Some experts fear climate crisis is leading creatures back to area where they were hunted almost to extinction
Blue whales, the world’s largest mammals, are returning to Spain’s Atlantic coast after an absence of more than 40 years.
The first one was spotted off the coast of Galicia in north-west Spain in 2017 by Bruno Díaz, a marine biologist who is head of the Bottlenose Dolphin Research Institute in O Grove, Galicia.
Continue reading...A shutdown would have devastating global impacts and must not be allowed to happen, researchers say
Climate scientists have detected warning signs of the collapse of the Gulf Stream, one of the planet’s main potential tipping points.
The research found “an almost complete loss of stability over the last century” of the currents that researchers call the Atlantic meridional overturning circulation (AMOC). The currents are already at their slowest point in at least 1,600 years, but the new analysis shows they may be nearing a shutdown.
Continue reading...This is the moment a house fell into the sea in the resort town of Mar del Tuyú in Argentina. The footage, captured by a neighbour on 28 July, shows waves crashing against the property as part of it breaks away and falls into the water. The owners of the property were not at home when the incident occurred
Continue reading...Carbon emissions, ocean acidification, Amazon clearing all hurtling toward new records
A new study tracking the planet’s vital signs has found that many of the key indicators of the global climate crisis are getting worse and either approaching, or exceeding, key tipping points as the earth heats up.
Overall, the study found some 16 out of 31 tracked planetary vital signs, including greenhouse gas concentrations, ocean heat content and ice mass, set worrying new records.
Continue reading...Conservationists demand killer is found after creature harpooned from close range
An orphaned monk seal known as Kostis, who had become a local celebrity in Greece after being rescued by fishers three years ago, has been found harpooned from close range, prompting outrage from conservationists and demands to find his killer.
MOm, the Hellenic Society for the Study and Protection of the Monk Seal, a not-for-profit group that works to protect the endangered species, said Kostis had been deliberately killed in the waters near Alonnisos, in the northern Sporades islands.
Continue reading...Researchers find ‘significant relationship’ between stony coral tissue loss disease and nearby shipping
A virulent and fast-moving coral disease that has swept through the Caribbean could be linked to waste or ballast water from ships, according to research.
The deadly infection, known as stony coral tissue loss disease (SCTLD), was first identified in Florida in 2014, and has since moved through the region, causing great concern among scientists.
Continue reading...An underwater gas leak caused a whirling vortex of fire to spew out of the ocean surface west of Mexico's Yucatán peninsula on 3 July. The fire began in an underwater pipeline connected to a platform owned by the state oil company Pemex. The fire took more than five hours to put out and no injuries were reported
Continue reading...From giant clams to zebra shark, marine biologists want to replace lost and vanishing species at sea but face unique obstacles – not least rampant overfishing
Kneeling on the seabed a few metres underwater, I pick up a clam and begin gently cleaning its furrowed, porcelain smile with a toothbrush. It’s a giant clam but a young one and still just a handful. Here in Fiji, giant clams or vasua as they are known, were so heavily overfished for their meat and shells that by the 1980s they were thought to be extinct locally. Australian clams were imported to start a captive breeding programme, and subsequent generations of their offspring have been released on coral reefs across Fiji. They’re still vulnerable to fishing and poaching, but if carefully guarded the giant clams do well and have become symbols of healthy corals reefs inside well-managed marine protected areas.
A key to their early survival is rearing them in cages to keep them safe from predators until they’re large enough to survive by themselves. However, the cages also exclude herbivorous fish, so the clams can easily get overgrown by seaweed, which is where the regular toothbrushing comes in.
Continue reading...Around the world, dozens of ingenious projects are trying to ‘trick’ the ocean into absorbing more CO2. But critics warn of unforeseen consequences
Tom Green has a plan to tackle climate change. The British biologist and director of the charity Project Vesta wants to turn a trillion tonnes of CO2 into rock, and sink it to the bottom of the sea.
Green admits the idea is “audacious”. It would involve locking away atmospheric carbon by dropping pea-coloured sand into the ocean. The sand is made of ground olivine – an abundant volcanic rock, known to jewellers as peridot – and, if Green’s calculations are correct, depositing it offshore on 2% of the world’s coastlines would capture 100% of total global annual carbon emissions.
Continue reading...To eat an oyster raw is to eat it alive
On the oyster’s edge, under the sea, on a rock, a tree root, a bamboo pole, a pebble, a tile or another shell, the bivalve’s cilia – from the Latin for eyelash – are waving. Together, they move water over the oyster’s gills – its shell is open, its muscles are relaxed. The oyster has lungs. It has a three-chambered heart. An hour passes; the oyster has filtered five litres of water. The oyster has listened to the breaking waves: it opens and closes according to the tides.
One valve is the cupped half of the shell, the other is the flat half. A cargo ship sounds its horn. The oyster shuts in fright.
Continue reading...China’s Pacific fishing fleet has grown by 500% since 2012 and is taking huge quantities of tuna
Since long before the steel-hulled fishing boats from foreign countries arrived in the South Pacific its people have had their own systems for sharing the ocean’s catches.
In the New Zealand colony of Tokelau, in the middle of the region, the 1,400 people living on its three atolls practise a system called inati, which ensures every household gets fish.
Continue reading...The Cape Cod fisherman estimates he was in the beast’s mouth for 30 seconds; experts say the encounter was a fluke
A commercial lobster diver who got caught in the mouth of a humpback whale off the coast of Cape Cod on Friday morning said he thought he was going to die.
Michael Packard, 56, of Wellfleet, told WBZ-TV after he was released from Cape Cod hospital that he was about 45ft (14 meters) deep in the waters off Provincetown when “all of a sudden I felt this huge bump, and everything went dark”.
Continue reading...‘Queen of the Deep’ says it is not too late to reverse human-made damage to oceans and preserve biodiversity
The world has the opportunity in the next 10 years to restore our oceans to health after decades of steep decline – but to achieve that, people must wake up to the problem, join in efforts to protect marine areas and stop eating tuna, according to the oceanographer and deep sea explorer Sylvia Earle.
“We are at the most exciting time maybe ever to be a human, because we’re armed with knowledge,” said Earle, also known as the Queen of the Deep and “her Deepness”. Earle has also set numerous records for deep sea diving, and was the first woman to serve as chief scientist of the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
Continue reading...Just 10 plastic products make up 75% of all items and scientists say the pollution must be stopped at source
Plastic items from takeaway food and drink dominate the litter in the world’s oceans, according to the most comprehensive study to date.
Single-use bags, plastic bottles, food containers and food wrappers are the four most widespread items polluting the seas, making up almost half of the human-made waste, the researchers found. Just 10 plastic products, also including plastic lids and fishing gear, accounted for three-quarters of the litter, due to their widespread use and extremely slow degradation.
Continue reading...Substance has spread through sea south of Istanbul, posing threat to marine life and fishing industry
Turkey’s environment minister has pledged to defeat a plague of “sea snot” threatening the Sea of Marmara, with a disaster management plan he said would secure its future.
A thick slimy layer of the organic matter, known as marine mucilage, has spread through the sea south of Istanbul, posing a threat to marine life and the fishing industry.
Continue reading...Government suspends fishing along 50-mile coastline after explosion and fire
A cargo ship carrying tonnes of chemicals has sunk off Sri Lanka’s west coast, and tonnes of plastic pellets have fouled the country’s rich fishing waters in one of its worst marine disasters.
The government on Wednesday suspended fishing along a 50-mile stretch of the island’s coastline, affecting 5,600 fishing boats, and hundreds of soldiers have been deployed to clean affected beaches.
Continue reading...Scientists say ice equivalent to 1-2 metres of sea level rise is probably already doomed to melt
A significant part of the Greenland ice sheet is on the brink of a tipping point, after which accelerated melting would become inevitable even if global heating was halted, according to new research.
Rising temperatures caused by the climate crisis have already seen trillions of tonnes of Greenland’s ice pour into the ocean. Melting its ice sheet completely would eventually raise global sea level by 7 metres.
Continue reading...A giant cod that was once a fishing staple is now so rare it has become the preserve of a few fine diners
It was no ordinary cod that Teitur Christensen was preparing. The head chef at Barbara Fish House, one of four restaurants located in tiny wooden houses in Tórshavn, the Faroe Islands’ capital, Christensen was hosting what has become known as a “Bank evening”, because of the main dish. In the small cosy rooms of these ancient houses – one of which was built more than 500 years ago – his team was getting ready to serve what has become an almost mythical fish: the Faroe Bank cod.
The Faroe Bank cod’s reputation is partly built on its size. It is huge: a three-year-old specimen is already twice as large, on average, as the Atlantic cod. But it is also legendary because of its rarity. A genetically distinctive member of the cod family, it was once plentiful before being nearly fished to extinction. In 2008, all commercial fishing of Faroe Bank cod was banned. Only the Faroe Marine Research Institute (Famri) is now allowed to catch them, when its researchers survey the fish population twice a year.
Continue reading...Native species have been revered, feared, hunted and tamed. Now experts hope revulsion can give way to fascination
For many years, the top-rated attraction in the Tasman district of New Zealand was a cafe famed for its rural setting, seafood chowder – and tame eels.
For a few dollars you could buy a pottle of mince and a wooden stick to take down to the stream, where a blue-black mass was shining, writhing, waiting.
Continue reading...From relaxing baths to seaside swims, water can be a balm in difficult times. Catherine Kelly, the author of a new book on blue spaces, shares her tips
It was after her mother died that Catherine Kelly learned the healing power of water. Following instincts that she did not yet understand, she moved to live alone by the sea in County Mayo, on the west coast of Ireland, and over the next few years began to heal. “It’s an ebb and flow that water gives us that allows us to connect with ourselves. It’s an allowing,” she says.
After eight years studying the therapeutic effects of nature, she has written a book called Blue Spaces, packed with ideas about how to make the most of being in or near water. You don’t have to live near the coast to benefit. “There’s being in it, being next to it, thinking about it,” she says. Nor does it matter how much water is available. From raindrops to the ocean, urban fountains to canals and fast-moving rivers, there is a blue space for everyone. And although the phrase “blue space” typically refers to natural waters, Kelly says the possibilities for meaningful connection are the same whether it is the sea or your shower.
Continue reading...