So, I was watching the news over the weekend, and there was a segment on cod fishing. Basically, cod fisherman who fish off the northeast coast of the US are limited in how much fish they catch; fishermen who used to fish 6 days a week can now only fish one day a week. That's a drastic reduction in someone's living. Also highlighted were 2 sides of the debate: the fishermen who believe they are being over-regulated, and the other side saying the fish just aren't there to fish.
I was poking around the LiveScience.com website today, and there's an article there by Matt Huelsenbeck, a marine scientist, that does a lot to support the side of the scientists who claim fish supplies are declining. According to the article, oceans absorb carbon emissions, which actually slows down global climate change. The problem is that this makes the oceans more acidic. This hurts marine life. Specifically noted in the article were oysters, muscles, clams, coral reefs, and these potato chip-like creatures called floating marine snails.
This is kind of scary when you think that we can't turn back the clock on the ocean's acidic levels; it's there to stay. If the ocean's acidic levels continue at the rate they're increasing, some marine life could become extinct in our lifetime. This could slam the people who depend on fishing for a living, and even countries whose whole economic systems depend on marine life.
What can we do? The bigger still remains global climate change. We need to reduce our carbon emissions to put a stop to ocean acidification and global climate change.
I was poking around the LiveScience.com website today, and there's an article there by Matt Huelsenbeck, a marine scientist, that does a lot to support the side of the scientists who claim fish supplies are declining. According to the article, oceans absorb carbon emissions, which actually slows down global climate change. The problem is that this makes the oceans more acidic. This hurts marine life. Specifically noted in the article were oysters, muscles, clams, coral reefs, and these potato chip-like creatures called floating marine snails.
This is kind of scary when you think that we can't turn back the clock on the ocean's acidic levels; it's there to stay. If the ocean's acidic levels continue at the rate they're increasing, some marine life could become extinct in our lifetime. This could slam the people who depend on fishing for a living, and even countries whose whole economic systems depend on marine life.
What can we do? The bigger still remains global climate change. We need to reduce our carbon emissions to put a stop to ocean acidification and global climate change.