Rock snot is a tenacious beast
NIWA scientist wins award
Gypsywort warning
Foreign yachts inspected for marine invaders
Scientists search for invasive sea squirt
Gypsywort smothering raupo in a Waikato lake.
NIWA has found that gypsywort (Lycopus europaeus) is likely to be at least as invasive in Auckland as it has been in Waikato, where it forms dense patches on lake edges, displacing native rushes.
Gypsywort was first recorded in Auckland in 1982. The ARC has classified it as a ‘research organism’ under its Regional Pest Management Strategy.
Each didymo plant is microscopic, but they grow in extraordinary abundance. We have measured it at up to 10 times the national guidelines for acceptable algal biomass.
The invasive alga Didymosphenia geminata (didymo) has now been found in several significant fishing rivers in the South Island.
NIWA scientist Cathy Kilroy discovered didymo for the first time in New Zealand about a year ago.
Dennis Gordon with two bryozoans, previously known only from Chinese coastal waters, found in Golden Bay several years ago.
Dr Dennis Gordon has won the prestigious New Zealand Marine Sciences Award for his outstanding contribution to marine sciences, particularly marine biodiversity. Dennis is a global authority on aspects of bryozoa. His many professional roles include chairing the Royal Society’s Biodiversity Committee and membership of two international editorial boards (Species Diversity, Zootaxa).
As this newsletter goes to press, NIWA divers are searching Auckland’s Waitemata Harbour, and Waikawa Marina near Picton, for the invasive sea squirt known as the club tunicate (Styela clava).
Biosecurity New Zealand commissioned these rapid surveys after the club tunicate was found in the Viaduct Harbour, and provisionally identified on the hull of a yacht which sailed from there to Waikawa Marina. A survey of Lyttelton Harbour is also planned.
The club tunicate can grow up to 160 millimetres long and reach densities of up to 500–1500 individuals per square metre.
Levels of hull-fouling plants and animals growing on foreign yachts are literally under the spotlight.
Over the next two years, staff from NIWA and the Cawthron Institute will be diving under the hulls of yachts arriving in New Zealand to photograph, video, and collect samples of non-indigenous species hitching rides into New Zealand’s coastal waters. The sampling on yachts is part of a major Biosecurity New Zealand research project which includes a wide range of vessel types.
