions of dollars into dredge and fill fill projects to protect the homes of millionaire beachfront property owners. Meanwhile what we could lose are millions of acres of coastal wetlands that provide habitat for a range of species including most of the world's migrating waterfowl and shorebirds. Not to mention critical habitat for fish and crustaceans and much of the world's population. Of course this already happening in Bangledesh.
Serge

 

 

The issue with water contamination progresses in my hometown, however I had no idea of the threat that was relevant and the severity it had upon my community’s public health.  I am an Imperial Beach local who enjoys my beach.  Each morning I check the surf and paddle out, well aware of the water condition being completely disgusting due to our on going problem with our neighboring country. When I think of rain I picture floodgates opening, allowing upon tens of thousands of raw sewage to spill into the ocean, making its just blue color to vanish, then turn a mucky brown.  However for the bold surfers, the thrill seekers, they paddle out, care free of the hazardous water that engulfs them.

 

            Until recently I too disregarded the notorious public health signs for warning beach goers of the contaminated water. To the local surfers these health signs just tend to blend into the beach, becoming a norm.  That’s how bad the situation is. Unaware of what lies in the water, and how it may not only lead to getting sick, but death. Such information was brought to my attention when I began to partake in Wildcoast.  Part of the orientation requires you to view a video dealing with local environmental problems, which completely opened my eyes to the hazards around my town. Bringing me to the case of a young surfer from Poway, and how his life was threatened by what was supposed to be another day at the beach.

 

            Chris Schaumachar ventured down to our town of Imperial Beach seeking some epic waves to surf.  Spotting the spectacular sets, he and his friends charged the beach, over looking the public health hazard signs posted.  Unfamiliar with the area Chris had no idea the risk he and his friends were putting themselves into.  That night prior to his surfday, Chris felt nauseous, sick, light headed, oblivious to why these symptoms had sufficed.  Due to the millions of gallons of raw sewage that flow into the ocean, Chris had fallen victim to the bacterial infection Cellulitis. Which in his particular case became life threatening.

 

            Cellulitis is an inflammation of the connective tissue beneath the skin that can be caused by a bacterial infection and often occurs where the skin has previously been broken.  Symptoms may include redness, swelling, pain, tenderness, fever or chills. Chris’ situation had taken a turn for the worse.  The bacteria had managed to seep into Chris’ eye making its way to his cerebral cortex, which began to spread and swell. Chris’ parents were later informed that if his condition did not better with his medication, that they would have to opt for surgery.  Luckily for modern health, Chris’ critical state had begun to subside, and return to normality. 

 

            Now imagine if a family member or a dear friend was swimming in the water thatday.  Coming down with the same symptoms as Chris, and having to be rushed to the emergency room.  My fears are of the ocean actually claiming a life due to the raw sewage, which continues to flow easily into the Pacific.  Something has to be done to not only help the environment, but also to protect our community.  How can you make our beaches a safer cleaner place?

 

            I have joined an organization in my hometown to try and deal with issues such as this one and many others that need to be recognized.  As a Wildcoast volunteer I have made awareness of this pollution issue, and have contributed as best to my ability to make the water cleaner for surfers, beach goers, and myself.  Wildcoast protects and preserves coastal ecosystems, and wildlife in the Californias and Latin America by building grassroots support, conducting media campaigns and establishing protected areas.  I am proud to be apart of something of this magnitude and would love to see more participation from our community.  If you would like to preserve your ocean visit our website at www.wildcoast.net.  Help southern California be a safer cleaner place.

Nathaniel M. Clower

 

            

No, it is not oil. Water, our most precious resource, is also our most frequently overlooked resource.  How many times do you go to the drinking fountain a day, go to the restroom to wash your hands, or even over to the pool for a swim?  Why, in a world where half its people don’t have proper drinking water do the other half swim their 500th yard to fitness without a second thought?  It is our culture, but it is also our responsibility to be educated.  1.1 billion people in this world lack access to clean water.  Most of those people live in Africa and Asia, lands that are inundated with floods and torrential downfalls during monsoon season, but lack the infrastructure to harness, conserve, regulate and distribute water to its thirsty citizens the rest of the year. 

During rainy season in these countries, water comes bitter sweetly, as a blessing and a curse.  Many people in San Diego are familiar with the multitude of beach closures that are the result of high levels of disease causing bacteria in the ocean after rain storms.  Imagine a world where that is the condition of your drinking water, daily…and this water, your water, even though it is polluted and infested with parasites, is still a highly coveted commodity.  It is what you drink, what you give you brothers and sisters, mother and father to drink.  It is high time to be aware of clean water’s growing scarcity.  It is time to shut the faucet off when you’re washing your face, brushing your teeth, washing your car.  Remember that you are responsible for a piece of the pie; you can do your share to use less; you have the ability to educate those around you! Start small, with your best friend, then don’t be shy with the rest!

Julia Novak

When the ship hit the bay bridge support tower, we knew coverage was going to linger for months on end regarding consequences. And consequences we got, some positive, but most discouraging.

After more than two months of battling the oil spilled into the ocean in the San Francisco bay, reports begin to trickle in. Beaches once closed are now reopening including Angel Island State Park, Point Pinole Regional Shoreline and Middle Harbor Shoreline in the east bay. Two others will reopen in the coming days and another three remain closed still. While beaches have been reopened to the public, they are advised to be aware that “balls of gooey fuel” may still remain in the water.

The infamous Cosco Busan ship that caused this exhaustive chain of events has been repaired and ready to sail. However, due to a customs hold on the ship, it is unable to travel outside of the bay area.

160-foot long gash along the port side of the container ship.

The oiled birds that volunteers so selflessly dedicated their hours and days to are proving to be a much trickier than expected. Federal and state wildlife officials are ignoring two large groups of birds that have been significantly affected by the spill because they simply do not have the resources to rescue birds found on Farallones Island. A total of 250 birds from the island were captured and treated, but no more than that. A final count of dead birds as a result of the spill comes to roughly 2,700.

For fisherman, the final opening of the crabbing season also proves to be disappointing. The crabbing season finally opening on Dec. 1, having been delayed from the original opening date of Nov. 15. The season’s opening day began with rough winds and soaring swells. Through the tough conditions, some fishermen made their way to their boats and set sail while others decided it wasn’t a risk they wanted to take. Thus crabbing at last began in places like Bodega Bay and Half Moon Bay, but catch has been dismal. Fishermen are reporting to catch half as much as they expected, some pots catching only 0-6 crabs.

Fiona Teng

The New York Times series Empty Seas documents the impact of illegal fishing in Africa by large commercial pirate fleets on the migration patters of West African fishermen. A similar situation exists in Mexico, where many fishermen impacted by the loss of fish then migrate to the U.S., or worse get involved in the drug trade.

KAYAR, Senegal — Ale Nodye, the son and grandson of fishermen in this northern Senegalese village, said that for the past six years he netted barely enough fish to buy fuel for his boat. So he jumped at the chance for a new beginning. He volunteered to captain a wooden canoe full of 87 Africans to the Canary Islands in the hopes of making their way illegally to Europe.
“I could be a fisherman there,” he said. “Life is better there. There are no fish in the sea here anymore.”

Many scientists agree. A vast flotilla of industrial trawlers from the European Union, China, Russia and elsewhere, together with an abundance of local boats, have so thoroughly scoured northwest Africa’s ocean floor that major fish populations are collapsing. That has crippled coastal economies and added to the surge of illegal migrants who brave the high seas in wooden pirogues hoping to reach Europe. While reasons for immigration are as varied as fish species, Europe’s lure has clearly intensified as northwest Africa’s fish population has dwindled.

Last year roughly 31,000 Africans tried to reach the Canary Islands, a prime transit point to Europe, in more than 900 boats. About 6,000 died or disappeared, according to one estimate cited by the United Nations.

The region’s governments bear much of the blame for their fisheries’ decline. Many have allowed a desire for money from foreign fleets to override concern about the long-term health of their fisheries. Illegal fishermen are notoriously common; efforts to control fishing, rare. But in the view of West African fishermen, Europe is having its fish and eating them, too. Their own waters largely fished out, European nations have steered their heavily subsidized fleets to Africa.

“As Europe has sought to manage its fisheries and to limit its fishing, what we’ve done is to export the overfishing problem elsewhere, particularly to Africa,” said Steve Trent, executive director of the Environmental Justice Foundation, a London-based research group.

European Union officials insist that their bloc, which has negotiated fishing deals with Africa since 1979, is a scapegoat for Africa’s management failures and the misdeeds of other foreign fleets. They argue that African officials oversell fishing rights, inflate potential catches and allow pirate vessels and local boats free rein in breeding grounds. Pierre Chavance, a scientist with the French Institute for Research and Development, said both foreign fleets and African governments allowed financial considerations to trump concerns for fish or local fishermen.

“One side has a big interest to sell, and the other side has a big interest to buy,” he said. “The negotiations are based upon what people want to hear, not the reality.” Overfishing is hardly limited to African waters. Worldwide, the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that 75 percent of fish stocks are overfished or fished to their maximum. But in a poor region like northwest Africa, the consequences are particularly stark.

Fish are the main source of protein for much of the region, but some species are now so scarce that the poor can no longer afford them, said Pierre Failler, senior research fellow for the British Center for Economics and Management of Aquatic Resources. The coastal stock of bottom-dwelling fish is just a quarter of what it was 25 years ago, studies show. Already, scientists say, the sea’s ecological balance has shifted as species lower on the food chain replace some above them.

In Mauritania, lobsters vanished years ago. The catch of octopus — now the most valuable species — is four-fifths of what it should be if it were not overexploited. A 2002 report by the European Commission found that the most marketable fish species off the coast of Senegal were close to collapse — essentially sliding toward extinction.

“The sea is being emptied,” said Moctar Ba, a consultant who once led scientific research programs for Mauritania and West Africa. In a region where at least 200,000 people depend on the sea for their livelihoods, local investments in fishing industries are drying up with the fish stocks. In Guinea-Bissau, fishermen who were buying more boats less than a decade ago now complain they are in debt and looking to get out of the business.

“Before, my whole family could live on what we caught in one pirogue,” said Niadye Diouf, 28, whose Senegalese family sold their pirogue for $500 to pay for an illegal — and ultimately unsuccessful — voyage to Spain. “Now even five pirogues would not be enough.”

Today's New York Times includes the second in a series on illegal fishing off of the coast of Africa. This series illustrates the tremendous social, political and environmental consequences of large-scale commercial fishing.

LONDON — Walking at the Brixton market among the parrotfish, doctorfish and butterfish, Effa Edusie is surrounded by pieces of her childhood in Ghana. Caught the day before far off the coast of West Africa, they have been airfreighted to London for dinner. Ms. Edusie’s relatives used to be fishermen. But no more. These fish are no longer caught by Africans.

On the underside of the waterlogged brown cardboard box that holds the snapper is the improbable red logo of the China National Fisheries Corporation, one of the largest suppliers of West African fish to Europe. Europe’s dinner tables are increasingly supplied by global fishing fleets, which are depleting the world’s oceans to feed the ravenous consumers who have become the most effective predators of fish.

Fish is now the most traded animal commodity on the planet, with about 100 million tons of wild and farmed fish sold each year. Europe has suddenly become the world’s largest market for fish, worth more than 14 billion euros, or about $22 billion a year. Europe’s appetite has grown as its native fish stocks have shrunk so that Europe now needs to import 60 percent of fish sold in the region, according to the European Union.

In Europe, the imbalance between supply and demand has led to a thriving illegal trade. Some 50 percent of the fish sold in the European Union originates in developing nations, and much of it is laundered like contraband, caught and shipped illegally beyond the limits of government quotas or treaties. The smuggling operation is well financed and sophisticated, carried out by large-scale mechanized fishing fleets able to sweep up more fish than ever, chasing threatened stocks from ocean to ocean.

The European Commission estimates that more than 1.1 billion euros in illegal seafood, or $1.6 billion worth, enters Europe each year. The World Wide Fund for Nature contends that up to half the fish sold in Europe are illegally caught or imported. While some of the so-called “pirate fishing” is carried out by non-Western vessels far afield, European ships are also guilty, some of them operating close to home. An estimated 40 percent of cod caught in the Baltic Sea are illegal, said Mireille Thom, a spokeswoman for Joe Borg, the European Union’s commissioner of fisheries and maritime affairs.
 
Tracing where the fish come from is nearly impossible, many experts say. Groups like Greenpeace and the Environmental Justice Foundation have documented a range of egregious and illegal fishing practices off West Africa. Huge boats, owned by companies in China, South Korea and Europe, fly flags of convenience from other nations. They stay at sea for years at a time, fishing, fueling, changing crews and unloading their catches to refrigerated boats at sea, making international monitoring extremely difficult.

When the Environmental Justice Foundation, which has studied the fishing industry, teamed up with a Greenpeace boat in 2006, more that half of the 104 vessels it followed off the coast of Guinea were fishing illegally, or were involved in illegal practices, the study found.

While small local fishermen in West Africa tend to fish sustainably, large seagoing boats use practices that are dangerous to the environment, particularly the use of vast nets to trawl the sea bed. The nets destroy coral, and unsettle eggs and fish breeding grounds. They gulp up fish that cannot be sold because they are too small. Their competition decimates local fishing industries. By the time huge mechanized vessels have thrown the unsalable juveniles back into the sea, they are often dead, bringing stocks another step closer to extinction. Of the estimated 90 million tons of fish caught worldwide each year, about 30 million tons are discarded, Ms. Vesper of the World Wide Fund for Nature said.