Study Suggests Ocean Acidification May Cause Disorientation Among Fish, Failure To Avoid Predators

[hatrack]

Ocean acidification could cause fish to become "fatally attracted" to their predators, according to scientists. A team studying the effects of acidification - caused by dissolved CO2 - on ocean reefs found that it leaves fish unable to "smell danger". Young clownfish that were reared in the acidified water became attracted to rather than repelled by the chemical signals released by predatory fish.

The findings were published in the journal Ecology Letters. Danielle Dixson from James Cook University in Queensland, Australia, led the study. She and her colleagues tested orange clown fish larvae that were raised in water with the same slightly alkaline pH as their ocean reef habitat, and those raised in more acidic water.

The team released the fish into a "flow chamber" with two water sources flowing in parallel. One source was taken from tanks containing the clown fishes' natural predators and one was drawn from tanks in which non-predatory fish were swimming. "The flow rates are identical, so the water won't mix," Ms Dixson explained. "This allows the fish in the chamber to choose which water cue they prefer or dislike."

In the test, the fish reared in normal water avoided the stream of water that their predators had been swimming in. They detected the odour of a predator and swam away from it. But, Ms Dixson said, fish raised in the more acidic water were strongly attracted to both the predatory and the non-predatory flumes. The researchers say that their study shows that fish larvae "might exhibit a fatal attraction to predators at CO2 and pH levels that could occur in our oceans by 2100 on a business-as-usual scenario of greenhouse gas emissions".

EDIT

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8369453.stm

[Gman2]

1. You have no idea how important those factors are to nutrient uptake,

and they are immersed, therefore their osmotic membrane{skin}, allows concentration of fluids. Our jerking around all biology in our fuck it all experiment, is hubris, on a global scale only eluded to, in antiquity. Hydrogen content, of water, and how that affects PH level, is above the idiotic heads of most Americans. Hey, there will always be animals to take up the nitche. Like Jellyfish. And invasive species. And yes, our latitude will endure well. That is why the military assessment of use of nukes in the new century was envisioned as need to nuke displaced refugees, from climate change. Nuke them at our borders seems to be the urgent use.

We, the people, will see things in our lifetimes we have only read holy books to equal. Or hollywood movies, of course. If only our journalists were able to use the technology we presently posess, our revultion of war would be near universal. Steps have been taken to ensure we do NOT tire of war, or climate change driven animal extinctions. Even making it look like video games. Truth will get even harder to ignore, unless the internet is controlled.