Gulf of Mexico Archives - Page 15 of 35 -

Welcome to the World Baby Turtles

By Simone Lipscomb | July 19, 2013

It was a glorious afternoon. I arrived at the nest we had been watching at 4.30pm and listened with the stethoscope. One 20 second cascade of sand was heard with some crawling sounds. Over an hour later…same. And on it went for hours. Checking only once an hour and thinking the turtles were resting…but that moon might just enliven them….a girl can hope, right?

In the meanwhile one of our team members refined the trench two had dug the day before. The trench helps the turtles from wandering to porch lights, condo lights and acts as a guide for their long crawl to the beach…which is especially long since the beaches were renourished, refurbished…whatever they call it. It is a very long crawl for such tiny tots. In crowded, light-polluted areas it gives the newborns their best chance at making it to open water.

The especially loooong crawl to the water....the trench helps with the light pollution experienced on our beaches. — The especially loooong crawl to the water….the trench helps with the light pollution experienced on our beaches.

Even though my shift was officially over at 9pm I had an intuitive hunch to stay around a while. At 10pm one of our folks checked and heard very active babies. They had awakened and were busy crawling up in their nest. When I last listened at 11pm it was a constant cascade of sand…so much so that I couldn’t believe we had not had some change in the surface. Just after listening I looked and saw a very small lip of sand had formed…no greater than 1.5 inches on one side of the nest. When a friend and fellow turtle-lover joined us from her home on the beach I asked her to re-check the nest at 11.20pm. In just a few moments she was excitedly saying….hurry!! They are coming!!

Because the sand was perfectly dry and fluffy, there wasn’t a big crater until they boiled. And boil they did…..delightful loggerhead hatchlings.

I squatted just outside the nest and watched as these little darlings used the steep incline as a slide. It was perfectly beautiful, perfectly precious. I sang Happy Birthday, Happy Trails and wished them well….my usual softly-delivered welcome-to-the-world-angels speech.

Hatchling from 2012. We cannot use any lights/flashes, etc when a hatching is happening. This one was from an excavation early evening last year.

While other humans were in front of TV’s or in bars or perhaps doing some job they hate in a place they like less, a sacred gift was bestowed on all who braved the late hour to witness one of nature’s miracles. I would not trade those hours for anything I know.

During the middle of the hatching, when there was a momentary lull in the action, I checked the nest and one baby was very still under a lip of sand. After all the others had vacated and were happily (hopefully) swimming in the sea, I kept tabs on the sleepy baby. A cascade here and there as well as crawling sounds were still happening and soon another baby slid down the sand slide to begin her march to the beach. There was one active baby that ‘swam’ up in the sandy nest that actually crawled over to the resting sibling and nudged her awake. Then together they took their miraculous journey to the saltwater…the journey that reverberates with healing metaphors that offer wisdom to all who are open to the teachings.

Arriving home near 3am I found myself once again feeling in sync with nature, with the cycles of life and the hope that is always birthed with a sea turtle nest exploding into life.

Leaping

By Simone Lipscomb | July 16, 2013

I was tired and had already been in my car too long running errands earlier in the day but something pushed me out of my comfy chair in my peaceful home. I grabbed my tripod and camera and only one lens….the glorious little beastie, the Nikon 14-24 2.8.

There wasn’t a lot of color in the sky when I arrived at the beach but soft hues create gentle images so I played around under the pier and then headed east, away from condos and into undeveloped shoreline.

Maybe 500 yards from the pier I came upon a loon. Not a human dressed in black socks and sandals sporting a hawaiian shirt drinking beer and littering cans all over the beach…a real loon. The bird. Specifically a Common Loon.

She was sitting on the lip of the sand, just out of reach of the water. Loons cannot walk because their legs are so far back on their bodies. They are diving birds and spend most of their time in the water, only coming on land for nesting. (This particular one was a juvenile…which I’m still puzzling about since they typically don’t nest here but back to the story).

The bird was alert, appeared uninjured and was tolerant but wary when I slowly approached. There was no blood or indications of any problems except the obvious one–she was not in the water. She just anxiously looked at the water and then back at me. I understand that look of longing and could feel her desire to be back in her element.

It was almost dark and concerned that coyotes would make a meal out of the grounded bird, I wasn’t quite sure what to do. Nobody was available to come check on her. But heck, I thought, I used to be the state park naturalist here, I can help this bird. I worked with all kinds of birds here in the 80’s.

The beaks are very sharp but I didn’t want to handle the bird anyway. Like I used to teach scuba students, self-rescue is always best. So I spotted a large piece of styrofoam down the beach and retrieved it. It was very bright white and my loony friend had an intense dislike of it. So much so that as soon as I approached, even very slowly, she decided to make a break for the water…never mind that she really couldn’t walk. With a burst of energy she pushed herself toward an oncoming wave, shot out a trail of poop and was out past the breakers before I could understand what just happened. She rescued herself with a little coaching from me. My guess is that with the rough water she was swept onshore while fishing inside the sand bar.

The last time I saw her she was frolicking (really…I’m NOT kidding) out past the breakers and taking a much-needed saltwater bath.

I suppose we all need a little encouragement to go for what we really long for sometimes. When and why do we take action? My suspicion is the fear of staying stuck becomes greater than the fear of leaping.

To all those awaiting a Universal sign to leap…..maybe today is the day!

Service, Gratitude, Beauty

By Simone Lipscomb | May 19, 2013

Sunday at dawn finds me on the beach these days. It is my day to cover a stretch of shoreline looking for sea turtle tracks and nests. I go a little early to play with the light, the wind and water. It sets the intention of the week for me–service, gratitude and beauty.

I awakened at 4am with a dream of turtle tracks. So real was it my senses were activated…touch and smell especially. After checking email I dressed in my green turtle shirt, shorts and flip flops and headed to the beach. But even with such a vivid dream there were only human tracks, no turtle tracks, in any of our team’s assigned area.

Surprised was I that no tracks or nests were found, but so happy to be present to witness the beauty and commune with the sea. And then share breakfast with three other women who share the same love of the ocean and sea turtles as me.

We’re still waiting mama turtles and we’ll be here whenever you bless our sand once more with your babes. Until then, happy turtle dancing with your turtle ‘mans.’

Seeing

By Simone Lipscomb | May 14, 2013

Last summer I spent nights sitting under a blanket of black sky twinkling with white stars. The sound of waves lapping on the sand and humid air hugging my skin brought me into the present where I experienced the wonder of nature. Sitting quietly awaiting the birth of sea turtle hatchlings, I was gently guided to recognize and harmonize with the magnificent natural world.

A few miles east, tourists wandered through souvenir shops looking for trinkets with which to remember their vacation. Perhaps few ever understood the biggest treasures could be found sitting on a quiet beach absorbing the peace and magic of the place. While the Gulf of Mexico and beaches affected them, maybe many left never seeing the beauty….the deep beauty…or feeling their connection to it, as part of it.

I wonder if that’s why humans can so easily ignore the plight of our planet. Collectively we see through eyes blinded with superficiality: Nice ocean, nice beach…oh, look a sea gull…wow there’s another tee shirt shop….let’s buy a $20 tee shirt to remember….nice flower….nice tree…too bad they are clearing them…gotta go to work…can’t save everything….oh that’s sad about the dolphins, let’s get a tee shirt with a dolphin on it….could I have extra plastic bags for shells….just put your cigarette butts in the sand they’ll dissolve….recycling takes too much effort….

There are probably many reasons humans ignore their connection to nature. I think we’ve specialized our roles in society and have forgotten that we are entirely connected and dependent on nature for our life.

Disconnect One: A farm half way across the planet grows food for us. A fisherman catches our dinner. We show up at the grocery store and connect to our food sources by perusing the air conditioned aisles. Most of us have no idea what it takes to grow enough food to sustain our own lives.

Disconnect Two: Collectively we have bought into the mindset that more is better. We consume at alarming rates. We feed the corporate mindset that more profit is vital and so resources dwindle at any cost.

Disconnect Three: We are too busy. Our collective pace is out of sync with the timing of the seasons and movement of the Earth. This is strongly connected to the ‘more is better’ mindset. We sacrifice ourselves to feed the ‘profit at any cost’ motto.

This reminds me of The Matrix movies where humans are only used for the energy they produce for machines. They are put into a dream-world of their choosing and exist in their minds in this place while their bodies are used only for what they produce. Sound familiar?

At some point individuals break out of their bondage and begin to see life as it really is in The Matrix. It’s not easy and they struggle but the reward is awareness, consciousness…awakening.

Our fate is determined by our choices…every day choices…by what we choose to notice, to give our attention to as that is what will multiply and blossom in our lives.

The birds are singing. My garden is growing…slowly, ever so slowly. The river is flowing. I breathe in slowly…I exhale slowly. My bare feet feel the warm soil. The leaves of the trees softly rustle in the breeze. Nature embraces me as its own. This, to me, is peace. This is a small beginning in learning to see beyond….

Shady Deals on Alabama Coast

By Simone Lipscomb | May 9, 2013

*Gulf State Park shoreline is one of the last undeveloped places between Gulf Shores and Orange Beach.*

It shouldn’t surprise me. I used to work for the State of Alabama in Gulf State Park and witnessed first-hand the rape of our coast at the whim of politicians. So when I found out that much of the $85.5 million from the Natural Resource Damage Assessment (NRDA) funds from BP are going to build a lodge and meeting facility I didn’t faint…isn’t this how Alabama politicians work it?

*Walls of concrete and glass broken by undeveloped shoreline in Gulf State Park.*

Never mind that the convention center has been in the plans for years since the old one was destroyed by…what was it…Ivan? Long before the oil spill occurred and people started figuring out how to use natural resource restoration funding to build more developments on the coasts…and thus destroy the very thing the funds are supposed to restore.

Louisiana, the most hard-hit state from the 2010 BP Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill is using $340 million to restore four barrier islands and create two fisheries laboratories. That makes total sense. Imagine….using money designated to restore the natural resources to actually RESTORE NATURAL RESOURCES! What a concept! Bravo Louisiana.

Hard to believe that money designated for natural resource restoration is going to be used for CONSTRUCTION of a convention center on the beach. This photograph was taken at Gulf State Park Pier during the spill in 2010

But back to Governor Bentley of Alabama. He said that the first money Alabama will spend for the convention center will address the loss of human use from the oil spill. That’s some mighty smooth pretzel logic there governor.

“In addition to its catastrophic impact on local fishermen and tourism, the BP oil spill dealt a severe blow to our pristine beaches and sensitive environmental areas,” said U.S. Representative Jo Bonner, R-Alabama. So the way to restore our Alabama pristine beaches and sensitive environmental areas is to destroy them through the construction process. Of course. That’s makes sense…said no one ever.

The second project in Alabama will use $2.3 million in Mobile County to restore oyster beds over 300 acres. The third project will spend $5 million in Baldwin County to create an oyster breakwater and living shoreline in Weeks Bay. Both of these projects make total sense in that they utilize funds designated for N A T U R A L R E S O U R C E R E S T O R A T I O N. The old saying, throw the dog a bone, seems applicable perhaps. Of the $92.8 million Alabama is receiving, 92% goes to construction projects in Gulf State Park. Development. Oysters in Mobile County get 2% and oysters in Weeks Bay get 5%. So 7% of this ‘natural resource restoration’ funding goes to doing what its supposed to do.

But back to project number one. Thrown into the mix of the $85.5 million is an environmental research and educational facility (sort of like the one Auburn University was already planning on building here???), trail construction and an interpretive center. I didn’t hear of trails in the park being damaged by the oil spill…did you? Nor did the old convention center get destroyed by the oil spill.

I completely support environmental education but the funds are supposed to restore the natural resources that were damaged during the oil spill. Can the governor and his cronies read? Can someone find them a dictionary? My BS radar is beeping when words like environmental and education are grouped with a huge convention center construction project.

While tourism is at the highest numbers ever in Gulf Shores and Orange Beach over the past two years, politics remains the same in this state…my home state…where shady deals continue to thrive. Storm clouds loom over this news and Governor Bentley only adds to the abuse of our coastline…unless you put money and development over natural resources. Then bravo gubner.