MARINE SCIENTISTS believe the death of up to 50,000 starfish washed up on a Sligo beach last week was caused by weather rather than pollution factors.
Prof Mark Johnson of NUI Galway's Martin Ryan Marine Science Institute said a similar event had occurred off the Isle of Man 10 years ago. "In that case, starfish had been feeding on mussel beds when they got caught in stormy weather and were washed up on the northern shore of the Isle of Man, which is not known for pollution," Prof Johnson said.
"In the Sligo case, it looks as if the starfish were caught on a spring tide and in gale conditions while feeding on mussel beds. That would be enough to cast them up on the beach."
The common starfish, asterias rubens, feeds on a shellfish diet and is particularly partial to mussels. It eats the mussel by prising open the shell and projecting its stomach into the shell to ingest it. The starfish's stomach then retracts into its body.
Starfish are relatively uninteresting to predators, although predatory starfish will feed on the common type of starfish, Prof Johnson noted.
Dr John Joyce of the Marine Institute in Galway concurred with Prof Johnson's theory.
"We had an event of this type on the south Dublin coast recently but not in the same numbers. This is an unusually large number of starfish to be washed ashore."
At the opening of Science Week at the Atlantaquaria, Salthill, Galway, yesterday, Dr Joyce was dressed up as Clare submarine designer John Philip Holland. Marine Institute colleagues also dressed up as well-known scientists and explorers such as Jacques Cousteau and Albert Einstein.
Galway Science and Technology Festival runs for a fortnight, with up to 20,000 young people expected at the festival exhibition in Leisureland on November 22nd.