The loss of these ice shelves means that rare ecosystems that depend on them are on the brink of extinction, said Warwick Vincent, director of Laval University's Centre for Northern Studies and a researcher in the program ArcticNet.
"The Markham Ice Shelf had half the biomass for the entire Canadian Arctic Ice Shelf ecosystem as a habitat for cold, tolerant microbial life; algae that sit on top of the ice shelf and photosynthesis like plants would. Now that it's disappeared, we're looking at ecosystems on the verge of distinction" said Derek Mueller, an Arctic ice shelf specialist at Trent University in Ontario.
What to do? Reduce, reuse, recycle; calculate your carbon footprint; watch an Inconvenient Truth (and take action); buy a Terra Pass or other carbon offset; save the Polar Bears; learn about the differences in the energy and environmental proposals of Barack Obama and John McCain; elect Barack Obama in November.
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