'Wasting' disease turning West Coast starfish to mush; experts stumped
26 replies, posted
[quote]
Starfish up and down the West Coast are suffering from a strange disease known as "seastar wasting syndrome," and scientists are unsure why it is happening.
Pockets of starfish decimation have been found from Southern California to Alaska. In some places the entire seastar population has been wiped out.
(And before you get confused, seastar and starfish are two names for the same animal and I'll be using them interchangably.)
The seastar wasting disease begins as a small sore somewhere along the seastar's body. The sore becomes infected, most likely with bacteria, causing the animal's tissues to decay, one limb at a time. After a few days, all that remains of the seastar is a small pile of mush.
"Imagine a wound on your finger that you never treated," said Pete Raimondi, a professor at UC Santa Cruz who has been tracking the seastar crisis. "The bacteria would continue to build up and just eat away the flesh until it fell off. That's how this disease goes."
This is not the first time that the seastar population on the West Coast has fallen prey to the wasting disease. There was a major starfish die-off in Southern California between 1983 and 1984, and a smaller die-off between 1997 and 1998. Both those events took place during El Niño years, when the ocean waters were especially warm. Since we are not currently in an El Niño year, and the waters are not particularly warm, it's hard to know what is going on, Raimondi said.
"This time we have nothing in particular to point to as to what might be causing the disease, and we don't know when it will end," he told the Los Angeles Times. "If this was an El Niño year, I'd already be making predictions now about when it will end."
The seastar crisis of 2013 was first detected over the summer. Now, scientists are working to get more information about how many seastar populations are being affected. UC Santa Cruz has created a map detailing where on the coast seastar populations have contracted the disease, but most of those reports are what Raimondi calls opportunistic - someone goes to the beach, checks out the tidepools and notices a bunch of starfish missing limbs.[/quote]
[url]http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-seastar-wasting-disease-photos-20131104,0,6486734.story#axzz2kG47eX3k[/url]
Poor Patrick. :(
If only this was happening to the Starfish in Australia, damn pests, eating everything.
[QUOTE=onebit;42850285]Probably acidification[/QUOTE]
The article said it was a bacteria
Have they not tried testing the starfish for bacterial/algal content? they might find a hitherto unknown species that caused this. It's an idea, at least.
But like as not we may need an environmentalists' panel to study the flora/fauna and the ecosystem nearby to find the actual cause.
I'll bet the clams are behind this.
They know that the starfish are the only things standing in the way of their plans.
I've heard a lot about this but no real answers. RIP starfish.
Sounds nasty, starfish are gross though.
[QUOTE=IKTM;42851252]I'll bet the clams are behind this.
They know that the starfish are the only things standing in the way of their plans.[/QUOTE]
[IMG]http://www.thefishsociety.co.uk/binary_data/14035_cherrystone_clams_plate.jpg?timestamp=1384363390213[/IMG]
[B][I]"The age of man has come to an end."[/I][/B]
[QUOTE=Empty_Shadow;42851323]Sounds nasty, starfish are gross though.[/QUOTE]
Starfish are pretty cool. They got eyes on the tip of their arms. I imagine their vision is like a Google StreetView car. How cool is that?
[editline]13th November 2013[/editline]
[QUOTE=Novangel;42851341][IMG]http://www.thefishsociety.co.uk/binary_data/14035_cherrystone_clams_plate.jpg?timestamp=1384363390213[/IMG]
[B][I]"The age of man has come to an end."[/I][/B][/QUOTE]
[B][I]"The genocide of our people cannot be tolerated. We must bring the war to their shores."
"Starting with the seastars, because fuck those guys."[/I][/B]
Has anyone considered the possibility that its radiation sickness from Fukishima? Star fish could be more susceptible to cesium 137 than other marine life. Open sores are a big sign of radiation poisoning...
[QUOTE=crazyjames;42851529]Has anyone considered the possibility that its radiation sickness from Fukishima? Star fish could be more susceptible to cesium 137 than other marine life. Open sores are a big sign of radiation poisoning...[/QUOTE]
What kind of effect does radiation exposure have on organisms? I would think you would need to be exposed to a lot of it really suddenly to start melting away. Sort of like the Los Alamos doomsday core mishap. I would think for there to be such a dramatic impact on seastars, there would be more similar things happening to other organisms as well, unless seastars are super duper sensitive to the stuff, which there was already a lot of in the ocean before Fukushima. Though it wouldn't hurt to investigate the possibility.
[editline]13th November 2013[/editline]
Radiation might be responsible for the initial open sore like you said though.
[QUOTE=crazyjames;42851529]Has anyone considered the possibility that its radiation sickness from Fukishima? Star fish could be more susceptible to cesium 137 than other marine life. Open sores are a big sign of radiation poisoning...[/QUOTE]
Once again, the article cites bacteria. And no, there's been no sign of radiation in the slightest or I'm sure they'd report on it.
Not to mention I've been hearing about this issue since long before Fukishima, but not nearly this severe.
[QUOTE=IKTM;42851252]I'll bet the clams are behind this.
They know that the starfish are the only things standing in the way of their plans.[/QUOTE]
But we never thought they'd actually carry out their plans. Usually they [I]clam[/I] up.
It truly is [I]shellfish[/I] of them to want the sea to themselves.
[QUOTE=Novangel;42851341][IMG]http://www.thefishsociety.co.uk/binary_data/14035_cherrystone_clams_plate.jpg?timestamp=1384363390213[/IMG]
[B][I]"The age of man has come to an end."[/I][/B][/QUOTE]
Eat shit clams, we've got explosives and pollution! What now, bitch?!
[QUOTE=crazyjames;42851529]Has anyone considered the possibility that its radiation sickness from Fukishima? Star fish could be more susceptible to cesium 137 than other marine life. Open sores are a big sign of radiation poisoning...[/QUOTE]
Radiation levels in the ocean are not very significant around fukushima, and they never were. Not to even mention what they are in the west coast.
Starfish AIDS.
[QUOTE=OvB;42851627]What kind of effect does radiation exposure have on organisms? I would think you would need to be exposed to a lot of it really suddenly to start melting away. Sort of like the Los Alamos doomsday core mishap. I would think for there to be such a dramatic impact on seastars, there would be more similar things happening to other organisms as well, unless seastars are super duper sensitive to the stuff, which there was already a lot of in the ocean before Fukushima. Though it wouldn't hurt to investigate the possibility.
[editline]13th November 2013[/editline]
Radiation might be responsible for the initial open sore like you said though.[/QUOTE]
Yeah exactly what Im saying and then they die from the bacteria that gets into the sore.
As soon as the water from Fukishima got into the ocean it was basically diluted into becoming innocuous.
[QUOTE=onebit;42850285]Probably acidification[/QUOTE]
acidification affects carbonates, pH, and organisms with a skeleton/exoskeletons made up of calcium compounds. starfish for the most part would be unaffected personally but it can have dramatic effects on their environment and habitat.
[QUOTE=DoctorSalt;42856085]As soon as the water from Fukishima got into the ocean it was basically diluted into becoming innocuous.[/QUOTE]
To humans
I went to the west coast once 8 years ago and loved the starfish, this is very unfortunate :<
[QUOTE=crazyjames;42851529]Has anyone considered the possibility that its radiation sickness from Fukishima? Star fish could be more susceptible to cesium 137 than other marine life. Open sores are a big sign of radiation poisoning...[/QUOTE]
radiation doesn't work like that. even if it was exposed to high amounts of ionising radiation, it would not "eat away" a starfish or cause any physical damage to it.
[QUOTE=Kai-ryuu;42857137]acidification affects carbonates, pH, and organisms with a skeleton/exoskeletons made up of calcium compounds. starfish for the most part would be unaffected personally but it can have dramatic effects on their environment and habitat.[/QUOTE]
Certain bacteria might thrive in more acidic conditions.
That's a shame, starfish seem chill as fuck.
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