eco-system related passages

8/20/2019 Eco-system Related Passages

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Mysterious mass deaths of

Alaskan birds bafflesscientistsBy Joby Warrick January 12 at 4:16 PM

Tens of thousands of dead birds are washing up on the beaches of Alaska’s

Prince William Sound, an unexplained mass die-off that some experts say may

be related to the changing climate.

The birds, all of a species known as the common murre, appear to have

starved to death, federal wildlife officials say, suggesting disruptions to the

supply of herring and other fish that make up the birds’ diet.

A survey by wildlife officials over the weekend counted more than 8,000 dead

murres on the shores of one beach near Whittier, about 60 miles southeast of Anchorage. Local news video showed bodies of the black-and-white birds

scattered on the beach and floating in the water offshore.

Even for a region that has seen die-offs of murres before, this event seems

exceptional, local officials say.

“Scientists tend to get blasé about this, but this is bigger than I’ve ever seen,”

David Irons, a biologist who recently retired from the U.S. Fish and WildlifeService’s migratory bird division, said in a video interview with KTVA -TV as

he assisted with the bird count.

“Seabird biologists say seabirds are indicators of the health of the ecosystem.

Now they’re dying, and that is telling us something,” he said.

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Wildlife officials say it’s not yet known why the birds are starving. One

possible explanation is that the birds’ usual food supply — the schools of

herring and other small fish usually found near the coast — have not

materialized this year, perhaps because of changing climate or this year’sextreme El Nino weather pattern. While generally plentiful elsewhere in

Alaska, herring populations have been depressed in the Prince William Sound,

scene of the 1983 Exxon Valdez oil spill.

A 2008 scientific study co-authored by Irons found that mortality rates for the

murre tend to increase in years when ocean temperatures are unusually warm.

Alaska is home to an estimated 2.8 million murres scattered among about 230

primary nesting grounds. Wildlife officials are continuing to investigate why

so many are dying this year, starting with the attempt to document the scale of

the die-off.

“If we don’t record they’re dying, it goes unnoticed,” Irons said.

Joby Warrick joined the Post’s national staff in 1996. He has covered national security, intelligence and the

Middle East, and currently writes about the environment.



Study: Carib reefs need fish Published:Thursday | July 3, 2014 | 12:00 AMPhoto

In this file photo, a parrotfish is shown swimming over a dead coral reef in the Florida Keys National Marine Sanctuary near Key

West, Florida.

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico (AP):

Colourful parrotfish and spindly sea urchins are the key to saving theCaribbean's coral reefs, which may disappear in two decades if no action is

taken, a report by several international organisations said yesterday.

The report, which analysed the work of 90 experts over three years, said Caribbean reefs

have declined by more than 50 per cent since the 1970s. It said that while many experts

have blamed climate change for the problem, a drop in the populations of parrotfish and

sea urchins is largely responsible.

feed off seaweed

Parrotfish and sea urchins feed off seaweed, and a drop in their numbers has led to an

increase in seaweed, which smothers coral reefs, Jeremy Jackson, lead author of thereport, said.

"The situation is truly horrific in the sense that you have all these places that are

desperately overfished," Jackson said in a phone interview from Australia.

He said the main culprits in reef degradation are overfishing, coastal degradation and

diseases introduced to the region.



"Climate change for me so far is 10 per cent of the story," said Jackson, a senior adviser

with the Swiss-based International Union for Conservation of Nature, which issued the

report with the United Nations Environment Program and the Global Coral Reef

Monitoring Network.

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