Rich deep-sea ecosystem off South Point

[TomK]

I thought some here might be interested in this:

"Researchers sample unusually rich deep-sea area off Hawaii"

https://goo.gl/7QJCi3

"Scientists with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration told The Associated Press in a telephone interview Thursday that the abundance of sea life sampled in a particular stretch of water off the Big Island points to a thriving deep-sea habitat, but they aren't exactly sure why. The area, about a mile off the south shore of Hawaii Island, was full of fish including sawtooth eels, dragonfish and many other mysterious deep-sea creatures."

[Guest]

Thanks for sharing that interesting link TomK.

Wonder if the strong poisoning of the Kapoho coastline a few years back may have killed off any of the abundance of sea life Kapoho once had. This Kapoho coastline poisoning started in 2007-08, maybe most of the Kapoho sea life drifted south in the current.

http://www.hawaii247.com/2011/07/06/sing...d-beaches/


Could the many poisons that were being used to kill the trees around the coastline have effects on the tide pools water temp?
Could this coastline poisonings have caused Kapoho's fish kills?

Could the poisoned trees being left to rot cause, breed, or mutate any fungi? possibly the "ROD"?


Looks like those who were poisoning the coastline decided to settle the lawsuit over the Mangroves.

http://www.environment-hawaii.org/?p=748

Why not involve the public some before doing large poisonings like this one in Kapoho?

[Kapoho Joe]

Nice one Gypsy - Off Topic with your first comment.

Tom shared a nice link about the "Rich deep-sea area off South Point" and you want to talk about "Kapoho Poisoning". Do you think maybe you could delete your comment and just start a new thread with it since it has nothing to do with the original topic?

[TomK]

I suspect it's very unlikely that whatever is happening in Kaphoho's tide pools, or ROD, is related to an abundance of sea life between a depth of 1500 to 2000 feet a mile off South Point.

[Guest]

KJ, I have high jacked this thread to help shed some light on to what may have happened to lower Puna's once rich ocean environment.

TomK,
The South point area between Pahala and South Point does have plenty of fresh water springs from Wood Valley and above that run off into the ocean in that area. This constant mixture of the ocean waters and abundance of fresh water may cause ocean sea life curiosity and excitement. The many years of Lava interacting with the Ocean may also play an effect on the deep sea-life abundance off our coast. Maybe the fire-water interaction creates more or less oxygen which could in turn create more or less algae that the rich sea-life eat.. jmo


http://www.whoi.edu/oceanus/feature/wher...et-the-sea

[TomK]

"TomK,
The South point area between Pahala and South Point does have plenty of fresh water springs from Wood Valley and above that run off into the ocean in that area. This constant mixture of the ocean waters and abundance of fresh water may cause ocean sea life curiosity and excitement. The many years of Lava interacting with the Ocean may also play an effect on the deep sea-life abundance off our coast. Maybe the fire-water interaction creates more or less oxygen which could in turn create more or less algae that the rich sea-life eat.. jmo"

Algae require sunlight. There's not much of that at a depth of 1500 - 2000 feet. I suspect you won't find too much fresh water at that depth a mile off South Point either. It might help if you actually pointed to some relevant studies rather than making stuff up and speculating.

[Guest]

My bad, sorry sir TomK.

of course You are right about my opinions or speculations regarding your threads topic. Guess I should call it a night then.

[TomK]

That's how to talk down a "high jacker".

[ElysianWort]

Funny punny Tom. A high jacking highjacker. Positive news about our healthy surrounding ocean. A pleasant surprise instead of dying coral reefs or poison oceans.

[SBH]

If I may speculate, the first thing that comes to my mind that's different about that area off the south shore is the underwater seamount Loihi, the next Hawaiian island rising up 10k feet above the ocean floor and 3k feet below the sea surface. That mineral rich water from the erupting underwater volcano may be contributing to this sea life although it's 20 miles offshore.

http://geology.com/usgs/loihi-seamount/