There's an old story about a little boy who was out on the beach after a big storm had washed up scores of starfish. He was throwing them back into the water, saving them from drying out and dying.
A passer-by stopped him. "Son, stop wasting your time. There are more starfish out here than you can ever throw back. You're not going to make a difference."
The boy looked back at the starfish in his hand, then looked the walker in the eye. He said, "It makes a difference to this one," turned, and went back to his work.
In a similar vein, allow me to present the first good news I've heard come out of the gulf region since the deep-water oil well ruptured: a chap with the YouTube handle of "guitarest" is doing what he can - all on his own - to save a few of the gulf's marine natives. On June 30, 2010 he wrote:
I originally set this tank up approx 3 months ago and since then the tank was slowly converted to a salt/fresh water tank so I would be able to catch local fish and keep them in a tank safe from the oil spill.
The tank now includes loads of fish I rescued from areas that might be hit by oil from the BP spill. I have wild shortfin molly's , mosquito fish (or known as guppies), pin fish, speckled trout, crawfish, hermit crab, blue crabs, a rock crab, shrimp, needle fish, and a huge bull frog tadpole.....
I am running a brackish tank and in a month I will have a larger 100 gal tank so these guys can live in a better and not so crowded environment.
Guitarest followed up on July 11 with a video, some pictures and these comments:
Ok its been a few months (since before February) when I started this project. I have gone through three different sized tanks. Sadly a few fish have died in the process of getting this tank up and running and doing what it was purchased for; a attempt to safe a few of our native fish from a death of mans mistake with the Deep Water Oil Rig...
I have let a estimated 30 fish go, and 6 larger blue crabs and the tank finally appears stabilized. I have had to do a estimated 500gal of water changes mostly due to over-crowding in the tank. As you can see the tank does appear to be...stabilized.
A tank to be proud of, indeed. My hat's off to you, sir.
I'm the Retail Marketing Director for Earth Sun Moon Trading Company, a small company that makes Nature-inspired T-shirts, and our daughter (or sister - I'm never sure which) company, Ink Pixi, which makes personalized apparel.
I'm lucky enough to be able to walk to work. As often as I can, I walk home for lunch with my two little girls - who, thankfully, take after their mother and are, consequently, beautiful.