4/21/2024 0 Comments Blue planet seas lifeThere, Lucy Quinn from the British Antarctic Survey says many chicks are killed by plastic fed to them by their parents, including one young bird whose stomach was punctured by a plastic toothpick. The Blue Planet 2 team found plastic everywhere they filmed, even in the most remote locations such as South Georgia island, an important breeding site for wandering albatrosses. You hear pops and grunts and gurgles and snaps.” He shows the noise of motorboats distracting saddleback clownfishes from warning against a predator attack. They use sound to attract a mate, to scare away a predator. Steve Simpson, at the University of Exeter, who works on coral reefs in southeast Asia, says: “There is a whole language underwater that we are only just getting a handle on. The noise from shipping, tourism, and fossil fuel exploration is also revealed as harming sea life. The reefs could be gone by the end of the century.” “The shells and the reefs really, truly are dissolving. Prof Chris Langdon, at the University of Miami, says it is “beyond question” that the problem is manmade. We’re headed into uncharted territory”Ĭarbon dioxide from fossil fuel burning also dissolves in seawater, making it more acidic. “What shocks me about what all the data shows is how fast things are changing here. Jon Copley, from the University of Southampton and one of many scientists appearing in the final episode, says. The programme also filmed on the Great Barrier Reef in 2016, witnessing the worst bleaching event in its history.Ĭlimate change is causing ocean temperatures to rise, bleaching the corals vital as nurseries for ocean life, and waters are warming rapidly in Antarctica too. Photograph: BBC NHUīrownlow said much of the footage shot of albatross chicks being killed by the plastic they mistake for food were too upsetting to broadcast. Through these valiant efforts, theirs is now one of the densest leatherback nesting beaches in the world.A bleached section of the Great Barrier Reef in Australia. Their numbers have dropped dramatically, by up to 90 per cent in some parts of the world, but here, volunteers are risking their lives to get turtle poachers to put down their weapons and instead protect the beach where these magnificent creatures nest. In the Caribbean, a community is reversing the fortune of giant leatherback turtles. He is using the latest technology to unlock one of the ocean's biggest mysteries - where these elusive giants may give birth. In the Galapagos, one scientist has devoted much of his life to saving the largest fish in the sea - the whale shark. Hundreds of giant humpback whales and one of the greatest gatherings of orcas on the planet feast on the herring - an extraordinary story of recovery.Īround the world, individuals are also making a huge difference to the future of the ocean. Today, thanks to careful regulation, they have returned, creating one of the greatest spectacles in the ocean. Every year, billions of herring overwinter in the icy seas off Norway, but just 50 years ago they were almost wiped out by overfishing. Yet, despite these devastating impacts, there is hope. We travel to Antarctica on a unique expedition to discover how melting polar ice sheets could one day impact the lives of hundreds of millions of people around the world. Warmer than normal seas caused the biggest coral bleaching event in human history, killing about 90 per cent of the branching corals at Lizard Island.īut the warming ocean could have an even more devastating effect. While filming the stunning corals on the Great Barrier Reef's remote Lizard Island, the film crew witnessed a catastrophe. Many creatures are struggling to survive in today's oceans, and some changes in the ocean will require a global effort. Scientists have even discovered that increasing noise levels may stop baby clownfish finding their way home. In this final episode, we uncover the impact that our modern lives are having on our best-loved characters from across the series, including devoted albatross parents unwittingly feeding their chicks discarded plastic and mother dolphins potentially exposing their newborn calves to pollutants through their contaminated milk. The oceans are changing faster and in more ways than at any point in human history and now, for the first time, we understand why. But we have also witnessed the profound effects of human activity. While making Blue Planet II, we have explored parts of the ocean that nobody has been to before, encountered extraordinary animals and discovered new insights into how life thrives beneath the waves.
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