When climate change helped trigger a 60-fold explosion of purple urchins off Northern California’s coast, the urchins went on a feeding frenzy and kelp forests were devoured.
Increasingly, Ted Grosholz's research is addressing the interaction between climate change and biological invasions. As the result of participation in an NCEAS (National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis) working group on climate change and invasive species, he has continued his collaborative work on synthetic analyses of climate change impacts on the invasion process that began with participation in an NCEAS working group on climate change and invasive species.
In addition to existing ocean acidification facilities constructed by the BOAR group, BML was successful in obtaining NSF FSML support to establish a climate change facility that will allow researchers and students to simultaneously control multiple environmental variables (including CO2) with precision at levels typical of real-world climate change scenarios.
An important focus for Ted Grosholz involves the ecology and potential for restoration of native Olympia oysters Ostreola conchaphila (previously Ostrea lurida) in western estuaries. Estuaries in California have been heavily impacted by human activities that have resulted in substantial loss of habitat, invasion by non-native species, inputs of sediments and contaminants and other stressors that have resulted in substantial declines in ecosystem function.
Changing climates inevitably raise the pervasive ecological and evolutionary question of whether populations are capable of persisting, either through dispersal, plasticity, or shifts in the genetic composition of populations. Bodega Marine Laboratory’s strategic location at the center of many ranges of intertidal invertebrates, along with its superb culturing facilities and access to rocky shores, makes it an ideal place to test hypotheses about the responses of marine organisms to changing climates.
Scientists at BML are engaged in researching many other aspects of climate change, which can be grouped broadly into oceanographic and ecological studies as well as in the context of habitat restoration and invasive species.
An embedded reporter describes research at Bodega Marine Laboratory during a time when the stakes are high for marine life in an era of climate change, and where scientists are weighing the impacts as warming oceans acidify.
