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Luna, a wild orca, plays with human friends

DEAD WHALES = 'RED ALERT'

High level of toxic PCBs in whale raises global alarm

By ROBERT McCLURE
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER REPORTER

The orca found dead on the Olympic Peninsula earlier this year carried a level of industrial byproduct contaminants that is among the highest -- if not the highest -- ever measured in Orca whales, laboratory tests show.

The 22-foot-long female orca was so full of polychlorinated biphenyls that when scientists first attempted to test her fat, the result was too high for the machines to read it.

"She basically knocked our instruments off," Gina Ylitalo, a researcher for the National Marine Fisheries Service, told fellow scientists at a recent seminar. "We had no idea we'd see these levels."

The PCB level found in the orca is dozens of times higher than concentrations known to affect the growth, reproduction and immune system of another marine mammal, the harbor seal.

Although the toxic chemical's effect on orcas isn't as well-known, researchers believe orcas are affected in much the same way.

The super-high reading on the Dungeness Spit whale surprised even scientists who have tracked orcas for years and were well aware of their PCB burdens. It also adds new urgency to old questions about pollution of the oceans.

http://www.seattlepi.com/local/69418_whale07.shtml

http://EcoDelMar.org/pcb

Beached Mother Whale Dies, Calf To Be Euthanized

Aug 10, 2009 2:00 pm US/Central

HOLLYWOOD, Fla. (CBS)

Dozens of beachgoers in Hollywood worked feverishly from keeping what appeared to be a pair of beached whales -- a mother and her calf -- from stranding themselves on shore.

Their efforts could not rescue the beached mother whale who died Monday afternoon. That means its calf will have to be euthanized because it cannot survive without its mother, said Blaire Mase of NOAA.

A NOAA Fisheries official told CBS station WFOR-TV's Gary Nelson the two whales appear to be a mother and her calf.

The whales were first spotted just before 1 p.m. when the larger one, approximately ten to twelve feet in length, tried to beach itself near Garfield Street, about five blocks north of Hollywood Boulevard.

Would be rescuers half steered, half carried, it back toward the open the sea but it turned around immediately and swam back to the shore. Half a dozen men then surrounded it and steered it into waist deep water as they tried to keep it from going back to the shoreline. At one point it swam a short ways out to sea and then began swimming in circles. It kept circling for several minutes before heading out to sea. It returned about half and hour later and again tried to beach itself.

Chopper4 spotted a second smaller whale, only about 5 feet in length, about a quarter mile south of the first one. It too tried to beach itself several times was turned back into the open sea by beach goers.

Vanessa Lane, a spokeswoman for the Marine Animal Rescue Society, warned against pushing the sea mammals back into the water.

"Please don't push them back at sea. Just get the area clear around them. People are on the way out there. Do not push them back at sea. If it's safe to keep the blowhole area clear," she said. "There is always a risk when you're near a wild animal."

Lane said once the vet arrives, there will be several options: "At this point they need to assess the animals and first responders will keep the area clear and keep the animals wet and keep debris away from their blowhole and stabilize the animal until the vet can get on scene. They will decide if they can rehabilitate and re-release it or euthanize it."

Marine Animal Rescue Society and NOAA Fisheries were called to check out the animals.

http://cbs2chicago.com/national/whale.beach.sea.2.1122199.html

http://EcoDelMar.org/pcb

what is happening to our whales...
source: http://news.aol.com/article/two-beached-whales-die-in-florida/610753

Scientists finally understand why dolphins and whales become terminally ill, with suppressed immune systems and cancers caused by industrial toxins of mass distribution, they beach themselves and die at our feet, victims of the money saved by dumping industrial toxins into the only living Oceans in the entire universe.

Between 2006 and 2007, industry admitted and reported PCB dumping increased by 40 percent, due to dumping of toxins manufactured before the substances were banned in 1979. Mercury releases, mostly due to mining, increased by 38 percent. Dioxin, the most poisonous of all, dumping increased by 11 percent. The “Toxics Release Inventory” classifies all releases together, including legal and illegal dumping, disposal in mine reclamation ponds (which leach into groundwater) and disposal in toxic dump sites.

please share this link --> http://ecodelmar.org/why

Amy Goodman

interviews scientist/author Dr. Theo Colborn

about PCBs, an endocrine disruption created by man-made chemical contaminants that interfere with; mimic; disrupt vital hormone and endocrine functions in both humans and wildlife.

Democracy Now:

audio interview:

famous Cancer epidemiologist took Industry Money for 30 yrs...

http:// Our Stolen Future . org

August 11, 2009

Tons of PCBs Adrift in Nature... G.E. Stops The Hudson River

By MIREYA NAVARRO

General Electric has temporarily suspended dredging for contaminants in the upper Hudson River after water samples showed that chemicals from the cleanup had traveled several miles downstream.

The Environmental Protection Agency ordered the dredging, normally carried out six days a week, to be stopped on Friday, but it could resume as soon as Tuesday afternoon, said Kristen Skopeck, a spokeswoman for the agency.

Water tests conducted about five miles south of Fort Edward in Washington County, where most of the dredging is under way, showed that levels of the chemicals known as PCBs exceeded water quality standards.

The E.P.A. said it was reviewing efforts by General Electric, which is overseeing the cleanup, to keep PCB levels down elsewhere in the river. That may involve steps like limiting the number of dredges operating at the same time and using silt curtains, made of mesh fabric, to keep the sediment disturbed by the dredging in the same area, Ms. Skopeck said.

The dredging operation, which began in May along a six-mile segment south of Fort Edward, is the first phase of a cleanup expected to last through 2015. (The current phase is expected to continue well into the fall.)

Two General Electric factories discharged PCBs for three decades beginning in the 1940s before PCBs were banned in 1977 as a health threat to people and wildlife. That led to the federal designation of nearly 200 miles of the river, from Hudson Falls, N.Y., to the southern tip of Manhattan. The total kilo tonnage dumped by industry for decades since the 1930's into Oceans worldwide has yet to be determined and the full extent of global damage to marine life and life on Earth will continue to expand as the PCBs are absorbed into non bio degradable plastic throughout the oceans of Earth.

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/11/science/earth/11dredge.html

http://EcoDelMar.org/pcb

www.wired-gov.net

13 Aug 2009 11:31 AM

Koi herpesvirus disease outbreaks confirmed

193/08 Movements of fish into, out of and within a fishery in Cambridgeshire have been restricted, following the confirmation of koi herpesvirus disease. Cefas, acting on behalf of Defra, has issued a Confirmed Designation prohibiting the movement of fish into, out of and within the affected site. The affected fishery is Long Island Lake, Earith, Cambridgeshire and the designation also includes nearby Earith Carp Lakes.

Koi herpes virus (KHV) is a viral disease that is very contagious to the common carp Cyrpinus carpio. It is most common found in ornamental koi, which are often used in outdoor ponds or as feeder stock. The first case of KHV was reported in 1998, but not confirmed until later in 1999.

KHV is a DNA-based virus. After discovery, it was identified that KHV is indeed a strain of herpesvirus. Like other strains, KHV stays with the infected fish for the duration of their life, making the recovered and exposed fish potential carriers of the virus. Koi fish infected with KHV may die within the first 24-48 hours of exposure.

Pollutants found in deep-sea octopods and squids

by Shelly Dawicki (NEFSC)

New evidence that chemical contaminants are finding their way into the deep-sea food web has been found in deep-sea squids and octopods, including the strange-looking “vampire squid". These species are food for deep-diving toothed whales and other predators.

In a study to be published in the journal Marine Pollution Bulletin, Michael Vecchione of NOAA Fisheries’ National Systematics Laboratory and colleagues Michael Unger, Ellen Harvey and George Vadas at the Virginia Institute of Marine Science of The College of William and Mary report finding a variety of chemical contaminants in nine species of cephalopods, a class of organisms that includes octopods, squids, cuttlefishes and nautiluses.

“It was surprising to find measurable and sometimes high amounts of toxic pollutants in such a deep and remote environment,” Vecchione said. Among the chemicals detected were tributyltin (TBT), polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBs), brominated diphenyl ethers (BDEs), and dichlorodiphenyl-trichloroethane (DDT). They are known as persistent organic pollutants (POPs) because they don't degrade and persist in the environment for a very long time.

Cephalopods are important to the diet of cetaceans, a class of marine mammals which includes whales, dolphins and porpoises. Cephalopods are the primary food for 28 species of odontocetes, the sub-order of cetaceans that have teeth and include beaked, sperm, killer and beluga whales and narwhals as well as dolphins and porpoises.

Recent studies have reported the accumulation of POPs in the blubber and tissues of whales and other predatory marine mammals as well as in some deep-sea fish. Other investigators had speculated that the pollutants in marine mammals had resulted from feeding on contaminated squids. However, almost no information existed prior to this study about POPs in deep-sea cephalopods. Vecchione and colleagues wanted to see if whales had a unique capacity to accumulate pollutants or if they were simply one of the top predators in a contaminated deep-sea food web.

The researchers collected nine species of cephalopods from depths between 1,000 and 2,000 meters (about 3,300 to 6,600 feet)

http://www.vims.edu/octopods-and-squids

Special Report: Youth at Risk

Industrial profits prevail

By Vicki Monks

The young are harmed far more by toxic pollutants than adults, suggests new research on wildlife and humans...

Not only are the young exposed to toxic chemicals in the womb, mothers also unload toxics in their milk. In milk from species ranging from beluga whales to dairy cows, scientists have measured concentrations of chemicals including dioxins, PCBs and various pesticides. On a daily basis, the infant is getting 50 times the exposure an adult gets every day, but for the infant, this is during the most critical developmental stage of the only brain they will ever have for their entire life.

Chemicals found in the Florida dolphins´ blubber include some of the most deadly and long-lived contaminants of the industrial age. Dioxins, a group of chlorine-based chemicals, are unwanted by-products of papermaking, incineration of chlorinated plastics and other industrial processes. Although PCBs were banned in this country in the late 1970s, they are still commonly found in electrical systems, where they were used for insulation. Leaks from the equipment into soil and water can move readily into food. The toxics are so persistent and widely distributed that people and other animals continue to be exposed worldwide. "What we are seeing now is the impact of damage that was done over the last few decades," says biologist Randall Wells of the Chicago Zoological Society, which runs the program that has studied the Sarasota dolphins for 26 years.

Now scientists are finding that these and other, still-manufactured toxic chemicals can interfere with immune systems. In 1987 alone, more than 700 bottlenose dolphins, HALF of the migrant Atlantic population, washed up on beaches from New Jersey to Florida, and scientific necropsies determined they were killed by infectious disease. The bodies contained extremely high levels of PCBs, DDT and other known immune-suppressing industrial chemicals, and those chemicals clearly explain the dolphins´ susceptibility to disease. "These chemicals are damaging immunity in adult dolphins, and they are doing even more harm to juveniles," says immunologist Garet Lahvis of the University of Maryland School of Medicine. That´s partly because mammalian immune systems aren´t fully functional until months or years after birth, so the industrial chemicals always kill off the youngest first.

Several extremely disturbing links between industrial pollutants and severely suppressed human immunity are currently under investigation. A study published in the journal Pediatric Research found a correlation between PCB/dioxin exposures and suppressed levels of disease-fighting white blood cells. Doctors who examined the children concluded that while the immune-system changes "will persist for a lifetime and cause severe health difficulties"--including autoimmune diseases that provoke the body to attack itself.

"We are finding the same pollutants in our birds--PCBs and organochlorines" that have been measured in seals, dolphins, humans and other species with similar T-cell immune problems.

In our birds, many new born chicks with suppressed immune systems die before they are able to leave the nesting grounds.

LOWERED INTELLIGENCE: Not only are kids´ metabolisms faster than those of adults, babies don´t excrete contaminants or store them away in fat in the same ways that adults do. That means babies get continuous exposures at a time when all of their organs, including their brains, are developing.

A Michigan study published in The New England Journal of Medicine last September found persistent intellectual deficits in children exposed before birth to much lower doses of PCBs than the Yu-Cheng children. In 1981, two Wayne State University psychologists, Sandra and Joseph Jacobson, measured PCB levels in mothers and newborn infants.

Since consumption of fatty fish from contaminated water is a major source of PCBs, the Jacobsons selected mostly mothers who had eaten Lake Michigan salmon or lake trout regularly during the years before their children were born. The researchers found that infants with the highest exposures grew more slowly than other babies, and at four years old, the high-exposure group had poorer short-term memory. By the time the group reached 11 years old, the 30 most highly exposed children had average IQs six points lower than the least exposed group. And of the high-exposure kids, 23 percent were two years behind in reading and learning skills.

Childhood cancers are on the rise, nearly doubling among teenagers in the United States. Some health officials are becoming concerned that these conditions may be somehow linked to toxic chemicals... but they are a long way from exposing any proof... see: efficient early retirement planners and new executive directors dot com (For more information on endocrine disruptors, see "The Alarming Language of Pollution," National Wildlife)

According to a study from the University of Minnesota published in the NIEHS journal Environmental Health Perspectives, in western Minnesota--where wheat, sugar beet and potato farmers rely on insecticides, herbicides and other pesticides to protect their crops--children of farm families had significantly higher rates of birth defects than the state´s general population. The highest rates were among children conceived in the spring... when the toxin spraying is most intense...

http://www.nwf.org/NationalWildlife

PCB test results for Jean-Michel Cousteau and Team

Humans and Whales are One with the Environment

Whale and dolphins washed up
on Senegal coast: WWF

(AFP) – Jul 10, 2009

DAKAR (AFP) — A four tonne sperm whale and eight dolphins have been washed up on Senegal beaches over the past month, the Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF) said Friday.

The mammals were washed up a year after the mystery over 100 whales that were beached north of the Senegal capital Dakar. Forty-eight were rescued and put back to sea.

The dead sperm whale washed up on the beach at Ngasobil, in the Mbour region on Wednesday, WWF official Mamadou Diallo told AFP.

The eight dolphins washed up on a beach at Tivaouane Peulh, north of Dakar. The WWF believes they were killed by toxins in the ocean, Diallo said.

About 20 Dead Dolphins Appear On Uruguay Beach

Conservation Group Says About 20 Dead
Fraser's Dolphins Wash Up On Beach In Uruguay

Richard Tessore of SOS-Marine Life Rescue says it isn't clear why the tropical dolphins died in the colder waters off South America's southern Atlantic...

Six whales die after rescue effort in Australia

Four others might still be alive after stranding by 90 pilot whales

Rescuers prepare to herd a pod of long-finned pilot whales and bottlenose dolphins back out to sea from Hamelin Bay, south of the western city of Perth, Australia, on Tuesday.

PERTH, Australia - Six whales believed to be part of a pod that was rescued from a mass stranding in southwestern Australia earlier this week died after they re-beached themselves, the government said Wednesday.

Two of the long-finned pilot whales were already dead when they were spotted by airplane on a beach about four miles away from where a pod of 10 had been released a day earlier. Veterinarians were sent to euthanize four others that were deteriorating rapidly, the Western Australia state conservation department said.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/29837129/

cape verdi dolphins, dying...

Cape Verde Dolphins come in tears to beach to die

A letter published by the www.beppegrillo.it, the most popular Italian blog, gives the reader the same tears than those of the dolphins landed to the Cape Verde beach to die.

Here a significant passage of the letter:

they continued coming back to shore, apparently wanting to die. I don't know if this is in fact so, but this is most certainly the impression we got. What a tragedy it was, seeing these dolphins, with tears in their eyes, simply asking to be left alone to die. They all died, notwithstanding all of our efforts, and there was little else left to do but to bury them

http://www.florencenewspaper.it/vediarticolo.asp?news=a7.12.03.11.32

Biologist urges closer look at dolphin deaths
Sept 2009

nzherald.co.nz

The council and other agencies ruled out a link between the dog and dolphin deaths without testing the dolphins' stomachs.

Dr Stockin said dolphins were often among the first victims of changes to their environment because they were high in the food chain. Whales and seabirds were other "indicator" species, she said.

She was told it was "not a line of inquiry" the council wanted to pursue.

Dr Stockin was keen to test pilchards found in stomachs of some dolphins, after other pilchards were found to have died of a herpes virus.

A reseacher says the rise in dead dolphins could point to deeper problems in the Hauraki Gulf. Photo / Herald on Sunday

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10594429

Beach warning extended to Great Barrier

Great Barrier Island has been included in a public health warning arising from the mysterious deaths of dogs and marine life in Auckland and the Hauraki Gulf.

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10589365&ref=rss

5,000-pound shark washes ashore on Long Island

NEW YORK (CNN) -- A 26-foot-long dying shark washed ashore Tuesday on a Long Island beach, the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation said.

http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/07/14/new.york.shark.beached

... i see all of this as a global ecological catastrophe... when dolphins are dying at our feet.... and children are being born with neurological damage secondary to their own mom's eating seafood for their health... i don't understand why people are not outraged over the loss of our Oceans and their own child's intelligence... or maybe they are already too comfortably numb from the PCBs... http://EcoDelMar.org/fish/

Mafia Also Solves Age Old Nuclear Waste Problem

Giant US Industries sue their EPA to continue

dumping Toxic leftovers into Earth's Oceans

Join our cause to force manufactures to "Take It Back" ... tell them YOU made YOUR Chemicals, and YOU know best how to RECYCLE them... not us!... so STOP dumping YOUR byproducts into OUR Oceans NOW! and take back what you have already dumped when it is returned to you by the EPA or the Army Corp Of Engineers or whatever salvage company has enough skills to safely transport it back to it's origin... http://EcoDelMar.org/TakeItBack

If this sounds impossible... think about it this way... if you painted antique cars in your garage... could you legally dump the old paint thinner/cleaners down the drain?... of course not! So why are manufacturers allowed to do this on a massive mega-tonnage scale... They are killing our Oceans and Planet Earth and this has to stop. Please sign the petition to tell the US Congress to stop allowing profiteers to destroy our planet for their profit. This is the cause of widespread cancer and children with autism... if you truly want to fight cancer... stop industrial pollution... http://EcoDelMar.org/TakeItBack

Nine more whales beached in Italy

Published: 12 Dec_2009

A pod of sperm whales was beached on Italy's southern coast and at least five died in what experts said was a rare mass beaching for such a large species

Nine whales measuring up to 40 feet in length were stranded Thursday on a beach in Puglia, the heel of boot-shaped Italy.

Only two managed to swim back to deeper waters and at least five were dead by Saturday, said Nicola Zizzo, one of the veterinarians caring for the animals. He said officials were considering euthanising the last two whales still trapped in high waves just off the beach.

The rough seas were making it difficult to understand even how many whales were still alive, with other experts telling Italian media that only one was breathing.

The sperm whale is the largest of all toothed whales and is considered a vulnerable species.
While similar mass beachings are more common in the oceans, they are extremely rare in the Mediterranean, occurring once every 150-200 years, said Giuseppe Notarbartolo di Sciara, a marine biologist and head of a conservation group.

Speaking to Italy's Sky TV, he said the incident may have been caused by noise from military exercises or surveys for underwater mineral deposits that can confuse whales and interfere with their communication.

"When a sperm whale washes up on the beach it's usually already dead," he said. "When an entire pod ends up on the shore it's difficult to think that the cause is natural, otherwise it would happen more often."

Scientists had taken tissue samples from the whales to try to determine the cause of the beaching while authorities were working on the difficult job of burying the huge carcasses.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/wildlife/6796434/Nine-whales-beached-in-Italy-in-rare-accident.html

INDIAN RIVER INLET -- A deceased 500-pound pilot whale that washed ashore near the Indian River Inlet on Thursday has been transported to the Marine, Education, Research & Rehabilitation Institute in Lewes where it will undergo tests.

MERR Director, Suzanne Thurman said she believes the whale, which measured 8 1/2 feet long, was "sick". She was notified of the whale death Thursday by the Department of Natural Resources and Environmental Control.

Since MERR lacked the necessary manpower to transport the animal at that time, volunteers returned to the scene Friday.

The previous whale stranding 6 months eilier occurred in May, just a few miles north of the Indian River Inlet Bridge. The 50,000 pound sei whale was one of the largest animals to ever be noticed in this coast.

http://www.delmarvanow.com/article/20091223/DCP01/912230319

Beluga baby whale lives 3 days - 12/22/09

The animal autopsy revealed no conclusive cause of death, but further tests will be conducted over the coming months.

http://abclocal.go.com/wls/story?section=news/local&id=7184841

... note to Claudia: thank you Claudia :-), i think we must become more aware of what is going on in our Oceans... No Blue... No Green... while INDUSTRY is getting away with nothing less than a Crimes Against Nature... please see: http://ecodelmar.org/pcb and http://ecodelmar.org/why When i hear of a beaching, i post it at: http://ecodelmar.org/luna Let me know if you have records of more... and all of us together can bring these issues to more grass roots, 501-c-3 Non-profit organizations... the "powers that be" are apparently only interested in the stock market, not life on Planet Earth... and even less in Life in the Oceans... "It has become appallingly clear that our technology has surpassed our humanity." -Albert Einstein