Science Scientists raise alert as ocean plankton levels plummet.

[oldfisherman]

We don't have 50 years to wait for an answer to the disappearance of plankton which are disappearing at a rate of about 1% annually.

I am not the least bit worried about global warming, whatever the cause. Especially this latest scare tactic in the op that we will run out of oxygen..

The earth has been through this before. All the ice melted and the mamials survived. Even those oxygen hog dinosaus survived globalwarming.

Present day deserts were forests and garden of edens. The world was a tropical paradise.

It sounds wonderful to me. Bring it on. But I will miss playing with the man eating dinosaus.

 

[MarAzul]

Models = voodoo science.

They still do this. I talked with the young marine biologist in most of the ports up and down the entire coast this last year.
Still counting boats and fish caught. So it must not be voodoo! It has to be modern.

 

[barfo]

Ok, we are on the same page. I also used every tool, including bath charts and bouy data.

I have a hard time considering the article in the OP as credible, for a couple of reasons.

First, it only uses 3 years of data to project future conditions. Like you said, 50 years would not be enough.

Next it uses models being taught in Universitys that support an agenda. I have not found even one of these models to project even close to the actual results, let alone being on target.

Let me give you an idea on how some of these models are used.

Once a week, for 4 hours, a marine biology student is sent to count the number of fishing boats, both commercial and sport, leaving the bay for the ocean.

From this boat count a model is used to project how many fish of each species were caught, for the entire week.

These numbers are then applied towards available fish quotas. Different models are than used to guess the impact on fish populations.

The fish population is determined by another model. Once a year, they use the one day catch, from one boat, fishing in one or maybe a couple of small areas. From this small sample, they project the fish populations for a very large area.

Models = voodoo science.

So what's the solution? Put a radio tracker on every fish in the ocean?
If you are going to try to do something like count fish, you have to make some approximations.
It's not voodoo. It certainly might suffer from insufficient or inaccurate data (any ideas on how to make it better?)
Or are you arguing that we should just give up on the problem?

barfo

 

[lawai'a]

They still do this. I talked with the young marine biologist in most of the ports up and down the entire coast this last year.
Still counting boats and fish caught. So it must not be voodoo! It has to be modern.

but the biologists don't gather the data concerning landings anymore. each comercial species is/must be sorted and weighed on certified scales, the harvesters submit signed logbooks concerning area harvested to the state or federal agency responsible for that species management. the buyer of the fish issues two copies of the delivery weights, one going to the harvestor the other to the agency.(remember there is a landing tax for all species so they want their cut if nothing else). realtime data is processed, assimilated for immediate distribution concerning quota that is left to harvest/ amount of effort/boats currently prosecuting that fishery. counting boats is only a small component and because we landed fish from morro bay to dutch harbor those counts would be of extremely limited utility. so in a very broad definition of counting boats and fish caught you are correct, but is far from being symplistic or voodoo. plenty of checks and balances included. we were in contact with the canaries on a regular basis as we edged closer to our quota, and the canaries had federal observers for federally managed species.

 

[Lanny]

I am not the least bit worried about global warming, whatever the cause. Especially this latest scare tactic in the op that we will run out of oxygen..

The earth has been through this before. All the ice melted and the mamials survived. Even those oxygen hog dinosaus survived globalwarming.

Present day deserts were forests and garden of edens. The world was a tropical paradise.

It sounds wonderful to me. Bring it on. But I will miss playing with the man eating dinosaus.

The world was not a tropical paradise.
Also, what is a mamial?
Alas, I've learned that deniers will never be convinced even when facts stare them straight in the face. e.g. Glacier National Park once had 150 glaciers and it now has 23. We can measure sea level rise due to all the ice melting that's been supported by land. Our last five hottest years on record were the last five years.
I could go on to quote NASA and NOAA but I'm certain it would fall on deaf ears, so I propose we drop it.