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Iceland resumes commercial whaling

The recent decision by Iceland to resume whaling, and to blatantly ignore the nearly two-decade-old moratorium established by the International Whaling Commission (IWC), is infuriating and puzzling.

Iceland's Ministry of Fishing justified its decision by arguing that the "catches are clearly sustainable and therefore consistent with the principle of sustainable development," but conveniently left out the fact that the fin whales now on their whaler's list are also on the International Conservation Union's "red list" of endangered species.

Within hours of the decision, the first harpooners were off on their mission of "sustainability," and the first two fin whales have already been caught.

Iceland's actions make the next IWC meeting all the more important. In the meantime, let's tell Iceland to call the fleet back in.

Help! We Need Somebody

Grist seeks volunteers for festive events in San Francisco You know how they say if you’re going to San Francisco, you should wear flowers in your hair? Well, Grist is getting the organic Gerbera daisies ready. We’re going to be in town from Nov. 10 – 12 for the Green Festival, and we’ll be holding […]

Brazil wants you to buy one.

This may be good for Big Ethanol:

Brazilian company ABC Esso will soon sell an adapter in the U.S. that lets any gasoline vehicle burn up to 100 percent ethanol.

But perhaps not that good:

According to Vidar Lura, managing director of Abcesso, the product will sell for between $500 and $900.

"Abcesso" is much funnier than "ABC Esso."

Beware, ye Halloween pirates and princesses.

We just received a timely pre-Halloween press release from the Sierra Club, warning about the dangers of toy jewelry. Not the choking hazard, or the dressing-like-Mr.-T-for-the-fourth-year-in-a-row hazard, but the leaching-toxic-metals hazard.

Toy jewelry, apparently, can have high amounts of lead. It also, according to the Sierra Club, has become a popular trick-or-treat item in recent years. (Thanks, but I'll take the candy. Unless you have a locally grown, organic apple sans razor blade?)

Lead is bad for you, particularly if you are a trick-or-treating-age tot -- even more particularly if you are a trick-or-treating-age tot with a propensity for putting anything and everything into your mouth.

Slate and TH challenge readers to lose 2.5 tons apiece

Slate and fellow green blog TreeHugger have just launched an eight-week Green Challenge carbon diet. The goal: to get readers to cut their carbon emissions 20 percent through the usual variety of actions. The kicker: an interactive "my emissions" evaluation tool that friends can use to challenge one another. Nothing like a little competition to spice things up.

(I'd love to share my results, especially since this week's theme is transportation, but it's not yet working for me. Anyone else?)

It never ends

Last Wednesday, conservative Boston Globe columnist Jeff Jacoby cited me by name in a column about how liberals want to destroy free speech.

This represents the latest (last?) stage in what has been a textbook conservative media swarm. It starts when a movement ideologue (in this case Marc Morano, hired attack dog of Sen. James Inhofe) plucks a quote out of context from an obscure source (in this case, Gristmill) and uses it to caricature the entire left side of the political spectrum. Then the context-free, already-spun quote spreads like wildfire around the conservative echo chamber, which is always ravenous for tidbits that reinforce its worldview. After buzzing around for a while, it drifts upward, being cited on talk radio and eventually in mainstream outlets like Fox News and now the Boston Globe.

It's a well-oiled machine. I have no illusions that I can stop it or alter its course. The right's sense of aggrievement, its victim complex, is adamantine, and nothing I can do will dent it.

Nonetheless, I sent a letter to the editor to the Globe. They printed an edited version of it today. Below is the original:

New shows make mention of global warming, other issues

OK, people. It's not like I spend every waking minute watching bad TV. (I also work, ya know!) But I did happen to catch this week's episodes of two new ABC shows, Ugly Betty and Brothers and Sisters -- and both made brief mention of environmental issues.

Prancing With the Stars

Celebs gather in Malibu to protest plans for offshore natural-gas facility Famous beautiful people and other denizens of Malibu, Calif., gathered on a beach yesterday to protest a proposal by energy company BHP Billiton to build a liquefied-natural-gas facility 14 miles off the coast. “We have to use our voices and band together and stop […]

Go for Choke

Deliberate forest fires cause choking haze in Southeast Asia Southeast Asia has been suffering through hellish smog over the last few weeks thanks to Indonesian farmers and owners of timber and palm-oil plantations who have set massive fires to clear land. Slash-and-burn practices are illegal in Indonesia, but nonetheless take place every year and rarely […]

A short hike reveals various lizard, insect species

I was poking around in an empty lot today about a mile from downtown when I heard a clicking sound. I looked up and saw this owl staring at me. It was snapping its beak and may have been defending a nest. I took the picture and bailed before the confrontation escalated.

I also took a short hike today with my wife and two daughters. Dusk is the best time to hike because the nocturnal wildlife is waking up, and for a brief period, you will see twice as much traffic.

Kids love bugs. If you have kids, bookmark this site. Note the comments on the photo of the Japanese beetles while you are there. My oldest daughter (now a young woman at the college we were visiting for parents' day) was the hand model for the photos of the tarantula, mantis, and giant black-faced spider shown below: