SAN FRANCISCO, December 20 – From 2014 to 2016 an unrelenting marine heatwave, ‘The Blob’, stoked by fossil fuel, wood pellet and palm oil combustion heat lambasted marine life along the west coast of North America.
That ocean heat, as much as 5.5C (10F) above normal, decimated Alaska’s Common Murre population. An estimated 4,000,000 seabirds starved to death. Alaska’s most prominent seabirds are in a deadly tailspin – half the population is gone and showing no signs of recovery, a decade later.
Murres are carnivorous, depending mostly on fish. They forage alone or in flocks, often with other seabirds. These Majesties ‘fly’ underwater using their wings for propulsion. They can dive as deep as 180m (591ft), usually they hunt between 20-50m (66-164ft) below the surface. Murres consume prey underwater, except when bringing fish to feed young.
Common Murres are a beacon of marine ecosystem health, more specifically they indicate the occurrence and robustness of fish populations. Large nesting Murre colonies are vital contributors to nutrient cycling on coastal islands and along the mainland’s shoreline. Their guano enriches plants, soils and entire ecosystems. Fisheries and manmade marine heatwaves are annihilating Common Murres.
But it’s not just the Common Murres that are collapsing. Since 2018, some 700 emaciated Eastern Pacific Gray whales have washed ashore in Mexico, Canada, California and other U.S. states. The culprit – fossil fuel, wood pellet, palm oil ocean HEAT.
There was a critical drop in food availability in the mammal’s Arctic and sub-Arctic seafloor feeding grounds. A dearth of seasonal sea ice that denied underbelly algae to feed Krill ricocheted onto the seafloor to wreak famine. Gray Whale food (Amphipods, Cumaceans, Isopods, Mysids) disappeared, condemning the Royal Highnesses to starvation.
Whales are Mother Earth’s climate stabilisers. The increasing loss of our irreplicable brethren and sistren, the great whales, means that humans, too, are doomed.
Orcas, the most widespread and largest dolphins, are also famished. Marine heatwaves and fisheries are pushing them over the edge.
Hence, these remarkably intelligent, sentient dolphins have begun to hunt the world’s largest fish, Whale Sharks. Fisheries and poachers have mercilessly slaughtered Whale Sharks. They are facing extinction. And now ravenous Orcas have begun to feed upon the remaining endangered gentle fish.
In the Gulf of California, the Moctezuma pod was videoed attacking the pelvic area causing a Whale Shark to bleed out. That pod then feasted on the lipid-rich shark liver.
Elsewhere across the North Pacific from 2013 to 2021, seven thousand Humpbacks were eaten away by hunger. Other Monarchs, too, are fossicking far and wide for Krill and fish. For instance, one Humpback made one of the longest and most unusual migrations ever recorded. It travelled from the Pacific Ocean off Columbia to near Zanzibar in the Indian Ocean – 13,000km (8078mi).
Instead of preparing for more extreme weather and insect epidemics interspersed with longer, sticker summers and shorter, hungrier winters, the world’s leaders continue to greenlight more fossil fuel combustion and levelling of finite old growth native forests.
For example, the Friday before Christmas, Australia’s prime minister Anthony Albanese announced opening and expanding another four new coal mines.
The ghastly starvation of seabirds and cetaceans and others is an urgent call to action for people to defend wilderness, prepare for extreme weather and frugally hunker down. Clearly, a disobedient uprising to break free from subsidised fossil fuels, wood pellets and palm oil is needed. And we need it now!
Agitate. Disrupt. Defend.
Reese Halter is a bees/trees/seas defender.
Unearthly Wails is a special edition, a collection of poetry
illustrated by renowned Ojibwa artist Terry McCue.
Email: HalterBooks@gmail.com to order
