enthalpy

Saturday, January 20, 2007


I'm no conservationist, but doesn't the same doctrine that says you should leave nature alone and let it live its live still apply when it's about to die? Take, for example, this story, or as I call it, "Teenage Frozen Comatose Turtles!"
Three dozen sea turtles are getting a little tropical vacation under heat lamps after being rescued from a cold front that caused the water temperature in an arm of the Gulf of Mexico to plummet 18 degrees in 48 hours.

"Four more coming in!" Sea Turtle Inc. curator Jeff George shouted over a din of volunteers and onlookers who, as of noon Friday, had found 36 turtles lying on the beach.

The turtles, all juveniles, had been left comatose by the rapid temperature drop this week in the shallow bay where the young feed.
So if they're coming up on a public beach, I'm supposed to leave them alone. I don't have a problem with that, nor do I have any ill will towards them. But if the temperature drops, as it does in the winter, and they freeze, why do they now warrant protection?

I was a dumb teenager and was close to a coma on many different occasions. Some people are lucky and some people aren't, just like turtles.

I just don't think you can have it both ways.



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