What's Killing California's Sea Otters

Sea Otters in California have been suffering from a parasite that either kills them or leaves them paralyzed, to die a slow and painful death such as being hit by a boat or attacked by a shark. The parasite is called Toxoplasma. Scientists did further research to find a way to prevent sea otters from being exposed to the parasite and they discovered that Toxoplasma is the product of domestic cats eating small birds and rodents which were already hosting the parasite. The feces of the housecats are cleaned up and flushed down the toilet and end up at waste treatment plants but the problem is that Toxoplasma isn't always cleaned out of the water and can make its way directly into the Ocean.


https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/28/science/california-sea-otters-cats.html


Overall, I enjoyed reading the article and thought it was a very interesting and prevalent problem that I wasn't even aware was happening prior to reading the article. I think the author could have further explained what the scientists were doing to try and combat the parasite with vaccines or medicines.

Comments

  1. AnonymousAugust 31, 2019 at 12:27 PM

    A death like that is inhumane and we should attempt to prevent it with all of our resources. More efforts should be put into filtering the water being flushed and released into the oceans, or it should be made aware and have cat owners dispose of their poop in other ways.

    ReplyDelete
  2. AnonymousSeptember 9, 2019 at 5:13 AM

    I agree that I would have liked to see more on how the scientist are going to solve this problem, because this seems to be getting bigger and bigger. It is killing more animals daily and will continue until someone does something to stop it. Overall, it was a great article, but more actions need to be taken.

    ReplyDelete
  3. AnonymousSeptember 12, 2019 at 12:14 PM

    It is interesting to see how our water waste from our homes can effect the ocean life with this much impact. Do you think there is a way to filter the parasite out of the water before it reaches the ocean?

    ReplyDelete

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