CT Beaches Awash In Stinging Jellyfish - Which Arrived This Year One Month Ahead Of Normal

[hatrack]

Waterford beach lifeguards Anders Drew and Silvia Stockman spend most of their mornings now scooping up swarms of jellyfish from the shoreline before beachgoers arrive. But all their scooping still can't stop people from getting stung. ”This is probably the worst year we have had,” said Stockman, who's been at the beach four years.

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The fruitful jellyfish population, however, is not as alarming as their ahead-of-schedule debut to southeastern Connecticut shores, according to jellyfish expert Megan Pried. Pried, who has worked for the last year and a half at the Mystic Aquarium and Institute for Exploration, said it is normal for jellyfish to be this abundant. What is out of the ordinary is their advanced arrival.

Pried said that locals reported jellyfish sightings as early as April. The normal jellyfish season begins at the end of May or the beginning of June, she said. She credited the jellies' early arrival to warmer water temperatures. ”I do believe that global warming has some play in the temperatures warming up,” she said. “A lot of animals just go by temperature. They don't really know what else is going on.”

Pried explained that if jellyfish sense the water has reached a certain temperature, they will start reproducing and grow larger regardless of the season. She also said when the water is warmer, there is more food, helping the jellies grow faster, and prompting them to migrate to an ample food source.

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http://www.theday.com/re.aspx?re=e237b83b-3b72-4012-93e1-0e7f2976e8f5

[phantom power]

1. Damn those jellyfish, and their naive temperature-based algorithms.

[soleft]

2. Weird thing is in Jersey, water still seems cold, but tons of jelly fish

usually they're not wreaking havoc until August.

[XemaSab]

3. .