El Niño may impact West Coast fishing industry

Might mean less squid!

"Researchers with the California Cooperative Oceanic Fisheries Investigations (CalCOFI) at Scripps and NOAA’s Southwest Fisheries Science Center are observing a stronger than normal northward movement of warm water up the Southern California coast, a high sea-level event in January and low amounts of plankton and pelagic fish. Sea surface temperatures along the entire West Coast are 0.5 to 1 degree Celsius warmer than normal.

“Based on our previous experience of El Niño in California, it is likely to reduce ocean production below normal, with possible effects extending to breeding failure of seabirds, and much lower catches in the market squid fishery,” said Sam McClatchie, a fisheries oceanographer at NOAA’s Southwest Fisheries.

Satellite remote sensing and field measurements together give scientists a broader view of the evolution of this El Niño that was not available during previous ones. NOAA Southwest Fisheries oceanographer Frank Schwing said scientists’ analytical tools better assess the strength of anomalies such as warming associated with the system."