“The United States does so little monitoring of marine systems that we know almost nothing about the health of creatures that form the bottom of the ocean food chain — things like pteropods, krill or other important zooplankton called copepods. The most-studied animals remain those we catch. Little is known about the things they eat.”—Craig Welch, The Seattle Times
Largely out of sight, the state of the oceans health are seemingly out of mind too.
For four years, Seattle Times reporter Craig Welch, and photographer, Steve Ringman, have travelled around the world to investigate the growing concerns of ocean acidification— directly connected to the problem of global warming. The increased build up of CO2 in the world’s oceans are causing damage not only to coral reefs in the tropics, it’s causing problems for oyster fisherman closer to home along the coast of Washington State, the epicenter of the story.
So far, their ongoing project has produced a series of short videos, and written pieces that can be freely accessed from the overview page of their site. As Welch explains in the video about the Sea Change project, this is a massive unfolding story that has largely been ignored by the media. They document how scientists are now discovering that high levels of CO2 already present in different ocean areas are effecting the behavior of certain fish, and may signal their premature demise.
Here’s a link to an overview of the Seattle Times Sea Change Stories.