marine life

How Water Pollution Effects Marine Life? For years man has been polluting our vast resource of oceans, not expecting to ever cause harm to them. Unfortunately, they were wrong. Our oceans and other waterways have become a poisonous playground of garbage, chemicals, and sewage. The effects of this ignorance has had devastating affects on the marine life and their habitat. This affects the habitat for marine life by destroying their homes. In doing so the intricate balance between marine animals and their homes can alter our oceans forever. Our very existence depends on the oceans. “Without oceans, Earth would be too hot and there would not be enough air to breathe.” (Hogan 10) The immediate importance to stop the destruction of our oceans is clear. Our oceans are not only crucial to our climate, but also provide us with food, jobs, and much loved recreation. The effects of man’s abuse can be seen on a daily basis, from the disappearance of long existing sea life such as whales, to garbage washing up on the shore, to the disastrous oil spoils that cost millions of dollars each year to clean up. In some areas the neglect is already so great that complete clean up is impossible. Pollution is the introduction of harmful contaminants that are outside the norm for a given ecosystem. Common man-made pollutants that reach the ocean include pesticides, herbicides, chemical fertilizers, detergents, oil, sewage, plastics, and other solids. Many of these

pollutants collect at the ocean's depths, where they are consumed by small marine organisms and introduced into the global food chain. (oceannationalgeographic.com) The most polluted body of water on Earth is the Mediterranean Sea. Factories and ships dump over 300,000 tons of oil, toxic waste, and raw sewage in the Mediterranean each year. (Hogan12) Even though most European countries have been working since 1975 to clean up the sea they still are living along the most polluted waters on Earth.