Ships made into reefs . . .effect on marine life?

[AmyJ]

As for tires, that was considered a swell idea... in the 1970's. There's a massive "reef" of the stuff of the coast of Fort Lauderdale, 2 million tires strong. Years of study have ascertained that tires stink as artifical reefs, for various reasons. Here's a cutesy synopsis I googled up.
http://globalcoral.org/Ft.%20Lauderdale%20Tires.htm

So... this begs the question (please realize I am a novice diver and know nothing about everything! ) I realize we are talking about a huge number... but this goes back to what can one person do and does it make a difference? I believe it does! The major concern in the article seems to be cost.. and I agree they need to do something... however in the meantime... is this not something that divers could assist in? It seems that many of the tires are no longer tied down en mass. So could there not be a 'recycling program' at the docks? For every tire a boat brings in you get $10 (much less than the prices quoted in the article) or Something. I am sure there are divers who would be willing to take a lift bag and upload a tire or two on their way....

Or am I just naive, idealistic and basically stupid???

Oh well, here's to doing your part... one tire at a time.

 

[miketsp]

As for tires, that was considered a swell idea... in the 1970's. There's a massive "reef" of the stuff of the coast of Fort Lauderdale, 2 million tires strong. Years of study have ascertained that tires stink as artifical reefs, for various reasons. Here's a cutesy synopsis I googled up.
http://globalcoral.org/Ft. Lauderdale Tires.htm

Interesting article. Just goes to show how a small sample is not reliable. The few times I've seen tyres on the bottom they were well integrated into the surroundings, were sheltering life and had inhabitants.
I suppose the answer is that a single tyre will bed into the sand whereas when you have a few tyres piled together they will keep shifting and rubbing. That would stop the growth and discourage inhabitants.

Maybe tyres are like pigeons.
You know - one is a sign of peace, two are a sign of love and three are a plague.

 

[miketsp]

I am sure there are divers who would be willing to take a lift bag and upload a tire or two on their way....

Or am I just naive, idealistic and basically stupid???

I would not like to see the accident rate caused by widespread use of lift bags. Too many divers can't control their own buoyancy let alone do something that needs a little bit of practice & technique.

I don't know about the USA but the idea of diving for money would cause complications in many countries where commercial diving standards are strict. Even if you only get US10.00 / tyre that will make a few opportunists fill the boat to pay for their diving.
Who is to say whether they just covered their costs or they made a profit?

 

[squee!]

From the article:

While sponges and corals occasionally latched onto tires, most marine creatures had a difficult time finding a home on the unstable rubber surfaces. Studies by the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission found that few fish spent much time among the tires and that sponges and other immobile organisms could rarely live on them for long. Worse, the tires began to move.


So, is the only reason that these tires do not make a decent artificial reef because of their instability? Or does the rubber have something to do with it too? Do you know if the surface of tires provides an adequate surface for ocean life to latch on to? If it does, then it would seem that the tire-reef would work if they filled the tires with concrete and dropped them. More expensive yes, but if the surfaces are fine, it may still be a solution after refinement of the building process. Again, just posing ideas, as I have no idea if the compostion of the tires themselves repel sealife.

 

[Hank49]

Would the oxidized iron from a ship's hull be usable as a nutrient for phytoplankton? Ferric (iron) chloride is used in lab culture of diatoms and such but this is iron in a non oxidized form. Also, regarding the experiment on adding iron to seawater in order to get massive algal blooms to suck up CO2.......open seawater (35 part per thousand salt) would be limited in nitrogen and phosphates also so adding only Fe would do nothing to stimulate a bloom. And even if it did cause a bloom the algae only sucks up CO2 during daylight and periods of photsynthesis. At night it would respire and give the CO2 back in exchange for oxygen. Those were some pretty dumb scientists. Didn't they ever culture algae?

 

[archman]

Yes, the rubber-stuff does retard recruitment of many organisms. There's also the question of slow leaching of the nasty compounds that go into making those tires... they're far from natural rubber nowadays. You should read some of the EPA air quality reports when they burn these things... yuk!

I too have seen individual tires at various places in the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico. Some are barren, some have stuff growing on them. But nobody deliberately makes them into artificial reefs anymore, at least in the developed nations.

About cleanup of Lauderdale's tire reefs, that's being managed as a mitigation option by the state of Florida for large ships damaging reefs. Rather than pay a big fine or spend years trying to repair the damage they caused, some companies/shipowners are given the option of recovering tires instead. It's a novel approach that has a great deal of popularity.

**
Aha, I tracked down an environmental report on tire leachings. These things are hard to come by, not too many have been done. Here's an excerpt from:
http://article.pubs.nrc-cnrc.gc.ca/...olume=37&calyLang=eng&articleFile=t99-086.pdf

Tires are fabricated with vulcanized rubber that contains reinforcing textile cords, high strength steel or fabric belts,and a high strength steel wire reinforcing bead. The most commonly used tire rubber is styrene–butadiene copolymer
(SBR) containing about 25% styrene. Other tire rubbers used are natural rubber (cis-polyisoprene), synthetic cispolyisoprene, and cis-polybutadiene. A typical chemical composition for tire rubber is provided in Table 1. Carbon black is added to strengthen the rubber and increase abrasion resistance. The extender oil used in fabrication is a mixture of aromatic hydrocarbons that acts to soften the rubber and increase its workability. Sulphur is employed to harden the rubber by cross-linking the polymer chains within the rubber which prevents high-temperature deformation. The zinc oxide, stearic acid, and an organo-sulphur accelerator are used to aid in the vulcanization process and enhance the physical properties of rubber (Williams et al. 1990). Antioxidant and other additives are also added to prevent deterioration of the rubber complex.

 

[archman]

Would the oxidized iron from a ship's hull be usable as a nutrient for phytoplankton? Ferric (iron) chloride is used in lab culture of diatoms and such but this is iron in a non oxidized form.

Beats me. I'm sure the experimental protocols are around here... somewhere.

Also, regarding the experiment on adding iron to seawater in order to get massive algal blooms to suck up CO2.......open seawater (35 part per thousand salt) would be limited in nitrogen and phosphates also so adding only Fe would do nothing to stimulate a bloom.

In many open ocean areas iron is more limiting than nitrogen and phosphorous. The suckers will bloom all right.

And even if it did cause a bloom the algae only sucks up CO2 during daylight and periods of photsynthesis. At night it would respire and give the CO2 back in exchange for oxygen.

Think on a bigger scale. The oceans act as enormous carbon storage tanks. Atmospheric CO2 gets uptaked in the photic zone, but many phytoplankton move below that at night. Many of THOSE never come back up, but sink down into the inky abyss, along with their carbon store. It's part of what oceanographers call the "carbon pump".

Those were some pretty dumb scientists. Didn't they ever culture algae?

I believe they were primarily oceanographers and marine chemists. It was also rumoured that a lot of corporate interest (=money) was fueling much of the research. I was working in a marine botany lab in the 1990's when most of these experiments took place. Needless to say we were less than enthused about the whole idea. Glad that the notion appears to have not been as great as was envisioned.
http://www.whoi.edu/media/buesseler_iron_fertilization.html