During a four-year study, the MarClim Project run by Plymouth's Marine Biological Association, scientists surveyed spreads of 57 species at some 400 sites around the country. They were able to compare their findings with previous survey records.
Concentrating their study on the inter-tidal zone, the MBA team found 'many of these species moving from the areas they are normally found - mainly due to rising sea surface temperatures'.
Taking Land's End as a starting point, seas generally get cooler travelling northward up western Britain and eastward along the South Coast. But the MBA scientists gave some key examples of species which, over the past 20 years or less, have extended in these directions into areas previously too cool for their liking.
A brown seaweed, bifurcaria bifurcate, has progressed more than 90 miles from southern Devon to Portland Bill, in Dorset. And a second brown weed, nicknamed Dabberlocks, has relocated from the South-west northward.
The common tortoiseshell limpet has spread from the Isle of Man and much of the Irish Sea to northern Scotland, while the acorn barnacle has moved more than 100 miles from Isle of Wight to Kent.
The purple topshell has extended some 55 miles northward in Scotland; and the toothed topshell has shifted about 30 miles along the South Coast from Lyme Regis to Weymouth.
Next up is another MBA project, IndiRock, which will look at the effects of climate change on ecosystems, while continuing study of individual species. It will also look for links between changes to inter-tidal zone populations and to those of deeper-water species.
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MBA Marine Bill Delay |
