Basking Case

What follows is a cautionary tale. A story about acting out in frustration; of letting passions get the better of our collective judgement. A yarn of life, economy, adventure, and...tourists.

Folks living in major coastal towns around the world know the story. As the days lengthen the sun's rays warm the air and the scent of dry grass drifts in the breeze. Locals finally get on the water as the rains and long dark of winter are left behind. But that's when they come: massive, constantly in the way, slowly moving in impassable groups, gorging themselves on an all you can eat buffet. 

Courtesy: Devin Braun via Flickr 

I am, of course, talking about basking sharks (Cetorhinus maximus). 

-"Hey, Kool-Aid"

-"Oh Yeah!" 

Courtesy: jidanchaomian via Flickr

Basking sharks and cruise ship travelers may not seem to have much in common at first, but diving in (Ha! Ocean puns) to their life history reveals some surprising commonalities.

Baskers are the second largest fish species in the world, growing to average lengths of 15-20 feet, but they can get as long as 30. Because they're so big; a single flick of a basking shark's tail moves a lot of water and thus their streamlined bodies are propelled smoothly along with very little effort. This energy efficient movement allows basking sharks to travel great distances through temperate seas. One shark was tagged in late June of 2007 between Ireland and the UK, and had traveled all the way across the Atlantic to south of Greenland by early August. Like other related sharks that make long treks, basking sharks are cruising in search of food. But these massive fish aren't hunting for seals or other large prey; they're cruising along, mouths agape, straining plankton from the water. The filters on their gills are so good at collecting particles, yet remaining unclogged, that they're even inspiring engineers designing industrial and commercial water and air filters.

Basking sharks migrate seasonally across the ocean, and daily up and down in the water column following their favorite food: calanid copepods (pronounced: ko-peh-pods).

Copepods are rich in fats despite their constant failed attempts
at stealing the Krabby Patty secret formula.
Courtesy: DFO via WOrld Register of Marine Species

During the winter these planktonic crustaceans tend to hang out deeper in the water and farther out to sea, so baskers do the same. During the summer, copepod populations explode near shore as lengthening days cause massive blooms of phytoplankton for the copepods to graze on. Basking sharks head shoreward just ahead of this explosion of life to catch the bloom right as it begins and optimize their own feeding. Like most other zooplankton, copepods also participate in the planet's largest migration. During the day they descend to avoid active predators at the surface, and at night they come up to the phytoplankton rich layer that formed while the sun was high. Typically basking sharks do the same daily vertical migration, but occasionally tons of copepod predators called arrow worms will show up at the surface at night. This unexpected pulse of predators drives the majority of the copepods, and consequently the basking sharks, deep when we'd expect them to be shallow.  So not only do basking sharks show up in the inland waters of the far north and south like cruise ships and their passengers, but they also predictably attend to the abundance of the buffet at the times of day it's most well stocked.

Basking sharks' feeding and travel habits aren't the only ways they jive with tourists. As their name implies, basking sharks often hang out in the sun not doing much. Since the sharks already have a pretty bitchin', deep-brown tan they must not be longing to soak up rays. Nope, it's that layer of copepods again. Because there's so much food at the surface, basking sharks don't have to move fast or far during the spring and summer blooms. The sharks are found in aggregations hundreds strong just lolling at the surface with their mouths open like they've fallen asleep sunbathing.

Okay I know there's a shark in this picture somewhere but...
Courtesy: candiche and Noodles and Beef via Flickr

These high concentrations of slow moving basking sharks occur in only a few places in the world. It's likely that these big shivers (the name for a group of sharks) show up in places like southern Chile, but we only know for sure that they happen in the Irish Sea, outside the Bay of Fundy, and historically in the Northwest Straits of the Salish Sea.

Just in case you're not from one of those places or didn't pay attention in geography

Now, you might have noticed that I said "historically" in the Salish Sea. In the past, basking sharks came to the region in droves every year to bathe in the Pacific Northwest sun and chow on the rich abundance of copepods in those waters. But like any pulse of summer tourists visiting a port; they were slow, in the way, and causing problems for traffic.

I'm lookin' at you; Pike Place!
Courtesy: Michael Munch via Flickr

As happens with anyone who deals with influxes of tourists too often; salmon fisher folk in British Columbia largely hated this yearly migration. The sharks were so numerous and slow that they frequently became entangled in salmon gill-nets. Basking sharks also have the same skin-teeth that other sharks possess, so when they thrashed to free themselves they often destroyed more of the net than just where they were caught.

Since much of the BC economy relied on salmon fishing at the time, basking sharks were listed as "Destructive Pests" by Canada's fisheries department in 1949. Six years later the department began an eradication program that, coupled with a commercial fishery for their skin and oil, did exactly as intended. Basking sharks were functionally extinct in the Salish Sea by the late 60s.

The Comox Post with its shark-slicing bow blade
was the pride of the program.
Courtesy: Popular Mechanics via Google Books

However attitudes towards basking sharks (and to a lesser degree cruise tourists) are changing. People better understand the role baskers play in the marine ecosystem as the massive end of a petite food chain. Ironically basking sharks now bring tourists to the Irish Sea and surrounding waters every year to watch their incredible shivers. Having basking sharks and cruise tourists around can greatly enhance the economies of northern port towns in the summer. And Lord knows we can use that extra cash for good beer and faux daylight to get us through the dreary mists of maritime winters.

There's also hope for the Salish Sea's population of basking sharks. They've been granted the protections that being listed as "endangered" under Canada's Species At Risk Act affords them since 2010. Baskers are also occasionally showing up in unexpected parts of the Salish Sea. In 2014 a basking shark gave a family out fishing a unique encounter when it basked about their boat for 15 minutes off of Edmonds, just 16 miles north of Seattle. No word on if the shark was planning to visit Pike Place.

" Excuse me, can you tell me how to get to the gum wall?"
Courtesy: Grace Coale via Q13 Fox

References:

Gore et al., "Transatlantic Migration and Deep Mid-ocean Diving by Basking Shark", Biology Letters: Marine Biology, Vol. 4 pg. 395-398, 2008.

Accessed via: http://rsbl.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/4/4/395

Lorch, Matt, "Close Encounter with Rare 25-foot Basking Shark in Puget Sound: "I didn't really feel scared, just excited", Q13 Fox News, Aug. 13th 2014

Accessed via: http://q13fox.com/2014/08/13/close-encounter-with-rare-25-foot-basking-shark-in-puget-sound-i-didnt-really-feel-scared-just-excited/

Pynn, Larry, "Rare B.C. Photograph of Endangered Basking Shark Shines Light on Change in Federal Attitudes", Vancouver Sun, Nov. 11th, 2013.

Accessed via: 

http://www.vancouversun.com/technology/Rare+photograph+endangered+basking+shark+shines+light+change+federal+attitudes/9152553/story.html

Sanderson et al., "Fish Mouths as Engineering Structures for Cross-step Vortical Filtration", Nature Communications, Vol. 7, Article #11092, 2016.

Accessed via: https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms11092

Siders et al., "Seasonal Variation in the Spatial Distribution of Basking Sharks (Cetorhinus maximus) in the Lower Bay of Fundy, Canada", PLoS ONE, Vol 8 Issue 12, 2013.

Accessed via: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0082074

Sims et al., "Habitat-specific Normal and Reverse Diel Vertical Migrationin the Plankton-feeding Basking Shark", Journal of Animal Ecology, Vol. 74 pg. 755-761, 2005.

Accessed via: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1365-2656.2005.00971.x/full

Siren Songs

Last week we looked at one of the most productive ecosystems on earth, sea grass prairies. Sea grass prairies house many animals that fill very similar ecological roles to terrestrial counterparts. The most notable, and tragically least discussed in the previous post, is the manatee. Thankfully manatees and their cousins are such a rich topic that they've earned their own post.

 Try not to look so excited, geez.

Courtesy Tracy Colson via Flickr

Almost everyone has heard that manatees are likely the source of mermaid legends, or at least were mistaken for mermaids after the legend had been around for a while. In fact the name of the manatee's order, Sirenia (pronounced: sih-ree-nee-uh), actually comes from the sirens that tempted Odysseus while he sailed from home after the Trojan War. Many people find it a bit surprising that such large, grey, and cowish looking animals could be mistaken for half women, half fish; but beyond sailor's missing home there's actually a decent reason sirens could have been mistaken for their namesake. Female sirenians have breasts in the exact same position that human females do. Add the fact that they nurse their young while floating vertically with their heads above water, and you can see how people could have made the mistake that there were aquatic humans.

Though manatees are often called sea cows; it's believed that sometime around 50 million years ago a close relative of elephants slipped into lakes and streams to feed on the rich grasses growing underwater. Over time these four-limbed sirens became more and more adapted to the life aquatic and their descendants spread out across the globe. Then as the earth cooled to today's more familiar state many sirenians went extinct, leaving us with only four species.

Unfortunately there isn't anywhere in the world where you can see all 

four species at once. This manatee quartet (dibs on the band name) is made 

up entirely of one species.

Courtesy: David Hinkel via Flickr 

All sirenians scour the river, lake, or sea floor searching for underwater grasses to eat. Other marine mammals eat meat, and so have access to copious amounts of fat and protein to keep their weights up and their bodies warm. Sirenians are the only herbivorous marine mammals so they have to eat about 10% of their weight every day. Quite a lot when you consider they can weigh between 500 and 800 lbs. One study found that a single sirenian needed about an acre of constantly regenerating sea grass per year in order to get the food they need.

Sirenian mouths are well adapted to consuming large quantities of plants.  On every species the mouth is turned downwards to the seabed so the siren can look ahead as it grazes. Their teeth are specialized for grinding up veggies and are constantly replaced with new ones as they wear down, just like a shark's!

Modern sirenians are all found in the fresh and nearshore salt waters of the tropics and sub-tropics. They're extremely intolerant of cold and will move out of waters that fall below about 68 degrees Fahrenheit (20C). This need for environmental warmth may be a consequence of having evolved during a much warmer period in Earth's history. Only one sirenian, the Steller's Sea Cow (Hydrodamalis gigas), managed to adapt to frigid waters and survive to the modern era, but believe it or not, we ate them all. 

In case you ever thought your drawing skills aren't good enough for natural history; 

this is thought to be the most accurate drawing of a Steller's sea cow because 

it's the only one we know was drawn from a live specimen

Courtesy: Public Domain via Wikimedia Commons

Steller's sea cows were discovered by westerners looking to hunt sea otters along the Aleutian Islands where food could be scarce. The scientist who first described them tells us that they ate more algae than sea grass, and that their forelimbs were curved instead of paddle shaped to allow them to pull themselves along in the shallows while grazing. What's particularly fascinating about these animals was just how big they were, some individuals were as long as an adult orca! That's a lot of manatee. Steller's sea cows were so slow, easily reached, and edible that they were gone about 17 years after their discovery. Sadly we'll never know if we did major detriment to this species while it was thriving in an isolated population, or if they were already nearing extinction naturally when we dealt the final blow. Fortunately there may still be time to save the sea cow's closest relative, the dugong (Dugong dugon).

Om Nom Nom Nom
Courtesy: Corrie Barklimore via Flickr

Dugongs (no, not the pokemon) are the most marine of the sirenia; meaning they spend all their time in salt or brackish (mixed salt and fresh) water. Their most noticeable distinction from manatees is their forked dolphin-like tail. Manatees have big, round, paddle-like tails that are useful for holding position in still water. While dugongs are wide spread across the tropical Indian and Western Pacific Ocean their populations are spotty, probably due to human alterations in their habitat. The largest herds live along the coast of Northern Australia and in the Arabian Gulf where sea grass beds are still large and healthy. The challenge for these sirens has been human development of beaches where sea grasses grow off shore. Unfortunately sea grasses grow off of exactly the kind of sandy, relaxing beaches humans like to put hotels and beach communities on. When land plants are taken away by construction; dirt and sand run into the nearshore smothering the prairies. Fertilizer runoff from agriculture and golf courses also causes quick-growing algae to out compete sea grass. So when you choose a place to stay during your tropical vacation, keep in mind the resort's potential impact on dugongs before you book a room.

Dugongs role as grazers is extremely important for sea grass prairies because they remove old grasses and fertilize new ones. As they browse, dugongs pull sea grass up by the roots creating noticeable  tracks of bare sand like someone set the lawnmower way too low. Like any herbivore dugongs make a lot of waste and as their poop falls into the furrows they've created in the grass it provides critical nutrients for the regeneration of the prairie.

Who else wishes it was possible to hire manatees to mow
your lawn instead of goats?
Courtesy: Ruth Hartnup via Flickr

The sirenian that is the next most comfortable in ocean is the West Indian Manatee (Trichechus manatus). West Indian Manatees are the most familiar and well-studied of all sirenians because they live in highly populated regions of North, Central, and South America. You may have heard of Florida and Antillean manatees in your travels, and those are legitimate, but they are names for distinct populations of West Indian Manatees. Antillean manatees are usually found in the Southern Caribbean, and Central and South America. You can probably guess where Florida manatees are most often found. For a deeper look at what makes a species, and how populations of one species can be distinct from one another without being totally different, check out the D&T posts "Celebrating Sculpin Speciation" and "Ghost Faced Killer (Whales)".

Most West Indian manatees split their time between fresh and salt water depending on the season. In Florida these manatees spend their winters huddled nears springs of warm water, and since the advent of modern electricity generation, the heated water outflows from power plants. As ocean temps warm up in the summer Florida manatees  spread out in search of lush prairies and can be found travelling as far north as Virginia! Interestingly, although as many as 500 manatees have been seen in one spot during the winter, they aren't particularly social. The mother-offspring bond is the strongest social connection in manatees. Young manatees will stay with their mothers for two years after they're born, learning where warm refuges and feeding grounds are located.

The green on his back is algae, kind of like the stuff that grows in sloth fur.
Courtesy: Keith Ramos via Flickr

The final two sirenians are the most river-adapted species, the Amazonian manatee (Trichechus inunguis) and the West African manatee (Trichchus senegalensis). Both can be found deep into large rivers in their respective continents. Amazonian manatees have stable populations as far up the Amazon water shed as Peru and Columbia, and West African manatees can be found living in lakes 200 miles inland from the sea. These manatees deal with particularly murky water compared to dugongs and West Indian manatees, so the sensitive bristles that cover all sirenians' bodies are especially important for finding food. It's kind of like if a cat had whiskers all over their body instead of just their face.

Yep, that's a baby Amazonian manatee. Commence squealing with delight
Courtesy: Harvey Barrison via Flickr

We know the least about African manatees because the humans of their homeland have struggled with colonialism and the unrest it often instills in the colonized. However, this chaos may actually benefit the manatees; as development in some countries where they're found has been slow. Without speed boats, big riverside properties, and erosion problems African manatees have fewer risks to their survival than sirens in more altered regions of the world.

Dugongs and manatees are one of the weirdest and most fascinating marine mammals on the planet. For every human that's encountered them it's as hard to resist the song of these sirens calling us to discover more about them. But unlike the sirens of Greek Myth, the lure of dugongs and manatees will bring every species to a healthier life and a richer planet.

References:

Mayaba, Theodore B., Kamla, Aristide T. & Self-Sullivan, Carlyn, "Using Pooled Local Expert Opinions (PLEO) to Discern Patterns in Sightings of Live and Dead Manatees (Trichechus senegalensis, Link 1785) in Lower Sanaga Basin, Cameroon", PLOS ONE, July 21st, 2015.   

Satizabal et Al., "Phylogeography and Sex-Biased Dispersal Across Riverine Manatee Populations (Trichechus inguinus and Trichechus manatus) in South America", PLOS ONE, December 20th, 2012.

Accessed via: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0052468

Sulzner et Al., "Health Assessment and Seroepidemiologic Survey of Potential Pathogens in Wild Antillean Manatees (Trichechus manatus manatus)", PLOS ONE, September 12th, 2012.

Accessed via: http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0044517 

Macdonald, Nicole, "Dugong dugon- Dugong" Animal Diversity Web. Accessed via: http://animaldiversity.org/accounts/Dugong_dugon/#food_habits

Weinstein, Brett & Patton, James, "Hydrodamalis gigas- Steller's Sea Cow", Animal Diversity Web, Accessed via: http://animaldiversity.org/accounts/Hydrodamalis_gigas/

I Love It When You Call Me Big Papa

Whether you love him, hate him, or don't care either way; Barack Obama's presidency ended on January 20th. While the 44th president has had a rough time forming a lasting legacy on many fronts; he's proven himself to be the public lands president. Since taking office in 2009 Obama has set aside more land, and even more relevant to Depth and Taxa, ocean than any president in history.

Obama is basically that kid in school who trashed
the curve for everyone else.
Graph based on National Park Service Data

There's a number of ways that land and sea can protected from exploitation in the US. Areas can be set aside as National Parks; which basically prevents them from use other than research and outdoor recreation. Lands can be established as National Forest; which has a conservation aspect but also allows for some extraction of resources. However both of these designations require action by Congress. Action is not something the 114th Congress was famous for. So if a president believes the people that elected him want lands protected, but can't get congress to do anything, how does he go about it? Enter the Antiquities Act.

In the final years of the 19th century Americans were concerned about the rampant destruction of archaeological sites and ecosystems across the country. In response, Congress created the Antiquities Act to allow important cultural, historical, and scientific places to be protected as National Monuments; without the delay that comes from congressional deliberation. Unsurprisingly, Teddy Roosevelt used the act to set aside more acreage than any president until his fifth-cousin took the job in 1933.

"Hahahaha, just try and outdo me little Frankie. I'm the only 
president  this century that everyone liked." -Teddy Roosevelt

You might expect that Democratic presidents are more likely to use the antiquities act, but the exact same number of Democrats and Republicans have established or enlarged National Monuments. In fact, one of the largest ever national monuments was established by the number two acreage protector, none other than George W. Bush! The Papahānaumokuākea (pronounced: papa-ha-now-mo-ku-ah-kay-ah) National Monument was established in 2006 by president Bush and expanded by over 400,000 square miles in 2016 by president Obama.

Papahānaumokuākea (Or for Notorious B.I.G. fans: Big Papa) hits every mark for the intent of the Antiquities Act. It has important historical sites; like Midway Atoll where the Allies scored a major naval victory in World War II. Culturally important places to indigenous Hawaiians. The northwest islands in the monument are believed to be where spirits are born and return to after death. And major ecologically and scientifically important ecosystems. Shallow and deep water stony coral reefs, breeding grounds for endangered species, islands full of endemic plants and animals, and a sea mount as high as Mount Rainier are all found inside the monument.

If we place Papahānaumokuākea on top of the US it's as long as Idaho to Indiana

and as wide as Montana to central Utah.

Image Courtesy; NOAA

Not only does Papahānaumokuākea represent the ideal of what a national monument should be; the restriction it puts on commercial fishing, but not recreational fishing, comes at an essential time in the health of the ocean. There's a growing consensus that about 30% of the world's seas needs to protected from large-scale fishing if we want to continue to feed humanity with good, healthy protein.

 Currently less than 2% of the ocean is covered by marine protected areas, so there's lots of work to be done. Fortunately we already have some guidelines on what makes for an effective marine protected area. One standard uses what are called NEOLI features to plan and assess successful marine protected areas. NEOLI stands for: "No-Take, Enforcement, Old, Large, and Isolated". If a protected marine site can meet four of those five features it's likely to be successful in promoting biodiversity, and in allowing fisher people to collect better catches with less effort at the edge of the protected zone.

"What's that about catching more fish with less effort!?" -This Hawaiian Monk Seal
Courtesy: Dr. James P. McVey, NOAA Sea Grant Program. (NOAA Photo Library: anim0290) 

Obviously Papahānaumokuākea meets the "large" standard, but how's it do in those other areas? Papahānaumokuākea isn't a no-take zone because recreational and sport fisheries are still able to get permits to use the area. However, the scale of recreational fishing is so small relative to commercial fishing that this represents a potentially huge cutback in the amount of harvest within the monument. And before you get frustrated that small scale commercial fishers will be going out of business there's great news. Research has shown that when areas are protected from fishing, species tend to repopulate the protected area and spill over into fishing sites. The edges of the protected area usually have more numerous, larger, and healthier fish than areas far from any protected zone.

Of course no-take doesn't matter if you don't have strong enforcement. This is where Papahānaumokuākea will probably struggle most to meet the standards for protection. The monument is managed by a partnership between the federal and Hawaiian state governments. Hopefully a strong realtionship between these parties will be able to monitor such a vast area. Thankfully some very cool systems are coming online in the near future to help countries protect their natural resources. The Pew Charitable Trusts have developed an incredibly cool program called: Project Eyes on the Seas that uses satellite images, vessel GPS transponders, and home port data to police marine protected areas for relatively cheap.

       Bad Boys, Bad Boys, What'cha Gonna Do? What'cha Gonna Do,
When They Come Fo' You!?
Courtesy: Tony Hisgett via Wikimedia Commons

Now obviously any newly expanded or created national monument isn't going to be considered "old". However, Papahānaumokuākea meets the last NEOLI standard by being isolated from cities and continents, and so thankfully hasn't historically been heavily impacted by human activities. Because exploitation has been limited, Papahānaumokuākea has many of the features we normally associate with old marine protected areas. In fact, in the deep channels between the islands, atolls, and sea mounts of the Hawaiian chain live black corals that have been growing in the same spot for 4,000 years.

Using the NEOLI standards, it looks like Papahānaumokuākea has the potential to help the ocean recover from our historical transgressions, and to provide for humanity in the future. Good environmental policy is about finding balance; meeting the needs of many while protecting the most vulnerable. The ecosystems that produce the natural resources we need have to be kept intact if they're to continue to provide raw materials, jobs, food, inspiration, and a connection to something larger than ourselves. National Monuments like Papahānaumokuākea are an important part of the land-use mosaic that allows the United States to provide the best life for its citizens.

The incoming administration has expressed a focus on the harvest and materials side of the benefits of the environment. An extractive management style may put places like Papahānaumokuākea at risk of having their protections revoked. Both goat farming hippies and doomsday preppers can agree that people have the right to survive off the land. If we can work to remind everyone that all the materials of our modern lives originated from, and are replenished in, pristine ecosystems; then places like Papahānaumokuākea will have a better chance of remaining unaltered. Let's work together to build a broad coalition of people who know the value of functioning ecosystems.

References:

Roberts, Callum M., Hawkins, Julie P., & Gell Fiona R., "The Role of Marine Reserves in Achieving Sustainable Fisheries", Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B, Vol. 360 pg. 123-132, 2008.

Bruckner, Andrew, De Angelis, Patricia, & Montgomery, Tony, "Case Study for Black Coral From Hawaii", Non-Detriment Findings Case Studies, WG 9- Aquatic Invertebrates, Case Study 1, Meeting of the IUCN 2008. 

Accessed via: http://www.conabio.gob.mx/institucion/cooperacion_internacional/TallerNDF/Links-Documentos/WG-CS/WG9-AquaticInvertebrates/WG9-CS1%20BlackCoral/WG9-CS1.pdf

Edgar et Al. "Global Conservation Outcomes Depend on Marine Protected Areas with Five Key Features", Nature, Vol. 506, Pg. 216-229, Feb. 13th 2014.

Accessed via: http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v506/n7487/full/nature13022.html

Long, Tony, "How Satellite Monitoring is Helping Catch Bad Actors", Pew Charitable Trusts Research & Analysis Online, March 7th 2016.

Accessed via: http://www.pewtrusts.org/en/research-and-analysis/analysis/2016/03/03/how-satellite-monitoring-is-helping-catch-bad-actors

US Congress, "American Antiquities Act of 1906"

Accessed via: https://www.nps.gov/history/local-law/anti1906.htm

The Great Pacific Garbage Chowder

The Great Pacific Garbage Patch: it's flashy, disturbing, simple, a great band name, and... is completely misleading. That name was given to an area in the Pacific ocean by Curtis Ebbesmeyer when a colleague reported on the amount of floating plastic in the area. Because the name is so catchy it stuck, and has been used extensively in popular media reports ever since. So what's it look like? Well prepare yourself, below you're going to see a picture from the very heart of this trash zone that's been described as having a surface area twice the size of Texas.

Where's all the garbage?
Courtesy:  ---=XEON=--- via Panoramio

The problem with the term patch is that it suggests a covering, like in a patch of grass; or a lot of big pieces, like in a cabbage patch. Neither of these is what you see in these areas. Really what's happening is that giant ocean currents, called gyres, are concentrating tiny bits of plastic (called microplastic) in their middles. The gyres are more like plastic chowder than a plastic patch. And just like in a chowder the chunks aren't evenly distributed. Different types of plastic have different densities, so they float at different heights in the water column or even sink to the bottom.

This is the North Pacific Gyre. There are two major gyres in the Atlantic and Pacfic,
 and one in the Indian Ocean
Courtesy: NOAA Ocean Service's Making Waves podcast

So why isn't the plastic more evenly distributed, or at the very least why isn't it close to land? Well it has to do with the fact that the gyres are circular currents. When particles sit in water they are partly held up by how fast the water is moving. In swirling water, like the gyres or a cup of tea being stirred, the water at the center is moving slower than the water at the edge. Particles catch on the slow water and are pulled into the center where they stay more or less still.

 Red sprinkles in water before, during, and after stirring: Some sprinkles float, others sink; all concentrate into the center; just like pieces of plastic caught in the ocean gyres.

There are a number of issues associated with plastic in the ocean, and all originate with the fact that plastic doesn't biodegrade. Plastics are designed to last forever; they're stable, cheap, and sturdy. When we throw out plastic it never turns back into the minerals that it came from. Plastics just continually degrade into smaller and smaller pieces, but they stay plastic for functionally forever.
The first problem is that plastic takes up space. Several studies over many years have led to calculations of about 35,000 tons of microplastic and 250,000 tons of larger plastics in the oceans. All of those bits can easily lead to entangled marine animals.

The other big issue is that act of breaking down. As plastics break into smaller and smaller shards they're inadvertently gobbled up by smaller and smaller organisms, entering the food chain at more levels. While they're breaking apart and mixing around in the ocean, the chemically raggedy edges of the plastic grab onto many of the toxins commonly found in sea water. This takes those chemicals from their spread out, and therefore less dangerous, state to concentrated on one of these bits. Some of these toxins are hormone disruptors and there's a growing body of evidence that they can and will affect fish by changing their reproductive organs to those of the opposite sex.

Lastly, when plastic breaks down it becomes much harder to clean up. Imagine trying to separate all the parts out of real chowder, including the spices. Some of it can be picked out pretty easily, but others not so much. The microplastics are so small that we can't go out and grab it all because we'd have to screen the water with nets with really tiny holes. Nets with tiny holes are also how you catch plankton, so to catch the estimated 5 trillion bits of plastic out there we would probably decimate plankton populations.

"A few billion more of these and we can save and destroy the ocean at the same time"
Courtesy: NOAA Photo Library via Flickr

There's also the problem of some plastic sinking. For years surveys of ocean plastics weren't finding as much as researchers expected, but we knew that our waste was making into the ocean, so where was it all going? Well it turns out, straight to the bottom. A three ocean study of deep sea sediments has found significant amounts of microplastic fibers in the depths. A lot of these fibers were rayon and acrylic, materials found in synthetic clothing that probably got into the water from particles coming off as the clothes were washed.

Alright if we can't clean up everything then what do we do? Well the beautiful thing about this issue is that it's entirely in our hands. There isn't a single company or government that has caused all this pollution, so there's no one to fight with to make it stop. We are so powerful in this situation it's unprecedented. The most important thing is to stop using plastic like it has a short life. That tupperware you or your parents bought in the 70's and is still in your kitchen; that's how plastic should be used. Keep that sucker around forever and hand it down to your kids too. Those Legos that have been dropped, washed, stepped on, pummeled, and still haven't broken. Hell yeah that's my kind of plastic. Where you can, eliminate single-use products, and when you're out walking pick up a piece of litter each time. If we do these things we can make a dent in the 30% of all plastic that gets thrown away within a year.

I have to give credit to Edward Humes, author of Garbology for the term "plastic chowder" it really is a perfect metaphor.

References:

Cozar et al., "Plastic Debris in the Open Ocean", Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Vol. 11 No. 28, 2013, DOI 10.1073/pnas1314705111

Accessed via: http://www.pnas.org/content/111/28/10239.full

Ericksen et al. "Plastic Pollution in the World's Oceans: 5 Trillion Plastic Pieces Weighing over 250,000 Tons Afloat at Sea", PLOS ONE, 2014, DOI 10.1371/journal.pone.0111913

Accessed via: http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0111913

Woodall et al, 2014, "The Deep Sea is a Major Sink for Microplastic Debris", Royal Society Open Science, 1:140317, http://dx.doi.org/10.1098/rsos.140317

Rochman, Chelsea, "A Story About Fish, Plastic Debris, and Sex", Deep Sea News, 2014,

Accesses via: http://deepseanews.com/2014/10/a-story-about-fish-plastic-debris-and-sex/

Humes, Edward, "Garbology", Ch. 5-6, Penguin Books, 2013

Getting Ston(ey)ed with Coral

We're Back! The new Depth and Taxa headquarters (AKA my apartment) is all set up with a fancy desk and everything. Thanks everyone for your patience during my moving process. So without further ado let's get back in the swing of things.

There was some great news that came out of the US National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) last month. Twenty coral species have been listed under the Endangered Species Act. "What? That's horrible, more corals are at risk of extinction!" you might be saying, but listing as endangered actually benefits many animals that are at the brink. When organisms are imperiled by extinction listing them serves to provide legal protections for, not only them, but also their ecosystems. It's kind of like a silent alarm going off. When someone breaks in, property is at risk, but once the alarm goes off; the police can come and take steps to keep you from being burgled. It's about time we got serious about protecting coral too. Whole reefs are in danger of disappearing. One study suggests that coral cover in the region between Asia, Australia and Hawaii has decreased by 20% since just the early eighties.

So why do we care? Coral is certainly very pretty, but it's also a fascinating and essential organism.

Seen here being all three at once.

Courtesy Ian Robertson via Flickr

Coral is a massive and incredibly old group of animals. In fact just about anything you think of as ancient, corals were there for its beginning: Megalodon? Coral bemoans its short time on the planet. Dinosaurs? Yeah coral thought they were cool for a while. Coelocanths? They're just trying to steal coral's old-timey charm. What I'm getting at is that coral shows up very early in the fossil record, something like 480 million years ago!

So what's the secret to coral's success? Well diversity is a big part of it. There are something like 2,500 coral species on earth today. They can be hard, soft, individual, colonial, small, large, tropical, temperate, shallow, and deep.  The corals we're most familiar with, and all of those recently added to the endangered species list, are the shallow-living stony corals we like to brag about snorkeling among when we take a trip to the tropics.

All corals are a part of the cnidarian phylum which you may remember from the earlier post about jellyfish.You might also remember that the scyphozoa, hydrozoa, and cubozoa have two life stages: the free-living medusa and the stuck-on polyp. Corals are part of the anthozoa which are all the animals that have no medusa stage.

Perseus can get behind an animal that removes the medusa. (I will not apologize for this terrible joke)
Courtesy Wally Gobetz via Flickr

What stands stony corals out from other members of their phylum is their structure. Unlike sea anemones or jellies; stony corals actually secrete a skeleton. Coral that you might find at a jeweler's, or on the beach, is in fact the skeletal remains of a stony coral. So your beach house may have skeletons in its closet as well as on its coffee table. These skeletons, made of the same molecules as eggshells, are what allow for the gigantic reefs seen in tropical waters throughout the world. And amazingly every reef starts out as a single teeny-tiny coral polyp.

See when a coral mommy-daddy and daddy-mommy (many stony corals are hermaphroditic) love each other very much, and the season and tidal phase are right, they pour floating packets of sperm and eggs out of their bodies and into the water. It's all very romantic as thousands of other animals circle the waters around them devouring their genetic material before it even has a chance to mix. But luckily there are so many of these gamete (reproductive cells) balloons that some do make a new baby coral. At this point in their life baby corals are called a planula, they're microscopic, and they're covered in little cellular oars that allow them to move and find a place to settle. As they settle, baby coral metamorphoses into its adult form, but its still incredibly tiny and all alone. So our intrepid hero begins making itself some friends, by cloning.

"I'm pleased...we're pleased...it's nice to meet you"
Courtesy Nhobgood via Wikimedia Commons

Each of those little anemone looking things up there is a clone of a single polyp that settled on a hard surface. If the entire colony is very large, then the original polyp probably settled decades ago. Some head's of coral have been estimated to be over a thousand years old! This slow growth rate is one of the reasons many coral reefs are at risk of extinction.

 Amazingly, although the clones are separate individuals from the other polyps they all share body tissues with one another. As the polyps catch prey with their stinging tentacles and eat it; the nutrients from that food are actually spread across the shared tissue so that the whole colony benefits. These shared tissues are also what secrete the hard skeleton of stony corals. And it's inside the corals' shared tissues that we can find the reason for their stony skeleton.

Just beneath the skin of stony corals lives one of a number of different algae. These single-celled seaweeds, called zooxanthellae, (pronounced zo-zan-thell-ee) are taken in by the coral deliberately because they can benefit one another greatly. The algae is protected from the thousands of mouths out in the plankton and the corals' wastes make great fertilizer. The coral also benefits because the algae's photosynthesis provides oxygen and nutrients both of which the coral can use. So the coral creates this elaborate skeleton in part to reach for the sun. The skeleton acts like the trunk and branches of a tree pushing the coral and its algae buddies towards the light. The constant competition for sun is what has driven the evolution of so many amazing forms and shapes of different corals.

Enough sun salutes to make a yogi weep for joy
Courtesy US Fish and Wildlife via Flickr

 This mutual symbiosis has been going on for so long and is so beneficial that some coral species can't feed themselves without their zooxanthellae. When people talk about coral bleaching this is what they mean. Something has gone wrong in the ecosystem, so the algae have either gone elsewhere or died. Leaving only skeletons behind. Luckily you can easily help prevent bleaching if you visit tropical areas. Danovaro et. al discovered that synthetic sunscreens actually encourage the growth of viruses that infect and kill zooxanthellae. So when you take that snorkeling trip make sure to use non-synthetics like titanium dioxide or zinc oxide. Often times these sunscreens are labeled as "coral safe" or "sensitive skin" so they're easily found.

References:

http://www.fws.gov/endangered/laws-policies/

http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2014/20140827_corallisting.html

http://www.ucmp.berkeley.edu/cnidaria/anthozoafr.html

https://marine.rutgers.edu/pubs/private/Mass%20et%20al_Immunolocalization_PNAS2014.full.pdf

Danovaro et. al, "Sunscreens Cause Coral Bleaching by Promoting Viral Infections", Environmental Heatlth Perspectives Apr. 2008: 116(14): 441-447. Accessed via http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2291018/

Hoover, John P. "Hawai'i's Sea Creatures: A Guide to Hawai'i's Marine Invertebrates", pg 46-49, Mutual Publishing, 1999