Queen

By Kathleen Ross

Queen is a digital painting. It depicts a woman looking through binoculars as a Queen Conch looks up at her. If you look closely, another Queen is nestled in her hair. Conches play an important role in the marine ecosystem that ties together the mangroves, sea grasses, and coral reefs. They serve to remove dead plants from the sea grass beds, ensuring their viability. Queen Conches are prey to sharks and turtles, which sustains the ecosystem as well. People also eat the sea snail throughout the Caribbean Islands. Due to overfishing, Queen Conches face extinction. Their role in maintaining their ecosystem is important enough that losing this animal could threaten the sustainability of the coral reefs and mangrove forests. Just the loss of the animal would devastate the people who rely on them for food. Scientists believe that following simple guidelines can help restore the vitality of the Queen Conch. This would help keep the environment in balance while allowing people to sustain a living from the fishing industry. Fortunately, there is some cooperation between the scientists and the people. Seeing the problem and facing it is part of the long term solution. The binoculars represent that willingness to look at a problem and try to solve it.