Essay 3 Brainstorming

     Wrightsville Beach, a vacation destination on the coast of North Carolina, is a place of beauty, relaxation. The community within the confines of this beach town relies heavily on tourism and nature to gain profit. A major benefit to being an island is the easy access to fresh seafood. Hundreds of fishing boats dock on the borders of the island each night and set out to reap the benefits of the wild and catch many different kinds of seafood. The island's few restaurants take seafood from the local fishermen and both the locals and tourists dine at the restaurants, therefore stimulating the local economy and making a complete cycle. While relying on nature for food and economic success is a tradition passed on through the generations of mankind, the relationship between man and nature is quickly becoming abusive and parasitic. The fish populations in the world oceans are rapidly depleting as more fish are being caught quicker than fish can reproduce. As Wrightsville Beach grows to be a bigger community due to the increasing population numbers, more people are requesting fresh seafood and more people are starting to pursue the career of a fisherman; all of these variables will ultimately lead to a fish shortage on a larger scale as there are many beach communities just like Wrightsville Beach.
     While fishing for food can be seen as an honest attempt for Wrightsville Beach to be a self-sustaining community, people do not solely live off of fresh seafood. Many other necessary food items are needed on the island, which forces the people to go off of the island and find the other food staples they need. The island is connected to the mainland by a drawbridge and a grocery store is under one mile away from the drawbridge; therefore, it is not difficult for the beach community to get other foods. Even though some of the seafood is locally caught, Wrightsville Beach is still very dependent on places for food. The need for mass production of vegetables and meats from factory farms is an epidemic that majority of the country's communities face. Wrightsville Beach is only a small fraction of the dependency but even the community on the other side of the bridge is heavily dependent on the big factory farms, partly due to the soil quality of the coastal bioregion. In an ideal world, a self-sustaining beach community would be the best option for places like Wrightsville Beach; however, with the large population, being self-sustaining is far from realistic.