Pacific Spirit Marine Institute
Will Jellyfish and cockroaches eventually be the only things left on earth?
Monday, August 4, 2008
Jellyfish are taking over the oceans, or so it would seem. One reason there are so many jellyfish is because so many of their natural predators are dwindling.
There are 200 classified species of jellyfish. Some are as small as a fingernail and other can grow tentacles up to 100 feet long. Some studies suggest jellyfish, which aren’t fish at all, account for up to 1/3 of the all the world’s marine biomass, and their hungry, really hungry.
In 1989, the Black Sea’s population of an invasive jellyfish reached epic proportions they cased a total collapse of anchovies and sardines. The Jellyfish ate not only the fish but they ate the eggs as well.
Yikes!
In 2000 a bloom of Jellyfish in the Gulf of Mexico contained 5.5 MILLION jellyfish living in 57 square miles of the Gulf. Runoff from agriculture, sewage treatment plants and other things that cause ‘dead zones’ in the waters that kill off other fish are a boon to the Jellyfish that can thrive in oxygen depleted waters.
Rising ocean temperatures only improve the conditions in which the Jellyfish thrive.
Jellyfish are one of the oceans most understudied creatures. Moss Landing in California is one of the world’s leading Jellyfish research facilities.
The Monterey Bay Aquarium research Institute at Moss Landing uses a ‘remote Vehicle’ named The Tiburon to study jellyfish. The recently discovered Erenna Jellyfish lights up to possibly attract small fish to them so that they can dine on them. The Erenna jellyfish poisons it’s meal with little harpoons and then draws its meal into its mouth.
Scientists say there are yet more Jellyfish to be discovered.
With so much of the Jellyfish’s natural predators disappearing from the oceans, and so many dead zones expanding throughout our oceans it’s no wonder our oceans are being overtaken by the Jellyfish.
In a series of documentaries that examines freak occurrences in nature, a film called Nature Shock highlighted what happened to Japanese fishermen in the Tsushima Strait in August 2005.
This article in the Telegraph describes how in an effort to curb a ‘box jellyfish’ explosion fishermen in Japan unleashed what can only be described as a nightmare of hellish proportions.
The Japanese government commandeered a fleet of fishing boats dragging razor-sharp wire through swarms of Jellyfish. Scientists found trying to kill them only unleashed a breeding explosion. They are genetically programmed to ensure their survival by producing more offspring than normal when they are under attack. Large female box jellyfish that were captured were swollen with million of eggs, far more than they would normally carry. Males were carrying billions of sperm.
Irukandji jellyfish and box jellyfish have killed more people in Australia than great white sharks and crocodiles combined.
Labels: jellyfish
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Will Jellyfish and cockroaches eventually be the only things left on earth?
