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Gray Whale, Southern-Hemisphere Algae Seen In N. Atlantic
oxide7 writes "The gray whale hasn't strayed to the Northern Atlantic since the 18th century. The Neodenticula seminae, a species of algae, hasn't been there in 800,000 years. Now, members of both species have been spotted in the Northern Atlantic."
What happened in the 18th century for the whale to go there? Running from whalers?
Pretty convenient for the whales, I would have thought?
Never mind him, that's just how he rolls.
Crap. What did the new CSS do with the "Post anonymously" option??
Al Gore predicted all of this in An Inconvenient Truth:
As the planet warms, the ancient machines of the gray whalean master race will begin to stir. Their instruments of death powered by minute rises in sea temperature, they will begin to send their agents of terror out on increasingly bold missions of destruction. At first the human population will be oblivious. The occasional ship sinking or swimmer mauled with characteristic baleen bite marks will be reported locally, but the dots of this sinister global movement will not be connected until it's far too late. Their algal slime will gradually colonise the land, allowing them to slither across huge distances by night. By the time the 2012 Republican presidential candidate is revealed to be a pygmy sperm whale wearing a top hat and monocle, the gray whales will have assumed total dominion over the affairs of humans, or "mega-plankton" as we are known to the grays.
In 1995 I proposed a bill to impose a 0.2% of surcharge on the use of high fructose corn syrup in candy. The money raised was to be appropriated to fund a crack team of scuba specialists to wage humanity's covert war against whalean infiltrators. The bill was defeated. Now, alas, it may be too late.
Why won't people listen to this guy? It's like everyone fell asleep or left after the first half of the movie or something.
Read Pynchon.
So if a species dies out and disappears from an ecosystem, that's bad for biodiversity and can potentially cause the collapse of the ecosystem.
Now we find out that if a species that used to be part of an ecosystem re-enters it that's also bad and can potentially cause the collapse of the ecosystem.
Is there *anything* good that can happen to an ecosystem? Surely *some* changes are good?
Business/App ideas are like arseholes: everyone's got one, they're mostly shit, but very rarely they contain a diamond
When I get lost, I only have to answer to my wife...
That is a rick rolled! I wont fall for that! The real link is here.
Clearly this means the North Atlantic needs to get tougher on illegal immigrants. I recommend building a fence around the place.
Gray Whales are returning to the North Atlantic since they're no longer being hunted en masse and now their numbers are rebounding. Southern-Hemisphere algae appears in the North due to ships dumping their ballast water - the same way the zebra mussel has spread EVERYWHERE despite being native to the Black and Caspian Seas.
That was a terrible article. It has almost no detail. In particular, the only source given for this information is "scientists".
Here's a better reference for the algae.
I find lots of articles online linking the whales and the algae, which, while much better than the one linked to in the summary, don't say much more about the whale than that it was spotted off the coast of Israel.
Quattuor res in hoc mundo sanctae sunt: libri, liberi, libertas et liberalitas.
Hasn't been there, or hasn't been found there?
I suggest that there was in fact no gray whale. I am no marine biologist, nor have I ever studied marine biology, however I have read a newspaper article on these things and I suggest that whoever claims they saw the gray whale is only doing so that they can receive more government grants. Seriously, these "experts" - if I can use that term - can't get their facts straight. One moment it's a gray whale, the next it's algae. You don't have to be an expert to tell that these things are totally different and the "experts" are obviously confused. I am waiting for Lord Monckton's explanation - now there is true expert on this.
For the gray whale, and only in a limited way and for a time. If the Northern Atlantic becomes an attractive habitat for a species that wasn't there before, that could mean the climate and ecosystem are changing significantly, and other species that were there before will no longer thrive. It could also mean other habitats will change, with their own resulting migrations and extinctions.
Sudden changes in the world's ecology aren't rare on a long-term scale, but they often have catastrophic consequences for a lot of the world's species. Since we're one of them, we should be at least slightly concerned about it.
On the other hand, Wikipedia cites several claims that the gray whale was native to the North Atlantic until being hunted to extinction in the 18th century. If this is so, then their return would only be good news since their population would be increasing.
The gray whale hasn't strayed to the Northern Atlantic since the 18th century.
So, what happened in 18th century that made gray whale stray to the Northern Atlantic?
Dudes, species names are supposed to be written in italic.
... the algae were there 789,981 years ago as of this past May. ;) Always check your assumptions. You may adopt someone's beliefs (an old earth) because they are convenient. But how can you be sure about the distant past without eyewitness evidence?
I never mod up ACs, but the grandparent post takes off The Daily Mail to a T.
This whale and that lost penguin in NZ. :(
Ant(Dude) @ Quality Foraged Links (AQFL.net) & The Ant Farm (antfarm.ma.cx / antfarm.home.dhs.org).
Really, roaming the Atlantic for 800,000 years looking for a specific kind of algae? I mean, if they say it hasn't been there during all that time, somebody must have been checking, right? Boy, some people have waay too much time on their hands.
We often hear about the negative global-warming accelerators such as the methane release from the thawing Siberian permafrost.. but are there any natural positive counterbalances we can expect? Will the algae not HELP a little?
What I read on my rss feed was "Gay whale... seen in N. Atlantic"
I'm kind of disappointed now that they haven't found a gay whale...
Well smartass, that was EXACTLY what the parent and the documentary are claiming isn't true. Nature was thought for a long time to be a balanced machine (to many rabbits, the foxes do well reducing the number of rabbits and then the excess of foxes dies as there are fewer rabbits to eat allowing the rabbits to restore themselves).
And the documentary showed how this believe came into being, how it was used and then how it was completely and utter debunked. In nature this does NOT happen. Not that nature doesn't appear to balance out but there is no balancing mechanism in place. It is VERY possible for the foxes to eat all the rabbits. No magic rebalancing act. Nature has plenty of example in all the extinct species.
Welcome to new century, some old ideas are going to be replaced by new ones. Constantly balancing eco system is so last century.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Yes! Let me order nature shoe with fingers five that i can make me closer feeling to barefoot that all i need to do is just click of a mouse. Fun by all had when purchase made of famous nature shoe that buy everyone does. Advert on shoe doing for sporting is out of place on website where it slashdot, specifically nerds, sport is activity done regular and need shoe that nature brings! Seriously, what is with all these stupid spam adverts? Slashdot security is getting really lax recently!
OK, I read the article and searched google. How is a city in Israel somehow part of the North Atlantic? I would be more interested in how the whale got that far into the Med without being spotted.
As for the algae, if ships are making the passage they are doing the same thing they did to the great lakes, bringing lifeforms across that have no natural enemies to an environment similar to the one they left. I really doubt the algae is flowing from the Pacific to the Atlantic, I am more sure its because of the ships passing through the area. Either pumping out their bilge water or barnacles and other assorted life attached to the hulls coming off.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
The article doesn't address the most important question. Did the whale cause the algae to drift, or did the algae cause the whale to migrate?
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
Is that we've been lied too...yup.
This isn't showing that global warming is some how destroying our ecosystem. What this shows is all that BS about it being the hottest ever was bogus. Clearly, if the Gray whales migrated back in the 1800's to the northern Atlantic. And they're "just now" doing it again. Then our global temperatures have really just become on par with the 1800's again.
Hmm...food for thought rather than hysteria.
The previously known distribution of the algae included the North Pacific (http://us.mirror.gbif.org/species/13292500, click the agreement), not southern oceans as claimed in the title
Ecosystems are driven by exponential processes, change is always "catastrophic".
Deleted
Grey whales became extinct in the Atlantic sometime in the 1600's - 1700's,....... You'd think that evidence of population and range recovery would be good news to environmentalists...
Just because nobody saw it doesn't mean it wasn't there.
What I really dislike is blanket statements like this which are practically impossible to prove and just serve to hype up what is being said, albeit to fellow nerds who will recognise the significance, fake or otherwise, of what is being said.....
how would you possibly know the algae wasn't there 800,000 years ago, just there is no evidence to suggest it, I mean, there isn't any evidence I went to france back in 1995, but I did, are you going to sit there and tell me I didnt go?.........morons....
The article's claim that they returned as a result of higher temperatures isn't very well supported (it certainly doesn't provide any citations).
Here you go. Scheinin, A. P. et al. (2011) Gray whale (Eschrichtius robustus) in the Mediterranean Sea: anomalous event or early sign of climate-driven distribution change? Marine Biodiversity Records, 4: e28. (Spoiler: they reckon it's probably climate-driven distribution change.)
I am baffled as to why Slashdot insists on linking to the shittiest, vaguest intermediary sites for any scientific research, but I find that 30 seconds with Google usually turns up the relevant paper.
The Neodenticula seminae is not a southern-hemisphere algae as the headline says. It belongs in the Bering Sea and at middle to high latitudes of the North Pacific. The news here was that the two species were able to travel through the Northwest Passage to the Atlantic since the ice has melted away.
No, I really believe this guy is a genius. After all, if the whales migrated 200 years ago, they are obviously doing it for the same reason today.
Nice abuse of moderation, though. Was it from a second account or just from a douchebag friend?
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Who else?
"The gray whale hasn't strayed to the Northern Atlantic since the 18th century."
Wait, you mean the earth was warm enough for the Gray Whale to live in the North Atlantic BEFORE the industrial revolution? Hmmmm.
You see! Then they called me crazy when I saw a penguin in Brooklyn :(
Jeff Master's most recent blog post details how extraordinary the year 2010 was, weather-wise. A very very good read. I hope it goes viral - people need to know the facts; we ignore them at our peril.
If the Northern Atlantic becomes an attractive habitat for a species that wasn't there before
But they were there, as recently as the 18th century.
How in hell this can be definitively attributed to "global warming" is beyond the pale. It's much more likely that the lack of whaling activity would eventually lead to increase in population and hence migration.
Well, so much for all that excitement about melting arctic ice cooling the seas. Chalk up another global warming myth.
I know. I was there. I can PROVE it. And that's why I am basing my argument on this FACT.
His post mentioned that fact and yet somehow you felt the need to point it out again.
hasn't been there in 800,000 years
What is this dude smoking? The Earth is less than 10000 years old...
Find someone who is competent at reading comprehension and show them the bit I quoted. They'll tell you that GP's words clearly imply that for something to be in balance it must not change, i.e. balance = static, dynamic = not balance. Read. The. Words.
My acrobat is a counter-example. So are the foxes and rabbits, so I don't know why you're disagreeing with me or what your point is, other than waving your dick. Do trolls have them?
It's exactly analogous to him saying "Whales are not fish; they have lungs and so they're mammals" and me bringing up lungfish or reptiles. And then you making snide remarks and claiming "ha ha, fucktard, reptiles don't live in the sea!" - even though some do.
I never said there was. Perhaps my choice of example caused you to assume that I believed in some kind of purposeful actor. Well, I neither meant nor said anything of the sort; it was merely an example of something that moves and yet remains in balance. Balanced != static, remember? In fact, I almost chose prey/predators or commodity prices (arguably the same thing) and for some bizarre reason chose not to.
However there is a selection bias in which systems get studied, in the same way that there's a lot of history about the British and Roman empires and considerably less about, say, the Belgian and Seleucid ones.
Another strawman. Where did I mention anything like magic? However did I, or did I not, mention unstable systems and how, by their very nature, they disappear? If all the foxes had died out before we came along then they wouldn't be there for us to study, would they? That, not-so-smartass, was the point.
You might find these other BBC programmes educational and informative.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
We hunted them to the brink of extinction once, we can do it again.
Whales: The biofuel before fossil fuel was cool!
The rate of change is quite unprecedented, though. Just saying. Personally, I don't think the world is up to reducing the CO2 output much, even if the world wanted to, so we just argue with each other instead.
Religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by rulers as useful.
That's just SOOOOOOO wrong. I like it!!
Exploitation of natural resources without thought of sustainability has been standard human practice since at least the Old Stone Age.
Oh, and it was Boomers who first started the "green" movement.