Achilles Tang

It is a Eunice worm. And its still a baby. What do you want it for??

A nearly complete collection of genes for a species of reef-building coral has been assembled. The scientists will use the genetic data to understand natural variations in corals from around the world and how they respond, at the genetic level, to rising water temperatures. View the full article

The mouth parts of the phantom midge are microscopic. But in the hands of scientists these midge bones become a time machine that can document 200 years of acidification and fish elimination in Swedish lakes. View the full article

Sediments released by many of the world's largest river deltas to the global oceans have been changed drastically in the last 50 years, largely as a result of human activity. View the full article

Scientists have documented the first known migration of blue whales from the coast of California to areas off British Columbia and the Gulf of Alaska since the end of commercial whaling in 1965. View the full article

Yikes. Makes my skin crawl! FYI, that's not the suspect. It's confirmed a fish killer.

Scientists have proposed a set of basic rules to help save the world's imperiled coral reefs from ultimate destruction. "The catastrophic decline in the world's coral reefs demands urgent management responses on two fronts," say the researchers. View the full article

There are different types of worms including those that stay small. If these worms come out only in the dark and wriggle in the water column, they should be harmless. Assuming they ARE bristleworms... Good = food for fish, when larger good for scavenging dead fish, uneaten food and helping to turn over the top layer of your DSB. Bad = bristles in your hands, larger worms may become nuisance predators depending on species.

They may be bristleworm spawn. Its both good and bad, depending on how you see it!

Even for Northern shrimp which support commercial fisheries worldwide, timing is everything in life. The tiny creatures, eaten in shrimp rolls and shrimp salad, occupy a pivotal role in the oceanic food chain and may serve as early indicators of changing climate due to their sensitivity to temperature. Northern shrimp also seem to have an uncanny sense of reproductive timing, releasing their larvae to match the arrival of food and thus maximizing larval survival. View the full article

Researchers have discovered where basking sharks -- the world's second largest fish -- hide out for half of every year, according to an article in Current Biology. The discovery revises scientists' understanding of the iconic species and highlights just how little we still know about even the largest of marine animals, the researchers said. View the full article

Oceanographers have analyzed data from an iron-fertilization experiment in the Southern Ocean. Unfortunately most of the carbon from lush plankton blooms, both artificially fertilized and natural, never reached the deep ocean. The Iron Hypothesis isn?t wrong, but it?s much more subtle than usually stated, according to researchers. View the full article

Sharks, barracuda and other large predatory fishes disappear on Caribbean coral reefs as human populations rise, endangering the region's marine food web and ultimately its reefs and fisheries, according to a sweeping study. View the full article

Scientists who have just returned from an expedition to an erupting undersea volcano near the Island of Guam report that the volcano appears to be continuously active, has grown considerably in size during the past three years, and its activity supports a unique biological community thriving despite the eruptions. View the full article

Caves on many state properties in the U.S. will temporarily close as a precaution against the uncontrolled spread of white-nosed syndrome, which is killing bats in record numbers in the eastern United States. View the full article

Many of Washington State's sea otters are exposed to the same pathogens responsible for causing disease in marine mammal populations in other parts of the country, according to a new study. View the full article

Researchers in Canada are reporting for the first time that high mercury levels in certain Arctic seals appear to be linked to vanishing sea ice caused by global warming. Their study provides new insight into the impact of climate change on Arctic marine life. View the full article

White-nose syndrome, a wildlife crisis of unprecedented proportions, has killed hundreds of thousands of bats from Vermont to West Virginia and continues unchecked. Now, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service is asking those who use caves where bats hibernate - called hibernacula - to take extra precautions and to curtail activities to help prevent the spread of WNS. View the full article

Cod bycatch was at least 70 per cent higher than target levels on the southern Grand Banks near Canada, holding back recovery of one of the world's best known fisheries following its spectacular collapse and closure in the early 1990s. View the full article

A new study documents for the first time the process in which increased mercury emissions from human sources across the globe, and in particular from Asia, make their way into the North Pacific Ocean and as a result contaminate tuna and other seafood. Because much of the mercury that enters the North Pacific comes from the atmosphere, scientists have predicted an additional 50 percent increase in mercury in the Pacific by 2050 if mercury emission rates continue as projected. View the full article

A student is bringing understanding to the troubling problem of ocean acidification due to increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide. Researchers have examined how mussels have adapted to extremely acidic waters near underwater volcanoes. View the full article

Even when a dolphin sleeps, half of its brain remains conscious. Knowing this, biologists wondered whether dolphins tire of keeping an eye on things. Monitoring for physical signs of sleep deprivation, researchers tested dolphins' reactions to visual and sound stimuli over a five-day period, and found that the animals were as sharp after five days as they had been at the beginning. View the full article

A wolverine first photographed by a remote-controlled camera on the Tahoe National Forest in February 2008 is most closely related to Rocky Mountain populations, according to a team of 10 federal, state and university scientists. (2009-04-30) View the full article

Scientists have found that the U.S. wildlife import system is broken. In a paper published in Science, the team reported that federal authorities failed to accurately list more than four in five species entering the country. The effect: A range of diseases is introduced into the United States, potentially decimating species, devastating ecosystems and threatening food supply chains and human health. View the full article

Fish don't make noises or contort their faces to show that it hurts when hooks are pulled from their mouths, but a researcher believes they feel that pain all the same. View the full article