I am holding up OK, I am struggling with the online classes a lot, mostly because I cannot learn very well through videos and readings alone. I have already missed multiple assignments mostly due to my horrible electronic skills and trouble navigating the blackboard website. I am working from 8:30 AM to 5:00 pm every weekday babysitting for a family friend who is in charge of setting up the wing of our hospital (Queen of the Valley) that is taking in all of the new patients from the virus. It feels good to be helping out but it is a lot of the day taken up and I don’t have much time to focus on school work. I genuinely miss having classes, I really took the face to face interactions and teaching for granted. I just hope this gets better soon.

Use of the word distill was an interesting way to describe processing another source and using it to form your own thesis. summarizing the primary sources will help you make your analysis more convincing. Being well red on the topic helps it to be strongly rooted in fact instead of being based on hazy recollection. The general task is to showcase you ideas, you analysis of the topic, and your source material.

True summary is more of a recap of the main points. Another type of summary is the interpretative summary.

My Environmental issue that I chose to write about is overfishing, particularly over fishing in the oceans. The reason I wanted to write about this is because I have always been interested in the ways that overfishing affects not only the environment as a whole but the different species of fish and their habitats. When looking for a nonprofit that opposed the regulation of fishing, I could thankfully not find one. There were plenty for the regulation of fishing but none against it. This is probably due to the fact that there are more often areas lacking in regulation rather than areas that have too much regulation. The effort to regulate fishing has only really been under way in recent years so it makes sense that there hasn’t been enough regulation to the point to where it would cause many problems. The key words and phrases that I was using to try to find the potential opposing nonprofit group were, “Nonprofit opposed to regulating fishing”, and “Non profit for non regulated fishing”.  Even with those searches I was still only fishing lists of groups that were dedicated to regulating fishing and saving our oceans. There are differences in fishing being regulated and fishing just being illegal all together. There are probably places in which fishing is illegal and people or groups stand to profit from fishing in the area, however most of these areas are too small to constitute an entire nonprofit organization being devoted to it. Overall the issue of over fishing is an issue that is very complicated and is only beginning to be regulated, so organizations that are against the regulation of fishing are hard to find.

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Many hygiene products including makeup, soaps, hair products, and others are tested on animals and commonly rabbits. This includes the product being placed directly on the animal’s bare skin and in their eyes to see if the animal shows any sort of reaction. Now when I was researching the different labeling of these products it seemed that the products under the leaping bunny program are the ones that you can trust the most. Around 1996 cruelty free shopping had become a popular label and many of the companies coming up with these labels claimed to be “cruelty free”. These labels were often times misleading. While other labels may not test their products on animals there was testing being done somewhere along the line and that is often done at the companies that they buy from. So often times companies do have parts of their products tested on animals however claim to not be tested on animals because they just put the indigence together. On the other hand the leaping bunny label is comprised of eight nation animal protection groups to help the consumer out. The leaping bunny label is the only label that goes around to all of their providers and makes sure that no ingredient or material that goes into their product has been tested on animals. At the end of the day it is really hard to tell if the label you are buying from is being genuine with their claims. Just like the labels on the eggs, what the companies claim can oftentimes be misleading. The leaping bunny program had done a great job of being transparent with their objectives.

The name pasture raised is pretty self explanatory, The hens that produce the eggs are raised on a pasture with plenty of room to roam around(not confined to barns or cages). The brand pasture raised stated from a family that began selling the eggs under the label by themselves, now they are connected with more than 200 families that also share the same sentiment for raising chickens.

The benefits of pasture raised eggs. You are not only benefiting the lives of the hens but in the end of the day the better treatment of the hens leads to a better and more healthy egg. Because the hens are roaming around drinking fresh water and eating bugs off the ground it produces a more nutrient rich egg. The eggs actually look visibly different once the shells are cracked. Most store bought eggs have a more yellow colored yoke but the pasture raised eggs have a more rich orange color. Studies have also shown that pasture raised eggs have higher levels of Omega 3s, Vitamin A, and Vitamin E than traditional eggs.

Personally I grew up in a household where we had our own chickens and they had about an acre to roam around. Waking up in the morning to go get the eggs from the chicken coop and looking after the hens making sure predators can’t get to them makes you have a much greater appreciation for where your food comes from. Overall pasture raised eggs are beneficial to both the animals and the humans that consume their eggs.

In 2012 Koala bears were determined to be vulnerable, Now in 2020 after the recent mass habitat destruction due to rampant wild fires in Australia they are considered endangered. Up to 30% of the already vulnerable species were killed in the fires. Now that this has taken place the majority of the koala bear populations exists in captivity. The Australian government has issued 50 million dollars to go to an emergency effort to help save and recuperate the species. Kola’s are not a vital part of the ecosystem however the dismissal of any animal from its place in the ecosystem is almost never a good thing. In these recent wildfires 13 other species have also become endangered and the combination of all of these endangerment will devastate the ecosystem and only make it harder for the forest and vegetation to recover. Before koala bears can be reintroduced into the environment there needs to be a good amount of time to let the vegetation and trees grow back because the koala bear’s habitat and food source come from the trees. Koala bears spend their entire lives eating leaves and sleeping so they would appear to many to be a non vital part to the environment but they do play a part in the food chain. Koala’s are also an animal that many people associate with Australia and when they travel they look forward to seeing koala bears. This is probably why the endangerment of the koalas has been such big news and the main species that is focused on when talking about the fires in Australia.

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My article was written in 2020 by Jim Robbins https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/10/science/grizzly-bears-deaths.html

           This article directly addresses the problem of trains and cars being responsible for the rising amount of grizzly bear deaths in Montana, specifically in Glacier national park. I have been to glacier national park twice and I would hate to see any of its beauty changed by fluctuating wildlife populations. In case you are not familiar, Yellowstone National Park located in the same state, developed a lower level of vegetation growth and an overall decline in the activity of the entire ecosystem due to the removal of wolves from the park many years ago. The decline in the activity of the ecosystem is referred to as a trophic cascade, and I would hate for this to happen In Glacier. However it appears that will not be an issue as the grizzly bear population has come roaring back to a high of 1,051 from a low of about 350. While this is good news it does not change the fact that the amount of grizzly bear deaths due to trains and cars are increasing.

If the high death rates continue they may affect the way that the bear population is managed. However the company responsible for the trains that have killed the bears claim that there trains are not responsible for all of the deaths and it seems that it is going to be a hard time discerning who is responsible for what and what should be down about it. Overall I hope the issues are resolved and the bear population can remain at its high levels without being affected by the trains.

Our first paper and this blog post is on the topic of my major, which is interesting because I am contemplating changing my major right now so this will hopefully serve as a helpful tool to evaluate my options. I am currently in mechanical engineering, I do enjoy certain aspects of the engineering major like the math that is involved and the creativity I can show in my solid works design class. However the engineering major has far more time spent sitting in front of a computer than I was initially aware of. It is true that a part of me wants to stay in Mechanical Engineering for the pay once a graduate but I don’t Know if that is such a good idea.

Another career option that has me very intrigued is firefighting or some sort of first response job. I’ve spent a year at an explorers post and went to an academy. My favorite aspects of these experiences are spending time outside and having a emphasis on fitness. I legitimately enjoy training and practicing to be a firefighter and I haven’t even experienced the most intriguing parts of the job yet. I have far more passion for firefighting than I do for engineering, however choosing a major that is complementary to fire fighting is tricky. I guess these are some of the issues that I will try to elaborate more on in my paper. I hope to make a final decision on my major by the end of this semester.

252 words.—–by John Moss

I have lived in Napa, my home town, for 18 years. Napa is a town that is very centered around the local agriculture. If you don’t know the Napa valley is famous for wine, meaning that every open field is sure to be drowning in grape vines. If you are visiting the Napa Valley and you are over 21 you are probably coming to wine taste because god knows there isn’t much for kids to do in Napa. Children and teenagers in the Napa valley don’t have much to do, you have to either play sports or you will run out of activities to do. Other than that the Napa valley is great.

While the wine is a big tourist attraction the scenery is equally attracting to tourists. The sweeping hills covered in grape vises, with amazing sunsets every night really tie the valley together. Growing up around this can cause you become desensitized to how beautiful the valley really is. Every morning when I would drive to school I would have a view that people travel thousands of miles to see. I most definitely took this for granted at the time but now that I am older I can appreciate it more.

Similar to towns like Paradise, Napa has been battered by wild fires recently, most notably in October or 2016. It was hard to see so many local parks, hiking trails, bike routs, and amazing views destroyed. But seeing the resurgence of vegetation and helping to reconstruct some of the trails in the area really made me appreciate my town more. To think that all of that beauty can be taken away over night is humbling. Napa is a great town and will definitely be a prime destination for travelers for many years to come.

By-John Moss

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Be yourself; Everyone else is already taken.

— Oscar Wilde.

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