Thanks again to Michelle for hosting Thinking Green Thursday.
As I have mentioned in the past, one of my most exciting adventures was climbing to Point Sur Light Station in California, spiraling up the rock toward the lighthouse, pausing along the way to look out over the Pacific Ocean, and watching the whales breaching and spouting as they migrated past.
Each year these animals travel from their feeding grounds in the Bering Sea, to lagoons in Baja, California, where they calve, and back again.
In the 1990's, about 28,000 of the whales made this trip, twenty or thirty per hour, swimming in close groups. Last year there were only 17,000 to 18,000. Climate change is impacting the habits of so many animals, the gray whale among them.
Scientists are observing these changes. They are seeing the northern migration of the whales become more spread out instead of traveling in the close groups as before. Their 10,000 mile trip seems to have become too much for them to accomplish all at once. As the ice melts away in the north, more and more are lingering along the coast of Oregon and Washington for a time before moving on to their feeding grounds. We do not yet know how these changes will ultimately effect them. Once again, the actions of human beings are interfering with Mother Nature.
My source and photo: Sea Notes from Monterey Bay Aquarium.
3 comments:
its scary to see the impact climate change is having so rapidly on natural phenomena.....
This is so monumental. It's much too much for us to burden ourselves and our children and grandchildren with. We can only help so much - the bulk of the responsibility for dealing with climate change should fall on the shoulders of government and industry. It's all about money. It's so, so sad.
This is all so frightening as we have caused so much suffering for so many animals...Another great post for Thinking Green. Thank you Bobbie! hugs.. Michelle
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