All About Water

The world’s oceans are so vast that they might seem immune to the influence of human waste. Unfortunately, this is not the case. Marine pollutants are a problem, and despite regulation and laws like the Clean Water Act, marine pollutants continue to be a problem. Marine pollutants, like urban runoff, biostimulants, petroleum, plastics, other debris and thermal pollution, severely harm our waterways and the life they contain.

Major Marine Pollutants: Urban Runoff

Human activity concentrates naturally occurring compounds until they become hazardous. When rainwater or wastewater from homes runs into storm drains, it picks up these hazardous compounds and deposits them into waterways. Man-made compounds like DDT and cleaners are also introduced into the marine environment this way. Much of human runoff results from individuals’ day-to-day activities.

Major Marine Pollutants: Biostimulants and Sewage

Biostimulants do not stimulate life, as their name might mislead one to believe; instead, they do more harm than good. Sewage is organic and breaks down via bacterial decay. The decay process depletes available oxygen and suffocates local animal life. Additionally, the chemical breakdown produces ammonia and hydrogen sulfide. These chemicals are toxic to fish, even in low concentrations. Bacteria and other contaminants may be consumed by shellfish, which then become hazardous to humans or other animals if consumed. Some forms of algae thrive on the nutrients created by biostimulants and can overgrow into algae blooms or “red tides.”

Marine Pollutants: Oil

Oil is introduced into waterways through spills like the massive Deepwater Horizon spill in the Gulf of Mexico on April 20, 2010. Oil production also leads to the seepage of oil into the marine ecosystem, as does rainwater runoff. Oil floats on the surface of the water, coating and suffocating any marine life that touches the water’s surface. Oil also prevents oxygen from permeating from the air into water, and thereby suffocates life that may not even directly touch the oil.

Marine Pollutants: Plastics and Other Debris

As humans travel the earth’s waters, we leave our mark. Despite regulation, we toss debris over the sides of ships, and lose things like containers and fishing nets overboard. This debris is eaten by fish and water mammals and can eventually kill them.

Marine Pollutants: Thermal Pollution

Nuclear power plants and other industrial outlets use water as a coolant. The heated water is disposed of directly into waterways where it increases the temperature of the body of water. This, again, stimulates the dangerous growth of algae blooms.

The Endangered Species Act (ESA) of 1973 was designed to protect threatened species from extinction.

The History of Species Conservation

The wildlife conservation movement was first driven by the dwindling populations of certain species, such as the bison and whooping crane, and the extinction of others, like the passenger pigeon. One can attribute the decline of these species to several factors, including market hunting, habitat loss, pesticide usage and the introduction of non-native species. Notably, the introduction of the Asian plant kudzu decimated American wildlife, often smothering native plants and even choking trees to death. Before the Endangered Species Act, some legislation was passed to try to conserve species, but this legislation was largely ineffectual.

The Creation of the Endangered Species Act

In 1973, President Nixon declared existing species conservation efforts inadequate and asked Congress to create better endangered species legislation. Congress replied by completely rewriting preexisting law into the Endangered Species Act, which was authored by a team of lawyers and scientists led by Dr. Russell E. Train. The Endangered Species Act forever changed American environmental conservation.

The Endangered Species Act

The Endangered Species Act was described by California historian Kevin Starr as “the Magna Carta of the environmental movement.” The Act’s stated purpose is to conserve “threatened and endangered plants and animals and the habitats in which they are found.” Its mission is facilitated by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which handles marine species, and the United States Fish and Wildlife Services (FWS), which handles freshwater fish and all other species.

The Endangered Species Act List

The two main goals of the Endangered Species Act are, first, to prevent the extinction of endangered plant and animal species, and second, to recover and maintain those populations by eliminating threats to their survival. To qualify for the federal list of endangered species, a species must meet one of five criteria:

1. The species’ habitat is threatened.
2. The species is over-used for commercial, recreational, scientific or educational purposes.
3. The species is declining due to disease or predation.
4. The species is inadequately regulated.
5. Other natural or manmade factors are endangering the species’ continued existence.

Endangered species candidates are then prioritized according to the amount of help that they need. The Endangered Species Act was amended in 1982 to prevent economic factors from being considered during the listing and prioritization processes.

The Endangered Species Act Mandates Recovery Plans

The FWS and NMFS then must create a recovery plan outlining the goals, costs, required tasks, and timeline of recovering an endangered species. The recovery plan prescribes “site-specific” actions, “objective, measurable criteria” for judging how well a species is recovering, and an estimate of resources necessary for recovery.

Results of the Endangered Species Act

Almost fifty species have been delisted since the creation of the Endangered Species Act, twenty-two due to recovery, including the bald eagle and peregrine falcon. However, there are still currently 1,890 plant and animal species on the threatened and endangered lists.

Smalltooth Sawfish

Known for their elongated snout ringed with teeth, the smalltooth sawfish, scientifically called Pristis pectinata, is a rather distinctive looking fish. It belongs to the elasmobranch group of fish, which includes sharks, rays and skates. The fish in this branch have skeletons that are composed of cartilage rather than bone.  Sawfish are technically a type of ray.  However, they have a long body similar to that of a shark.  In fact, Smalltooth sawfish grow to be about 18 feet long, with some growing to as large as 25 feet.  It uses its namesake ‘saw’ to locate prey in murky water or the sand. The saw then functions as a weapon to kill the prey, which mostly consists of fish, but sometimes crustaceans.

Leatherback Sea Turtles

Coral reefs are known throughout the world for their vivid colors and importance in the marine ecosystem. They have been the subject of intense study by marine biologists and oceanographers, but today coral reefs are under threat due to various human activities.

Structure and Formation of Coral Reefs

Blue Whales

The blue whale is the largest animal to have ever roamed the earth. Scientifically known as balaenoptera musculus, these whales can span as long as 108 feet and weigh more than 330,000 pounds. Blue whales live for about eighty years. Their diet consists of tiny krill. The whales live throughout the oceans of the world; they travel from sub-polar to sub-tropical regions in a seasonal migration pattern based on the availability of their food, and during the winter subsist on their fat stores. The whales can migrate thousands of miles.

Whaling: A Devastating Industry

Commercial whaling devastated blue whale populations around the world. Blue whale-hunting began in the 19th century, but caused the most damage between 1920 and 1965. Blue whales were once considered too dangerous to hunt because of to their immense size, but the introduction of factory ships and harpoon guns made them viable prey. From that point on the whales were hunted intensely until commercial whaling of blue whales was banned in 1966, at which point the blue whale was nearly extinct, numbering at one thousand. Prior to exploitation, blue whales in the Southern Hemisphere were estimated to number around 210,000. Post-exploitation, around four hundred remained. Before their exploitation, an estimated 1,500 blue whales lived in the North Atlantic. After their exploitation, around one hundred remained. Currently, the blue whale population is estimated around fifteen thousand.

Threats to Blue Whales

The blue whale was most damaged by aggressive whaling, but it is still threatened in other ways. Although commercial whaling for blue whales is now illegal, it still occasionally occurs. The whales are also killed by boat strikes and fishing line entanglement. The whales are also threatened by noise pollution, high competition for prey, ocean vessel disturbance, habitat degradation, chemical pollution, ice entrapment, and predation by killer whales.

How Are Blue Whales Currently Protected?

A Blue Whale Recovery Plan was published in 1998 by the National Marine Fisheries Service. Current efforts to protect the whales include the Marine Mammal Protection Act of 1972, the Endangered Species Act of 1973, the International Whaling Commission, the monitoring of the status of whales off the Pacific Coast of the U.S, the monitoring of commercial fisheries’ treatment of protected species, the creation of a network that alerts marine biologists when whales that show up on beaches, and autopsies on dead whales.

Atlantic salmon, known scientifically as Salmo salar, are a bony fish that averages about 28 to 30 inches long and weighs about 8 to 12 pounds. Before migrating to the ocean, they are reared in rivers. At one time they were highly prolific and found throughout the rivers north of the Hudson. Currently, they are only known to run in 11 rivers.

Why Are Atlantic Salmon Endangered?

Atlantic salmon populations began to take a nosedive in the early 19th century. Because of industry, logging and the damming of rivers, the habitat for Atlantic salmon was severely degraded. Exploitative overfishing also contributed to the problem. The population continued to decline throughout the first half of the 20th century. By the mid-20th century, distribution of Atlantic salmon was limited to the eastern third of the coast of Maine. The population of the fish that return yearly to spawn is continuing to decline, despite conservation efforts. Today fewer than 2,000 fish return to Maine each year to spawn. Even with current hatchery supplementation, the estimated extinction risk in the next 100 years is 19 to 75 percent.

Specific Threats to Atlantic Salmon

Humans have done much of the damage that is resulting in the depletion of Atlantic salmon. Fewer juvenile salmon survive because of changes in the acidity of water due to industrial activity and accidental capture by fishermen. Those that do make it are at risk because of thermal pollution and other degradations of water quality, climate change, introduction of competitive non-native species, loss of connectivity and complexity in the habitat and deliberate poaching of adult salmon. Additionally, diseases like salmon swimbladder sarcoma virus, infectious salmon anemia and bacterial coldwater disease are creating problems, even requiring some stock to be killed off to protect those remaining.

How Can We Conserve Atlantic Salmon?

The State of Maine is a key player in the conservation of Atlantic Salmon. They have a conservation plan that addresses the impacts of recreational fishing, forestry, agriculture and aquaculture. They also helped develop the Federal recovery plan. The following steps are being taken to help rebuild the Atlantic salmon population:

• Recognition of the species as endangered, making it protected under the Endangered Species Act
• Making it a Federal violation to take salmon from protected rivers
• Making an effort to divert fish away from the turbines of hydroelectric dams
• Initiating legal action against companies that are in violation of the Federal Clean Water Act
• Prosecuting those who use illegal pesticides

An Overview of Endangered Fish and Marine Animals

Humans have left a strong mark on the world. Unfortunately, that mark sometimes comes at a hefty cost. Because of overfishing or damage to their natural habitat, many fish and sea animals are now threatened, endangered or on the verge of extinction because of overfishing or damage to their natural habitat. Atlantic salmon, leatherback sea turtles, blue whales, smalltooth sawfish, and coral reefs are just some of the creatures on the list of endangered fish and marine animals.

Endangered Fish and Marine Animals: Atlantic Salmon

Atlantic salmon once swam in every river north of the Hudson. Today, the remaining wild Atlantic salmon population can only be found in eleven rivers. Only about fifteen to thirty-five percent of eggs laid by spawning salmon will survive through the fry stage because their habitats have been destroyed by acidified water, climate change, thermal pollution, the introduction of competitive non-native species, and poaching.

Endangered Fish and Marine Animals: Leatherback Sea Turtles

Leatherback sea turtles are not only the largest species of turtle, but the largest living reptile in the world. Generally these turtles remain in the open ocean, but they return to coastal areas to breed and forage. They make the list of endangered fish and marine animals for several reasons. The turtles are ingesting marine debris, they are continually entangled in nets and fishing gear, their eggs and females are being harvested, their environment is being contaminated, and they are bombarded with infection and disease

Endangered Fish and Marine Animals: Blue Whale

Blue whales once numbered in the hundreds of thousands. Today, their population worldwide is estimated at 8,000. The blue whale’s decline is primarily attributed to the overfishing of the whaling industry.

Endangered Fish and Marine Animals: Smalltooth Sawfish

Smalltooth sawfish belong to the chondrichthyes class of animals, which includes skates, rays and sharks. This class is composed of fish with cartilaginous skeletons, rather than bony ones. Sawfish are known for their distinctive long snouts, which are ringed around with teeth that are used to locate and kill prey. Smalltooth sawfish are included among endangered fish and marine animals because of their low population growth, frequent net entanglement, and loss of habitat.

Endangered Fish and Marine Animals: Coral Reefs

Although at first glance a coral reef may appear similar to stone, it is in fact composed of tiny creatures. Coral reefs are not only alive, but they also provide a habitat for many other creatures. Currently, about two-thirds of the world’s coral reefs are damaged; ten percent of the world’s reefs are damaged beyond repair. Human activity has caused about sixty percent of that damage. We’ve condemned coral reefs to the list of endangered fish and marine animals by polluting, developing along coasts near coral reefs, mining coral for ornamental purposes, introducing non-native species to their ecosystems, and aiding climate change.

Biostimulants and Sewage

By definition, biostimulants are defined as any product apart from fertilizer or pesticides that can contribute to plants’ health and growth.  As a result, at first glance, biostimulants sound like they are very helpful.  However, it turns out that they are not as good as they sound.  In fact, biostimulants can produce life-forms that interrupt the natural balance of the ecosystem and strangle out vital members of the food chain.

Today, this issue has been complicated by the fact that each county in the U.S. dumps enough untreated sewage into waterways each year to fill Madison Square Garden and the Empire State Building (according to Environmental Protection Agency estimates).

Where Do Biostimulants and Sewage Come From?

Many sewage pipes are old and damaged.  Therefore, when wet weather leads to flooding, the system can get overloaded and cause sewage backups to flow into streams.  As a result, in some locations, the overload flows straight into local waterways.

At this moment, biostimulants becomes very important.  Many times, biostimulants enter the sewers through illegal dumping by industrial plants.  Therefore, when the flooding occurs, the biostimulants escape from the pipes and come in contact with fresh water sources.

What Effect Does Biostimulant and Sewage Pollution Have on the Earth?

Untreated sewage contains human pathogens that can be devastating for wildlife. For example, white pox disease, a human pathogen found in untreated sewage, has wiped out 70 percent of Elkhorn Coral, found off the Florida Keys.

• The nutrients found in sewage are harmful to some plants, but they can cause other plants, like certain types of algae, to overgrow.   Subsequently, this action may lead to the birth of algae blooms, or “Red Tides,” that suffocate natural wildlife.
• Toxins and bacteria can poison local wildlife.
• As bacteria break down the waste, excess nitrogen and phosphorous are produced, causing depletion in oxygen supplies.
• Heavy metals can accumulate locally, which can be toxic to fish and plants.
• A layer of detritus can accumulate on the floor, killing off plant life and bottom-dwelling creatures.

What Effect does Biostimulant and Sewage Pollution Have on Humans?

Besides rendering the water completely unfit for human consumption through diseases like typhoid, dysentery and cholera, biostimulants and sewage have major environmental impacts as well:

• Consuming seafood that has been contaminated poses a serious health risk.
• Public beaches are rendered unusable, leading to the loss of recreational facilities and tourism.
• The disruption in the food chain leads to lower fish availability and threatens the fishing industry.
• Backed up sewage can flow into homes, creating massive damage that is expensive to repair. If your local laws allow the dumping of untreated sewage, petition for a change in the laws. The environmental impact is tremendous, and this practice should be strongly discouraged.

Thermal Pollution