http://www.oceanfdn.org/blog/?p=1159

by Mark J. Spalding, President of The Ocean Foundation
A magnified image of the coccolithophore, Gephyrocapsa oceanica Kamptner. Coccolithophores are single-celled algae, protists, and phytoplankton and considered especially vulnerable to ocean acidification due to their calcium carbonate shells. (Image: Gephyrocapsa oceanica Kamptner from Mie Prefecture, Japan. SEM:JEOL JSM-6330F. Scale bar = 1.0 micron. Licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 2.5 Generic license.)

Last week I was in Monterey, California for the 3rd International Symposium on the Ocean in a High CO2 World, which was simultaneous to the BLUE Ocean Film Festival at the hotel next door (but that is a whole other story to tell). At the symposium, I joined hundreds of other attendees in learning about the current state of knowledge and potential solutions to address the effects of elevated carbon dioxide (CO2) on the health of our oceans and the life within. We call the consequences ocean acidification because the pH of our oceans is getting lower and thus more acidic, with significant potential harm to ocean systems as we know them.

OCEAN ACIDIFICATION

The 2012 High CO2 meeting was a huge leap from the 2nd meeting in Monaco in 2008. Over 500 attendees and 146 speakers, representing 37 nations, were gathered to discuss the issues at hand. It included a first major inclusion of socio-economic studies. And, while the primary focus was still on marine life organism responses to ocean acidification and what that means for ocean system, everyone was in agreement that our knowledge about effects and potential solutions has greatly advanced in the last four years.

For my part, I sat in rapt amazement as one scientist after another gave a history of the science around ocean acidification (OA), information on the current state of science knowledge about OA, and our first inklings of specifics about the ecosystem and economic consequences of a warmer ocean that is more acidic and has lower oxygen levels.

As Dr. Sam Dupont of The Sven Lovén Centre for Marine Sciences – Kristineberg, Sweden said:

What do we know?

Ocean Acidification is real
It is directly coming from our carbon emissions
It is happening fast
Impact is certain
Extinctions are certain
It is already visible in the systems
Change will happen

Hot, sour and breathless are all symptoms of the same disease.

Especially when combined with other diseases, OA becomes a major threat.

We can expect lots of variability, as well as positive and negative carry over effects.

Some species will alter behavior under OA.

We know enough to act

We know a major catastrophic event is coming

We know how to prevent it

We know what we don’t know

We know what we need to do (in science)

We know what we will focus on (bringing solutions)

But, we should be prepared for surprises; we have so completely perturbed the system.

Dr. Dupont closed his comments with a photo of his two children with a powerful and striking two sentence statement:

I am not an activist, I am a scientist. But, I am also a responsible father.

The first clear statement that CO2 accumulation in the sea could have “possible catastrophic biological consequences” was published in 1974 (Whitfield, M. 1974. Accumulation of fossil CO2 in the atmosphere and in the sea. Nature 247:523-525.). Four years later, in 1978, the direct linkage of fossil fuels to CO2 detection in the ocean was established. Between 1974 and 1980, numerous studies began to demonstrate the actual change in ocean alkalinity. And, finally, in 2004, the spectre of ocean acidification (OA) became accepted by the scientific community at large, and the first of the high CO2 symposia were held.

The following spring, the marine funders were briefed at their annual meeting in Monterey, including a field trip to see some cutting edge research at Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI). I should note that most of us had to be reminded of what the pH scale means, although everyone seemed to recollect using the litmus paper to test liquids in middle school science classrooms. Fortunately, the experts were willing to explain that the pH scale is from 0 to 14, with 7 being neutral. The lower the pH, means lower alkalinity, or more acidity.

At this point, it has become clear that the early interest in ocean pH has produced some concrete results. We have some credible scientific studies, which tell us that as ocean pH falls, some species will thrive, some survive, some are replaced, and many go extinct (the expected result is loss of biodiversity, but a maintenance of biomass). This broad conclusion is the result of lab experiments, field exposure experiments, observations at naturally high CO2 locations, and studies focused on fossil records from previous OA events in history.

WHAT WE KNOW FROM PAST OCEAN ACIDIFICATION EVENTS

While we can see changes in ocean chemistry and ocean sea surface temperature over the 200 some years since the industrial revolution, we need to go back further in time for a control comparison (but not too far back). So the Pre-Cambrian period (the first 7/8s of Earth’s geological history) has been identified as the only good geological analog (if for no other reason than similar species) and includes some periods with lower pH. These previous periods experienced a similar high CO2 world with lower pH, lower oxygen levels, and warmer sea surface temperatures.

However, there is nothing in the historical record that equals our current rate of change of pH or temperature.

The last dramatic ocean acidification event is known as PETM, or the Paleocene–Eocene Thermal Maximum, which took place 55 million years ago and is our best comparison. It happened rapidly (over about 2,000 years) it lasted for 50,000 years. We have strong data/evidence for it – and thus scientists use it as our best available analog for a massive carbon release.

However, it is not a perfect analog. We measure these releases in petagrams. PgC are Petagrams of carbon: 1 petagram = 1015 grams = 1 billion metric tons. The PETM represents a period when 3,000 PgC were released over a few thousand years. What matters is the rate of change in the last 270 years (the industrial revolution), as we have pumped 5,000 PgC of carbon into our planet’s atmosphere. This means the release then was 1 PgC y-1 compared to the industrial revolution, which is 9 PgC y-1. Or, if you are just an international law guy like me, this translates to the stark reality that what we have done in just under three centuries is 10 times worse than what caused the extinction events in the ocean at PETM.

The PETM ocean acidification event caused big changes in the global ocean systems, including some extinctions. Interestingly, the science indicates that total biomass stayed about even, with dinoflagellate blooms and similar events offsetting the loss of other species. In total, the geological record shows a wide range of consequences: blooms, extinctions, turnovers, calcification changes, and dwarfism. Thus, OA causes a significant biotic reaction even when the rate of change is much slower than our current rate of carbon emissions. But, because it was much slower, the “future is uncharted territory in the evolutionary history of most modern organisms.”

Thus, this anthropogenic OA event will easily top PETM in impact. AND, we should expect to see changes in how change occurs because of we have so disturbed the system. Translation: Expect to be surprised.

ECOSYSTEM AND SPECIES RESPONSE
Brilliant shades of blue and green explode across the Barents Sea just north of the Scandinavian peninsula in this natural-color image, created by a massive bloom of phytoplankton that are common in the area each August. The milky blue color strongly suggests that the bloom contains coccolithophores, microscopic plankton that are plated with white calcium carbonate. When viewed through ocean water, a coccolithophore bloom tends to be bright blue. The species is most likely Emiliana huxleyi, whose blooms tend to be triggered by high light levels during the 24-hour sunlight of Arctic summer. Ocean acidifications impact on plankton species is of particular concern given the potential to undermine the base of the ocean food chain. (Image: NASA Earth Observatory)

Brilliant shades of blue and green explode across the Barents Sea just north of the Scandinavian peninsula in this natural-color image, created by a massive bloom of phytoplankton that are common in the area each August. The milky blue color strongly suggests that the bloom contains coccolithophores, microscopic plankton that are plated with white calcium carbonate. When viewed through ocean water, a coccolithophore bloom tends to be bright blue. The species is most likely Emiliana huxleyi, whose blooms tend to be triggered by high light levels during the 24-hour sunlight of Arctic summer. Ocean acidifications impact on plankton species is of particular concern given the potential to undermine the base of the ocean food chain. (Image: NASA Earth Observatory)

Ocean acidification and temperature change both have carbon dioxide (CO2) as a driver. And, while they can interact, they are not running in parallel. Changes in pH are more linear, with smaller deviations, and are more homogenous in different geographical spaces. Temperature is far more variable, with wide deviations, and is substantially variable spatially.

Temperature is the dominant driver of change in the ocean. Thus, it is not a surprise that change is causing a shift in distribution of species to the extent they can adapt. And we have to remember that all species have limits to acclimation capacity. Of course, some species remain more sensitive than others because they have narrower boundaries of temperature in which they thrive. And, like other stressors, temperature extremes increase sensitivity to the effects of high CO2.

The pathway looks like this:

CO2 emissions → OA → biophysical impact → loss of ecosystem services (e.g. a reef dies, and no longer stops storm surges) → socio-economic impact (when the storm surge takes out the town pier)

Noting at the same time, that demand for ecosystem services is rising with population growth and increasing income (wealth)

To look at the effects, scientists have examined various mitigation scenarios (different rates of pH change) compared to maintaining the status quo which risks:

Simplification of diversity (up to 40%), and thus a reduction of ecosystem quality
There is little or no impact on abundance
Average size of various species decreases by 50%
OA causes shift away from dominance by calcifiers (organisms whose structure is formed of calcium-based material):
No hope for survival of corals which are utterly dependent on water at a certain pH to survive (and for cold water corals, warmer temperatures will exacerbate the problem);
Gastropods (thin-shelled sea snails) are the most sensitive of the mollusks;
There is a big impact on exoskeleton-bearing aquatic invertebrates, including various species of mollusks, crustaceans, and echinoderms (think clams, lobsters and urchins)
Within this category of species, arthropods (such as shrimp) are not as bad off, but there is a clear signal of their decline
Other invertebrates adapt faster (such as jellyfish or worms)
Fish, not so much, and fish may also have no place to migrate to (for example in SE Australia)
Some success for marine plants that may thrive on consuming CO2
Some evolution can occur on relatively short time scales, which may mean hope
Evolutionary rescue by less sensitive species or populations within species from standing genetic variation for pH tolerance (we can see this from breeding experiments; or from new mutations (which are rare))

So, the key question remains: Which species will be affected by OA? We have a good idea of the answer: bivalves, crustaceans, predators of calcifiers, and top predators in general. It is not difficult to envision how severe the financial consequences will be for the shellfish, seafood, and dive tourism industries alone, much less others in the network of suppliers and service. And in the face of the enormity of the problem, it can be hard to focus on solutions.

WHAT OUR RESPONSE SHOULD BE

Rising CO2 is the root cause (of the disease) [but like smoking, getting the smoker to quit is very hard]

We must treat the symptoms [high blood pressure, emphysema]
We must reduce other stressors [cut back on drinking and over-eating]

Reducing the sources of ocean acidification requires sustained source reduction efforts at both the global and the local scale. Global carbon dioxide emissions are the biggest driver of ocean acidification at the scale of the world’s ocean, so we must reduce them. Local additions of nitrogen and carbon from point sources, nonpoint sources, and natural sources can exacerbate the effects of ocean acidification by creating conditions that further accelerate pH reductions. Deposition of local air pollution (specifically carbon dioxide, nitrogen and sulfur oxide) can also contribute to reduced pH and acidification. Local action can help slow the pace of acidification. So, we need to quantify key anthropogenic and natural processes contributing to acidification.

The following are priority, near-term action items for addressing ocean acidification.

Quickly and significantly reduce global emissions of carbon dioxide to mitigate and reverse the acidification of our oceans.
Limit nutrient discharges entering marine waters from small and large on-site sewage systems, municipal wastewater facilities, and agriculture, thus limiting the stressors on ocean life to support adaptation and survival.
Implement effective clean water monitoring and best management practices, as well as revise existing and/or adopt new water quality standards to make them relevant to ocean acidification.
Investigate selective breeding for ocean acidification tolerance in shellfish and other vulnerable marine species.
Identify, monitor and manage the marine waters and species in potential refuges from ocean acidification so they may endure concurrent stresses.
Understand the association between water chemistry variables and shellfish production and survival in hatcheries and in the natural environment, promoting collaborations between scientists, managers, and shellfish growers. And, establish an emergency warning and response capacity when monitoring indicates a spike in low pH water that threatens sensitive habitat or shellfish industry operations.
Restore seagrass, mangroves, marsh grass etc. that will take up and fix dissolved carbon in marine waters and locally prevent (or slow) changes in the pH of those marine waters
Educate the public about the problem of ocean acidification and its consequences for marine ecosystems, economy, and cultures

The good news is that progress is being made on all of these fronts. Globally, tens of thousands of people are working to reduce greenhouse gas emissions (including CO2) at the international, national and local levels (Item 1). And, in the USA, item 8 is the primary focus of a coalition of NGOs coordinated by our friends at Ocean Conservancy. For item 7, TOF hosts our own effort to restore damaged seagrass meadows. But, in an exciting development for items 2-7, we are working with key state decision-makers in four coastal states to develop, share and introduce legislation designed to address OA. The existing effects of ocean acidification on shellfish and other marine life in Washington and Oregon’s coastal waters have inspired action in a number of ways.

All of the speakers at the conference made it clear that more information is needed—especially about where pH is changing rapidly, which species will be able to thrive, survive, or adapt, and local and regional strategies that are working. At the same time, the takeaway lesson was that even though we do not know everything we want to know about ocean acidification, we can and should be taking steps to mitigate its effects. We will continue to work with our donors, advisors, and other members of the TOF community to support the solutions.

Special thanks to Mark Spalding, The Ocean Foundation

http://www.oceanfdn.org/blog/?p=1143

Date: October 4, 2012 5:53:29 PM EDT

by Kenneth Stump, Ocean Policy Fellow at The Ocean Foundation

Photo courtesy of John Surrick-Chesapeake Bay Foundation/Marine Photobank

Overfishing (and the use of destructive fishing gear) is often cited as one of the two greatest threats to animals in the ocean. Overfishing occurs when a fishery removes fish from a population faster than the population can replenish itself – in a word, overfishing is overkill. If not quickly controlled, overfishing leads to the eventual decimation of a fish stock and the collapse of the fishery. Scientists and fishery managers strive to identify how big the population of any given species should be to say that it is not overfished.

For well-studied stocks that have been scientifically assessed, it is possible to evaluate the status of the stock relative to overfishing criteria that are based on the ability of a given stock to produce maximum sustainable yield (MSY). Using these conventional measures of fisheries sustainability, Dr. Boris Worm et al. (2009) found that 63% of assessed fished stocks worldwide have a breeding stock size (“biomass,” denoted as “B”) below the level that is estimated to produce MSY (B/Bmsy <1), while a separate study by the FAO (2010) concluded that 32% of globally assessed stocks are overfished (B/Bmsy < 0.5). In short, most of the world’s assessed fish stocks are fully or overexploited. But only ~20% of the global fish catch (reported landings) comes from assessed species. What about the status of the thousands of data-poor, unassessed fish stocks which account for 80% or more of the global seafood catch every year? UC Santa Barbara’s Christopher Costello and colleagues have just published a new study of the status of the world’s data-poor stocks in an online edition of Science (September 27, 2012). Using available landings records and indirect evaluation methods, the authors of the new study conclude that most of these fish stocks are likely to be considerably depleted and in serious decline: 64% of unassessed fisheries stocks have a stock biomass less than Bmsy (B/Bmsy <1), which is tantamount to a depletion rate on the order of 60-70% for most stocks. 18% of unassessed stocks are collapsed (B/Bmsy < 0.2) – a level of depletion so severe that a fish population may be only a tiny fraction of its natural, unfished size. The depleted status of so many fish populations (low B/Bmsy) has consequences for food security: fishery yields are far below their potential if stocks were allowed to recover to the level that will, in theory, produce MSY. Since many of these unassessed fisheries are in poor and developing countries, management approaches to rebuilding stocks that rely on strong governance and monitoring capabilities are not likely to work. But Costello and colleagues also hold out the hope that innovative strategies combining territorial user rights (TURFs), fishing cooperatives, and no-take marine protected areas can restore these populations to healthier, more productive levels – if swift action is taken to reverse the declines. In the U.S., reforms to the national fisheries law in 1996 and 2006 have reduced overfishing on assessed stocks by about half since the National Marine Fisheries Service began issuing annual status reports in the late 1990s, as shown in Fig. 1. In 2011, U.S. commercial fisheries recorded the highest catch in 17 years, which suggests that efforts to curb overfishing and rebuild overfished stocks are starting to pay off in many (but not all) regions of the country. Fig. 1: Of the U.S. fish stocks that could be assessed for overfishing and overfished status in 2011, 14% were subject to overfishing and 21% were overfished - an improvement over past years. While encouraging, the fact that overfishing persists at all testifies to the difficulty of preventing it even when the governance system prohibits it and when substantial investments in management are made to monitor compliance with catch limits. Political and economic pressure to keep catch limits high can undermine efforts to prevent overfishing and rebuild overfished stocks as quickly as possible. Fig. 1: Of the U.S. fish stocks that could be assessed for overfishing and overfished status in 2011, 14% were subject to overfishing and 21% were overfished – an improvement over past years. While encouraging, the fact that overfishing persists at all testifies to the difficulty of preventing it even when the governance system prohibits it and when substantial investments in management are made to monitor compliance with catch limits. Political and economic pressure to keep catch limits high can undermine efforts to prevent overfishing and rebuild overfished stocks as quickly as possible. But about half of all managed stocks in U.S. waters are still unassessed and the study by Costello et al. finds that some of these data-poor stocks are likely to be in as bad a shape as those in developing countries. For instance, numerous reef fish such as groupers in the South Atlantic and Gulf of Mexico, many species of sharks, halibut in New England, to name a few, are known to be historically depleted even though they have not been formally assessed. The effects of overfishing are not limited to the decline of individual species of fish. Depletion of commercially valuable species in rapid succession can trigger trophic cascades that change the structure of the food web over time, creating unintended consequences,. The ecological consequences of overfishing rarely receive much consideration in the conventional calculus of overfishing, but one recent analysis by NOAA’s Northeast Fisheries Science Center concluded that the New England region has experienced ecosystem overfishing as a consequence of widespread overfishing and species-selective harvesting patterns that have caused a shift in the fish community composition from a system dominated by species such as cod to one increasingly dominated by lower-value small pelagic fishes such as herring and elasmobranch species (small sharks and skates). Similar effects have been observed in other heavily fished marine ecosystems, such as Europe’s North Sea or the coral reefs of the Caribbean. As the new study by Costello et al. shows, literally thousands of species are affected by fishing worldwide and most appear to be in decline. The unintended consequences of such widespread impacts on marine ecosystems are not fully known, but ignorance is not bliss. Overfishing threatens food security and local fishing economies, but efforts to sustain the production of wild fish as food for humans will fail if we ignore the functional roles that all these species play in the ecosystem. . As fisheries scientists and managers grapple with ways to end the scourge of overfishing, they must factor these ecological considerations into their calculations of how much fishing is too much. It may mean catching fewer fish, but the alternative may be catching no fish at all. Sources: Christopher Costello, Daniel Ovando, Ray Hilborn, Steven D. Gaines, Olivier Deschenes, and Sarah E. Lester (2012), Status and Solutions for the World’s Unassessed Fisheries, Science Online, September 27, 2012. NOAA Northeast Fisheries Science Center (2009), Ecosystem Status Report for the NE Continental Shelf Large Marine Ecosystem. Boris Worm et al. (2009), Rebuilding Global Fisheries, Science 325: 578-585. Special thanks to Mark Spalding, The Ocean Foundation

Posted on October 7, 2012 by Bob Berwyn

Shellfish are expected to be hit hard by ocean acidification in the coming decades.

Bob Berwyn photo.

CO2 from decaying algae blooms adds to ocean woes

By Summit Voice

SUMMIT COUNTY — Runoff from agricultural and urban areas is speeding up ocean acidification in some coastal areas, adding to the woes resulting from increased concentration of atmospheric carbon dioxide.

A new study by researchers with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and the University of Georgia found that CO2 released from decaying algal blooms intensifies acidification, which is already taking a toll on shellfish populations in some areas.

Ocean acidification occurs when the ocean absorbs carbon dioxide from the atmosphere or from the breakdown of organic matter, causing a chemical reaction to make it more acidic. Species as diverse as scallops and corals are vulnerable to ocean acidification, which can affect the growth of their shells and skeletons.

The study suggests that, given current atmospheric CO2 concentrations and projected CO2 released from organic matter decay, seawater acidity could nearly double in waters with higher salinity and temperature, and could rise as much as 12 times current levels in waters with lower salinity and lower temperature.

The study found that, that, given current atmospheric CO2 concentrations and projected CO2 released from organic matter decay, seawater acidity could nearly double in waters with higher salinity and temperature, and could rise as much as 12 times current levels in waters with lower salinity and lower temperature.

NOAA’s William G. Sunda and Wei-jun Cai of the University of Georgia found that eutrophication — the production of excess algae from increased nutrients, such as, nitrogen and phosphorus — is large, often overlooked source of CO2 in coastal waters. When combined with increasing CO2 in the atmosphere, the release of CO2 from decaying organic matter is accelerating the acidification of coastal seawater.

The effects of ocean acidification on the nation’s seafood industry are seen in the Pacific Northwest oyster fishery. According to NOAA, ocean acidification is affecting oyster shell growth and reproduction, putting this multi-million dollar industry at risk. Annually, the Pacific Northwest oyster fishery contributes $84 million to $111 million to the West Coast’s economy. According to an earlier NOAA study ocean acidification could put more than 3,000 jobs in the region at risk.

Sunda and Cai used a new chemical model to predict the increase in acidity of coastal waters over a range of salinities, temperatures and atmospheric CO2 concentrations. They found that the combined interactive effects on acidity from increasing CO2 in the atmosphere and CO2 released from the breakdown of organic matter were quite complex, and varied with water temperature, salinity and with atmospheric CO2.

“These interactions have important biological implications in a warming world with increasing atmospheric CO2,” said Sunda. “The combined effects of the two acidification processes, along with increased nutrient loading of nearshore waters, are reducing the time available to coastal managers to adopt approaches to avoid or minimize harmful impacts to critical ecosystem services such as fisheries and tourism.”

These model predictions were verified with measured acidity data from the northern Gulf of Mexico and the Baltic Sea, two eutrophic coastal systems with large temperature and salinity differences, which experience large-scale algal blooms. The observed and modeled increases in acidity from eutrophication and algal decay are well within the range that can harm marine organisms.

Funding support for the research came from the National Science Foundation, NASA and NOAA. The study can be found in this month’s edition of the American Chemical Society’s Environmental Science and Technology journal.

Special thanks to Craig Quirolo

http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/10/01/australia-reef-idUSL3E8L14K220121001
_______________________________________________
Storms to starfish: Great Barrier Reef faces rapid coral loss-study

Mon Oct 1, 2012 2:59pm EDT

* Great Barrier Reef suffers unprecedented coral loss

* Study says storms, starfish, bleaching cause most damage

* Risk of rapid decline unless world adopts tough CO2 goals

By David Fogarty

SINGAPORE, Oct 2 (Reuters) – The world’s largest coral reef – under threat from Australia’s surging coal and gas shipments, climate change and a destructive starfish – is declining faster than ever and coral cover could fall to just 5 percent in the next decade, a study shows.

Researchers from the Australian Institute of Marine Science (AIMS) in the northeastern city of Townsville say Australia’s Great Barrier Reef has lost half of its coral in little more than a generation. And the pace of damage has picked up since 2006.

Globally, reefs are being assailed by myriad threats, particularly rising sea temperatures, increased ocean acidity and more powerful storms, but the threat to the Great Barrier Reef is even more pronounced, the AIMS study published on Tuesday found.

“In terms of geographic scale and the extent of the decline, it is unprecedented anywhere in the world,” AIMS chief John Gunn told Reuters.

AIMS scientists studied data from more than 200 individual reefs off the Queensland coast covering the period 1985-2012. They found cyclone damage caused nearly half the losses, crown-of-thorns starfish more than 40 percent and coral bleaching from spikes in sea temperatures 10 percent.

The starfish are native and prey on the reefs. But plagues are occurring much more frequently.

Ordinarily, reefs can recover within 10 to 20 years from storms, bleachings or starfish attacks but climate change impacts slow this down. Rising ocean acidification caused by seas absorbing more carbon dioxide is disrupting the ability of corals to build their calcium carbonate structures. Hotter seas stress corals still further.

Greens say the 2,000 km (1,200 mile) long reef ecosystem, the centre-piece of a multi-billion tourism industry, also faces a growing threat from shipping driven by the planned expansion of coal and liquefied natural gas projects.

Those concerns have put pressure on the authorities to figure out how to protect the fragile reef.

FALLING FAST

The researchers say the pace of coral loss has increased since 2006 and if the trend continues, coral cover could halve again by 2022, with the southern and central areas most affected.

Between 1985 and 2012, coral cover of the reef area fell from 28 percent to 13.8 percent.

“Coral cover on the reef is consistently declining, and without intervention, it will likely fall to 5 to 10 percent within the next 10 years,” say the researchers in the study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences journal. They called for tougher curbs on greenhouse gas emissions as a crucial way to stem the loss.

Shipping and new ports on the Queensland coast are another major threat, Greenpeace says.

Coal is one of Australia’s top export earners and the state of Queensland is the country’s largest coal-producer. It also has a rapidly growing coal-seam gas industry for LNG exports.

Earlier this year, Greenpeace estimated port expansion could more than triple Queensland’s coal export capacity by 2020 from 257 million tonnes now. That would mean as many as 10,000 coal ships per year could make their way through the Great Barrier Reef area by 2020, up 480 percent from 1,722 ships in 2011, according to the group.

The Queensland and national governments, which jointly manage the reef, have launched a major review of managing the risks facing the UNESCO-listed reef and its surrounding marine area. The review will look at managing the threats from increased shipping to urban development.

Gunn said better management was all about buying time and improving the reef’s resilience to climate change. A key area was improving water quality from rivers flowing into the reef area, with studies suggesting fertiliser-rich waters help the crown-of-thorns starfish larvae rapidly multiply. (Editing by Jeremy Laurence).

Special thanks to Coral-list

http://www.samuseum.sa.gov.au/index.php?option=com_content&Itemid=172&catid=177&id=431&view=article

4 September 2012

South Australian Museum parasite expert Ian Whittington is one of several international scientists whose study in New Caledonia is today published in the journal Aquatic Biosystems.

New Caledonia is home to the biggest coral reef lagoon and the second biggest coral reef on the planet. Coral reefs, essential to the world’s ecosystems, are home to more than 25% of global marine biodiversity but comprise less than 0.1% of the Earth’s ocean surface. They are considered biological “hotspots” because they are especially rich in marine species. Parasites play a major role in species evolution and the maintenance of populations and ecosystems. However the role of parasites is little known or appreciated.

South Australian Museum Scientist, Associate Professor Ian Whittington, and Honorary Research Associate at the Museum, Professor Ian Beveridge (University of Melbourne) are among an international research team of eight scientists from Australia, Britain, Czech Republic, and France. Directed by Jean-Lou Justine at the National Museum of Natural History in Paris, the team are embarking on an eight year study investigating parasite biodiversity on fish living in New Caledonia’s tropical lagoon.

Their study found that the number of fish parasites is at least ten times the number of fish species in coral reefs (for fish of similar or greater size to the species in the four families studied). Therefore extinction of a fish species on this coral reef would very likely lead to the co-extinction at least ten parasite species associated with it. The disappearance of these parasites, although insignificant at first glance, would result in a biodiversity loss ten times higher. The consequences of such extinctions for the balance of coral reefs and species evolution in general are incalculable.

Associate Professor Ian Whittington and his team in New Caledonia. Photo by Jean-Lou Justine, National Museum of Natural History, Paris.

The Director of the South Australian Museum, Professor Suzanne Miller, says “the findings of this study provide a key insight into the aquatic biodiversity of the Pacific region. Associate Professor Whittington and his colleagues have effectively illustrated the complex relationships between marine organisms and their fragility in the face of climate change and other environmental disturbances.”

The team’s investigation primarily focused on traditional parasite morphology – with an emphasis on crustaceans, external and internal flukes, tapeworms and roundworms. The aim was to estimate the number of parasite species from reef fish and the number of host-parasite combinations possible, and give a clear picture of marine biodiversity in the region. The results of this study are published this week in the online open access journal Aquatic Biosystems.

Parasitic isopod (Anilocra gigantea), photographed alive on an ornate snapper (Pristipomoides argyrogrammicus). Jean-Lou Justine, National Museum of Natural History, Paris.

The parasite and certain fish material collected and studied is held in several natural history museums across the world including the South Australian Museum’s Australian Helminthological Collection in Adelaide. This collection is an internationally renowned collection of parasitic worms established with support from the Australian Society for Parasitology. The material is also held in the Czech Republic, France, UK and USA. All these collections are available to the scientific community for further studies. This emphasises the importance of preserving and increasing the collections of natural history museums. Scientists’ pioneering work in this area and the collections will serve as a reference for similar studies on other coral reefs.

The team:

Jean-Lou Justine, UMR 7138 Systematics, Adaptation, Evolution, Muséum National d’Histoire Naturelle, Paris, France
Ian Beveridge, Department of Veterinary Science, University of Melbourne, Australia
Geoffrey A. Boxshall, Department of Zoology, Natural History Museum, London, UK
Rod A. Bray, Department of Zoology, Natural History Museum, London, UK
Terrence L. Miller, Biodiversity Program, Queensland Museum, Queensland, Australia
František Moravec, Institute of Parasitology, Biology Centre, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Branišovská, Czech Republic
John Paul Trilles, Team ecophysiological adaptations and Ontogeny, UMR 5119 (CNRS-IRD-UM1-UM2-IFREMER), Université Montpellier 2, France
Ian D. Whittington, Monogenean Research Laboratory, The South Australian Museum & Marine Parasitology Laboratory, & Australian Centre for Evolutionary Biology and Biodiversity, The University of Adelaide, Australia

Header image: Associate Professor Ian Whittington and his team studying specimens. Photo by Jean-Lou Justine, National Museum of Natural History, Paris.

03 September 2012