While climate change is often associated with global warming and rising seawater temperatures, there are other climate-related anomalies that can adversely affect marine life. From February 27 to May 26, 2011, 37 bottlenose dolphins were found dead on South Carolina beaches primarily in the central and southern sections of the state. This level of mortality [...]
Research conducted by scientists at the National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science’s (NCCOS) will be published as a chapter in, Quagga and Zebra Mussels: Biology, Impacts, and Control, Second Edition, edited by Thomas Nalepa (NOAA Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory). The book will include over 30 chapters dealing with ecological consequences of dreissenid mussels in [...]
EDMONDS — On the jetty at Brackett’s Landing this past week, volunteers pried mussels from barnacle-encrusted boulders using serrated table knives. The tiny black bivalves dislodged to crinkling sounds on a frigid afternoon were too puny for any self-respecting chef to serve up on a steaming plate. No, these mussels were headed for Ziploc bags [...]
The southern third of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) 22-sqmi Gray’s Reef National Marine Sanctuary off the Georgia coast was designated a research area, where scientists can study how human activities and natural processes affect the sanctuary’s marine resources. The new designation will take effect after a 45-day Congressional review. This new research [...]
In an effort to monitor the condition of Alaska’s offshore resources, scientists from the National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science are sampling the water and seafloor life of the Chukchi Sea. The three-week research cruise supports the state’s Department of Environmental Conservation, which is gathering baseline data on areas proposed for oil and gas surveys [...]
The Great Lakes have multiple stresses acting on them, but offshore and nearshore systems may show different trends in relation to stresses. A new paper by NCCOS-supported researchers links these trends with invasive mussels. Mussels filter waters coming into coastal embayments, and can pull phosphorus out of the water column and deposit it into nearshore [...]
Atlantic croaker, one of the most abundant fish in the Gulf of Mexico, are starting to exhibit changes that appear to be related to the massive summer “Dead Zone.” A NOAA-sponsored study found croakers exposed to low oxygen for as few as 10 weeks underwent hormonal alterations that transformed some of their female reproductive tissue [...]
High Frequency Radar (HFR) can resolve ocean currents to a scale of 1 kilometer and extend out to approximately 150 kilometers offshore. In addition to oceanographic studies, HFR has proven useful to applications such as supporting oil spill response, search and rescue, fisheries, and coastal discharge assessment. Now, through the support of the Integrated Ocean [...]