[redpoll]

This legislation protects the bacteria who live at the edge of the oil seeps on the north slope. The oil seep ecosystem in North America’s tundra wilderness is a fragile and beautiful place that deserves protection from development. Caribou, arctic fox, and polar bears regularly visit these seeps and no doubt gain much from the interaction between the earth and its creatures. Thank you, Sen. Lieberman, for saving the oil seeps and allowing my grandchildren to have the opportunity to watch dark slicks slowly gather among the saxifrage and willow while gently swatting black flies and mosquitoes amid the snorting caribou calving in the midnight sun.

[thackney]

Oh yes, we must protect the beauty of the Coastal Plain.

Beauty year round.

< /sarcasm>

[Species8472]

The native people in Kaktovik (The town that sits in the middle of the “wilderness” area) have been burning pieces of oil soaked tundra from the oil seeps as fuel for hundreds of years.