(p. 9) The squids are all right — as are their cephalopod cousins the cuttlefish and octopus.
In the same waters where fish have faced serious declines, the tentacled trio is thriving, according to a study published Monday [May 23, 2016].
“Cephalopods have increased in the world’s oceans over the last six decades,” Zoë Doubleday, a marine ecologist from the University of Adelaide in Australia, and lead author of the study, said in an email. “Our results suggest that something is going on in the marine environment on a large scale, which is advantageous to cephalopods.”
Dr. Doubleday and her team compiled the first global-scale database of cephalopod population numbers, spanning from 1953 to 2013.
. . .
“When we looked at the data by cephalopod group we were like ‘Oh my God — they’re all going up,’ ” she said.
She said it was remarkable how consistent the increases were among the three cephalopod groups, which included species that swim in the open seas and creatures that scuttle through tide pools. They published their findings in the journal Current Biology.
For the full story, see:
NICHOLAS ST. FLEUR. “One Resident of the Sea, Unlike Many, Is Thriving.” The New York Times (Weds., MAY 25, 2016): A7.
(Note: ellipsis, and bracketed date, added.)
(Note: the online version of the story has the date MAY 24, 2016, and has the title “Squid Are Thriving While Fish Decline.”)
The academic Current Biology article mentioned above, is:
Doubleday, Zoë A., Thomas A. A. Prowse, Alexander Arkhipkin, Graham J. Pierce, Jayson Semmens, Michael Steer, Stephen C. Leporati, Sílvia Lourenço, Antoni Quetglas, Warwick Sauer, and Bronwyn M. Gillanders. “Global Proliferation of Cephalopods.” Current Biology 26, no. 10 (Mon., May 23, 2016): R406-R07.