March 12,
2019 by Janie Har
Dozens of
species of sea slugs, jellyfish and other marine life from toastier southern
waters migrated into the Northern California region over an unusually long
two-year period of severe heatwaves, says a new scientific report.
The 67
species identified in the report include a carnivorous sea slug that preys on
other sea slugs and a sea snail "butterfly"
usually spotted hundreds of miles away off the coast of Mexico. The study by
the University of California, Davis is to be published Tuesday in Scientific
Reports.
Not all
the species stuck around, but the abundance of migration provides a glimpse of
what the Northern California coast might look like in the future, said Eric
Sanford, lead author and UC Davis professor.
"I've
been working here for 14 years and before our very eyes we are seeing a shift
in the local marine communities," he said.
The
2014-2016 period studied by researchers began in the Gulf of Alaska as a
persistently warm patch in 2013 known as the "warm-water Blob" that
spread south. Later, an El Nino event along the equator moved north, and the
two factors led to unusually warm waters.
Temperatures
in Northern California waters, which normally range from 50 to 55 degrees
Fahrenheit (10 to 13 Celsius), increased 3.5 to 7 degrees Fahrenheit.
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