Jay's Global Warming Research

Is their global warming occurring in the waters?

Sea levels around the world are rising, Current sea-level rise can potentially affect human populations. Global warming in the last century has increased sea levels worldwide, The number one cause is Thermal expansion, which is a trend change in volume in response to a change in temperature. The second being the melting of glaziers and ice sheets.

How has the temperature of water affected the lobster?

“Lobsters don’t really like the water to be too warm so they’ll move away”. Warmer temperatures can also promote other diseases for the lobster. Warm ocean waters are being blamed for lobsters shedding their shells weeks earlier than usual in Maine waters last spring. Lobsters are cold-blooded, their body temperatures are determined by the water in which they live. Higher temperatures cause cold-blooded animals to use more energy for respiration, leaving less energy for feeding, growth, energy storage, immune response and reproduction. Much of a lobster's life is related to the temperature on the ocean floor what it eats, how successfully it breeds, where it migrates. Lobsters can respond to temperature changes by changing their habitat. Warming temperatures increase the lobster’s respiration rate and oxygen needs while reducing the amount of dissolved oxygen available. Scientists have also seen evidence linking rising seawater temperatures to the spread of lobster shell disease in Massachusetts’ waters. Caused by a bacterial infection in the carapace, lobster shell disease has become dramatically more common in recent years.

Where is the global warming affecting the lobsters?

Over the past 20 to 25 years, scientists have seen a “pretty steady increase” in water temperatures in the Gulf of Maine, according to Department of Marine Resources (DMR) biologist Carl Wilson. Over the same period, “the lobster population has seen an exponential increase favorable to Maine,” if the waters of the northeast Atlantic ocean grow more acidic, crustaceans and bivalves will have to work harder to build their shells and will have less energy available to forage for food, but scientists are unsure of how lobsters in the Gulf of Maine would be affected. “We’re at a remarkable juncture in the history of the lobster resource right now,” Wahle said. “On the one hand, we have this surge in lobster population we’ve never seen before in the Gulf of Maine, [but] as you go to southern New England, it’s a collapsing fishery — and the causes may be the same.” Temperatures in eastern Maine, where increases in catch have occurred, have increased a few degrees Fahrenheit over the last few decades, according to Wahle. In western Long Island Sound, lobster landings have decreased 99 percent since 1998, according to Connecticut officials cited by the Associated Press. Evidence of the changing temperature’s effect on Maine’s lobster fishery can be seen when looking at nursery grounds

What affects the Lobsters in the sea?

Lobsters are influenced by the temperature and the chemical composition of the ocean water. The calcium carbonate in the ocean is extracted to allow them to build their shells. So if that compound is reduced in concentration, it will stress the animal and hurt its longevity. Warmer water has been known to increase the lobster population however it can also disrupt the food source for larval lobsters which could reduce their numbers. Warmer water could also increase the likelihood of diseases in lobsters. Lobsters precipitate calcium out of the ocean through their blood system.