From the Smithsonian , something that makes me wonder. When the ice ages lowered sea levels and opened land bridges, and mammals of all sorts made passages, or when a study shows Arctic sea ice extent ~6000 years ago was much less than today, were those migrations then worthy of the label “invasive species”. It seems lame to me, Nature is just doing what Nature does, filling a void with life. It also seems to me that this story is nothing more than a headline generator, for buried within it is the admission that it is mostly a non-problem so far.
Melting Arctic opens new passages for invasive species
Scientists say early action could protect coasts
For the first time in roughly 2 million years, melting Arctic sea ice is connecting the north Pacific and north Atlantic oceans. The newly opened passages leave both coasts and Arctic waters vulnerable to a large wave of invasive species, biologists from the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center assert in a commentary published May 28 in Nature Climate Change.
Two new shipping routes have opened in the Arctic: the Northwest Passage through Canada, and the Northern Sea Route, a 3000-mile stretch along the coasts of Russia and Norway connecting the Barents and Bering seas. While new opportunities for tapping Arctic natural resources and interoceanic trade are high, commercial ships often inadvertently carry invasive species. Organisms from previous ports can cling to the undersides of their hulls or be pumped in the enormous tanks of ballast water inside their hulls. Now that climate change has given ships a new, shorter way to cross between oceans, the risks of new invasions are escalating.
“Trans-Arctic shipping is a game changer that will play out on a global scale,” said lead author Whitman Miller. “The economic draw of the Arctic is enormous. Whether it’s greater access to the region’s rich natural resource reserves or cheaper and faster inter-ocean commercial trade, Arctic shipping will reshape world markets. If unchecked, these activities will vastly alter the exchange of invasive species, especially across the Arctic, north Atlantic and north Pacific oceans.”
The first commercial voyage through the Northwest Passage—a carrier from British Columbia loaded with coal bound for Finland—occurred in September 2013. Meanwhile, traffic through the Northern Sea Route has been rising rapidly since 2009. The scientists project that at the current rate, it could continue to rise 20 percent every year for the next quarter century, and this does not take into account ships sailing to the Arctic itself.
For the past 100-plus years, shipping between oceans passed through the Panama or Suez Canals. Both contain warm, tropical water, likely to kill or severely weaken potential invaders from colder regions. In the Panama Canal, species on the hulls of ships also had to cope with a sharp change in salinity, from marine to completely fresh water. The Arctic passages contain only cold, marine water. As long as species are able to endure cold temperatures, their odds of surviving an Arctic voyage are good. That, combined with the shorter length of the voyages, means many more species are likely to remain alive throughout the journey.
Though the routes pose major risks to the north Atlantic and north Pacific coasts, the Arctic is also becoming an attractive destination. Tourism is growing, and it contains vast stores of natural resources. The Arctic holds an estimated 13 percent of the world’s untapped oil and 30 percent of its natural gas. Greenland’s supply of rare earth metals is estimated to be able to fill 20 to 25 percent of global demand for the near future. Until now the Arctic has been largely isolated from intensive shipping, shoreline development and human-induced invasions, but the scientists said that is likely to change drastically in the decades to come.
“The good news is that the Arctic ecosystem is still relatively intact and has had low exposure to invasions until now,” said coauthor Greg Ruiz. “This novel corridor is only just opening. Now is the time to advance effective management options that prevent a boom in invasions and minimize their ecological, economic and health impacts.”
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But one species that has not been able to migrate are the North passage Yachts! But I understand they are endangered anyway. Climate scientists will keep a few in captivity, but they will make sure none are in the wild as the cost of fighting the unicorns will take care of that.
“For the first time in roughly 2 million years, melting Arctic sea ice is connecting the north Pacific and north Atlantic oceans.”
They’re off to a great start with this big fat lie. There is ample evidence that the Arctic was seasonally ice-free during previous interglacial periods. Are we sure this “research” wasn’t conducted by the K-Mart science team?
Every species must be an invasive species during its development else it will never become established.
Liberal Activist #1 “Damn these invasive mammals. Bring back our dinosaurs overlords”
Liberal Activist #2: “Damn these invasive dinosaurs. Bring back our reptilian overlords”
Liberal Activist #3: “Damn these invasive reptiles. Bring back our amphibian overlords”
Liberal Activist #4: “Damn these invasive amphibians. Bring back our brachiopod overlords”
Scientist #1: “Damn these Luddite Liberals. Bring back people with brains”
Tim Folkerts says:
May 28, 2014 at 11:19 am
…
“Shipping” is not “nature doing what Nature does”. “Hulls of ships” are not “Earth just being Earth”. If, for example, whales started swimming along the north coast of Canada, that would be “Nature doing what Nature does.”
This is misguided. The assumption is that somehow human behaviour is not natural, and, while many religions might agree, as well as “intelligent design” advocates, there is simply no support for the idea that we are special in some fashion and apart from nature, or that our behaviours have qualitatively distinct effects from natural catastrophes. Extinctions tied to “invasive species” predate humanity, not just as modern humans but to well before the hominins split off from the rest of the hominidae. Just one truly spectacular example was the end of the dominance of Marsupials in South America when the Isthmus of Panama opened. Similarly, even after Humans are modern, the extinctions at the end of the Pleistocene are far more likely to have been the result of diseases carried by new arrivals, and new competition (as well as climate changes that erased habitats out from under entire ecosystems) than to be the result of ravening human hordes eating their way across continents. There simply isn’t any evidence for that – just models.
There are differences. A ship’s hull or ballast tank can carry unwanted passengers like zebra mussels farther and faster than a floating log for instance, but that is a quantitative difference rather than qualititative..
Arggh. Missing marker in there.
[Fixed. -w.]
Alex (@FedFanForever) says:
May 28, 2014 at 1:28 pm
OK. Pooh-pooh. That’s your alarm-du-jour, the attack of the killer jellyfish? I’ve fished where there were so many jellyfish that the seine nets were full of them. You know how fishermen deal with that? Sink the corks and let them out, plus gloves and full face shields. When the jellies come over the power block and drop on deck, they splatter their stinging cells everywhere … so what?
Plus, nothing ever “takes over” the ocean. Everything in the ocean goes up and down, abundant one year or one decade, scarce the next year or decade.
Seriously, Alex, if rogue jellyfish terrorizing the Atlantic is your best shot at alarmism, take up another line of work. Until you come up with warnings about rogue jelly sharks, I’m not impressed.
w.
As the ice in the Arctic floats I am presuming there are no currents in the Arctic ocean and the invasive species cannot swim.
Curious George says:
May 28, 2014 at 1:40 pm
For ease of comparison, let’s assume 7 billion humans at average mass of 50 kg (maybe light, but precision isn’t needed in this case), for 350 million tonnes.
For rats, let’s say 300 g & mice 30 g. There are surely more rats than humans, but how much more? No one has a good handle on the number of rodents. Although there is this plague (since from the Guardian, probably caused by global warming):
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2007/jul/17/naturaldisasters.china
So approach it a different way. How many rodents would it take to equal the human mass? Ignoring all rodents besides Superfamily Muroidea, which includes rats, lemmings, mice, hamsters & gerbils, etc, let’s guess ten billion rats, ten billion mice & ten billion lemmings, etc, with the later @ur momisugly 50 g. That would total 5.67 million tonnes, or far short of human biomass. But if there are 1.85 trillion members of this rodent superfamily rather than 30 billion, in the same proportion, then they weigh more than we do.
My arithmetic & assumptions might be off. A large adult male rat might weigh 500 g (over a pound), ie 1/100 the assumed average human mass, which estimate includes women & children. So as a very rough check, that would mean more than 700 billion such big rats to equal our weight. Call it over a trillion with the smaller male, female & little rats.
The Northern Sea Route ship transit figures for 2011, 2012, 2013 respectively are 41, 46, 71. Cargo volume was at its greatest in 1987. Last years volume was only half the 1987 season even though rising over the past three years.
Here is a good site information and a couple graphs..
http://www.arctic-lio.com/nsr_transits
milodon: That’s my point exactly. We are uncertain about rodents, but xkcd is certain: they don’t exist. Trust their numbers or not; I don’t.
Curious George says:
May 28, 2014 at 2:47 pm
The linked chart didn’t label what counted as wild animals, except for elephants. It should have shown the squares that represented rodents, bats, etc., if those groups are in fact represented. Bats are worth billions of dollars to US agriculture, but of course windmill advocates were for the birds & bats before (when enviros) they became against them (now).
Define “opened” please as we would like to agree with you. Are we talking about the area directly behind the ice-breaker… commonly called “the wake”?! GK
This is stupid. Arctic ice melt, climate change, has nothing to do with it. What they are describing is a Maritime Bio-security issue. Standard procedure dictates a deep, open water exchange of ballast water before entering a port. Crew and cargo areas are inspected for “guests”. Crew food stocks are typically removed and destroyed. If they are not travelling the Northwest Passage, they are using the Panama Canal. Geez…
How exactly does sea ice prevent fish from swimming under it?
Tim Folkerts says:
May 28, 2014 at 11:19 am
—-
Whales have been swimming along the northern coast of Canada for millions of years. In the past they have been limited to doing it in the summer.
If the worst case global warming does occur, they will have an extra week in the fall and spring to do it as well.
So, unless something drastically changes, what are we going to do when Cape Horn and the Straits of Magellan are blocked by Antarctic sea ice for weeks (or more!) each year ? At today’s rate of increase, still near-continuously increasing since satellite measurements began in 1979, the Straits could be closed within 8 – 12 years! Oh no’es. The Arctic is not guarantted to be “open” for passage every year, and – certainly, the ships have to leave port on both Pacific and Atlantic/north sea/Sea of Japan sides long before the last ice melts, but they equally MUST get past the islands and restricted waters long before they close again for the summer.
A 100,000 ton merchant cannot sit waiting like a kayak or yacht just watching the ice melt, dodging between islands and around icebergs willy-nilly. Or watch ice freeze up in front and behind it, waiting for 3x more icebreakers to free it from the sea ice as happened last “summer” in Antarctica.
/sarchasm. Or maybe not.
I thought all these species were going extinct because they can’t adapt to new their changing environment and now you say they can go anywhere?
I know they just want to keep me confused.
cn
Is this a study to prove that dems / libs are more gullible than average?
Again posted in the wrong thread, dang…
For the 2nd time today Warmists continue their garbage.
And here is a MODEL result for those who insist on models being right and observations being wrong. 😉 Checkmate?
2 million years! New shipping routes! So I can safely assume that during the following events there was more Arctic sea ice than now. This post belongs to climate craziness of the week.
Why the icebreakers? What do these gullible fools know? We must warn them that they are making a multi-million dollar mistake. 2012 was the lowest Arctic sea ice extent evaaaaaah. So WU with the Russians? They don’t understand ice. The US understands ice.
I forgot the last link for the Seattle Times
http://seattletimes.com/html/opinion/2022396191_ricklarsenopedicebreakers05xml.html
Since everyone is worried about invasive species how about they tell Hansen and Gore et al to stop making ANTARCTIC ‘eco’ journeys? The eco-worriers and concerned climate scientists are also spreading disease into the very areas they claim to love.
You can bet your bottom Dollar they are doing the same in the Arctic. Plus they foul the environment with diesel cans, faeces, urine, and garbage.