Our Dying Oceans
Just when you thought the news about the environment couldn’t possibly get any worse, it does. The Los Angeles Times is beginning a five-part series today that focuses on the magnitude of destruction we are unleashing on our unseen but essential ocean habitats.
The first article in the multimedia series, “A Primeval Tide of Toxins,” talks about how humanity is quickly knocking the oceans back millions of years on the evolutionary scale. The problem is with the huge amounts of human sewage and fertilizer run-off from farms being dumped into the oceans every day. These substances essentially serve as nutrients for certain species of weeds, algae, and jellyfish that are quickly choking all life around them. They threaten many species, from fish to coral reefs, with imminent extinction as the latter are deprived of oxygen and food.
The statistics and photos in the article are sobering and heart-wrenching to me:
- 75% of kelp forests, prime habitat for many fish, have disappeared off the coast of California in the last 50 years.
- 650 grey whales have washed up sick or dead along the West Coast in the last 7 years.
- 97% of elkhorn and staghorn coral off the coast of Florida has died since 1975.
- 150 ocean-depleted “dead zones” have been identified around the world, including a huge one the size of New Jersey in the Gulf of Mexico off the Louisiana and Florida coasts.
- 90% of the world’s stocks of tuna, cod, and other big fish have disappeared in the last 50 years.
One element in the story I found ironic is that some of the weeds that are now choking fishermen’s nets all over the world are extremely toxic to humans, even if you’re just splattered with water that contained the weeds. It is as if these life forms that are suddenly proliferating have somehow realized that humankind is really their worst natural enemy and have devised a suitable defense.
It doesn’t have to be that way, unless we cherish the idea of a planet with oceans full of nothing but slime for future generations and for millions of years.
Sphere: Related ContentTags: coral-reefs, environment, extinction, human-sewage, ocean-habitats, oceans, pollution, whales
This problem is also starting here in Puerto Rico our beaches are not safe to bath in anymore we cant take our children out to the beach because of our own ignorance. The beaches are contaminated people are getting nasty rashes and other things. Please we need people like greenpeace to help stop the ignorance and help us clean up our act. I feel for California and other countrys that have this same problem, but we also need help and soon before is to late and all of our water are highlly contaminated and all is lost that how I feel because nothing is beig don ,and the goverment says ther’s no money we dont need money to educate correctlly. That is the most important start.
I hear you, and agree.
My husband and I visited British Columbia in July.
He saw ‘colorful’ trees, large numbers of them intermixed with the pines and wondered what they could be. Turned out …
DEAD is what they are.
The pine beetle requires periods of adequate cold weather to kill it or put it into dormancy long enough to prevent rampant spread throughout pine forests.
We estimated that 1/4 to 1/3 of the pines are gone in British Columbia. They cannot harvest them fast enough to slow the spread of the beetle and the inevitable death of the trees in which they bore and lay eggs.
In my own garden, the growing season is off by about a month. What consequences does this have on a finely tuned ecosystem in which each element depends on the other for survival? Will bees and migrating birds that pollinate and spread seed be present when plants start a full month later than usual? What about the birds and insects who feed on parts of plants that may not be ready when the birds need them?
Obvious … I know … but distressing. What will our children and grandchildren face on a once beautiful synchronous planet?
I hear you..here in DC the cherry blossoms have been blossoming so early that they were already gone by the time we had the cherry blossom festival, which had previously always coincided with the blooms. They ended up having to move the festival earlier by several weeks.
I’ve heard of the pine beetle menace..it’s really very sad.