Baby Oysters Are Mysteriouly Dying Off in France
First honey bees, then snails, now this? Baby oysters are mysteriously dying by the millions along the French coast from Normandy to the Mediterranean, in what has become the worst crisis to hit the French oyster industry in 30 years.
There's speculation that warmer sea temperatures have generated more plankton and baby oysters are dying from eating too much of the tiny organisms. But that doesn't add up: why would adolescent and adult oysters remain unaffected? Why are some oyster beds completely killed off while others remain immune?
The impact on the French oyster industry could be devastating. Officials are assessing ways to change the harvesting process in the next several seasons, and the French government is expected to give emergency aid to oyster producers for new oyster "larva." While oyster-eating humans aren't at risk, the French Food Safety Agency is taking a closer look.
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2 Comments:
I was just reading about a similiar issue in the LA Times last week, where a bloom of bacteria off the West Coast wiped out billions of oyster larvae (link here, but I can't recall whether it makes you log in or not) -- Effectively, the culprit out here is a strain of bacteria called Vibrio tubiashii, which is harmless to humans but fatal to baby oysters, and attacks their free-swimming larval stage before they settle to the seafloor, latch onto rocks or other oysters and grow thick shells. (Wild oysters are even more vulnerable than the farmed ones.)
To me, this sounds like it may not be just a local issue. :(
bansidhe at 11:32AM on 07/22/08
In regards to why it might be killing off the baby oysters and not the older ones, could be that the baby oysters don't have the same metabolism as the older oysters. That, or the baby oysters don't have the immune system to fight off bacteria like the older ones do. Just a guess. I'm not an expert, but I did stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night.
This is happening with more occurrence now that we're experiencing warmer weather. There's a small lake not far from where I live that had that problem a few years ago. Algae over grows from the high temperatures and ends up eating all of the oxygen in the lake, leaving none for the fish. So fish were dying, floating to the top, and reeking like mad. So they drained the lake, dredged it, and re-installed pumps that would keep the water flowing, so the algae couldn't grow as quickly.
philn at 1:56PM on 07/22/08