Saving Seafood

Stopping the world’s most rapacious invasive species, one fillet at a time

August 18, 2016 — Since Pacific lionfish were first detected off the coast of Florida three decades ago, they have spread around the Caribbean, gobbling up everything that fits in their mouths and reproducing at a phenomenal rate. Scientists have shown that soon after they descend upon a reef, there is a sharp fall in the number of small fish, notably the herbivores on which coral depends for survival.

“They’re eating their way through the reefs like a plague of locusts,” said Mark Hixon, a lionfish specialist at the University of Hawaii.

It is by far the most destructive invasive species ever recorded at sea, and the blight is believed to have started with aquarium fish released off the Florida Atlantic coast in the mid-1980s.

However, in the last few months, a set of unrelated trends has resulted in two U.S. supermarket chains, Whole Foods and Wegmans, offering Florida lionfish, which has a white, delicate flesh, to consumers with much fanfare. Early signs suggest that the state’s fishery might just be big enough to protect the native denizens of at least some reefs from being decimated.

Read the full story at the Alaska Dispatch News

Biodiversity makes reef fish more resilient in the face of climate change, research confirms

May 17, 2016 — New research confirms that biodiversity can help reef fish weather the impacts of global warming.

Reef systems with greater numbers of fish species are not just more productive but also more resilient to rising sea-surface temperatures and the temperature swings associated with climate change, according to a new study led by researchers with the Smithsonian’s Tennenbaum Marine Observatories Network.

After analyzing data from more than 4,500 fish surveys of reefs around the world to compare the effects of biodiversity and other environmental factors on global reef fish biomass, the authors of the study found that biodiversity, measured by the number of species (species diversity) and the variety of functional traits (functional diversity) within a reef system, was one of the strongest predictors of fish biomass, second only to mean sea-surface temperature.

A direct impact of the carbon emissions that continue to concentrate in Earth’s atmosphere is warmer, more acidic ocean waters, which has contributed to the bleaching of reefs around the world. Just last month, scientists announced that 99 percent of coral reefs surveyed in Australia’s Great Barrier Reef have been hit by the global bleaching event that has already taken a toll on reefs at the Pacific islands of Hawaii, Vanuatu, American Samoa, and Fiji, as well as parts of the Caribbean, the Florida Keys, and the Indian Ocean.

Read the full story at Mongabay

More acidic seawater now dissolving bit of Florida Keys reef

May 4, 2016 — Seawater — increasingly acidic due to global warming — is eating away the limestone framework for the coral reef of the upper Florida Keys, according to a new study. It’s something that scientists had expected, but not so soon.

This is one of the first times scientists have documented long-term effects of ocean acidification on the foundation of the reefs, said study author Chris Langdon, a biological oceanographer at the University of Miami.

“This is what I would call a leading indicator; it’s telling us about something happening early on before it’s a crisis,” Langdon said. “By the time you observe the corals actually crumbling, disappearing, things have pretty much gone to hell by that point.”

The northern part of the Florida Keys reef has lost about 12 pounds per square yard (6.5 kilograms per square meter) of limestone over the past six years, according to the study published in the journal Global Biogeochemical Cycles. Over the length of the reef, that’s more than 6 million tons. The water eats away at the nooks and crannies of the limestone foundation, making them more porous and weaker, Langdon said.

Read the full story at the New Jersey Herald

China’s Island Building Hurts Environment, U.S. Report Says

April 13, 2016 — China’s reclamation work in the South China Sea may have destroyed coral reefs, damaged fisheries in a region heavily dependent on seafood and breached international law on protecting the environment, according to a report to U.S. Congress.

“The scale and speed of China’s activities in the South China Sea, the biodiversity of the area, and the significance of the Spratly Islands to the ecology of the region make China’s actions of particular concern,” an April 12 report prepared for the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission said.

China reclaimed about 3,000 acres of land on seven features it occupies in the Spratly islands of the South China Sea between December 2013 and October 2015, the report said. Vietnam has reclaimed about 80 acres, Malaysia 70 acres, the Philippines 14 acres and Taiwan eight acres, according to the U.S. Department of Defense.

See the full story at Bloomberg

Is global warming causing marine diseases to spread?

March 29, 2016 — PORTLAND, Maine –Global climate change is altering the world’s oceans in many ways. Some impacts have received wide coverage, such as shrinking Arctic sea ice, rising sea levels and ocean warming. However, as the oceans warm, marine scientists are observing other forms of damage.

My research focuses on diseases in marine ecosystems. Humans, animals and plants are all susceptible to diseases caused by bacteria, viruses, parasites and fungi. Marine diseases, however, are an emerging field.

Infectious agents have the potential to alter ocean life in many ways. Some threaten our food security by attacking important commercial species, such as salmon. Others, such as bacteria in oysters, may directly harm human health. Still others damage valuable marine ecosystems – most notably coral reefs.

To anticipate these potential problems, we need a better understanding of marine diseases and how climate change affects their emergence and spread.

Read the full article at the Portland Press Herald

Acidic Ocean Leads to Warped Skeletons for Young Coral

February 19, 2016 — Rising emissions of carbon dioxide create twin threats for coral in oceans around the world: warmer temperatures, which can cause mass bleachings, and ocean acidification, which can hinder the animals’ ability to build reefs.

But a new study published on Friday in the journal Science Advances suggests that ocean acidification may be the bigger worry in some waters.

Studying a chain of remote Australian islands in the Indian Ocean, researchers found that more acidic waters (those that have absorbed more atmospheric carbon dioxide) cause serious skeletal deformities in juvenile coral in subtropical waters.

Using 3-D imaging techniques, they saw that young coral from the Houtman Abrolhos islands developed skeletons that were missing sections or had very porous and fragile surfaces.

Other studies have shown similar effects of ocean acidification, but the researchers also discovered something that had not been seen in earlier studies of tropical coral development — higher temperatures didn’t have a negative effect on coral skeleton formation.

Read the full story at the New York Times

Sunken sanctuary: Former Omega Protein WWII-era vessel becomes artificial reef

December 15, 2015 — For much of the last decade, the MV Shearwater caught menhaden by the ton but in its new life, as part of the Del-Jersey-Land reef 26-miles off the coast, it will become a fish habitat and diving destination in the state’s artificial reef program.

The ship didn’t go easy into the deep last week. The stern sank first and the ship started to turn leaving just the bow out of the water. It took about six hours to fully sink after the seacocks opened and the interior compartments flooded.

The 176-foot-long vessel went down in 120 feet of water. It lays about one-half nautical mile from the 568-foot long USS Arthur W. Radford, a former Navy destroyer. The Radford was sunk at the artificial reef site in 2011 and has become a popular destination for divers and anglers.

“About three weeks ago, a state-record bluefish was caught there,” said Jeff Tinsman, the state artificial reef coordinator.

“These old freighters make ideal reefs because of the voids and cavities in them – they’re really the perfect sanctuary for fish,” Tinsman said. “But not long after this ship sinks, the fish will start to come ‘outside’ it to feed. Within a few weeks, blue mussels, sponges, barnacles and soft corals will attach themselves to the structure, and in about a year, the reef will be fully productive, for fish and fishermen alike.”

Read the full story at Delaware Online

Baby fish will be lost at sea in acidified oceans

December 15, 2015 — The ability of baby fish to find a home, or other safe haven, to grow into adulthood will be severely impacted under predicted ocean acidification, University of Adelaide research has found. 

Published today in the journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B, the researchers report the interpretation of normal ocean sound cues which help baby fish find an appropriate home is completely confused under the levels of CO2 predicted to be found in oceans by the end of the century.

“Locating appropriate homes is a crucial step in the life cycle of fish,” says Tullio Rossi, PhD candidate with the University’s Environment Institute. “After hatching in the open ocean, baby fish travel to reefs or mangroves as safe havens to feed and grow into adults.

“Baby fish can find those places through ocean noise: snapping shrimps and other creatures produce sounds that the baby fish follow.

“But when ocean acidity increases due to increased CO2, the neurological pathways in their brain are affected and, instead of heading towards those sounds, they turn tail and swim away.”

Read the full story at Science Daily

Remember the Oceans!

November 25, 2015 — On Nov. 30, more than 140 world leaders, including President Obama, will meet in Paris for the beginning of a historic two-week conference on climate change. There’s already been a flurry of voluntary national pledges, increasing confidence that the meeting will likely result in the first global agreement on emissions reductions. What they won’t be discussing, however (due to diplomatic quirks), is the effect of climate change on the world’s largest and most important ecosystem: the oceans.

That’s a shame. As I wrote this summer in Rolling Stone, there’s increasing evidence that the world’s oceans are nearing the point of no return. They’re getting hit with a double whammy—rising temperatures and acidification—that together are forcing fundamental changes to the basis of the planet’s food chain.

So far, the oceans have absorbed about 93 percent of all the additional heat energy trapped by rising greenhouse gas concentrations. That’s already prompted the loss of about 40 percent of the world’s coral reefs, accelerated by a series of worldwide bleaching events in which exceptionally warm water temperatures prompt normally symbiotic algae to become toxic—the most recent of which was just this year. Since coral reefs—the “rainforests of the sea”—support a quarter of all marine life on just 0.1 percent of the ocean area, a mass extinction may already be underway. If we lose the oceans, we lose everything.

Water temperatures this year in the North Pacific have surged to record highs far beyond any previous measurements. That means krill and anchovies have been forced into a narrow corridor of relatively cooler water close to the shore, and predators like whales are feasting on the dregs of an ecosystem. Along the coast of California, there’ve been sightings of rarely present species such as white pelicans, flying fish, Mexican red crabs, and nearly extinct basking sharks. Last year, a subtropical Humboldt squid was caught in southern Alaska—along with a thresher shark that was also far from its natural range. After a startling number of starving baby California sea lions began washing up on shore a couple of years ago, a colony has taken up residence in the Columbia River in Oregon. Marine life is moving north, adapting in real-time to the warming ocean. But for how much longer?

Read the full story at Slate

To catch a fishing thief, SkyTruth uses data from the air, land and sea

November 24, 2015 — No one knows how much illegal fishing goes on in the oceans. They’re too vast to patrol. But a small nonprofit is helping governments track down seafood pirates by using powerful software, digital maps and publicly available data.

That nonprofit, SkyTruth, is led by a 52-year-old geologist named John Amos. It has fewer than a dozen employees and operates out of rural Shepherdstown, West Virginia – population: 2,140. Yet last spring, SkyTruth used its data to help the government of the Pacific island nation Palau track down a Taiwanese fishing ship whose holds were filled with illegally caught tuna and shark fins.

“Busting the bad guys is sexy,” says Amos, but he has bigger things in mind. In partnership with Google and Oceana, an international conservation and advocacy group, SkyTruth is building Global Fishing Watch, a website that allows the public to track fishing activities and outlaws and enable seafood purveyors to assure that the fish they are buying comes from sustainable fisheries. It also plans to provide data to researchers.

Meantime, SkyTruth does pathbreaking work around oil spills, mountaintop coal mining and hydraulic fracturing – for example, tracking pollution from unconventional oil and gas drilling, and using crowdsourcing to track the growth of fracking.

SkyTruth was among the nonprofits and companies showcased 18 November at Wired in the Wild: Can technology save the planet?, a daylong conference in Washington DC organized by World Wildlife Fund to highlight ways in which technology can support conservation. Participants heard about deploying drones to survey wildlife, attaching sensors to rhinos to help identify poachers and using submersibles to take marine biologists deep below the surface of the oceans to study coral.

Read the full story at The Guardian