Oysters have been the foundation of a booming business for the Hog Island Oyster Company in Northern California. But ocean acidification as a result of increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide is threatening that.
"PENN COVE, Wash. – Cookie tray in hand and lifejacket around chest, Laura Newcomb looks more like a confused baker than a marine biologist. But the University of Washington researcher is dressed for work."
"The Australian who heads fishery management in the Western and Central Pacific has warned an international agreement is urgently needed to avert disaster for the tuna industry."
"There weren't any keepers yet, but the fish were definitely biting for Willie Edwards one day last week as he trolled along the edge of the Susquehanna Flats. The 72-year-old fisherman from North East said he'd caught 'a lot of little rock,' or striped bass."
"In an effort to reduce the number of giant bluefin tuna killed by fishing fleets, the U.S. is putting out new rules about commercial fishing in the Gulf of Mexico and parts of the western Atlantic. The rules have special protections for giant bluefin — fish that have grown to 81 inches or more."
"It began forming in May, when heavy spring rains loaded the rivers and creeks with fertilizer washed from farms and suburban lawns. It grew rapidly over the summer, as a broth of chemicals, animal waste and microbes simmered in the warm, slow-moving waters of the Chesapeake Bay."
"Signifiers of the good life, local bivalves may be harbingers of another phenomenon: species extinction."
Discovery Channel's Shark Week is able to draw as many as 53 million viewers. While the cable outlet has included some conservation information in recent years, it seems to be shifting back toward fear-mongering based on fantasy rather than fact. The productions include Photoshopped film of a "megalodon" that is extinct, "deadliest" sharks that haven't killed anyone, and scientists played by actors.
Bob Garfield interviews marine biologist David Shiffman for On the Media August 15, 2014.
"ASTORIA, Ore. — The salmon here in the Columbia River, nearly driven to extinction by hydroelectric dams a quarter century ago, have been increasing in number — a fact not lost on the birds that like to eat them. These now flock by the thousands each spring to the river’s mouth, where the salmon have their young, and gorge at leisure."
"The ancestral connections of tribal coastal communities to the ocean’s natural resources stretch back thousands of years. But growing acidification is changing oceanic conditions, putting the cultural and economic reliance of coastal tribes—a critical definition of who they are—at risk."
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