Humans may be inadvertently wiping out marine life due to
noise emanating from our machines, two recent studies purport.
The
first study found that ship noises could hurt endangered killer whales. A
second, published in Nature
Communications (subscribe now, operators are standing by!), purportedly
found that the noises our machines make underwater may actually be fatal to “smaller fish.”
The researchers,
from Britain, Canada and Australia, point out that the planet’s coastal regions
are “experiencing unprecedented human population growth.” The University of
Bristol’s Andy Radford stated, “The combination of stress and poor responses to
strikes by predators is why these fish became such easy prey.”
Or, it
could be the fact that they are small fish. Small fish have been eaten by
larger fish and other predators for some millions of years now. Nature, you
see.
The
team of scientists was led by Stephen Simpson of the University of Exeter. They
say that the noise appeared to make the fish breathe more heavily, leading them
to consume more oxygen and slowing their ability to respond to a dangerous
situation, thereby increasing a predator’s success at capturing the fish. (I
don’t know about you, but when I find
myself breathing more heavily I usually respond quicker to the situation, but perhaps that’s a story best left for
another time).
If
mechanical noise is so dangerous to whales and porpoises, why do they so often
swim alongside ships? And if the noise is so deadly to smaller fish, why
doesn’t the same noise have that same affect on the predators, which are mainly larger fish? I mean, if
it bothers the whales and the small
fish…?
How did
these fish make it through World War II with German U-Boats prowling about, sonar
constantly pinging, sinking everything in sight (oil everywhere, too!) while Japanese
Kamikaze pilots plowed into the sea like large, metallic ospreys?
Chill
out, guys, your theory is all wet. Maybe evolution and survival of the fittest
will work in this case, too.
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