Pity the yellow-lipped fish that researchers are catching, tagging and releasing on Gray’s Reef this month. First, they get hooked and hauled aboard a ship. Scientists then poke the groupers, some as old as 20 years, with a hypodermic needle to deflate their gas bladders, which give them buoyancy. After a day or so of [...]
The invasive lionfish (Pterois volitans), a native to the Indo-Pacific, has continued its expansion along the Atlantic coast of the U.S. and has now been found farther inshore in Georgia waters than previously observed. Two adult size individuals were observed September 23 and 24 during bottom surveys at Gray’s Reef National Marine Sanctuary (GRNMS) located [...]
Scientists from the National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science (NCCOS), in collaboration with NOAA’s Marine Debris Program and Gray’s Reef National Marine Sanctuary (GRNMS), completed a field mission September 23-24, which will improve debris removal and monitoring efforts within GRNMS. The purpose of this mission was to characterize the types, abundance, and accumulation rates of [...]
As part of the National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science (NCCOS) and National Marine Sanctuary Program’s Long-Term Agreement, NCCOS scientists conducted an initial characterization of Gray’s Reef National Marine Sanctuary (GRNMS) to refine models predicting the density of debris and improve future monitoring and removal efforts. Based on these results, NCCOS and GRNMS staff have [...]
Local divers off the coast of North Carolina were not expecting to see what they found on that August day in 2002: exotic and beautiful lionfish, common to the warm waters of the western Pacific but non-native and unknown off the Carolina coast. A year later, scientists from NOAA’s National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science [...]