The post WWII Munitions Discovered in Deep Sea off California Coast first appeared on Deep Sea News.

The Bakken Sea was unlike any ecosystem that exists today. Now, instead of the dry plains of North Dakota, imagine floating on the surface of this sea about 380 million years ago. The evening air is moist and musty, the sinking sun is dipping low, the sunset a wash of muted colors gleaming off crumpled black waves. Algae near the surface collect the last rays of sunlight, combining light with water and carbon dioxide to make organic matter. A strange collection of prehistoric animals feed on these algae (and each other) here at the sea’s surface, but to truly understand the Bakken, we must go underneath.

Standing underwater, on the Bakken seabed, there is no visible life. There is almost no oxygen in the water around you, transforming the seabed into a “dead zone.” You are at the bottom of a large basin—a bowl in the ocean floor nearly 400 miles wide . As the struggles of life play out in the waters above, the old, sick and defeated sink to their graves on the seabed. But without oxygen, they do not fully decompose, and nothing ventures this deep to scavenge upon their carcasses. Instead, billions upon billions of bodies–mostly algae but some larger creatures, too–slowly amass on the seafloor, forming a layer of organic matter known as the ‘lower Bakken.’

Fast forward through geologic time several million of years into the future: the sea level rapidly drops, and the basin becomes shallow with quick-moving currents. Sediment tumbles in from the surrounding mountain ranges. A layer of sandy, porous rock that covers and buries the layer of bodies. This sandy layer is knows as the ‘middle Bakken.’ Fast forward one more time: the sea rises again, and the first stage repeats, blanketing the seabed once more in dead remains, this is the ‘upper Bakken.’

These three layers—the lower, middle and upper Bakken—are then covered by sand and rock, compressed, and heated in a perfect combination of conditions that geologists refer to as an ‘Oil Kitchen.’ Slowly, this kitchen converts the Bakken carcasses into a diverse collection of gases and complex molecules called hydrocarbons–the fossils that make our fuel [2].

The lower and upper Bakken layers are sludgy and dense, difficult to drill into. But as the remains in these layers liquify, their old resting places crack open under the extreme weight and pressure . The bodies of these ancient dead sea creatures, long immobilized in their graves, now move again: the liquids of the lower and upper Bakken layers seep into the spongy middle Bakken layer. It is from this middle layer that, millions of years later, that they will be exhumed.

To harvest fossil fuels from the Bakken reserve, we drill wells thousands of feet down into the middle layer, and then extend them an additional two miles horizontally, maximizing the amount of oil we can harvest (Continental Resources, PDF). A high pressure mix of sand and water, called ‘proppant,’ is pumped in, fracturing the rock and opening small pockets of oil, which ooze through the cracks and are captured in the well.

Before the beginning of this month, this ‘crude oil’ was pumped into trucks or trains, destined for refineries. But as of June 1st, it instead enters the Dakota Access Pipeline–traversing multiple states, eventually destined for national or international refineries. At refineries, the ancient ocean remains of the Bakken Sea will be processed into the oil in your car, gas in your tank, and plastic lid on your morning coffee cup. Transporting oil via pipeline will potentially reduce the risks and costs associated with overland transport. But the 1,172  miles of pipeline raise a suite of new humanitarian and environmental concerns, including possible spills at important water sources like Lake Oahe, and destruction of sacred sites associated with the Standing Rock Indian Reservation. Protesters tried to stop the pipe’s construction, or have it move it to a new location. Just today, a federal judge ruled that proper environmental procedures were not followed before the pipeline was approved. But for now at least, this long stretch of pipe will be the primary way these remains march across the plains.

Back in in Williston, North Dakota, business is booming; this small community is undergoing an oil-fueled renaissance. After one last look around at the dry grassy expanse, you get back in your car, turn the key–the gas ignites, the combustion moves the oily gears, and drive away.

Additional information

[1] Depositional Facies And Petrophysical Analysis Of The Bakken Formation, Parshall Field, Mountrail County, North Dakota (http://geology.mines.edu/Bakken/NETL_DOE/DOE-Student_theses/Andrea_Simenson_THESIS.pdf)

[2] http://www.glossary.oilfield.slb.com/Terms/o/oil_kitchen.aspx

The post The Ancient Ocean of the Dakota Access Pipeline first appeared on Deep Sea News.

“It is also an era dominated by industry, in which the right to make a dollar at whatever cost is seldom challenged.” –Rachel Carson, author of Silent Spring, 1962

“We need to provide regulatory certainty to the thousands of American farms that rely on chlorpyrifos, while still protecting human health and the environment” –Scott Pruitt, EPA Administrator, 2017

Rachel Carson had no idea how impactful her words would be over 5 decades later; yet after reading the EPA press release denying the petition to ban the pesticide chlorpyrifos for agricultural use in the US, it’s hard to believe how little has changed since the 1960s. Despite decades of progress, our reality is that it is industry—not public or environmental health—that the new EPA Administrator, Scott Pruitt, aims to safeguard with “regulatory certainty.” While the EPA has based its decision to allow the continued use of chlorpyrifos on its uncertain risk to human health, the risks to environmental health, including marine and aquatic environments, have been well documented.

Chlorpyrifos belongs to a class of insecticides called organophosphates (OPs) which are popular because (1) a little goes a long way in killing pests (in the business we call this “high acute toxicity”), and (2) it is broad spectrum (effective at killing several crop pests). Chlorpyrifos, like other OPs, works primarily by blocking the proper function of acetylcholinesterase, an enzyme needed for normal brain and nervous system functioning.¹ This enzyme is common across the animal kingdom including invertebrate groups (like crabs and worms), fish, birds, and, you guessed it, humans. By essentially ‘clogging’ neural pathways, chlorpyrifos exposure can lead to a host of behavioral changes including muscle spasms, reduction in muscle coordination, and, with high enough doses, paralysis and death. It’s a nasty, highly effective chemical. So nasty, in fact, that it has been banned for household use since 2000.

But if chlorpyrifos is sprayed mostly on commercial crops, how can it be a problem for marine ecosystems? Chlorpyrifos and many other dangerous toxicants can be washed into nearby streams or sewers by rain storms or crop irrigation and end up in estuaries, where fresh water bodies like rivers meet the sea.² While chlorpyrifos usually doesn’t stick around in the environment on land, it tends to stick around longer in saltwater³ and anoxic sediment⁴ (the dark sludge that gives estuaries their sulfur smell). In fact, in the Santa Monica estuary in California, chlorpyrifos drove acute toxicity (i.e. high mortality of test organisms) observed in sediment and water samples collected in 2008.² Although this pesticide degrades over time, it is still found in high concentrations in both fish and crustacean tissues.⁵

Pesticide use has only increased through the years. For example, according to the California Department of Pesticide Regulation, 15,412 lbs. of chlorpyrifos were applied to agricultural crops in 2008 (the same year as the study above). Compare that to 2014 (the latest available data), when 67,982 lbs. were applied (that is a 341% increase!).

Over the last several years, we decided to focus our graduate thesis research on the sublethal (i.e. not quite deadly) effects of exposure to chlorpyrifos. Nick’s research investigated how chlorpyrifos exposure impacted predator-prey interactions between two estuary residents: the California Killifish and its prey, a worm that builds tubes in the mud. He found that when exposed to even relatively low doses of chlorpyrifos, fish struggled to accurately locate and strike the worms. He also found that the fish indiscriminately ate worms that had been exposed to chlorpyrifos, which suggests at least one way these fish are being exposed. This sounds crazy and gross, right? But think about how similar it is when you eat fruit or vegetables that have been coated in pesticides. You don’t know the difference! But the consequences can be devastating all the same.

Violet’s research looked at different types of ecological fish behaviors that could be altered by low doses of chlorpyrifos. She found that this pesticide made fish anti-social, oblivious to predator attacks, and less willing to forage for food. In other words, even small amounts of this pesticide can make fish an easy snack to their predators (leading, of course, to chlorpyrifos exposure for the unwitting predator!).

Each of our studies shows a small snapshot of the complex interactions that happen in estuaries daily, and together they paint a larger picture of some of the ways that chlorpyrifos can alter estuarine ecosystems. Estuaries are extraordinarily important systems, performing water filtration, providing nursery grounds for many fish you eat, and a variety of other ecosystem services. Aside from the importance of human health risks (because chlorpyrifos is a risk to human health), it is important to consider environmental health risks as well, because we all benefit from a properly functioning environment.

Sources

Fulton, M. H. & Key, P. B. Acetylcholinesterase inhibition in estuarine fish and invertebrates as an indicator of organophosphorus insecticide exposure and effects. Environ. Toxicol. Chem. 20, 37–45 (2001).

Anderson, B. et al. Impacts of pesticides in a Central California estuary. Environ. Monit. Assess. 186, 1801–1814 (2014).

Bondarenko, S., Gan, J., Haver, D. L. & Kabashima, J. N. Persistence of selected organophosphate and carbamate insecticides in waters from a coastal watershed. Environ. Toxicol. Chem. 23, 2649–2654 (2004).

Bondarenko, S. & Gan, J. Degradation and sorption of selected organophosphate and carbamate insecticides in urban stream sediments. Environ. Toxicol. Chem. 23, 1809–1814 (2004).

Smalling, K. L. et al. Environmental fate of fungicides and other current-use pesticides in a central California estuary. Mar. Pollut. Bull. 73, 144–153 (2013).

About the Authors

Nick Hayman recently graduated with his Masters in biology from San Diego State University, where he studied effects of pesticide exposure on predator-prey interactions in estuaries. He is currently a contractor working in the exotoxicology lab at SPAWAR Systems Pacific performing environmental monitoring work.

During her doctoral research, Dr. Violet Renick looked to better understand the influence of pollutants (specifically chlorpyrifos) on the ecology and behavior of fishes. She currently manages the Ecotoxicology Lab for the City of San Diego.

The post The Return to Silent Spring first appeared on Deep Sea News.

This week the best part of the 90s has returned in full force with the Niantic’s release of Pokémon Go. You guys, this is like that thing when they re-released Oregon Trail for mobile devices…but better.

For those not in the know, Pokémon Go basically blurs the lines between the real world and the virtual world by allowing “Pokétrainers” to catch em’ all as they go through their everyday lives. Quite effectively getting the nerds out into nature to exercise. Sneaky sneaky.

Reports have poured in regarding the rather interesting places people have found themselves looking for wild Pokémon. From strip clubs to delivery rooms, you never know where a Squirtle may be hiding. Perhaps even next to a dead body. 

With that said, I think we can all agree, there are good places to look for Pokémon and very bad, bad places to look for Pokémon. We here at Deep Sea News believe it is our sacred duty to keep the public well informed of all things ocean-faring and would like to point out some of the places that perhaps you shouldn’t go looking for your next Seel or Horsea. You’re welcome.

1. Mariana Trench 

Nearly 7 miles down (36,070 feet), the Mariana Trench clocks in as the deepest point in the world’s oceans. Not only would you not be able to see anything, but the pressures 1,000x that of sea level would crush you and your hopes of catching all the Seadra lurking around in the ocean’s depths. Of course, if you are besties with James Cameron…you might have a chance.

2. Rocky Intertidal Zone

Unlike most of the sea stars on the West Coast of the United States, Starmie’s are immune to Sea Star Wasting Disease so you might actually by lucky enough to find one. However, you must remember that they occupy one of the most extreme ecosystems in the world, the Rocky Intertidal Zone. Thus, in order to be the very best like no one ever was, you must first combat some potentially massive wave action.

3. Hydrothermal Vents

Ironically, there are probably a crap ton of Pokémon at hydrothermal vents and most likely the rarest and most exotic species of all. These vents are teaming with biological diversity uniquely adapted to this most extreme environment comprised of high temperatures and seemingly toxic water. They are adapted…you aren’t.

4. Cook Inlet (Anchorage, Alaska)

Boasting some of the most dramatic tidal exchanges in the United States, this area off the coast of Anchorage, Alaska is no place for Pokétrainers. Krabby and the rest of the water Pokémon won’t get stuck in the quicksand-like glacial silt, but you might. Combine that with a 12.2 m tidal shift and Team Rocket trying to steal your Pokémon will be the least of your worries.   

5. Dead Zone (Gulf of Mexico)

Hypoxic Areas, or Dead Zones, occur when the level of dissolved oxygen in the water column is so low that the area can no longer support aerobic life (note: of which I assume for the sake of this post Pokémon to be). The United States claims domain over one of the second largest hypoxic zones world wide, the Mississippi River mouth in the Northern Gulf of Mexico. This is due, in major part, to large agricultural nutrient run-off. Do not let the photoshopped Squirtle in this picture fool you. There are no Pokémon here. They are all dead.

6. Polar Region

Let’s be real. It’s cold. There is ice everywhere. You don’t have an ice breaker. Though with climate change the way it’s going, catching that Seel might just be a waiting game.  

7. Mediterranean Sea

“The United Nations Environment Programme has estimated that 650,000,000 tons of sewage, 129,000 tons of mineral oil, 60,000 tons of mercury, 3,800 tons of lead and 36,000 tons of phosphates are dumped into the Mediterranean each year.” Probability has it that the Mediterranean Sea is the world’s most polluted ocean, meaning that there are most likely low levels of Pokémon and high levels of “you don’t want to swim there”.

The post The Worst Ocean Environments to “Catch Em’ All” first appeared on Deep Sea News.

The results? You had better put most of your 29 giant plastic scooping machines close to where the biggest litter bugs reside, near coastal Asia. Where you shouldn’t put them? In the center of the North Pacific Gyre.

But it’s not all doom and gloom people, this study lends support for reducing plastic use and just stopping it from getting into the ocean. That’s why I think projects like the Baltimore’s Mr. Trash Wheel and Seabin are so awesome, they are stopping trash and plastic from getting into the ocean right now. And while it’s known that I am not an ardent fan of the Ocean Cleanup, and this is certainly not an endorsement, this study does lend some support for relocating the proposed array closer to the coasts in shallower water which would be easier to design, build and service**. Here’s to hoping the Ocean Cleanup takes the conclusions of this research to heart, but I’m not holding my breath since they are only oceanographers.

*This paper judiciously doesn’t address engineering or even feasibility, but rightfully so. It just assumes that no matter where a plastic sink was put it operates at 45% efficiency (the number put forth by the Ocean Cleanup people), which is all you need to figure out the best place for your ocean cleanup booms.

** This is totally ignoring that when the array is moved inshore, you might not be in international waters anymore, subject to maritime laws of different countries and will now have to contend with much more ship traffic and larger sea life.

REFERENCES:

P. Sherman and E. van Sebille. Modeling marine surface microplastic transport to assess optimal removal locations. Environmental Research Letters, 11(1):014006, 2016.

The post Where is the best place to put your ocean cleanup device? Not where currently proposed. first appeared on Deep Sea News.

2. One Fish. Two Fish. Red Fish… No Fish.

3. Snow Caps Cones for Everyone.

4. Too Many Lionfish on the Dance Floor.

5. I See Deadzones.

6. No Escape from Plastic Monstas.

7. Where Have All the Coral Reefs Gone and Where are all the Cod?

8. Goodness Gracious, Great Plumes of Oil…and Mercury…and all that other crap we put in the sea.

9. I’m all alone and there’s no zooxanthellae inside me.

10. Fin.

The post 10 Reasons Why the Ocean’s Struggle is Real first appeared on Deep Sea News.

as judged within our own moralistic anthropomorphism, the links between dolphins and drugs are the most widespread and least know.

1) Dolphins as Recreational Drug Abusers?
Two years back, a sensational yet possibly important finding was released via the internet of observations that Bottlenose Dolphins caught and tortured small pufferfish into releasing Tetrodotoxins. This intensely powerful poison protects these fish from predators, and can kill anything that eats them, including sushi

connoisseurs seeking the thrill of fugu, the elusive and expensively-prepared raw pufferfish. Theoretically, low non-fatal doses of the toxins were providing a high for the dolphins that they actively sought to score mind-bending bliss. What became apparent is that this ‘discovery’ was merely an observation loaded with assumption within no framework of actual scientific research, and more importantly, it became a marketing ploy for an upcoming television program on dolphins. Despite this behavioral interpretation being untested and unproven, the hilarity of stoned dolphins caused the blogosphere to erupt with sweeping generalizations of recreational drug use among dolphins, and fears that gangs of pufferfish-toking dolphins might terrorize your favorite Club Med, added to our list of grievances against them.

2) Dolphins as Victims of Drug Abuse?
2014’s BBC exposé about neuroscientist John C. Lilly and his systematic dosing of LSD and Ketamine to captive Bottlenose Dolphins made lot of people lose their scat in a big way. How could – and why would – someone send dolphins on an acid trip? It’s not like they are Peter Fonda or anything. While the 1960’s were the heyday for oceanographic expeditions and marine science, it was also the golden age of harebrained

hippie pseudoscience, and it just made perfect sense to slip drugs to dolphins to better understand their ‘consciousness’. Lilly’s intent was to develop a method of communication between man and dolphin, whether dolphins wanted to or not didn’t really figure into his scheme. Of course, it never worked. Despite a flurry of recent articles about Lily’s work, none of it was ever really secret, and I even heard about Lilly’s dolphin drug den from a professor when I was a teenager taking a marine mammalogy course at my local community college way back in 1984. What shut down his project wasn’t outrage from the public or other scientists, but a combination of lack of funding (well after NASA pulled out), the lack of any tangible peer-reviewed research, Lilly’s own accelerating drug use, mortality of his captive strung-out dolphins, and the 1972 Marine Mammal Protection Act that prevented Lilly’s kind of direct abuse to dolphins. Nothing came out of Lilly’s dolphin dosing experiments, but years later, video game creator Ed Annunziata was so entranced by Lilly’s increasingly fanciful and paranoid writings, particularly about the possibility that humans and dolphins might be able to communicate with aliens, that he developed Sega’s Ecco the Dolphin.

3) Dolphins and Drug-Fueled Raves?
I’ve seen dolphin shows at marine life parks, and while they are pretty damned ace at diving through flaming hoops, they are still lousy dancers, so what are they doing at raves? Sadly, from a great-idea-gone-horribly-wrong debacle involving a rave in the Swiss amusement park Connyland, we now know that raves and dolphins definitely do not mix.

Even the greenest novice of dolphin fun-facts knows they have an incredibly sensitive and complex ability to receive and process sound, so what idiot green-lighted six hours of high-decibel disco thump thump thumping next to a dolphin tank? This is the type of deafening sonic warfare we used to torture dictators (I’m looking at you Manuel Noriega!), so nobody should have been too surprised when two of the dolphins went belly-up the next day. One was dead, the second would die a few days later. The real surprise wasn’t that they died from the ear-blasting dance music, but that a the toxicology report from the necropsy found them to have high concentrations of Buprenorphin, a synthetic heroin popular at raves, likely slipped to them by a raver, possibly to better understand their ‘consciousness’, which deteriorated into unconsciousness and death by drowning. As with any murder mystery, fingers were pointed at other culprits who were later cleared of wrongdoing.

The only thing even more unfathomable than dolphins tripping their lights out during a Swiss rave is this question: what the hell are dolphins even doing in Switzerland in the first place? My initial thought was so they could be closer to all the offshore banking (sorry), but in reality, wherever some city leader or chamber of commerce officer hatches a plan to build a municipal aquarium as a tourist draw or potential cash-cow, it means there will be dolphins, even in the Alps. Sadly, but not unexpectedly, many dolphins do not adjust well to captivity so far from the sea and away from members of their own pod, so socially-dysfunctional behaviors like aggression and anxiety can be treated with drugs like Valium, used to ameliorate the same mental disorders in humans.  As some have asserted, these drugs can be potentially be overused in captive animals, and may ultimately hasten the death of dolphins in captivity.

In an even more ironic twist, several of the most widespread and dangerous drugs at raves are Blue Dolphin, White Dolphin, and Pink Dolphin, basically cheap derivations of opiates, methylamphetamines, or methamphetamines, each pill embossed with a tiny dolphin. To take that irony to the third degree is the drug Dolophine, a type of methadone that is used as a pharmaceutical therapy to wean users off of opiate-based rave drugs. When a doctor is administering Dolophine as a treatment for an addiction to Blue Dolphin, they can use the treatment tracking system called DoLPhIn, the Database of all Pharmaceutical Inventions, to better manage their care.

4) Dolphins and Mexican Drug Cartels?
Earlier this year, May 24th, a 66 pound load of cocaine with an estimated street value exceeding $3.5 million US, washed ashore on a Galveston, Texas beach. Bootleggers dumping their load to evade capture or erase the evidence isn’t new, but this one was particularly interesting. Each of the 1 kilo packages were wrapped in black plastic and stamped with a white dolphin – the logo of the notoriously violent Gulf Cartel. Beach combing for drugs seems to be the new pastime for coastal law enforcement as these types of discoveries

happen virtually on a weekly basis. You would think that dolphins could make use of these parcels (they have a blow-hole after all), but it is morphologically impossible for dolphins to ingest cocaine in the usual manner, and toxicology sampling from live and dead-stranded dolphins from the Gulf of Mexico and Caribbean have yet to show any level of discarded cocaine in their system.  With ramped-up enforcement by U.S. and Mexican authorities, moving large quantities of drugs from Mexico is getting costlier and more difficult, so a loss like this batch of cocaine can be a big financial hit to the cartels. Since drugs are becoming less of a guaranteed money-maker, cartels are diversifying, putting money and effort into everything from extorting lime growers to illegal tuna fishing. Mexico and several other Latin American countries have been trying for decades to make their legal tuna fleet abide by ‘dolphin safe’ regulations or face a ban on their fish from US canneries, but cartel-backed tuna boats follow none of these regulations and kill hundreds of dolphins in tuna nets with impunity while easily moving their product with well-honed business skills of violence, bribery, corruption, and intimidation. Moreover, these same fishing boats are often used in the transport of cocaine and marijuana, with the tuna odor effectively thwarting drug-sniffing dogs.

5) Dolphins as Anti-Drug Enforcers or Junkie Athletes?
On the front line of the high-seas War on Drugs is The Dolphin, an 87-foot US Coast Guard cutter that has made record drug seizures in recent years in the drug-running hot-zone between south Florida and the Caribbean. The Dolphin’s crew intercepts drug cartel’s cocaine-packed speedboats blasting across the Caribbean from Colombia and dilapidated tuna boats stocked with bales of marijuana from the Dominican Republic, and each year they confiscate tons – literally tons – of drugs, but much more still makes its way to the shores of Miami.  And here, one type of dolphin in particular has an intense hunger for drugs – the Miami Dolphin. With their long-running parade of current and former players failing drug tests, caught carrying or dealing drugs, and even keeling-over from drug-related deaths, this team far out competes any pufferfish-toking dolphin gang, any time, in any ocean.

The post Dolphins and Drugs – The Shocking Connections first appeared on Deep Sea News.

Bio Logik is the deeper understanding of Biology and Ecology that is achieved when science, hip hop, and videos merge. This collaboration emphasizes the production of scientifically accurate music videos that 1) create a more personal connection between students and science and 2) make science accessible to a broader audience. The Bio Logik crew is represented by SDSU professor (Dr. Jeremy Long), high school teacher (John Ashley), two hip hop artists (Parker Edison and Generik), a film production team (Rowlbertos), myself and other SDSU graduate students.

Over the past couple of months, students from Mar Vista High School have been working diligently on their science music videos and now without further ado…

I think we have created little monsters. Mission accomplished.

For more amazing science videos, check out: Bio Logik

The post TGIF: Seaweed Shop first appeared on Deep Sea News.

“…in the final analysis, the thing we really need to fix is ourselves. It’s not about the fish; it’s not about the pollution; it’s not about the climate change. It’s about us and our greed and our need for growth and our inability to imagine a world that is different from the selfish world we live in today. So the question is: Will we respond to this or not? I would say that the future of life and the dignity of human beings depends on our doing that.”

This past fall, I had the privilege of hearing the renowned ecologist Dr. Jeremy Jackson speak at the 2013 Western Society of Naturalist Meeting. What I most appreciate about Dr. Jackson, is that he gives it to you straight. No bullshit. And I respect that.

I encourage you all to check out his 2010 TED talk “How We Wrecked the Ocean“.

The post How we wrecked the ocean first appeared on Deep Sea News.

For those of you without an iron stomach, hang out in the #DSNSuite more often or, a more palatable version:

The Dirty Martini

2 oz gin

1 tbsp dry vermouth

2 tbsp olive juice

2 olives (and an extra bowl on the side so I can put them on my fingers and eat them…cause I’m cool like that)

How to Dirty your Martini:

1. Place an ice cube and a small amount of water in a cocktail glass. Place in freezer for 2 – 3 minutes. 

2. Fill a mixer with all ingredients including garnish. Cover and shake hard 3 – 4 times. 

3. Remove cocktail glass from freezer, and empty. Strain contents of the mixer into the cocktail glass, include one of the olives, and serve with a mysterious smile.

The post The Dirtiest of Martinis first appeared on Deep Sea News.