Alaska has seen mass deaths of wildlife before, but the evidence is this year is literally on the ground, where the dead bodies of seabirds such as Murres dotting the snow leaves many wondering how big a role climate change is playing in the decimation of Arctic species.
Seabird biologist David Irons drove recently to the Prince William Sound community of Whittier to check on a friend's boat and spotted white blobs along the tide line of the rocky Alaska beach. He thought they were patches of snow.
A closer look revealed that the white patches were emaciated common murres, one of North America's most abundant seabirds, washed ashore after apparently starving to death.
"It was pretty horrifying," Irons said. "The live ones standing along the dead ones were even worse."
Murre die-offs have occurred in previous winters but not in the numbers Alaska is seeing. Federal researchers won't estimate the number, and are trying to gauge the scope and cause of the die-off while acknowledging there's little they can do.
Scientists who monitor these birds believe that the birds are dying because of diminished numbers of fish stocks that represent their primary source of food.
Scientists say the die-offs could be a sign of ecosystem changes that have reduced the numbers of the forage fish that murres depend upon. Warmer water surface temperatures, possibly due to global warming or the El Nino weather pattern, may have affected murre prey, including herring, capelin and juvenile pollock.
And the murres are not the only species struggling to survive this year. Up to 100,000 are at risk of losing the fight to survive. [edited to remove “100,000 other species” as source only refers to 100,000 seabird deaths]
Wildlife scientists say the dead and dying birds – 18in tall common murres – are only a few among what might be as many as 100,000 or more of their species losing the battle to survive in the the storm-pounded North Pacific Ocean.
What is the common denominator as more and more of the native flora and fauna in Alaska face the threat of extinction? Many are now more than willing to openly consider climate change as the one of the primary culprits in these mass death events as weather patterns rarely if ever seen before in the Arctic continue to hammer the viability of native wildlife.
What has been different this time is the number of dying murres pushed inland by an oscillating jet stream that has played havoc with Alaska weather for the past two winters. Some blame climate change, but climate experts say it is hard determine whether Alaska is witnessing a long-term shift or only a strange, short-term anomaly in a region where the weather is notoriously unpredictable.
Whichever the case, winds that normally flow west to east across the Pacific have been eddying into a south to north pattern as the atmosphere swirls like a whirlpool in a river. Starving murres still strong enough to get airborne have found themselves caught in warm, moist winds up to 100 mph roaring north out of the gulf into the heart of the 49th state.
It’s not just these birds, obviously. Whale deaths spiked sharply higher this year as well, and scientists are attributing that to warmer waters in the far north.
American scientists have reported a sharp increase in the number of dead whales found in the Gulf of Alaska. From May through August, 30 whales washed up along the coast of Alaska.
Scientists say there may be a connection between the animals’ deaths and warming waters. They say the Arctic is getting warmer faster than any place on the planet.
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“[T]he average for the whole year generally is eight. So it is definitely a significantly elevated (level) and for us that was a reason of concern.”
Obviously this year’s El Nino, one of the strongest on record, has played a major role in the bizarre wind and warming ocean temperatures that we are witnessing in the Arctic. However, since 2015 is shaping up to be the new warmest year on record, and many scientists have attributed the strength of this year’s El Nino to its interaction with an increasingly warmer world due to climate change.
“This event is playing out in uncharted territory,” Jarraud said. “Our planet has altered dramatically because of climate change, the general trend towards a warmer global ocean, the loss of Arctic sea ice and of over a million square kilometers of summer snow cover in the northern hemisphere.”
“So this naturally occurring El Niño event and human induced climate change may interact and modify each other in ways which we have never before experienced,” he said.
Massive toxic Pacific ocean algae blooms that stretched from Southern California to Alaska that killed off large numbers of small fish and crustaceans leading to the increased deaths of pelicans, dolphins and sea lions off the West coast. Temperatures above freezing at the North Pole in the last week of December, fifty degrees above the average for early winter. What many are calling a freak storm, i.e., a series of winter cyclones in the Atlantic Ocean that pushed warmer water and air northward past Greenland and into the polar region. Much warmer than usual ocean temperatures in the Northern Pacific since 2013 thanks to the "blob." Uncharted territory, indeed.