Posted on 11/19/2014 12:29:19 PM PST by Bettyprob
Swimmers who dive into any number of Canadian lakes might not emerge clean and refreshed, but dripping with globs that resemble slimy fish eggs. A legacy of industrial pollution has caused great changes in the country's water chemistry, creating a boom in tiny organisms that transform lakes into "jelly."
That's the gooey news from scientists behind a new paper in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, who say that populations of this particular organism have doubled since the 1980s in many of Ontario's lakes. The reasons involve a complex dance of species, but here's the short version: Acid rain caused by smelting operations and other human activity removed calcium from the soil in drainage areas. That depleted the calcium levels in many lakes, which has hurt a kind of plankton (Daphnia) that needs the element to build armor. Enter a competing plankton, Holopedium, which requires far less calcium to bulk up and is coated with a gel that's excellent at repelling predators.
(Excerpt) Read more at msn.com ...
Bullcrap. So-called “acid rain” isn’t acidic enough to leach out all the calcium from the soil.
Smelting leaves behind more than it depletes. Aluminum smelting leaves behind PCBs, cyanide and fluoride in toxic levels. I am certain Canadian smelters are closely monitored by the government, more closely than those in the US. Canada has safety levels for fluoride set, we don’t.
ALCOA was involved in a law suit in our county for a smelter operation that took twent years and $27 million to clean up.it would have cost more, except that the dept of ecology determined that the drinking water in the area was so deep that it could not be recovered.
Acid rain is the new global warming.
The solution is straightforward: bring up train loads of limestone. Dumped in the rivers and lakes, it raises the pH. The US has been doing it for years.
While on the surface it seems like Ontario has a lot of water, if you exclude the great lakes and Hudson Bay, it is a manageable problem.
cough , Bull Crap
They might just freshwater jellyfish, a species thought to be extinct, it’s a MIRACLE!
You’re right of course but for the sake of argument let’s say acid rain did leach calcium from the soil. Where would that calcium go? Into the lakes. So there should be more calcium in the lakes not less.
And the Ozone Hole over the Poles.
Imagine if the Grand Canyon was just now discovered................
I can tell you have never been to Sudbury, Ontario, Canada. It is a lot better there and the srounding lakes than it was but it will take many years of work to clean it all up.
It’s real, but like most environmental issues overblown. In some areas industrial pollution devastated some lakes with acid rain. Young people are taught that pollution is worse than ever, when in fact it’s mostly been cleaned up in America. I’m wondering what lakes? How many and where exactly?
You mean it was the original “Global Warming.”
The global warming drum is worn out so while the greenies look for another farce ... er, I mean cause ... to champion, they’ve resurrected this acid rain relic from the 80s.
The Grand Canyon... whew! That was a close one! LOL
I do recall living in Burbank when the smog was REAL bad back in the 70’s; if you looked up and kept your eyes open during one of the sparse rains your eyes would feel like they are burning.
I remember the crystal clarity of the lakes in the Adirondacks and their lack of any fish life back in the mid-eighties, supposedly caused by the acid levels being too high. So, in my opinion and subject to correction, the reports of sulfuric acid rain derived from the burning of high sulfur coal in the power plants and steel mills to the west may have been legitimate. Having grown up in NE Ohio I can also recall the day glow chemical spew which went by the name of the Cuyahoga River as it winded through the industrial Flats of Cleveland. At one time the EPA had real work to do and was not the out of control agency it is now.
BTW, that ozone hole mention is spot on too IMO.
I’m not saying man couldn’t have an effect on this planet. I think man does have negative effects.
I still think we need to keep them in perspective and minimize them where they are obvious.
This is nowhere near obvious.
If you look at the earth and how it has changed over time, you see an obvious history of vast change. Strangely, life goes on.
The changes we’re observing are almost non-existent compared to other massive periods of change.
This article uses “Canada” as a blanket term. Sudbury, Ontario is not representative of the whole of Canada by any means.
As an Alaskan, I have driven through the western provinces many times. Yukoners are our next door neighbors, I can tell you, their waters are some of the most un-polluted rivers and lakes you’ll ever experience. (Except for moose and caribou droppings upstream, of course.)
Somebody found Senator Robert Kelly! (X-men joke)
Probably came from making clean batteries for the Prius....
we’ve always been told that plankton is critical because all other larger life forms build off of it. lots of plankton equals good.
now it’s bad.
our scientific overlords - it’s good when we say it’s good, but bad when we say it’s bad. sorry I don’t want to switch faiths.
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