CalCOFI Ship Conducts Research off Manhattan Beach
Aug 10, 2024 12:51PM ● By Jeanne Fratello
(The CalCOFI research vessel, as seen off the coast of Manhattan Beach on Saturday morning. Photo credit: Evelyn Schmitt.)
If you were an early bird on Saturday morning, you might have seen the iconic CalCOFI marine research vessel off the
coast of Manhattan Beach.
The ship's crew carried out research in the coastal waters between the Manhattan Beach Pier and Bruce's Beach at around 6:00 a.m.
The
California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigations program, known
as CalCOFI, is the longest running marine research program in the world.
The program aims to serve as "our eyes and ears under the ocean,"
sampling hundreds of environmental and biological parameters from the
coast to over 300 miles offshore, from the surface down to thousands of
feet deep, and from San Diego up the coast – to assess the status and
health of the ocean and better understand how the ocean in California is
changing.
CalCOFI plays a pivotal role in monitoring ocean
health and investigating climate phenomena like El Niño and La Niña.
Because of CalCOFI, California's waters are the most studied in the
world, which showcases California's global leadership on ocean issues.
(The CalCOFI research vessel Sally Ride conducted research off the coast of Manhattan Beach on Saturday morning. Photo via CalCOFI.)
Saturday and Sunday will be the last two days the ship is on its journey. To track the CalCOFI vessel's location, visit vesselmarinefinder.com and enter "Sally Ride" in the search engine.
Current Observations
The
research vessel has been traveling up and down the coast since July 27.
Erin Satterthwaite, a marine ecologist and the CalCOFI program
coordinator, told MB News that this summer's observations include
massive catches of salps [transparent jelly-like marine animals] in the
southern part of the bight and
just off the shelf.
"We also set a new CalCOFI record for both the
number and different types of booby [a species of seabird]. Additionally, we've noted a
significant decrease in sightings of whales and dolphins this year
compared to last, highlighting a shift in marine conditions," she added.
(The ship as seen from Manhattan Beach. Photo credit: Evelyn Schmitt.)Rasmus Swalethorp, CalCOFI's
director of ship operations, also touched base with Manhattan Beach
News on Friday night to give an update about what the crew has been
finding.
"Our massive catches of salps have continued into the northern part
of our survey grid where we also found very high abundances of
doliolids [barrel-shaped transparent marine animals similar to salps]. Both are gelatinous filter-feeding organisms that feed on
microscopic phytoplankton (algae) in the ocean, and sometimes they occur
in high abundances off our coast particularly in more recent years," wrote Swalethorp in an email.
He
continued, "With
the exceptions of boobys (that are more tropical in origin and have
increased with the temperature increases we have seen over this past
decade) we saw very few birds, whales and dolphins on most of this
cruise, which is atypical. That changed when we reached our
northernmost stations on our survey line 76.7, which runs offshore from
Port San Luis Obispo. This area and the Santa Barbara Basin has been the
most productive on this year's summer cruise, with strong upwelling
(that we generally expect to see throughout much of our survey area this
time of year) of deep nutrient water that fuels high phytoplankton
production, and associated zooplankton (like krill) that feeds on the
phytoplankton. In this area, our marine mammal observers spotted several
blue whales, fin whales, humpback whales and large pods of common
dolphins, and more birds."
What is CalCOFI?
CalCOFI
was born out of the need to better understand the collapse of the
sardine fishery in 1949, which at the time was California's most
valuable fishery (as John Steinbeck famously chronicled in "Cannery
Row").
Since then CalCOFI has conducted its iconic
quarterly cruises, during which scientists venture out into the Pacific
Ocean to collect a comprehensive array of data. These cruises involve a
multidisciplinary approach, employing traditional sampling methods and
cutting-edge technologies, such as environmental DNA, artificial
intelligence, and machine learning, to investigate everything from sea
surface temperature and nutrient concentrations to the distribution and
abundance of plankton, fish, marine mammal, and seabirds. The plankton
collected on the cruises enter some of the world’s largest collections
of planktonic marine animals, the Pelagic Invertebrate Collection at
Scripps Institution of Oceanography and the larval fishes collection at
NOAA Southwest Fisheries Science Center.
(Photo via CalCOFI)CalCOFI sheds light on how climate change is impacting our coastal waters, including changing sea temperatures, marine habitats, and shifts in marine species distributions. Additionally, CalCOFI helps inform fisheries management decisions by providing insights into fish populations and ecosystem dynamics. The research done by CalCOFI also contributes to understanding water quality, harmful algal blooms, and other factors that may affect coastal recreation.
Perhaps most relevant to the Los Angeles coast, CalCOFI is studying how DDT and other toxins have progressed into and through the food chain since dumping began, and the legacy of these toxins in local marine life.
This summer, CalCOFI is in the midst of its 396th cruise, marking 75 years since the program's inception, as it navigates a zigzag route between the Californian coast and far offshore waters.