Save the Whales

This last weekend people from my town, Half Moon Bay, gathered at the beach to protest lifting the moratorium on commercial whaling. The organizers made a grid with stakes and twine in the sand to form a 100 foot long whale. Protesters wearing black and gray filled in the body and were then photographed from an airplane. This aerial shot will be send to President Barack Obama to protest against the lifting of the moratorium.


Protesters waving to the airplane

What is the moratorium?
Agreed in 1982, and introduced in 1986, the whaling moratorium was brought in after long campaigns by environmental groups pointing out the fact that many populations of the great whales had been drastically reduced by over-hunting. The largest of them, the Blue Whale, had even been driven to the brink of extinction.

The main article of the moratorium of the IWC (International Whaling Commission) reads:
“....catch limits for the killing for commercial purposes of whales from all stocks for the 1986 coastal and the 1985/86 pelagic seasons and thereafter shall be zero.”

As the moratorium applies only to commercial whaling, whaling under the scientific-research and aboriginal-subsistence provisions is still allowed. However since 1994, Norway has been whaling commercially and Iceland began hunting commercially in September 2006. Since 1986, Japan has been whaling under scientific research permits. 2009 about 1700 whales were killed, half of those whales were taken by Japan under the guise of scientific research. One wonders what they are researching that makes it necessary to kill so many whales​?! The US and several other nations are whaling under aboriginal whaling provisions.
The IWC now proposes to lift the moratorium and put in yearly quotas of how many whales can be killed. Supposedly the whaling vessels would have to have observers on board and a DNA registry of whale meat would be required in order to track whales being caught and sold illegally. The question now is, if Norway, Iceland and Japan have killed 1700 whales last year with the limit being zero, how many will they hunt if the moratorium gets lifted???

In my opinion whales should not be hunted, period!

They are extremely intelligent and gentle mammals that already suffered so much through us.
In spring 2007 I traveled to Silver Bank, off the coast of the Dominican Republic, to snorkel with Humpback whales.
Silver Bank is part of the Sanctuary for the Marine Mammals of the Dominican Republic.
Pregnant Humpback whales come to these shallow waters to give birth and “hang around” with the calves until they are ready for their first journey north to the feeding grounds in the waters off Newfoundland and Labrador.

On our first encounter in the water with these gentle giants, we watched a mother with her calf, resting on the bottom of the shallow bank.



After a few minutes the calf came up to breathe. On it's way down back to mom,



it swam really close by me, looking me right in the eye, curious, what strange whale I might be. For seconds our eyes locked. I was so mesmerized, that I completely forgot that I had a camera in my hands. I didn't get the photograph, but I caught something way more important, I caught a glimpse of a deeper understanding between two mammals, one being a whale and one being a human.



All photos © Susanne Weissenberger - White Mountain Photography

May Conservation Tip

Since we are hopefully by now done with this rainy spring, and summer is approaching fast, why not use solar energy to dry your clothes. Just hang them out for the sun to dry. I know it's a hassle with the small stuff, but if you just hang up one or two loads of laundry a week, sheets or jeans for example, it makes a huge difference.
Don't have any outdoor space? Try dryer balls.
As I first got them from our son as a result of a energy saving school project, I was rather puzzled. But I have to say, they really make a difference. I was not standing in front of my dryer stopping the time, but I noted a distinctive shorter running time when the balls where in there. Also fleece items seem to be fluffier with the “ball drying” method.

What are dryer balls? Well, meanwhile you can buy all sorts of plastic dryer balls in stores, but the original dryer balls are soft wool felted balls that you put in the dryer with your wet clothes when you start the drying cycle. The balls bounce around lifting and separating the clothes, allowing the hot air to flow more efficiently. This makes the drying time shorter and therefore you use less energy. If you use 4 balls in the dryer at one time you can cut an average of 25% off your drying time. Our son recommends using 16, so you would save 100%.......

How to make dryer balls: You will need 100% wool yarn, preferably light colors to prevent initial bleeding. It needs to be relatively unprocessed wool, so no super wash or acrylic mix wool, since you want the ball to felt.
Make the core: Wind the wool tightly to a about golf size ball, secure the end and put it in a sock or nylon stocking, knot the sock tightly and wash and dry this a couple of times in your hottest cycle. If you do multiple balls at once, make sure to separate them in the sock or stocking by tying a band around the sock between each ball (looks like a caterpillar).
Finish the ball: Once your core is nicely felted, wind more wool around it, until it has the size of a tennis ball, secure the ends and repeat the sock/washer/dryer exercise. Take the sock off and your dryer ball(s) are ready to use.
I used my original ones for about a year before they were starting to fall apart, but since I have enough wool scraps, I just made myself new ones.

And more dogs...

Dogs just make me happy, can you tell?

After the last blog entry, where I was showing off the photographic results of the Unleashed workshop, many were asking for pictures of my dogs. Well, here they are:

At the Ranch





Peeking



And at the Beach:

The Race




Flying Trouble




Double Trouble...