Thurs. 2/21

Ocean Garbage Patch

The ocean garbage patch is found in the pacific ocean that is a a gyre of marine debris located roughly between 135 degrees W to 155 degrees W and 35 degrees N and 42 degrees N.  It has high concentrations of pelagic plastics, chemical sludge and other debris.  All of this comes 80 % of land-based pollution  and 20 % of pollution from ships.  Some of these plastics end up in stomachs of birds and animals, including sea turtles, and albatrosses.  Many of the birds young dies because of the plastic being fed to it from the mother. Toxic chemicals are also eaten by many other marine creatures witch in turn are eaten by a larger predator.  Then some fish that we eat might also have these chemicals, so therefore it affects humans too.  The ways humans can fight off this garbage patch is creating organizations of clean ups and get lots of people to help.  And also to promote the idea of cleanup and to let people understand what littering does.

Wed. 2/20

Reptiles - Marine Iguana 
Scientific name: Amblyrhynchus cristatus
Sometimes called: Galápagos marine iguana
Marine iguanas are found in of course, the Galapagos Islands, but can also be found on the rocky shores, mangroves, or beaches.   These are the worlds only marine lizards. They can dive up to 50 feet and stay under water for about 40 minutes.  The have evolved blunt noses to help them feed on seaweed, a strong tale for swimming, and powerful limbs with strong claws to help them cling to rocks.  They also have a specific nasal gland that allows them to spew out salt from their system.  This animal is not endangered, however, they do face threats.  Things like predators such as hawks, cats, and dogs affect them. But mainly El Nino changing the coastal environment and depleting their food sources, causes the death of marine Iguanas by 50 percent.

http://www.arkive.org/galapagos-marine-iguana/amblyrhynchus-cristatus/

I chose this animal because I watched a special on the TV on the Galapagos islands recently and thought these marine iguanas were very interesting creatures.

Tues. 2/19

Ocean Acidification is when carbon dioxide is absorbed into ocean water and the ocean becomes very acidic.  When the ocean gets more acidic, the balance of molecules needed for organisms that have shells and skeletons is altered.  This causes the shells to of some sea creatures to dissolve or skeletons to be harder to create.  Animals like crabs, sea stars, plankton, and sea urchins etc. are impaired with ocean acidificaiton. When these animals suffer so do the creatures that eat them affecting the entire food web.  Humans are a huge contribution to ocean acidification from cars to factories making the CO2 in the air more abundant.  We can help by cutting back on how much we drive cars or putting limits on states to how long you can run factories maybe.
Three things I've learned
1. I had no idea that ocean could absorb carbon dioxide, I thought polluting the ocean just meant oil spills or something.
2.Our ocean is more acidic now then any point in history.
3. This will also affect our ecosystem by making it harder to find fish when fishing if the acidity becomes worse

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Friday 2/15

Karenia Brevis is a toxic dinoflagellate which has a significant role in producing harmful algae blooms or "red tides" like in places such as the Gulf of Mexico and the coast of Florida.  Karenia Brevis is a microscopic, single celled organism that each cell has two flagella that allow it to move through water in a spinning motion. It produces potent neurotoxins collectively called brevetoxins, which cause neurological problems in other organisms, responsible for many die-off marine animals.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karenia_brevis (only website containing it's characteristics that i could find.)


Neurotoxic Shellfish Poisoning is a condition caused by ingestion of brevetoxin, a neurotoxin which is given off by certain dinoflagellates.  Most of the brevetoxin is generated by Kerenia Brevis.  The Neurotoxic Shellfish Poisoning symptoms found in humans usually appear within one to three hours.  The person may feel tingling, numbingness and intestinal distress as the body processes the toxin.  Death would be normally rare.
  http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-neurotoxic-shellfish-poisoning.htm  However, when marine animals are exposed to this toxin there are more sufficient deaths or it can cause the creature to be confused or mentally ill. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amnesic_shellfish_poisoning#Possible_animal_effects This effects the Gulf coast economy by affecting what sea food is produced and eaten that could be poisonous.  Therefore it would slow the economy tremendously if this were to occur often.

Thurs. 2/14

5.) Plankton like phytoplankton rely on the sun for photosynthesis, the other type, zooplankton, feed on phytoplankton.

Five things we have learned about Plankton.

1.) Plankton makes up half of the worlds oxygen today.

2.)Plankton are divided into two distinct types:
- Phytoplankton: That are algae that live near the waters surface where there's sunlight to support photosynthesis.
- Zooplankton: Includes animals like crustaceans, jelly fish, and other animals that feed on plankton. Also eggs of larger animals are in this category.


3.) Plankton is large marine animal's main food source.  If plankton were to go extinct it would effect the entire food web and including our oxygen source.

4.) Plankton is the most abundant creature, besides bacteria, in the ocean.


5. Zooplankton is the smallest creature in the ocean. It's length ranges from one-tenth of a millimeter to four millimeters.

Wednesday 2/13

Killer Whale

The killer whale is one of the top predators of the sea.  It's scientific name is the Orcinus Orca. Their habitat is normally in all open oceans but most abundant in coastal areas and even more abundant in the Arctic and Antarctic Ocean.  Females become sexually mature around 15 years of age and males 15 to 21.  Many males become aggressive when trying to win females over, when they do the females will have one pup every  five years in what is called a Polyestrous cycle.  Killer Whales are the world's largest distributed cetacean species in the world.
3 Interesting Facts:
1.) They can grow up to as large as a school bus.
2.) They have 40-50 teeth that are up to four or five inches long.
3.) They live in families called "pods" with up to 40 other Killer Whales.
http://voices.yahoo.com/20-interesting-facts-killer-whales-5554625.html, http://www.nmfs.noaa.gov/pr/species/mammals/cetaceans/killerwhale.htm
The problems that face Killer Whales are declining fish populations such as Salmon that are 90% of an Orcas diet (Salmon are over fished and losing their habitats), toxic exposure from human pollution, and surface impact (ships colliding with the Orcas and polluting the sea with exhaust).
Lastly, I chose the Killer Whale because I think they're fierce but beautiful creatures and wanted to learn more about them.
http://www.whalemuseum.org/education/library/issues.html

Tuesday 2/12

Spotted Eagle Ray (replaces plankton race) 

I chose this animal to talk about because I think their spots are pretty and I wanted to learn more about there life style and what they eat.
Originally called Aetobatus Narinari, the Spotted Eagle Ray can grow up to at least 16 feet depending on their age. They're also named bonnet ray, duckbill, bonnet skate, and duckbill ray. The eagle rays feed mainly on bivalves but also eat shrimp, crabs, octopus, and worms, whelks and small fishes.(http://marinebio.org/species.asp?id=58) These creatures also stay near coastal areas and reefs or bays and have predators like the hammer head shark, Bull Shark, Tiger Shark, and the Silver Tip Shark. At sea beds, eagle rays bury themselves in the sand because their spiracles and eyes help them to breath and see in such conditions. http://www.animalplace.net/fishes/spotted-eagle-ray-facts-characteristics-habitat-and-more/