The big waves off our Outer Banks beaches roll on endlessly, and so does controversy over beach-driving restrictions intended to protect nesting seabirds and turtles. By and large, surf fishermen are in one camp, environmental groups in another. All await the National Park Service's final rules regulating motor-vehicle access to beaches along the Cape Hatteras National Seashore.
Meanwhile, as we humans flap our gums, the birds and turtles that nest along our coast, some of them sadly depleted in number, are having a banner year. Something about the spring and summer of 2010 - few damaging storms, plenty of turtle chow, the beach-driving prohibitions, who knows? - led to record numbers of piping plover and American oystercatcher chicks' learning to fly, and to bigger hatches of sea turtle eggs.
That's a gain worth nurturing. Just about everyone, be they fisherman or bird watcher or both, appreciates these wonderful creatures so dependent on the margins of the sea, and wishes them to thrive.
