As the Gulf Oil spill rages on, more and more people's attention is waning. It has yet to hit hard on the animal populations in the area. If the local news can't get video of some cute fluffy animals drenched in oil then viewers can't comprehend why they should care. What a perfect time for anti-ecological legislation to pass around the world.
Enter the International Whaling Commission. Recently it authorized the hunting of humpback whales for Greenland natives. I guess they think it makes more sense to protect the culture of a few.
Yep, it's better not to insult them or their ways. Plus, Japan allows whale hunting so how bad can it be? Grrr!
And here in the USA, the FDA wants us to eat genetically modified animals. Not quite Dolly the Sheep yet but the agency is leaning toward approving genetically modified Salmon.
The company that engineered the process describes it as taking a growth hormone gene from a Chinook salmon as well as a genetic on-switch from the ocean pout, a distant relative of the salmon and installing it into an Atlantic salmon. Mmm. Sounds tasty so it can't possible damage us or the ecological balance.
Good news on another front. The Oil Spill is probably not harming our turtles. What about all the dead turtes that have been washing ashore lately (23 most recently spotted on the Mississippi shore) you ask?
Well, more than half the turtles dissected so far, most of which were found shortly after the spill, had sediment in their lungs or airways, which indicated they might have been caught in nets and drowned. So it's not oil that's killing them- just shrimp fishers, so no worries!
Another day on Earth. Enjoy it while it's here.
