Ecology and the Environment 2022

Image of a kelp forest from below: Learn more about kelp forest ecology here: Monterey Bay Aquarium Kelp Forests Fossil Fuels to Kelp Detritus - Redirecting Our Focus for a Healthier Planet Ruby Chase, November 27, 2022.           It has come to the attention of politicians, sc ientists, businessmen and engineers worldwide that carbon concentration in the Earth’s atmosphere is alarmingly high. Will carbon sequestration techniques become more valuable than fossil fuel mining practices? If mother nature has any say this will hopefully be the case. Kelp forests are currently one of the most efficient natural carbon sinks. Approximately 80% of kelp enters the ecosystem as detritus, which eventually becomes stranded on the coast or sinks to the seafloor where it is consumed and decomposed. This movement of detritus is vital for storing carbon for long amounts of time, giving humans a grace period to create solutions to our high carbon emissions before it is too ...

  What image comes to mind when you see the word “Dinosaur”? Most likely Godzilla rampaging the streets of Tokyo; or maybe a pack of velociraptors prancing around Chris Pratt. Dinosaurs are so ingrained into popular culture that it's easy to forget that no one actually knows what they looked like. Our image of these creatures is based solely on fossil samples and paleontological inference. In the paper Dinosaur Biology (Farlow et. al.), a team of researchers take us through the process of determining the characteristics of these prehistoric phenomena.    Fossil Record The first place paleontologists turn to for clues about dinosaurs is the fossil record. Fossils provide the most hard-backed primary evidence for certain dinosaur characteristics, so an inference is more likely to be accurate the more it is based on the fossil record. Unfortunately, it is not possible to reconstruct an entire skeletal model from just a single bone, and in most cases the complete fossilized b...

Over the past few decades, there has been a significant decline in western monarch butterfly populations. Phenological mismatches between the butterflies and their milkweed host plants mediated by climate change have been hypothesized as a possible cause of this decline. The timing of phenological events, such as bird migration, varies among years. More specifically, variation in migration and breeding phenology of monarchs appears to be driven by complex patterns of precipitation across time and space. Understanding the consequences of this variation is important to understanding the temporal dynamics of monarch communities and how they are affected by climate change. Phenological shifts driven by such variation have already been documented in nearly all major taxonomic groups in habitats across the world. These shifts have the potential to change interspecific (between species) interactions by altering which ontogenetic (developmental) stages of species occur simultaneously.  Sta...

Penguins and Polar Bears and Plants? Crystal Millar November 17, 2022 A picture of a peat bog located in the Arctic ( ArcticToday ). Climate change is threatening the Arctic. However, up until now, little was known about the environmental role of  vegetation . Thanks to a new study, we are able to more accurately predict future climate changes not only in  the  Arctic, but globally as well.  Vegetation in the Arctic? What do you associate the Arctic with? Glaciers? Penguins? Polar bears? I can almost guarantee you did not think of plants. You may not have even known that vegetation existed in the Arctic. Well, it’s true. They do exist, and they actually play a larger role in the Arctic's climate dynamic than you think. Climate change is one of the world’s most daunting issues today. The Arctic is the most susceptible biome to climate change- it is “warming three times faster than the global average” ( ScienceDaily ). Land that used to be covered in snow is now barre...

Ocean Acidification is one of the many many many consequences of climate change. For those of you who don’t know, ocean acidification is the phenomenon where pH is reduced in the ocean, causing chemical alterations to occur (Doney, 2009). This is happening as a result of all that Carbon Dioxide (CO2) we keep pumping into our atmosphere. The rate at which we’re producing CO2 is accelerating so rapidly, it’s worsening the effects of ocean acidification. These consequences will affect the ocean carbonate system, biological responses of marine life, and marine food webs. This will cause unprecedented damage, and might be irreversible if we don’t do anything to fix it.   The ocean’s ability to absorb CO2 from the atmosphere depends on the dissolution of calcium carbonate (CaCO3). Scott Doney’s article Ocean Acidification: The Other CO2 Problem , affirms that CaCO3 is used to form shells and skeletons necessary for the survival of marine organisms such as plankton, coral, algae, and ma...

In recent decades, harmful algal blooms have become more and more common due to increasing temperatures and increased incidents of natural disasters. This impact on communities ranges from inconveniences, such as beach closures, to health hazards.  While algae can develop into a harmful algal bloom almost anywhere where the conditions are right, one area that has encountered many issues with algal blooms in the Great Lakes and surrounding bodies of water. Specifically, Lake Erie has struggled to keep algal blooms at bay. The lighter coloration in this image shows the algal blooms in Lake Erie.  What are harmful algal blooms (HABs)?  Algal blooms are the overgrowth of bacteria or algae in water over a short period of time. This can happen in any type of water, fresh or salt, and usually blooms are the most productive in warmer months of the year. Harmful algal blooms, abbreviated as HABs, is when algae or bacteria grow out of control while producing toxins that can result ...