Op-Ed

                                                   
Dayle Walters
03/22/12
Writ 101

                    Dead...Zone

        The dead zone is a cancer of the sea. It lines the coast with an abnormal growth of yellow lumps that look unnatural and unhealthy. A dead zone is a cancerous tumor on the earth. A place where everything from yard waste to agricultural fertilizer winds up and are never used. The Puget Sound is quickly becoming one of a list of 400 dead zones in the world.
 
   The reason for the extravagant name, The Dead Zone, is that nothing can live there.  The area has become hypoxic, “Hypoxia occurs when oxygen levels in seawater drop to dangerously low levels, and severe hypoxia can potentially result in the death fish and harm to marine life, thereby creating a ‘dead zone’ of life in that particular area” (1). Nitrogen and phosphorus are two of the main components in creating a dead zone. These fertilizers accumulate in a body of water and cause algae to flourish into algal blooms “These blooms thrive on nitrates and phosphates and deplete the water of nearly all dissolved oxygen.” (2)
    I believe pollutants are also a problem of a dead zone. When I was little one of the best parts of summer was going out to Lake Boren and cooling off while splashing around with friends. Learning to swim in a lake, exploring the banks where the trees roots made perfect hiding places for colorful rocks found at the bottom of the lake. However, during the summer algal blooms are at their peek. When this lake was over populated with run off from the near by golf course and leakage from houses septic tanks the dead zone process began and because of the  excess nutrients children were no longer aloud to swim in lake Boren. The water is toxic and one of the best parts of summer is lost to future generations. 
    The agricultural techniques in place are wasteful of our natural resources and this is what is causing massive dead zones.  20,842 tons (4) of nitrogen and phosphate fertilizers were used in 2010.  We don’t need to used all this fertilizer we are just to worried that if we don’t over compensate we will not get a product but that is not true.
    Without the help of volunteers the whole eco-system will collapse.  The natural eco-system is in crisis although some creature are able to escape the eclipsing lack of oxogen “some bottom-dwelling creatures don't have the option of leaving the sea floor, making them the No. 1 casualty of dead zones. Certain worms, crustaceans and other animals choke as the oxygen is all sucked away by bacteria” (3).  The changes that would be needed to revert the effect that we have made on the dead zone are simple. What we need to do is look at nature to fix this current problem.  “William Mitsch, professor of natural resources at Ohio State University [says,] ‘These solutions embrace ecotechnology, which includes restoring or building wetlands and riparian buffer zones along waterways.’” (2) So many things develop around water. It makes thing easier on the communities around the river but by making it easier on ourselves we in turn make it more difficult for nature to take it natural course. “When water naturally spills over the banks, it can drain through a riparian corridor and come back as cleaner ground water.” (2) This is simple putting nature back and letting it fix our fertilizer happy culture.
    It is hard for our culture to take responsibility for these sort of things. When an environmental problem comes up it is usually a slow growing problem and it does not show massive changes over night. Just like a tumor a dead zone is slow to metastasize but if you let it grow and take over the environment around it then there is little chance of saving it. Taking action early is very simple by getting to know the Puget Sound Action Agenda which has many quick steps to make personal changes to ease the effect on the dead zone as well as give more information on what you can do to stop the larger effects on the dead zone.

                 










                                                                  Work Cited

Texas A&M University. "2011 Gulf of Mexico 'dead zone' could be biggest ever." ScienceDaily, 18 Jul. 2011. Web. 6 Mar. 2012.
The Ohio State University. “Potential Solutions for Gulf of Mexico’s “Dead Zone” Explored.” OSU Research News, Web. 17 Jun. 1998.
Mother Nature Network. “What is the Gulf of Mexico dead zone?” improve your world, Web. 24 May 2011.
USDA “Fertilizer Use and Price” Economic Research Service, Web. 2010