#land-based

New Post has been published on http://www.therakyatpost.com/news/2015/04/09/ngo-study-whats-killing-beautiful-corals-in-pd/

NGO: Study what's killing beautiful corals in PD

PORT DICKSON, April 9, 2015:

A thorough study on the types of land-based development activities that contribute to the destruction of coral reefs in Blue Lagoon should be conducted, said a non-governmental organisation.

EcoKnights president Yasmin Rasyid said this was to minimise finger pointing without scientific evidence on what causes pollution in Port Dickson and the origin of the pollutants.

“This calls for strong coordination on the part of scientists, developers and communities to address the issues constructively,” Yasmin said when contacted by The Rakyat Post.

Expressing her sadness over how Port Dickson’s beauty had “withered” away due to uncontrolled unsustainable practices, the marine biology degree holder said there should be a more sustainable approach to coastal management.

“We have to look at more sustainable ways of coastal management.”

Last week, a coral expert had warned that the coral reefs in the area, specifically in Blue Lagoon and Tanjung Tuan, may be lost within 50 to 60 years should rampant development along the coastline continue.

A Tenaga Nasional Berhad (TNB) power plant station nearby was alleged to have been releasing water above room temperature, leading locals to express worry that this could affect the coral life.

Reef Check Malaysia (RCM) general manager Julian Hyde said the corals had ecological and biological value and should be protected from harm.

“Corals are very sensitive to water temperature.

“Most survive in a narrow band of 2-3 degrees Centigrade and if they are exposed to temperatures outside the normal range for extended periods, they will start to suffer from stress,” Hyde said.

Should the period of stress be prolonged — usually 4-8 weeks, depending on the species — then the corals may start to bleach and die, he added.

“If the temperature is extreme, for example, much higher than the usual narrow band, then the stress and bleaching will happen more quickly and the corals may die sooner.”

Though waters around PD were also negatively affected by high siltation from rivers and mangroves, as well as the pollution from the Straits of Malacca, Hyde said the area still had healthy and biologically diverse coral reefs.

“Even though people may not dive among them much — unlike the east coast islands — that doesn’t mean that they don’t have ecological or biological value.

Welcome to the 3rd Blog for July 2011 (the 29th this year); A big thank you to those of you who joined my trial of Typecast on Monday – the developer contacted me after the Typecast to ask for some feedback. We were some of the first to use it – cutting edge or what? Thank you for the feedback as well, I’ve pasted it on and next time we try it out, we should see some improvements. P.S. The response time was down to my typing skills – sorry! J

Today’s 5 Finds (188 posted this year) include…

1:

Being a country boy and having been brought up on a farm, I'm aware that one of the key factors in growing vegetables is ensuring rotation of crops every year, avoiding disease build up and prevention of nutrient depletion. Rotating things around ensures optimum and healthy conditions.

Keeping track of what’s been growing where, is a daunting task for farmers, gardeners and others working the land.

Here is where VGALive comes in; a 100% free (now and we are told forever) online vegetable plot management system and encyclopaedia.

VGA’s main function is to keep track of yearly crop growing cycles.

Users can record...

what crop has been planted;

where and when a crop was set and harvested; and

a complete history of that any zone.

When considering what to plant next year, it’s easy to see what can safely be planted next, and, probably why it is free, the built in seed catalogue makes it easy to plan ahead before the busy planting season arrives.

Visit http://www.thevga.co.uk/index.cgi to find out more.

2: QuieTube and SilenTube provide users buttons which they can drag to their toolbar.

When they see a YouTube video they want to use in resources/VLE/etc., they can click the button and they’ll get a URL which will let them, and/or their learners, watch just the video.

Users can embed these links into IWB pages to go straight to the video page.

Visit http://quietube.com/ or http://silentube.com/ to drag the button to your toolbar.

3:

Looking for some Safety in the Home Resources for Key Skills, Functional Skills, Learners with Learning Difficulties, Family Learning etc? Then take a look at this Blog Post.

Some resources that will be useful for the areas mentioned and much more.

Visit http://studentswithlearningdifficulties.blogspot.com/2011/07/dangers-in-kitchen.html to find out more.

4:

YouTube XL is a modified version of YouTube designed to use on...

large-screen televisions; and

on Interactive Whiteboards (IWBs).

The interface makes it simpler to use by cutting out a lot of the clutter on the page.

Note: There’s no way of hyper linking to a specific video, but users can add to their Favourites, which can then be accessed under the Favourites tab on the main YouTube XL screen.

When I accessed YouTube XL I was logged into my YouTube account; my clips were automatically added to the player.

Try it out at http://www.youtube.com/xl.

5: The Internet is getting bigger and becoming more important than ever.

The UN considers the world wide web so important to communication, self-education and global participation that it has designated "Internet access" a human right.

Visit http://www.onlineschools.org/state-of-the-internet/soti.html to take a closer look at an  interactive info graphic that shows many important facts about the current landscape of the Internet. I particularly like the impact of the additional real-time data embedded within the info graphic.

Note: This blog is also available as…

·         A mobile version at http://acljohn.wirenode.mobi

·         Vidcasts at http://www.youtube.com/user/acljohn.

Items included in this blog are also available in my web portal at http://www.acljohn.com/.