Pandora's Locks: The Opening of the Great Lakes-St. Lawrence Seaway
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | 4.66 (985 Votes) |
| Asin | : | 087013857X |
| Format Type | : | paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 431 Pages |
| Publish Date | : | 2013-08-04 |
| Language | : | English |
DESCRIPTION:
Jeff Alexander is an award-winning environmental journalist and author of The Muskegon: The Majesty and Tragedy of Michigan's Rarest River.
- Dave Dempsey, Conservation Minnesota . skillfully chronicles how the realization of a centuries-old dream of a commercial shipping passage between the Great Lakes and saltwater seas has spawned an invasion of foreign fish, pathogens and other unwanteds that has damaged native fisheries, killed birds, and cost the public billions of dollars to controlAlexander's writing is as compelling as his conclusion
I could not exaggerate the importance of the subject matter. As a lifelong Michigan resident with a deep love of the surrounding waters, I was dismayed to learn the extent of the damage wrought by carelessness and the delay of any remedy. There was no mention of the effect that has been breaking my heart for a couple of decades now: zebra mussels degrading the best shipwrecks in the world. I've watched the sickening progress firsthand. To learn of the many other hugely expensive and overwhelming effects of these preventable invasions was disheartening. I would like to see more citizen outrage in defense of priceless . A Plea from a Lover of the Lakes Pandora's Locks is an amazing account of the invasion of the Great Lakes by foreign species since the opening of the St. Lawrence Seaway, of the devastating effects of this invasion, and of the ineptitude of the U.S. and Canadian governments in dealing with the situation. The author conveys a strong love for the Great Lakes and a righteous indignation at the neglect of the authorities' who had the power to protect the Lakes but didn't. This reviewer, himself a lover of the Great Lakes who enjoys the magnificence of Lake Michigan at his summer home on Beaver. An impressive read! A must read for those interested in the true story of the destruction of one of the world's great natural resources, the North American Great Lakes. But, this is not simply a Great Lakes story, as evidenced by the quagga mussel expansion out west (chapter 23). Although many stories have been written about the plague of aquatic invasive species, none with the thoroughness and eloquence of this book. Anyone interested in our natural resources should read this book. The St. Lawrence Seaway is just a subplot, as the real story is about the harm that resulted fr
But it came at an extraordinarily high price. Lawrence River-opened the Great Lakes to the global shipping industry. Linking ports on lakes Superior, Michigan, Huron, Erie, and Ontario to shipping hubs on the world's seven seas increased global trade in the Great Lakes region. Foreign species that immigrated into the lakes in ocean freighters' ballast water tanks unleashed a biological shift that reconfigured the world's largest freshwater ecosystems. Pandora's Locks is the story of politicians and engineers who, driven by hubris and handicapped by ignorance, demanded that the Seaway be built at any cost. The St. It is the tragic tale of government agencies that could have prevented ocean freighters from laying waste to the Great Lakes ecosystems, but failed to act until it was too late.