[CINC] Fwd: Humboldt squid on Rio Del Mar Beach

[Shauna Bingham - NOAA Federal]

An interesting follow-up to the Humboldt Squid off the CA Coast and how
ocean currents play a role....

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: Gary Sharp <gsharp at redshift.com>
Date: Mon, Dec 10, 2012 at 11:08 AM
Subject: Re: Humboldt squid on Rio Del Mar Beach
To: Inger Marie Laursen <iml at jaredphoto.com>
Cc: Research Interests <mbnms_research at willamette.nos.noaa.gov>,
BeachCOMBERS <mbnms_bcombers at willamette.nos.noaa.gov>


Inger,

The Humboldt Squid show up on beaches from Baja California all the way to
Oregon -
and recently as far north a British Columbia - due to intensified coastal
Upwelling and related deep water processes -
(http://marinebio.org/species.asp?id=249) - pretty clear - but =
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Humbolt_Squid) (the article is a bit biased) -

Warming/Cooling along the Pacific Coastlines are NORMAL -



with ENSO playing a large role off South America -

Their real habitat is in the deep cool waters of the transition of Pacific
coastal upwelling regions and the Tropical Ocean -

Basically from the Gulf of California into the Eastern Tropical Pacific,
and northward -

About two weeks ago there was an article in the Monterey Herald about their
being found just along the beaches
around the Hopkins Marine Station, and collected by students and staff,
where William Gilly has studied them for decades -
<http://hopkins.stanford.edu/gilly.html>

They do not 'Swim' all the way - but get a free ride in the 200-300 meter
deep current that flows north along the coast,
driven by strong NW winds that drive the California Current southward, and
creates a strong gravitational 'dent'
in the surface waters that is resolved by those deep cool (squid habitat)
water northward currents - that refills the missing water -

Then Strong Upwelling events - often associated with our offshore storm
winds - sucks their cool deep habitat upward into the coastal areas -
and some end up on the beaches = low O2 levels - a long way from home -

In the Southern Eastern Pacific, they range from the Galapagos, southward
into Equador/Peru/ and during their strong -
often decadal weather events - get a free ride south into Chile, where the
indigenous Mapucho (Bahia Concepcion, and southward) -
thrived on them during their 'invasions -

Just more facts about the role of the winds and ocean currents - both
surface and deeper into the System -

As a mean, hungry species, that pops to the surface to feed at night - and
- that only lives one year -
There are lots of things to consider -

                *   Looking Forward!*

___

Gary Sharp
 Center for Climate/Ocean Resources Study
 780 Harrison Road, Salinas, California 93907
 <http://sharpgary.org>
 831-449-9212
gsharp at redshift.com

 "The improver of natural knowledge absolutely refuses
 to acknowledge authority, as such. For him, scepticism
 is the highest of duties; blind faith the one unpardonable sin."
 Thomas H. Huxley





-- 
Shauna Bingham
NOAA's Channel Islands National Marine Sanctuary
113 Harbor Way, Suite 150
Santa Barbara, CA 93109
805-884-1460
805-568-1582 (fax)
http://channelislands.noaa.gov/
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://www.rain.org/pipermail/channel_islands_naturalist_corps/attachments/20121210/36a3f0fd/attachment.html>