A species of invasive seaweed is becoming very abundant and displacing native species.
OBSERVATION: While strolling along Bamfield's westside waterfront, my children and I encountered Siobhan Gray, the Scientific Diving and Safety officer at Bamfield Marine Science Center, who was filling a wheel-barrel with the invasive marine macroalgae Sargassum muticum.
She told us that this species had suddenly become unusually abundant and invasive in Barkley Sound, and that it had been displacing eelgrass (Zotera marina) habitat in and around the Bamfield Inlet.
Given the broad ecological importance of eelgrass habitat, she had been working hard to physically remove this Sargassum from the local area.
Sargassum muticum is known to have invaded British Columbia from Japan by 1944, but it seems to have suddenly become more abundant during 2015. Useful links include species profiles on AlgaeBase.org and the ExoticsGuide.org.
PHOTOS:
"World map ocean genus-Zostera" by gerardgiraud - own work from File:World map ocean locator.jpg. Licensed under GFDL via Commons (Wikimedia)
"Sargassum muticum stranded" by Graça Gaspar - uploaded with the author's permission. Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Commons (Wikimedia) Japweed, or Japanese Wireweed (Sargassum muticum) stranded on the shore. This species is highly invasive: it remains alive after being detached from rocks (for instance after a storm), and may reattach itself somewhere else after being carried away by water currents. Picture taken on Baleal, Peniche, Portugal.
"Eelgrass" by Ronald C. Phillips PhD.. Licensed under CC BY-SA 3.0 via Commons (Wikimedia)
