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© Copyright 2017 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.Sea creatures 'hitchhiked' across Pacific on 2011 tsunami debris
By SETH BORENSTEIN WASHINGTON©2024 GPlusMedia Inc.
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Rik314
This form of species movement has been happening for millions of years. Tsunamis and currents have been pushing critters around for eons. And not only sea life. Bit different from the redbacks, fire ants and Scotch thistles I seen my neighbourhood recently that have been unwittingly transported in to Japan in crates etc., or the introduced species such as the mongoose on Amami Oshima.
Brian Wheway
A friend of mine worked at a large flower importer ( in the UK) the other year, he found one of those bright green, red, blue deadly Amazon rain frog amongst the flowers!! he was going to pick it up until I told him how deadly they were!!
Fijure
This is true, but even natural dispersal like this is relevant for humans, since it could make nasty mussel parasites like the one mentioned in the article spread to mussel populations in America, and I don't think mussel fishers whose livelihood will be destroyed will care about what means the new parasites arrived, they will care about what to do about it. Also, in this example that spread was artificially helped by providing plentiful human debris for the critters to cross the sea with, while in earlier times, they would have to latch onto logs to do the crossing. Which could probably happen, but would be less likely.
mmwkdw
Now, Imagine the effects of pollution, even polystyrene has been found floating around under the Antarctic ice flows. So, North Korea doing a Nuclear test somewhere in the Pacific, should be a major concern for all Countries globally as we're all effected.