An international consortium has been formed to study the potential effects of adding iron to the ocean to promote the growth of phytoplankton. Phytoplankton use carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and ocean fertilization might therefore be a way of mitigating the effects of global warming. When phytoplankton die, organic carbon sinks to the seafloor where it may remain for decades, centuries or even longer – we still do not now much about the time-line.

Iron fertilization of the ocean is far from uncontroversial, since it is very difficult to foresee the long term effects of such a project. The international consortium, which has been named In-Situ Iron Studies (ISIS) consortium , will carry out iron fertilization experiments in the open ocean in an effort in to answer some of the questions regarding how iron affects the ocean’s capacity for dragging carbon dioxide from the air and into the water. All experiments will adhere to the London Convention/London Protocol regarding ocean iron fertilization research.

“A great deal remains to be learned about ocean iron fertilization and how effective it could be in storing carbon dioxide in the oceans, and the formation of this consortium is an important first step,” says Lewis Rothstein, professor of oceanography at the University of Rhode Island. “This is not a call for climate engineering; on the contrary this is a research consortium. It is premature to advocate for large-scale ocean iron fertilization, but it is time to conduct a focused research experiment that will examine the concept as comprehensively as we can. We want to make sure that it doesn’t generate harmful side effects that might negatively affect the marine ecosystem.”

The twelve ISIS-members are the following:
University of Rhode Island, USA
University of Hawaii, USA
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, USA
University of Maine, USA
University of Massachusetts Boston, USA
University of Plymouth, UK
Xiamen University, Fujian, China
The Antarctic Climate and Ecosystems Cooperative Research Centre, Australia
Netherlands Institute for Sea Research, The Netherlands
The National Oceanography Centre, UK
Moss Landing Marine Laboratories, California, USA
Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, Massachusetts, USA

When salmon is farmed in large-scale monocultures, the fish tend to become susceptible to disease and parasites. Researchers working for the organization Nofima have now found a way of combating the parasite salmon lice in fish farms without using any dangerous toxins. Wrasse loves to eat lice, so the researchers simply added wrasse to the salmon populations and the result was astonishing.

During the trials, the most efficient lice eater turned out to be the Ballan wrasse (Labrus bergylta). In addition to being highly efficient, it also gathered lice at lower temperatures than the other Wrasse species that took part in the experiment.

When Ballan wrasse was used, roughly 2-5% wrasse was needed for salmon living in sea cages. This means that a population of 100 000 salmon will need somewhere between 2 000 and 5 000 wrasse to stay deloused. A new larger project will now be prepared to make sure there is an adequate supply of the lice eaters in Norway. The project will go on for three years and has received funding from The Fishery and Aquaculture Industry Research Fund (FHF).

The effort which is now commencing is unique in both a Norwegian and global context. Norway is the only salmon-producing country that is using wrasse on a large scale to combat salmon lice,” says Arne Karlsen, managing director of FHF.

Removing large amounts of Ballan wrasse from the wild to keep in salmon farms could cause serious damage to the wild populations and the goal of the Norwegian project is therefore to cover at least 25% of the demand with farmed wrasse by 2013.

In addition to Nofima and FHF, the project will also involve SINTEF Fisheries and Aquaculture, the Institute of Marine Research and the Norwegian University of Science and Technology.

Several Norwegian projects are already taking a closer look at the Ballan wrasse, including a research venture concerning Ballan wrasse farming that started last year with funding totaling NOK 12 million from the Research Council of Norway, FHF and industry partners.

” It is estimated that the total Norwegian effort on Ballan wrasse farming is in the vicinity of NOK 100 million,” says Kjell Maroni, research and development director at FHF

The researchers will now have to find out how to carry out large-scale wrasse farming without being plagued by the same problems with disease and parasites as the salmon farms.



There is something fishy going on in Derbyshire – but it’s the good kind of fishy.

After two centuries and 80 kilometers inland, an amazing thing has happened on one of the largest rivers in Britain – a salmon was seen leaping its way upstream to spawn.

This amazing thing – which is more common in Scotland and Canada – was seen in Derbyshire on the Rover Derwent.

The salmon – which would have swum to the ends of the earth just to spawn and perish – had an easier time making its way up the river due to the higher water levels because of recent rainfall.

Experts are keeping their fingers crossed, and by building “fish passes” around the weirs, hope to encourage a more permanent presence of the salmon.

Salmon need to be able to make their way upstream to breed, and Jim Finnegan – an Environment Agency expert – has commented that everything should be done to try and make this process easier.

He said: ‘We have been down there and seen salmon trying to leap over the weir.
‘But the ultimate objective is to see them spawning or breeding in the Derwent, and there’s no evidence of that yet.
‘We will need to build these fish passes.’

Well, the good news is that the salmon are making their way back up to Derwent. This means, that with a little bit of work and care, that we as humans can help mother nature return to its natural course.

Goldfish

That’s right.. The new team which has been charged with looking out for the safety and wellbeing of the representatives of the G20 summit are six goldfish.

The people in charge at the Convention and Exhibition Center in Seoul, South Korea, have sworn in this “seal team” of fish to help keep tabs on the purity of the water in the bathrooms of the facility, in the hope that they will be able to sound the alarm if something is fishy.

Oh Su-Young, who heads up public relations for the venue, has told the AFP that the crack team of goldfish are being utilized as part of the process of inspecting the venue before the representatives arrive for the G20 summit, adding: “The fish also symbolize an eco-friendly water policy, which recycles used water for restrooms.” There was no mention made of exactly where this recycled water came from..

One of the people who will benefit from the efforts of these goldfish is British prime minister David Cameron when the summit takes place this 11th and 12th of November.

However, this is not the first time this year where animals have been trained and put to good use for the safety and wellbeing of our world leaders.

During the Commonwealth Games in Delhi, the police force of India scooped up monkeys and trained them to run regular patrols in the athlete’s village as well as the venues of the event.

These unlikely bouncers with long tails were meant to protect spectators and athletes alike, from the notorious Bonnet monkey, which supposedly holds a grudge against us humans.

Concept of the recycled vac

Electrolux Launching new “Vac from the Sea” Initiative:

Stockholm, Sweden – It is a well known fact that the Pacific Ocean is chock full of garbage, so much in fact that there are actually “islands” which are comprised entirely of it. Electrolux has the intention of gathering up the plastic out of the worlds’ oceans, and converting it into brand new vacuum cleaners. This initiative, is known as “Vac from the sea”, has taken on the goal of bringing attention to the issue of plastic pollution in the Pacific Ocean, while at the same time combating the problem of the scarcity of recycled plastics which are needed to create sustainable home goods.

The Vice President of Floor Care Environmental and Sustainability Affairs at Electrolux, Cecilia Nord, enlightens us on the plans over at Electrolux, “There are plastic islands, some several times the size of the state of Texas, floating in our oceans. Yet on land, we struggle to get hold of enough recycled plastics to meet the demand for sustainable vacuum cleaners. What the world needs now is a better plastic karma”

The general plan is to create a limited quantity of “green” vacuum cleaners from the plastic debris which is being collected from the Pacific, Indian, and Atlantic oceans, as well as the Mediteranean, Baltic and North seas. Anyone who is interested in the project can follow its progress on the Blog as well as on Facebook and can also find full details on how to become involved, should they wish to do so. These “green” vacuum cleaners are set to be put on display, in order to drum up support for the project.

We at AC tropical fish applaud the idea for its great symbolic value!!

If you’re an environmentally conscious golf enthusiast you probably cringe at the shear notion of playing golf near the shoreline or practise your swing onboard a yacht or cruise ship where the risk of your balls ending up in the ocean is high.

To remedy the problem with awol golf balls polluting our oceans, Barcelona based golf ball manufacturer Albus Golf has created a 100% biodegradable and non-toxic golf ball filled with fish food. According to the company, the outer part of the ball will biodegrade within 48 hours after ending up in the water, giving the oceanic fauna free access to the tasty fish food inside.

Around the globe, more and more costal regions outlaw the use of ordinary golf balls near the shore since they have a tendency to end up in the ocean where their durable plastic materials live on “forever”. Our ever increasing production of plastic and other materials that are difficult to break down have caused the formation of five enormous trash vortexes in the ocean; areas to where sea currents bring the floating debris we throw into our oceans and waterways each day. The largest of them, the Great Pacific Trash Vortex, currently covers an area twice the size of the continental U.S.

Massive fish death is planned for the Chicago Sanitary and Ship Canal, historically known as the Chicago Drainage Canal, in northern United States.

Starting early next month, authorities will inject the powerful fish poison Rotenone into a five-mile stretch of the canal; from Lockport Locks to the electronic barrier system near 135th Street in Romeoville. The government wants to stop Asian carps from entering the Great Lakes while one of the electronic barriers is shut down for routine maintenance.

Completed in the year 1900, the canal is the only shipping link between the Great Lakes and the Mississippi River system, and the aim of the mass killings is to save the Great Lakes ecosystem from the Asian invaders that have found their way into the manmade waterway.

Two species of Asian carp – the bighead* and the silver** – were imported by catfish farmers in the 1970’s to remove algae and suspended matter from the catfish ponds. During the early 1990s, large floods in the area made farm ponds overflow, giving the carps a chance to escape into the Mississippi River basin.

Since then, the carps have steadily made their way up the Mississippi river and are today the two most abundant species in parts of the system. They outcompete native species and cause starvation in large native game fish by devouring such large amounts of plankton.

Introducing rotenone to the canal will kill all fish, not just the Asian carps, and this has naturally stirred up some controversy. The poison is said to be safe to people, pets and other wildlife in the area, but no one should eat any fish killed by the chemical.

The plans to poison the canal were announced during a special telephone press conference Friday afternoon with members of the Illinois Department of Natural Resources, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the U.S. Coast Guard and the United States Environmental Protection Agency.

“This plan has been developed with input from many biologists and scientists who all agree this is the best course of action,” said John Rogner, assistant director of the IDNR. “All of the (dead) fish will be removed and disposed of in our landfills. The clean up will take a couple of days and the cold water should remove any odours.”

Electro-fishing techniques will be used to remove and relocate as much game fish as possible from the canal prior to the release of the poison, and there are also plans to restock game fish in the area afterwards, as soon as chemical accelerants have been applied to remove the rotenone from the water.

* Bighead carp (Hypophthalmichthys nobilis)
** Silver carp (Hypophthalmichthys molitrix)

Compared to the record-setting low years of 2007 and 2008, the Arctic Sea ice has made a slight recovery in 2009, according to the University of Colorado at Boulder’s National Snow and Ice Data Center. Despite this positive change, the minimum sea ice extent in 2009 was the third lowest since satellite record-keeping started in 1979.

“It’s nice to see a little recovery over the past couple of years, but there’s no reason to think that we’re headed back to conditions seen in the 1970s,” said NSIDC Director Mark Serreze, also a professor in CU-Boulder’s geography department. “We still expect to see ice-free summers sometime in the next few decades.”

The standard measurement for climate studies is the average ice extent during September. This September, the average Arctic Sea ice extent was 5.36 million square kilometres, which is 1.06 million square kilometres more than September 2007 and 690,000 square kilometres more than September 2008.

According to Mike Steele, Senior Oceanographer at the University of Washington, the decrease in ice loss is probably due to cloudy skies during late summer. Sea surface temperatures in the Arctic were higher than normal this season, but slightly lower than in 2007 and 2008 – most likely due to the presence of clouds this year. Atmospheric patterns in August and September also helped spreading the ice pack over a larger area.

Arctic sea ice follows an annual cycle of melting during the warm season and refreezing in the winter, and the extent of Arctic sea ice has always varied due to changing atmospheric conditions. During the past 30 years, there has however been a dramatic overall decline in Arctic sea ice extent.

Significant areas of coastal wetlands have been restored and enhanced in Port Arthur, Texas. The largest restoration took place in the Lower Neches Wildlife Management Area near the Gulf of Mexico where historic water flow has been brought back into roughly 1,300 acres of wetland.

The other main restoration site is located within the J.D. Murphree Wildlife Management Area where approximately 1,500 acres of coastal emergent marsh plant communities have been restored to historical conditions through the installation of berms and other water control structures.

Almost 90 acres of estuarine intertidal marsh and over 30 acres of coastal wet prairie have also been established by NOAA in conjunction with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department, the Texas General Land Office, and the Chevron Corporation.

“Coastal wetlands are extremely valuable habitats that provide numerous services for both humans and the environment,” said John H. Dunnigan, assistant administrator for NOAA’s National Ocean Service. “The wetlands restored through this cooperative project will help improve water quality and provide a buffer as tropical storms and hurricanes move onshore.”

The restored wetlands are a way for Chevron to compensate the public for the injury caused by the Clark Chevron refinery in Port Arthur. The refinery, which commenced production in 1902, caused substantial injury to natural areas and waterways inside and adjacent to the processing plant by releasing hazardous substances into the environment.

“These completed projects will not only provide habitat benefits to the fish and wildlife of the region, but will also enhance public use and outdoor recreation opportunities,” said Wildlife Management Area manager Jim Sutherlin.

The restoration is a part of NOAA’s Damage Assessment, Remediation and Restoration Program. Through this program, NOAA works with industry, agencies and communities to restore environments harmed by oil spills, hazardous substance releases and ship groundings. Last year, the program settled nearly 200 natural resource damage assessment cases, generating almost $450 million for restoration projects.

The invasive kelp Undaria pinnatifida is has now spread from Los Angeles to San Francisco Bay, despite eradication efforts.

Earlier, the northward spread of this sea weed – which can grow an inch a day and forms dense underwater forests – was believed to have been stopped at Monterey Bay, but this assumption turned out to be wrong when a biologist at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center happened to notice a six-foot long piece of kelp attached to a boat in a yacht harbor in San Francisco Bay.

“I was walking in San Francisco Marina, and that’s when I saw the kelp attached to a boat,” said Chela Zabin, biologist at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center in Tiburon, California. “It was six-foot long, and there is nothing here in the bay that gets to that size. I didn’t want to believe what it was, it’s depressing.”

Further investigation showed U. pinnatifida clinging not only to boat hulls in the marina but to docks and pier pilings as well.

U. pinnatifida was discovered in Los Angeles Harbour in 2000 and within a year reports of its presence had arrived from Catalina Island and Monterey Bay. A federal eradication program was put in place, but the funding dried up last year. Since then, volunteer divers have been the only ones combating the kelp.

Five quick facts about Undaria pinnatifida

• Undaria pinnatifida is a fast growing kelp native to the waters of Japan, China and South and North Korea.

• Within its native range it is an appreciate source of food and if you’ve ever tasted miso soup, this is what you were eating. The Japanese name for this species is wakame.

• U. pinnatifida has managed to establish itself in many different regions outside its native range, such as the Atlantic coast of Europe, the Mediterranean Sea, and the Argentinean coast. By attaching itself to vessel hulls it can hitchhike across the globe in search of new suitable habitats. This kelp can also enter ecosystems via imported oysters, and some people deliberately or accidently introduce U. pinnatifida to local ecosystems by cultivating it for cooking purposes.

• When U. pinnatifida spread to ecosystems not used to its presence, it can grow uncontrolled and prevent native kelp species from getting any sunlight. This can disturb the entire ecosystem.

• U. pinnatifida has been nominated to the list “100 worst invasive species in the world”.