Deaths-head Jester

About:
[The Project]
[The ApocaDocs]
[Equal Share]
The Six Scenarios:
[Species Collapse]
[Infectious Disease]
[Climate Chaos]
[Resource Depletion]
[Biology Breach]
[Recovery]
Explore:

Play:

It's weekly, funny, and free!

SEARCH

More than 5,600 stories!

A great gift
for crisis deniers!


The ApocaDocs have a Book!
Humoring the Horror of the
Converging Emergencies
94 color pages
$24.99 now $15!
Or read FREE online!




Twitter




Ping this story
in social media:
del.icio.us
Digg
Newsvine
NowPublic
Reddit
Facebook
StumbleUpon

Posted Sat May 15 2010: from Nola.com:
Tiniest victims of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill may turn out to be most important http://apocadocs.com/s.pl?1273922086
But scientists who know these estuaries best are more concerned about a less photogenic community. The grass, microscopic algae and critters living in the wafer-thin top layer of marsh mud - called the benthic community - are the fuel that drives the whole system. If it's covered with oil, everything above, including birds, fish and cute, furry critters, will be in trouble. And so will the humans who rely on the marsh for storm protection and seafood production. "The top two millimeters of that marsh muck is where the action is in a coastal estuary," said Kevin Carman, dean of the College of Basic Sciences at LSU. "That's the base, the food that fuels the whole system... fish, shrimp, oysters, all the species that rely on the estuary." Half of the all the life created in the one of the world's most productive estuaries takes place in this slimy zone just seven-hundredths of an inch thick. It's a world too small for the human eye to detect and involves creatures few people have ever heard of, but one that looms huge for the larger critters in the system.... But if the oil is thick enough to coat the soil as well as the leaves and stems and seeps into the soil to affect the roots, the impact could be far longer, and much more serious. "In that case it might be five or six years before the oil is degraded enough, because the soil would have no oxygen and no light and the organisms that can degrade the oil would not be there," he said. "We seen examples at inland spills when the soil was soaked, and nothing really grew there for four years."
[Read more stories about: oil issues, wetlands, massive die-off]

New!:
No reader quips yet -- be the first!

Got a PaniQuip?

Your Quip (limit 140 characters, no links, just wit):

First name:

The text shown in the Web image to the right:


We reserve the right to reuse, remove, or refuse any entry.

'Doc Michael says:
And here I thought the oil would work like moisturizer!

NEXT>
More stories:
  • Asian ivory black market poses danger to African elephant
  • Rivers closest to Toronto have highest concentrations of PCBs, other chemicals: study
  • (Tiniest victims of the Gulf of Mexico oil spill may turn out to be most important)
  • New water-splitting catalyst found, for feeding H to fuel cells
  • Size of Oil Spill Underestimated, Scientists Say

  • Want to explore more?
    Try the PaniCloud!
    Copyright 2010 The Apocadocs.com