I want to tell you about an exciting new project I started in honor of Wallace “J.” Nichols, Ph.D.'s work with our oceans. I first learned of J's (as he likes to be called) work around 2007 when I began a blog to educate people about our environment. The ocean being my top concern since learning of the North Pacific Gyre, the amount of plastic and trash in our ocean, leaves me sickened when I think of it.
Here is an excerpt from How Stuff Works.
In the broad expanse of the northern Pacific Ocean, there exists the North Pacific Subtropical Gyre, a slowly moving, clockwise spiral of currents created by a high-pressure system of air currents. The area is anoceanic desert, filled with tiny phytoplankton but few big fish or mammals. Due to its lack of large fish and gentle breezes, fishermen and sailors rarely travel through the gyre. But the area is filled with something besides plankton: trash, millions of pounds of it, most of it plastic. It's the largest landfill in the world, and it floats in the middle of the ocean.
The gyre has actually given birth to two large masses of ever-accumulating trash, known as theWestern and Eastern Pacific Garbage Patches, sometimes collectively called the Great Pacific Garbage Patch. The Eastern Garbage Patch floats between Hawaii and California; scientists estimate its size as two times bigger than Texas.
After reading this I discovered Wallace J. Nichols, PhD. site LIVBLUE ...where I then read this excerpt from "Occupy The Ocean"
We have put too much into the ocean, in the form of oil, sewage, fertilizers and pesticides, antibiotics, plastic pollution, noise and increasing levels of CO2.
We have taken too much out of the ocean by subsidizing and encouraging inefficient and destructive overfishing, bottom trawling, long-lining, purse seining, dynamite fishing, irresponsible aquaculture and illegal hunting.
We have destroyed the edge of the ocean -- places like wetlands, kelp forests, mangrove forests, river deltas, coral reefs and seagrass beds -- where diversity and abundance once thrived, now turned into dead zones growing in size and number.
As a result of our behavior, the wildest animals and most remote beaches on the planet carry plastic in them, coral reefs are on the verge of disappearing, shark populations have been decimated, the ocean is warming and becoming more acidic and fisheries are predicted to collapse globally.
This situation will only continue to spiral downward, unless we listen, learn and change.
To slow, stop and then reverse this trend will take immediate, widespread and drastic actions, not isolated, small and incremental adjustments.
The control large corporations have over our political processes must be severed, bold legislation enacted and new behavior patterns widely adopted.
We need an Ocean Revolution.
It is with this knowledge that I felt compelled to act however I can so I asked J then if I could publish his work on my blog site to help educate and promote his work. He agreed.
Then recently when Kayaker Magic created and gave me the Sea Turtle I requested, it was then that I realized I could help educate people virtually and direct them to J's work. I asked J if it would be okay to set up an ocean garden that would be interactive for the user. They could click on the various marine life and vegetation and learn about our ocean. Which would be an incredible way for the disabled or persons in the hospital to escape the reality of illness and learn and interact with our magnificent ocean. Again J, agreed that bringing this knowledge however we can is vital in preserving our ocean for our future.
So we have begun. Tiffany Magic and logger Sewell, yet again has been caring and could see just what it was I was trying to achieve. They have offered to help in whatever way they can to help bring this vital knowledge to you. That is what I love about Virtual Highway. The support these owners give when you become a resident is unlike any grid I have ever known.
So, with their help and help from Travis Hunter, also Melina Horten we have begun landscaping the ocean floor. We have sea turtles and giant mantas with more fish soon to come. We plan on working to bring all that we can to help educate about our oceans health.
Thank you Tiffany Magic, logger Sewell, Travis Hunter, Melina Horten, Kayaker Magic, and J. We thank you for your undying love for our ocean.
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