CAPE CHARLES MIRROR

Reflections on Cape Charles and the Eastern Shore

You are here: Home / Archives for Activism

United Poultry Concerns President Karen Davis Passed Away

by 4 Comments

 Karen Davis, PhD, the President and Founder of United Poultry Concerns has passed away. After a long illness, she passed away peacefully on the morning of November 4, 2023, at the UPC sanctuary in Machipongo surrounded by her beloved birds.

She has been a leading figure in the Animal Rights movement, passionately, tirelessly, and unapologetically advocating for the birds. She has been an inspiration to many of us. Her vision and legacy will continue through the UPC sanctuary at Machipongo, VA, and vegan advocacy work to promote the UPC mission.

The Mirror will miss her deeply. There was no one that we respected more than Karen Davis.

UPC invites friends, colleagues, and fellow advocates to join them in a memorial service at the UPC sanctuary to celebrate Karen’s extraordinary life and legacy. Together, let us remember her as a beacon of compassion, a trailblazer in the fight for animal rights, and a beloved friend.

Memorial Service Details:

  • Date: Saturday, November 25th, 2023
  • Time: 1-4 PM
  • Location: 12325 Seaside Rd, Machipongo, VA 23405

Please RSVP to Liqin Cao at liqin@upc-online.org.

Image courtesy of UPC.

Karen Davis, PhD was the President and Founder of United Poultry Concerns, a nonprofit organization that promotes the compassionate and respectful treatment of domesticated birds including a sanctuary for chickens in Virginia. Inducted into the National Animal Rights Hall of Fame for Outstanding Contributions to Animal Liberation, Karen was the author of numerous books, essays, articles, and campaigns. Her latest book is For the Birds – From Exploitation to Liberation: Essays on Chickens, Turkeys, and Other Domesticated Fowl.

See Animal Activism Mentorship’s reflection on Karen:
Rest in Peace Karen Davis

Animals 24-7 article on Karen’s pivotal role in the Animal Rights movement:
Karen Davis, Ph.D., United Poultry Concerns founder, dead at 79

Pamela Rice shares her memories of Karen:
Karen Davis was my mentor . . .

The Washington Post:
Karen Davis, animal rights advocate who spoke for the birds, dies at 79

The Cape Charles Wave:

WAYNE CREED Pays a Visit to United Poultry Concerns

$20,000 Reward for Sea Lion Murderers

by Leave a Comment

NOAA increases award to $20,000 as endangered Steller sea lions continue to turn up dead in the Copper River Delta.

Multiple endangered Steller sea lions have been found dead with evidence of human interactions along the Copper River Delta this summer. These animals do not appear to have been struck and lost during subsistence hunting by Alaska Natives, which is allowed under federal law. As of June 2, seven animals had been found, some with evidence of gunshot wounds or other human interactions. Since then, at least 15 additional Steller sea lions have been reported or found during surveys conducted by NOAA Fisheries in collaboration with the United States Coast Guard. Some had evidence of gunshot wounds. Investigations are underway on all of these mortalities. The number of carcasses seen this summer during NOAA surveys on the Copper River Delta is greater than during previous years’ efforts. 

Note: NOAA Fisheries has revised the original web story posted on July 26, 2023, to better reflect the original intent. At this point we don’t know who is responsible for the recent marine mammal mortalities, and our language in the original web story wrongly implied that we knew fishermen were at fault. 

Report violations when you see them. NOAA’s Office of Law Enforcement is offering an increased reward amount of up to $20,000 for information that leads to a civil penalty or criminal conviction in these killings. Anyone with information about the illegal killing of endangered Steller sea lions or protected harbor seals in the Copper River Delta should contact the investigating agent at (907) 250-5188 or through NOAA’s Enforcement Hotline at (800) 853-1964. To report dead, injured, or stranded marine mammals, call the Alaska Marine Mammal Stranding Network at (877) 925-7773. When reporting a stranded marine mammal, please include the following information: 

  • Date
  • Location of stranding (including latitude and longitude)
  • Number of animals
  • Condition of the animal (alive or dead)
  • Species (if known) 

Photos or videos taken from a safe and legal distance can also provide valuable information to stranding network responders. Only trained and permitted responders should approach or pick up a stranded marine mammal.

The western population of Steller sea lions is protected under the Endangered Species Act, which prohibits harassing, harming, or killing listed species. Killing marine mammals is also a violation of the Marine Mammal Protection Act. Shooting seals and sea lions is against the law unless you are an Alaska Native subsistence harvesting for food or handicraft. The population of these endangered Steller sea lions is in decline. Protect seals and sea lions and don’t illegally shoot seals and sea lions.

NOAA Fisheries Sadie Wright uses a metal detector to examine a dead Steller sea lion found on a beach in the Copper River Delta. Credit: NOAA Fisheries
A NOAA Fisheries marine mammal specialist uses a metal detector to examine a dead Steller sea lion found on a beach in the Copper River Delta. Credit: NOAA Fisheries

Illegal killing of a seal or sea lion may result in:

  • Spending up to a year in jail
  • Forfeiture of your vessel
  • Paying criminal fines and civil penalties

More Information

Safina Center: Connecting Science and Indigenous Mythologies About Sharks

by Leave a Comment

The original article is published by By Safina Center Senior Fellow Dani Khan Da Silva.

Unveiling the Mystical Connection of Sharks and Indigenous Mythology

In recent years, researchers and Indigenous communities have joined forces to explore the remarkable relationship between sharks and indigenous mythology. These collaborative efforts have shed light on the profound connections that exist between ancient beliefs and the majestic predators of the ocean, revealing a rich tapestry of cultural significance and ecological understanding.

Since time immemorial, Indigenous communities around the world have revered sharks as sacred creatures, deeply woven into their spiritual and mythological narratives. These beliefs are founded on a profound understanding of the intricate balance between humans and nature, emphasizing the importance of respecting and coexisting with the natural world.

Indigenous communities around the world have revered sharks as sacred creatures. ©Dani Khan Da Silva

In various Indigenous cultures, sharks are often depicted as powerful guardians or ancestral spirits, possessing unique qualities that mirror their respective values and teachings. The Māori people of New Zealand and other Pacific islands for example, consider the shark (known as “māmāo”) as a symbol of strength, protection, and adaptability. They believe that sharks act as guardians of the oceans, ensuring the delicate equilibrium of marine ecosystems.

Similarly, the Torres Strait Islanders of Australia view the shark (“wurai”) as a spiritual totem representing courage, wisdom, and ancestral connections. They believe that sharks embody the spirits of their ancestors and serve as navigational guides, leading fishermen safely through treacherous waters.

These Indigenous beliefs are not merely folklore; they hold profound ecological wisdom that scientists are finally beginning to recognize. In fact, many say that science is only beginning to catch up to Indigenous knowledge.

Research has revealed that sharks play a vital role in maintaining healthy marine ecosystems by regulating prey populations and ensuring balance within food chains. Their presence has a cascading effect, influencing the behavior and distribution of other species.

Indigenous communities have long understood the ecological significance of sharks and their role in maintaining the delicate harmony of oceanic ecosystems. By aligning scientific findings with ancient myths, researchers are gaining a more comprehensive understanding of the complex interconnections between humans, sharks, and the natural world.

One such collaboration has taken place between marine biologists and indigenous elders in the Pacific Islands. Working together, they have documented traditional knowledge passed down through generations, detailing the behavior and habits of different shark species. This valuable information has been incorporated into conservation efforts, leading to the establishment of marine protected areas and the development of sustainable fishing practices.

The renewed recognition of Indigenous wisdom has sparked a global dialogue on the importance of preserving cultural heritage and integrating traditional knowledge with scientific research. As scientists delve deeper into the links between sharks and indigenous mythology, they are uncovering a wealth of information that can inform conservation strategies, deepen our understanding of marine ecosystems, and foster a greater appreciation for the intricate connections between humans and the natural world.

This collaborative journey of exploration serves as a reminder that cultural diversity and Indigenous perspectives are integral to our collective understanding of the planet’s intricate web of life. By honoring and embracing these ancient beliefs, we can forge a more harmonious relationship with the oceans and the extraordinary creatures that inhabit them, including the revered sharks that have long captivated our imagination and inspired both awe and respect.

As we continue to unravel the mysteries of the deep, it is clear that Indigenous stories offer invaluable insights into the significance of sharks and the importance of protecting these magnificent beings for generations to come.

NOAA Updates Tribal Consultation Handbook and Indigenous Knowledge Guidance

by Leave a Comment

In response to Executive Order 13175 and the Presidential Memorandum on Tribal Consultation and Strengthening Nation-to-Nation Relationships, NOAA updated its Tribal Consultation Handbook and Indigenous Knowledge Guidance in consultation with federally- recognized tribes. Collectively, these documents will serve as a reference and the vital foundation of NOAA’s work to build and strengthen our relationships with Indian tribes, Alaska Natives, and Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islanders.

NOAA’s National Marine Fisheries Service (NMFS), and the National Ocean Service (NOS), along with NOAA’s General Counsel’s Office (GC), have created a Indigenous Knowledge Guidance for regional and field staff. This guidance, developed as a continuation of NOAA’s commitment to engage meaningfully with Federally recognized tribes. This guidance was built upon NMFS, NOS, and GC in the regions to build upon the NOAA Tribal Consultation Handbook in providing guidance on how to incorporate Indigenous Knowledge (IK) into decision making.

Animals Lost in the Vast, Dark World of Gene‑Editing

by Leave a Comment

In this podcast United Poultry Concerns President Karen Davis discusses the plight of chickens and all farmed animals condemned to the world of genetic manipulation, a global industry devoid of ethics and empathy for animals whose bodies are being manipulated for specific culinary traits and who are being experimentally bred to appear not to mind the environmental “stressors” of filth, excessive heat, lack of personal space, disease organisms, brutal handling, and whatever else generates unlimited funding.

Listen to the podcast here.

The title of this podcast quotes the title of a recent article in The Washington Post about a drowned sea vessel with five passengers. The Post image summons up the far deeper Abyss in which countless individual animals are submerged, as we humans charge full speed with our plans and projects to subjugate all manner of life on earth to our Will. This is the ultimate, institutionalized, War Against All Anthropomorphism – not the anthropomorphism of appreciative recognition of our evolutionary kinship with the other creatures; rather, it is the anthropomorphism in which genetic engineers intentionally deform, debase, defile – play with – the minds, bodies, and feelings of other animals to reflect researchers’ desires, be they ever so trivial, perverse, biologically obscene, and pitiless. And, of course, to maintain the status quo and keep the money flowing. Here is a sample from a May 8, 2023 article in the agribusiness newsletter Meatingplace titled “Gene-editing advances win a regulatory nod”:

Dr. Oatley discusses advanced research into gene-editing in livestock, a technique that alters an animal’s genetic code to focus on desired traits such as muscle characteristics or resilience in specific environments. His team recently received U.S. Food and Drug Administration investigational authorization to create food for humans from gene-edited animals in a process that is akin to traditional selective breeding. Gene-editing could play an important role in meeting the growing global demand for protein over the next few decades.

Dr. Jon Oatley is an agribusiness veterinarian of the type I assume would not oppose the mass- extermination of farmed birds and pigs with heatstroke to control the highly pathogenic avian influenza virus documented by Dr. Michael Greger, M.D., in his 2006 book Bird Flu: A Virus of Our Own Hatching.

The genetics research Dr. Oatley builds on has already produced, in chickens bred for the chicken meat industry, what researchers call the effects of “human controlled evolution.” Veterinarian Andrew A. Olkowski and associates state in “Trends in Developmental Anomalies in Contemporary Broiler Chickens” that chickens with extra legs and wings, missing eyes and beak deformities “can be found in practically every broiler flock,” where “a variety of health problems involving muscular, digestive, cardiovascular, integumentary, skeletal, and immune systems” form a complex of pathologies unlike anything in the natural world of avian evolution. Poultry personnel, they say, provide “solid evidence that anatomical anomalies have become deep-rooted in the phenotype of contemporary broiler chickens.”

Here is a quick look at two of Dr. Oatley’s gene-editing objectives:

1) Altering the chicken’s genetic code to focus on desired traits such as muscle characteristics.

2) Breeding resilience in chickens to specific [pathogenic] environments.

Designing Culinary Chicken Muscles

The “desired muscle characteristics” means culinary traits, as in the industry boast of “growing chickens to become pieces.” Such characteristics do not benefit the chickens but deform them even more thoroughly than they already are deformed. With these further culinary traits bred into them, the pathologies already embedded in chickens and other “food” animals will grow worse, because there is no limit to what these types of people and institutions will do to chickens and other animals.

Fitting Chickens to Intensive Farming and Global Warming

“By selecting for chickens that could tolerate the social stress, we also got chickens that could tolerate environmental stress.” —Purdue University poultry researcher William M. Muir on breeding hens who are “better adapted” to battery cages quoted in “Purdue’s ‘kinder, gentler chicken’ moves into real-world test,” Feedstuffs, Jan. 16, 1995.

Instead of producers cleaning up their operations to fit the birds’ need for hygiene, less crowding and chronic stress, agribusiness geneticists like Bill Muir at Purdue University say that “adapting the bird to the system makes more sense.” Starting in the 1980s, Muir worked to develop a strain of hens whose normal pecking behavior would weaken, to eliminate the “need” to debeak hens destined for life in cages. In the course of his studies, Muir said that a power outage in his laboratory revealed that his “docile” hens fared better in the intense heat than his more active hens fared. So he devised a heat-stress experiment which led him to conclude that his heat-stressed hens not only pecked less but had more tolerance for this particular form of intense environmental stress.

(It is a commonplace for poultry researchers to claim that chickens made “docile” by blindness and other debilities in captivity have more “tolerance” for chronic stress, as if the chickens’ abnormally passive behavior meant that they suffered less in their helplessness.)

Meanwhile, global warming has opened up whole new windows of opportunity for heat-stress grants from NIH, USDA and their global counterparts. “Impact of Heat Stress on Chicken Performance . . .” states for example:

“The industry is grappling with the effect of climate change which causes heat stress and harms the performance and welfare of the chicken.” Accordingly, “it is necessary to develop newer varieties of chicken, especially heat-tolerant breed lines, in response to climate change and the diverse need of the farmers and consumers.”

Then, it could happen that when these genetically-altered heat-tolerant chickens are involved in the never-ending avian influenza outbreaks, it will be harder to kill them by baking them to death in the sheds, as is now done in the United States by turning the heat up to induce, in the chickens, massive heat stroke.

Conceivably, the industry could then resort to setting chickens and turkeys and other farmed birds on fire to control avian influenza in “constrained circumstances.” “Euthanasia” by fire could be justified as “more humane” than Ventilation Shutdown-Plus-induced heat stroke because, the industry could claim, actual factory-farm fires have shown that exposing the birds to smoke inhalation in a fire is quicker than merely turning up the heat to intolerable levels. Setting chickens on fire to get rid of the “evil spirits” of avian influenza has already been reported by the Associated Press in Indonesia.

One way or another, chickens, turkeys and countless other birds are lost in the vast, dark world we have made for them to live and die in. A 2018 review titled “Application of Gene Editing in Chickens: A New Era is on the Horizon” summarizes that “using genetically modified chickens as a model for various research areas like developmental biology, immunology, physiology and neurology is gaining importance in the avian research community.” In addition, “there is an increasing interest to generate genetically modified chickens resistant to specific pathogens, benefiting from the availability of gene manipulation techniques. This review focuses on the advances made in gene editing in chickens and the future perspectives including the generation of specific-pathogen-resistant birds.”

Pathogen resistant, stress resistant, heat resistant . . . the scenarios are endless.

The scenario that is of no interest to the poultry industry and its affiliates, including poultry researchers, the government, and the American Veterinary Medical Association, is phasing out business practices that inflict agony on chickens and other animals. Poultry veterinarian Simon Shane epitomizes the rejection of even considering the idea of morally driven human evolution in how we treat animals. He told the journalist who reported on “The bitter civil war dividing American veterinarians” that he is in the business of feeding people and has no interest in “a fruitless discussion on ethics and morality.”

I hope you have found today’s podcast episode informative and thought-provoking, and that you will share it with others. Please tune in for the next podcast episode of Thinking Like a Chicken – News & Views! Thank you and have a wonderful day.

*For more, see The Experimental Use of Chickens and Other Birds in Biomedical and Agricultural Research

Woke Mobsters Propel Jason Aldean to #1

by Leave a Comment

Who would have thought that the woke warmongers at CNN and a cadre of no-count, historically and intellectually challenged liberal social justice mobsters would wind up being your best marketing team? As a result of all the bad faith troll attacks, Jason Aldean’s song “Try That in a Small Town” and the accompanying music video, both of which may have flown under the radar, rocketed to the top of the iTunes charts in less than 24 hours as outlets began reporting that the video had been pulled from country music channel CMT.

The song reached the top spot on the iTunes all-genre charts, beating out the super K-Poppers BTS as well as fellow country artist Luke Combs. Aldean’s videos made their way to the top of the music video chart, passing the boring, self-indulgent vocal left-wing activist Taylor Swift.

It all hit the fan when the video was pulled by the woke mob over at CMT on Monday. The apparent problem is that the video showed familiar clips of Antifa and BLM rioting. News coverage of looting, violent protests, and spitting on police were all featured in the video. While not illegal (yet), it is apparently frowned upon by woke, left-wingnut mobsters.

CMT declined to comment on why it stopped playing the video on Monday. The Billboard report dropped Tuesday, and by 11 p.m. that night the music service had reported the song had reached number one on the charts.

Aldean said that he had been “accused of releasing a pro-lynching song,” to which he responded that “these references are not only meritless, but dangerous.”

“There is not a single lyric in the song that references race or points to it- and there isn’t a single video clip that isn’t real news footage -and while I can try and respect others to have their own interpretation of a song with music- this one goes too far,” he added.

“Try That In A Small Town, for me, refers to the feeling of a community that I had growing up, where we took care of our neighbors, regardless of differences of background or belief,” Aldean explained.

What’s Wrong with ‘Humanely Raised’ Poultry and Eggs?

by Leave a Comment

Chicken producers are misleading consumers with misinformation.

By Karen Davis, PhD, President, United Poultry Concerns.

Published in LA Progressive, July 4, 2023, and live on Nation of Change

On June 13th the animal advocacy organization Direct Action Everywhere (DxE) rescued and reported their removal of nineteen chickens from trucks delivering the 6-week old birds to a slaughterhouse in Sonoma County owned by Petaluma Poultry, a subsidiary of Perdue Farms. Petaluma Poultry markets its chickens as “free-range” and “organic” under brand names like Rocky and Rosie.

A report covering several investigations of Petaluma Poultry published by DxE the same day of June 13th shows scenes of sick, crippled, dying and dead chickens living in filth and being treated by workers with extreme cruelty. The report includes veterinary diagnoses of Petaluma Poultry chickens from several locations infected with zoonotic bacteria (transmissible to humans) in their blood and other body parts.

Petaluma Poultry is not an isolated case in an otherwise truthful industry targeting customers willing and able to pay high prices for “humanely-raised” chickens as opposed to “factory-farmed” birds.

Los Angeles-based Jidori Chicken provides yet another example of misleadingly marketed chickens “raised free range, humanely, at small farms in California.” From 2020 to 2022, slaughterhouse investigators for Slaughter Free Network documented “some of the worst animal abuse and filthy conditions we’ve ever seen,” in what surely must violate California’s sanitary and animal cruelty statues.

U.S. egg producers, like poultry meat producers, have similarly been shown by investigators to misrepresent how the hens are housed and treated.

U.S. egg producers, like poultry meat producers, have similarly been shown by investigators to misrepresent how the hens whose high-priced eggs they market as humane, free-range, and organic are actually housed and treated.

An example is Nellie’s Free Range Eggs. Owned by the New Hampshire-based company, Pete and Gerry’s Organics, Nellie’s Eggs, which can cost up to $8 a dozen, are labeled “Certified Humane.” In 2019, People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals filed a lawsuit alleging that Nellie’s Eggs falsely depicts hens ranging on open pastures and being cuddled by children, when in fact Nellie’s hens are crammed inside long confinement sheds holding 20,000 hens per shed with little more than a square foot of living space for each hen.

In 2009, I became involved with a farm called Black Eagle, which portrayed itself as “the largest organic, free-range, egg producer in the state of Virginia.” The farm president said the hens had “places to roost inside, exposure to natural light and air, and access to the outside with an average of five feet of space per bird within a fenced yard.”

Meanwhile, that same year, documents obtained by an attorney in the course of investigating a complaint about malnourished dogs at Black Eagle Farm revealed an absentee owner, unpaid bills, and malnourished pigs and sheep. Unexpectedly, a veterinarian with the Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services discovered a building with 25,000 hens described in her report as “thin to emaciated,” with many dead and dying birds on the floor. Farm personnel told her the hens had been unfed for seven days in November, five days in December, and for two straight weeks earlier in the year.

Lest it be thought that the conditions I’m describing are rare or are no longer practiced by the majority of alternative egg producers, I must point out that, while some businesses may treat their hens better, investigations of alternative poultry and egg farms typically reveal practices and attitudes that do not meet consumer expectations – expectations that are cultivated not only by the companies and retailers they do business with, but also by animal welfarists who employ “humane” farming language that glosses over the facts with nebulous assertions and omissions. Omissions include, but are not limited to, showing hens foraging in a field while never showing them being grabbed upside down by their legs and thrown into gas-killing carts or transport crates. More often than not, the difference between “humane” farms and factory farms is moot.

In part the deception arises from the popular notion that free-range, cage-free, and organic farming is essentially a collection of small, local enterprises, distinct from industrialized operations like, say, Tyson Foods and Perdue Farms in the meat industry, or Cal-Maine and Rose Acres in the egg industry.

But as a 2019 report on the organic food industry in The Washington Post explains, contrary to the pristine image of organic egg production, “many conventional egg producers have organic subsidiaries that operate on a vast scale, 100,000 laying hens housed in a huge building, their federally mandated access to outdoor space winkingly fulfilled by screened porches.”

The fact is that constricting and diminishing the life of animals is built into raising them for food. Their own food is chosen; their social, familial, and physical environment is controlled; their reproductive organs and activities are manipulated; and how long they live is determined by humans. They can be abused and killed at will based on economic “necessity.” An example in poultry and egg production is the routine culling – removal from the flock for killing – of birds who are not gaining weight fast enough or laying enough eggs. Whatever compassion a person may initially feel for birds slated for commercialization, once they become a business, the business mentality takes over.

The business mentality prioritizes a commitment to soothing rhetoric over harsh reality, a shielding of the customer from the practical facts of animal farming with palliative platitudes and pretenses. All agribusiness companies claim “high animal welfare standards.” But at best, it is only by comparison with the worst conditions and practices of industrialized animal farming that any commercial animal farm can claim to be “humane.”

For a close look at the issues presented in this article by a range of contributors, see the new book The Humane Hoax: Essays Exposing the Myth of Happy Meat, Humane Dairy, and Ethical Eggs, edited by Hope Bohanec and published in 2023 by Lantern Publishing & Media.

KAREN DAVIS, PhD is the President and Founder of United Poultry Concerns, a nonprofit organization that promotes the compassionate and respectful treatment of domesticated birds including a sanctuary for chickens in Virginia. Inducted into the National Animal Rights Hall of Fame for Outstanding Contributions to Animal Liberation, Karen is the author of numerous books, essays, articles and campaigns. Her latest book is For the Birds – From Exploitation to Liberation: Essays on Chickens, Turkeys, and Other Domesticated Fowl published by Lantern Publishing & Media. Karen hosts a biweekly podcast series titled Thinking Like a Chicken – News & Views!

Is it too late to save the Amazon

by Leave a Comment

Deforestation reduces the forest’s ability to generate rain clouds, which significantly raises the odds of drought. And the more fragmented the forest is, the harder it is to bounce back after a drought ends. Over-harvesting and passing the forest’s tipping point would be devastating for the forest’s biodiversity and for the Indigenous people that live there. The forests of the Amazon area are home to more than 3 million species of plants and animals. They also store large amounts of carbon dioxide that, if the forests die, would be released back into the atmosphere.

This week, Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and Colombian President Gustavo Petro formed a “pact” earlier this month to try to save the Amazon “for humanity.”

  • The first anti-deforestation raids on Lula’s watch took place last week to stop the illegal clearing of the forest.
  • Earlier this month, Lula signed a series of executive orders to address illegal deforestation in Brazil, which is home to 60% of the Amazon forest and reactivated the Amazon Fund that invests in efforts to stop deforestation.

An estimated 13 to 17% of the original Amazon rainforest has been deforested over the last half-century.

In a paper published in the journal Science, an international team of scientists report humans are causing changes to the Amazonian ecosystem in a matter of decades or centuries, as opposed to millions to tens of millions of years for natural processes. “Organisms can’t adapt in the period of decades or centuries,” Albert says.

Another analysis looked at the problem of land degradation in the Amazon due to logging, fires, extreme droughts, and changes at the edges of the forest caused by the habitat being fragmented.

  • Deforestation changes the land cover and can be spotted by satellites. Degradation stems from changes in how the land is used and can be hidden by the forest canopy — a forest continues to be a forest but is degraded and weakened.
  • Using data from earlier studies and new satellite images, the authors estimate about 2.5 million square kilometers of the Amazon — about 38% of the remaining forest — is considered degraded by one or more disturbances. That’s in addition to deforestation.
  • They also found the carbon lost from the forest due to degradation is on par with that due to deforestation — and degradation can lead to as much loss of the forest’s biodiversity as deforestation.

Their projections suggest “degradation will continue to be a major source of emissions in the region, regardless of what happens with deforestation,” says study co-author David Lapola, a research scientist at the University of Campinas (Unicamp) in Brazil. “We need specific policies to handle degradation. It’s not using the same policies and actions for deforestation,” he says.

8 Dead Whales: Time to Stop Windfarm Development

by 3 Comments

ATLANTIC CITY, N.J. (AP) — Environmentalists and opponents of offshore wind stood on a beach where the marine mammal lay buried and called for a federal probe into a spate of whale deaths in New Jersey and New York. Groups from the two states wrote President Joe Biden requesting a probe of the deaths of six whales that washed ashore over the last 33 days in areas being prepared for large-scale offshore wind farms. They also are asking for a halt to site work until the causes are determined.

The death total has now reached 8, with another dead whale floating near Virginia Beach.

Last Thursday a 20- to 25-foot-long (6- to 7.6-meter-long) humpback whale washed up on the Jersey Shore. Its remains washed ashore in Brigantine, just north of Atlantic City, which itself has seen two dead whales on its beaches in recent weeks.

“We should suspend all work related to offshore wind development until we can determine the cause of death of these whales, some of which are endangered,” said New Jersey state Sen. Vince Polistina, a Republican who represents the area. “The work related to offshore wind projects is the primary difference in our waters, and it’s hard to believe that the death of (seven) whales on our beaches is just a coincidence.”

The Clean Ocean Action environmental group notes that wind farm site work typically involves exploring the ocean floor using focused pulses of low-frequency sound in the same frequency that whales hear and communicate, which could potentially harm or disorient the animals.

Brigantine’s mayor, Vince Sera, joined in the call for a temporary halt to offshore wind site prep, as did U.S. Rep. Jeff Van Drew, a Republican congressman representing southern New Jersey.

At a news conference Monday in Atlantic City, the groups calling on Biden to probe the deaths said offshore wind developers have applied for authorization to harass or harm as many as 157,000 marine mammals off the two states.

Of course, Climate Change grifters tried to use the fake ‘climate crisis’ to push for wind farm development, even as the work is killing off endangered species. For Clean Water Action, Environment New Jersey, the Sierra Club, New Jersey Audubon, NY/NJ Baykeeper, and others, the end (the money grift) always justifies the means.

“The climate crisis demands that we quickly develop renewable energy, and offshore wind is critically important for New Jersey to reach the state’s economic development and environmental justice goals,” the groups said in a statement.