The sad news out of Florida is that the iconic pink plastic flamingo, resident of many Florida front lawns since the 1950s, is about to become extinct.
The last flamingo was produced in June, and the parent company is going out of business today -- a mere seven months before the icons were to celebrate their 50th birthday.
Only days before the flamingo announcement was made, Oceana released a report entitled Net Casualties showing that the federal government authorizes commercial fishing operations to kill nearly 10,000 sea turtles and harm another 334,000 each year. The report based its findings on the government's own documents and data, and is the first time anyone has tallied the number of sea turtles killed by commercial fishing operations each year.
Sea turtles are among the earth's oldest living creatures. They have been swimming the oceans since before the dinosaurs roamed the earth, more than 110 million years ago. While there may be no hope for the famous flamingos, it's not too late to do something for the sea turtles.
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Biodiversivist Posted 4:50 am
02 Nov 2006
In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Help acquire and protect ecological hotspots, give to a conservation organization: http://www.saveourbiodiversity.com
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caniscandida Posted 5:40 am
02 Nov 2006
The Oceana research on "authorized" by-catch of seaturtles is amazing, and very important. Well done! It is horrifying, how the regulatory agencies can so blithely give the green light to such terrific losses.
Another famous Florida reptile was just in the news: the at present not endangered alligator. I guess I saw the story in CNN.com. It seems the state's wildlife conservation agency wants to delist alligators from the "endangered" category, and let home-owners deal with visiting alligators on their own. This sounds like a really really bad suggestion. What do you think, Andrew?
Chickens are our cousins!
So are other sensitive animals!
Enough is enough!
No more factory farms!
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Biodiversivist Posted 6:05 am
02 Nov 2006
In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Help acquire and protect ecological hotspots, give to a conservation organization: http://www.saveourbiodiversity.com
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