> Depending on how permanent Sharpie markers really are, I may have managed to confuse anthropologists years from now, who will surely wonder how it is that hermit crabs on Jabonwod are numbered.
That is awesome.
That is awesome.
I don't think he has done much damage to these crabs, it's insignificant, but he's ruining the beauty that nature has to offer him. He's also ruining it for others and that's more annoying.
I'm sure he was pleased to discover this untouched place, he's gesture in my opinion is selfish because he is depriving others from the experience he had, he's even saying at some point :
I thought I was watching a large graceful bird in flight, like a red-tailed hawk [...] I was watching a large manta ray, spotted and absolutely beautiful.
Now I'm not sure this mantra would have seem so beautiful to him if someone had written his name on it for example.
Agreed the Sharpie might disapear in a few days, I'm more concerned about the behaviour : he was bored so he wrote on crabs.
You would find it charming but I would find it sad. We don't know who else might visit this area and by what frequency, just by respect for other people who may not be pleased by such a gesture and because he doesn't own the place he shouln'd have done that. It really seems just like a basic outdoor camping rule to me.
You can't "leave no trace". The animals that noticed you behave differently now. Your footprints diverted an insect. (And, if you were riding a horse, the water that pooled in the hoof prints kept a Texas Ranger alive.) Your "waste" poisoned one thing and provided nutrients to another.
You can argue that these things don't count, but the line isn't as bright as your aesthetic revulsion requires.