Environmental Effects Of Coral Reefs

Coral reefs are dying at an alarming rate thanks to many factors, mostly caused by humans. For instance, when we pollute the earth and our oceans by burning greenhouse gases, we cause climate change. This affects the coral as they can’t withstand the water raising by only a few degrees. This often causes coral bleaching, which kills these animals. Also, storms can destroy reefs, also often caused by humans affecting the environment. Around 50% of our coral has died, and this has a major impact on many other organisms, and the world in general. Many fish live in reefs, and need it survive, and this ruins the ocean, the most important part of the Earth. This comes back to hurt us as well.

Eutrophication is a process in which excess nutrients

Some of these species can do harm to an ecosystem in an economic or ecological way. These species can harm ecosystems and agricultural or recreational activities dependent on those ecosystems. In fact, they can harm our health as humans. A freshwater example of an invasive species is a zebra mussel. Zebra mussels were first discovered in 1988, in North America. Most scientists believe that they came to the Great Lakes on a cargo ship, specifically from ballast water, which is water that is carried in ships’ tanks to improve stability and balance. When ships use ballast water, plant and animals that live in the water are also picked up. These tiny shellfish spread rapidly around the area. However, zebra mussels have a negative effect on the environment because they eat tiny food particles that they filter out of the water, which diminishes food for larval fish and other animals, and causes aquatic vegetation to grow. Also, zebra mussels sometimes attach themselves to native mussels which can kill them. They also posed a big threat to pipes for water utilities, where they clustered on each other and severely constricted the pipes. An marine example of an invasive species is the european green crab. European green crabs first appeared off of Cape Cod in the 1800s, coming from the European coast and northern Africa from seafood shipments or ballast water. They appear on five continents, with a huge presence on both American coasts. European green crabs try to eat anything there size or smaller, and one crab can eat three dozen small mussels a day. They can also crack young clams and oysters, and probably the cause for the end of commercial clam harvesting in so parts of