Complex ocean needs a deeper look.

Byline: GUEST VIEWPOINT By Terry Thompson For The Register-Guard

The `dead zone' off the central Oregon Coast is coming back to life, according to the latest scientific reports.

I can't say I'm surprised.

On Aug. 15, The Register-Guard published a guest viewpoint in which I sought to bring some perspective to the hype I saw in much of the coverage of this phenomenon. That piece has generated more reaction than anything I've ever written.

Thanks to the column's global distribution over the Internet, I've heard from people all over the world, and most of the comments have been favorable. This reinforces my belief that people care deeply about the health of our oceans.

It's true that this year's area of low oxygen was larger than in recent years, and the oxygen levels dipped to record lows. But the recovery has already started, the natural cycle is once more turning from death back to life.

It was interesting to me to hear that some people were citing my piece as an argument that global warming - suggested by some to be the cause of the phenomenon - doesn't exist.

You won't find support for that idea from me. I believe that global warming is real. Asserting unsubstantiated theories linking the `dead zone' to global warming, however, serves only to confuse people about both issues.

Some of the feedback I've heard reinforces my own observations that this phenomenon has been around for decades. In fact, it may go back much, much further. I was told that the logbooks of Capt. George Vancouver, who explored our coastline in the 1780s, recorded observations of large stretches of brown water and huge numbers of dead fish littering the beaches.

That was, of course, long before large-scale industrial pollution, global warming, or some of the other causes that have been suggested affected our environment.

Perhaps the most important lesson we can draw from this is the need for a deeper understanding of what's really going on under the sea.

A long time ago, the television series `Star Trek' declared space to be the final frontier. But it's really our oceans that are the final frontier. Despite excellent work by scientists at Oregon State University and many other institutions, we have only just begun to understand the incredibly complex and abundant life that teems beneath the waters.

The need for a more thoughtful, science-based approach to ocean management is also apparent.

In recent years, there's been growing support for establishing marine reserves in our offshore waters. These protected areas have been set aside in many other parts of the world, and scientific and conservation groups see them as a key tool in preserving endangered ocean species.

That very well may be the case. I'm certainly not against marine reserves, but I believe they may have been oversold in some cases. Most of the existing reserves are in warm, temperate climates, where the sea life tends to cluster around specific habitats. In our cool Pacific waters, fish and other species migrate over large areas, making it difficult to establish boundaries for a reserve.

Imagine trying to put a fence around an entire country's borders and you have some idea of the challenge. When you add this low oxygen phenomenon to the mix, the challenges multiply.

Does it make sense to establish a reserve in an area where much of the life regularly dies off and the rest migrates far distances?

This is not the time for simplistic responses to complex questions. This is the time for a new commitment of resources to a deeper understanding of what lies beneath the ocean, and then to change our management practices to reflect those findings.

Terry Thompson, a former commercial fisherman, is a member of the Lincoln County Board of Commissioners.