The Death and Life of the Great Lakes

Posted on 10 February 2018 by Dan Egan

The Great Lakes Erie, Huron, Michigan, Ontario, and Superior hold 20 percent of the world s supply of surface fresh water and provide sustenance, work, and recreation for tens of millions of Americans But they are under threat as never before, and their problems are spreading across the continent The Death and Life of the Great Lakes is prize winning reporter Dan Egan s compulsively readable portrait of an ecological catastrophe happening right before our eyes, blending the epic story of the lakes with an examination of the perils they face and the ways we can restore and preserve them for generations to come. Read The Death and Life of the Great Lakes author Dan Egan – kino-fada.fr For years my mother has refused to drink tap water claiming that zebra mussels have affected the taste of her water supply Lake Michigan is part of the Great Lakes, the largest freshwater source in the world, and to me, the water still tastes crystal clear, until this past summer when it did not, and I reluctantly joined her in drinking filtered water While zebra mussels...The five Great Lakes of North America are one of the world s great treasures Their surface area is larger than the United Kingdom, they contain one fifth of the world s fresh water supply, and the lakes are home to thousands of different species But while the surfaces of the lakes seem calm and peaceful, they have been buffeted by a series of environmental crises over the past century.Egan s narrative focuses not on pollutants, but the parade of invasive species which wreaked havoc on the nati The five Great Lakes of North America are one of the world s great treasures Their surface area is larger than the United Kingdom, they contain one fifth of the world s fresh water supply, and the lakes are home to thousands of different species But while the surfaces of the lakes seem calm and peaceful, they have been buffeted by a series of environmental crises over the past century.Egan s narrative focuses not on pollutants, but the parade of invasive species which wreaked havoc on the native ecosystem, starting with lampreys tearing up the lake trout in the 1930s, until a selective poison wiped them out by the 1950s Then the alewives began to take over, until two non native species were introduced to kee...Egan separates a couple of salient facts by the length of a book, but I here eclipse the space between them The Great Lakes are the largest expanse of freshwater in the world The Great Lakes are in the midst of a slow motion ecological catastrophe begun by opening to the St Lawrence Seaway and the Atlantic Freshwater is the world s most precious natural resource The intuition is that a very large lake like this would be slow to respond somehow to climate change But in fact we re findi Egan separates a couple of salient facts by the length of a book, but I here eclipse the space between them The Great Lakes are the largest expanse of freshwater in ...Dan Egan, a journalist who covers the Great Lakes for the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, has written a fascinating book about the changes in their ecosystems The Great Lakes Lakes Ontario, Erie, Huron, Michigan, and Superior hold about 20% of the world s freshwater, a precious commodity.For years, the Lakes and their connecting rivers were isolated from invasive species from the Atlantic Ocean by the tremendous force of the Niagara Falls which prevented organisms from moving upstream The constr Dan Egan, a journalist who ...Dan Egan s book The Death and Life of the Great Lakes was distressing to read I know these lakes I have lived near the Great Lakes for almost 50 years I grew up along the Niagara River and have lived 40 years in Michigan including seven years living near Lake Michigan, three years so close I heard the sound of the waves day and night I have seen the lakes die and become reborn and die again I remember in the 1970s when the water at the base of Niagara Falls foamed with brown yellow froth f Dan Egan s book The Death and Life of the Great Lakes was distressing to read I know these lakes I have lived near the Great Lakes for almost 50 years I grew up along the Niagara River and have lived 40 years in Michigan including seven years living near Lake Michigan, three years so close I heard the sound of the waves day and night I have seen the lakes die and become reborn and die again I remember in the 1970s when the water at the base of Niagara Falls foamed with brown yellow froth from pollution I remember when shallow Lake Erie was declared dead the wonder of it s rebirth now its waters have become poisonous.We have wrecked havoc with the beautiful and perfect ecosystem We have made decisions based on capital gain, without foresight or thought about our actions impact on the natural balance We have altered the landscape to serve our need, heedless of the consequences.We dug canals, opened the Lakes to world wide shipping, dumped industrial and agricultural waste in...If you care about the environment and sustainability, you must read this book Even if you live thousands of miles away from these North American freshwater marvels, this book makes the case why we should all care about the impacts of invasive species, eutrophication, and...The Death and Life of the Great Lakes was one of those books that was fascinating and engaging well beyond my expectations No one wassurprised than me that the history of the Great Lakes would be so captivating But this was farthan a history book It s also a bit of an horror story without the inevitability of doom In an America that finds itself being governed by a President Trump, it isn t a stretch to understand that we have a long history of squandering one of our greatest ass The Death and Life of the Great Lakes was one of those books that was fascinating and engaging well beyond my expectations No one wassurprised than me that the history of the Great Lakes would be so captivating But this was farthan a history book It s also a bit of an horror story without the inevitability of doom In an America that finds itself being governed by a President Trump, it isn t a stretch to understand that we have a long history of squandering one of our greatest assets What has transpired in the history of the Great Lakes is fundamentally about corporate avarice as well as individual hubris and macho individualism and selfishness Heck, that s the story of America.Egan believes that in the coming years, fresh water will become the world s most precious resource The Great Lakes are home to 20% of the fresh water supply in the world We share the Great Lakes with our neighbor to the nort...You don t know what you ve got til it s gone Joni MitchellThe Great Lakes hold 20 percent of the world s freshwater They and area lakes and rivers have been repeatedly poisoned for the last couple hundred years, as if water supplies were somehow permanently resilient and endless They are neither When I swam in Lake Michigan in the seventies, for a couple summers I had to wade through a sludge of alewives spread across the shoreline On the other hand, during that time you could never imag You don t know what you ve got til it s gone Joni MitchellThe Great Lakes hold 20 percent of the world s freshwater They and area lakes and rivers have been repeatedly poisoned for the last couple hundred year...This book was muchinteresting than I anticipated I live on Lake Erie, so when I saw the book at the library I picked it up.The Great Lakes are not really lakes, they are inland fresh water seas If you ve ever stood on the shore of one, you know what I m talking about They are beautiful yes, even Lake Erie isnow, thanks to the clean water act I recently saw Lake Michigan, where it just about meets up with Lake Superior and I was absolutely stunned by the beauty.The fresh water on t This book was muchinteresting than I anticipated I live on Lake Erie, so when I saw the book at the library I picked it up.The Great Lakes are not really lakes, they are inland fresh water seas If you ve ever stood on the shore of one, you know what I m talking about They are beautiful yes, even Lake Erie isnow, thanks to the clean w...You pick up a book like this and on some level, you expect it to be dull Dusty facts repeated This book is something else entirely It s an edge of your seat nail biting horror experience There is shock after shock, at an unrelenting pace It would have been a fun ride if it had been fiction, but this is reality and the facts slam dunk you into the mud The story of the ecological collapses of the Great Lakes is devastating reading The ale wives, the zebra mussels, the quagga mussels, the co You pick up a book like this and on some level, you expect it to be dull Dusty facts repeated This book is something else entirely It s an edge of your seat nail biting horror experience There is shock after shock, at an unrelenting pace It would have been a fun ride if it had been fiction, but this is reality and the facts slam dunk you into the mud The story of the ecological collapses of the Great Lakes is devastating reading The ale wives, the zebra mussels, the quagga mussels, the continuous threat of new invasive species arriving in th...

English
10 February 2018

Dan Egan