Video featuring UCF professor from the Orlando Sentinel
Scientists around the world are documenting increasingly severe invasions of ascidians — which survive by consuming plankton filtered from the surrounding seawater — and which are overpowering oysters, mussels and clams, also filter feeders.
Possibilities for why that’s happening include rising sea temperatures brought on by climate change; worsening water pollution; and overharvesting of the fish and crabs that may otherwise keep sea squirts in check.
Where these sea squirts came from and what they portend for Mosquito Lagoon are critical questions for UCF biology professor Linda Walters, who has been rebuilding the waterway’s oyster beds.
Read the article from the Orlando Sentinel here.