Look Who Visited Our Harbor!

[Stu Fyfe]

Who says there's no global warming?
http://www.capecodonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081002/NEWS/81002012

[TonyH]

Wow! And of course, where there's manatees... there's 'gators!:D

What next - dugongs and crocs in Port Phillip Bay? We'll have to get our Melbournian correspondents to keep their eyes open.

[Paul Pless]

"It looked like a giant ball of seaweed," Kevin Spear added.He certainly didn't mistake it for a mermaid.:D

[Stu Fyfe]

I'm going on a manatee safari this weekend! Glad I still have Redwing in the water.

[coelacanth2]

Manatees were once common in the Chesapeake, where they apparently contributed very positively to the local ecology. An entry in an early diary or log reveals their fate..."and they tasteth like the finest Beef"

[Yeadon]

A head of lettuce and a shotgun. That's the way we hunt 'em back in the swamp.

[Captain Blight]

I think about as bad as I've ever felt in my adult life was the time I hooked into a manatee while snook fishing in Florida. I'm not even sure it felt it, but I will say it ran out 300 yards of 80-lb test and didn't slow down at all. Didn't speed up much, either; it was like hooking a F-350.

[Paul Pless]

fishing for snook with 80# test:confused::rolleyes:

[Ian McColgin]

Maybe it read an old remark by Dixie Lee Ray and was looking for the Pilgrim discharge.

[Captain Blight]

fishing for snook with 80# test:confused::rolleyes:
Oh damn, man, it was the first rod that came to hand when I had a free hour for lunch that day. It was spooled with Spiderwire and I like that stuff, really easy-casting. Also a little spendy. Lots of mistakes got made that day.

[ishmael]

Back to the original topic. A few manatee at Cape Cod don't global warming make. I'll bet they've been seen there before. A bit outside their defined range, but not terribly odd.

Amusing looking critters. BIG! With the advent of high speed power boats they've had a time of it in more Southern waters because they like to loll near the surface. I understand stricter enforcement of speed limits in confined waters has helped.

[GoldDogs]

I grew up an hours drive from the Cape Cod Canal at Sandwich (Mass Bay, to the North) and lived there for 35 years. I Used to fish down there often. I have never heard of Manatees in the area before, Bonito yes.

Call "Red Top Sporting Goods" and ask them what the record is for a Manatee.

I talked to Gordan a dragger capt out of Scituate(Mass) while I was on the Vineyard in 91, he fished both sides of the Cape for 20 years prior and told of types of fish he caught regularly on the North side the last few years that never had been up there before.

Schoolie Bluefin Tuna didn't come North of the Cape before because they didn't have the body mass to keep warm, now you can find charter boats all over the North side to hook you up with them.

It used to snow from X mas through Feb at least, mostly rain now for 15 years years. I was in Quincy in mid January about 7 years ago, a rose was in full bloom, shrubs bright green. HAlloween used to be killing frost time.

thunder and lightning in the Winter? never once saw that my first 30 years down there, then it was common a few times each Winter. Same here.

Gardeners in England are growing plants many zones warmer than they could not long ago.

of course the climate is heating up and it should be obvious that man is doing most of it.

[Stu Fyfe]

Had my last sail of the season today. Looks like our manatee has moved on.

[Stu Fyfe]

He's Back!!!
http://www.capecodonline.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20081009/NEWS/810090318http://images.capecodonline.com/apps/pbcsi.dll/bilde?

[Milo Christensen]

He's dead. (http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2008/10/13/manatee_dies_before_reaching_rehab_site/)

[Dave_C]

I grew up an hours drive from the Cape Cod Canal at Sandwich (Mass Bay, to the North) and lived there for 35 years. I Used to fish down there often. I have never heard of Manatees in the area before, Bonito yes.
Call "Red Top Sporting Goods" and ask them what the record is for a Manatee.
.....of course the climate is heating up and it should be obvious that man is doing most of it.


Relax, it's just your aluminim foil hat leaking. The historic range of the manatee is believed to be as far north as New Jersey.

[gregleeber]

Kewl, soon the ice caps will have melted enough so I can shoot these manatees from my porch in Oklahoma. I hear they're great after twelve hours on the smoker!

Course I'm already shootin them damn liberals !

[Captain Blight]

Relax, it's just your aluminim foil hat leaking. The historic range of the manatee is believed to be as far north as New Jersey.
I don't know what your maps of the USA look like, but on every one I've examined, New Jersey is a good bit south of Brewster, Mass.

[Dave_C]

I don't know what your maps of the USA look like, but on every one I've examined, New Jersey is a good bit south of Brewster, Mass.

I know how to read a map skip. Chesapeake Bay has strong historic record of pre-columbian resident manatee population. Points south of there are taken for granted. Points north of there as far as Delaware Bay NJ were likely the "normal" northern range for the species. Considering that the previous hysterical post was asking us to conlcude that a manatee in Cape Cod waters in 2008 is evidence of global warming, I was merely pointing out that the historic range was much farther north than what most people assume. Logic would dictate that if industrial activity is warming the Earth, and that if pre-Columbian oceans were colder then they are at this time, then the Chesapeake and Delaware Bays must have been colder 500 years ago when manatees were common there. Even if we set that aside, it is not such a stretch to see how a manatee then or now could wander within this historic range and end up in Cape Cod waters by being swept up in the gulf stream. I would have been more impressed if it showed up off of Greenland, but then again, Greenland was warmer 1000 years ago when the Norse arrived wasn't it . ;)

[Captain Blight]

faulty logic would suggest that that might be true. Now: For the record, I agree with some of what you said; I don't get how in the same paragraph you can say that the Chesapeake and Delaware Bays were colder then, shortly after Greenland was warmer. Do what now, yo? I also just don't understand how anyone can look at the records available and not conclude that the Earth is indeed getting warmer. That's not under contention: What is, is why. Most good, peer-reviewed research does point fairly strongly to human influence. I also wouldn't be surprised if GW is in (small) part due to aftereffects from volcanic eruptions in the later half of the 20th Century. Anybody who says man can't have an effect on the environment should ask Clevelanders why their river caught on fire.

[Dave_C]

faulty logic would suggest that that might be true. Now: For the record, I agree with some of what you said; I don't get how in the same paragraph you can say that the Chesapeake and Delaware Bays were colder then, shortly after Greenland was warmer.

Relative to Chesapeake and Delaware being colder, that was merely a nod to your religion for the sake of illustraiting a point. If industrial activity is warming the Earth at dangerous rates and we are all in imminent peril, "Earth in the Balance" and all that, then a pre-industrial age ocean of 500 years ago MUST have been markedly colder, No? I'm willing to concede the point and agree with you that the ocean was probably about the same temperature 500 years ago as it is now. Regarding Greenland, History tells us that the Norse arrived there around 900ADish and established a colony which vanished around 1400AD. Science has since proven that the colony died because the northern hemisphere entered a mini "Ice Age" about 1400 that is only now ending.( Hmmm, I wonder if that could explain anything), The Norse were not prepared to adapt to the new colder conditions and the colony died out. See PBS series ;
"Secrets of the Dead: The Lost Vikings of Greenland"

...where extensive scientific proof of this is collected, analysed and presented. Cool stuff, Ice cores, fossilized humans,dogs, and flies.

[Captain Blight]

(1) I'm an atheist, you dip. I have no religion and I think Al Gore's a sanctimonious douche.

(2) I've seen the PBS series.