June 16, 2010
COMMENTARY: REQUIEM: A Naturalist Responds to the Gulf Oil Disaster
By Rachel Smolker
As the toxic oil continues to spew from the Deepwater Horizon oil “volcano” into the Gulf of Mexico, coating the beaches, smothering and poisoning pelicans, turtles, dolphins, fish, ruining livelihoods... I feel the need to turn inward – avert my gaze, protect myself from full recognition of the scale and implications, which perhaps my own life experiences as a naturalist, throw into bleak relief.
I spent 15 years following dolphins around in the shallow seagrass beds of Shark Bay, West Australia, a place with many parallels to the Gulf of Mexico: shrimp nursery, spawning grounds for myriad fish species, home to ancient sea turtles, intricate seahorses, poisonous octopus, gentle dugongs….a rich, diverse, occasionally startling watery universe. The dolphins I came to know during my years of study in Shark Bay had names – Nicky, Puck, Holly, Snubnose and Bibi – dozens more. Their lives were as rich and interesting, and their personalities as unique as any humans’ I have known. They roamed a pristine and accommodating bay, their place on this earth.
This morning a friend sent me a photograph of some sort of creature from the Gulf – no longer recognizeable, entirely coated with a thick layer of oil. It could not live encased in such a poisonous tomb – I figured, its skin or feathers or scales would offer no protection… but it defied all by appearing, grotesquely to be attempting to stand. The image struck me down - a horrible, horrible, death for one of earth’s creatures, a cruel and unimaginably thoughtless act of humanity.
I cannot help but to imagine – what if instead of the Gulf, this spill – not spill but earth hemmorhage - happened in the place I knew and loved, and all the gentle and amazing creatures that so enthralled me, were now coated in oil, toxic and dying. What if?
Shark Bay also resembled the Gulf in being home to several species of sea turtle. These animals survived the extinction that wiped out the dinosaurs, they roamed the seas, placid, mysterious and peaceful for millions of years. But now every species is endangered, and chances are likely they may not survive us.
The irony runs deep, as these turtles feature prominently in the creation myths of native peoples in North America – the basic story is that the creator made the first human and threw him or her to the earth, where a great turtle rose up to provide a landing place, a surface – the turtles back, upon which humanity could thrive – “turtle island”. But now the turtles are going, as the islands too succumb to rising seas. So very sadly, we are taking it all down with us for no better reason than to fuel the manufacture of plastic widgets, many of which now spin sickeningly in the great Pacific garbage gyre.
Along life’s path, I also had chance to visit some of the forests of the world – in Asia and the Americas, where I spent my days following some of the denizens of those places. I watched orangutans lumbering through the forests of Borneo, and spider monkeys whisking through the treetops of Belize, all busy with their own lives, unknown to most, harming nothing.
Safe from the oil spill, they are nonetheless going down with their oceanic counterparts. Not willing to accept limits, ignorance, stupidity and greed now compels us to harvest every forest and field in sight to provide “biomass” as a substitute for increasingly scarce oil. The forests of Borneo – the orangutans place I visited years ago, is now covered with palm oil monoculture for “biodiesel”, poisoned with paraquat, and the orangutans slaughtered as pests.
The dolphins and sperm whales, pelicans, sanderlings and ospreys and many, many fish species in the Gulf – like the orangutans and hornbills, tigers and tapirs of the forests might ask us: How could you have let this happen? How could the human species, capable of so much art, music, compassion, curiosity and discovery...be at the same time so ignorant, disdainful, stupid and heartless: so utterly out of balance with the pulse of life?
As the dispersants were sprayed and the media told us not to worry about the oil unless it hit our coastlines, as if the rest of the ocean were more or less disposable, I did not worry about the rising price of oysters. I thought of the ocean’s creatures whose places are ruined, their bodies poisoned. Those creatures whose ways we never bothered to know or understand or care for, whose well being we failed to even consider, much less treasure and honor as cohabitants of this earth.
The decline and suffering of these creatures is largely hidden from our view, but their future existence on this planet is increasingly doubtful. Like the oil spewing from the Deep Horizon, I feel my own spirit hemorrhaging with unrelentless and profound sorrow for all that has been so thoughtlessly destroyed.
* * *
Rachel Smolker is the author of “To Touch A Wild Dolphin”, Doubleday Press 2001. She is codirector of Biofuelwatch, and an organizer with Energy Justice Network and Rising Tide North America. She has a Ph.D. in biology from the University of Michigan and now lives in Vermont. This commentary was submitted by HNN contributor Rebecca Sommer.
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COMMENTARY: REQUIEM: A Naturalist Responds to the Gulf Oil Disaster
By Rachel Smolker
As the toxic oil continues to spew from the Deepwater Horizon oil “volcano” into the Gulf of Mexico, coating the beaches, smothering and poisoning pelicans, turtles, dolphins, fish, ruining livelihoods... I feel the need to turn inward – avert my gaze, protect myself from full recognition of the scale and implications, which perhaps my own life experiences as a naturalist, throw into bleak relief.
I spent 15 years following dolphins around in the shallow seagrass beds of Shark Bay, West Australia, a place with many parallels to the Gulf of Mexico: shrimp nursery, spawning grounds for myriad fish species, home to ancient sea turtles, intricate seahorses, poisonous octopus, gentle dugongs….a rich, diverse, occasionally startling watery universe. The dolphins I came to know during my years of study in Shark Bay had names – Nicky, Puck, Holly, Snubnose and Bibi – dozens more. Their lives were as rich and interesting, and their personalities as unique as any humans’ I have known. They roamed a pristine and accommodating bay, their place on this earth.
This morning a friend sent me a photograph of some sort of creature from the Gulf – no longer recognizeable, entirely coated with a thick layer of oil. It could not live encased in such a poisonous tomb – I figured, its skin or feathers or scales would offer no protection… but it defied all by appearing, grotesquely to be attempting to stand. The image struck me down - a horrible, horrible, death for one of earth’s creatures, a cruel and unimaginably thoughtless act of humanity.
I cannot help but to imagine – what if instead of the Gulf, this spill – not spill but earth hemmorhage - happened in the place I knew and loved, and all the gentle and amazing creatures that so enthralled me, were now coated in oil, toxic and dying. What if?
Shark Bay also resembled the Gulf in being home to several species of sea turtle. These animals survived the extinction that wiped out the dinosaurs, they roamed the seas, placid, mysterious and peaceful for millions of years. But now every species is endangered, and chances are likely they may not survive us.
The irony runs deep, as these turtles feature prominently in the creation myths of native peoples in North America – the basic story is that the creator made the first human and threw him or her to the earth, where a great turtle rose up to provide a landing place, a surface – the turtles back, upon which humanity could thrive – “turtle island”. But now the turtles are going, as the islands too succumb to rising seas. So very sadly, we are taking it all down with us for no better reason than to fuel the manufacture of plastic widgets, many of which now spin sickeningly in the great Pacific garbage gyre.
Along life’s path, I also had chance to visit some of the forests of the world – in Asia and the Americas, where I spent my days following some of the denizens of those places. I watched orangutans lumbering through the forests of Borneo, and spider monkeys whisking through the treetops of Belize, all busy with their own lives, unknown to most, harming nothing.
Safe from the oil spill, they are nonetheless going down with their oceanic counterparts. Not willing to accept limits, ignorance, stupidity and greed now compels us to harvest every forest and field in sight to provide “biomass” as a substitute for increasingly scarce oil. The forests of Borneo – the orangutans place I visited years ago, is now covered with palm oil monoculture for “biodiesel”, poisoned with paraquat, and the orangutans slaughtered as pests.
The dolphins and sperm whales, pelicans, sanderlings and ospreys and many, many fish species in the Gulf – like the orangutans and hornbills, tigers and tapirs of the forests might ask us: How could you have let this happen? How could the human species, capable of so much art, music, compassion, curiosity and discovery...be at the same time so ignorant, disdainful, stupid and heartless: so utterly out of balance with the pulse of life?
As the dispersants were sprayed and the media told us not to worry about the oil unless it hit our coastlines, as if the rest of the ocean were more or less disposable, I did not worry about the rising price of oysters. I thought of the ocean’s creatures whose places are ruined, their bodies poisoned. Those creatures whose ways we never bothered to know or understand or care for, whose well being we failed to even consider, much less treasure and honor as cohabitants of this earth.
The decline and suffering of these creatures is largely hidden from our view, but their future existence on this planet is increasingly doubtful. Like the oil spewing from the Deep Horizon, I feel my own spirit hemorrhaging with unrelentless and profound sorrow for all that has been so thoughtlessly destroyed.
* * *
Rachel Smolker is the author of “To Touch A Wild Dolphin”, Doubleday Press 2001. She is codirector of Biofuelwatch, and an organizer with Energy Justice Network and Rising Tide North America. She has a Ph.D. in biology from the University of Michigan and now lives in Vermont. This commentary was submitted by HNN contributor Rebecca Sommer.
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