Ocean Acidification affecting squid?

 Jordan Blocher 

Author: Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution

Date Published: September 26th, 2014

Link: http://www.whoi.edu/oceanus/viewArticle.do?id=201109

Summary: Ocean acidification is becoming more and more of an issue in todays world, and common marine animals are now expected to pay the price for the careless actions of humans. The acidification is capable of impacting the inner ears of different types of squid. Similarly to humans, the ears are utilized by squid as an orientation tool, and without their inner ears squids likely would not be able to swim straight, would have a greater difficulty capturing a prey because the lack of inner ears would cause total chaos and make it so the squid could hardly catch fish. It isn't certain this would happen, but scientists believe it to be a very real and unfortunate possibility. Scientists have also found, that squid eggs exposed to higher content of CO2 take longer to hatch, thus exposing them for larger periods of time to the biotic limiting factor of predation. Scientists also note that squid eggs exposed to high levels of CO2 grow and develop at a slower rate than squid eggs in areas of low CO2 content. Very few species that humans come into contact with on a day to day basis don't at one point in their lives, eat squid, or get eaten by squid. If squid were to be removed from an ecosystem, everything would change. And many species wouldn't be able to survive.

Connection: This video ties into several topics we have covered thus far this year. The concept of ocean acidification is one which we have spent large quantities of time on, especially since ocean acidification goes hand in hand with global warming and the idea that humans impact both our own atmosphere and the ecosystems of many different species including squid, when we put large amounts of CO2 into the air. We learned that the oceans bear the burden of absorbing very large quantities of CO2, and the oceans essentially act as regulators for the amount of CO2 within our own atmosphere. However, over the past hundred years or so, humans have put more carbon dioxide into the air than is natural. Therefore, the oceans absorb more CO2 than is natural, thus impacting oceanic creatures such as squid. We have learned this year, about what happens when a keystone species is removed from an ecosystem, and the results can often be devastating. If there are four species which feed solely upon squid, and then the number of squid decrease because fewer are born because more squid eggs are being eaten since it takes longer for them to hatch, all four species would be in competition for the few squid that survive, and then from there it would be survival of the fittest. Not all four of those species could survive, because the number of squid available acts as a limiting factor on all four of the species. When there is an abundant amount of squid, all four species can thrive, but when there is only enough for one species, all the rest die out. Therefore we can conclude that carbon dioxide content can act as an abiotic limiting factor within ocean communities.