{"id":2219,"date":"2015-09-23T23:02:15","date_gmt":"2015-09-24T04:02:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/?p=2219"},"modified":"2015-09-23T23:02:15","modified_gmt":"2015-09-24T04:02:15","slug":"that-seal-fur-coat-is-set-to-poison-you","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/2015\/09\/23\/that-seal-fur-coat-is-set-to-poison-you\/","title":{"rendered":"That Seal Fur Coat is set to Poison You"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Thinking of buying a seal fur coat?\u00a0 Think again.\u00a0 <em><strong>NewScientist<\/strong><\/em> (12 September 2015, paywall) <a href=\"https:\/\/www.newscientist.com\/article\/mg22730383-500-seal-fur-and-arctic-bacteria-leach-toxic-mercury-into-waters\/\" target=\"_blank\">reports<\/a> that it contains <em>mercury<\/em>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>SEAL fur may be toxic. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.newscientist.com\/article\/dn23096-global-mercury-treaty-will-take-decades-to-work\">Mercury is building up even in pristine areas<\/a>, and it\u2019s coming from an unexpected source \u2013 moulting elephant seals.<\/p>\n<p>Industrial pollution can release mercury into the environment, where it may end up as an organic compound called methylmercury. This is taken up by bacteria, and it builds up in organisms much higher up the food chain, including <a href=\"https:\/\/www.newscientist.com\/article\/dn2362-extreme-mercury-levels-revealed-in-whalemeat\">top predators such as elephant seals<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>But it doesn\u2019t end there. \u201cElephant seals undergo a catastrophic moult,\u201d says <a href=\"http:\/\/www.researchgate.net\/profile\/Jennifer_Cossaboon\">Jennifer Cossaboon<\/a> of San Diego State University in California. \u201cIt comes off in big sheets of fur and the top few layers of skin.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Thinking of buying a seal fur coat?\u00a0 Think again.\u00a0 NewScientist (12 September 2015, paywall) reports that it contains mercury: SEAL fur may be toxic. Mercury is building up even in pristine areas, and it\u2019s coming from an unexpected source \u2013 moulting elephant seals. Industrial pollution can release mercury into the \u2026 <a class=\"continue-reading-link\" href=\"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/2015\/09\/23\/that-seal-fur-coat-is-set-to-poison-you\/\"> Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr; <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2219","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2219","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2219"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2219\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2220,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2219\/revisions\/2220"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2219"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2219"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/huewhite.com\/umb\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2219"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}