Backcasts archive: Through Aug. 3, 2007
By Brett PaulyBlog calendar: Aug. 3 | Aug. 1 | July 31 | July 30
There's nothing midway about helping Midway Atoll; it needs an all-out effort
We've heard it described as an angler's paradise by those who can afford the trip to Midway Atoll in the farthest stretches of the Hawaiian Islands, northwest of their hub.
Indeed, billfishers tackle blue marlin, stripers and swordies; giant trevally and a half-dozen other species of trevally are fabled; and there's ample yellowfin tuna, wahoo, dorado, amberjack, records on pompano to be broken and likewise for grouper and jacks. The list goes on.
The expanse of atolls and coral reefs are so precious humans generally aren't allowed to venture there, the Associated Press reports from Midway Atoll.
Boats need special permits to enter. And, bummer, all fishing must stop, in 2011, aside from what Native Hawaiians catch for cultural purposes. President Bush made the region the largest protected marine area in the world when he declared the Northwestern Hawaiian Islands a marine national monument last year.
We salute you on that, prez.
But there is one spot in the 1,400-mile archipelago where officials believe human visitors, in limited numbers, could do more good than harm: Midway Atoll itself.
In about six months, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service plans to allow tourists to visit Midway, primarily to help clear the island of debris and invasive species. Wildlife officials also hope visitors will leave having become strong advocates for the continued preservation of the monument, according to the AP.
"That is such a treasure that America is not yet aware of," Interior Secretary Dirk Kempthorne said during a recent visit to the remote island.
The marine national monument, recently named Papahanaumokuakea, is home to thousands of species found nowhere else in the world. Kempthorne said it was America's equivalent of the Galapagos Islands and the Great Barrier Reef.
Wow, that's no small potatoes. Our very own Galapagos Islands. Imagine that!
Midway, in the upper extreme of the island chain, is a three-to-five-hour plane ride from the nearest city, Honolulu, depending on the type of aircraft.
Visitors are greeted immediately by the mating call sounds of hundreds of thousands of gooney birds, or Laysan albatross, echoing through the trees.
Hawaiian monk seals, a critically endangered species, lounge on the beach. Green sea turtles, a threatened species commonly known by its Hawaiian name "honu," lurch ashore to bask in the sun.
The atoll is best known for the 1942 battle in which the U.S. defeated Japan, turning the tide of World War II. Most of the fighting was offshore as U.S. and Japanese planes rained bombs on each other's aircraft carriers, but a seaplane hangar and some other Midway buildings suffered heavy damage, still visible.
The Navy used the island as a base for decades during the Cold War but left in 1996.
Now refuge workers need help clearing harmful marine debris – such as fishing nets and hooks – that entangle and kill honu, fish, and monk seals, the AP reports.
They also need people to weed invasive plant species including the golden crownbeard, a bright yellow flower native to the Southwest. The flowers spread so far and fast that some gooney birds have trouble reaching their nesting grounds.
Authorities plan to allow the first tourists sometime between November and January, most likely in groups of 15 on a chartered plane from Honolulu. No more than 40 overnight visitors would be allowed.
A weeklong stay would cost one person about $3,600, including airfare from Honolulu and lodging in old military barracks. But be assured, it won't be no vacation, folks. Midway is no resort. Stay in Waikiki or Maui if you want to be pampered.
"Those that will ultimately come will want to pitch in," Kempthorne explained.
Tourists won't be able to go water skiing or kite-surfing, although authorities will allow less disruptive activities including swimming and snorkeling. There's no shopping aside from a small gift store.
The refuge would also welcome up to three cruise ships per year, perhaps those making the rounds of World War II battlefields in the Pacific.
But there definitely are concerns with the new assistance plan.
Stephanie Fried, senior scientist with the New York-based group Environmental Defense, worries the refuge won't have enough properly trained staff to watch visitors – particularly the large numbers arriving on cruise ships – so they don't trample on bird nests and disturb monk seals, according to the AP.
She added the refuge should limit the number of day travelers, not just overnighters, and visitors should be selected by lottery.
"Otherwise, all of the goodwill in the world may end up doing in this ecosystem," Fried said.
Staff will have to be vigilant so new invasive species don't hitch rides with travelers arriving from far corners of the globe, said John Klavitter, a Midway wildlife biologist.
But for all the worries, Klavitter predicted the tourists would ultimately help the island.
"Anytime that you allow people to see the resource that they're protecting, it becomes more powerful," Klavitter said. "They say 'Wow, this is Midway. Let's for sure protect it.'"
What's new? Just another run-of-the-mill seven-legged lamb, that's all
Polydactyl – with many legs – is a condition that occurs once in several million sheep.
And with all the sheep in all the flocks of New Zealand, you wouldn't be surprised if the anomaly reared its ugly limbs Down Under.
Sure enough, a lamb born with seven legs was reported by a clinic in the rural town of Methven, according to the Associated Press in Wellington.
Dave Callaghan said he was surprised to find the seven-legged lamb on his farm in the company of its mother and normal twin sibling.
The animal was born with three hind legs, two forelegs and two extra legs that hang useless behind its forelegs.
"I have never seen anything like that," he said.
We're guessing it was quite a shock, Dave. Perhaps less surprising is the news that the lamb born polydactyl will have to be put down, said veterinarian Steve Williams at the Canterbury Vets clinic. The woolly animal also was missing a portion of its bowel, he said.
"To keep it alive is probably inhumane really," Williams told the Ashburton Guardian newspaper.
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Troubles by the trunkful in India
What's a poor working pachyderm to do?
Alas, elephants are packing up their trunks in old Bombay.
The state government has banned domesticated elephants from India's largest city, saying that forcing the animals to walk the city's chaotic, crowded and polluted streets was an act of cruelty, the Associated Press reports from Mumbai, formerly known as Bombay.
Before the ban, India's first, 14 elephants worked in Mumbai. They begged for their handlers, participated in religious ceremonies or became status symbols at weddings.
Elephants – long revered in India as symbols of wisdom and good fortune – often plodded along crowded promenades or suburban beaches, collecting money with their trunks. Caparisoned elephants with colorful sequined parasols would stand outside wedding halls, surrounded by band members playing brash music.
News of the ban in Mumbai comes less than a week after two domesticated elephants went on a rampage through several villages in the northeastern portion of the country, killing eight people and injuring five before being shot dead by police, the AP reports out of Gauhati, India.
Police were searching for the owners of the animals and trying to establish what caused the violent behavior. Angry villagers protesting the lack of protection burnt down the local forestry office.
The rampage occurred July 25 in an area bordering India's Assam and Mizoram states, said Gautam Ganguly, a senior government official in the area.
The male and female elephants, which were employed in logging operations, ran through at least five villages in Assam, trampling anyone in their way and knocking down several of the mud-and-thatch houses before crossing into the neighboring state of Mizoram, where police were called in.
Meanwhile, the state government issued the elephant ban in Mumbai after animal rights activists said the elephants were not properly fed, and suffered skin and foot ailments from being forced to walk on scorching roads, according to the AP.
When not working, the elephants were chained to posts and unable to move. Most lived under busy highway overpasses.
Activists welcomed the ban, but said the government did not adequately arrange for the evicted elephants.
"It would have been ideal to build rescue centers first and then issue the ban," said N. Jayasimha, a lawyer with the People for Ethical Treatment of Animals. "But the order is positive and a step in the right direction."
Police were forced to release an elephant handler arrested after the ban went into effect because there was no way to look after the elephant, which spent five hours chained outside the police station.
The 13-year-old elephant named Laxmi and her handler went free after he signed a statement promising to take the animal out of the city, said police officer P. Gaitonde.
Bhagwan said the government plans to build a rehabilitation center in the Nashik forests, about 125 miles northeast of Mumbai.
Some 3,600 tamed elephants live in India, including some 1,000 in northeastern Assam state, where they work in logging.
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In China, a new view on zoo poo
Like the popular kids science book proclaims, "Everyone Poops."
Staffers at animal parks know this better than most, and now a panda facility in China has developed a novel way to recycle the excrement of the endangered species.
No need to fear it. Embrace it. That's seems to be the new view on poo at the Chengdu Giant Panda Breeding Base, which, the Associated Press reports from Beijing, has designs on making a profit from selling odor-free souvenirs made from panda droppings.
Bookmarks, photo frames and Olympic-themed statues of the animals will be crafted from poop that one source at the panda base said is "carefully selected, smashed, dried and sterilized at 300 degrees Celsius," or 572 degrees Fahrenheit.
The facility in the southwestern province of Sichuan houses about 40 bamboo-fed pandas that produce something less than a ton of dung a day.
Worry not, however; the selected material won't offend the ol' olfactory nerve.
"They don't smell too bad because 70 percent of the dung is just remains of the bamboo that the pandas are unable to digest," Jing Shimin, assistant to the base director, was quoted as saying by the Xinhua News Agency, the state media.
"We used to spend at least 6,000 yuan ($770) a month to get rid of the droppings, but now they can be lucrative," Jing said.
The panda is one of the world's rarest and most beloved animals, with about 1,590 living in the wild in China, mostly in Sichuan and the western province of Shaanxi, according to the AP. Another 180 have been bred in captivity.
Soccer fans in China next month for the Women's World Cup will have a chance to examine the facility's new trinkets and baubles firsthand when the tournament plays out in Chengdu on Sept. 11, 14, 18 and 19. (Consult the ESPN SportsTravel guide on the World Cup for details.)
Be forewarned about the golden apples, however. They aren't really apples.
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Dying breed: Can the game warden be saved?
The "thin green line" that protects our wildlife is growing thinner and recruits are becoming harder to find.
Indeed, states across the country are struggling to hook new wardens.
Though hard numbers are difficult to come by, officials say poaching of fish and game is rising, habitat and other projects are being delayed, and environmental enforcement is sometimes lacking, according to the Associated Press.
"I think the nefarious people realize there's a good chance they're not going to get caught and are taking more opportunities," said Nancy Foley, chief of the law enforcement division of California's Department of Fish and Game.
As upbeat as we'd like to think we are at Backcasts, it's difficult not to be pessimistic under such circumstances.
And as sad as it sounds, we have to wonder if this is destined to have a self-fulfilling solution:
The more game poachers kill due to lacking enforcement, the fewer animals need protecting. Hence, the fewer new wardens are required.
But let's put that negative outlook aside for now and concentrate on the critical importance of our game wardens.
Besides enforcing hunting and fishing regulations, wildlife wardens respond to calls about injured or nuisance wildlife, protect and educate the public about the environment, and in some states even are the first on the scene of natural disasters.
"If a hurricane hits the Gulf Coast, we are the first responders out there," said Col. Pete Flores, director of the law enforcement division for the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department.
The danger of the job and falling interest in outdoor activities may also be to blame for shortages, officials say. But mostly, it's the pay, often thousands less than traditional police officers make, the AP reports.
California, for example, loses about 40 percent of its trainees in academy, mostly because of their concerns about the starting pay, which was recently raised to $48,000 from $44,000, Foley said. The disparity could be because officials don't view conservation officers as valid law enforcers, she said.
"In their minds, they only see the police departments, the sheriffs' departments and highway patrol as real cops," she said.
"To think a conservation officer is any less important than a state police officer … they're not thinking about it in the right way," said Col. Julie Jones, director of law enforcement for the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission and president of the National Association of Conservation Law Enforcement Chiefs.
Meanwhile, in Pennsylvania, starting annual pay for waterways and wildlife conservation officers under the state's Fish and Boat and Game Commission is about $9,000 less than for state troopers, said Thomas J. Kamerzel, the commission's director of law enforcement.
"We are police officers by definition, so we should be compensated based on what the state trooper pay scale is," said Brian Witherite, a Wildlife Conservation Officer in southwestern Pennsylvania.
It all adds up to a shrinking environmental policing presence.
Pennsylvania's Fish and Boat Commission operates with about a half-dozen vacancies in its complement of 80 field officers. California's Department of Fish and Game has about 75 vacancies out of 300 officers. And Florida's Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission has about 50 vacancies out of about 470 field officers, according to the AP.
Even though they typically get paid less than traditional peace officers, game wardens apparently face as much or more risk.
Game wardens in California are probably more likely than traditional officers to encounter illegal marijuana crops and drug smugglers because they are in the field. California's wardens issued about 45,000 to 50,000 tickets last year, about one-third of which fell into categories associated with traditional policing, Foley said.
And the job can be more dangerous than traditional policing, simply because of whom and what they patrol. Statistics show a warden is about 2.5 times more likely to be assaulted with a deadly weapon than are other officers, said Rob Buonamici, chief game warden for the Nevada Department of Wildlife.
"Virtually everyone we deal with is armed," he said.
Think about it: gun, bow, knife – these are the tools of the sportsman's trade.
Bully for the warden, and here's to hoping this dying breed rebounds. Because I for one certainly won't be more inclined to approach a poacher on my own knowing the scalawag is likely armed, if not ill-intentioned.
About the author: Brett Pauly spent nearly six years editing and publishing ESPNOutdoors.com before moving on to produce the ESPN.com Sports Travel site.
He is a national award-winning writer and editor with 14 years of experience in the newspaper trade. The Evergreen State of Washington is where he makes his home. Click here to email him.
