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Jan
We are a society that is completely reliant on plastic and we have to change. Recycling helps a little but if we are to improve the health of our oceans we need to find alternatives to plastic and change our consumption habits. It might just work if we all take part.
The prevalence of plastic in our society is now affecting our oceans. Plastic outnumbers zooplankton 6 to 1 in the North Pacific Garbage Patch and kills thousands of sea birds every year.
Reduce. Reuse. Recycle. It’s a start but not enough plastic is recycled (only ~6.8%) and a product can only be recycled so many times before it ends up in the landfill or the ocean. All of us as individual consumers need to really focus on the reduce aspect of this well known mantra. So vote with your dollars and try not to buy items packaged in plastic. I know this is not possible right now for most of us but there are ways you can greatly reduce your plastic consumption.
If you have access to a farmer’s market you can usually get all of your food free of packaging – just bring your own bags to carry it all home. Buy most of your food in the bulk section; you can even bring your own muslin bags or reuse some of the many plastic bags you may already have at home. Do not buy plastic water bottles. Buy a filter or just fill a reusable water bottle with tap water – it’s usually safer to drink anyway. Enacting countywide bans on plastic bags and styrofoam also help to decrease the amount of plastic produced and brings awareness to the issue. Ask you local restaurants and groceries to replace plastic takeout containers and utensils with biodegradable ones.
It will take time and effort on everyone’s part to tackle the North Pacific Garbage Patch and other plastic pollution. If we are to improve the health of our oceans then everyone’s consumption habits will need to change drastically. If we are to save the oceans and our planet in time, then changes at the source of the problem need to take place.
We need to find feasible long-term alternatives to plastic and increase regulations at plastic manufacturing plants. Obviously all of this is easier said than done and I admit, I am no expert on the topic. But what if we as individuals became less reliant on plastics and through our purchasing power actually convinced large corporations to follow suit? What if our everyday consumption habits could change the world…for the better? Isn’t it worth a try?
Jan
Everything in the ocean relies on zooplankton either directly or indirectly. What will happen when the health of the marine ecosystem’s most critical species is threatened? We need to act now so we don’t have to find out.
Plastics from everyday products end up in the ocean.
All life in the ocean, from anemones to humpback whales, depend on zooplankton either directly or indirectly. They are a critical link in the marine food chain and they are a keystone species; that is, their abundance and diversity in a marine community is a good indicator of the overall health of that system.
These incredible tiny arthropods are also important regulators of global warming. Everyday and night, the zooplankton takes carbon dioxide from the surface down to the ocean’s depths, effectively removing CO2 from the atmosphere and depositing it in the planets largest carbon sink – the ocean. Without zooplankton the ocean’s ecosystem could collapse and our climate would change even more rapidly. The oceans are what make our earth inhabitable and without their life, there can be no life on earth. (Visit mongabay.com for more information on the importance of zooplankton.)
In the North Pacific Gyre or Garbage Patch, plastics outnumber surface zooplankton 6 to 1. This mass of plastic is estimated to be twice the size of Texas to one and half times the size of the continental U.S. It does not just float on the surface but extends downward into the watery world below. It appears an impossible mess to clean-up, though people are trying through research and voyages to the patch, and it is continuously getting bigger.
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Jan
The oceans sustain life on Earth and yet we are treating them like landfills. The sea is a place of mystery, discovery, beauty and balance – without a properly functioning marine ecosystem we risk throwing off the equilibrium of the entire planet. We need to start making the right decisions, both on land and at sea.
Our oceans cover over 70% of the earth’s surface, harbor millions of species most waiting to be discovered and are as close to another world as we can get.
The deep blue waters are home to humpback whales whose flukes can evoke a gasp from a child or a jaded elder, sea lions whose comical barks echo through ocean towns, Finding Nemo clown fish who make their homes in brightly colored sea anemone forming a symbiotic relationship, crabs who speedily scuttle sideways across the sands when surprised, mussels and limpets who cling with Zeus’s might to wave washed rocks amidst tide pools filled with starfish and purple sea urchins, giant silvery sunfish that can weigh up to 5,000 pounds, schools of flashing sardines, bluefin tuna who swim in tight groups up to 55 miles an hour, adorable sea otters who laze on their backs in the kelp beds, and the kelp forests and coral reefs teeming with diversity and constantly providing scientists with new discoveries.
The sea is a magical place, a place of of beauty and wonder. Rachel Carson illustrates its powerful beauty in her book, The Edge of the Sea:
“If there is poetry in my book about the sea, it is not because I deliberately put it there, but because no one could write truthfully about the sea and leave out the poetry”.
This ecosystem that evokes both poetry and scientific inquiry should be devoutly protected and revered as the greatest wonder of our miraculous world.