Seaweed records show impact of ocean warming
As the planet continues to warm, it appears that seaweeds may be in especially hot water. New findings reported online on October 27 in Current Biology, a Cell Press publication, based on herbarium records collected in Australia since the 1940s suggest that up to 25 percent of temperate seaweed species living there could be headed to extinction. The study helps to fill an important gap in understanding about the impact that global warming is having on the oceans, the researchers say.
“Our findings add an important piece in the puzzle that is determining the global impacts of climate change,” said Thomas Wernberg of the University of Western Australia.
“We found that temperate seaweed communities have changed over the past 50 years to become increasingly subtropical, and that many temperate species have retreated south towards the Australian south coast. By extending the observed rates of poleward retreat to other species in the southern Australian seaweed flora, we estimated that projected ocean warming could lead to several hundred species retracting south and beyond the edge of the Australian continent, where they will have no suitable habitat and may therefore go extinct.”
The magnitude of the shifts the researchers observed are consistent with patterns of observed warming in those areas.
The findings in Australia represent two of the major global oceans, the Indian and Pacific, Wernberg said. He added that it is also important to have documented these shifts in Australia because the Southern Hemisphere has been substantially underrepresented in climate change studies.
The analyses draw on a very extensive marine database of more than 20,000 records of collected seaweeds. “Importantly, we did not select species based on preconceived ideas about which ones should have shifted or not—we looked at all 1,500 or so species in the southern seaweed flora and analyzed all of those species that had sufficient records.”
The changes observed in the seaweed community could have cascading effects across marine ecosystems, Wernberg said, as seaweeds are the “trees of the ocean,” providing food, shelter, and habitat to a diversity of other species.
“I hope people will appreciate that the threats of climate change to marine environments are not just about exotic tropical coral reefs but also are likely to affect the diversity of life across a much broader spectrum of marine ecosystems,” Wernberg said.
“hink I’ll get drunk – Oh wait I don’t drink – poor, poor me.”
I’d start, if I were you.
Sea surface temperatures have been rising in the Indian Ocean off the West Australian coast (see Indian Ocean Dipole). Extrapolating that temperature rise along the Southern Ocean coast is another thing. Anyone who has swum off the WA southern coast (I have, many times) can tell you the Southern Ocean is **** cold, and it extends a long long way. All the way to Victoria.
Can I interject with a serious politically correct point if I may, I can no longer stand idly by as a very concerned and kelp-full citizen while you kelp lot make smart humorist remarks about a very kelp serious subject, kelp, I have, and many other kelp concerned scientists have been for years screaming for kelp kelp to bring awareness to this very serious calamity which I call kelp. And do we get the kelp we need? No! who’s laughing now about kelp, don’t kelp me I kelp’ed you so. kelp. kelp kelp kelp kelp kelp. unless you have an issue with that? No I didn’t think so, to kelp with you, I’ll not be back here to be criticized by a bunch of kelp deniers any time soon, I bid you all a good bye and kelp bless.
Sparks says:
October 27, 2011 at 8:28 pm
In all seriousness, I agree. Kelp don’t spam. Spam.
Uh, before kelp can go extinct, we need warmer water. Warmer land bases surface temperatures aint gonna do it. Measurements show no warmwer water.
As the newly unelected official leader of the kelp society, I hereby declare that all documents that contain words and phrases such as “climate change” or “Anthropogenic Global Warming” from this day forward must be changed to Kelp, I recommend anything in the Ipcc beginners manual or the WWF how to combat climate change and be creepy, I also recommend looking up obscure but somewhat intelligent material by Willis Eschenbach for a hoot. just because. my main goal as the new leader of the kelp fellowship is to bring hope to mankind and fellow kelp, I hope some day there can be peace between us. I have a dream where human and or fellow Kelp can make this world worth living in. Kelp be with you!
@Glenn Skankey says:
October 27, 2011 at 3:42 pm
The real problem is that they’ve been smoking too much kelp.
Gets my vote for comment of the year.
Dave Wendt says:
October 27, 2011 at 11:55 am
“If ifs and buts were candy and nuts oh how happy we’d be!
It,s a crazy world.
First we had had Bob Hope (Comedian)
Then we had Johnny Cash (Singer)
Then we had Steve Jobs ( Inventor)
Now we have Obama = With no Hope, no Cash. and no Jobs!
A Google of “As the planet continues to warm”…over 14, 000, 000 hits.
http://www.google.ca/search?sourceid=navclient&ie=UTF-8&rlz=1T4GGLL_enCA393CA393&q=As+the+planet+continues+to+warm.
Indicates that it is an “important premise” among a lot of writers. “The study helps to fill an important gap in understanding about the impact that global warming is having on the oceans, the researchers say.” Gee, there’s a gap? Who in their right mind would have the hubris to think that such a “gap” exists? The genuflecting reporter who wrote this?
I think that Kudzu is the same as Japanese Knot Weed that is a severe problem in the UK. With no natural predators here growth is very rapid and even thick concrete is no escape with houses being demolished because the rooms are growing with the stuff. There is no permitted weed killer that will kill it.
In Japan, of course, there are insects and bacteria that keep it under control. Attempts to introduce these to the UK are not permitted because they might bring their own problems.
Just another case of attempting to justify some ‘scientists” grant addiction.
Herbarium specimen analysis may be fine for some purposes, but when sampling is irregular in both time and space, conclusions about phytogeography must be viewed with the skeptical switch fully on. It’s not an accident that deliberate sampling is rigorously designed to make sure the territory is completely covered. So randomly — and probably sparsely — collected herbarium specimens introduce great uncertainty about the coverage which greatly weakens the results.
Kelp!
… and other seaweeds contain a nutrient which is essential to human health: iodine
http://www.slideshare.net/MedicineAndHealth14/iodine
The real threat to Kelp is radiation slowly spreading across the Pacific from Fukushima. Too bad these AGWhores aren’t looking for solutions to actual real problems. Too bad mainstream cancer-management “medicine” is totally ignorant of the incredible benefits of iodine. Luckily, you have stumbled upon one of the simplest and most effective natural cures on Earth: Kelp yourself to some iodine:
http://www.cayceconcepts.com/DetoxIodine.php
Maybe I’m missing something, but their data has nothing to do with temperature. All they’ve shown is that species have migrated over time. They haven’t even shown the ocean temperatures changed, much less that temperature changes are responsible for the shift.
How can you do a study that concludes plants are migrating due to temperature changes if you haven’t shown the temperature changed? Maybe the amount of sunlight changed, favoring one species over another? There could be a dozen reasons (or more). Why assume its temperature?
And not only do they conclude the changes are due to temperature, Figure 2 (of two figures total), shows;
“Current Distribution Limits and the Frequency of Species Potentially Displaced Beyond the Continental Margin Given Different Warming Scenarios”
So the paper is one figure showing some species have migrated, and one figure using “Warming Scenarios” to predict “potential displacement”? That’s it!?
RE: “The real threat to Kelp comes in the form of Urchins”
SAVE THE KELP! EAT MORE UNI!
Wait a minute! What happened to organisms evolving to overcome stressors in the environment?? Is natural selection no longer operating in the Pacific Ocean? Was evolution repealed? The kelp will either man up (kelp up?) and survive, or it will die and another ,more fit, species will take over. What is the big hoopla about? This is the way the world is supposed to work.