{"id":193992,"date":"2024-12-12T19:52:42","date_gmt":"2024-12-12T19:52:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/12\/12\/the-blob-an-unprecedented-marine-heat-wave-killed-4-million-seabirds\/"},"modified":"2024-12-12T19:52:42","modified_gmt":"2024-12-12T19:52:42","slug":"the-blob-an-unprecedented-marine-heat-wave-killed-4-million-seabirds","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/2024\/12\/12\/the-blob-an-unprecedented-marine-heat-wave-killed-4-million-seabirds\/","title":{"rendered":"The &#8216;Blob,&#8217; an unprecedented marine heat wave, killed 4 million seabirds"},"content":{"rendered":"<div style=\"text-align:center\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.sciencenews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/121124_jb_seabird-die-off_inline1.jpg?fit=680%2C907&amp;ssl=1\" class=\"attachment-post-thumbnail size-post-thumbnail wp-post-image\" alt=\"The &#8216;Blob,&#8217; an unprecedented marine heat wave, killed 4 million seabirds\" title=\"The &#8216;Blob,&#8217; an unprecedented marine heat wave, killed 4 million seabirds\" \/><\/div> \r\n<br><div data-component=\"video-embed\">\n\t\t\t\t\n\n\n\n\n<p>The tall, stony coastlines of the northeast Pacific Ocean are much quieter than they were just a decade ago. Following a punishing marine heat wave in the region, the raucous seabird colonies that once crowded the sea cliffs are now greatly thinned, to a quarter of their former size in some places.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>This <a href=\"http:\/\/www.science.org\/doi\/10.1126\/science.adq4330\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">abrupt loss of millions of birds<\/a>, and probably many other animals, may be the largest wildlife mortality event recorded in modern times, researchers report in the Dec. 13 <em>Science<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n<aside class=\"sn-conversion rich-text rich-text--with-sidebar\">\n<style><![CDATA[\n.email-conversion {\n  border: 1px solid #ffcccb;\n  color: white;\n  margin-top: 50px;\n  background-image: url(\"\/wp-content\/themes\/sciencenews\/client\/src\/images\/cta-module@2x.jpg\");\n  padding: 20px;\n  clear: both;\n}\n\n]]><\/style>\n\n\n\n<div class=\"rich-text embedded-conversion-content is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container\">\n<style><![CDATA[\n#dynamic-wrapper {\n  border: 1px solid #ffcccb;\n  background-image: url(\"https:\/\/www.sciencenews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/11\/cta_background_aurora.jpg\");\n  background-size: cover;\n  background-position: center center;\n  padding: 20px;\n  clear: both;\n}\n\n#dynamic-conversion {\n  padding: 20px;\n  background:rgba(0,0,0, 0.5);\n  color: white;\n}\n\n#dynamic-conversion h2 {\n  color: white;\n}\n\np.has-text-align-center a {\n  color: white !important;\n  text-decoration: none;\n  font-weight: bold;\n}\n\n]]><\/style>\n\n\n\n<div id=\"dynamic-wrapper\" class=\"wp-block-group\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-constrained wp-block-group-is-layout-constrained\">\n<div id=\"dynamic-conversion\" class=\"wp-block-group\"><div class=\"wp-block-group__inner-container is-layout-flow wp-block-group-is-layout-flow\">\n\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading has-text-align-center\"><strong>Have feedback for Science News?<\/strong><\/h2>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center\">Help us improve by telling us about your experience<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div><\/div>\n\n\n\n<\/aside>\n\n\n<p>\u201cWe knew [the population decline] was big, but the numbers are a gut punch,\u201d says Heather Renner, a wildlife biologist with U.S. Fish and Wildlife at the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge in Homer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The story begins in late 2014, when a brutal marine heat wave nicknamed the \u201cBlob\u201d parked itself over the Pacific northeast, raising ocean temperatures far above normal for almost two years. The colossal cauldron cooked up an <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencenews.org\/article\/massive-marine-heat-wave-blob-unprecedented-seabird-die-off\">ecological chain reaction<\/a>, slashing phytoplankton populations and in turn the forage fish that seabirds like common murres (<em>Uria aalge<\/em>) eat (<em>SN: 1\/15\/20<\/em>). In 2015 and 2016, the birds starved to death en masse.<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image  has-alignleft\">\n<figure class=\"alignleft size-full\"><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><span class=\"caption wp-caption-3147524\">Around 62,000 common murres washed up on U.S. and Canadian Pacific coast beaches during the heat wave, including in Alaska\u2019s Pigot Bay (shown). New research estimates the total losses at 4 million birds.<\/span><span class=\"credit wp-credit-3147524\">David Irons\/USFWS<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n<p>Renner runs a monitoring program spanning the region that has been collecting data on seabirds for the last 50 years. The scale of the toll was immediately obvious.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cWe knew right away that it was a big catastrophe,\u201d Renner says. \u201cThere were 62,000 carcasses that washed up on the beaches, all over the Gulf of Alaska, all the way down to California. It was clearly a big deal, but we couldn\u2019t really quantify the size of the mortality very well.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To get a better idea of the full impact on the murre population, the team used colony count data from 1995 to 2022, gathered across 13 colonies along the margins of the Bering Sea and the Gulf of Alaska. After getting bird counts before and after the heat wave, the researchers then extrapolated those results to the entire Alaskan murre population.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Renner and her colleagues estimate that the heat wave killed 4 million murres between the Gulf of Alaska and Eastern Bering Sea. Roughly half the region\u2019s murres died during a single winter.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIt was just so much worse than we thought,\u201d Renner says.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>She and her team suggest the loss is the largest die-off of wildlife, specifically nonfish vertebrates, yet reported in the modern era. In the same heat wave, some <a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencenews.org\/article\/10-billion-snow-crabs-disappeared-alaska\">10 billion snow crabs<\/a> in the Bering Sea also died from starvation (<em>SN: 10\/19\/23<\/em>).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The sheer scale and speed of the common murre population collapse is shocking, says Simon Tye, an ecologist at the University of Arkansas in Fayetteville who wasn\u2019t involved with the research. \u201cThe before and after pictures [of the colonies] are pretty heartbreaking.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image  has-aligncenter\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full is-resized\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"680\" height=\"702\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.sciencenews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/121124_jb_seabird-die-off_inline2.jpg?fit=680%2C702&amp;ssl=1\" alt=\"Two photos of one ocean rock outcropping, the top covered in birds and the bottom mostly empty\" class=\"wp-image-3147525\" style=\"width:572px;height:auto\" srcset=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.sciencenews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/121124_jb_seabird-die-off_inline2.jpg?w=680&amp;ssl=1 680w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.sciencenews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/121124_jb_seabird-die-off_inline2.jpg?resize=371%2C383&amp;ssl=1 371w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.sciencenews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/121124_jb_seabird-die-off_inline2.jpg?resize=436%2C450&amp;ssl=1 436w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.sciencenews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/121124_jb_seabird-die-off_inline2.jpg?resize=180%2C186&amp;ssl=1 180w, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.sciencenews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/121124_jb_seabird-die-off_inline2.jpg?resize=562%2C580&amp;ssl=1 562w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 680px) 100vw, 680px\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-element-caption\"><span class=\"caption wp-caption-3147525\">A comparison of a common murre colony on South Island, part of the Semidi Islands in the Alaska Maritime National Wildlife Refuge, illustrates the severe population loss before (top) and after (bottom) the extended marine heat wave.<\/span><span class=\"credit wp-credit-3147525\">USFWS<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n<p>The fact that the birds hadn\u2019t rebounded even seven years later helps reject an earlier hypothesis that the birds were just temporarily delaying breeding to wait out the hostile climatic conditions. The stubbornly sparse colonies may mean that something fundamental has changed in the ecosystem, and it can\u2019t support a return to past murre numbers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Renner says she doesn\u2019t think climatic impacts spurring such a dramatic, swift shift has been previously documented. The findings show such intense changes can occur on the scale of years.<\/p>\n\n\n<aside class=\"sn-conversion rich-text rich-text--with-sidebar\">\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center wp-elements-27c40654034fbeecef6418d6adfe0794\" style=\"color:gray; margin-bottom:0px; font-size:.9rem;\">Sponsor Message<\/p>\n<!-- Tag ID: sciencenews-org_leaderboard_incontent -->\n\n<\/aside>\n\n\n<p>Tye and Renner both point out that with continued climate warming, heat waves like the Blob are expected to occur more frequently. This could imperil already vulnerable populations of many animals that have yet to recover in an ocean ecosystem reeling from the previous heat wave.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>While there\u2019s little immediate human control over marine heat waves, Renner says the findings underscore the importance of other conservation efforts for seabirds. This may include removing invasive predators or other species that \u2014 alongside climatic swings \u2014 create an additive stress on seabird populations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe top of the food web going away, I think that\u2019s really important,\u201d Tye says. \u201cIt should be an ominous thing for everybody.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\t\t\t<\/div>\r\n<br>\r\n<br><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sciencenews.org\/article\/blob-marine-heat-wave-killed-seabirds\">Source link <\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The tall, stony coastlines of the northeast Pacific Ocean are much quieter than they were just a decade ago. Following a punishing marine heat wave in the region, the raucous seabird colonies that once crowded the sea cliffs are now greatly thinned, to a quarter of their former size in some places. This abrupt loss [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":193993,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"tdm_status":"","tdm_grid_status":"","fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.sciencenews.org\/wp-content\/uploads\/2024\/12\/121124_jb_seabird-die-off_inline1.jpg?fit=680%2C907&ssl=1","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[606],"tags":[43042,1029,1177,6896,2458,2085,22228,6390],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193992"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=193992"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193992\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":193994,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/193992\/revisions\/193994"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/193993"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=193992"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=193992"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.talkwithrattan.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=193992"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}