Bubbles in the Bathtub

Matthew mentioned in one of his last posts that we recently spent some time in the field together. One thing I noticed was Matthew's abundance of swag. It seemed like he wore a t-shirt from a different sea turtle project every day we were in the field. Sometimes TWO in one day!

All I have are a couple dozen symposium t-shirts and seaturtle.org hats and shirts.

The experience left me feeling... inadequate. I need more swag. Send a t-shirt (sized XL, or L if your sizes run large), or other favorite item, from your sea turtle project or organization. Bonus points for items that can't normally be purchased. I promise I'll wear your swag to all the best meetings :)

Send your swag to:
Michael Coyne
1 Southampton Place
Durham, NC 27705

I am happy to make a trade. If you would like some seaturtle.org swag in return, drop a note in your package and let me know if you'd prefer a baseball cap, bucket cap or t-shirt. If you'd like a t-shirt let me know what size. If you don't have anything to trade, consider making a donation to seaturtle.org and select the swag you would like.

Posted by Michael Coyne at 03:37 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

What does it say about you when you start editing manuscripts with a crayon?

Actually, it was a Crayola™ pencil, so maybe not as bad. In any case, I found myself trying to squeeze in the final review of a manuscript at the kitchen table yesterday morning before taking the kids to the museum of life science. Everybody was distracted having fun and I knew that I ran the risk of disturbing the moment if I actually stood up. The only writing implement I had close at hand was a Crayola™ pencil.

sigh

Posted by Michael Coyne at 01:09 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

The following stories from the news tracker this morning caught my attention.

Poachers massacre protected turtles on Mexico beach
Leading The Charge, Australia - http://www.leadingthecharge.com/stories/news-0057472.html
Synopsis: MEXICO CITY - Mexican poachers bludgeoned and chopped some 80 protected Olive Ridley sea turtles to death for their eggs, believed to be an aphrodisiac, and ... 10-Aug-2005

Turtle Gets A First-Class Ride
WCCO, MN - http://wcco.com/topstories/local_story_222072226.html
Synopsis: ... require that all healthy loggerhead turtles be released into the wild. Only one in 1,000 sea turtle hatchlings make it to adulthood. 10-Aug-2005

The first is about poachers butchering 80 turtles on a beach in Mexico and leaving all of the remains on the beach. They may have taken some parts, but it wasn't clear from the story. The big question is why did they do it? What was the motivation if they weren't doing it for turtle meat, etc? On a nesting beach you don't need to kill turtles to poach the eggs, which is bad enough, but they certainly did not need to hack up the turtles.

The second story is about a turtle hatchling that was taken back to Minnesota by someone vacationing in Florida. I guess the turtle was discovered and an airline has offered to fly it back to Florida (along with a USFWS escort), FIRST CLASS! And the airline (rightly so) takes the opportunity to generate some good PR for itself.

For some reason these two stories really caught my eye and I think serve to highlight the extreme social and economic differences under which people live around the world. Differences that have a large impact on sea turtle conservation. In one case people are butchering turtles for no apparent reason and in another an airline is flying a single small turtle at great expense to be released in to the wild.

Posted by Michael Coyne at 02:50 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)

An interesting article here:

http://www.courier-journal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20050802/OPINION01/508020352

equating a ban on balloons (protecting marine animals) to a ban on smoking (protecting humans). The author essentially lambasts the city council of Louisville, Kentucky because they failed to pass a smoking ban in the city after previously banning balloons.

Interesting argument, but I am guessing that there a lot fewer balloon advocates in Louisville, Kentucky than there are smoking "rights" advocates.

Posted by Michael Coyne at 02:37 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)