As millions of gallons of sticky black crude continue to gush out of a pipe in the Gulf of Mexico, we’re hearing a lot about how adorable animals like sea turtles, otters and dolphins are going to be affected. But while we love the cute animals, we don’t want to overlook the so-called redheaded step-children of the animal realm, either. They need just as much help as the fluffy furry ones, if not more because, according to a recent study, ugly animals are more likely to go extinct.

Manatees

There’s a reason that manatees are called sea cows – they sort of resemble what the remains of a drowned cow might look like after a week or so. These bloated, bulbous animals may not be beauty queens, but they definitely deserve our attention and protection. Scientists don’t know exactly what’s going to happen when manatees start swimming through the oil, but they’re going to find out all too soon; a group of seven animals was spotted swimming along the coast of Destin, Florida.

Marsh Rice Rat

Few animals are more reviled than rats, even though these animals are technically incredibly similar to the ones we think are so dang cute (think fuzzy bunnies). The semi-aquatic Marsh Rice Rat resembles its landlubber cousins with its grayish-brown fur and long naked tail, but its need to dive underwater to forage for food like plants, snails and subterranean fungus will put it at risk as the oil seeps into the marshes of Gulf states like Louisiana.

Gulf Sturgeon

The gulf sturgeon, a bizarre-looking relic of the dinosaur age, ended up on the Endangered Species list back in 1991 when its populations were nearly annihilated in the wild by centuries of demand for its meat and caviar. During the warmer months, Gulf Sturgeon spend their time in coastal rivers from Louisiana to Florida, but come cooler weather they’ll be back in the Gulf of Mexico, where they’re likely to face a battle for survival in the aftermath of the oil spill.

American Alligator

It’s got a spiky back, a powerful tail that could knock you to the ground in an instant and what seems like a sinister grin. But as imposing as the American Alligator may be to us, this animal is defenseless against the negative changes that are starting to occur in the marshes and wetlands that it calls home in Florida, Texas, Louisiana and Alabama.

Shrimp

Shrimping is big business in the Gulf of Mexico – or at least, it was. The fishing industry has been effectively shut down for obvious reasons, and even when the fisherman are allowed to start trawling again, consumers might not bite. While the oil may not have had a catastrophic effect on creepy-crawlies like shrimp that live along the sea floor on its own, BP’s toxic dispersants are actually spreading the contamination deeper into the water.

Oysters

Because each of these bumpy mollusks breathe 50 to 100 gallons of water a day, “the oyster is to Louisiana’s estuaries what the fabled canary was to coal mine safety,” according to NOLA.com. So water that has been contaminated both by oil and by toxic dispersants will be deadly to the intertidal oyster reefs that grow along and just inside the coast of Louisiana.  Ironically, the American Petroleum Institute once produced a video with a segment called “Lifeline to Oysters,” attempting to convince skeptical Gulf fishermen that oysters and offshore drilling get along just fine.

Smalltooth Sawfish

The critically endangered Smalltooth Sawfish has already seen its habitat shrink from a large portion of the Atlantic Ocean to a small area near the lower peninsula of Florida. But when the Loop Currrent, a strong flow of warm water in the Gulf, brings oil to the Florida Keys, this rare fish could be wiped out altogether.

Plankton

They’re literally at the bottom of the food chain in the sea, but that doesn’t mean that curious-looking zooplankton aren’t important – they serve as sustenance for small animals like snails, shrimp and jellyfish, including some endangered species.  These drifting organisms are just as much at risk from the oil spill as the larger animals whose suffering we can actually witness.

Images:Andrea Westmoreland, Wikimedia Commons (manatee, marsh rice rat, sturgeon, alligators, shrimp, oysters, smalltooth sawfish, plankton)

The post The 8 Ugliest Animals Threatened by the Oil Spill appeared first on EcoSalon.

Where would Malibu be without its surfers and where would its surfers be without safe water?

That’s part of the driving energy behind the Legacy Park project. Construction has been launched this week as veteran wave riders joined Malibu City Council to reduce stormwater pollution in Malibu Creek, Malibu Lagoon and world-famous Surfrider Beach.

According to the L.A. Times, the sand breaking drew pioneering surfers Cal Porter and Richard Davis as well as Los Angeles County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky, state Sen. Fran Pavley (D-Agoura Hills), Assemblywoman Julia Brownley (D-Santa Monica) and Malibu-ite Victoria Principal.

The cost of the major undertaking: $50 million. The benefits of cleaning polluted ocean waters by October 2010? Priceless!

“Legacy Park is going to act as Malibu’s environmental cleaning machine,” said Mayor Andy Stern. “It will reduce pollution from stormwater, improve the city’s water quality, and allow residents to enjoy the health and recreation benefits of an open space area and a clean ocean.”

The City of Malibu envisioned a central park that functioned like an environmental cleaning machine to reduce pollution impacts and improve water quality in areas used daily by residents and tourists from around the world. This following a lawsuit last year by two environmental groups (The Natural Resources Defense Council, NRDC, and the Santa Monica Baykeeper) to stop allowing urban runoff carrying bacteria and toxins to flow into coastal waters.

The groups argued urban runoff  is the major culprit of coastal water pollution and contact with the pathogens and chemicals, such as cyanide, aluminum and fecal coliform, sickens beachgoers and damages marine life.

The motto of the project: It’s a central park. It’s an oasis. It’s an environmental cleaning machine.

The goal is for Legacy Park to transform 15 acres in the Malibu Civic Center area into a park and stormwater treatment facility, one that captures and cleans more than 2 million gallons a day of stormwater and urban runoff. The water is disinfected and then recycled.

The City says Malibu Legacy Park will be “the only park in California where five coastal natural habitats are linked and accessible: the ocean, lagoon, stream, seasonal wetland and coastal bluffs, and where the development of five habitats on-site will serve as an outdoor educational and living learning center.”

The park will also be a civic attraction with an amphitheater, a Malibu culture commemorative area and educational kiosks.

The City is still seeking donations to support the project. A gift of $500 or more will get you recognition on the park’s permanent honor wall.

Membership in the Legacy Leadership Circle, which is limited to 100 families, begins at $25,000.

Naming opportunities in the park are available for gifts of more than $25,000.

Donations of $5,000 or more are eligible for our three-year pledge program.

Contact the Legacy Park Campaign at (310) 456-2489, ext. 232, or email info@malibulegacy.org.

Main Image: Pnoeric

Image One: City of Malibu

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It’s not unusual in California to see from 1,500 to 2,000 sea lion deaths on our beaches each year. But this year is off – way off – and no one can figure out why.

Starting in May and continuing through September, an unexpected onslaught of emaciated, young sea lions has been beached along the coast, requiring a tremendously heightened response among the marine mammal rescue networks throughout the state.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which coordinates these networks, is just as concerned about what is happening offshore at sea lion breeding colonies in California’s Channel Islands: Unusually high levels of mortality among the 59,000 pups born in this past spring.

“In one study area, 6,000 pup mortalities were observed where the average had been 1,000 to 1,500,” said Jeff Lake of NOAA’S National Marine Mammal Lab (NMML).

Beach goers have seen – and smelled – the signs that something is amiss. I’ve spotted many carcasses myself throughout the summer months and was surprised to encounter so many visitors soaking up surf and sand and picnicking on rocks amid rotting, decomposing mammals.

The rank smell just about knocked me out while exploring Costanoa with my husband. And in recent days, I’ve passed several rotting sea lions on the beach at Fort Funston, where I run. Naughty dogs go wild, barking and sniffing those sad decaying bodies with empty, hallowed-out eyes.

“We refer to marine mammals as a sentinel species that is like us and can provide a barometer of what is happening to our own ecosystem,” Trevor Spradlin of NOAA’s Washington D.C. office  tells me. “The sea lions have tapped out with a record number of cases of the mammals starving and since it cannot be linked to an El Niño, folks are scratching their heads.”

Perhaps puzzling now, the deaths are typical during an El Niño, such as the one experienced in 1997-1998, due to changes in water surface temperatures and a lack of upwelling.

Ocean upwelling is the mixing of deep cold water at the bottom of the ocean with warm water at the surface so that the cold water and nutrients that fertilize aquatic plants that form the food web can rise to the surface layers while warm water travels to the mid to deep depths. Such areas are very rich along the coast and that is where you find the anchovies, squid and sardines pinnipeds feed on.

While this isn’t the time for such a cycle, scientists are still seeing the oceanographic changes caused by the dying of winds in late April and June. There was no way to pull the vital nutrient-filled waters to the surface. This has been a large contributor to the starvation.

“A huge number of pups were born this year in the Channel Islands and the breakdown in the upwelling may have resulted in the fish moving to other areas inaccessible to young sea lions looking for food for the first time,” observes Joe Cordaro, a wildlife biologist and marine mammal strandings coordinator at NOAA National Marines Fisheries Southwest Regional Office in Long Beach, CA.  “Unlike the older animals, the young pups cannot follow the fish wherever they go.”

Cordaro says scientists also are considering the theory that upwelling has been so great, it has acted like a conveyor belt transporting nutrients to other areas. Either way, he agrees, nature is acting just like it does in an El Niño.

“We do have one developing in the Tropics, and if it continues to develop, it will be nothing compared to what we are now seeing in strandings and deaths,” says Cordaro. “It will pretty much wipe out the reproductive year, slowing down the rate of increase in the population.”

He adds that there is no way it will make a huge dent in the population, itself, because the sea lions have been increasing since the last El Niño with the current population of California  sea lions at about 239,000.The big mystery is why the lack of upwelling has occurred in some areas while not in others.

An investigation into the mystery is being led by Dr. Frances Gulland, Director of Veterinary Science at the Marine Mammal Center in Sausalito. No one knows yet if any of this can be attributed to climate change. They do know that nothing like this occurred last year.

Meantime, beach visitors are asked to continue reporting sea lion strandings to the Sausalito center (415)298-SEAL rather than trying to coax mammals back into the water. Also, always stay back from the dead mammals found on the beach and keep your dogs away, as well.

For animal removal, you should contact the beach maintenance service in your city. Some have policies of removing the carcasses, while others allow them to remain, despite the ghastly smell.

While the dead animals provide food for sea birds and fowl, the sea lions are usually contaminated from pesticides and other toxins dumped into our oceans over time. Cordaro says it isn’t in the best interest of scavengers to feed on the carcasses.

“They don’t die from eating contaminants but their eggs become thin and crack before hatching,” he says. “It effects the reproduction of the next generation.”

Main Image: Luanne Bradley

Image One: Vanilla Sheikh

Image Two: NOAA

Image Three: Quarterdome

The post Scientists Baffled by High Sea Lion Death Count in a Non-El Niño Year appeared first on EcoSalon.