Melting Starfish Disease Confirmed All Along US West Coast; No El Nino Link

[hatrack]

EDIT

This is not the first time that the seastar population on the West Coast has fallen prey to the wasting disease. There was a major starfish die-off in Southern California between 1983 and 1984, and a smaller die-off between 1997 and 1998. Both those events took place during El Niño years, when the ocean waters were especially warm. Since we are not currently in an El Niño year, and the waters are not particularly warm, it's hard to know what is going on, Raimondi said.

"This time we have nothing in particular to point to as to what might be causing the disease, and we don't know when it will end," he told the Los Angeles Times. "If this was an El Niño year, I'd already be making predictions now about when it will end."

The seastar crisis of 2013 was first detected over the summer. Now, scientists are working to get more information about how many seastar populations are being affected. UC Santa Cruz has created a map detailing where on the coast seastar populations have contracted the disease, but most of those reports are what Raimondi calls opportunistic - someone goes to the beach, checks out the tidepools and notices a bunch of starfish missing limbs.

To get a more accurate view of how widespread the disease has become, a team of researchers has been dispatched to drive up and down the coast on a seastar observing mission that may take months. The good news is that just because the current seastar population is taking a serious hit, it does not mean that our coastline will be devoid of starfish. "They do come back pretty quickly," Raimondi said.

EDIT

http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-seastar-wasting-disease-photos-20131104,0,6486734.story#axzz2jmdUFMog

[gopiscrap]

1. yikes

[lonestarnot]

2. This makes me so sad. I love starfishes!

[pinto]

3. There were algae blooms along the CA coast this summer.

The toxins given off by the algae settle to the sea floor. They accumulate in mussels. Starfish's main food source - mussels. That may be a vector.

The Marine Mammal Center has identified domoic acid poisoning as one prominent factor in this summer's sea lion beaching.

[NickB79]

4. It happened before in 1983-1984 and 1997-1998?

You all know what this means, right?

It means Fukushima is so bad, it's even poisoning the Pacific Ocean BACKWARDS IN TIME!!!!!

Oh my God!!!!

[Nihil]

5. I was waiting for it ...

The suspense was building up over who would be the first poster (or sock-puppet)
to mention "the F-word" in yet another unrelated thread ... then you go and spoil it!



Well played sir!