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Pollution Ingestion
A main factor that affects marine life is pollution. Oil and toxic pollution are the two biggest problems and occur when large ships leak oil directly into the sea, when toxic chemicals settle on the surface of the sea or when pollutants wash up on beaches and aggregate in garbage patches in the sea. Common toxins that are released into the marine environment come from chemical pesticides, fertilizers, plastics and batteries. Toxic pollution affects marine life on a large scale because fish either ingest the toxins directly or through eating other organisms that have ingested the toxins. These toxins are the main reason for the decrease in marine life in recent years.
Other Affects of Pollution
Toxins in the ocean also decrease the levels of oxygen in the water that allows marine life to breathe. The toxins also starve the water of nutrients that fish need to survive. Further effects of pollution occur when fish get caught in large foreign materials such as plastic bags and balloons. This is a common cause of death among larger marine life such as turtles; the plastic bags resemble jelly fish in the water and they mistakenly ingest them and die from asphyxiation. Pollution disrupts ecosystems and kills marine creatures.
Salinity
The measure of the salt content in the ocean water is explained via salinity. The average salinity of ocean water is 35 parts per 1,000 grams of water. The salt affects what types of marine life live in which particular habitat, and it also prevents the oceans from freezing; salinity fluctuation can also affect the less salt-tolerant marine life and in some cases cause organisms to move to outlying areas such as the mouth of rivers. Climate, weather, currents and seasons can all have an affect on salinity.
pH and Ocean Acidification
The water's pH balance is one of the biggest factors in affecting marine life. The ocean absorbs vast amounts of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, which reacts with the water and produces carbonic acid. This causes the water's natural pH balance to lower to an increased acidic level. This damages marine life because it destroys the essential calcium in the water that is needed to build their internal and external skeletons. Microscopic organisms, also known as phytoplankton, are the basis of most marine food chains and they depend heavily on the calcification process to build their exoskeleton frame, which protects them from the environment. Failure to develop properly will likely mean that they will not survive and this will affect the entire complex food web of the ocean.
Sunlight
Sunlight is essential to the survival of many organisms in the sea. It penetrates the ocean to a depth of approximately 65 feet, and 90 percent of all marine life inhabits this part of the ocean. Without sunlight, photosynthetic organisms are unable to complete energy synthesis and are not able to survive. Problems occur when climates unexpectedly change; this leads to cooler water temperatures, and some organisms are unable to move to warmer climates quickly enough. Animals and plants that live in the depths of the ocean have adapted to survive in the cooler temperatures so they are unaffected by any disruptions in sunlight; however, they rely on the light-absorbing photosynthetic organisms in the upper layers of water for food.