Marine Bioinvasions: A Story of Maritime History, Marine Science, and Environmental Policy

Slide 1: Title

Slide 2: 5 Ways to change the ocean

• Fisheries Operations
• Chemical Pollution and Eutrophication
• Removal / Alteration of Physical Habitat
• Invasion of Exotic Species
• Global Climate Change

Slide 3: How Marine Biodiversity Changes 

Each phenomenon is often divided into the dichotomy of human vs. non-human mediation:

I ALTER WHAT’S THERE

• Abundance of species ( + / -)
• Genetic structure of populations

II REMOVE SPECIES ( = EXTINCTIONS)

• Scaled: habitat, local, regional, global; functional

III ADD SPECIES ( = INVASIONS)

• Range Expansions (non-human vectors)
• Introductions (human-mediated vectors)
• AKA: alien, invasive, non-indigenous, exotic

Slide 4: Community History 

Species are either:

NATIVE

• Endemic: found no where else
• Indigenous: found over a broad(er) range
  

Slide 5: Community History (cont)

INTRODUCED

• Transported by human activity into a region
• where they did not occur in historical time and
• are now reproducing in the wild

Slide 6: Community History  (cont)

Classical default in ecology, biogeography and evolutionary biology:

If the history of a given species in a community is not known …. it’s native.

Slide 7: Community History  (cont)

... (which is why in almost all guides to local floras or faunas, species are listed as either native or introduced)

Slide 8: Community History

CRYPTOGENIC

• Species that are not clearly native or introduced.

Slide 9: The Two Major Epochs of the Modern-day History of Life in the Sea

• BMB = Before Marine Biologists Evolve as a Subspecies
• AMB = After Marine Biologists Evolve as a Subspecies

Slide 10: The Two Major Epochs of the Modern-day History of Life in the Sea (cont)

BMB = Before Marine Biologists Evolve as a Subspecies:

• The ocean is seen as “naturally assembled”: the touch of the “hand of man” has not yet commenced

Slide 11: The Two Major Epochs of the Modern-day History of Life in the Sea (cont)

AMB = After Marine Biologists Evolve as a Subspecies:

• The ocean begins to be altered, after the first “baseline” surveys established the “natural” background status

Slide 12: The Two Major Epochs of the Modern-day History of Life in the Sea (cont)

= Shifting Baseline Syndrome:

• the state of the world is reset to “0” based upon our perceptions of what is “natural”

Slide 13: The Two Major Epochs of the Modern-day History of Life in the Sea (cont)

For our purposes, this means that most recognized invasions are those that occurred after the early or mid 1800s

Slide 14: (Examples of US marine invasions)

• The European snail Littorina littorea now controls the structure of many rocky shore communities
  from Canada to New Jersey.
• Known since about 1840 in the Gulf of St. Lawrence … by the 1860s arrives in the Gulf of Maine

Slide 15: (photo) European periwinkle Littorina littorea on a Massachusetts shore

Slide 16: Grateloupia turuturu - Asian Red Algae:

• Detected in Gulf of Maine in July 2007

Slide 17: Grateloupia turuturu:

• The largest red algae in the world:
• 6” wide, 3 feet long
• A good “weed”:
• Tolerates nutrient-rich water
• Broad salinity and temperature range
• > 22-37 ppt (survives 12-52 ppt)
• > 4-28 C

Slide 18: Japanese shore crab introduced by ballast water (Hemigrapsus sanguineus)

• Now (2008) the most abundant intertidal crab of southern New England, and steadily increasing in the Gulf of Maine
• (arrived in Long Island Sound in 1993)

Slide 19: (chart) Japanese rocky shore crabs expand to 6 habitats in America

• The Asian crab lives only in tidepools in Japan, but in New England has invaded many more habitats

Slide 20: Masses of Asian seasquirts invade Georges Bank … a rare example of an open-ocean invader

• Over six square miles of the invasive Asian seasquirt Didemnum vexillum -- in 150 feet Of water in the open ocean

Slide 21: (photo) Expanding lobes of the seasquirt Didemnum, covering many different substrates

Slide 22: (photo) Didemnum covers sea scallops: one of New England’s major shellfisheries

Slide 23: (Photo) Asian sea squirts (Styela clava) and Asian green seaweed (Codium fragile tomentosoides) on ropes and buoys

Slide 24: (photo) Masses of Asian seasquirts (Styela clava) replaced native edible mussels (Mytilus edulis) in Narragansett Bay, Rhode Island

Slide 25: (photo) Pacific seasquirt Styela clava coating Canadian commercial mussel farms

Slide 26: (photo) Asian whelk Rapana venosa in Chesapeake Bay: a shellfish predator

Slide 27: (photo) Red mangrove prop roots, Florida east coast

Ends of prop roots extensively chewed

Slide 28: (photo) Indian Ocean isopod Sphaeroma terebrans bores into the roots of red mangroves from Florida to Brazil

Slide 29: (photo) Invasion of the Pacific jellyfish Phyllorhiza punctata in the Gulf of Mexico, summer 2000

Slide 30: (photo) Pacific jellyfish Phyllorhiza punctata, Gulf of Mexico:

• Two feet tall, 25 pounds each
• Now (2007) detected along the Carolina coasts

Slide 31: (photo) Mudsnail Ilyanassa obsoleta on an Atlantic coast shore

Slide 32: Atlantic mudsnail Ilyanassa obsoleta in San Francisco Bay:

• Astronomical numbers alter the Bay’s intertidal zone

Slide 33: Atlantic mudsnail Ilyanassa versus Pacific mudsnail Cerithidea

• Ilyanassa eats the eggs of Cerithidea on intertidal mudflats

Slide 34: Cerithidea, once the abundant native snail in San Francisco Bay, is now restricted to isolated populations in high intertidal marsh refugia, above the physiological tolerance of the exotic Atlantic snail that eats its eggs

Slide 35: (photo) Intertidal zonation on a seawall in San Francisco Bay

Slide 36: Intertidal zonation on a seawall in San Francisco Bay (cont)

• North Atlantic barnacle Amphibalanus improvisus
• Australian tubeworm Ficopomatus enigmaticus
• New England mussel Geukensia demissa

Slide 37: New Zealand Burrowing Pillbug, Sphaeroma quoianum

• (first recorded in 1890s in San Francisco Bay)
• causes cms to meters landward erosion/yr

Slide 38: (map) The New Zealand pillbug Sphaeroma invades Oregon in the 1990s

Slide 39: 100,000 isopods in a Styrofoam float release more than 20,000,000 styrene particles per day
into the ocean

Slide 40: (photo) Sphaeroma-caused erosion in Coos Bay, Oregon

Slide 41: (photo) Sphaeroma-caused erosion in Coos Bay, Oregon

Slide 42: Japanese eelgrass Zostera japonica on a Pacific Northwest mudflat

Slide 43-44: Vectors

• Global Bioflow: Things we move around with life attached:
  • Ships, drydocks, oil platforms, seaplanes, boots, etc
• Liiving things we move around because we want to ….
  • …. eat, culture, release, use as bait, pets, ornaments, etc.

Slide 45-51: HOW ARE SPECIES MOVED AROUND? (Human-Mediated Vectors of Marine Organisms)

• Ocean-Going Ships:
  For … thousands of years … hundreds of years:
• Ancient voyages
• Expansion of Global Exploration and Colonization: 1400s - 1800s
• Major pulses: Wars, gold rushes, etc.
• Fouling Community: Animals and plants attached to the hull, keel,
  rudder, or other areas on the vessel
• Boring Community: Shipworms and gribbles boring into wood, creating large galleries
• Solid (Dry) Ballast: Rocks, sand, debris used for weight
• Water Ballast: Water used for weight

= The ship as a floating “biological island”

Slide 52: (map) Norse Voyages of Exploration: about 725 - 1022

Slide 53: (map) English, Russian, and Spanish Exploration Voyages: 1565-1770

Slide 54: (map) Dutch and French Exploration Voyages: 1615 - 1793

Slide 55: (map) Main Ocean Sailing Routes, 1500s to early 1800s

Slide 56: (map) Main Ocean Steam Routes, 1850s to 1950s

Slide 57: (map) World Waterways Network: 2008

Slides 59-64: Main Ocean Sailing Routes, 1500s to early 1800s

• Ships slower (5-10 knots/hour)
• Long port residency (> fouling)
• Less effective antifouling
• technology

Main Ocean Shipping Routes, 2007

• Ships faster (20-25 knots/hour)
• Short port residency (< fouling)
• More effective antifouling
• technology

Slide 65: (Illustration) Ballast Water Capacity of Ocean-Going Vessels frequenting the Great Lakes

Slide 66: Ballast water …

• In wide-scale use since 1880s
• Ships may carry from 1000s to 10s of millions of gallons of water
• Hours … days … months in age
• Vessel with no ballast: in ballast
• Vessel with some ballast: with ballast
• Ballast water is not bilge water

Slide 67: Map: Container ship ports in the Americas

Slide 68: (Illustration) Typical bulk freighter route around the globe

Slide 69: (Photo) The bulk carrier Pennsylvania Getty arrives at the head of Delaware Bay, just in from an
11-day voyage from Germany

Slide 70: (Photo) Removing the hatch cover from an upper wing ballast tank of the bulk cargo vessel
Pennsylvania Getty

Slide 71: (Photo) Sampling upper wing ballast tank with an 80um plankton net: A ship-full of fish and zooplankton from Germany released into Delaware Bay

Slide 72: Photo: Papyrus:

A wood-chip ship (“chipper ship”) arriving in ballast in an Oregon port from Japan (with millions of gallons of ballast water, and 50+ species per voyage)

Slide 73: (Illustration) Central hold carries a lake of water

Slide 74: (Photo) Full ballast tank

Sampling the 50 to 70- foot deep water column reveals scores of species

Slide 75: (photo) Scale worm larva from ballast water after 12 day voyage from Japan to Oregon

Slide 76:(Photo) A 13” mullet in ballast tank of cargo vessel arriving from the Mediterranean into Chesapeake Bay (about 50 fish were in the tank)

Slide 77: Over 5,000 species are in motion around the world this afternoon in the ballast water of ocean-going ships

Slide 78: Vectors

Global Bioflow:

• Things we move around with life attached:
  • Ships, drydocks, oil platforms, seaplanes, boots, etc.
• Living things we move around because we want to ….
  • …. eat, culture, release, use as bait, pets, ornaments, etc.
    

Slide 79: (chart) “The Bio-Web”: Number of Species Associated with Shipments of Bait, Seafood, Marsh Plants, and Research/Education Shipments (Sea Grant funded research project)

Slide 80: (chart) Vectors Double Every 100 Years

Slide 81: (chart) One day in the (vector) life of the Pacific Northwest

Slide 82: Vector Blitz: A polaroid snapshop of one vector day

(using, for example, the City of Seattle:)

Sample in 12 hours multiple vectors:

• vessels (yachts … fishing boats … cargo ships)
• bait shops
• aquarium shops
• live sea food
• fishing
• other shoreside maritime activities
• (etc.)
  

= would bring instant, broad national attention
to vectors and invasive species

Slides 83-87: The Future of Invasions in the Pacific Northwest?

• With a warming coast … with increasing global trade…
• Species coming from the south (California)
• Species coming from the west (Asia)
• Species coming from elsewhere in the world
  (for example, Australasia, Atlantic America, Europe ….)
• Who are they
  • ?

Slide 88: Japanese snail: Assiminea parasitologica

• First noticed July 2007, Coos Bay, Oregon
• Identified January, 2008 by Prof. Hiroshi Fukuda, Okayama University

Slides 89-90: New Zealand mud snail Potamopyrgus antipodarum

Slide 91: Assiminea parasitologicaIntroduced

• Size: 4 mm (Japan)
• (so far:) up to 5.8 mm (Coos Bay)
• Name: Assiminea parasitologica Kuroda, 1958,
  [so named because of being the first intermediate host of Paragonimus ohirai, a lung fluke]
• Native Range: Japan: Honshu, Shikoku, Kyushu
• Introduced to: Coos Bay
  (first record (so far) recognized on June 1, 2008 from samples collected by Tim Davidson in 2005)

Slide 92: (Photo) Carlton research expedition sampling Coos Bay for A. parasitologica, May 31 2008

Slide 93: Assiminea parasitologicaIntroduced (cont.)

• Smith-Umpqua Rivers: Gardiner
  (discovered June 1, 2008)

Slide 94: Assiminea parasitologicaIntroduced (cont.)

• Yaquina Bay: Toledo
  (discovered June 2, 2008, 10:45 AM)

Slides 95-96: Assiminea parasitologicaIntroduced (cont.)

• Habitat: Supralittoral of mixed habitats (under plants, in/under
  woody debris, rocky rubble) of estuaries; common to
  abundant in horizontal expanses of marshes; oligohaline to salinities of 25 o/oo or more
• Habitat Diversity:
  • Co-occurs with freshwater snail Physa In Kentuck Inlet, Coos Bay (0.7 o/oo)
  • Co-occurs with terrestrial
    snail Vespericola in
    Gardiner, Smith River

Slides 97-100: Reproduction

• The native A. californica:
  • Dioecious (separate males and female);
  • egg capsules deposited in mud (one egg per capsule) …
  • with “direct development” = crawl-away young
• The introduced A. parasitologica:
  • Dioecious
  • Method of reproduction not previously known, but determined May 31, 2008 at the University
    of Oregon Institute of Marine Biology:
    • tiny white silt-covered capsules in mud
    • hatch as free-swimming planktotrophic veliger larvae

Slides 101-104: Assiminea parasitologica

Methods of Dispersal?

• From Japan to the American Pacific coast:
  • Ballast water ……. as planktonic larvae, or as juveniles or
    adults attached to floating debris
• Along the coast and within estuaries:
  • A plethora of human and non-human mediated mechanisms available to this tiny snail …
    • Vessels of many genera and species
    • Movement of people and their gear (fishing, hiking, birding, research …)
    • Aquatic waterfowl?
    • Larval dispersal
• Can remain alive out of water (desiccated) for at least 4 days (experiments commenced May 28, 2008)
  

Slide 105: (Photo) Assiminea parasitologica

Slides 106-107: (Photos) May 31, 2008 Coos Bay

15cm-2 quadrat: 230 snails = approximately 10,000 snails m-2 in a Coos Bay marsh

Populations patchy, densities vary hugely

Slide 108: The Invasion Process - The probability of …

EMIGRATION: Uptake from Species Pool / Conveyance

• Adjacent Pool Interfacing with the vector
  I Entrainment (Vector Entry) Engaging successfully with the vector
  II Transport Survival Window A: Surviving transport event

IMMIGRATION: Arrival-Release (Inoculation)

III Discharge (Vector Exit) Being released
IV Survivors Survival Window B: Surviving release (physiological accommodation)
V Reproduction Survival Window C: F1 production
Colonization (Introduction)
VI Establishment Survival Window D: Population escapes extinction

EMIGRATION

VII Spread Range expansion

Slide 109: Synergism between Changes in Aquatic Systems and Bioinvasions

• habitat alteration
• chemical pollution / eutrophication
• fisheries impacts
• introduced species
• global climate change
• Changes in the coastal environment
  (increasing susceptibility or resistance to new invasions)
• Bioinvasions
  (more and different exotic species in motion)
• Changes in vectors
  increases and changes in:
  • world trade, petroleum exploration, bait trade, live seafood, and aquaculture industries, recreational pleasure craft … and much more…
    

For more information about this presentation, contact: james.t.carlton@williams.edu