Pteropods: Tiny But Important
"These... pteropods, which provide food for salmon, herring and other fish, hadn’t been burned in some horrific lab accident. They were being eaten away by the Pacific Ocean."
- Craig Welch, "Sea Change: Vital part of food web dissolving"
- Craig Welch, "Sea Change: Vital part of food web dissolving"
Pteropods, also known as sea butterflies, are tiny sea snails that play a significant role in marine ecosystems because they are an important food source for many commercially important fish. For instance, pink salmon rely heavily on pteropods for food; sometimes, pteropods can "[make] up 60 percent of the diet of juvenile Alaskan pink salmon" (Welch).
However, pteropods are one of the most vulnerable species to ocean acidification. Therefore, ocean acidification can impact pteropods, which, in turn, can throw entire marine food webs into chaos, reducing the supply of fish for the overall population. With salmon being a significant food source for many Americans as well as for many others around the world, this demonstrates that ocean acidification's effects on pteropods can have a significant impact on food sources for many people all around the globe. |
Pteropods play a crucial role in marine food webs; however, they are unfortunately very vulnerable to ocean acidification.
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Pink salmon is an important food source for many people around the world; in the United States alone, more than $3.4 billion worth of it was imported during the first 10 months of 2018 (Huffman).
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This image depicts the changes in a pteropod's shell over 45 days when placed in seawater with pH levels that are predicted to occur in the year 2100.
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