Effects of Global Warming in Goa

Arabian Sea

The emergence of noctiluca blooms, commonly referred to as bioluminescence, along Goa’s beaches is a cause for worry because the phenomenon could lead to scarcity of fish off the state’s coast, Sunil Kumar Singh, Director, National Institute of Oceanography (NIO), said on Thursday.

?”This situation is of course serious,” Singh said while referring to the blooms, when he was asked about the possibilities of a fish famine off Goa’s coastline.

?Noctiluca blooms are not good for fisheries, because they consume most of the oxygen. They do not allow zooplankton (common fish fodder) to develop, which is important for fish. Without these zooplanktons, the fish will die.

?A loss of snow and ice on Earth’s highest mountain peaks could be driving dangerous changes in the food chains of distant coastal water, according to new research.Like a gardener turning over soil, cold winter winds blowing down from the Himalayan mountains are known to fertilise the Arabian sea by chilling the surface and causing the dense waters to sink, only to be replaced with fresh currents rich in nutrients.

?Due to climate change, however, winter monsoons are rapidly becoming warmer and moister, leaving marine habitats with less oxygen and nutrients, and allowing microbes that thrive in an oxygen-depleted wasteland to bloom instead.

?Recently, it’s gotten so bad, the thick green swirls of algal blooms can actually be seen from space.