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Ocean
Pollution, Ocean Garbage and Marine Debris
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Marine pollution
can start as far away as middle-America. Any toxic
materials that are put into rivers and bodies of
water can flow eventually to the oceans. Run-off
from drains and areas adjacent to the ocean is also
a severe problem, bringing all kinds of materials
into the sea. Toxic pollutants in the ocean have
considerable impacts on plants and animals. Heavy
metal poisoning from elements such as lead and mercury
caused by industry builds up in the tissues of top
predators such as whales and sharks, causing birth
defects and nervous system damage. Dioxins from pulp
and paper mills, and poly-aromatic hydrocarbons (PAH's)
from oil pollution and burning wood and coal cause
cause genetic problems in marine animals. Polychlorinated
biphenyls (PCB’s) from electrical equipment can cause
birth problems in most marine organisms. Sewage can
cause massive nutrient loading in the oceans, which
leads to algal blooms, effectively decreasing the
amount of dissolved oxygen in the water and many
organisms die from lack of oxygen. Sewage also introduces
parasites and bacteria, which can cause beach and
shellfish harvesting closures. Garbage has always
been discarded into the ocean, but since the 1940s,
plastic use has increased dramatically, resulting
in a huge quantity of nearly indestructible, lightweight
material floating in the oceans and eventually deposited
on beaches worldwide. Marine garbage includes fishing
nets, plastics, party balloons, beach toys, general
household garbage. Animals eat this garbage and it
strangles them or blocks their digestive system causing
starvation. Entanglement can also constrict growth
and circulation, causing eventual slow death, or
trap marine animals within large debris, leading
to drowning, starvation or attack by predators. Even
if just attached, it slows the animals’ ability to
move through the water, and animals starve due to
their inability to catch prey. Always pick
up your trash when you leave the beach. Pollution
can be reduced a number of ways. Many communities
have beach-clean-up days. Recycling reduces the amount
of trash that is available to go into the ocean.
Care should be taken to make sure that oil from cars,
suds from washing, and other pollutants do not go
down your storm drain. Any landscaping should be
protected until it is stable so that silt does not
get washed into rivers and streams. Party balloons
should be popped and never released into the air.
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Picture of trash on
beach. After winter storms, raw sewage and every
possible type of floating trash from modern urban
life are flushed down the Tijuana River from Mexico
and ultimately end up in the ocean south of Imperial
Beach San Diego California.
Picture #: 067465 |
Image of kelp bass,
Paralabrax clathratus, caught in gill net, Los Coronados
Islands, Baja California, Pacific Ocean
Picture #: 011623 |
Stock photo of
a sign near a Seattle, Washington harbor that warns
not to eat bottomfish,crab,and shellfish due to water
pollution.
Picture #: 082953 |
Photo of garbage and
marine debris, a cylinder washed up on shore South
Point, Hawaii, Pacific Ocean
Picture #: 020012 |
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Picture of oil spilling
from pipes and polluting a lake near Niznevartovsk,
Khanty Mansiysk, West Siberia, Russia
Picture #: 068832 |
Image of garbage or
debris, an illegal dump site on the slopes of Hualalai
volcano Kailua Kona The Big Island of Hawaii, Pacific
Picture #: 098522 |
Stock photo of inupiat
guide Jack Kayotuk standing in front of a test well
for crude oil, outside Prudhoe Bay along the Arctic
coast, Alaska
Picture #: 100027 |
Picture of paper pulp
mill spewing smoke from processing plant on the Campbell
River on Vancouver Island, British Columbia, Canada.
Picture #: 024746 |
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Picture of
run off from development that chokes fringing
coral reefs and coastal vegetation, Kimbe Bay, West
New Britain Island, Papua New Guinea, Pacific Ocean
Picture #: 014565 |
Image of hawksbill sea
turtle, Eretmochelys imbricata, suffering from fibropapilloma
tumors, Turtle Hospital, Marathon, Florida
Picture #: 003287 |
Stock photo of Wyland,
a painter renown for his whaling walls, and an environmentalist,
as he paints a large canvas of a humpback whale mother,
calf & escort,
Megaptera novaeangliae, Hawaii
Picture #: 090245 |
Photo of algae bloom,
Eagle Key, Pass Key, Tern Keys, and Park Key, Everglades
National Park, Florida Bay, Florida, Gulf of Mexico
Picture #: 004611 |
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Picture of huge truck
outside a Pulp Mill in Bratsk, Siberia, Russia
Picture #: 068824 |
Image of a sign
asking fishermen to help the environment by recycling
their fishing line by placing it in the receptacle
provided beneath the sign. Florida,USA
Picture #: 082971 |
Stock photo of juvenile
reef octopus, Octopus cyanea, living in
empty wine bottle, Jahir divesite, Lembeh Strait,
North Sulawesi, Indonesia
Picture #: 084492 |
Photo of harbor seals,
Phoca Vitulina, on discarded tire in Elliot Bay,
Puget Sound, Wahington State, Pacific Ocean
Picture #: 076418
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Picture of Pacific harbor
seals, Phoca vitulina richardsi, on log raft, Quadra
Island, British Columbia, Canada, East Pacific Ocean
Picture #: 009339 |
Image of pantropical
spotted dolphins, Stenella attenuata, and
spinner dolphins, Stenella longirostris,
trapped in a tuna net, East Pacific
Picture #: 010884 |
Stock photo of coal
barges on the Ohio River delivering their goods to
an electric power plant in Cincinnati, Ohio.
Picture #: 083695 |
Photo of finger coral,
choked off and killed by runoff and siltation, Los
Frailes, Sea of Cortez, Mexico, East Pacific Ocean
Picture #: 005482 |
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