Bigger Is Better

People may not think it, but whales are an extremely important organism in the ocean biome. Due to their immense size, the carbon that is stored within them greatly affect their environment. Humans have impacted the ocean biomes by reducing the abundance of several large marine vertebrates. These marine vertebrates consist of whales, sharks, and other large fish. A major consequence of removing these organisms is the inability to store carbon, due to the significant loss of organisms that could store it in their bodies.

Particularly immense whales that most individuals focus on relating to this topic are baleen whales. Whaling is takes a crucial part in reducing the amount of carbon being stores into whales. Humans will kill the baleen whales, while their carcasses will be left untouched and will sink. After whaling occurred, baleen whale populations store 9.1 X 10^6 tons less carbon. This is a significant decrease in carbon storing, hence making it a noticeable matter in the ocean biomes.

There is a beneficial side to organisms in the ocean biome with whaling, however. With the decrease in baleen whales, crustaceans will increase in population. However, since a shift towards smaller animals have occurred with the absence of several larger predators, this could decrease the total community biomass by 30% or more. With whaling occurring currently, carbon spread is decreased throughout the biome. Whales and other large marine animals can spread carbon while they're alive from the surface throughout the biome, due to their immense size. Overall, whaling produces more problems than it does resolutions.  

 http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=human+impact+on+carbon+cycle+article&source=web&cd=5&ved=0CEgQFjAE&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.plosone.org%2Farticle%2Finfo%253Adoi%252F10.1371%252Fjournal.pone.0012444&ei=18WZUOiAMuuy0AHZ3oHYBg&usg=AFQjCNGHtvhaoGG0uPChzI3epBTe98nvGQ

DDT Is Still Here

For my article I chose an article with the title " High Levels of DDT still present in fish. The chemical DDT was banned because seven though it gets rid of many pests and diseases such as malaria, it is very harmful to us as humans. It can ruin parts of our nervous and reproductive system. 

The reason why this is a big problem is that even though DDT was banned, it is still present in our biosphere today. When the chemical was banned, many companies just dumped it Ito sewers and waste ways, which led it straight into the ocean. Since many fish live in the ocean, they now have very high DDT levels.

This is a very big problem. DDT can be very toxic to some fish and kills a lot of them. When humans eat the fish, we can get very high levels of DDT as well, and according to many studies, cause brain problems and even more serious diseases than it wards off,like cancer in your liver.

This topic relates to our Biology class in particular. We learned about Biomagnification a few weeks ago. This is truly a problem now. Since these fish live in the ocean, there is a very high risk for humans. First, if you go swimming in these parts of the ocean could potentially give you some levels of DDT, but also eating the fish could cause an even more serious problem. This chemical is toxic and will permanently damage most humans.

Another way this topic relates to our Biology class is because we were talking a few weeks ago about the harmful chemicals such as PCBs and DDT being released all over the biosphere. These chemicals have been banned for a long time, but it doesn't mean the problem has gone away.

We, as humans need to be aware of the dangers of these chemicals. They have been banned, but some traces could be still left in the air. We need to be cautious about what we put in our wasteways, because it could potentially come back to us. If people eat the contaminated fish, it will be very damaging to their health and the health of people around them. We should be more aware of how much damaging chemicals are really around us.

http://www.naturalnews.com/021527_DDT_water_pollution.html

Locust Swarms Pose Threat

The article I chose to read is called "On the Horizon, a Dreaded Wave of Locusts", by Emma Bryce. This article was written on November 1st 2012 and it can be found in The New York Times. The article focuses on the large locus swarms in Africa's Sahel region. Swarms of billions of locusts are moving northwards from Africa's Sahel region to countries like Algeria, Libya, Morocco and Mauritania. These swarms of locusts are a great danger to the environment because they can consume more than its own weight each day, posing a threat to harvests and food security. Mr. Keith Cressman who is the senior locust forecasting officer for the F.A.O. states "The situation we face now, it's the most serious since the last regional plague." Even though locusts are a serious environmental issue, there is treatment that is being done to the amount of locusts under control. Teams work to capture young locust that cannot fly yet and spray adult locust with pesticides.

 

This article relates to our biology class because we have learned about insecticides like DDT which is a chemical that bioaccumulates. In the past, I have heard about locusts and that they can grow up to six inches long. From this article, I learned that locusts are a threat to the environment. I think it is good that we are trying to control the number of locusts because it seems like these swarms are getting out of our control. I find it fascinating that locusts travel by the billions and when they fly, they appear as a black mass. Mr. Cressman says "It’s like a moving carpet over the sand in the same direction, like someone’s leading them,”. Hopefully we are able to work together to keep these giant insects under control.

http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/11/01/on-the-horizon-a-dreaded-wave-of-locusts/?ref=earth

Fixing the harm we did 12,000 years ago.

               I read the article "DNA in hair balls could give life to woolly mammoth." By Seth Borenstein, published on The Boston Globe, on November 20, 2008. The article states that Mammoth  hair was find frozen in Siberia, and there is a possibility bringing a Mammoth back to life. 80%of the Mammoth's DNA was available in the hair. The project was said to be very possible and if it is successful, it will happen in about 10 to 20 years. And the article was published in 2008 so that would mean around 2018 to 2028. The article can be found here:http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2008/11/20/dna_in_hair_balls_could_give_life_to_woolly_mammoth/?camp=pm

              
               Woolly Mammoths are giant creatures that existed during the Ice Age. Since then they have become extinct. A woolly Mammoth weighs 7 to 9 tons, and is about 9 ft. tall. They have to large tusks and a thick layer of shaggy hair.

In my opinion this really cool idea. Bringing back creatures that have been extinct for around 12000 years ago could open so many doors for us. We could breed them with today's Elephants, and possibly restart the Woolly Mammoth species. It would be an extreme accomplishment for mankind. But I think that if a  Mammoth was genetically born it would just be kept and zoo or a lab, and have no real freedom. 

The woman is this very has a very valid point. She says that if a Mammoth was brought to life then it would have no biome to live in. In biology we learned that a biomes are climatically and geographically similar climatic conditions on the Earth, and in every separate biome different biotic and abiotic factors are found. And a Woolly Mammoth live in the Ice Age were basically the whole world was cover in iced. And their biome is gone today, so a Mammoth would have an extremely hard time living in our world. 

This article reminded me of the Lorax because in the movie many of the creatures in the forest left because of the pollution, them leaving represented extinction . And Mammoths were hunted to extinction by Humans about 12,000 years ago and now we are trying to bring them back and fix are harm from way back when. Bringing these Mammoths back could lead to the possibility of re creating a species we destroyed. 

Over all I think the idea of bringing a Mammoth to life would be a good idea, but it still suffers from many flaws. I would give it shot, what do you think? 

Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Mi5Wh8zGHU

Picture: http://funtobebad.blogspot.com/2012/08/perfectly-preserved-woolly-mammoth.html

Article: http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2008/11/20/dna_in_hair_balls_could_give_life_to_woolly_mammoth/?camp=pm

Buildings Can Wait, Focus on the Rain Forests!

       I read the article "In Fragmented Brazilian Forest, Few Species Survive" by Kelly Slivka, published in The New York Times on August 14, 2012. The article talks about how the Atlantic Forest in Brazil has been fragmented by many years of human habitation. This has caused many species to find other habitats to live in because their habitat has been ruined. If you want to read the article, here is the link: http://green.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/08/14/in-fragmented-brazilian-forest-few-species-survive/.

       The Atlantic Forest is a rain forest near Rio de Janeiro and runs along Brazil's southeastern shore. This rain forest used to be over half a million square miles! Now 90% of that is gone due to habitat fragmentation. This is a picture of the forest.

       There are some areas of forest that have survived forest fires and deforestation. These pockets of forest may vary in size. They are very important for the biodiversity that the region still boasts. Although many species have found different homes because the patches do not provide enough protection for some species to thrive, some areas have a very diverse group of species. 

       Researchers found only 22% of the original animals that inhabited the area still live there. They also found that five larger mammal species are essentially extinct throughout the region of the rain forest. This is all because trees have been exchanged for roads, cities, buildings, and fields.

        Carlos Peres, an Ecologist at the University of East Anglia in Britain said, "There is little chance that the patches from which many mammals have vanished can be repopulated because a strong “source population” would be needed for recolonization." This is very sad to hear because it is our fault that the rain forest has been fragmented. We are the ones that kept building. 

       Reading this article made me realize that humans fragmenting land is very bad for the habitat. It causes species to leave their homes. I choose to do this topic because I had never really heard about habitat destruction before and I'm glad I choose it. I think that we need to stop cutting down trees as much so we have more buildings. We don't need that many buildings and it is important to keep our habitats, such as the rain forest, the way they are.

       This is exactly like what we learned in class when we watched The Lorax. In the movie the Onceler and his family kept building factories and didn't even realize that they had ruined the habitat until it was too late. They cut down all the trees and the species that lived there had to find a new habitat. In the article the Atlantic Forest is losing its species because of habitat destruction. This goes to show that once something drastic is done to a habitat, it is very hard to get it back to normal. I hope one day the Atlantic  Forest will be the way it was many years ago, but everyone will have to try to save it because it is worth it!

The Great Barrier Reef's Coral Crisis

     

           The article, “Great Barrier Reef has Lost Half its Corals Since 1985, New Study Says” by Juliet Eilperan, published on October 1^st, 2012, from the Washington Post, can be found at http://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/great-barrier-reef-has-lost-half-its-corals-since-1985-new-study-says/2012/10/01/c733025c-0bda-11e2-bb5e-492c0d30bff6_story.html. 

            The Great Barrier Reef, located in Australia, is the world’s largest coral reef system.  Within 133,205 square miles, the Great Barrier Reef attributes about 3,000 individual reefs.  It is one of Australia’s most incredible natural gifts.  Unfortunately, Australia is slowly losing it.  Throughout the past 27 years, the Great Barrier Reef has lost half of its corals.  The causes of the decline of coral include hurricanes, coral-eating starfish and coral bleaching.

             Storm damage contributed 48 percent of the losses, while starfish known as crown-of-thorns caused 42 percent.  The remaining 10 percent of the damage came from coral bleaching, caused by warmer waters. While intense storms and warm water are almost impossible to control, the crown-of-thorn starfish are easier to target.  In order to do this, Australians need to improve their water quality.  This is because nutrient runoff is what is fueling the crown-of-thorn’s population to increase.  These outbreaks, which once only occurred every 50 to 80 years, are now occurring once every 15 years. 

Crown-of-Thorn Starfish

            A chief executive of the Australian Institute of Marine Science, John Gunn states, “The study shows that in the absence of crown-of-thorns, coral cover would increase at 0.89 percent per year, so even with losses due to cyclones and bleaching there should be slow recovery.”  He is saying that even with storms and coral bleaching, the coral population would increase if there weren’t any crown-of-thorns affecting it.  It is amazing how one species can impact a whole ecosystem so greatly.                         

            This article was really eye opening.  It made me realize that we are losing an ecosystem that is essential to the world.  I think that if Australians really do care about the Great Barrier Reef, they will make the effort to help it.  It’s not only the Australians, who can help save this ecosystem, but other people can help too by releasing less carbon dioxide into the air, which is raising sea temperatures and making the ocean more acidic.  I suggest that Australians release a predator of the crown-of-thorns into the Great Barrier Reef to decrease the population of the starfish, just like farmers release organisms such as ladybugs to keep pests away from their crops.  If there are no changes made, and the Great Barrier Reef keeps on losing corals at this rate, there will be barely any corals left 10 to 15 years from now.           

            This article really reminded me of the movie The Lorax, which we watched in class.  In The Lorax, the organisms were losing an ecosystem because the Onceler and his family were ruining the environment by cutting down trees.  In the article, organisms living in the Great Barrier Reef are losing an ecosystem because the crown-of-thorn starfish are eating the coral.  This shows that it only takes one species to affect an entire ecosystem.  The Great Barrier Reef is an ecosystem worth saving.

Citations for Pictures:

Digital image. N.p., n.d. Web. <http://2012freshmanenglish.blog.ntu.edu.tw/files/2012/10/Great-Barrier-Reef-Holiday-Reef-Fish12.jpg>.

Crown-of-thorns Starfish. Digital image. Flickriver. N.p., 16 Jan. 2007. Web. 29 Oct. 2012. <http://www.flickriver.com/photos/g-na/370139074/>.

Lack of data could be the cause for the lack of enforcing of the no "finning'" law in UAE

For this blog post I read the article "Shark finning hitting Persian Gulf hard" by Michael Casey on boston.com, the link for the article is http://www.boston.com/news/world/middle-east/2012/10/21/shark-finning-hitting-persian-gulf-sharks-     hard/RtxR9PwCwmQwSQk5LmovON/story.html

This article was about how in the Persian Gulf while some governments have laws banning the practice of “finning”, they lack the information to enforce these laws.  Finning is the practice of catching a shark, removing its fins and tossing it overboard while it is still alive.  The fin is used in making shark fin soup which is a dish served in some asian countries.  Some people like Rima Jabado are doing research on the effects it has on the population of certain shark species.  “The government will not react until we give them actual data,” said Jabado, but these are very few people who are researching this topic.  The article states that these countries such as Kuwait, Saudi Arabia, and the UAE have limited data on the number of each shark population in the Persian Gulf. “Our hands are tied because of insufficient data,” said Mohammed Tabish, a fisheries specialist in the UAE, also he said that the information they receive is general and has no information on any species specific data and this makes it difficult to take action on particular species.

         If the shark hunting continues to go unregulated this could have a detrimental effect on the Persian Gulf community.  One of the affects that the extinction of the shark species would be that the remora population would take a blow because they would have to find a new symbiotic partner because the shark would not be present.  Another effect that this would have would be that because the shark is the top predator the other trophic levels would see a population increase because the top predator would be absent.  This article enforces the fact that knowledge is power because if these countries had access to the information that they need they would be able to enforce their no finning laws
.

http://www.thelivingocean.net/2012_04_27_archive.html

I think this article is on an important topic that is over-shadowed by the bigger environmental issues such as global warming and whaling.  Also, what is not realized is that this is a huge issue and that 82 countries export fins mostly to to Hong Kong and other Asian markets.  Also, fishermen kill as many as 70 million sharks a year just for their fins, which in my opinion is a huge waste, just like killing elephants and rhinos just for their ivory tusks and horns.   However some questions should be answered such as (What will these countries do once they get the required information?, How will these countries get the information?, and Will these countries help the shark population of the Persian Gulf?)