Ocean warming has seafloor species headed in the wrong direction | Science | AAAS

Ocean warming has seafloor species headed in the wrong direction | Science | AAAS

Ocean warming sends sea life the wrong way

With water temperatures on the rise, sea creatures need to head to cooler waters — but warming water is causing some of them to head in the wrong direction. In the northwest Atlantic Ocean, slow-moving snails, sand dollars, mussels and other creatures with drifting larvae are spawning earlier, triggered by warmer seas. Unfortunately, that’s when winds and currents are aligned to drive them into even hotter waters. The result is that the ranges of once-abundant species are shrinking.

Science | 6 min readReference: Nature Climate Change paper