NEWPORT -- After examining dozens of pieces of debris from the 2011
Japanese tsunami, scientists are certain of only this: The invasive
species are out there, but how damaging they ultimately will be might
remain a mystery for years -- and then some.
"Ecologists have a terrible track record of predicting what introduced species will survive and where," said John Chapman, a marine invasive species specialist at Oregon State University's Hatfield Marine Science Center.
"But once things are here, they are a threat. They could explode at any time. It's just like roulette. Each time something lands here, we pull the trigger. We're getting more and more every year."
Chapman and colleagues at the Hatfield facility have been at the center of the research on invasive species since the tsunami debris began arriving, including the dock that washed ashore last summer at Agate Beach, as well as a sister dock that beached off northwest Washington late last year.
"It's been a constant surprise. You know how babies have that surprised look on their face? That's us."
Scientists never expected that so many organisms would survive the ride, let alone that they would thrive, he said. The dock that washed in on Agate Beach was at sea for about 450 days.
A dock observed off of Hawaii stayed afloat for about 100 more days, and the dock beached off Washington spent 650 days at sea.
"There was a huge diversity of organisms," Chapman said. "There are multiple generations. They were carrying on with life like fleas on a dog's back. The other thing that was maybe even a bigger surprise is that lots of things settled on the debris after the tsunami. We know that because it was on top of the things that were there at the time of the tsunami."
Scientists know from other invasive species that they may be around for years, even decades, causing no problems at all until suddenly they become invasive and threaten native species. One example is a parasite that sucks the blood from mud shrimp.
"That's been in the San Francisco Bay since the 1850s," Chapman said. "Then it started to spread north. The species was described in Yaquina Bay in 2004. We know it was here for years before. We know that it was in Willapa Bay in the mid-1980s. We think it was along the coast in very, very low abundances and then all of a sudden it was everywhere."
Scientists fear now that the parasite could kill off the entire mud shrimp population.
Until researchers know more about the non-native species that already arrived here, the most important action they can take is to carefully measure all the tsunami debris that washes in, Chapman said. That means assessing the types of species, recording their numbers, their size and the debris they arrived on.
"This is very important because it tells us what's next. This is a giant experiment, and if we get a chance to measure this we can exploit this terrible experiment that should have never happened.
"I can't see the dock and debris and know what happened in Japan and not feel an enormous amount of responsibility for pulling everything good out of it I possibly can."
-- Lori Tobias