SAN FRANCISCO, October 8 – Animals are the heartbeat of this meaningful planet. Certain animals, like Northeast Pacific Herring, are Mother Earth’s engineers. That is, they are the hub that sustains their community.
From British Columbia’s fjord-rich Inside Passage to Alaska’s famed Bering Sea and Gulf of Alaska, heralded Herring and their proteinaceous eggs (roes) feed an impressive array of predators, including hundreds of marine and terrestrial species. Fascinatingly, their carcasses provide the coastal Salmon Nation Rainforests with nitrogen, a crucial marine-derived nutrient for colossal castles, the trees. (Incidentally, Herring also feed flies that power millions of migrating songbirds).
Herring can live for 20 years and spawn up to nine times. Herring support Humpback and Gray Whales, Orcas, Sharks, Chinook Salmon, Porpoises, Dolphins, Seals, Sealions, Sea Otters, Halibut, Rockfish, Cod, Hake, Lingcod, Dogfish, Steelhead Trout, Surf Scoters, Bald Eagles, Common Murres (80 per cent of their diet during breeding season), Sea Wolves, Spirit and Black Bears and others.
Welcome to Mother’s intertwined time-tested heaven on Earth.
Let’s for a moment dial into just one Herring predator, the mysterious Humpbacks. Each year, thousands of Humpbacks overwinter amongst the warm Hawaiian Island waters. Some mate, some calve, others, juveniles, luxuriate, play and watch the adults. All the winter while, they fast. Humpbacks, like other filter-feeding (baleen) Whales depend upon tons of bubbler accumulated during the 20-hour, daily, summer feeding frenzies to tide them over for five months of winter fasting.
In May, these Majesties migrate to the cool British Columbian and Alaskan waters, their feeding grounds. After a 4800-kilometre journey, these Regal Ones are famished. On the surface, they snack upon shrimp-like krill and zooplankton, (small animals within the plush plankton mats). But that’s not nearly enough to satiate these 50-metric-ton ravenous Humpbacks. They are in search of vast schools of Herring hiding beneath.
In one of Nature’s finest feats, clans of Humpbacks fan out in formation. They dive in synchrony keeping in contact with a low vocabulary, swimming below the Herring shoal. Then the lead male does something marvellous. From his blowhole, he makes a stream of bubbles. As the bubbles rise, they create a curtain encircling the fishes, a bubble net.
At the same time, the leader unveils his stealthy acoustic weapon: a haunting war cry. This otherworldly call bounces off the rising bubble curtain and frightens the Herring into the centre of the bubble net.
Let the feast begin! Using this bubble netting technique each Whale can devour over one-metric-ton of Herring a day.
Only Humpbacks of all baleen Whales (Bowheads, Blues, Fins, Minkes, Grays, Seis, Bryde’s, Omura’s, Rices), are capable of high performing turns required for the signature bubble feeding strategy. Their unique pectoral (long) flippers enable them to perform this dazzling maneuver in all the major oceans.
Fast-forward to today. Rising ocean temperatures (from manmade global heating) are acidifying and deoxygenating the Northeast Pacific shorelines, making it much more strenuous for Herring to feed, breed and support their community. Plundering west coast fisheries (lead by billionaire Jimmy Pattison) are systematically executing Herring, shoving them closer to the brink of extinction.
‘The World has enough for everyone’s need, but not their greed,’ warned Mahatma Gandhi.
If the oceans are bankrupt and sick then we are bankrupt and sick.
Fish are Mother’s alkalisers. They excrete calcite crystals that counteract the ever-rising carbonic acid from burning fossil fuels, wood pellets and palm oil. Fish are indispensable ocean acidity combatants and carbon keepers.
Humpbacks and all the other filter-feeders (Whales) are Mother’s carbon farmers and carbon keepers. Each Masterpiece, throughout their 80+ years of patrolling and fertilising the oceans, removes in excess of 33 metric tons of carbon, biggest Majesties (Blues and Fins) 50 metric tons. When Whales die their carcasses feed billions of creatures along the ocean floors for a century before all that carbon is put to bed (for thousands or millions of years). We need every Whale alive, helping to keep the World alive.
From the sea to the land, more than 75 per cent of agricultural land is used to raise livestock and this is very inefficient. ‘We rear 80 billion farm animals each year and every one of them needs feeding,’ said Sir David Attenborough. Producing the food for such numbers of domesticated animals is demolishing the Natural World.
Each year, two million hectares of the Amazon Rainforest is being levelled to accommodate more cattle and to grow soybeans to feed more livestock.
So, what’s the answer? By switching to plant-based diets, the sun’s energy goes directly into growing our food. It’s so much more effective and freshwater smart. Farmers can produce enough food to feed 8.2 billion people using only a quarter of the land.
The World can therefore free-up an area equivalent to the United States, China, the European Union and Australia, combined. This space could then be given back to Nature and rewilded with animals, the carbon-keepers, to resuscitate our only home.
The oceans occupy 99 per cent of the planet’s living space (biosphere). For thousands of years, we have plundered marine life and natural resources. Uncle Mercy! Healing the oceans so that young people can live full lives is the path forward. This means terminating the exploiters: the fishers, fossil fuellers and ocean floor miners, forthwith.
Action is the Antidote!
Reese Halter is a bees/trees/seas defender.
Unearthly Wails is a special edition, a collection of poetry
illustrated by renowned Ojibwa artist Terry McCue.
Email: HalterBooks@gmail.com to order
