Since the dawn of the Industrial Era mankind has continued to pour untold levels of pollutants into our air, water and land. In the span of less than a century, we are the first civilization whose existence and endeavors threaten the destruction of the planet. From commercial manufacturing and tapping natural resources to farming and lawn maintenance, humans continue to pollute the environment with toxic substances of all kinds. The depletion of the Ozone layer, changing weather patterns (i.e., more 90+ degree days per year), well water pollution and many other consequences have occurred as a result of this mindless behavior. Within the past decade or so another pollution-caused consequence has occurred in the coastal waterways of states like North Carolina and Maryland. A microorganism known as pfiesteria piscidia, a one-celled dinoflagellate that secretes toxins, has been linked to large numbers of fish kills and even neurological damage in humans in the coastal waterways of the mid-Atlantic states, especially North Carolina and Maryland. This microorganism is a suspected result of phosphate pollution from the dumping of hog waste, pollution that has been cited as the cause of the pfiesteria blooms in North Carolina and the Chesapeake Bay. Pfiesteria is unique because it does not act like typical phytoplankton, in fact, it acts like something more germane to a science fiction fantasy than to our coastal waterways:
Pfiesteria spends much of its life as harmless-looking, microscopic cysts in the sediment. But introduce large numbers of fish and, under the right conditions, it undergoes a transformation out of a science-fiction movie. In minutes, the cysts turn into toxic flagellated vegetative cells and propel themselves towards the fish. They stun the fish by unleashing a powerful toxin and then, after the fish die, transform themselves into large amoebae and eat the carcasses. As they’re feasting on the fish, they are...