Thursday, February 16, 2023

Whose environment is it? Ours!

 I recently watched a presentation by a fisheries biologist regarding the fishing pressures and fish stock structure of a nearby trout stream. The essence of the presentation was that the current fishing regulations include a possession limit of 3 fish and a minimum size of 12 inches. The majority of fish in the stream are in the six to ten inch class. To improve the fishery structure [to what end?], the preference is to change the regulations to a maximum size of 12 inches and a possession limit of five fish.

trout stream? polluted? who’d know?
trout stream? polluted? who’d know?
Photo by J. Harrington

I’ve read about other fisheries where the biologists claim that an overabundance of smaller panfish precludes the ability of the habitat to produce fewer, bigger fish. I believe I understand the concepts involved but I have major doubts that the fisheries folks have clearly enough defined the problem they’re trying to solve to be confident their proposed solutions will work without generating unintended consequences in today’s world, a world in which “New research from Stockholm University found that the levels of PFAS in rainwater now exceed levels deemed safe by health and environment advisory agencies.” 

For example, recent stories about PFAS/PFOS in fish indicate more and more of our environment has become contaminated. Other articles note just how ubiquitous those contaminants have become. For example, Minnesota’s Fish Consumption Advisory [FCA] goes on for 25 pages, mostly because of mercury contamination, but we’ve been sampling for mercury much longer and probably more extensively than for PFOS. According to the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency:

PFAS testing began in Minnesota’s lakes and streams in 2004, which has led to fish-consumption advisories due to perfluorooctane sulfonic acid (PFOS) levels in fish tissue. PFOS is just one of the almost 5,000 PFAS chemicals. Continued monitoring is needed; many Minnesota lakes and streams that are potentially contaminated by PFAS have not been tested.

Please note that the FCA is issued by the Health Department, the water quality is overseen by the MNPCA and fishing regualtions are set by the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources. Presumably, many other states, and the federal government, have a plethora of agencies involved in the permitting of intermedia transfer of pollutants that ultimately end up in our bodies and cause health issues for which each of us must pay for treatment. This state of affairs is yet another reason citizens should be able to petition for the termination of corporate charters so remediation costs don’t just continue as a cost of business (See, e..g., fossil fuel industry.)

If you’re reading this and you live, work or play in Minnesota, you might want to let your state legislators know how you feel about a bill to ban nonessential use of PFAS. Here’s some background that includes a link for contacting your legislators.


There It Is


My friend
they don't care
if you're an individualist
a leftist  a rightist
a shithead or a snake
They will try to exploit you
absorb you  confine you
disconnect you  isolate you
or kill you

And you will disappear into your own rage
into your own insanity
into your own poverty
into a word a phrase a slogan a cartoon
and then ashes

The ruling class will tell you that
there is no ruling class
as they organize their liberal supporters into
white supremacist lynch mobs
organize their children into
ku klux klan gangs
organize their police into
killer cops
organize their propaganda into
a device to ossify us with angel dust
preoccupy us with western symbols in
african hair styles
inoculate us with hate
institutionalize us with ignorance
hypnotize us with a monotonous sound designed
to make us evade reality and stomp our lives away
And we are programmed to self-destruct
to fragment
to get buried under covert intelligence operations of
unintelligent committees impulsed toward death
And there it is

The enemies polishing their penises between
oil wells at the pentagon
the bulldozers leaping into demolition dances
the old folks dying of starvation
the informers wearing out shoes looking for crumbs
the life blood of the earth almost dead in
the greedy mouth of imperialism
And my friend
they don't care
if you're an individualist
a leftist  a rightist
a shithead or a snake

They will spray you with
a virus of legionnaire's disease
fill your nostrils with
the swine flu of their arrogance
stuff your body into a tampon of
toxic shock syndrome
try to pump all the resources of the world
into their own veins
and fly off into the wild blue yonder to
pollute another planet

And if we don't fight
if we don't resist
if we don't organize and unify and
get the power to control our own lives
Then we will wear
the exaggerated look of captivity
the stylized look of submission
the bizarre look of suicide
the dehumanized look of fear
and the decomposed look of repression
forever and ever and ever
And there it is


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