House of cards

I read a Marine Science Today article that really underscored the delicate balance that exists within natural predator and prey relationships. NOAA scientists found that a band of Killer Whales known as the "Southern Resident Population", which spend their time in the inland waters of Washington and British Columbia from late spring to early fall before swimming to the Pacific Ocean for the winter months, have a very specialized diet. It turns out that they are dependent on Chinook stocks from Canada's Fraser River and that 90% of the salmon they ate came from there. How will these new discoveries affect conservation measures? That remains to be seen, but for me it helps illustrate that ecosystems can be as fragile as a house of cards. Read the complete article - Endangered Killer Whales Only Eat One Kind of Salmon

Image from Digitalchemey