Introduction A dead zone is defined by when there is a body of water that lacks an adequate amount of oxygen to keep the species in it alive. With the low oxygen levels, species who have a lower tolerance of hypoxia like “...oysters, crabs, and finfish...” die while species with a higher tolerance like jellyfish have higher chances of survival and takes the place of where those low tolerance species used to be (Dybas 553). A major contributor to the creation of dead zones is an excess amount of nitrogen in the water. The excess amounts of nitrogen are primarily caused by farmers over fertilizing their land. Although plants need nitrogen to grow, plants only take in a small fraction of the nitrogen applied to their soil. In addition, nitrogen
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Since only a small fraction of nitrogen is used by the plants that farmers want to grow, the rest of the nitrogen goes elsewhere such as into bodies of water. Once there is too much nitrogen in the water, there becomes a lack of oxygen causing species living in that water to be unable to breathe. It becomes a dead zone in that body of water because of the marine life in it escaping the horrible conditions to go elsewhere or simply dying from suffocation because they are not able to leave. Bottom dwellers have the smallest chance of survival in hypoxic waters. Dead zones are spreading across many oceans and even some lakes worldwide. The Baltic Sea contains the world’s largest dead zone (Dybas, 554). Two major factors in the creation of this dead zone was the pollution of its water with human waste and nitrogen buildup emitted by burning fossil fuels. The Gulf of Mexico is currently one of the world’s most well known dead zones, being the “...planet’s second largest” (Dybas 554). 43 of the world’s dead zones exist in the United States (Dybas 554) out of the 146 coastal dead zones in total worldwide since …show more content…
Geological Survey in Reston, Virginia and her research team discovered that dead zones have existed long before the news of current, well known dead zones such as the ones that take place in the northern Gulf Of Mexico. To examine and analyze dead zones that existed in the past, Osterman and her research team extracted sediment cores from where the Gulf of Mexico’s most current dead zone took place then dated each core they collected.
Since only a small fraction of nitrogen is used by the plants that farmers want to grow, the rest of the nitrogen goes elsewhere such as into bodies of water. Once there is too much nitrogen in the water, there becomes a lack of oxygen causing species living in that water to be unable to breathe. It becomes a dead zone in that body of water because of the marine life in it escaping the horrible conditions to go elsewhere or simply dying from suffocation because they are not able to leave. Bottom dwellers have the smallest chance of survival in hypoxic waters. Dead zones are spreading across many oceans and even some lakes worldwide. The Baltic Sea contains the world’s largest dead zone (Dybas, 554). Two major factors in the creation of this dead zone was the pollution of its water with human waste and nitrogen buildup emitted by burning fossil fuels. The Gulf of Mexico is currently one of the world’s most well known dead zones, being the “...planet’s second largest” (Dybas 554). 43 of the world’s dead zones exist in the United States (Dybas 554) out of the 146 coastal dead zones in total worldwide since …show more content…
Geological Survey in Reston, Virginia and her research team discovered that dead zones have existed long before the news of current, well known dead zones such as the ones that take place in the northern Gulf Of Mexico. To examine and analyze dead zones that existed in the past, Osterman and her research team extracted sediment cores from where the Gulf of Mexico’s most current dead zone took place then dated each core they collected.