The Toxins Of California Beach Sea Lions

Oxygen depletion will create stress which can take years to recover. These HABs can also suppress mammalian immune functions which results in mass mortalities of dolphins and manatees. This can be seen by a significant reduction in manatee lymphocytes in cell culture that are exposed to these toxins. With all of this evidence of the negative impacts of these toxins, it shows the need to recognize these biotoxins as significant stressors within south-west Florida coastal ecosystems.

In addition, the nutrients from these sources cause harm to the Gulf of Mexico because they cause an increase of algae growth in the area usually known as red tide. The algae releases toxins in the water, killing many of the marine mammal life

The salt marsh is an ecosystem that has many different organisms and species dwelling upon the surface. Of these organisms, they include sea lettuce, the Sheepshead Minnow, Fluke and the Great Blue Heron. These organisms interact with each other in the ecosystem. The sea lettuce is a producer, which gets eaten by the consumer, the minnows. Then, minnow is eaten by a secondary consumer, a fluke. Lastly, the Great blue Heron, as a top predator and tertiary consumer, eats the fluke. Through this process, toxins are transferred from trophic level to trophic level. An example of this is the BP oil spill, which released a large amount of toxins to the ocean, and animals can take in the toxins, causing large amounts of deaths. Each organism has a lethal threshold, or the amount of toxins an organism can have before death. The Great Blue Heron in this case has a lethal threshold of 44 toxins (EduChange, 2004). A lab has been done to model the biological magnification of toxins in an ecosystem with the Great Blue Heron. If a Great Blue Heron eats for five weeks, then the animal will die because the lethal threshold of 44 toxins has been passed and the toxins cannot be

Marine life is a mysterious and clouded mystery, although there are somethings we know, such as the damage that indigenous species, like the lionfish, can cause. Lionfish have affected marine life by feeding on various species, harmed tourism, and are almost impossible to remove from the affected oceans, this will have an absolutely chaotic effect on the surrounding land.

Livestock and pets can also be affected by skin contact or swallowing harmful algae and some algae can be lethal to fish either as a result of the release

live and feed in those coral reefs until they are big enough to survive the wide vast of the deep ocean. Warming temperatures are also a death sentence to many species of fish. When I was visiting Port Saint Joe, FL and it’s surrounding area, I noticed that at some places the tide was a tinted yellow, orange and red. It was Red Tide, also known as harmful algal bloom. Simple plants the live in the sea and freshwater grow out of control. These algal blooms produce toxic and harmful effects on people, fish, shellfish, marine mammals and birds. Algal bloom has high concentrations of nutrients from agricultural and urban run off. Red Tide does expand the decomposition of which kills animals by depleting the oxygen levels needed, limits the aquatic plant growth. This was occurring both at the shoreline of Powell Lake in Laguna Beach, FL and the East Bay in Panama City, FL. Off the tip of St Joseph Peninsula State Park, the government agencies were picking up hundreds of dead fish this past month alone. Red Tide could be found in a stretch of miles west of the peninsula to Mexico Beach and east of the peninsula to Cape San Blas.

Background Information: There are lots of different ways that pollution harms marine wildlife. About 100,000 marine mammals and seabirds die each year from plastic and waste in the ocean, including fish and sea turtles. Some animals are even becoming extinct, such as the Hawaiian Monk seal and the Steller Sea lion. Oil spills are also harmful to animals in the ocean.

The sea lions currently populating the docks in Astoria Oregon may be causing serious depletion of fish as well as causing problems for the infrastructure of the docks they reside on. They are native to the California coastline but have made their way to the docks in Astoria which lies on the Columbia River. The reason this can be such a problem is because when you introduce an animal population that does not have any predators in their new habitat it can lead to overpopulation which leads to underpopulation of what they consume. In this case, the california sea lions are overpopulated and eating too many of the fish in that area of the Columbia River. The overpopulation of sea

Along the coast bordering northern Argentina, and southern Brazil, the consequence of plastic being ubiquitous is evident. 133 Dead South American Fur Seals (SAFS) were found in this area; the stomach of these individuals were examined. Solid waste found in the ocean is called marine debris, given that the source of the waste is from humans. Of the sampled seals, ten of them had marine debris in their stomach; the seals found to have marine debris in their stomach were typically young. Most of the marine debris extracted from the stomachs were plastic. Just like the microplastic, these larger plastic pieces found in the stomachs of organisms can be either directly or indirectly ingested (Denuncio et al., 2017). The impact plastic has on

Red tide, by definition, is a toxic algae bloom in seawater that causes discoloration of the water, illness or death to many coastal animals, and can make people sick (Raloff, 2005). To be more specific, red tide is a more common name for “high concentrations of harmful marine alga, Karenia brevis” (Pierce & Henry, 2008). The Karenia Brevis toxin, named after Dr. Karen Steidinger, makes itself into mostly fish, but sometimes other vertebrates and can affects their central nervous system (Raloff, 2005).

One reason why sea lions are dying is because of poison in algae. The poison causing the sea lions to die is called domoic acid. Domoic acid is produced by algae called Pseudo Nitzschia and forms when the Pseudo Nietzsche bloom. When the sea lions eat the algae, the domoic acid kills their brain cells. The acid damages the hippocampus, the part of the brain responsible for memory and navigation. This causes the sea lions to not know where they are or where anything is. This is one reason why sea lions are dying.

The issue on ocean acidification is popularizing but what exactly is ocean acidification? It occurs when carbon dioxide is absorbed in the ocean’s waters from then on a series of chemical reactions take place which lowers the ocean’s water pH, carbonate ion concentration, as well as the saturation states of the calcium carbonate minerals ( “What is Ocean Acidification?”). Since we are addressing the issue on ocean acidification we will touch on the marine creatures that are harmed and will possibly be harmed due to the acidification of the seawater. A background of the chemicals involved as well the beneficial usage of the chemicals will be described in order to address the solution to this environmental problem.

Alexandrium and Dinophysis, two of the most noxious algae, are located in the North Atlantic and North Pacific oceans. These deadly algae create neurotoxins and gastrointestinal toxins which cause paralytic and diarrhetic shellfish poisoning in both aquatic life and humans. Extensive studies have shown that as temperatures increase as a result of global warming, Alexandrium abundance has also increases. As a result, this phenomenon poses a major threat to the health of both marine animals and humans.

Amnesic shellfish poisoning is a rare type of food poisoning caused by eating seafood that contains a poison (toxin) called domoic acid. Domoic acid is produced by a saltwater form of algae, and it is often eaten by shellfish, such as clams, oysters, and mussels. You can get sick when you eat shellfish or crab that contains domoic acid (is contaminated). Cooking or freezing the shellfish does not kill the toxin.

Also the destruction of wetlands and overfishing have played a big role in letting this substance get out of hand. With overfishing and the destruction of wetlands competing organisms that usually keep the element from getting out of hand, are dying. And with less and less organisms to keep it in check the growth only becomes faster. The effects of this are not only found in Morenton Bay, Australia, but worldwide. During Swedish summers strands of the crynobacteria wash up on shore as a yellow-ish substance. Dead fish pop out along the coast and if the locals get near it, their eyes burn and they can’t breathe. On the southern coast of Mauii in Hawaii the high tide brings in green algae so foul smelling that condominium owners hired tractor drivers to scrape it off the beach each morning because of the smell. On the Gulf Coast of Florida residents complain that harmful algae blooms are longer lasting, more frequent and bigger. This is killing off many sea mammals and is flooding the Florida emergency rooms with patients suffering from repertory diseases. North of Venice, Italy, a sticky mixture of algae and bacteria collects on the Adriatic Sea in spring and summer. This white mucus washes ashore, fouling beaches, or congeals into submerged blobs, some bigger than a person. On the Spanish coast jellyfish have become so large that special nets have to be strung to protect