California Seamounts Hope Spot

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The seamounts are home to creatures like the endangered blue and gray whales and sperm whales, sharks, rare deep‐sea corals that take hundreds of years to grow, and seabirds hunting high overhead for fish that aggregate near the seamounts.

<a href="https://mission-blue.org/2019/05/rodriguez-seamount-a-geologic-rarity/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Rodriguez Seamount – A Geological Rarity</a>

The deep-sea corals and anemones that form living habitats on them are fragile, uniquely adapted to live extremely long lives (100’s of years or more), and slow to reproduce.&nbsp;

Scientists have identified approximately 60 different seamounts.

Take a look at the map below. If you're a Californian, there might be a seamount not too far from home!

The California Seamounts Hope Spot was launched Tuesday, May 14th, 2019, at the Exploratorium in San Francisco, California. 

Bright pink hydrocorals (Stylaster californicus) and squarespot rockfish (Sebastes hopkinsi) cover the seascape at Tanner Bank. (c) NOAA Southwest Fisheries Science Center

Dr. Sylvia Earle, founder of Mission Blue, a world famous ocean explorer recognized by National Geographic, and former chief scientist for NOAA, delievered the keynote remarks.&nbsp;

While&nbsp;early mineral leases&nbsp;for Gorda Ridge were abandoned due to a lack of technology and low commodity prices, renewed interest in deep-sea mining means that these sites may be targeted in the future. 

Dr. Sylvia Earle and the ocean conservation community celebrated the launch of the California Seamounts Hope Spot at the Exploratorium in San Francisco, California on the evening of May 14th, 2019.

California Seamounts Hope Spot Launch at the San Francisco Exploratorium

﻿Californians love and celebrate their coast. Spending a day at the beach with their families, having their senses come alive to the sounds and smells of the ocean, and watching colorful marine life in tide pools is a wonderful way to relax. Little do beachgoers know that the California coast used to be much further offshore, and the seamounts are not just biodiversity hotspots, but ancient islands. We want to bring greater awareness to these wonderful places and let everyone know the diversity of life these places house.” – Lance Morgan, Hope Spot Champion

Despite their high biological significance, the Seamounts remain virtually unknown to the Golden State’s nearly 40 million residents.

Deep below the ocean’s surface, not far from the beautiful beaches of the California coast, where millions sunbathe, surf, and enjoy the majesty and tranquility of the sea, lies a world of underwater mountains, volcanoes and ancient islands called seamounts.

The California seamounts provide a home to living treasures critical to the health of the ocean. 

Yellow Picasso sponge and white sponges (c) NOAA and MBARI

Learn more about some of the richly unique California Seamounts in the following blogs:

Unfortunately, the dozens of vibrant seamounts along California’s coast and across the globe face a risky future due to potential deepsea trawling, ocean warming and acidification, offshore drilling, and the rise of deep-sea mining, a practice that extracts minerals from the seamounts and seabed.

"Just as we protect the special mountain environments of the Rockies and the Sierras… Just as we have created parks to protect Yosemite Valley, and Giant Redwoods, we must act to protect the great mountains underneath the surface of the ocean and the coral forests that live on them. The ocean and its life – whether we can see it from the beach or not – is a wonderful creation, and it is our responsibility to be a good steward and protect those things we have been given.”

A gray whale (Eschrichtius robustus) and her calf, one of the many marine mammal species that use the productive waters above Cortes and Tanner Banks to feed or reproduce. (c) NOAA

It is critical to enact strong protections to safeguard the unique and diverse ecosystems found on the Gorda and Mendocino Ridges before they are destroyed by deep-sea mining or other man-made disturbances.

Tubeworms cover a deep-sea hydrothermal vent near the Galápagos Islands. (c) NOAA

Some seamounts serve as ‘fueling stations’ for migratory species including endangered sperm whales and sea turtles, seabirds and sharks.

<a href="https://mission-blue.org/2019/04/gorda-and-mendocino-ridges-californias-test-cases-for-deep-sea-mining/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Gorda and Mendocino Ridges – California's Test Cases for Deep Sea Mining</a>