Now the plankton too are dying

Remember my recent post on corals dying off the coast of West Malaysia? Global warming has also affected the plankton. We learnt in Geography that plant plankton are the foundation of the food chain. Even though they are tiny and sometimes not seen by the naked eye; their existence in the planet's oceans is important as they are a source of half the world's oxygen and helps reduce carbon dioxide levels. Reducing carbon dioxide in turn reduces the temperature of the Earth, making it cooler.

The latest journal, 'Nature' reported that Canadian scientists and a top government US scientist who have researched the population of plant plankton discovered that worldwide phytoplankton levels are down 40 percent since the 1950s. They blame it on global warming, which prevents the plant plankton to get vital nutrients, so the researchers say.

It is a vicious chain. When the seas are warm at the surface, it will not mix well with the colder waters below. It would then make it difficult for the plant plankton which are light and often live near the ocean surface to get nutrients in deeper, cooler water. It also matches other global warming trends, with the biggest effects at the poles and around the equator.


Half a million data points dating to 1899 show that plant plankton levels in nearly all of the world's oceans started to drop in the 1950s. The biggest changes are in the Arctic, Southern, equatorial Atlantic and equatorial Pacific oceans. Only the Indian Ocean is not showing a decline. The researchers said it's too early to say that plant plankton is on the verge of extinction.

When plant plankton reduces drastically, sea birds and marine mammals which feed on fish and other marine life will starve and die in huge numbers because the fish which feed on the plankton also dies, experts said. Ultimately, humans are also affected.