Large marine life could become extinct

archimedes(55)

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Marine life in the big blue ranges from small to massive. Usually in the animal kingdom the strongest and most adaptable survive and often that leads to the most successful predators and scavengers being fairly large, but that isn't always true. Recently some of the largest animals in the oceans have become more threatened than they have ever been before.

The Issue

Jon Payne Stanford Earth professor has stated that there has been a strong correlation between extinction threat and the size of an animal. This is most likely due to people primarily hunting large animals first for consumption than small ones. These can include things such as whales and tuna.

Extinction

Through the use of the fossil records, it has been concluded that the current extinction event that could be happening now is not like any other that has been recorded. It is unique in the way that organizes with a larger bodies are being the targets of extinction threats. An analysis done by the people at Stanford have said that the correlation is that with every factor of 10 increase in body size for an animal, it leads to an increased threat of extinction by a factor of around 13. So what this means in simple terms is, is that the bigger you are, the higher risk of extinction that you are at.

Though the extinction of larger animals in the ocean has never been seen before, there has been something like this seen on land. It has been seen in the past with the ancient humans hunting down larger animals such as mammoths and megafauna across the globe before they had access beyond coastal areas.

The Aftermath

With the extinction of larger animals, the ecosystems that they live in can take a massive hit as well because the nutrients will not cycle through the different levels of the ocean as well. This same issue would also extend to other ecosystems.

The Solution

There is still time for humans to change the fishing habits and attempt to restore the animal populations in the oceans. If nothing is done and the issue is not brought to the attention of the public the large animals of the oceans may one day go extinct and nothing can be done then.