Many Coasts Losing Their Kelp Forests Due to Warming Ocean

[Sea Save Foundation]

The latest victim to the warming ocean due to climate change is the coastal kelp forests around the world. These include kelp forests off the Gulf of Maine, Mediterranean Sea, southern Japan, Australia, and California. In addition to the warming ocean, invasive seaweed is the likely culprit in Maine, and in Australia, Mediterranean, and Japan, tropical fish have been eating the kelp. A study found that 38 percent of kelp forests have declined over the past 50 years.

Read more here (story #5).

 

[Wookie]

To be sure, Maine kelp is healthier than ever, now that we fed all those pesky urchins to the Japanese. Lobster landings are way up since the urchin population was decimated.

 

[elbig]

@Wookie So this study is bogus (at least for Maine)? I am generally very skeptical of the global warming alarmist agenda. Much of it does not appear to me to be very scientifically based even though it is supposedly done by scientists. A lot of data manipulation and extrapolation is done with particular predetermined biases.

 

[Wookie]

Can't tell you about the study. I can only tell you what I see with my eyes and from lobster landings. There is far more kelp now than when I was a kid, because urchins eat kelp, and the urchins were all eaten.

 

[StefinSB]

@Wookie So this study is bogus (at least for Maine)? I am generally very skeptical of the global warming alarmist agenda. Much of it does not appear to me to be very scientifically based even though it is supposedly done by scientists. A lot of data manipulation and extrapolation is done with particular predetermined biases.

Can you please elaborate which data in regards to the kelp forests have been manipulated and extrapolated with predetermined bias.

 

[elbig]

Sorry I cannot elaborate in regards to this specific kelp forest study. My comment was about global warming alarmists in general manipulating data therefore I am skeptical about these studies. This study may be very sound. Although anecdotally Wookie has experienced exactly the opposite of what was stated which is what prompted my post.

 

[Wookie]

Remember, what I see anecdotally is caused by environmental pressures completely outside the boundaries of the study. Urchins eat kelp, and with the urchin population decimated, the kelp is everywhere in places where it wasn't seen 30 years ago. It's possible that the study relied on data methods completely outside of actual population studies ( looking at red snapper population in terms strictly of biomass would lead you to believe that red snapper are more abundant than ever. Which they are, but the majority aren't large enough to spawn) or anecdotal information. Without knowing the parameters of the study I can't detirmine what the researcher looked at, but kelp in Maine is more plentiful than it's ever been in my history.

 

[Wookie]

This is what I refer to as fake news, or, we need the rest of the story.

 

[Skeptic14]

The details within the article that shouldn't be overlooked and that don't support the title.

"...which found that 38 percent of kelp forest declined over the past 50 years in regions that had data."

"The likely culprit, according to several scientific studies, is warming oceans from climate change, coupled with the arrival of invasive species."

Perhaps a more reasonable title would be

"Based on limited data some kelp forests appear to be in decline from warmer oceans and invasive species".

 

[scubafanatic]

There was a huge sea urchin die off back in the 80's due to a virulent disease, and urchins almost went extinct, so urchins are still trying to recover from that event.