domoic acid News

Maine's health department and Department of Marine Resources has closed certain portions of the state's coastline to the harvest of shellfish and issued a so-called "harvest recall" because of a finding of high domoic acid levels in samples tested.

The California Department of Public Health has issued a warning over the dangerously high levels of domoic acid, a marine toxin, found in rock crabs and certain bivalves along beaches in the central part of the state.

San Francisco - Northern California crabbers and crab lovers start eating it up at midnight when the long-delayed commercial crab season opens.

The current climate trends behind the rapidly declining sea ice and increasing ocean temperatures will likely expand the northern geographic range of harmful algae blooms (HABs) in the Pacific Ocean, affecting marine life and fisheries.

San Francisco - In 2015, record levels of the algal toxin domoic acid were found in samples from a wide range of marine organisms on the west coast of North America. Now the toxin has been detected in the muscle tissue or fillet of a number of commercial fish.

A toxin produced by marine algae is causing brain damage in sea lions along the coast of California, causing neurological and behavioral changes that seem to be impairing their ability to navigate in the ocean and survive in the wild.

Oregon and Washington state health officials issued a warning on Friday asking recreational and commercial diggers of razor clams taken from selected beaches on Thursday and Friday to be destroyed due to high levels of the marine toxin, domoic acid.

San Pedro - First, the pelicans started falling out of the sky, flopping on their backs as soon as they landed and flailing drunkenly. Scores of brown pelicans, disoriented, sick — and dying—were winding up far away from their ocean home.