Final JUNK PSA and arrival details
Sunday, August 24, 2008

PSA #8 from JUNK: Solving The Problem:

As for the arrival:
JUNK will be pulling into the Ala Wai Fuel Dock at around 10:00 am, Wednesday the 27th, to what we hope will be a wonderful welcoming. All are invited! Give a call Tuesday if you want more exact arrival times: 310-998-8616

After a few days of rest, showers, fresh food, and reconnecting with their land legs, JUNK's crew will join Surfrider, The Nature Conservancy, The Kokua Foundation, and others at Sunset on the Beach, for music, activities, booths, food, and a word or two from JUNK (and perhaps Roz!)

Also on the program is an evening event at the Hawaii Yacht Club on September 3rd, with slides and tales; a press conference with Roz Savage and her Brocade on September 4th at the Waikiki Aquarium, and a North Shore party Saturday September 6th at Kainoa's Bar.

Details to come - hope to see you on Wednesday! Read more!
Posted by Anna at 5:35 PM 9 comments
Joel's bristleworm and marine debris
Less than 100 miles to go per recent satellite phone conversation!

And a few words from Joel on a recent pet he found on a piece of floating debris:

While on watch earlier this week I spotted something large floating towards us. I put JUNK hard over and managed to scoop up a chunk of a plastic crate. We often see plastic crates in the Gyre. I’m not sure way we see so many. Maybe a nearby fishery uses - and often loses them overboard. The crate had started the process of photodegredation. Not only did we fid a bristleworm hitching a ride, it was brittle, cracked, and had the owner’s name or boat’s initials “JR” with a floral design melted into. Anybody know any fisherman named JR missing a crate?
Read on for Joel's continued Marine Debris Observations

Now that we are in the North Pacific Gyre the amount of debris that floats by has greatly increased. Last week I saw a basketball sized ball of rope float by. The fish that have been with us since they hatched and were recently swimming around with their yolk sack still attached, swam out to check the ball of rope out. They came back to JUNK with some friends, two black and white fish that all are also staying with us now.

When getting in the water to spear Mahi Mahi it’s almost like swimming through a snow globe of plastic confetti. From the surface you may only see a fleck of plastic here and there but once in the water you can see the plastic bits floating deeper in the water column. I’ve seen the all too common packing strap both on the surface and underwater while diving. JUNK’s debris trawl does a great job of collecting the plastic fragments from the surface and concentrating them into a sample that make quite a visual impact when you hold in our hand and see all the little plastic pieces swirling around. It’s a great way of educating people on land about the magnitude of the problem, but getting in the water in the middle of the ocean and seeing more plastic floating around me than life make even more of an impact and gives me profound feeling that we are smothering the planet with all of our synthetic waste.

180 miles to go!
Friday, August 22, 2008

Just 180 miles to go. We’re almost due north of Hilo. This morning I scanned the deck for flying fish and found one. I’ll likely use it as bait to catch another Rainbow Runner. Joel and I think constantly about making landfall next week. I want a fresh salad and Joel wants a beer. What we don’t want: ANY MORE FISH!

(Our intrepid sailors don't know this yet, nor can they read the blog....but thanks to Kona Brewing company, they will have cold ones awaiting their arrival!)

We’re still catching fish though. Joel is making jerky for his friends in Honolulu. Right now, we’re more interested in the guts than the meat. Ever since finding that Rainbow Runner filled with plastic, we’ve collected 4 more of them and two Mahi Mahi. Of the four little fish, three were 4-5 inches with empty stomachs. The 8-inch Rainbow Runner had plastic in its gut. The Mahi Mahi were empty. We would like to catch one with fish still in it’s stomach, then dissect the stomach contents to see if big fish are eating little fish that eat plastic. And here is the rest of it. Read more!
Posted by Anna at 7:02 PM 3 comments
Plastic Sushi:
Here it is.....this should be all the reason we need to start seriously reexamining our trashy ways.

Groundbreaking JUNK News: Plastic Sushi
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
We remember seeing little 1-inch fish with yolk sacks still attached swimming next to JUNK 5 weeks ago. They followed our raft, enjoying the security of its undulating underbelly with nooks and crannies to hide in. They would ride what little bow wake JUNK created, and at times keeping up with the raft at 3 knots. Now they are a foot long, with yellow stripes, and there are fewer of them.

This morning I awoke to find two thumb-size flying fish on board. They became bait and soon I had one of the yellow fish on deck. I cut two fillets out of it and then opened it’s stomach. It was full of plastic. A dozen large fragments, and nothing else, filled the tiny stomach to capacity. There is no way this fish, at this size, will be able to pass those fragments.

These plastic particles, including one pre-production plastic pellet, are sinks for several persistent organic pollutants. PCBs, DDT and PAHs from the incomplete burning of fossils fuels, absorb into plastic marine debris, making the particles toxic. From the size of the particles inside the stomach, and the size of the fish’s cloaca, there is no way this fish can pass the plastic through its body. Therefore there will likely be a long residence period. Will the toxins in the plastic leach into the tissues of the fish?

This question about migration of toxins into the fisheries we harvest is the question we want to know now. Is plastic marine debris a vector for pollutants to enter the food chain and eventually your dinner plate?

To date, 267 species have been known to ingest or be entangled by plastic. Captain Charles Moore recently discovered #268, the 2-4 inch nocturnal lantern fish. Half of the specimens collected had plastic in their guts. One even had 84 individual fragments. Our fish, #269, adds to the list of marine organisms impacted by manmade synthetic compounds.

Please check out our website to see what research we are conducting on plastic in the marine environment. In the meantime, can anyone identify this fish to the species level? Read more!
Posted by Anna at 11:53 PM 14 comments
Jack Johnson Foundation and JUNK press!
A few exciting bits of recent media for Algalita and JUNK:

Algalita was chosen to be a partner for Jack Johnson's All At Once campaign, joining people from around the world who are active in their communities, to inspire and create positive change.

From now until September 14th, any donation sent to Algalita will be matched by the Johnson Ohana Charitable Foundation - up to $2500. And every time viewers watch our video on the website (currently featuring JUNK), AMRF receives a donation.

And on the media front, JUNK has received some wonderful recent press as the ETA approaches - yesterday's Honolulu Star Bulletin ran a great article on the JUNK - Roz meetup, and the Honolulu Advertiser also plugged the arrival.

And Joel's home town paper in Lafayette also ran an article. The word is spreading far and wide.

This was, and continues to be our ultimate goal: to draw attention to Algalita's critical research on plastic debris, and get people talking about solutions. The growing accumulation of plastic in our oceans may well have devastating impacts on marine ecosystems - impacts we are only just beginning to understand. Our window for addressing this problem will disappear unless we have greater public awareness, enlightened leadership, and engaged citizens. We're all responsible. Read more!
Posted by Anna at 3:24 PM 1 comments
Monday, August 18, 2008
The home stretch!
We crossed 500 two days ago, 400 this afternoon, and we expect to arrive in Honolulu in 8 more days. It definitely feels like the home stretch now. Maintenance is still paramount, but new projects are off the table. There are only standing watches and passing time left to do. We still drag the marine debris trawl behind us. Still, every sample is filled with small fragments of plastic debris.

Today, to celebrate the 400 mark, we had cheesecake. We've been hording a stock of freeze dried food that was given to us on the dock before we departed by a Dave, a volunteer for the project. "You might need these." Two and a half months later, you were absolutely right. And of course, thanks to Roz Savage we are enjoying a delightful assortment of dehydrated meals and Larabars. We often wonder where she is right now.

As I close this email there are 383 miles to go. At 1.7 knots, we should be enjoying pizza soon.

Meanwhile, plans are coming together for a wonderful arrival celebration, in collaboration with Roz Savage. Details to come for all the Hawaii folks.