Dead mussels
"They've been hit with these consecutive heat waves that are just too hot for them," said Christopher Gobler, the associate dean and researcher with the School of Marine and Atmospheric Sciences at Stony Brook.
State Department of Environmental Conservation officials concurred.
"It is likely that high water temperatures due to the prolonged hot temperatures we have experienced this summer is the cause," DEC spokesperson Aphrodite Montalvo said.
The mussel die-off appeared Wednesday morning just east of Iron Pier beach and west of the oil terminal. Jamesport homeowner David Gruner said he and his wife noticed a rotting smell that morning and walked along the private beach to find thousands of mussels.
Mr. Gruner, a Jamesport native, said he's never seen anything like the recent mussel die-off.
"It has created a whole nuisance here," he said.
Mr. Gruner, who described the mussels as clean and adult-sized, speculates they were farm-raised. He believes they died while being transported by boat and were dumped overboard.
Mr. Gobler, however, described his theory as "not probable."
"It's awfully coincidental," he said.
Mussels thrive when temperatures along the shoreline are around 70 degrees, Mr. Gobler said. Recently, shoreline water temperatures have hovered around 80 degrees, which he described as too warm for mussels to survive.
Mr. Gobler said he believes the mussels found in Jamesport were born in late 2013. The following two summers were cool, which may have helped the mussels grow but also made them less able to adapt when temperatures shot up this summer, he added.
BS