Minutes of the U.S. GLOBEC Scientific Steering Committee Meeting

Narragansett, RI --- October 5-6, 1995

DAY ONE (Thursday, 5 October 1995)

Powell reviewed the agenda and noted that the major part of the meeting would be devoted to three topics: (1) progress report and scientific summary of the first NW Atlantic field year; (2) Pacific activities, including both the PICES North Pacific and California Current activities; and, (3) the GLOBEC Southern Ocean program.

NW ATLANTIC PROGRAM REVIEW

Mountain noted two significant problems facing the program. First, the larval fish samples from the broadscale survey remain unsorted; it is estimated that sorting of the samples will require about $135K. Second, projects of the NMFS scientists participating in the program need to be funded. The technical staff hired by the NMFS scientists are funded through the 1996 field season, but there are no commitments beyond that. These technical staff represent a trained pool of workers which cannot afford to be lost from the program.

Mountain, Beardsley and Wiebe gave brief summaries of preliminary scientific results of the 1995 (and 1994) field program on Georges Bank. In 1994, cod larvae disappeared from the south flank in two weeks in May, accompanied by a strong north wind event. Haddock larvae abundance were not affected. Later, the fall survey indicated a low abundance of O-group cod. Perhaps, the strong north wind in May washed cod larvae off the bank, reducing recruitment.

In 1995, low salinity water from the Scotian Shelf advected across the NE channel onto the NE peak of Georges Bank, especially in February to April. In May 1995, high salinity bottom water (from offshore) covered all of the southern flank of Georges Bank--probably caused by a nearby warm core ring (as evidenced by AVHRR images). During the high salinity, warm water bottom intrusion, cod larvae moved up onto the bank crest. Whether the movement is passive or active is not certain. Despite the Scotian Shelf water and offshore bottom water intrusions, stratification on the southern flank of the bank in 1995 appeared pretty normal; however, because the cod larvae were located further up on the bank crest, especially during the warm water offshore intrusion, they were in unstratified water.

Beardsley showed movies of the Lagrangian flow determined from the monthly releases of drifters drogued at 10-15 m depth. Three seasonal regimes were observed. In Nov-Jan, circulation on the bank was wind dominated and there was slab-like flow; drifters released during these months responded directly to wind vectors, and were often lost offshore. During February to May 1995, floats released near the center of the bank tended to mill about with little displacement; circulation during this time was characterized as nondispersive recirculation, with few floats being lost from the bank. During July to October, the drifter trajectories revealed strong recirculation in the anticyclonic gyre on the bank, with an apparent "hole" on the center of the bank, which floats did not enter. Wiebe noted that although no fish larvae were found on the July 1995 broad-scale cruise, the 1995 Coastal Ocean Program cruise found large numbers of O-group larvae. This was interpreted to indicate that the overall schedule of larval development on the bank in 1995 was completed two months early.

In May-June 1994, hydroids Clytia gracilis were extremely abundant (up to 10000/m3) on the bank. They have been observed to eat Calanus eggs and nauplii, and can also consume (or cause death) of fish larvae. Wiebe noted that at times in 1995, fine-mesh net samples from far off the bottom (bottom depth 55 m) contained great quantities of sand. Sand and the hydroids both have sources on the bottom. Sand in the water column interferes with acoustic estimates of zooplankton, and needs to be corrected for. Wiebe hypothesized that the sand might be attached to marine snow, thereby lowering the particle's specific gravity.

Wiebe related to the committee several "outreach" efforts that the Georges Bank leadership has done in the past six months. Wiebe and others met with staffers of Sen. Kerry. Wiebe and others participated in the GLOBE meeting organized by Sen. Weldon and Sen. Kerry. Several Georges Bank investigators briefed NOAA Chief Scientist Kathy Sullivan on the U.S. GLOBEC Georges Bank program. During a recent WHOI visit of a congressional delegation, Wiebe met independently with several of the delegates, including representatives of Rep. Joseph Kennedy and Sen. Weldon. Fogarty and Wiebe visited four groups of congressional staffers on a trip to Washington, DC. Finally, Scott Gallager and Larry Madin briefed Jerry Lewis, Chair of the House Appropriations Committee for HUD (and NSF), about U.S. GLOBEC during a recent visit to WHOI.

TRANSATLANTIC STUDIES OF CALANUS (TASC)

JOINT U.S./CANADA WG ON COD AND CLIMATE CHANGE

GEORGES BANK DATA CENTER AND DATA MANAGEMENT

ANN DURBIN REMEMBERED

ARABIAN SEA

SCIENCE TALK -- SCIENCE ISSUES IN THE NORTH PACIFIC

Frost proceeded to use a 1D NPZ (nutrient-phytoplankton-zooplankton) model with external forcing to examine the dynamics of the pelagic ecosystem. Due to the permanent halocline, the mixed layer in winter is shallow enough that phytoplankton production can occur throughout the year. This provides enough food to support microzooplankton populations through the winter. Martin's results on iron enrichment indicate that big cells in the oceanic subarctic Pacific are severely limited by iron (or other micronutrients). However, small oceanic cells may not be micronutrient limited (insufficient data presently). Some authors have suggested that mixed layer depth of the north Pacific has shoaled in recent years (since the late 1970s), and that this could result in enhanced productivity. Using Station P data alone, there is no evidence of a shallower MLD since 1976-77. Polovina's interpretation of MLD from the COADS data set for the North Pacific shows large spatial variability in the shoaling of the depth of the mixed layer since the later 1970s in the North Pacific. That analysis shows no change in MLD at the Station P site, although nearby regions have changed. Frost points out that our understanding of the ecology and temporal dynamics of ocean conditions of the subarctic Pacific are very biased by almost exclusively relying on data from ocean station P, which may or may not be representative of the gyre in general. It should be pointed out that the later years of the SUPER project chose to study at 53 deg N, as well as 50 deg N (Station P), because of this.

Mike Healy (Univ. British Columbia) spoke on Canadian efforts to study Pacific Salmon (esp. Fraser River sockeye) in the Oceanic North Pacific. He described a project that may be undertaken as part of Canada GLOBEC. It involves coupling a circulation model of the North Pacific (Ingraham's model using wind effects on underlying geostrophy) with a model of salmon migration and foraging behavior. Goals are to aid resource management by predicting the size, timing, abundance, and migration routes of returning salmon. Bioenergetic models will be used to examine ocean ecology, trophodynamics, and prey- predator interactions. Preliminary results indicate that ocean thermal regime has a large impact on the size of returning fish, with higher temperatures resulting in smaller fish sizes. Thus the link to potential climate warming and variability. Overall, the west coast Canada GLOBEC effort will involve modelling and observation/verification at both basin scale (focus on salmon) and shelf scale (focus on ecosystem interactions).

NORTH PACIFIC

CHAIR AND AGENCY REPORTS

Powell noted that he had received a letter signed by both Rolland Schmitten, Assistant Administrator for Fisheries (NMFS), and Donald Scavia, Director of the Coastal Ocean Office (COP), indicating their support of GLOBEC studies in conjuction with other NOAA coastal fisheries efforts. In short, pending availability, NOAA will support GLOBEC by providing real science dollars (through COP) and by contributing vessels, shiptime, and senior scientist's time (through NMFS). The letter shows a commitment to the GLOBEC program.

DAY TWO (Friday, 6 October 1995)

SOUTHERN OCEAN

The GLOBEC International Office, which has recently moved to the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth, has published the Implementation Plan for Southern Ocean Studies. Brian Rothschild (Chair of International GLOBEC) distributed copies of the plan to the SSC at the meeting. Copies are available from the GLOBEC International office. Huntley summarized the implementation plan for the committee. In terms of organization structure, the plan recommends the formation of a Southern Ocean Secretariat office, a modeling working group (MWG), a data management task team (DMTT), and for three regional planning meetings (RPM). Individual nations have interests in different regions of the Southern Ocean. Thus it was recommended that there be planning meetings for work in the following regions: Antarctic Peninsula-Bellingshausen Sea; Indian Ocean Sector; and the Weddell Sea region. These meetings need to occur early in 1996 to ensure that ship scheduling and long-term planning can occur to get the various nations into the field by 1998-99. Rothschild indicated he was ready to move forward in establishing the Southern Ocean Secretariat and the Executive Committee that it will report to. Hollowed asked whether the initial AO had requested retrospective data analysis in addition to modeling proposals. Hofmann replied that most of the modeling proposals had a retrospective component as well, but that she was unsure whether there were any solely retrospective data analysis proposals. She also noted that there were no higher trophic level modeling projects, such as on birds or marine mammal, funded. She did not know whether there were proposals submitted in those areas, or whether they had been unsuccessful in the competition for funds. Hofmann agreed that GLOBEC International needs to encourage making the historical data that have been collected from the Southern Ocean more available (such as the data from the BIOMASS program and the Discovery cruises). A first step would be compiling an inventory of the data that has been collected to date in the Southern Ocean. Rothschild suggested that the chair of the U.S. GLOBEC committee (Powell) write a letter to the GLOBEC International office stressing the need for data inventory, data management, and retrospective data analysis of Southern Ocean data. Powell agreed to prepare such a letter. As of right now, the Southern Ocean field program is tentatively scheduled for the 1998 to 1999 season. Using that assumption, Huntley prepared a tentative timeline of Southern Ocean activities.

November 1995            Form Southern Ocean Executive Committee
December-Jan 1996        Establish Secretariat
January-April 1996       Estab. MWG, DMTT, and hold three regional planning mtg (RPM)
May-June 1996            Release RFP for U.S. GLOBEC Southern Ocean studies
June 1997                Proposals due
January 1998             U.S. GLOBEC Southern Ocean funding available
October 1998             Field season begins

It was noted that the U.S. JGOFS program had cruise transects through the Ross Sea, and that there might be some data that could be collected of use to GLOBEC. Hofmann pointed out that only the British JGOFS worked near the proposed site (Bellingshausen Sea) of the U.S. GLOBEC Southern Ocean program, and that the data probably would not be of much use to GLOBEC. The U.K. is already planning GLOBEC Southern Ocean cruises for the late 1990s. Since the U.K. and U.S. would probably both be working in the vicinity of the Antarctic Peninsula, it is important to coordinate the two programs. Karen Wishner pointed out that to the extent possible, it was important to overlap, especially the micro- and macrozooplankton components, the two programs (JGOFS and GLOBEC) activities in the Southern Ocean. It was unclear how this might be accomplished given the longer term population dynamics emphasis of GLOBEC, and the different regions of interest. Beardsley noted how in SCOPEX, whales were used to find krill patches to sample, and that the program needed to employ adaptive sampling. Could a similar approach be used in the Southern Ocean? Hofmann noted that the International Whaling Commission would like to have a joint program with GLOBEC, in which the IWC would concentrate on the minke whale. For that (and other political) reason, the GLOBEC International Southern Ocean Implementation plan focused more on birds and seals at the higher trophic levels, leaving whale studies to the IWC.

CANADA GLOBEC

CHELTON HYPOTHESIS

COMMITTEE ORGANIZATION

Factors that were considered in discussing possible new SSC members were: discipline, geographic and institutional representation, and program affiliations. The committee discussed new member possibilities and a number of names were forwarded by the executive committee (who had discussed nominees previously), and the names of other scientists were nominated for possible SSC membership by full committee discussion. It was agreed that the U.S. GLOBEC office would distribute a call for nominees as widely as possible to the general scientific community. We will send a call for nominees to all U.S. scientists on the U.S. GLOBEC mailing list, with the intent of receiving nominations by 1 December, selecting by the executive committee, and notification of new members by 15 January.

Powell led a discussion about two other issues that arose as a result of reviewer's comments to the U.S. GLOBEC Steering Committee Coordinating Office proposal to NSF. Those issues are 1) interprogram coordination, and 2) program evaluation. Several reviewers commented that with U.S. GLOBEC now beginning to fund science in several regions (NW Atlantic currently, Southern Ocean, perhaps a West Coast project), that there should be steps taken to ensure that future programs take advantage of earlier program's experiences and results, and that there be some mechanism to ensure intercomparability of the various programs. Wiebe suggested that ensuring that similar technologies/methods are used in sampling (e.g., similar net sampling systems or acoustics systems) in the different regions is important in allowing intercomparison of results. Likewise, a consistent data management and retrieval system is necessary. Groman had pointed out during his presentation a day earlier that the Georges Bank data system structure was capable of handling data generated by programs in other regions as well. It was pointed out that perhaps the best way to foster interprogram communication and coordination would be for subsets of the funded investigators in the different regional programs to meet to discuss common issues and problems.

A comment from some of the proposal reviewers was that U.S. GLOBEC needed to establish milestones, by which the program could monitor its progress in meeting its stated goals (both in individual initiatives, such as the Georges Bank program, and in the U.S. GLOBEC program overall). Beardsley suggested that a fairly small (perhaps 3 scientists) Technical Advisory Committee be formed. This group must be independent of the funded scientific investigators, and independent of the SSC. Something similar, using independent reviewers, was used to evaluate several of the Coastal Ocean Program's projects at their midpoint. Johnson pointed out that it was important to define success (scientific papers are not enough; social relevance and impact need to be considered); determine how success will be measured; and, determine who will do the measuring. He stressed that the latter must be scientifically credible and totally independent of the program. Partly, the need for an independent measure of success is to answer criticism in the community about "large programs" (top-down science), as opposed to individual-driven (bottom-up) science. It was argued that the timing of the evaluation of a program, such as that on Georges Bank, is tricky; it needs to occur late enough into a project's timetable that there are results to evaluate, but early enough to provide midcourse corrections if needed. Independent external review can also be valuable for providing directions for scaling science programs back to available (or projected) funding levels.

SCIENCE TALK - Zooplankton Omnivory

GLOBEC INTERNATIONAL

Rothschild also informed the committee that the SPACC (Small Pelagic Fish and Climate Change) report from the workshop held in La Paz, MX was finished and would be published and distributed soon. SPACC represents a real opportunity for GLOBEC to conduct global-wide coastal research on pelagic ecosystems. Its focus is on small pelagic fishes and their prey, especially focusing on their growth and distribution. Coupled modeling of the physics and biology is also a focus.

INTER-AMERICAN INSTITUTE (IAI)

AMIGO/IAI Meeting -- Palo Alto, 27-31 June, 1995

Although the majority of the participants of AMIGO meetings have been and continue to be terrestrial, the book that resulted from the first meeting, held in La Serena, Chile, included a fair amount of material on the role of the large-scale ocean in climate change, possible effects of climate change on eastern boundary current fisheries (referenced at length in U.S. GLOBEC EBC Science Plan) and on the effect of climatic and anthropogenic factors on the near-shore marine ecosystem (Earth System Responses to Global Change: Contrasts between North and South America. 1993. H.A. Mooney, E.R. Fuentes and B.I. Dronberg (eds.), Academic Press, 365 pp.).

Participants at the third meeting in Palo Alto came from Argentina, Chile, Mexico, the U.S. and Canada. Those working in the marine ecosystems will attempt to include Peruvian scientists in the future. Small working groups (2-7 people) addressed nine AMIGO research themes dealing with: fire regimes; arid and semi-arid ecosystems; marine and terrestrial paleohistory; biological invasions; UV-B effects; habitat fragmentation; coastal marine ecosystems (originally called upwelling systems); atmospheric pollutants; and land use and water quality in forested regions. The theme of coastal marine ecosystems was represented by marine ecologists, coastal oceanographers and an atmospheric scientist with interests in scales from the intertidal to the large-scale coastal and pelagic systems, with connections to basin-scale variability. Jane Lubchenco and Juan Carlos Castilla represented the more nearshore ecosystems, while Vivian Montecino, Jose Rutllant, Ted Strub, Tim Baumgartner and Tom Powell represented larger scale physical and biological systems. The approaches taken in the planning efforts by the U.S. GLOBEC Eastern Boundary Current and GLOBEC International SPACC (Small Pelagics And Climate Change) projects were well represented in this group.

There were two concrete products required of each working group: 1) a proposal was to be written in response to the recent IAI RFP for Phase I planning proposals, for funding to hold a further meeting to coordinate research proposals on the theme's topic; and 2) a chapter of a book is to be written. The theme of the book is natural linkages in the ecosystems and disruptions (natural or human) in those linkages. Outlines for both the proposal and chapter were produced by the end of the meeting, with final responsibility for the proposal going to Tim Baumgartner and final responsibility for the chapter going to Ted Strub.

The proposal was written and submitted to IAI, composed of material written mostly by Baumgartner and Strub, based on discussions and the outline written at the meeting. It proposes to hold a meeting of 40-50 scientists in Valparaiso, Chile, in October 1996. At that meeting, research proposals would be written or outlined for studies off the west coasts of Chile, Peru, Mexico, the U.S. and Canada. One or more of these proposals would be submitted to the IAI for Phase II proposals, while most would go to the funding agencies of the individual countries. The theme would be linkages and biophysical interactions in the intertidal to nearshore coastal region (0-5 km offshore) and between this nearshore region and the "pelagic" region 5-200 km (or more) offshore. Natural (ENSO, other?) and human (fishing, pollution, climate change) disruptions are to form a major subtheme of the research and the human dimension is important, from the IAI perspective. Education, training, and the creation of information and research networks are also important IAI goals. Within the scope of these research proposals, the kinds of studies envisioned in the U.S. GLOBEC Eastern Boundary Current program and the GLOBEC International SPACC program would fit naturally. The usual blend of retrospective studies, modeling, process studies and ongoing monitoring are described in the proposal. The opportunity for GLOBEC, created by association with the AMIGO planning efforts, is the chance to help design parallel studies in two eastern boundary currents, where benthic invertebrates and small pelagics are important (or dominant) species of the fishery. The hope is that the collected data sets will allow truly comparative analyses of these systems, which are similar in many ways, but also include fascinating differences in physics, biology and human use.

Connections between the proposed AMIGO/IAI workshop and GLOBEC will be maintained by the participation of Strub, Baumgartner and Powell. We anticipate that those invited will include others with GLOBEC ties. Since this AMIGO effort concentrates on the West Coasts, others must be proposing planning meetings that discuss the East Coast oceans, to form the complete IAI agenda in temperate oceanic systems. Those working on the U.S. GLOBEC Georges Bank project may have an interest in participating in those efforts.

MISCELLANEOUS

ADJOURNED AT 1514

Everything doesn't always go as planned on cruises. However, everybody that went on a Georges Bank cruise did come back. That wasn't true for some of the instruments. -- Dave Mountain

Buffoonery was not my principal objective. -- Paul Smith