This looks like a fun word to say.

There's a paper mill in Shreveport that emits a wretched effluvium like a million orcs practicing synchronized farting.

I had heretofore only known the word effluvium to mean a foul liquid discharge, but there it is right in the Webster's Eleventh, definition one: invisible emanation, especially a foul exhalation or smell.

I'll switch to effluent, since that definitely implies liquid. 

And then there is anagen effluvium and telogen effluvium which deal with the loss of hair.

Anagen effluvium is the pathologic loss of anagen or growth-phase hair caused by radiation therapy to the head or systemic chemotherapy. This alopecia (hair loss) is non-scarring.

Telogen effluvium is a scalp disorder characterized by the thinning or shedding of hair due to the early entry of hair into the telogen phase (the resting phase of the hair follicle). It is in this phase that telogen hairs begin to shed at a rate beyond the approximate normal hair loss rate of 129 hairs per day.

Thus ends our brief examination of hair loss in animals.

Oh, and this just in from the wire. Effluvium is singular, effluvia is plural, therefore effluviums and effluvias are incorrect.