To make their findings, the researchers used an underwater camera sled to observe a never-before-studied group of king crabs off Marguerite Bay on the western Antarctic Peninsula.
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If this happens, it will be for the first time in millions of years that these crabs will staying playing a role in the marine ecosystem in the Antarctic.
Crabs that haven’t been in Antarctic waters for millions of years could return to wreak havoc because of global warming, researchers say.
The crabs haven’t yet made their way to the flat expanse of the shelf because the water there is just a tad too cold for them, said Richard Aronson, head of the department of biological studies at the Florida Institute of Technology and lead author of the new study on Antarctica’s burgeoning king crab population.
According to the new study, which was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, this is bad news for a large number of species from Antarctica.
Researchers concluded that if king crabs were to migrate to shallower waters, they would initiate a process known as biotic homogenization – where two distinct communities become progressively similar and ultimately less diverse.
Aronson adds that it is still hard to determine how fast the king crab population is moving where scientists only recorded king crabs on the Antarctic continental shelf beginning in 2003.
Temperatures are rising in the ocean west of the Antarctic Peninsula. In fact, the entire continental shelf of Antarctica is populated by small marine animals that are either filter feeders or capturers of particles.
According to an global team of researchers, king crabs might soon travel further up the continental shelf, due to the warming temperatures. The variation and “colorful differences” that are being exterminated by climate change and the introduction of invasive species into non-native environments is a real problem on land and at sea, Aronson said.
Dr James McClintock of the University of Alabama said the only way to know if the crabs are expanding their depth-range is to track them through long-term monitoring.
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Observations suggest a reproductively viable population is present, as juveniles, discarded molts and precopulatory behavior were seen. These changes would fundamentally alter the Antarctic sea-floor ecosystem and diminish the diversity of marine ecosystems globally.
