Bill Peterson Senior Scientist Newport Field Station and

1. Bill Peterson Senior Scientist Newport Field Station and Cheryl Morgan, Hongsheng Bi, Jennifer Fisher and Jay Peterson <www.nwfsc.noaa.gov> “Ocean Conditions and Salmon Forecasting” Variations in source waters which feed the California Current may be the mechanism which links the PDO and climate change with ecosystem response

2. We are contributing to salmon management by studying the ocean phase of their life history and by developing management advice based on a suite of physical, biological and ecological indicators of ocean conditions Today I will speak about each of these aspects of “ocean conditions” Large scale forces acting at the local scale can influence biological process important for salmon PDO Local Conditions Upwelling & SST Spring Transition Coastal currents ENSO We believe our work is an example of an ecosystem approach to management Local Biological Conditions

3. Observations 48° N La Push Washington Queets River 47° N Grays Harbor Willapa Bay Columbia River 46° N Oregon Cape Falcon Cape Meares 45° N Cascade Head Newport _ ^ Cape Perpetua 126° W 125° W 124° W 123° W • Newport Line biweekly sampling since 1996 (16th year) • Juvenile salmon sampling in June and September since 1998 (14th year) • Historical data: • hydrography, 1960s; • plankton, 1969-1973; 1983, 1990-1992 • juvenile salmon, 1981- 1985

4. Methods and Outline Copepods with ½ m diameter 200 µm mesh net towed vertically from 100 m Krill, fish eggs and fish larvae with 70 cm 333 µm mesh Bongo net towed obliquely Ordination analysis of ~ 400 copepod samples collected at the station NH 05 Use X-axis scores of an ordination

5. Here are two types of plankton that play key roles in a salmon’s food chain: copepods and krill, COPEPODS Omega-3 fatty acids KRILL

6. Oceanography 101

7. Circulation off the Pacific Northwest Subarctic Current brings cold water and northern species to the N. California Current; The West Wind Drift brings subtropical water and subtropical species to the N. California Current Therefore, ecosystem structure is affected by the source waters which feed the California Current.

8. Winds and current structure • off coastal Oregon: • Winter: • - Winds from the South • - Downwelling • - Poleward-flowing Davidson Current • - Subtropical and southern plankton species • transported northward & onshore • - • Spring Transition in April/May • Summer: • - Strong winds from the North • - Coastal upwelling • - Equatorward alongshore transport • - Boreal/northern species transported • southward • Fall Transition in October WA Winter: 4 6 ° N OR 4 5 ° N Newport 4 4 ° N 4 3 ° N 4 2 ° N WA Summer: 4 6 ° N OR 4 5 ° N Newport 4 4 ° N 4 3 ° N 4 2 ° N

9. NMDS (Non-Metric Multidimensional Scaling): Copepod Community Structure over 21 years X-axis explains about 70% of the variance

10. Seasonal Cycles of the following: Copepod Community Structure (x-axis scores) Upwelling (Bakun upwelling index at 45 N Temperature at a depth of 50 m at the NH 05 station Salinity at a depth of 50 m at the NH 05 station

11. X-axis SCORES UPWELLING INDEX AT 45 N TEMPERATURE AT NH 05 AT 50 mSALINITY AT NH 05 at 50 m

12. 15 year time series of SST anomalies off Newport shows that PDO downscales to local SST PDO and SST correlated, (as they should be. Note the three recent periods of persistent sign changes: mid-1999, mid- 2003 and mid-2007 However there are time lags between PDO sign change and SST response of ~ 3-5 months, suggesting perhaps that the PDO is an advective signal along the Oregon coast Temperature differences usually + 1°C

13. Interannual Variability in Copepod Community Structure W S Positive = warm water community; often in winter (W) Negative = cold water community; usually in summer (S) Note: 1998 and 2005 never showed a “cold water community”

14. PDO and zooplankton: copepod community composition The sign of the PDO is associated with either warm or cold water being advected to the coast As a consequence you get “warm” and “cold” water zooplankton communities in coastal waters in association with positive or negative phase of the PDO, but with a few months lag. Warm water community Cold water community

15. X-axis anomaly vs PDO X-axis anomaly vs Upwelling Index X-axis anomaly vs temperature

16. Summer-averaged PDO vs summer averaged X-axis scores: 1969-1973, 1983, 1996-2010 (n = 21 years) 98 97

17. Proportion of cold water species: 1996-2010 (Pseudocalanus, Calanus marshallae and Acartia longiremis

18. Contrasting Communities Negative PDO = “cold-water” copepod species. These are dominants in Bering Sea, coastal GOA, coastal northern California Current Pseudocalanus mimus, Calanus marshallae, Acartia longiremis Positive PDO = “warm-water” copepods. These are common in the Southern California Current neritic and offshore NCC waters Clausocalanus spp., Ctenocalanus vanus, Paracalanus parvus, Mesocalanus tenuicornis, Calocalanus styliremis Based on Peterson and Keister (2003)

19. Comparisons in size and chemical composition Warm-water taxa - (from offshore OR) are small in size and have minimal high energy wax ester lipid depots Cold-water taxa – (boreal coastal species) are large and store high-energy wax esters as an over-wintering strategy Therefore, significantly different food chains may result from climate shifts;

20. Cool Phase Transport of boreal coastal copepods into NCC from Gulf of Alaska Warm Phase Transport of sub-tropical copepods into NCC from Transition Zone offshore A working mechanistic hypothesis: source waters. . . “Cool” Phase “Warm” Phase Verified in Keister et al. 2011 GCB and Bi et al. 2011 GRL

21. What problems lie ahead for salmon? Will coastal upwelling become weaker, stronger or stay the same? Will warming of the ocean lead to greater stratification thus reducing the effectiveness of coastal upwelling? Will the Pacific “Decadal” Oscillation return to “Decadal”? Will the central North Pacific Gyre expand northward and make the waters off Oregon more subtropical? Alternatively, will expansion of the gyre make coastal upwelling more productive? Of great concern in coastal upwelling systems is the trend toward decreased oxygen concentration and of decreased pH in waters which upwell at the coast.

22. Acknowledgements Bonneville Power Administration U.S.GLOBEC Program (NOAA/NSF) NOAA Stock Assessment Improvement Program (SAIP) Fisheries and the Environment (FATE-NOAA) National Science Foundation Office of Naval Research NASA See www.nwfsc.noaa.gov, “Ocean Conditions and Salmon Forecasting”

23. Oxygen in shelf waters off Newport Hypoxia observed only on two dates in 2010: September (3rd and 9th)

24. Oxygen data from CTD casts during the September Juv. Salmon trawl survey:2006-2010 Widespread hypoxia (blue/purple color) in 2006 and 2007; Virtually none anywhere in 2010