I wonder if this has anything to do with the current El Niño pattern we’re in. A surge of warm water in already warm waters sounds like a recipe for disaster.
Iirc, sardines require cool currents to get through warm(er) water. There’s a thing called the sardine run, where a specific area in the migration path has a (relatively) narrow cold water current that forces them into a bottleneck, and predators feast in a huge spectacle.
What I’m guessing happened was these poor guys were following a cold current that disappeared, and died of heat exhaustion. Which iirc isn’t that uncommon of an occurrence
That sounds very reasonable and all, but I’m gonna guess some of those fish were gay and God smited (smote?) them with holy fury. What follows after that is lots of dead gay fish.
Huge composting effort should be undertaken. As for the nasty smelly gases from it, those should be burned with an excess of oxygen to get rid of any smell.
Of course, many samples should be taken and frozen for lab. analysis.
TOKYO (AP) — Thousands of tons of dead sardines have washed up on a beach in northern Japan for unknown reasons, officials said Friday.
The sardines and some mackerel washed ashore in Hakodate on Japan’s northernmost main island of Hokkaido on Thursday morning, creating a sliver blanket along a stretch of beach about a kilometer (0.6 mile) long.
The town, in a notice posted on its website, urged residents not to consume the fish.
The decomposing fish could lower oxygen levels in the water and affect the marine environment, he said.
“We don’t know for sure under what circumstances these fish were washed up, so I do not recommend” eating them, Fujioka said.
Associated Press writer Mari Yamaguchi contributed to this report.
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