"Climate change is bad for commercial oyster and mussel growers. But until recently, researchers weren’t sure exactly how rising CO2 levels and the resultant ocean acidification—reduced pH—harmed the farmed bivalves. This week (December 15), researchers proposed an answer: it’s all about saturation state. In a paper published in Nature Climate Change, scientists from Oregon State University and state agencies reported that the larvae of Pacific oysters and Mediterranean mussels have a hard time forming their calcium carbonate shells as the surrounding seawater’s saturation state falls. Saturation state is a measure of how corrosive the seawater is to the shells that the larvae make as they grow, and as CO2 increases in the atmosphere, saturation state drops. A lower saturation state means more corrosive water. “Biological oceanographers have speculated that early life stages of marine organisms might be particularly sensitive to ocean acidification, but the underlying mechanisms remain unknown for most species,” David Garrison, program director in the US National Science Foundation’s Division of Ocean Sciences, which funded the research through an ocean acidification competition, said in a statement. “This research is an important step in being able to predict, and perhaps mitigate, the effects of ocean acidification on coastal resources.”" - Todd Hoff

Yep. A very troubling harbinger. :( - Jenny H.

The oysters in this study are imported from Japan not native to the Pacific North West. The average PH of the ocean water they come from is naturally more alkaline "8.5 PH" than the waters off the coast of Oregon "8.1 PH." The larval die off which occurred is actually due to up welling. Oregon's natural oysters indigenous to the area are thriving. The aquaculture farms that have relocated the larval stage of the imported oysters to Hawaii are not experiencing die off. http://www.kgw.com/story... - Eric Logan