Fuck Yeah Environmentalism

Tourists Thwart Turtles from Nesting in Costa Rica

By ELISABETH MALKIN and PAULINA VILLEGAS SEPT. 18, 2015- NY times

MEXICO CITY — The day-trippers swarmed onto the beach to watch one of nature’s most extraordinary sights, hundreds of thousands of olive ridley sea turtles crawling out of the ocean to lay their eggs in the sand. The turtles did not want the company. Scared off by the thousands of tourists massed along Ostional Beach on Costa Rica’s Pacific Coast, snapping selfies and perching their children on the turtles’ backs, the ancient reptiles simply turned around and retreated into the sea. “It was a mess,” said Yamileth Baltodano, a tour guide who was at the scene when the turtles were scared away two weeks ago. What happened during the first weekend in September was a one-time event, when a confluence of factors allowed the utterly unexpected to take place. But it was a cautionary tale for the conservationists charged with protecting the turtles, which are classified as vulnerable, not to mention a social media sensation. Now Costa Rican officials are scrambling to make sure it does not happen again. “We are reassessing the way we work and the way we tackle the issue,” Mauricio Méndez, deputy director of the Tempisque Conservation Area, which includes Ostional Beach, said in a telephone interview on Friday. The olive ridley nesting season, from August through October, coincides with Costa Rica’s rainy season, which ordinarily provides a natural barrier that protects the turtles. During that time, the beach is all but cut off by the flood tide of the swollen Nosara River, which blocks access on bridges. Even in the dry season, the beach is accessible only by a four-wheel-drive vehicle driven by a local guide. But this year, low rainfall caused by El Niño left the river all but dry, making passage to the beach easy. Mr. Méndez said officials were working on changes before the next arrival, expected on Oct. 4. He said he hoped to double the number of police officers and security guards, and even to bring in the Coast Guard. Groups will only be allowed in with guides and will be limited to the edges of the nesting area.

Let’s be as frank as possible here. I LOVE meat. Seriously. I think it’s delicious. However, I’ve come to accept that meat consumption as frequent as my own is damaging, and not a sustainable practice. 

So first off, what’s wrong with meat? On it’s own, as in meat that has not been altered or heavily exposed to antibiotics and where the animal grew up healthy, nothing really is wrong with consuming meat. In fact, properly raised meat is really very good for you. Yet meat is usually not so well off these days mainly due to genetic modifications, grain feeding, and antibiotics. These afflictions on the animal due to common practices in industrialized meat production have an easy time of it making their way into the human who consumes it. 

So how does one eat meat sustain-ably?

1) Eat less meat. I know this isn’t what you want to hear, but it’s the truth, and that’s sorta the point of this whole blog. You don’t have to say goodbye forever, but the benefits of eating less meat are enormous, including significantly lowered risks of cancer, heart disease, diabetes and cancer aside from benefiting your carbon footprint. As a bonus, it will probably help your wallet out too. 

2) Eat more grass fed/finished or pasture raised meat. There are varying definitions of the term “grass fed” and the scariest is that the USDA may consider cows that ate grass in the first few months of their life but were kept on grains for the rest can still be considered “grass fed”. Safer terms are “grass finished” or “pasture raised”, so look for those. If the meat has the AGA logo on it though, it’s a safe bet it’s truly grass fed.  

3) Eat more local meat. By far the best way to ensure that your meat is of quality without getting it yourself is to get it from a small farm. There are several advantages to this, like being able to visit the place you get your meat from and supporting a local farmer and the local economy. 

4) Get it yourself. The cold hard fact of meat consumption is that something has to die so that you can eat it. This is easily forgotten when you get your meat from the grocery store, where the meat no longer resembles the living thing it once was. The most basic way to surpass this level of ignorance is to do it yourself. Hunter’s get a bad rap for what they do, despite their methods of obtaining meat being probably the most sustainable and healthy. But you don’t have to go out and get the big game. Fishing and raising chickens are options too. Check out the links below for benefits.

Before/After Assholes

Toxic water floods river after EPA disaster at Gold King Mine in Silverton

Source: The Durango Herald

Krill, those tiny, pink, semi transparent crustaceans in the Antarctic ocean are actually extremely important in the food chain and to the overall health of our planet.

Save the planet, Tell CVS to take krill oil off their shelves —->>  bit.ly/1DFB1JG