Supplementary material from "Submesoscale coupling of krill and whales revealed by aggregative Lagrangian coherent structures" ...

• Main Authors: Fahlbusch, James A., Cade, David E., Hazen, Elliott L., Elliott, Meredith L., Saenz, Benjamin T., Goldbogen, Jeremy A., Jahncke, Jaime
• Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
• Language: unknown
• Published: The Royal Society 2024
• Subjects: Ecology not elsewhere classified; baleen whale
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.c.7073604; https://rs.figshare.com/collections/Supplementary_material_from_Submesoscale_coupling_of_krill_and_whales_revealed_by_aggregative_Lagrangian_coherent_structures_/7073604

In the marine environment, dynamic physical processes shape biological productivity and predator–prey interactions across multiple scales. Identifying pathways of physical–biological coupling is fundamental to understand the functioning of marine ecosystems yet it is challenging because the interactions are difficult to measure. We examined submesoscale (less than 100 km) surface current features using remote sensing techniques alongside ship-based surveys of krill and baleen whale distributions in the California Current System. We found that aggregative surface current features, represented by Lagrangian coherent structures (LCS) integrated over temporal scales between 2 and 10 days, were associated with increased (a) krill density (up to 2.6 times more dense), (b) baleen whale presence (up to 8.3 times more likely) and (c) subsurface seawater density (at depths up to 10 m). The link between physical oceanography, krill density and krill–predator distributions suggests that LCS are important features that ...