To quote the executive director of a nonprofit habitat restoration agency, I send you this to remind everyone that we live in the watersheds that feed into the Puget Sound.

Be mindful of the products and chemicals you use. Everything leads to the ocean.

Everyday humans use a variety of chemicals that go down our drains and into our streams, lakes, and oceans. These household chemicals, along with pesticides and industrial pollution, are detrimental to the health of aquatic animals, ecosystems, and us. We tend to not realize the impacts of the things we use everyday because our products have become second nature to us.

We use countless soaps, perfumes, and dyes to clean ourselves and our living areas without much thought to what happens to them when they are washed down the drains. They end up in our waterways where they not only contaminate the water but affect the health of aquatic animals throughout the food chain. These chemicals builds up in marine life through a process called bioaccumulation.

This process happens throughout the food web and continues to us when we eat fish and other marine life. The chemicals that we use directly affect our oceans, our environment, and affect us. We thrive off of the environment and it is important to recognize that so we can treat it will the respect that it deserves.

In order to preserve our ecosystems we must be mindful of the products that we use and put back into the environment. By using environmentally friendly and biodegradable products and reducing our wastes we can minimize our pollution and focus on ridding the environment of these damaging chemicals.

Susan Mailheau, Kenmore