Genocide in Louisiana

The oil has reached the pelican marshes, where the birds are raising the young they won't leave. They dive into the marsh to get fish for the babies and come up covered with oil. They flap around at first. It takes a long time to die. All those people in the gulf who just love big oil, who make their living from big oil in the off season, who are even now saying we must still drill, they are also filled with BP sin and living with the results of their sin.

Obama is talking to experts as if he never had any idea of an environmental vision. He wants to know whose ass to kick because he is not the brilliant guy we were told was better than the truly brilliant woman. Is it too hard for our prince to realize this is the opportunity to end toxic energy dependence?

Now Obama, build the infra structure for clean energy. Convert every BP gas station to bio-fuel and force the auto industry to build bio-fuel cars. Get the weatherization crews to put solar on the roofs and teach people how it works. Ban drilling and nuclear because both are too dangerous and leave toxic waste. These fools will have the same excuses when we have a nuclear "accident".

Blessings on the sobbing volunteers who are trying to clean millions of dying animals.
News

FROM BEST FRIENDS: Gulf Oil Spill: Saving those they can, part two

June 07, 2010, 1:16AM MT
By Sharon St Joan, Best Friends Network

Sea turtles, endangered species, eyewitness reports along the coasts, and local Louisiana wildlife rehabilitators.

Part Two
Sea turtles

NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) and the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission, along with others, have been combing the waters of the Gulf 20 to 40 miles off shore in search of sea turtles in distress. They have captured 23 live turtles and one dead turtle, all heavily oiled. The turtles were cleaned of oil and given vet care on board ship and then transported to the Audubon Aquarium of the Americas in New Orleans for further treatment, recovery, and eventual release.

Sadly, other rescuers have recovered over 200 dead turtles. Sea turtles, both live and dead, have been found stranded on the beaches in unusually high numbers.

Which endangered species are threatened?

Five species of sea turtles have their homes in the Gulf of Mexico, including the Kemp’s Ridley, the earth’s most endangered sea turtle. Loggerheads, also endangered, spend their summers in the Gulf.

Sharks are in worldwide decline, and several shark species have their babies near the Chandeleur Islands. Rare great bluefin tuna also spawn in the Gulf until mid-June.

Sperm whales and dolphins are in danger, especially when they come to the surface to breathe, and some have died. The oil also kills their food supply.

Brown pelicans, the state bird of Louisiana, came off the endangered list only last year. As was reported on MSNBC, on the Rachel Maddow Show, their nesting site on Queen Bess Island was saved by a monumental effort, building dikes of 30,000 tons of rocks and seashells to keep the island from slipping into the sea (due to erosion of the Gulf shores, in part caused by offshore drilling and other human activity). Now oil has washed up on to Queen Bess Island where brown pelicans are nesting, and there are many oiled birds.

Eyewitness reports

Thousands of dead fish have washed ashore at Dog River Marina near Mobile, Alabama. (Please see the link below.)

A CNN I Report from Grand Isle, due south of New Orleans, where President Obama visited last week, describes seeing double sets of booms, but no workers cleaning. There were oily patches on the sand and an oil sheen on the waves. However, they saw pelicans and gulls, apparently clean, flying overhead. (Please see the link below.)

Thick globs of tar were found on Pensacola beaches, where tourists were cleaning it up.

Local wildlife rehabilitators in Louisiana

A quick survey of a few local licensed wildlife rehabilitators in Louisiana found them, as always at this time of year, struggling with vast numbers of hungry orphaned nestlings, fledglings and injured adult birds and mammals — unrelated to the oil spill.

All the local rehabilitators we talked with are ready and willing to help with any oiled birds from the Gulf, but they have so far not been called on to help in the effort. They have been asked, in fact, not to treat any oiled birds that may be brought to them, but instead to transport them to the Fort Jackson rehab center.

Susie Heck, of the Heckhaven Wildlife Rehabilitation Center at Lake Charles, Louisiana, says they are all set to help with oiled birds, if needed, “We’re on ready. We have a set-up for caring for the birds, if the oil comes back this way.” Fortunately, Lake Charles is to the west of the oil spill. She added, “Most of the Louisiana rehabbers are inundated with babies.”

Heckhaven has just released some great horned owls, and they have six more nearly ready for release, with about 15 baby birds, mostly fledglings, soon to follow.

Sally Farrell runs the Wind in My Feathers wildlife educational program and also rehabilitates raptors. She currently is caring for 23 birds in rehabilitation, including screech owls, red-shouldered hawks and a flammulated owl, just seven inches high, who seems to have gotten blown off course — these owls usually migrate to Mexico. She reports that they’ve been instructed not to touch any oiled birds, but to transport them to Fort Jackson.

Leslie Lattimore directs the Wings of Hope Wildlife Sanctuary, where they are caring for 250 orphaned or injured wild animals. About 100 of these are birds, from songbirds to raptors, among them a Mississippi kite and three barn owls. One of the officers of the National Wildlife Rehabilitators Association, she has advanced training in oil spill response and has experience with several hurricanes. So far, the teams rehabilitating the oiled birds have not needed further help, though she has offered.

Local licensed wildlife rehabilitators and others who are volunteering near the Breton Sound coast in Louisiana are being asked to go to Breton Sound Marina, to bring a chair, and to wait for boats coming in. There they accept the transport boxes containing birds that have been picked up on or near the water, and make a call for vehicles to deliver the birds to Fort Jackson. They are asked to keep them in the shade and to keep them from being disturbed by the media or by onlookers.

An outpouring of volunteers, but some still waiting for a call

IBRRC and Tri-State are highly professional and are doing a spectacular job cleaning the birds at the Fort Jackson center, saving and releasing all those that can be restored to good health. They are caring for every bird that is sent to them.

The USFWS is in direct charge of the teams that are collecting the birds and other wildlife that are brought in to be rehabilitated.

From the day that the oil rig sank in the Gulf, an outpouring of volunteers from all over the country, as well as local Louisiana volunteers, have added their names to lists of those waiting to help. Among them are highly skilled and trained, licensed wildlife rehabilitators, but some are still waiting to be contacted.

One is left wondering if there could be more teams deployed in more boats to cover a bit more of the miles and miles of unending, intricate marshlands and islands, where there may be birds waiting for help.

The International Bird Rescue Research Center (IBRRC)
Tri-State Bird Rescue and Research
Audubon Aquarium of the Americas
Heckhaven Wildlife Rehabilitation Center
Wind in My Feathers
Wings of Hope Wildlife Sanctuary

Even though, clearly, it will never be possible to pick up every oiled bird, it would be a pity not to use every resource to help as many birds and other wildlife as can be reached.

UPDATE: Thanks to Anderson Cooper 360, on CNN, for following up on the issue of the collection of the birds and for determining that there are 52 boats out on the water with 165 rescuers in the boats. The collection of the birds off the Louisiana coast is being handled by the USFWS and by LDWF.

GC NOTES: You go out and buy Dawn Dish Soap which is donating bottles as it is the best formula to clean the birds and turtles. You go buy 6 or 7 of the bottles that donate to the clean up. One dollar from every Dawn bottle goes to clean up. Don't buy BP gas. Let those gas stations convert to bio fuel.