Toxic turtles: Long-lasting chemicals could be harming sea turtles

[Staff]

Toxic turtles: Long-lasting chemicals could be harming sea turtles
By Brett Israel
Environmental Health News
March 14, 2013

Toxic turtles: Long-lasting chemicals could be harming sea turtles. — Environmental Health News
excerpt from above:

From the moment they are born, sea turtles fight to survive. Buried alive, they dig themselves out and evade hungry crabs and birds as they crawl to the ocean, where they begin a long and treacherous migration. One out of 1,000 will survive into adulthood. And those that do will bear a toxic burden.

Scientists are discovering that sea turtles, long ignored by toxicologists who study wildlife, are highly contaminated with industrial chemicals and pesticides.

Hawksbill turtles, which are spongivores, have "surprisingly high concentrations of PFOS and PFCs."

Loggerhead turtles have altered immune systems and smaller eggs that some studies have linked to contaminants. These chemicals kill turtle cells in lab experiments, and based on research in other marine life, scientists suspect that...

[Equilibrium]

Hey spruce..... this is the same thing that's happening to the seals that polar bears are eating.

[sprucetree]

So the Polar Bears are getting a good dose of toxins too.[From consuming the Walrus and Seals]

I like the way the article pointed out this is an across the board problem; mammals, reptiles fish, and birds are all effected.

I think there's a link between having acidic oceans that isn't helping coral formation, egg production and even healthy shells that we aren't even studying now.

[Equilibrium]

Ya.... they're all being negatively impacted by the chemical cocktails we've allowed. I'm not so sure about the "alleged" ocean acidification link the media have been bombarding us with though especially as pertains to coral fecundity. Although we haven't been funding any research recently that points a finger to much of anything but ocean acidification as the decline "culprit".... other countries have been. There's some interesting hematypic research out there surfacing that's pointing to some very real foes beyond coal dust from "developing" countries.