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The cool, nutrient-rich water of the California Current supports a variety of marine life, including invisible phytoplankton, economically important salmon, rockfish, and Dungeness crab, and majestic orcas.
For the study in Science Advances, researchers used recent understanding of water breathability and historical data to explain population cycles of the northern anchovy. The findings for this key species could apply to other species in the current. |
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“If you’re worried about marine life off the west coast of North America, you’re worried about anchovies and other forage fish in the California Current. Ultimately it’s what underpins the food web,” says lead author Evan Howard, a postdoctoral researcher in oceanography at the University of Washington.
Climate change and ocean breathability
The study shows that species respond to how breathable the water is—a combination of the oxygen levels in the water and the species’ oxygen needs, which water temperature affects.
The anchovy historical data matches this pattern, and suggests that the southern part of their range could become uninhabitable by 2100.
“Climate change isn’t just warming the oceans—it is causing oxygen to decrease, which could force fish and other ocean animals to move away from their normal range to find higher-oxygen waters,” Howard says. |
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