Jelly fish ‘early warning system’ to be launched in French Riviera

Two websites partly funded by the European Union – Medazur.fr and
jellywatch.fr – will cover beaches between Marseilles and Menton, and from
Saint Tropez to the Italian border.

“We’re offering a five-point probability rating going from zero (no risk)
to five (maximum jelly alert) on beaches of the Alpes-Maritimes region,”
Lars Sternmann, one of ten scientists working on the project told Le
Parisien.

“Our research has enabled us to discover that there is a link between the
beaching of these jellyfish and the wind and currents,” he said.

The brainless creatures normally live in the open Ligurian Sea but can be
pushed towards the shore at night when they come to the surface.

Biologists say their proliferation is in part down to climate change and
rising water temperatures, but also a decline in its only real predators –
turtles and tuna. The species, which glows in the dark, has also benefited
from rising plankton levels and pollution-related nutrients.

All the oceans of the planet have seen rising numbers, leading to long-term
fears of a “jellification of the oceans,” according to Jacqueline
Goy, a medusa specialist at the oceanographic institute of Paris.

“In the Baltic Sea and China Sea we have seen jellyfish soups forming.

“In 2009, a Japanese fishing trawler even capsized when trying to haul up
its nets that were full of giant jellyfish,” she said.

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