Tag Archives: invertebrates

The aquarium trade is often the target for invasive species chatter, but it looks like the US has another potential source, debris from the 2011 Japan tsunami. Since the disaster, pieces of debris have washed up on US shorelines and still continue to do so. Some of this debris has contained marine life from Japan, but those organisms were either plants or invertebrates that were physcially attached to a structure, like a dock for example. But a recent discovery has just changed all of that. For the first time, it is believed that live fish have made the trans-oceanic journey stowed away in a small boat that was set adrift during the tsunami. The fish, which have been identified as striped beakfish (Oplegnathus fasciatus) were found on March 22nd in an 18-foot skiff that had beached itself in Long Beach, Washington by a local resident. They were located in a rear compartment of the small fiberglass boat, which had was partially submerged and was missing its lid.… More:

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